In terms of game play Elden Ring has a lot of nicer stuff, though I’m always going to like DS1 because the gameplay is visually technical which seems “clunky” but is nicer to me personally because I can understand that I’m actually executing what I’m trying to do correctly.

As far as the game play balance goes, it’s a wash, plenty of DS series games had pointless annoyances.

In terms of lore / world building / writing / meaning Elden Ring is 3rd behind DS3 / DS1. I’d arguably put it even lower like below DS2 / Sekiro because the DLC was nonsense and a lot of fan service and made me lose faith in the cohesiveness of the work.

I have a lot of regret putting the time I did into Elden Ring.