Elden Ring has undoubtedly become one of the sensations in gaming this year. The dark fantasy open-world adventure features an expansive universe created in tandem with George R. R. Martin. As a result, players have a wealth of game lore and worldbuilding to explore in Elden Ring.
Naturally, such an immersive world needs a companion and strategy guide, which publishers Future Press have been hard at work on. Elden Ring is a truly massive game and as such, the accompanying guide would’ve been simply too huge to fit into one book. Future Press previously made audiences aware of this and let people know to expect the Elden Ring guide in two volumes. It’s pretty exciting stuff for Elden Ring fans, either way.
Volume One of the official Elden Ring guide is set to hit the shelves in Europe at some point in the next week, with copies made available in the US in the early part of November. However, Future Press has now issued an update on the state of all things Volume Two, leading some to wonder if there may be some Elden Ring DLC on the cards. In a new tweet on the official Future Press Twitter account, the publisher has revealed that the guide’s second volume won’t be making an appearance this year after all. Instead, eager readers will need to hold off until some time in 2023 to get their hands on it.
While the news is a bit disappointing for those eager to dive into the full Elden Ring experience on paper, many have questioned the reasons behind the delay of Volume Two. While it’s important to consider that it may be simply down to production times or possibly even the sheer amount of content that needs to go into the guides, it’s also entirely possible that it is down to the potential inclusion of DLC. Elden Ring has been getting plenty of content updates and patches since its release back in February of this year. However, any official word on DLC or expansion content for the game has been thin on the ground. It’s pretty likely that FromSoftware is working on an expansion for its smash-hit title, but we’ll need to wait and see if anything concrete is announced in the next few months.
While the official statement explains that Future Press is “striving to include all there is to know at the time of publication, making it accurate and useful long after its release,” it may be that “all there is to know” could include expansion content for the game that may be on the way next year. Of course, this is purely speculative at the moment, but it would make a lot of sense if this was the motive behind holding off on Volume Two’s publication.
Elden Ring is available now on Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4 and PC.