Elden Ring has arrived in the Game Boy’s green, pixelated realm, with one fan recreating the action RPG in a fan-made playable demake for PC and Nintendo’s original handheld console.
Teased in April, the demake reduces Elden Ring to a 2D dungeon crawler that appears to draw heavily from early The Legend of Zelda games. Developer Shin has released the game in its entirety for free at itch.io (opens in new tab) (thanks, GameSpot (opens in new tab)). You can play it with a keyboard in your browser or download the game files to play on the original Game Boy consoles.
While the demake’s visuals are a world away from those of Elden Ring, it mimics much of its world and core functionality. You’ll start out in the Chapel of Anticipation and soon come face to face with the Grafted Scion. As in FromSoftware’s original release, you’ll be swinging a sword and rolling to fend off enemies, in between interacting with NPCs and exploring the land.
The demake also encompasses a retro interpretation of Northern Limgrave and Stormveil Castle. In an FAQ on the game’s page, Shin says that they stopped making content for the demake because they “need to find a real job”, but hope to “expand the game in the future”.
Demake in abundance
Stellar fan-made demakes have become strong and fast in recent months. FromSoftware’s Gothic RPG Bloodborne got the retro recreation treatment this February with BloodbornePSX, which recreated a part of the action RPG with minimal polygons and low-res textures to mimic the style of PS1-era games.
The project had been in development for over a year before receiving a free release on PC. It might not match the original game, but it’s the closest thing to a PC port of Bloodborne.
Horizon Zero Dawn has also been recreated in the graphical style of the original PlayStation games – a short video shows what the PS4 open world title would have looked like if it had been made on the retro console. As you’d expect, it takes a lot of hints from early Tomb Raider titles, but it’s still recognizable as Horizon.