It’s recommended you play Elden Ring offline for the time being as hackers are using the invasion mechanic to ruin save files.
For as popular as Elden Ring is, there are those that seem dead set on completely ruining the experience for everyone else. One person has been getting innocent players softbanned and now there are reports of hackers altering other players’ save files.
As detailed on Reddit and Twitter, hackers are using Elden Ring’s online invasion mechanic to jump into another player’s game and ruin their day even more than usual.
Precisely how they’re doing this isn’t known but, basically, if you’re affected, your game will crash and when you reload your save, you’ll find yourself in an infinite death loop.
The one saving grace is that this seems to only be affecting PC players, since there’s no cross-play, so console players should be safe. Hopefully FromSoftware and Bandai Namco are aware and working to stop this but, in the meantime, there are a couple of workarounds.
Firstly, it is recommended you regularly back up your save files. Secondly, there’s a DIY fix where you can open the map and teleport to a Site of Grace in the split-second before you die, although this is somewhat tricky to pull off.
The safest option is to opt out of invasions or just play offline altogether. This can be frustrating for those wanting to play with friends or get some online assistance.
There were hacking concerns even before Elden Ring released. Players raised awareness of an exploit that could allow hackers to take over someone’s PC and gain access to private info and/or install malware.
At the time, it was claimed that FromSoftware and Bandai Namco have a history of failing to address major security flaws in their releases, such as the Dark Souls games.
As a result, it has always fallen to other players to come up with solutions and countermeasures to hacking problems. Unless FromSoftware and Bandai Namco step in this time, this cycle looks set to continue.
Elden Ring is available for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, and PC.
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