Highlights

  • Elden Ring's bosses thrive on FromSoftware's trademark approach of high difficulty and valuable rewards.
  • Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree's Blackgaol Knight raises the bar for optional bosses with a challenging fight and generous rewards, as defeating the foe provides a weapon and an armor set.
  • FromSoftware's optional bosses have often been difficult but not always rewarding, making Blackgaol Knight a welcome change.

Bosses have always been one of the biggest highlights of FromSoftware's catalog. In many ways, bosses act as the perfect encapsulation of FromSoftware's trademark Souls formula, being difficult but fair – at least for the most part – and often rewarding the player with a rush of excitement and satisfaction upon finally conquering the challenge. It's also an important element that players are usually rewarded in-game after defeating a boss with new weapons, armor pieces, spells, and enough currency to level up at least once. Elden Ring's bosses adhere to this trend pretty closely.

The first truly open-world FromSoftware game, Elden Ring is home to over 200 bosses, including some of the toughest in FromSoftware history. The infamous Malenia, Maliketh, and Radahn are all challenging boss fights in Elden Ring's base game, and all reward the player well for their effort. But few FromSoftware bosses have hit as hard and rewarded the player quite like Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree's Blackgaol Knight.

Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree Lies of P
Related
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree Proves FromSoftware's Next Game Needs a Lies of P Feature

Shadow of the Erdtree has proven to be challenging for a number of reasons, one of which demonstrates what FromSoftware can learn from Lies of P.

Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree's Blackgaol Knight Raises the Bar for Optional FromSoftware Bosses

FromSoftware's Optional Bosses Haven't Always Felt Rewarding

FromSoftware's Dark Souls series, Bloodborne, and Sekiro have all had their fair share of compelling optional bosses, from Dark Souls 2's Darklurker to Dark Souls 3's Nameless King to Sekiro's Demon of Hatred. These optional bosses have often provided some of the most difficult challenges in their respective games, pushing even the most talented Souls veterans to their limits with their frenetic movesets, hard-hitting attacks, and huge health pools. Fighting these optional bosses has often felt rather grandiose, dropping the player into a vast arena and putting them up against some kind of hulking foe that seems impossible to defeat all while a bombastic score accompanies the on-screen action.

Defeating these challenging optional bosses can evoke an immense feeling of satisfaction that goes beyond any moment in the game before this point. But aside from this brief moment of triumph, the player isn't usually rewarded all too well for their dedication. The most players can hope for is a special weapon, spell, or armor piece related to the boss, but frequently, these rewards don't quite feel worthy of all the time and effort the player has put into overcoming the colossal challenge put before them. But the same can't be said for Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree's Blackgaol Knight.

Shadow of the Erdtree's Blackgaol Knight Is a Tough But Satisfying Challenge

Appearing in the first area of Elden Ring's new Shadow of the Erdtree DLC, the Blackgaol Knight is the first painful reminder that FromSoftware's optional bosses can be some of the most difficult not just in the entire base game, but the DLC as well. Likely the first DLC boss that many players will encounter, Blackgaol Knight hits like a freight train and is capable of wiping the player's whole health bar in just two or three hits. Blackgoal Knight requires patience, speed, determination, a fair amount of luck, and maybe some build-tinkering to defeat, but when players do manage the impressive feat, they're rewarded extremely well.

Upon death, Elden Ring's Blackgaol Knight drops his entire Armor of Solitude set, along with his Greatsword of Solitude , both of which are some of the most impressive items in the game. Though he's a fierce challenge for Elden Ring veterans, he sets the tone of Shadow of the Erdtree quite well, and FromSoftware's willingness to reward the player so much should be something it keeps in mind for future optional boss fights.