Elden Ring is a Symphonic Masterpiece
In case you didn't already know, a significant contributor to Elden Ring’s breathtaking aesthetics and narrative is thanks to the collaboration between Fromsoftware and the renowned author George R.R Martin.
Martin's exceptional world-building skills honed through his renowned literary works played a pivotal role in crafting a visually compelling and immersive world that mesmerizes players.
Elden Ring is probably the only video game where for the first two hours of gameplay, I simply went about exploring what the world had to offer in its endless beauty, unconcerned with the main objective. Now George RR Martin collaborated with Fromsoftware's talented team of artists and designers to create a visually enticing universe. The game's world, also known as the lands between, is a realm brimming with ethereal landscapes, mystical creatures, and ancient ruins.
Martin's descriptive narrative style and attention to detail seamlessly blend with Fromsoftware's artistic vision, resulting in a world that is not only visually appealing but also feels alive, believable, and lived in.
The game's landscapes are masterfully crafted with remarkable attention to detail invoking a sense of wonder and discovery. Martin's influence on the game elevates its visual and aural beauty as players traverse sprawling forests, towering mountains, desolate deserts, and hauntingly beautiful ruins. Each location in the game tells its own story with Martin's guidance ensuring that even the smallest details contribute to the overall aesthetic and atmosphere of the game.
Martin's unparalleled ability to craft immersive worlds, combined with Fromsoftware's artistic talent has resulted in a visually breathtaking game that pushes the boundaries of the narrative aesthetic. Elden ring stands as a testament to the potential of collaboration between literary, musical, and gaming giants, serving as an inspiration for future developers to embrace the beauty of visual and aural storytelling and world-building in their creations.
There is agony everywhere you turn in Elden Ring, and despite how threatening this world is, there is beauty in the lands between, and mostly in the music. Unbelievably, a year has already come and gone since Elden Ring first came out and the list of awards it has won has only grown in time, but for me, it has to be the music that made this game a masterpiece.
An Overview of Elden Ring’s Aural Thematic Structure
The overworld themes in Elden ring like Limegrave, Stormveil Castle, Consecrated Snow Field, Divine Tower, and so on, are marked by very long bowings, with a lot of sustain notes, and sure, these are all individually different, but they are markedly similar in terms of musical structure and overall themes in a game like this have to exist in the background in a non-intrusive way. They aid in showcasing what an environment is like. For instance, you hear the glimmer of the snow against the sunlight in the consecrated snow field with the high musical notes and the wind billowing around. You hear the crumbling structures in Crumbling Farum Azula, the chorus of the former denizens, the whirling of the tornadoes, the depth of the age, and the music.
Ambient music like this is wonderful because it combines long-held-out notes with a musical atmosphere to create discomfort. It's a subtle, below-the-surface discomfort that creeps up into you knowing that the lands between are not necessarily a safe place to travel even while speedily riding torrent and while ambient music is valuable and important in developing tension, fear, discomfort, and a sense of vastness, to me what stands out the most are the boss themes.
Fromsoftare games boss themes are always a spectacle and for good reason. They follow an almost symphonic structure with most following a two-movement format, and these two-movement pieces focus on characterization and increasing desperation and tension almost every single time. Boss themes are amazing to me because we really get to step into the personalities and circumstances of the characters that we're facing in the game. When we fight against Mohg, Lord of Blood, we sense a primordial evil and the True Villain of the story.
Radahn and Malenia
Similarly, we also witness the powerful and poignant farewell to General Radahn across Redmane Castle, alongside those ferocious war drums as we ride torrent towards the rotting warrior. The first section of General Radahn’s theme truly gives us this ascendant feeling that we are fighting against the greatest warrior the lands inbetween has ever seen with these ruthless and tenacious strings in the chorus, we can feel the heft of Radahn’s attacks. As we are thrust into the second phase of the battle with General Radahn, you can physically hear the comet that he is, coming crashing down on us. What begins as a triumphant celebration, becomes a slow dirge, as the general is put down in his final resting place. It is a moment of praise and reflection.
We see this pattern in all of the battle themes. We hear the fallen, pained warrior cry in Malenia’s theme with her ferocity in the spinning strings and the single soprano representing her during the first phase alongside a fiery explosion of the Scarlet rot in the second.
Lich Dragon Fortisaxx
The pain of a dutiful friend in Lich Dragon Fortisaxx’s music exudes the complex themes of loyalty set in the fantastic second-section organ concerto with the chorus ripping—a standout track to me in all of video game music writing ever.
Astel and Regal Ancestor Spirits
Now, there are a few tracks that do pivot from this format, mainly Astel, Natural Born of the Void, where it coalesces with Also Sprach Zarathustra by Strauss in an almost painful and otherworldly theme.
There’s also the Regal Ancestors Spirit, whose track is the most haunting track in Elden ring with a mixture of environmental ambient music with the painful and agonized characteristics of fighting a spiritual entity. This music is much more than a dance with nature and a fight to the death because there is a simple elegance in the symphonic structure of the entire track.
Radagon and the Elden Beast
Interestingly, despite Radagon and the Elden beast both having their own individual themes, they are essentially one character which is very fun speaking from a character and music analysis point of view.
The diversity between the two, a cage match of sorts, against the strongest foe in Elden Ring and the emissary of the greater will, these battles couldn't be more different and neither could the music representing each of them.
Elden Ring is an incredible journey not only due to the fantastic story and cast of characters but also for the way the music is handled. Music is an essential and vital part of what makes Elden Ring unique and I believe has exposed many people who would have previously been averse to classical music to consider witnessing performances in Symphony Halls.