Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree trailer analysed

After what has seemed like forever since its initial announcement a year ago, on Wednesday we finally got a full trailer for Elden Ring DLC Shadow of the Erdtree.

Eurogamer spoke to creator Hidetaka Miyazaki to gain some more details: it's FromSoftware's biggest DLC to date, is based on previous workings from George R. R. Martin, and has a developed world design that blurs the line between field areas and dungeons.

But is there more we can garner from the trailer itself? Let's go into detail.

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It's Miquella's world

As suspected from the DLC's concept art and now confirmed in the trailer, Shadow of the Erdtree will follow the story of Miquella. Who's Miquella? He's the twin brother of Malenia, the boss we all love to hate.

The twins are the demigod offspring of Queen Marika and Radagon, though both were cursed from birth. While Malenia is afflicted with Scarlet Rot, Miquella is doomed to be eternally young. He devised Unalloyed Gold, which some suspect is a new form of magic seen in-game as the Unalloyed Gold Needle that allows players to ward curses from the gods.

Miquella used the Haligtree in an attempt to grow older, lying in a cocoon and binding himself to the tree by watering it with his blood. Yet his cocoon was stolen by the depraved Mohg Lord of Blood who wished to become a god himself and commune with Miquella in his dreams.

Which brings us to the opening of the trailer, in which we clearly see Miquella's cocoon in Mohg's palace, a decaying arm hanging limply from an opening.

Image credit: FromSoftware

Miyazaki confirmed to Eurogamer that Shadow of the Erdtree will take place in a brand new map, while in the trailer itself a voice states «touch the withered arm and travel to the realm of shadow». It seems fair, then, that we'll access this new realm directly from Miquella's arm — something