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On July 9, late into the night, Twitch streamer Ainrun roared in relief after beating Elden Ring’s final boss. After a grueling two-and-a-half hours he had finished the game without taking a hit from any enemy or spending a single rune to make his character stronger. “Oh my god it’s over dude, let’s go, yes!” he said deliriously. “Oh my god dude fuck this game. Elden Ring rune level one no-hit run, yes!”
Elden Ring can be a frustrating but rewardingly difficult game on its own terms. Once complete, however, die-hard fans have had to find other ways to keep the challenge alive. Speedrunners finish the game as quickly as humanly possible (currently just over an hour without using glitches). One has defeated every major boss using only their ass. Even among these feats, the no-hit, no-leveling runs hold a special place. There’s something both straightforward and incredibly old-school about the endeavor.
“I’ve been doing no-hit runs and speed runs of FromSoftware games ever since 2020, starting with Dark Souls 1,” Ainrun told Kotaku in an email. He’s since done no-hit runs of all three Dark Souls games, as well as Sekiro, and even completed a “trilogy” run where the no-hit playthroughs had to all happen sequentially. He’s now focused on Elden Ring, whose open-world design allows for some interesting choices and more room for strategizing.
This was how the earlier attempt ended btw pic.twitter.com/RHJtbXw5Mh
— Ainrun (@Ainrun_ttv) July 10, 2022
While well known Souls streamers like The Happy Hob have already completed RL1 No Hit Runs, those skip the game’s first boss, the Grafted Scion. You have to jump over a cliff and die to progress to the start of the game, regardless of whether the Scion is defeated. But where other streamers bypassed the initial fight, Ainrun considers it an important part of the run (he cheekily refers to his as the “best” version of this type of run).
Read the full article on Kotaku
