For many of the connoisseurs of frustration that roam the plains of Elden Ring, having a difficult time is all just part of the experience.
After all, when you fail to mow through the pesky boss that always has your number, armed only with your best sword and a motivational pep talk from Israel Adesanya, the right approach isn’t to rebalance the game, but to get good, right?
Well, as reported by Kotaku, in the case of one streamer, the process of personal improvement has led them to be able to complete the game at level one using only a single hand.
Can you beat Malenia with this kind of handicap?
The streamer in question is MissMikkaa, one of Twitch’s elite Elden Ringers, who has made a bit of a thing out of beating the game with some interesting wrinkles thrown into the mix.
By placing her controller flat on her desk and resting the sole hand being used across the centre of it, MissMikkaa was able to put a finger within range of every button necessary to fight the game’s notoriously hard bosses (including Malenia) and come out on top, as you can see in the clip below:
The climax of the run came after a gruelling 75 hours of playing across multiple live streams, with the Elden Beast finally falling to MissMikkaa’s one-handed assault.
Many users on ResetEra were very impressed by the feat, with Molecule saying: “That’s wild! Impressive!” and Disco Infernal musing: “There ya go, the easy mode people requested was there all along - two hands.”
On the other hand, a few thought the achievement put their own Elden Ring abilities into some pretty brutal context, with user Karlinel admitting: “Now I feel even more unskilled” and Davidion arguing: “That's not very polite of her, embarrassing the (poop) out of the rest of us like that.”
Thankfully, user Zetta had a more positive mindset, saying: “This just shows that when there's a will there's a way. How can I say that a game is too hard for me when there are people out there doing this?”
Meanwhile, user Bessy67 issued a challenge to MissMikkaa, asking: “Now can they beat it one-handed with a Guitar Hero controller?”
Ironically, since completing the one-handed run, MissMikkaa has arguably gone a step beyond plastic guitars for her latest Elden Ring run, taking on the game with a dance pad, as you can see in the clip below:
Regardless of how fleet-footed your Tarnished is, make sure to follow us for more updates on the wacky worlds of Elden Ring, Skyrim, and Fallout modding.