In a surprising collision of my primary interests, the latestElden Ringtheory revolves around the lyrics to Taylor Swift’s vastly underrated song Ivy, an album track from the also vastly underrated Evermore. Ivy is my favourite song on my favourite album by my favourite singer, so naturally I sat up and paid attention to this. Like most theories posted on the Elden Ring subreddit, it is utter nonsense, and well aware of this fact. While I don’t hold Elden Ring in as high a regard as I hold Ms Swift, the collective personality of the fanbase has always been my favourite part of the community, and this only deepens that affection.
The theory posits that the Ivy climbing the walls of the song is a reference to the weed-strewn Church of Elleh, while the opening verse’s mention of an ‘incandescent glow’ and the phrase ‘tarnished’ point to meeting Ranni at the Guidance of Grace at this very same church. Other lyrics allegedly point to Vyke at the Mountaintop of the Giants, the Deeproot Depths, and the Frenzied Flame, narrating a romance between Vyke and Ranni.
It then moves from telling this story to hinting at the Shadows of the Erdtree DLC release date, with Swift known for dropping Easter Eggs into her lyrics. It claims the lines ‘spring breaks loose’ suggests the vernal equinox, backed up by the song’s title (Ivy becoming IV becoming 4), suggesting a launch someway at the early to mid point of the year’s fourth month, during the vernal equinox. Sprinkle in some Swiftie lore, and that brings us to July 26, 2025 - the apparent release date for Elden Ring’s Shadows of the Erdtree, confirmed by Taylor Swift back in December 2020, before Elden Ring even launched.
Quite obviously, the song is not about Elden Ring, and not even the theory’s creator, u/Jiatao24, believes it is. These sorts of over-the-top coping strategies were common when several showcases, events, and award shows passed by without Elden Ring getting a look in, and I’m glad the community has kept it alive. But, not to overanalyse what is clearly a joke, it’s also a pleasant picture of where gaming is these days.
What’s interesting here is not so much what’s being said - think creatively enough and you can make any square peg fit. You could argue the lines ‘The fatal flaw that makes you long to be/Magnificently cursed’ are a reference to Dragon Age’s Solas, while the line ‘in from the snow’ confirms Dreadwolf will launch in winter. After all, ‘I’d meet you where the spirit meets the bones’ clearly means the Fade and the Boneyard will play major roles in the game’s story.
For those interested, Ivy actually tells the story of a woman who is having an affair and is torn between the loyalty to a husband who ignores her, and the wild and dangerous future of leaving him, where the new lover is climbing up her flesh and thoughts like Ivy clinging to a wall. Its use in the Hailee Steinfeld show Dickinson heightened the queer subtext many have read in its lyrics.
It’s less how Ivy fits and more that Ivy has been chosen, and has seen such a positive response. Taylor Swift may be the most popular artist in the world right now, but her hardcore fan base are still majority female, and her songs about love, togetherness, tragedy, heartbreak, and partying with friends tend to cater more to a female demographic. Gaming still has a lot of work to do, but it’s fascinating to see a community like Elden Ring, full of git gud gamers committed to the most hardcore and dreary genre of gaming there is, open their arms to a Taylor Swift post. It’s ‘just a joke’, sure, but it’s a joke that requires you to engage with a lesser known, more lyrically complex, and heartfelt Taylor Swift song.
It’s not that long ago that gamers would not have tolerated engaging with something that was ‘meant for girls’. 15 years ago we had a word for men who showered, and treated it like it was an entirely new sexuality. Gaming has come a long way in the past two decades, more than it is sometimes given credit for given how far it still has to go. The Ivy/Elden Ring theory is complete and utter nonsense, but it’s the kind of nonsense that reminds me why I love video games so much in the first place. Now, roll on the winter launch of Dreadwolf - the Taylor Swift song The Egghead Mage Is Probably Going To Turn Out To Be Good Again In This One has some nice clues in it for that too.
