Over two years after its initial release, Elden Ring continues to struggle with significant performance issues across all platforms, including PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The recent Shadow of the Erdtree expansion, while adding substantial content and enhancing gameplay mechanics, fails to adequately address the game’s technical shortcomings.
The expansion introduces a new Shadow Realm map, expanding the game’s content by approximately 50%. Despite its impressive world design and engaging combat mechanics, Shadow of the Erdtree does little to improve the game’s overall technical performance.
On consoles like the PS5 and Xbox Series X, players continue to experience frequent framerate drops, especially in areas with complex environmental structures or during intense battles. The promised modes such as framerate, quality, and ray tracing (RT) fail to consistently maintain a stable 60fps, often dipping into lower ranges that impact gameplay fluidity.
Specifically, on the PS5, even in the frame-rate mode that dynamically adjusts resolution from 1512p to 2160p, Elden Ring struggles to maintain a locked 60fps. Areas like Castle Ensis exhibit noticeable drops below the lower limit of the console’s variable refresh rate (VRR) support, causing noticeable juddering and interruptions.
The quality and RT modes, designed to enhance visual fidelity with features like ray-traced shadows and ambient occlusion, also suffer from suboptimal performance, frequently hovering in the 30-40fps range, particularly in graphically demanding sections.
The Xbox Series X faces similar challenges, with slight performance disparities compared to the PS5 but still failing to achieve consistent 60fps across all modes. The Series S, being the least powerful of the current-gen consoles, struggles even more, often running at lower resolutions and frame rates.
On PC, where one might expect more flexibility and optimization options, Elden Ring’s performance remains largely unchanged since launch. Issues such as CPU bottlenecking causing frame-time spikes and occasional extreme frame-rate drops persist, regardless of system specifications. The game lacks support for modern upscalers like FSR2, DLSS, or XeSS, further limiting performance enhancements on capable hardware.
Despite Elden Ring’s financial success, which suggests ample resources for improvement, FromSoftware has yet to effectively address these longstanding technical issues. This oversight is particularly disappointing given the studio’s reputation for immersive world-building and intricate combat systems seen in their previous titles.
While Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree expands upon the game’s content and gameplay mechanics, it fails to deliver the expected improvements in technical performance across PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC platforms. Players continue to face significant frame-rate fluctuations and other performance-related issues, detracting from an otherwise engaging gaming experience.
