The year is 2089, and I’m still trying to figure out who Zanzibart is—and why he’s instrumental in the current state of the world I’m exploring. I found a shiny item along the way: a piece of Regalia Clothing with the flavor text, “Zanzibart was the King of New Eden, now broken and bare after the death of his daughter Zaneeba.”
Okay, sure. At least now I know who this guy is. But as I continue playing, the more items I collect, the more I lose track of who’s who. In the next castle, I come across a corpse clutching an item to its chest. Pretty lonely way to go. I read the note beside it, and now I find out Zaneeba wasn’t really Zanzibart’s daughter, but the child of an extraterrestrial being that once appeared in this world.
This makes no sense. Where’s the rest of it?! I know I won’t uncover everything unless I scour every corner of this world, hunting for scattered items and fragments of story, just to read two or three cryptic sentences about a kingdom’s history long gone.
I’m tired of games that hide their lore in items. As someone obsessed with unraveling a game’s overarching narrative, missing a key piece of the story just because I didn’t pick up one item in the first level feels incredibly frustrating.
Sure, I appreciate the loretubers who compile this stuff into one nifty (and often very long) video, but I’d rather uncover the story myself. I don’t want to rely on the game’s Wiki or watch yet another @VaatiVidya breakdown just to know what’s going on.
FromSoftware is notorious for this kind of storytelling, and more studios like Neowiz's Lies of P have followed suit. In Elden Ring, one major revelation about the true nature of Radagon and Queen Marika was hidden behind a spell description, and casting that spell in a very specific location. Only a handful of players discovered it in the game’s early days. I didn’t Google it outright, but I did ask around for hints. When I finally did it, the revelation shook my entire understanding of the story.
Is it time to ditch flavor text altogether? I don’t think so. It adds to immersion as you explore ruined lands. And no, it’s not a game’s job to spoon-feed you a full-on history lesson. Plus, this kind of storytelling encourages replay value and player interpretation. It sparks community theories—none of which ever seem to agree on the “definitive” version of events until the Game Director states it.
But personally? I’ve grown to despise it. Even worse, FromSoftware often writes in cryptic, archaic English that sometimes just feels pretentious. I’d much rather have a diegetic lore dump—a library detailing key historical events, a seer talking about the past events, or a stone tablet that explains what happened here and who was involved. I don’t want to rely on a Waist Armor’s item description to find out Zanzibart was terrified of Queen Zuzu from the Kingdom of Far Far Away.
Still, I love a good story. I’ll read every piece of it anyway—or head to the nearest YouTube lore expert if I’m feeling too invested. But I wish there were fewer of them.