I was really negative in regards to Elden Ring in my review of it, and while I do think all of my complaints hold true, I've been playing it a bit more with a different build from the beginning and enjoying it a bit more. That said I didn't get into one thing about the game that was bothering me, and that is the game's naming. The way this game names things is... kind of horrible. Minor spoilers ahead.
The very first thing that comes to mind is the thing that came to everyone's mind, and that is 'Maidens of the Finger' sounding unintentionally perverted. And this was so obvious to everyone that there were hundreds of messages everywhere in the game about fingering the butt hole. I am going to not go into that specific aspect of the name too much because I think it's obvious to everyone why they maybe should have come up with a different name, and also the 'Finger' motif is already stupid enough on its own. This isn't something like 'Praise the Sun' which makes at least some semblance of sense even without any context. Looking forward to the light in the sky is a fairly common idea and at least indicates something about those who use the term. However, these people are followers of the Two Fingers because.... they listen to the ramblings of an old woman who translates the meanings of two giant severed fingers. I mean at least it's accurate? This isn't even getting into the 'Three Finger' nonsense, you know, the other three fingers missing to make a full hand. Three fingers are now evil, and I do not understand how anyone is looking at these names and taking these people seriously.
It goes on to 'The Lands Between'. On one hand, I get it, it sounds mysterious and ethereal at first. But what exactly are the lands between? Well, from anything I saw in the game or looking up other people talking about it, not much of anything. It's just the name of the land. Maybe it's called that because of something about a Sky City above it and a city underground, which would mean it's called that specifically because it happens to exist between two cities. Nothing about the game seems to imply it exists between worlds or anything, so that seems out of the question. There was some talk I read about being called this thematically because the current state of the land exists in a transitioning point between the old world and the new one after the Ring is repaired, but surely people wouldn't have been calling it The Land Between before the Shattering, not that it would make much sense being named that mid-transition either. It's not a name that means anything, it's a name given to make things seem more mysterious than they are.
Those are the two egregious factors in this game that kind of take me out of the narrative to a degree, at least about the naming. What you name things matters, it affects how people view what's going on. It almost doesn't matter how evil and twisted a villain is if he is named, and I know I'm referencing a dead meme here, The Poo-Poo Pee-Pee Man. I'm not going to feel like some diabolical mind got the better of me, I'm going to feel like a dunce cause I got outclassed by the fucking Poo-Poo Pee-Pee Man. Furthermore, names like 'The Lands Between' having almost no actual meaning in the game and seeming like they have the name JUST to give the area a mysterious aura breaks the immersion of the world itself.
Of course, this isn't to say it's a bad game overall because of this, I think it's an overall very well-made game despite me not being very big on it (I'm honestly kind of on the edge of liking it or not right now). But things like this irk me, and I do think that depending on your tolerance for things like this it may be enough to turn some people away from the game, so I think it's worth pointing out.
