I have played all soulslike games except the original Demon Souls and completed all of them except the first Dark Souls. I was familiar with how the lore is laid out in these games but I never found the lore compelling enough.
I think compared to Dark Souls, Elden Ring’s lore is much much more interesting. I say this as someone who never took interest in high fantasy settings like LotR, Game of Thrones, etc. But I really enjoy Elden Ring’s. Don’t know why. I feel it is mostly because of the plot is convoluted yet coherent. There is a sense of mystique because much of the world’s ontology is written rather than shown so it feels like reading a book or being told a story orally. It’s a really unique way of experiencing high fantasy fiction.
I had heard of VaatiVidya and watched all his Elden Ring videos. Then I stumbled upon some guys called Tarnished Archeologist and SmoughTown who I find much better. I have some tens of hours of their video in my backlog and I really enjoy watching them when I have time to unwind.
It’s not clear how much work on the lore was done by Martin vs. the folks at From Software. The only concrete words about this are from one Miyazaki interview where he says something like Martin writing the lore of the times that preceded our PC’s story which sounds like 90% of the lore. On the other hand, it could be a mistranslation because all the important characters look very much like From Software creations. On the other hand, the instances of vague incest sound like straight up Martin’s wheelhouse.
Unclear, for sure, but it seems like GRRM’s role in the story and lore may have been very minor.
Me, I see a lot of Martin DNA in the interplay between the god and demigod characters, and all the backstabbing and plotting going on, while stuff like the Elden Ring itself, and the Erdtree and all the mysticism of the world reads very FromSoft.
So it seems like GRRM had a substantial role in how it all turned out.