It took me roughly 85 hours to platinum Elden Ring (Platinum on PC that is!)

In case you’re curious how much work it entails

So this is one of the least-spoilery articles we can write about Elden Ring, and it involves a simple anecdote on the cruel nature of time itself. It took me roughly 85 hours to “platinum Elden Ring,” and I’m using quotes because it’s on PC. But by God it’s the same thing and everyone knows what I’m talking about if I say “platinum!”

Note that 95% of this platinum was spoiler-free, guide-free, and pre-launch: so your mileage may vary, and you might be able to do it faster if you’re consulting guides constantly. I was able to locate every hidden achievement encounter except for one in the solitary pre-review period, which our own Jordan Devore helped me dig up. In fact that last 5% push to platinum was due to  Jordan, and we’ve been sharing our findings with each other like a secret treasure hunter’s club.

Amazingly, the vast majority of the weapon/spell/item achievements aren’t nearly as bad to gather as past games in the series (with the right moves, you can get them all in one run). Most of them are not missable, but there are a few ones that are. You can find instructions for one of the weapons here (spoiler warning shield), and another one that was missable in my game here (spoiler warning shield); but some people are claiming the latter can still be found under certain conditions. In those two instances, I was able to get both of them in about 45 minutes of a New Game+ run (breezing through). I’m leaving out any specifics on the endings here just in case.

So all in all, if you want to platinum Elden Ring, it’s more painless than a few other From Software games. Again, with very little in the way of missable content, and the ability to use save techniques to get all three endings, it’s totally doable. Just set aside around 80 hours depending on your pace and be aware of the above two items.