If you thought a 37-minute Elden Ring speedrun was the quickest time ever recorded for FromSoftware’s latest Souls-like, think again. That fast run was just blown outta the water by a sub-30-minute completion, which has my head spinning in a jealous rage. What’s especially wild about this new time, though, is that it was done by noted Souls speedrunner Distortion2. You know, the same person who crushed Demon’s Souls on PS5 in under 20 minutes and posted that ridiculous 37-minute Elden Run speedrun.
It’s worth noting this was Distortion2's fifth “Any%” speedrun posted to YouTube, meaning the only goal was to finish the game as fast as possible. Distortion2 has been tearing through FromSoft’s action role-playing game since it came out on February 25. Their latest time was 28 minutes and 59 seconds, which supplants their previous world records. That’s just bonkers!
For this sub-30-minute run, Distortion2 sparingly applied the wrong warp glitch, which spawns you at a different, safer location after you save and close the game. After selecting the Samurai and Fanged Imp Ashes keepsake, a summon that calls forth two imp spirits to aid you in battle, Distortion2 started the run by jumping off a cliffside to avoid the obligatory death against the Grafted Scion boss at the beginning. From there, it’s a fairly standard speedrun, with Distortion2 bee-lining from Limgrave to the Gatefront Site of Grace and unlocking Torrent the horse, occasionally using the wrong warp glitch to reset aggressive enemies and then reappear at the nearest Site of Grace for safer travel. With the ethereal stead, Distortion2 zipped around the Lands Between, hitting some rest spots and ignoring just about everything else, including good items and tough bosses.
Distortion2 did use The Four Belfries, an area in Liurnia of the Lakes where you can warp around the map quickly, but the second half of the run was just a lotta platforming in treacherous locations, like the Crumbling Farum Azula and Volcano Manor. It was an efficient route, as evidenced by Distortion2's sub-30-minute time.
Kotaku reached out to Distortion2 for comment. Their YouTube channel is worth checking out, though, just to watch them get a bit faster with each upload. The Souls speedrunning community tends to have specific categories with specific requirements to bolster the challenge, all of which are cataloged on Speedrun.com, but Elden Ring doesn’t have any such stipulations yet. The leaderboards won’t open on the site until March 18, so Distortion2's latest speedrun might not be the fastest out there. But until the leaderboards unlock and scores are posted, sub-30 minutes is the time to beat and Distortion2 seemingly holds the record for the most runs right now.
Meanwhile, I’m not even done with Elden Ring! I mean, I haven’t even beaten the pseudo-second major boss Godrick the Grafted yet since I’ve just been combing the Lands Between for gear and runes, a testament to the immense amount of discoverability FromSoft has packed into the game. Getting lost in Limgrave is my favorite thing about Elden Ring, but I also love seeing folks just blast through the action-RPG like it’s nothing. It gives me hope that one day, in a year or two, I might beat Elden Ring myself.
The speedruns are getting outta hand now. Someone first beat the game in two hours without dying. Someone else posted a runtime of a little under an hour. What’s next, someone hitting Elden Ring’s credits in 20 minutes or less? Maybe someone else beating the game blindfolded? Will the speedrunning community chill? I don’t know, but I’m totally here for it.