We are only a week away from the release of Shadow of the Erdtree, and Bandai Namco already revealed the official release time for the upcoming Elden Ring expansion across all platforms.
This is the first expansion for Elden Ring arriving three years after its original release. The expansion will send players to the new Shadow realm, where the Tarnished will follow the steps of Miquella in a war-torn region, where there are a lot of mysteries to uncover.
Shadow Of The Erdtree Preload And Release Time
Shadow of the Erdtree will only have preload on PlayStation consoles, which starts on June 19, two days before the release time. PC and Xbox players will only be able to download the data after the official launch. Here is the release time for each platform:
- Consoles:
- North America: June 20 at 9 PM PT / June 21 at 12 AM ET
- Rest of the Regions: June 21 at midnight local time (12 AM)
- PC:
- North America: June 20 at 3 PM PT / 6 PM ET
- Europe: June 20 at 11 PM BST / June 21 at 12 AM CEST
- Asia: June 21 at 2 AM GST / 7 AM KST / 8 AM AEST / 10 AM NZST
If you are located in North America, PC will be the platform that gains access to the expansion earlier than others. However, in the eastern parts of the world, consoles will gain access to the game earlier than PC.
It’s worth noting that on July 20, the base Elden Ring game will receive a new update, which also serves as a Day 1 update for Shadow of the Erdtree. Along with some bugfixes, this new patch will add some new inventory improvements such as a Recent Items tab, as well as five new hairstyles to the character creation system. Also, the patch will allow active Summoning Pools to be carried to New Game Plus.
It’s worth noting that since the release time is not simultaneous on consoles, you will be able to play Shadow of the Erdtree earlier if you change your console region to Australia or New Zealand. However, sometimes developers penalize players for deliberately changing their region to play a game earlier.
The file size for Shadow of the Erdtree is around 16 GB on PlayStation, and it is expected to have a similar size on other platforms as well.
The new expansion is said to have around 30 to 40 hours of content with 10 new boss fights, dozens of new enemies, and a ton of new weapons. The major antagonist of Shadow of the Erdtree seems to be Messmer the Impaler, who is also featured on the official box art for the DLC.
Based on the hands-on previews, the Shadow realm will add a new region to the map in the size of the entire Limgrave, and it will come with some specific new gameplay mechanics replacing the Guiding Grace.
If you are preparing to play the expansion at launch, make sure that you have already beaten Starscourge Radahn and Mohg, Lord of Blood bosses, as only after beating them you will be allowed to enter the Shadow realm.
According to the Steam achievements, over 60% of Elden Ring owners on Steam have not beaten Mohg yet, which is a worrying number, especially knowing that Mohg is a pretty difficult boss to defeat.
