Elden Ring Tarnished Edition Switch 2 Graphics & Performance Tested
Elden Ring Tarnished Edition has finally arisen on Switch 2, and it’s already been a huge hit with the critics. We awarded it a 96 out of 100 in our review, earning it our Certified Exceptional award. After that review went live, a lot of you asked us to take an even closer look at the port under the microscope. You suggested areas to test for framerate, asked about graphical fidelity, and wanted to know just how well Elden Ring holds up on Switch 2. So, thanks to all of those comments and suggestions, I’ve been putting the Tarnished Edition through its paces so we can take a much closer look at its resolution, textures, level of detail, framerate, and overall performance. So, with that in mind, let’s head back to the Lands Between.
A quick reminder, though: a lot of the things we’re about to highlight are incredibly easy to spot when you’re specifically looking for them. But if I’m being honest, much like I said in my full review, these imperfections did very little to take away from what is still an incredible experience.
Resolution
Let’s start with resolution, and this is perhaps one of the more interesting aspects of Elden Ring Tarnished Edition. All of the footage you’re seeing here has been captured in QHD, and from what I can tell, the game appears to be working from a 1080p image before being upscaled. Importantly, though, this doesn’t have the kind of extreme ghosting or smeared, overly soft image that you might associate with some implementations of DLSS. In fact, when we slow down some of our boss footage, we can still make out a surprising amount of detail from frame to frame. And while we’ll get into the framerate in much more detail shortly, it’s worth pointing out that during this fight with Rellana, Twin Moon Knight, the image remains sharp, stable, and the action stays smooth.
Things do get a little more interesting when we head out into the open world. There are moments where you can see some pixelation, particularly in more demanding scenes or when we’re moving through the environment. It can make the image look a little softer than you’d ideally want, but honestly, it’s not something that I found particularly distracting during normal gameplay. What does seem to be happening is that the game’s image reconstruction or upscaling becomes less effective when the hardware is under greater load. Whether that’s the result of a dynamic resolution system or another method of adjusting the game’s internal rendering resolution, I can’t say for certain without access to the game’s rendering data. What I can say is that the image quality can fluctuate, particularly in the open world, and you’ll see that more clearly when we start looking for it.
Texture Detail
One area where I’ve actually been really impressed with Elden Ring Tarnished Edition is its texture detail. Whether we’re looking at the environments, enemies, weapons or the incredible armour designs, there’s a surprising amount of detail here. The world retains a lot of the texture work that makes Elden Ring’s environments feel so rich, and the character and armour designs look fantastic when we get up close. I have caught the upscaling briefly softening or blurring some of those finer armour textures, particularly during movement, but these moments are fleeting. For the most part, the textures are incredibly detailed.
Environmental Fidelity
Moving away from resolution, there are a few other visual compromises that become apparent when we start looking closely at the environment. For example, in some of the more distant scenery, you can see a noticeable dithering effect. This is particularly visible on structures in the distance, as well as on some of the waterfalls, where certain areas take on this almost dotted or speckled appearance.
Level of Detail & Pop-In
As mentioned in my full review, level-of-detail pop-in is noticeable in Elden Ring Tarnished Edition. However, it’s not particularly aggressive. Rather than objects suddenly appearing in front of you, we’re seeing a much softer transition as additional detail is loaded in. You can see this quite clearly in the trees here in Limgrave, where the level of detail gradually changes as we move closer. And while the transition is noticeable when you’re specifically looking for it, the game does have a rather generous view distance, so you’re still able to see a lot of the world stretching out ahead of you.
I also had a few people ask about grass pop-in when travelling around on Torrent, and thankfully, this isn’t really an issue on Switch 2. As you can see here, the grass remains fairly consistent as we move through the environment. There is, however, a trade-off worth acknowledging. Compared to the other console versions, the Switch 2 edition does have a reduced amount of some ground-level environmental assets. There are fewer smaller rocks, plants and other pieces of environmental clutter in certain areas, which appears to be one of the ways the game helps manage its rendering demands.
Framerate
Now onto everyone’s favourite part… the framerate. Elden Ring has a variable framerate, generally sitting somewhere around 30 to 40 frames per second depending on what’s happening on screen. And after reading through the comments, I picked out some of the areas you thought would put the Switch 2 through its paces. For the most part, I’m going to let these scenes play out so you can see the performance for yourself. I’ll jump back in with some notes where necessary, but otherwise, enjoy a little break from my voice!
Starting with the Ruins of Rauh in the Erdtree expansion. This is a gorgeously detailed area of the world, with some absolutely monstrous foes. Here, we’re crossing a bridge with several NPCs and enemies, just as our friend at the end of the bridge prepares to unleash a rather enormous flame attack. There’s a lot going on in this scene, and the biggest drop I recorded was down to 28 frames per second. Our frametime stayed around the 33 millisecond mark for most of this section, which means the game is delivering frames at a fairly consistent pace.
Moving on to Castle Ensis, another incredibly detailed area. Here we see a dip just after the bridge, before we ascend the stairs, where the frametime briefly jumps to around 66 milliseconds. That particular dip gets recorded at 26 frames per second, but as you can see when we repeat the section, it’s a very brief interruption rather than something that has a major impact on the experience.
I also wanted to include this scene from the base game at the Academy of Raya Lucaria, partly because I just wanted to show off some of this gorgeous architecture and detail, but also because we see that consistency continue despite the sheer amount of geometry on display.
Finally, we take Torrent for a run through one of the more open areas of the world. Here, we’re able to maintain a pretty solid 30 frames per second even while travelling at speed through the environment.
Now, there were certainly moments during my review period where the drops were more noticeable. Unfortunately, I don’t have footage of those particular moments, as I have to capture framerate footage differently from my standard gameplay footage. So I don’t want to pretend these examples tell the entire story. What they do show, though, is a pretty accurate representation of the majority of my time with Elden Ring Tarnished Edition. There were two bosses, from memory, where I noticed some stuttering during particularly intense attacks, as well as moments like the footage from my review, where I had around a dozen soldiers fighting me at once. Those situations could push the game harder, but they were the exception rather than the rule during my time with the game.
So, after putting Elden Ring Tarnished Edition under the microscope, what have we found? Well, there are certainly some compromises here. We’ve seen some pixelation, softer image quality in certain situations, level-of-detail pop-in, and the occasional dip in framerate. But after spending so much time with this version, I still feel much the same way I did when I wrote the full review. These imperfections are there, but they did very little to take away from what is an incredible experience. If you want to hear my full thoughts on Elden Ring Tarnished Edition, including the open world, combat, exploration, performance and everything else this version has to offer, you can check out our full review right here.
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