‘Twitch plays Elden Ring’ is going as well as you’d imagine

A dishevelled character on a horse in Elden Ring
(Image credit: FromSoftware)

Bruce Greene, who’s worked with Funhaus, Rooster Teeth, and Inside Gaming, is currently hosting a charity subathon on Twitch with a unique twist. 

While he’s away, the Twitch chat is able to collaboratively play FromSoftware’s latest title, Elden Ring, from the stream’s chat interface.

Subathons, which extend the stream with each new subscription to the channel, can last as long as a month, so streamers often create ways for the chat to entertain itself, including letting viewers or mods control the entertainment by playing videos. 

But Greene’s method involves mimicking the format made popular from the original ‘Twitch plays Pokemon’ phenomenon and turns control of the game over to the people who play by inputting chat commands into the interface with the consensus commands winning out.

On the plus-side, watching 600 people try to navigate the newly-released Soulsbourne title just might be messy enough to take the sting out of the game’s PC experience, which is somehow worse than the Steam Deck experience.

Of course all this chaos is for a good cause, as Greene is donating half the profits from the stream to UNICEF and the Red Cross in support of Ukraine.

Via PC Gamer

Allisa James
Computing Staff Writer

Named by the CTA as a CES 2023 Media Trailblazer, Allisa is a Computing Staff Writer who covers breaking news and rumors in the computing industry, as well as reviews, hands-on previews, featured articles, and the latest deals and trends. In her spare time you can find her chatting it up on her two podcasts, Megaten Marathon and Combo Chain, as well as playing any JRPGs she can get her hands on.