Elon Musk is concrete proof that mediocre white men will always fall upward. When he isn’t recalling busted Teslas, sharing cringe memes on Twitter, or being dumped by his girlfriend, the billionaire is busy being a gamer. See? He’s just like the rest of us.
He loves Rick & Morty, anime, and people who look and act exactly like he does. Sounds like a bonafide gamer to me. In recent years there is nothing more exhausting on the internet than those who stan Elon Musk, believing him to be both unbelievably cool and worthy of looking up to as some form of righteous figure. He has money, but like many billionaires, he relies on a mixture of greed and nepotism to maintain his needless fortune and social status. Oh, and his nepotism is tied to apartheid - even worse.
Elden Ring is a big deal, having sold tens of millions of copies since its release and cementing itself as yet another masterpiece by FromSoftware. We’ve all been losing ourselves to The Lands Between, creating distinct characters before embarking on adventures that will last hours upon hours. It’s a special game, and I’ve always believed there is no wrong or right way to play it so long as you’re having fun.
Well - that was the case until I saw Elon Musk’s travesty of a build. He’s a casual, and I can figure that out purely from looking at the gear he’s using to survive. It’s a mixture of poorly matched armour, too high an equipment load, and long-ranged spells that describe a player unwilling to get into a fight - one who would rather stand back and wait for his spirits to do all the work while also wearing armour that would protect even the most hardened of melee builds.
You can see the build in its entirety for yourself above. Musk is basically playing as a power mage, meaning he is using extremely effective spells with armour that allows him to soak up damage with little to no consequence. In other words he is an untouchable man with little to no understanding of his own privilege and how it affects those around him. Classic Musk.
Lusat’s Glintstone Staff is a fairly powerful weapon capable of wielding the game’s finest spells with the correct attributes, and scales effectively with a bunch of other equipment too. The rapier in Musk’s possession is one that is immediately overleveled given it drops from an NPC in the Roundtable Hold, while the third item is simply a katana that doesn’t make too much sense with a character otherwise built around traditional armour and magic.
I want to give Musk credit for having Radahn’s armour, given you need to actually defeat the boss and exchange his soul to get it. But when I take a step back and think about that battle and how heavily it relies on summoning allies to help you, combined with his over reliance on cheesy spells, I take back any praise. He absolutely stood back and let everyone else do all the work while reaping the rewards.
This transparent overconfidence is made even more obvious when glancing at the remainder of his loadout. His equipped charms seem to focus on overall stats, stamina, and health instead of actively contributing to the betterment of his specific build. Musk has geared his attribute points to improving his spells, but I’m also confused by his lacking strength stat given the armour he uses and his unusually heavy load. This is a player who spends the majority of the game standing still, cycling through spells and downing his enemies long before they even have a chance to approach him. It’s a valid way to play, but it ain’t fun.
His summon spells are the biggest crime of all. Musk is already sporting a heavy mage loadout that - at least with the right management - will make the majority of encounters a breeze. Yet he has hefty armour equipped without the stats to manage them so I imagine whenever a boss battle comes along that requires even the slightest bit of mobility his entire strategy falls apart. Who am I kidding, he definitely summons people to beat things anyway.
Elden Ring has an awesome mechanic where you can ring a bell to summon spectres to fight alongside you. These can range from lowly infantry units to clones of yourself that can main entire boss battles given they reflect your stats and playstyle. These spirits can also be levelled up, meaning the whole game can be centred around them if you so choose. I used them alongside my own abilities, often summoning a pack of wolves to attract the attention of a boss as I studied its moveset for the first time before moving in to attack.
Musk on the other hand, probably loitered by the arena’s edge and summoned his minions to do all the work. He has powerful spells, so can spunk them into the distance and not need to worry about taking any damage, forming a union, or actually having to consider if he’s helping or not. It’s a boring, uninspired approach to an otherwise fantastic game, and to see Musk leaning into it without even the slightest bit of shame is a classic reflection of his real character.
Even putting aside his cumbersome way of playing Elden Ring, people almost praising him for spending his spare time playing video games and acting like he is ‘one of us’ is the worst part of this whole situation. Behind the money, greed, racism, and backwards approach to modern society, he is just a human like the rest of us, albeit a slimy one who has previously called a man who helped trapped schoolchildren without the use of Musk’s pointless submarine a ‘pedo’ and has settled sexual harassment allegations out of court.
I hate the mantra of ‘git gud’ attached to FromSoftware games, but for Elon Musk I’ll make an exception. Git gud you pathetic little scrub, I’ll be waiting in the Roundtable Hold for a deathmatch when you’re ready.