Elden Ring - Godrick the Grafted - Review

Godrick the Grafted is very mild compared to Margit but don't get me wrong, I adore this battle. This fight is extremely fun and I have a lot to say about it. If you haven't noticed I'm using another character for this fight due to me killing Godrick too early on the other character when quitting and restarting during the death animation didn't work like it usually does. I have a separate video about that occurrence on the channel.

At first glance this fight immediately reminded me of the Ludwig, the Accursed and the One Reborn designs from Bloodborne with all of the additional limbs attached to the model however the fight plays out very differently. This may be a stretch but the move set very vaguely reminds me of the Dirty Colossus from Demon's Souls. That boss also shoots projectiles out of it's seemingly amputated left arm which has a barrel encasing that can be destroyed but has no significant change. Other than that the boss is very unique compared to anything else in the SoulsBlood games.

Since I'm using a much faster weapon then I usually do, I was able to approach more attacks to punish and I really wish I approached Margit this way to explore more i-frames but thankfully I'll get that opportunity again later. My main strategy was to lightly strike small attacks and strike heavy after more cinematic attacks which is how it usually goes but Godrick perfectly displays that here. The attacks I looked forward to the most was the Axe Drag and the Whirl Wind Jump which were the most satisfying for me especially the Whirl Wind Jump that has an incredible i-frame hug during the jump that allowed a lot of hits. The Whirl Wind attack also has a variant move that doesn't happen a lot unless you're always far away from what I've noticed and this additional move has Godrick dragging his axe creating a homing vortex. This attack reminds me of the Large Homing Purple Mass from the Four Kings which is a very complicated attack to avoid and it deserves a video alone discussing it's incredibly stubborn behavior in player strategies but it's great to see it conceptually executed better here in Elden Ring.

Phase two is a lot better and slightly faster paced. Thankfully Godrick doesn't idle nowhere near as bad like Margit so the battle moves at a fairly constant pace. The dragon head attacks are wonderful for the most part except for the one that sprays forward tracking the player. This attack has some random damage detection so I usually just keep my distance and once again the attack I hated the most isn't present in the footage I have so I can't fully showcase my annoyance of how much time it wastes. As for the other fire breath attacks I was very surprised on how generous the i-frames were like the Fire Breath Sweep allows so many attack opportunities if you're close enough and the Fire Gravel Toss also just lets you walk right up for some free hits.

Like I said in the beginning I loved this fight however I can't help but feel underwhelmed after Margit. I was really hoping to spend days practicing this fight but perhaps Elden Ring is saving something very special for me.