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Yeah that was totally directed at people with a physical handicap, strawman harder

If you're going to come into a game thread and argue that "the game expects me to learn from my mistakes and I think that's bad" then yes someone is going to point out you probably need to move onto another thread.

Has literally nothing to do with what you're talking about at all.

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9 hours ago, JLSigman said:

Because some of us have had rheumatoid arthritis for over 30 years and have no soft tissue left in our wrists and fingers, and would like to try this game without needing to preload on massive painkillers that I can't get prescribed.

Have you played Souls games before? I’m not sure how an easy mode would reduce strain in your case. An easy mode would ultimately have to come down to taking less damage and doing more damage yourself, but you’re still going to have to use complicated reflexive button inputs, this game especially compared to the first Dark Souls has much more complex controls.
 

But I ultimately come back to play styles in these games. You can get 300k souls without even fighting a single boss at the start. You can pump your HP up as well as Int and get an S Scaling magic staff and a spell that will wreck everything in your way. If your reaction times are slow you can play a heavily armored tank with a huge shield. You can summon friends or NPCs to help you with all the bosses. There’s endless possibilities in how to make the game easier.

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My 15yo is loooooooooooving it, he's a freak for these games. Me? Nope. I tried Bloodborne three times and just don't dig it, but watching my son play is fun!

Although he's hogging the system which means no H:FW for me until school vacation is done ???

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2 hours ago, Raziel said:

There was a "get gud" literally in this thread.

The devs don't gatekeep,, but their players sure as hell do.

 

I get it, if you love super hard stuff and want to play everything on the hardest setting, fine.  But don't shit on us that don't have the time to sink into it  or physical capabilities to play shit like you do because we're open to spend money on the game but won't because we can't fucking play it.


I don’t think you get it, because I don’t like hard games and never touch hard mode, and a huge amount of Souls fans are the same way. Hard mode is usually just tankier enemies with less player HP, while Souls strikes the perfect balance of most enemies being able to die in a few hits, but you as well. It’s not a hack and slash, it’s a position and stamina management game. A lot of Souls fans are just long time gamers who were unaware with how sick they were of handholding video games where victory was guaranteed. I can’t play games like Cuphead for more than 30 minutes without my eyes hurting.  I don’t like the easy mode and don’t want to play it since it’s too easy compared to normal, and I don’t get to see the full phases of bosses. It’s just not a game for me, it’s hard for the sake of memorization, Souls games are hard for the sake of figuring out creative ways to solve problems. I don’t feel the need for Cuphead to do more to be accessible to me, I can just respect that the creative vision for it doesn’t align with my taste. What specifically makes you feel like you “can’t fucking play” a Souls game? Which ones have you tried and what were your sticking points?

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They're all the same game with various re-skins anyway.  I have Demon's Souls on PS3 and Dark Souls on PC, aka "The FromSoftware Game".  They're both insufferable.

And yes, not including an easier mode is 100% a choice, because the people who make The FromSoftware Game are the ones who *MADE* it.  It's literally a choice they made in that process. 

I actually found even the Easy mode of Witcher 3 to be initially frustrating, because even that does ask you to understand alchemy and signs just enough.  Once you get those down, the game really does get better.  I have a NG+ on Blood & Broken Bones that I quit playing because I'd just played it so much at that stage, and even that game mode wasn't actually hard anymore.   But at least I was allowed the option of incrementally learning the game at my own pace.

Would I have played Witcher 3 if it kicked me straight into Death March, gave no quest markers, and let me access DLC-level regions by simply making a wrong turn out of White Orchard?  Fuck no. 

I make a choice, too; I vote with my wallet to skip being told that this "game experience", which is just a skeleton-themed or Samurai-themed or Lovecraft-themed rehash of the same bullshit, is worth my time.  It's too bad, because from a story and development perspective, Bloodborne is *exactly* the kind of thing I would want to enjoy, if I could actually play it for more than, I don't know, 3 fucking minutes without wanting to smash a controller.  I'm just not going to waste my time and money on something that exists to frustrate me, since the people who develop The FromSoftware Game want to cultivate the playerbase and attitude they cultivate because they probably are those people themselves.

But keep telling us we don't get it.  That's obviously what's wrong.

Edited by Contentious C
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No one is saying to anyone that if the game isn't your style, that you must buy it and play it. This is how From Software develops their games, this is the direction and style they make. It is absolutely their choice but one they clearly are comfortable making and aren't changing. Their fans enjoy it and its profitable for them. You may think the game is insufferable, and you're 100% entitled to that opinion, but millions of others disagree and those are the gamers that From Software is targeting.

Its perfectly fine if it isn't your style, there are lots of games I don't play because they aren't my style. I don't post in the Destiny thread because I don't like grindy online shooters. I don't expect Bungie to change Destiny for my preferences, I just don't play it. I wish Animal Crossing games had more direction and less goofiness, but I don't post that in the Animal Crossing thread every day, I just don't post there and don't play it. Those developers made the games the way they want, its not what I want, so I do something else. But no one can be surprised if they reply in this thread that someone is going to defend the game, its a thread primarily full of people playing the game and discussing it.

From Software games are complained about every release for the same thing, and that's why their fans keep replying the same way, its been the same argument for 12 literal years on repeat. And I get it, I actually don't love hard games myself and play games on either normal or easy because I'm old, but I sure don't expect them to change. Fans wouldn't keep saying 'git gud' if people wouldn't complain about a staple and intentional style choice of the franchise every three years, it can get tiresome to some so they get trolly and offensive to try to get people to move on. But hopefully no one here is taking any of it personally and I certainly don't condone personal attacks over a video game, its not that serious.

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I always wonder how people who say things like "The Souls games are hard for the sake of being hard" handled games like Super Mario Bros back in the day. Three lives and if you fuck up too many times you RESET THE WHOLE GAME. Unless, of course, you know the secret command in which case you just go back to the start of the world in which you died.

At least Mega Man let you keep levels cleared once you beat the boss but even that needed a passcode. Oh you lost your code? Time to start again, loser.

Souls games are super hard when you first start but I think if you grew up on the OG platformers and RPGs of the late 80's/early 90's then you've been through this before. It's why I've really enjoyed playing through them TBH, it reminds me of that amazing feeling of completing things like  Mega Man 3/X and FFVII when I was a kid.

 

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I'm not wading into this whole thing. I'll just say that Elden Ring reminds me a lot of Breath of the Wild, but if I had one criticism for the game, it's that the lack of any story or overriding narrative is disappointment. There are story bits here and there, but it's basically, you're a rejected person, and there are 5 lords you need to kill. I don't know why this entire land is flooded with monsters. At least with BotW, the explanation was that Ganon came back as prophesized, brought all of the blight and monsters with him, you wake up from your 100 year slumber, and you need to stop Ganon from reaching his full power or he'll destroy the world.

Any attempt at a story would have been nice. Hell, even getting a mission would have been cool. Every now and then I'll bump into someone who is crying about their castle being overrun or whatever, but that's about it.

I still like the game a lot, but it's just missing something.

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One other nitpick, and keep in mind that this is coming from someone who has very little experience with anything other than Dark Souls, combat is starting to feel a little...boring? I rolled an Astrologer. I almost never go with a mage class in these types of games. I think in any other open world game like this, so like any of the Bethesda games, I'm playing a murder hobo. It's what I do when I play D&D too. I just always play a dude who is going to be swinging big swords and axes. So I'm playing this Astrologer and 90% of my combat is casting that pebble, which does a buttload of damage to most things even 15 hours in. I've even upgraded to the meteorite staff and now have the spell that casts three huge rocks. That, coupled with various other things that the three spectral wolves just makes shit easy. I mean, if I see a giant, I drop those three wolves, and they just start going to town while I just cast spells from a safe distance. It's even more OP during boss (or are they miniboss) fights. I have fought 4 or 5 minibosses and haven't died once since getting those three wolves.

And if it's not that, then it's just roll, roll, roll, roll, swing my short sword, roll, roll, roll, etc. Or I'm on my mount and then just riding past an enemy, swiping at them, wondering how there wasn't any hit detection, then trying it again. 

I think this is where the complaint of these games being too difficult come into play. I don't need everything to be easy, but making it so that most enemies don't 1 or 2 shot you would go a long, long way towards making this more accessible to everyone. And hey, even BotW has plenty of enemies that will 1 or 2 shot you, but you also have more tools in your arsenal to make taking on a whole gang of gray Bokoblins fun. For example, if they're in one of those skull caves, those things usually have a lantern up above that will cause AOE damage when it falls. So you can initiate an attack that way by shooting the lantern down, ambush one of the last Bokoblins that leaves, then fight the rest.

It's been hard finding many instances of where it makes sense to vary my attacks. Even dungeons with tight spaces are pretty easy. Creep along, stomp, stun, cast pebble, cast pebble, keep moving. And every enemy, including bosses, just seem to come at you. There was one enemy in particular who kept his distance and would keep strafing around me like it was a UFC fight, but aside from that, enemies just charge at you and start swinging. Some kind of variety in how enemies attack you would go a long way.

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By the way if you go into the multiplayer item menu you can also press a button (Y on XBOX controller not sure on PS) to set multiplayer passwords. A lot of people from twitch are using FrankerZ as a Group Password (you can have multiple of those at once) and you can pick up random short buffs when some people beat certain stuff which is nice.

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On 3/3/2022 at 3:10 AM, Kevin Wilson said:

Its perfectly fine if it isn't your style, there are lots of games I don't play because they aren't my style. I don't post in the Destiny thread because I don't like grindy online shooters. I don't expect Bungie to change Destiny for my preferences, I just don't play it. I wish Animal Crossing games had more direction and less goofiness, but I don't post that in the Animal Crossing thread every day, I just don't post there and don't play it. Those developers made the games the way they want, its not what I want, so I do something else. But no one can be surprised if they reply in this thread that someone is going to defend the game, its a thread primarily full of people playing the game and discussing it.

The distinction here would be that while Destiny and Animal Crossing are well recieved neither is being lauded as one of the greatest games of all time. So I think these are likely attacks on the hype rather than the game itself.

There's no obligation for anyone to buy or play it but with a metacritic score of 97 it's fair to expect something more universally appealing beyond 'If you like Dark Souls then you'll love Elden Ring'. People who didn't like roguelites were happy to try Hades because its reception painted it as something different / better / more accessible than the norm. People who dive into ER using the same logic might feel disappointed if the same problems that you're tired of hearing people complain about are still there as before - the score suggests something transcendental, not just Dark Souls 5.

As someone who wasn't in love with the original Dark Souls I'm trying to work out which of those last two things this is myself.

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I continue to have no idea where I'm going or what I'm doing. I did a little bit of cheating to look on YouTube to find where the Meteorite Staff was located and where the spell to throw three huge rocks was located, but now I'm trying to not look anything up. I did wind up entering a castle and I think facing my first actual boss/lord. He was a giant dude with a big ol' sword and then midway through the fight he'd start wielding a giant yellow warhammer. I got him down to about 1/5 of health so many times, but could never finish him off. I'm just going to abandon the 4k in souls I had and come back to fight later.

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I have found so many ashes and not a single new short sword for my Astrologer. I'm tempted to re-roll because I've found plenty of weapons for other classes, but aside from the Meteorite Staff, I can't find a better melee weapon or any talismans that others have talked about that regen your health.

And yet, I keep searching and wandering around.

BTW, I think more than giants and bosses, those ballistas are the things I hate the most.

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2 hours ago, Craig H said:

I have found so many ashes and not a single new short sword for my Astrologer. I'm tempted to re-roll because I've found plenty of weapons for other classes, but aside from the Meteorite Staff, I can't find a better melee weapon or any talismans that others have talked about that regen your health.

And yet, I keep searching and wandering around.

BTW, I think more than giants and bosses, those ballistas are the things I hate the most.

Uchigatana and moonveil are both fantastic weapons for int builds with some Dex investment as well. I’m using both (currently 20 Dex 40 Int) and switch between them depending on what does more damage. Meteorite staff for casting as well. Moonveil has a fantastic ranged attack and it seems to be really popular. You have to beat a tough boss to get it though, which Id recommend you be around level 50 for. Uchigatana could hold you over until then, and only that can be buffed with magic armament.

Margit is the first major skill check of the game, I’d recommend clearing out the majority of Limgrave first, and being at least level 30. You’ll want your main weapon at +3 as well. Using a summon to draw attention away from yourself is a great idea, the jellyfish is very tank and helped me a lot. And make sure to use heavy R2 and/or jumping attacks to deal major posture damage, as well as guard counters, though they can be trickier to time. The longer you wait between these attacks the more an enemy will regain its invisible posture meter. Rock Sling can also break posture. Having a shield that has 100% physical block has been a game changer for me in this game, unlike other Souls games where it’s much easier to roll through everything. With a good amount of enemies, big ones especially, it’s usually best to actually fight them really close and strafe to one of their sides as opposed to fighting from a distance, though that’s sometimes necessary for magic casting. You can also grind up a bit, there’s a Boulder spot that’s really easy to farm, as well as two big enemies very close to it that give 45K and 75k runes with zero skill to beat. Best of luck, this is honestly the worst Souls game to start with.

Edited by A.M.B.
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I've got about ten hours in and have finally settled on an Astrologer build. My main issue is the left analog stick controls movement on the horse but it's also the dismount button. I am constantly dismounting while fighting the Tree Sentinel and I can't remap the button so it's getting pretty annoying. It's already bad enough that it makes you crouch too, I'm constantly crouching in the middle of fights because that analog stick is so sensitive. Still having a blast but the game is already frustrating enough without that issue.

 

Despite my complaining after I posted this I searched around and found a new staff and proceeded to curb stomp a few bosses. I love the option to free roam and just try something new when frustration sets in.

Edited by StevieNippz
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7 minutes ago, Control said:

Is anyone playing this on PS4? I figured I’d need a PS5 but turns out I’m an ignorant boob.

My son plays the PS4 version, both at his mom's on that system and at my place on the 5, he hasn't said anything about drastic differences between the two so there is that. He has been playing a shit ton of it, apparently he is one trophy away from getting the platinum, almost entirely by just fucking around in the world and not using a guide. 

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I'm 50 hours in with my dex build (Twinblade) and I'm continually just floored with this game. For fifty hours, every time I've picked up the game I've had some experience that has drawn wonder or excitement or fear from me. Usually the times where I feel fear are the times that I stop, even though there's a few sections of the games that are primarily full of a childhood fear of mine. Maybe I'll conquer it. Maybe I'll pay a friend with tacos to play through those areas for me. I'm undecided. At this point my opinion is the extremely reasonable take of "I think this is the best 3D game." Sadly, Tetris exists, so I can't say it's the best game of all time, but "tied with Tetris" is pretty fuckin good in my book! At the end of the month I'm going to be alternating between this and Kirby and that will be funny. I don't expect I'll have it beat by then because I'm taking my time and also I don't like playing games for more than two hours at a time.

I also know that I am probably not doing new game plus with this character, and I know what I'm doing for my next character: Max Poise. Sick of getting interrupted lol

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