Elden Ring’s Switch 2 build looks much smoother, and that’s great news for Duskbloods

FromSoftware was meant to put Elden Ring on the Switch 2 last year, but Miyazaki’s team held off rather than ship something half-baked, pushing the Tarnished Edition to August 28 instead. Looking at the new footage doing the rounds, that delay was the right call.

Elden Ring docked mode isn’t fast, but it’s finally steady

Famitsu and Denfaminico Gamer have shared new clips of the game running in both docked and handheld mode, and docked mode is the standout. It’s capped at 30 FPS rather than 60, but there’s no stuttering even through the heavier boss fights, a big step up from last year’s shakier showing. Thirty frames isn’t ideal for a game this fast, sure, but FromSoftware fans have put up with far worse, Bloodborne’s frame pacing on PS4 being the obvious scar tissue here.

Handheld mode isn’t quite there yet. The footage shows some dips during boss battles, though with ten days left before launch, there’s still time to smooth that out.

What this means for The Duskbloods

FromSoftware has never been the most technically polished studio. Elden Ring’s own launch had issues, Bloodborne had its pacing problems, and even Dark Souls 3 needed a fan-made path tracing mod to look its best. So a noticeably steadier Elden Ring on Switch 2 matters beyond this one port, because The Duskbloods runs on the same in-house engine. Whatever optimisation work went into this port should carry over, at least nominally, to FromSoftware’s next game, a Switch 2 exclusive built as a very different experience from the studio’s usual single-player fare.

The Closed Network Test wraps up on August 24, and that should give us our clearest look yet at the gameplay FromSoftware reportedly spent the longest time refining.

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