Elden Ring, a FromSoftware open world progression of the Soulslike genre, has received widespread praise, and the developer has been releasing monthly updates to address any remaining faults in the game. However, after its release, additional information about the enormous action RPG has continued to surface. For example, dataminers seem to have discovered evidence of an in-game bestiary that was never included in the final release.
@JesterPatches recently published a series of photographs on Twitter depicting opponents and animals featured throughout the game may be discovered within the game files, leading many to assume that a bestiary was intended for the game at one time.
The photos come in two variations, one darker and the other clear and brilliant, which might indicate whether or not a creature has been detected. The dataminer of Elden Ring adds that none of the game’s main bosses are in the files, implying that this was intended for the game’s ordinary foes.
Regardless, that may have been a fun element to have in the game. Anyone’s guess as to why FromSoftware opted to remove it, and whether or not they would return the concept in the future — potentially even in a subsequent project – is that they will.
Looking through the game files I came across a few icons making me believe that a bestiary was planned at some point.
There are 128 icons showing different NPCs. Each NPC shown has 2 icons, one greyed out and another one filled in, so it could be not found and found. pic.twitter.com/9b0Tj6ckm3
— JesterPatches (@JesterPatches) March 27, 2022
So there are 64 unique icons. Ranging from regular soldiers, nobels, to animals, demi-humans, even Godskins and a few I don't even recognize, but I don't see any major bosses in here.
My favorites so far what I would assume are "Caelid Dog", "Caelid Crow" and the "Pigeon". pic.twitter.com/1kPKKCxMaN
— JesterPatches (@JesterPatches) March 27, 2022