Why Are From Soulslikes Different?

I had barely played soulslikes before Elden Ring so when I lost track of time and accidentally dumped 350 hours into it, I figured I should pay my respects to its forebears. I played through the whole From Software catalog, and after staring at the gameless void on the other side I turned to other developers' soulslikes. It was there I learned that there's nothing like a From soulslike. There's…