Elden Ring Leak Hints At Crystal Ball Item That Was Cut From The Game

AAA games like FromSoftware’s Elden Ring are big projects requiring hundreds of people, thousands of hours, and millions of dollars. Unfortunately, none of these resources are infinite, and compromises are often necessary if developers intend to release their games on time and within the budget. As a result, game developers often leave many things on the cutting room floor.

However, dummied-out content isn’t necessarily gone, and modders and dataminers can find bits and pieces buried in the code. This is the case with St. Trina’s Crystal Ball, a recently discovered item cut from Elden Ring at some point in development.

A member of the Elden Ring modding Discord known as EvilCookie found the item description in the code, with Twitter user JesterPatches sharing it in a recent tweet. The discovery includes both an icon and what would have been the Crystal Ball’s in-game description. It would have allowed players to extract a crafting ingredient called Dream Mist from sleeping NPCs. According to the items’ lore blurb, Dream Mist was used to create potent Flasks of Wonderous Physick, a type of potion in Elden Ring. It’s not clear exactly what effect the Dream Mist would have had, but the text implies it triggered some sort of frenzy effect.

The item description also notes that the crystal ball bears the symbol of St. Trina, a mysterious character whose name appears on many other items in Elden Ring. A carving of a young woman, presumably St. Trina herself, clings to the right side of the ball. As one commenter pointed out, the top of the ball also shows a decoration resembling Trina’s Lily. Said Lilies are crafting items that in lore serve as a symbol for the saint, so their inclusion in the item’s design makes perfect sense.

While the crystal is an interesting cut item, it’s reportedly not the only bit of canned content related to Elden Ring’s mysterious saint. In the game’s lore, even St. Trina’s followers can’t agree if their saint was a woman or a young man, only that they mysteriously vanished long before Elden Ring takes place. However, a cut quest reportedly would have had players discover that St. Trina is actually Miquella, one of Elden Ring’s god-descended Empyreans. Reportedly, the cut quest also would have solved the mystery of Miquella’s fate, revealing that he was “sleeping” but still alive. However, it’s not clear if FromSoftware considers any of this information to still be canon.

As for the Crystal Ball’s intended function, one fan’s theory is that players would have somehow used it to fill an in-game Bestiary. Elden Ring’s files contain 128 unused icons depicting 64 enemies and NPCs. Each icon has a light and dark variant, which some Elden Ring fans believe would have served as “discovered” and “undiscovered” entries or something along those lines. However, there’s no hard evidence of a connection between the cut icons and St. Trina’s Crystal Ball.

Elden Ring is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.