An official Elden Ring board game is on its way. Taking place in the world of The Lands Between, Elden Ring: The Board Game is a 1-4 player game described in a press release as “a huge and varied adventure, visiting iconic locations and crossing paths with familiar enemies and characters”. It’s being made by Steamforged Games, which makes a lot of sense, since that’s the company behind the Dark Souls board game, card game, and RPG. It’ll be coming to Kickstarter, and Steamforged promises it’ll soon have a launch date to share.
Sherwin Matthews, the lead designer on Elden Ring: The Board Game, tells Wargamer his game is designed to appeal to both Elden Ring fans and tabletop audiences. “It will be as challenging as you’d expect from the video game’s fearsome reputation,” he warns. Steamforged Games Chief Creative Officer Mat Hart says the Elden Ring board game has “satisfying combat and rewarding exploration. Prepare to lose hours to this game, and to be glad about it.”
Though it has similar elements, Elden Ring is a fairly different game to Dark Souls, and Matthews says Steamforged has changed things up for this title. “Elden Ring: The Board Game uses an entirely new game engine,” he says, stressing that players can delve into the setting. “Elden Ring’s massive open world and the feeling of exploration was very much at the forefront of our minds during design and development of the game.”
Beyond that, he’s keeping a close lid on the game’s mechanics and features, but promises these details will be with us soon. “We plan to dive deeper into how the game plays in the coming weeks, with designer diaries and interviews, so stay tuned for that,” Matthews says.
The press release gives a few more clues. Apparently “the video game’s characteristically challenging fights will be recreated by intelligent dice-free combat, requiring players to strategise and adapt their plans during each encounter—whether that be a lowly Godrick Soldier or the Grafted King himself.” Just like the Dark Souls board game, we’re expecting it to feature lots of lovely minis, like the one of Margit, The Fell Omen above.
The Dark Souls board game raised $5 million on Kickstarter, so it’s no surprise that The Elden Ring board game is coming to the crowdfunding platform too.
Since we don’t even know how the game plays yet, it’s understandable Steamforged is giving no hints on future expansions for the Elden Ring board game yet, but if it follows in the footsteps of Dark Souls board game, there’s bound to be a few. Dark Souls: The Board Game has over a dozen expansions now, and five years after the base game came out in 2017, is still releasing more. Just last month Painted World of Ariamis and Tomb of Giants were announced.
Steamforged says it will share the date of the Elden Ring board game’s Kickstarter campaign “soon”. Stay tuned for more details on gameplay, design, and other key elements.