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Souls games.
I really want to like them too, but they seemingly aren't compatible with how I play games. I need to be able to put a game down for a couple of weeks and not feel like I'm back at square one because the specific muscle memory for that game has gone.
Just kinda kills the fun when the game is effectively telling me to get good, when I don't actually have the amount of free time IRL necessary to do that.
Soulslikes are fucking boring. I did that beat my head against the too-hard boss fight 289348923x when I was a kid because that was the only option and I had all the time in the world. Neither of those is still true.
for me it feels like they don't respect me as an adult. i need to be able to pause and save games. sometimes i get phone calls. sometimes the power goes out. sometimes i spill my drink. but no, it's all just "get gud".
also i just can't handle the aesthetics .
Souls games autosave constantly, you can quit out at any time and reload to where you were. The only exception being that if you quit out during a boss fight you'll have to restart.
Could you talk a little more about the aesthetics thing? I have no intention to pick a fight with you or tell you that your opinion is wrong, I'm just curious because I don't think I've ever heard anyone say that about them before
Also yes the no pausing thing is very frustrating
everything is dark and gray and meaty and slimy and gory and bloody and disgusting and sad and lonely and unpersonal and depressing and hopeless and evil and hateful and murderous and dead and off and...
even screenshots fucking wreck my mental health.
Try "Death Door". It is as hard but fun to play.
bro the difficulty is yet another reason why i don't want to get into it. you really think i'm in a mental state to be beaten to a bloody pulp after a rant like that? i gave up on tunic because the combat was too hard.
it is my firm belief that soulslikes have ruined metroidvanias because they now apparently all need to beat you to death for attempting to enjoy them.
Death's Door isn't nearly as difficult as the Souls games; it just felt like a solid metroidvania. I don't enjoy beating my head against high difficulty curves these days and it felt very approachable and fun to me. I even went back after my first playthrough and did the achievement where you only use the weaker umbrella weapon.
There are some stunningly beautiful scenes too though. I get what you mean regardless, its a grimdark setting for sure.
yeah let me just wade through this ocean of death so i can see a dying sun set over a dead world.
things may be beautiful in isolation but the context is what gives them meaning, and the meaning in most fromsoft worlds (and things inspired by them) is "look at how awful everything is here; it's your fault if it doesn't get better".
"haunting" is a better word than "stunning" there.
Omg I feel seen. Yeah I might not be fully unappreciative of the aesthetic, but shit can be dark and grim in real life as it is and it feels edgy and emo to go all gore gothic all the time. Every videogame trailer that starts with "shit's horrible around here" is an instant "next". Also I've always had a problem with eternal unliveable dungeons that make no architectural sense. Even though it is fantasy, it makes it far more childish, which matters if they're trying to take themselves seriously.
The intended meaning of most of from soft games is perseverance in spite of objective futility and the failure of society.
The world has died, society has failed, the powerful both good and bad have failed. No one, no matter their intentions can change the world for everyone around them let alone themselves by themselves. The good can not make the world better and the bad can not make it worse.
To inact change requires people to sacrifice and push forward. Even if it means their doom, even if it's pointless. For no good ever comes from half measures, from hiding away, or from denying that which is around them because it is unpleasant.
For only with perseverance and the lasting memory and hope of change being taken up be each successor can true change be made.
And even still, to fight to hold that change still, and deny the next generation their right to enact change is just as futile and harmful as not trying at all.
This not including the additional horrors and commentary from their armored core games or spin offs such as Bloodborne. Even those series still have this under lying messaging.
While you arnt wrong on the aesthetics and what they give off on a surface level. You clearly lack the context of the world and story of the main souls games beyond only what is on the cover. You are very much in the wrong and deeply at that, over what the meaning of the worlds of from soft games.
Haunting IS a better word to describe it then stunning tho.
For as "nuanced" as people like to claim the from soft games are. They are very very blunt with their messaging, even if the stories they tell are terribly convoluted.
...yes? i don't know how much more clearly i can spell out that what's on the cover is preventing me from playing the games.
until this sentence i was completely certain that you were agreeing with me
I disagree with you completely on this but I really enjoy your point of view here
i'm glad.
It's okay if grimdark doesn't appeal to you. I like stories about people doing the right thing in a hostile setting,
that was my point yes
Is it particularly more your fault that things don't better in Souls games than in any other game in which you are meant to save the world? I think the only difference is that in the Souls ones and others like them, the world is already horrible and needs repaired in some way rather than on the verge of becoming horrible
Interestingly Elden Ring went for quite a different direction. The world is, unquestionably, still an enormous mess that would be horrendous to live in, but they've left in far more of the beauty. I particularly like how every so often you hear hostile NPCs playing music or singing if they haven't spotted you yet, and how there's a little puzzle side quest about a painter; people are still making art in this ongoing apocalypse. One important allied NPC even actually openly makes an argument that the world is worth preserving if it looks like you're going for the "destroy everything" ending
Of course the atmosphere and gameplay are still heavy going, both in the Souls trilogy and Elden Ring. I get why that wouldn't be for everyone. It's like playable Cormac McCarthy stories, except you can punch your way out of most of the misery if you get it right
idk i can barely look at the games without feeling awful, im just going off of the opinion of others
Yeah. Heard so much about Elden Ring, and watched the kids play it, so I thought I'd give it a shot.
After about 45 minutes of wandering aimlessly and nearly as many deaths, I decided I wasn't having a good time.
I finally had the Get Good moment where everything clicks recently, its very real. Now im on Nightreign like its crack.
Level your Vigor, people. Farm that little village with the soldiers and get a few levels into your health bar. And boom! Now you don't die bc you missed a dodge. There's good starting gear there too.
Once you "get it", suddenly Elden Ring becomes like the coolest DnD game ever from an old-school perspective. Honestly, its not much different from Zelda - if you can play that, you can play Elden Ring i think.
That has been my experience with it too. It's probably more fun with good gear, but i just see hours on the couch in my future that I don't want to spend.
The gear would not have saved you. The game gets substantially more difficult as you progress, even accounting for your character getting stronger, and if you don't do a decent job of levelling up appropriate skills that will compound the issue. The starter gear for most of the classes is actually perfectly viable all the way to the end of the game for most players too, it's not notably weak at all
I love Elden Ring, but I can absolutely respect why it wouldn't be for everyone. No sense in playing it if you're not enjoying it, the point is still to have a good and/or interesting time
The beauty of Elden ring is that you can explore without actually killing much. Eventually you'll find some cool weapons or smithing stones to upgrade your current weapon and some runes to get a couple of levels (putting points on vigor helps a lot early on)
And then the game starts feeling less rough.
But I can definitely understand why it's not for everyone.
I feel similar. After having tons of people tell me for years I need to get into them, I finally played Bloodborne, which multiple people have told me is their favorite.
I pushed through it on my own first. I actually didn't die quite as much as I expected, though I definitely had to spend time watching YouTube videos and reading 3 different fan-made wiki's to figure everything out. I managed to finish it, but I didn't think it was worth it and would not have finished it if not for wanting to be able to talk about it with my friends.
Then I did another playthrough with a friend doing co-op. When it worked (ugh) it was a way better experience. Partly because of my previous experience - I had a better feel for how to build my character, I remembered most of the environments and enemy placement, and still had that muscle memory from my first run. Partly because it's better as a cooperative experience. Having an ally makes the world feel less desolate. Having another player to take aggro so you can heal is huge- some bosses almost feel like they were designed for multiplayer. And it's fun just cracking jokes and hanging out, making fun of how ridiculous some of the stuff is.
I still don't have the love for it that other people do though. I agree 100% on the aesthetic: everything in Bloodborne is just dark and wet and looks the same. FromSoft makes a LOT of game design decisions that are different from most other developers in terms of what they prioritize. Which is fine, but there are aspects of design where they clearly cut corners and the fanbae seems to laud it as a desirable artistic choice. I shouldn't need to spend hours watching YouTube and researching fan sites to learn how to play the game, and I would argue I shouldn't have to do that to appreciate the story. They simply do not respect my time.
The multiplayer barely works. It's restricted to bosses and the areas leading up to them, and costs Insight (a valuable and kind-of finite resource) to use. Simply connecting is a tedious pain. You can only play either completely online or offline, so if you want to play with a friend you have to accept your whole world cluttered with annoying and distracting messages from random players and the specters where other players died. And that also opens you up to having hostile players gank you. Like... Why can't my friend and I just pair up and play through the whole game together without inviting the rest of the internet too? Why does it cost Insight? Why are the caps for stats never communicated to the player? Why does the Hunter's Axe do primarily Blunt damage while the KirkHAMMER does almost no Blunt damage, and for that matter why aren't the damage types explained anywhere? I'm still not sure why some gems increase Attack, others increase Physical Attack, and others increase Blunt or Thrust, plus there are hidden damage types.
The game feels like it was designed to really get good on your second playthrough and beyond. Especially NG+, although even starting a fresh file again is much better than the first playthrough. Kinda reminds me of how some MMO fans like to say "it gets good after the first 100 hours". For most developers, the player onboarding experience is one of the most important parts to be developed, but FromSoft basically skills over that and outsources it to their community of hardcore fans.
The only real way to play full co op is using the Seemless Co-op Mod. Also disables other players jumping in to kill you. You would have to play on PC though.
Try Jedi Fallen Order. It's got a lot of the ingredients, but a lot shallower learning curve.
Same for me!