Sekiro vs Elden Ring: Which Should You Play First?

Combat: Sekiro Is a Sword Duel, Elden Ring Is a Toolbox

Sekiro puts you in the role of Wolf, a shinobi with one katana and a prosthetic arm. Fights revolve around posture rather than health. Every attack you deflect at the right moment builds up the enemy’s posture bar, and once it breaks, you land a single killing blow called a Deathblow. Dodging and hanging back rarely work, so the game pushes you forward into a rhythm of attacks and deflects that feels closer to a rhythm game than a typical Souls fight.

The prosthetic arm adds tools such as a shuriken, a firecracker and an axe, each useful against specific enemies, and Combat Arts give you special sword moves. A grappling hook and a dedicated jump button let you reach rooftops and tree branches, and stealth matters too: an enemy that hasn’t spotted you can be killed or badly wounded in one strike.

Elden Ring hands you far more options. You can fight up close with swords, axes and spears, block with a shield, parry, attack from range with bows, or build a character around sorceries and incantations. Ashes of War add special skills to weapons, and in the open world you can fight from the back of your spectral steed, Torrent. If one approach fails, you can switch weapons, change your build or bring help.

If parrying is what draws you to Sekiro, our Lies of P vs Sekiro comparison looks at another soulslike built around deflecting.

Difficulty: Sekiro Is Harder to Get Through

Most players find Sekiro the harder game to finish, and the reason is that it never lets you around a wall. There are no stats to grind, no character builds to swap and no online co-op. Each boss has to be learned until you can deflect its attacks on reaction. Sekiro has no difficulty settings, and its only optional settings make the game even harder: ringing the Demon Bell raises the challenge, and giving up Kuro’s Charm on a fresh playthrough makes blocked attacks still hurt you.

Elden Ring has no difficulty settings either, but it gives you many ways to make a fight easier. You can leave a tough area, explore elsewhere and come back at a higher level. You can summon AI helpers with Spirit Ashes or call in other players through online co-op. You can also switch to a stronger weapon or a ranged build. That flexibility is why Elden Ring is usually the safer first FromSoftware game, even though its hardest bosses are as punishing as anything in Sekiro.

Sekiro softens one part of dying. If you have resurrection power, you can revive on the spot instead of returning to a checkpoint, and defeating enemies refills that power.

World Design: Elden Ring’s Open World vs Sekiro’s Ashina

Elden Ring is a full open world. The Lands Between spread across several large regions that you cross on Torrent, with caves, catacombs and optional bosses hidden everywhere. Nothing tells you where to go, so you can stumble into an area far above your level or find a powerful weapon early.

Sekiro is set in Ashina, a fictional take on late Sengoku period Japan. Its areas connect to each other and branch in places, but progress is far more directed. There is no map, and the grappling hook turns exploration into a vertical puzzle of rooftops, cliffs and hidden paths. It’s a smaller, tightly handcrafted world, which suits a game built around set-piece duels.

Builds and Progression: Elden Ring Lets You Reinvent Your Character

Elden Ring is a full RPG. You create your own character, pick a starting class and spend runes to raise attributes like Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence and Faith. Hundreds of weapons, armor sets, spells and Ashes of War let you build a heavy knight, a fast samurai, a sorcerer or something in between. If a build stops working, a Larval Tear lets you redistribute your stats.

Sekiro has no character creation and no stat leveling in the usual sense. You always play Wolf, and your attack power rises by defeating major bosses. Progress comes from skill trees, Combat Arts, prosthetic tool upgrades, and items that add healing gourd charges or vitality. You get better at Sekiro mostly by getting better at deflecting, not by building a stronger character.

Story and Lore: Sekiro Tells, Elden Ring Hints

Sekiro tells a direct, character-driven story. Wolf has sworn to protect Kuro, a young lord with an immortal bloodline, and the plot follows his choice between that oath and the code he was raised with. Cutscenes and dialogue carry most of it, and four endings depend on key decisions.

Elden Ring is classic FromSoftware storytelling. You play a Tarnished, an exile called back to the Lands Between to restore the shattered Elden Ring and become Elden Lord. George R. R. Martin wrote the world’s backstory and Miyazaki wrote the main storyline, but much of it is buried in item descriptions and side characters for you to piece together. There are six endings. Pick Sekiro for a story you can follow, and Elden Ring for a mythology to dig into.

Already finished one of them? Our Lies of P vs Elden Ring comparison covers a strong next soulslike from outside FromSoftware.

Sekiro vs Elden Ring: Full Specs

FAQ

Is Sekiro harder than Elden Ring?

For most players, yes. Sekiro forces you to master deflecting with no summons, no co-op and no stat grinding, while Elden Ring lets you level up, change builds or bring help when a boss is too hard.

Is Sekiro more linear than Elden Ring?

Yes. Sekiro’s areas connect and branch, but the path is far more directed than Elden Ring’s open world.

Should my first soulslike be Sekiro or Elden Ring?

Elden Ring is the easier start because you can choose how to handle every challenge. Sekiro is a great second game once you enjoy learning bosses.

Can you play Sekiro with friends?

No. Sekiro is single-player only, while Elden Ring supports online co-op and PvP.

And the Winner Is…

WinnerElden Ring

Sekiro does one thing better than any other FromSoftware game: its sword fighting. When deflects start landing on rhythm and a boss’s posture finally breaks, nothing in Elden Ring feels quite as precise, and Ashina’s rooftops and grappling hook give it a speed the Lands Between never matches. It also runs on much older PC hardware. Still, Elden Ring is the one we’d hand to most people. It’s bigger, it lets you build any character you like, and when a boss stops you cold, you can ride off, level up, summon help and return stronger. That freedom makes it the better first FromSoftware game and the one with more to come back to. If you’ve already beaten Elden Ring, settle the Sekiro vs Elden Ring question by playing Sekiro next.