This is a community for discussion, news, and memes pertaining to the video game sub-genre "soulslike".
Given Lemmy's size, the definition of soulslike may be treated relatively loosely. While games like the numerous FromSoft titles, the recent Star Wars Jedi games, Lies of P, Nioh and similar games should be the focus, games that incorporate soulslike elements - like Hollow Knight and Blasphemous, for example - may also be discussed here.
Basic Lemmy-quette applies. Additionally, since flairs don't exist yet, please do make sure to include a marker to denote what game your post is about in square brackets for clarity's sake. An example could be:
[BB] This enemy is so difficult!
or
[DS1] Anyone struggling with the gargoyles?
Friends:
Should you have any questions, please do let me know.
Disregarding lack of time, that is. Is there any particular mechanic you were not fond of? Was a game too difficult for you? Was it the overall enjoyment of the game?
Pic totally unrelated :]
Lords of the Fallen (remake) just felt a little too floaty to me. I might have ended up liking the game if I gave it more of a shot, but the very first boss was enough for me already. Maybe I'll get back to it at some point, but I doubt it
Right now, DS1. With the fucking Four Kings of all things. My save corrupted at Blighttown twice, and I kept going. I ran through Ornstein and Smough first try. My patience and my build are pretty good, I'd say. But I just cannot beat these fucking guys. To the point where I've just had to focus on other games for a little bit.
That fucking runback is so atrocious it deals psychic damage irl.
Praise Marika and her stakes.
Was thinking about it backwards and at first I was like "eh, not that bad after the ghost room elevator." Then I remembered you had to run all the fuck way from the very first bonfire in the game! Get lucky one of the ghost drops a couple transient curses too otherwise you only got like 4 tries unless you wanted to try the four kings with half HP.
Did you find the short route? You don't have to fight anything.
Down the stairs, over the bridge, run past the ghosts. Jump off the ledge. Run forward a bit and drop down, and you're outside the boss room. There might be a ladder you have to kick down first. It's been a while.
I hope this works because you just stopped me from going hollow if so
It does, yes. It's not a super obvious one to find, on your own, and it still takes almost a minute. But it's much better. Here: video guide.
edit: replying to the right person
I don't know where's a good place to upload anonymous video for free, but here's the route I usually take: https://www.viddler.com/UFko4q . Looks like they added some AI slop to the caption, heh.
It's a little sloppy because I haven't played in a few years, but thanks to steam's cloud saves I had this character ready to go.
You take a little falling damage, but I think there's a ring for that. You don't have to fight anything so long as you run past the ghosts.
That's really what's been getting me. And now the Undead Merchant has stopped carrying Transient Curse so idk what I'm going to do lol
There's an npc in new londo ruins that sells unlimited transient curses. You have to reach the top of the buiding that's across the second bridge, before you unlock the elevator to lower new londo ruins.
(If I also recall correctly the ghosts also drop a dagger or sword that can damage them without the need of a curse)
My instructions are shit sorry :P I'll try to get you a screenshot something.
The lazy way to beat them is to pile on the armor until you can barely roll, stack any stat buffs you can, buff your weapons, tank most of the damage, and heal when you need to.
Havel's armor has heavy poise and you can take some good hits without staggering.
If you have pyromancy, Power Within is a good attack and stamina buff.
The four kings are, unintuitively, a DPS check. Make sure your weapon is upgraded as much as possible, and play aggressively and you'll have more success. The real problems come when you can't kill them fast enough before a new one spawns in. Either way, good luck! It's a tough fight but if you beat O&S you can take these guys too.
Yes, all those I tried. I mean isn't it the whole concept of this type of games?
Waaaa it's too hard
-- me
Same. I have a bunch of them, have tried most of what I have, and really want to play through them cuz they sound really rewarding. Instead I find them rage-inducingly, frustratingly difficult and I’m just not that into being frustrated and mad for hours at a time. If I was, there’s some humans I could talk to for similar effect..
You're basicslly the Crestfallen Warrior at this point, muh dude.
This is probably an unpopular opinion, but I could not stand Sekiro. I'm not saying it's a bad game at all, but it's not for me. On just about every level it felt like a game that was designed to not appeal to what I enjoy, even though I've played all of Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and Elden Ring enough to complete 100% runs at lvl 1.
Overall, my impression of Sekiro strikes me as the devs saying "you play by my specific rules, or you don't play at all." I tried to like it, gave it over 15 hours of my time, and didn't enjoy anything other than some pretty environments. Probably never picking the game up again, even though I'm currently tempted to go back to Dark Souls 1 again for my annual playthrough.
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.
Dang.
I'd give just about anything to play this game again for the first time.
Yeah, I also bounced of hard of Sekiro.
Build variety is one of my greatest joys in Souls Games and while I occasionally enjoy parrying, to be forced to always parry and deflect didn’t jive with me.
Straight after beating DS3, I planned to go in release order and play Sekiro after two (?) days of playing I instead bought Eldne Ring. Now I have beaten ER so many times, even once all Bosses at RL1.
I will probably return to Sekiro and give it another go … eventually.
I loved sekiro tbh and I'm sorry to hear your experience with it. It's definitely not a game for everyone.
Like another commentor said I wish I could play it for the first time again. It broke my dodge only habit and when I returned to other fs games I can now parry like no one's business and it's breathed new life into my play styles. It also made for a fun time through expedition 33 for the parry mechanic.
I just said almost the same. But expedition 33 kinda lost me with option paralysis on the skills and the punishment for missing a parry. And that was on normal. The first optional boss you come across literally one hit KOs you. It took me three or four tries, but I powered through. But that lantern boss fucking broke me! Turned it to easy and it was way too easy. And it was like I was playing with cheat codes and I lost interest. Wish it had something in between 1hitKOs and immortality.
I personally found the chip-chip-EXECUTION pretty satisfying. Posture is a neat mechanic, in my opinion. I've done the first phase of the final boss that went like deflect-deflect-deflect-mikiri_counter-slash-jump-DEATHBLOW, and that was really satisfying.
It's not for everyone, of course, and that's fine.
I stopped playing DS3 because Silksong came out... I resumed last weekend -- after recently beating Silksong -- and while it took me a bit to remember what the hell I was doing and how to control my character, I managed to defeat a demon and stumble my way through most of Smouldering Lake (to the point that I found the boss, at least) so I guess I haven't forgotten everything in the interim.
Does stopping skong at the end of act 2 count as putting it down halfway? Cause that's what I've done
Sekiro: I guess it's unfair to say that I started, it wouldn't run on my video card beyond the intro.
DS3: I beat it but I had just run through DS1 and 2 and was too burnt out by the time I got to the DLC.
Elden Ring: multiple save file corruptions. Probably would have pushed through anyway but my video card took the whole rig down and now it feels too daunting to start over from scratch.
Bloodborne: Rom, the Vacuous Spider. Enough said.
Oh, there's another:
Ashen: stopped being able to schedule game times with my co-op partner.
Sekiro. Between the insane difficulty and me not knowing where to go or what to do next I just kinda stopped bothering
I so recommend you give it another shake. Everyone said it, but until like 2 years ago I didn't understand what everyone was saying. It truly is a rhythm game. Even the big gate keeper genechiro (? Dunno how to spell it) really only boils down to like 5-6 easily recognizable patterns. It took me 3 days of hours after work grinding, with YouTube's help. But I'm kinda into the banging of head against brick wall until it cracks.
But once it clicked, it really clicked.
After you beat him, you get a memory you can use to re fight him. I didn't even use one gourd. After that the game became so much easier!
The "parry" window is so much more forgiving than you're used to, you just got tap it kinda quick. Shit, you could probably spam it fast enough for most fights. But it's such a beautiful game!
Like I know all souls games are pretty in a dark way, but sekiro hits different with the actual foliage, wilting cherry blossom trees, non human skeleton like mountain sides. I beg everyone to try your best to get through at least to that boss, cause he really is a teacher more than a roadblock. You've surmounted seemingly impossible challenges before and came out victorious. You can do it again, it's so rewarding!
Your post makes me want to revisit it. I have platinum in From’s other souls games, but Sekiro had me tapping out not long after the giant drunk guy. It is beautiful, but I am terrible at playing with rhythm.
Genichiro Ashina I think the bastard's name is.
I think I'm going at him too soon, like I think the game expects me to go do other stuff first, but I can't resist the temptation to try anyways.
I've gotten to his lightning phase a few times but I can never stay alive more than a few seconds at that point.
I may go back to it yet. I do generally enjoy the challenge. But between him and the butterfly person boss, honestly more frustration with unfair bullshit than genuine enjoyment.
I stopped playing 3. I forgot what i was doing or i got lost. Idk.
I think I tried Dark Souls 2 for half an hour before I realised I'm too dopamine-deprived and not patient enough by far for this type of game. I admire anyone who makes it through even one souls-like.
It's an unpopular opinion in the community, but I like ds2. I dunno what order I put in it with the all the others from fromsoft, they all got their own charm to me. DS2 's main one is it's the only one that's optimized to any degree! That souls is as about as resource intensive as portal 2! The igpus I've seen it getting 60 fps on are fucking crazy!
Twice, actually. First time was the Ringed City DLC for DS3. I was already kind of burnt out after the first DLC, Sister Friede was really challenging for me and I hated how long phase 1 and 2 was, only to get one shot instantly at the start of phase three. Took me a really long time to beat her. Then in the Ringed City for some reason I struggled with the Demon Prince even more. And it had all the same things I hated: a gank fight (I struggle with tracking multiple objects so any gank fight feels almost impossible) and a super long phase 1 that just feels boring and like it deliberately wastes your time. And I don't know. Eventually I just realised I wasn't having any fun. Didn't keep going past Demon Prince, and then Elden Ring came out and I just never went back to the DS3 DLC after, and after ER I kinda moved on to other things.
And then recently it was GRIME. I was already kind of feeling Soulslike fatigue I think, and I think the game was just a bit more difficult than I was expecting. Got to the first major boss and it was a 2v1 gank fight. Eventually got through it - only to find out it had a second healthbar and then get instantly one-shot. And I just kinda realised maybe I just need a break from feeling like I suck at everything for a while. Or maybe I've finally gotten too old for Soulslikes and really difficult games. I didn't really feel that fire or that need to overcome the challenge that I used to feel that would lead me to spend days working on a boss until I beat it. I just felt tired.
GRIME looks interesting. I’m book marking it.
It's a really good game, don't let my experience with it scare you off. The world building is awesome, the graphics are beautiful and the art style is gorgeous and very unique. It also has a very interesting character customisation system where you absorb aspects of enemies.
I still half-plan (or at least hope) to return some day, I think I just need a long break.
Dark Souls when I got my ass handed to me repeatedly in Blightown. Came back a couple of months later and started over.
Dark Souls 2,3, and Bloodborne.
I'm just not good enough.
I had 20-30 hours into each one, and just wasn't making progress. Even if you're enjoying the story, not being able to progress just kinda sucks.
DS1: Really enjoyed it until the pitch-black area. People convinced me to go back to it, and I eventually made it to the bottom of the pit... but I hadn't rung the second bell, so the path was closed. (There's no fast travel in DS1, so I would have to climb all the way back out).
Sekiro: Grapling hook is fun, stealth is fun, thought the combat was dumb and too clunky. Gave up at the first fire troll or whatever it was. Absoluetly loved Nine Sols though.
In general I have no tolerance for "just git gud" as an excuse for bad game design. If it's not fun, then I don't play it.
Oof there IS fast travel in DS1 after you reach Anor Londo 😅 you really aren't meant to be in the tomb for the giants until you've unlocked it
I had to take a break the first time I got to O&S in ds1. I hadn't yet accepted that being defeated is okay, so I just got really frustrated.
I barely started Nioh and I was struggling, I got preoccupied with other things, next thing I know, its been years
I loved Nioh. When Nioh 2 went on sale, I picked it up cheap, and played about an hour.
I cannot beat Roland in Another Crabs Treasure and I'm tired of trying to grind / learn new builds to beat him. I tried even cheesing him with a wall clip bug that's probably patched now. I am just tired of it.
I haven't finished ER, I am savoring it, not done, just pausing for a bit
I never finished Sekiro for the same reason as ACT, I keep getting to the drunken house fire boss and getting my ass whooped. I want to try it again sometime, give it another go. I'm pretty sure this will be my 4th attempt to start over.
If by drunken house fire boss you mean ishin, that's an optional early endgame and not advised for a first play through.
If you mean big ol heavy dude with the big ass sword and vomit, go to the temple and practice jumping counters
Do it... use the gun...
Original Lord's of the Fallen because it was so bland, I made it about an hour in.
The Surge like 75% of the way through - I slogged my way through most of the game, but the level design towards the end was lacking and I wasn't interested in continuing, it was too difficult.
Elden ring... I got to the big gold guy and sat in it for months then I hopped back in, beat him then stopped playing again... This is my playthrough I started when it released.
Orphan Of Kos, because I knew it was going to take a few attempts and then Silksong came out.
Lady Maria about six years ago because I was just chewing through my vials and needed a more chill game for a while. I started from scratch when I came back this year and beat her fairly easily.
Dark Souls 3. I have all these huge build plans and want to revisit it, but I always lose interest super quickly after thinking about all the mediocre areas i gotta get through and frustrastion of the enemies that almost encourage you to just run past all of them. Really sucks too, cuz the endgame stuff is great, I just cant be bothered with the tedium of everything between Undead Settlement and Irythil or whats its name.