It’s been a little over a month since Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree released, and modder Andmonika has already backported some of its bosses into 2019 FromSoftware ninja action game Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. Details are slim on the project’s Nexus Mods page, called “Sekiro the Lord of Erdtree,” but screenshots show Midra, Messmer, Radahn, as well as base game bosses Maliketh and Malenia hanging out in the kingdom of Ashina.
Soulsborne YouTuber Ongbal has uploaded a video of the Sekiro version of the Midra: Lord of the Frenzied Flame fight, and while the challenge runner makes everything look easy—including no-hitting Promised Consort Radahn—you can tell that even Erdtree’s more aggressive bosses just can’t keep up with the faster pace of play in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. See also how Ongbal punked Malenia when she was added to Sekiro as part of The Land of Reeds mod.
Similar to The Land of Reeds, Lord of Erdtree seems to be a bit of a complicated installation, and it’s been giving some commenters on the Nexus trouble. Between that tough hurdle and the ROM hack-y content of the mod itself, I’m not sure I’d recommend it as anything other than a novelty, but it’s still a fascinating proof of concept. It’s also a reminder of how much room for experimentation and change there still is for FromSoftware’s signature combat system: Even with the Sekiro-style counter sneakily added to Erdtree, it just doesn’t match Sekiro’s rhythm deflection gameplay.
It’s also another example of the continuity across all of FromSoft’s games, in part due to the in-house engine it’s used since 2006’s Armored Core 4. This common tech lends itself to surreal cross-game discoveries and demonstrations, like a prototype Bloodborne level left over in Dark Souls, Armored Core mechs dwarfing the very landmass of the Lands Between, and lowly Tarnished scurrying about colossal AC6 maps in turn.
