oh lol, I guess I wasn’t paying attention because I just assumed it was college the whole time.
isnt it just both things and your preference depends on where your design values lie?
What would these two opposing philosophies be called?
I mean, as long as it doesn’t evoke any memories of High School for me I should be fine…
The more I think about this the I realize I might just be insane.
UUUUUUUGH.
So first, don’t STOP POSTING. I value your opinion, bloody hell I listen to your podcast. But I also value other people’s opinions. I mean this is SB, and if you complain about a 'From" game it’s not going to just sit there, people will question it. Also everyone here is a big kid, and this hasn’t devolved to a youtube comment thread or anything… and hell sometimes it’s fun to prod people a little sometimes, since all we’re doing is taking video games far too seriously.
To Parker, much like you… man SB has some personalities, and I’ve seen people leave the forums simply to dodge that element but man, it’s better when the disagreements make for AMAZING reading.
Also Blueberry’s post “Fuck ‘good’ design though” was freakin’ hilarious. Like if you’re reading that without humor, I think you misread it. Beyond that, I think setting rules for how a game is supposed to be has lead to the sanitary design that brings so many modern games down, which the Souls games are most pointed to for breaking in the first place, so you throw that on and ya it was funny.
Lastly, YA’LL MOTHER TRUCKERS better learn to respect the Ubisoft design. I’ve been playing TC-SC-Blacklist and a lot of elements they get shit on for are present in that game, and it’s one of the coolest stealth shooters I’ve played in years. Playing it poorly I’m sure, but man the way the text pops up helps, the prompts do feel useful less to tell you what button to press but when you can given the systems oblique rules for what hitting A will do at any given moment. IDK I think there’s great stuff there and UBI gets too hard of a wrap for putting out some damn fine games.
1 Like
@Ni_Go_Zero_Ichi, I had a lot of problems with The False King but ultimately prevailed with a stick, stick, movemovemove strategy.
Still get a bit motion sick just thinking about it.
Also, I finally finished my Tower of Babel in Terraria. I’ll throw some pics up later maybe.
(I showed the missus and she’s like man you are on the spectrum, huh? Well I mean, I am, so yeah?)
1 Like
1 Like
Just to repeat what Felix said above, the key to False King is to always hold midrange distance. Not too close, not too far. Then his attacks will be A) harmless ranged pew pew, B) interruptible AoE, C) highly punishable committed strike. Holding that range almost amounts to a cheese: False King’s combat design is very polished by Demon’s standards (though pretty vanilla by Bloodborne standards which has taken his style of design much further) but this the big hole in it.
I think the highly variable experiences of difficulty that different players have with False King come down to whether they intuitively prefer to hold this range, or prefer to stay in his face. The latter type of player has a lot more trouble. And actually, on my second playthrough of Demon’s I had converted into the second type of player so I had more trouble with him than my first, until I consciously realized what was going on, at which point I crushed him.
1 Like
unrelenting brutal minefield of people agreeing and disagreeing with you to varying degrees while also trying to give advice on how to deal with the thing that’s giving you trouble
get out while you still can
3 Likes
less sarcastically:
i didn’t respond to this before because i didn’t want to be a broken record but: nah. the skeletons in 4-1 are maybe the only enemies in the series that can actually outpace you enough that you can’t just sprint by them all the time forever, and even then that only applies to areas like the very start where you can’t get them stuck behind walls or flinging themselves off of elevation. evasion is baked into the level design just as much as trepidation (hint: you’re invincible while picking up items/opening chests/passing through fog gates for a reason), especially in Demon’s where pathfinding and aggro ranges are very underdeveloped. i guess it’s a learned brazenness, but it’s a pretty important skill to develop eventually
Hey i will help you wreck anything jn demons under any stupid circumstances you give me.
Or i will just constantly invade and terrorize you.
I feel like if we actually gave advice and feedback after watching you play you would take that upsettingly.
both as someone interested in the topic and as a mod i’ve scanned over this conversation 9999 times since it started and i honestly don’t see any of those things anywhere. i think it feels different to be in your position and it can be difficult to see outside of it, but, honestly
summary of responses:
- you’re right it’s dumb but here’s why it’s not that big of a deal imo
- i actually think it’s great but for mostly unrelated reasons
- [i had no idea this was even a thing and] here’s why it’s manageable
- “good” design in the conventional sense isn’t necessarily a virtue or what souls is about
i’m pressing on this because i don’t want it to be added to a list of examples of stuff you think you can’t talk about because sb is a bunch of bullies and hivemind and etc. if you want to pm me examples of line crossing that don’t involve booji and parker’s dumb thing do so and i’ll take another look, but i honestly think it’s fair to say basically everyone has been meeting you halfway here
1 Like
I think part of the issue here is Ni Go is pretty much alone on his side of the debate, so it has that dog-pile feeling going on. Where I kind of feel like the majority of players would have agreed with him on their first play through and only retroactively look back at it and think ‘oh, that’s just Souls’.
Personally, I remember when the soulsuck thing happened to me the first time I freaked out and thought it was the biggest bullshit, and after it happened a second time I think I just thought fuck it and summoned someone to steamroll it for me. Now that I am experienced with the series I am not quite as bothered by it. I agree it is not totally out of place, since another sacred untouchable line that gets crossed when the important NPCs in your ‘safe place’ in the nexus can get permanently killed off because you rescued some guy.
As for the ‘just run past everything’ advice, normally I would agree with that , but 4-1 in particular is a lot less friendly to that tactic in my view, since you have that dragon that you have to get past every time and screw wasting 20 minutes shooting arrows and magic at it.
I think 4-1 is a slog (I ended up killing the dragon with a full party of summons + a invader that decided to be friendly shooting at it in my first play through lol), but that’s a separate issue from the level steal.
I don’t get where this “don’t talk shit about demon’s or you’ll be bullied by the sb hivemind!!!” came from
every time it comes up we complain about world tendency
2 Likes
I played Earthbound today, what a loud of crap! It’s just a Peanuts riff of Dragon Quest!
19 Likes
I’ve been divvying up the last few days between Furi and Pony Island.
I feel bad that Furi does so many cool things and the first thing I feel compelled to mention is how terrible the between fight walking sections are. I get that the game wants you to take in the sights, but I can choose to do that on my own. Give me the same walking speed I have in the rest of the game.
It’s odd though, one of my least favorite gaming tropes is the boss rush yet I generally like these boss-only games. I think in the former it is just that beating a boss should feel like an accomplishment, yet if I fall to the fourth I faced in a row and have to start over I feel robbed to a degree. Don’t even get me started on the “hey, these are all old bosses you have to face in a row because we need to pad things out” pox the Mega Man games cursed us with. Still, as long as the game respects that my victories are actual victories I’m cool with an endless parade of them. Maybe we should call them Boss Strolls.
Oh yeah, the game itself is snazzy and looks great. It reminds me a bit of El Shaddai, except that I like the actual game part here. I’m four bosses in and they’ve walked the fine line balancing complex with manageable almost perfectly so far. I wish I could get a better grasp on either the charged sword strike or the longer dodge but I’m rather subpar at that, mostly getting by with my reaction times instead.
Pony Island basically reminds me that I really dug Moon Patrol.
1 Like
the charged sword strike is almost 100% unnecessary, whereas there are a good number of times you need to use the longer dodge or the charged shot
everyone complains about the walking interludes but I really like them, it’s just the right amount of staging and they all feel so wonderfully distinct. I agree they’re a little clumsy but they’re well worth it
1 Like
It’s odd, the game is so gorgeous to look at that if I could move around at a decent clip I’d likely end up spending as much time in between fights just looking around. The thing is that I move so slowly that I’m basically holding down a single direction and heading right for the next battle as that alone takes so much time relatively speaking. I feel like there could be something to say about pacing and lack of control here, but as is I feel like I’m getting the same visual content except given to me in a manner where I don’t enjoy it nearly as much.