Reflecting submerged in deep feelings, Ninjaman ponders each and everyoneās thoughts here.
5 Likes
the game is good, is my official take now.
the monastery area is probably my favorite so far. itās exactly what i want the game to be, and even the Armored Warrior fight ended up being fun after the first initial frustrating failures.
i hope i donāt hit a brick wall with a boss again, but it feels like maybe iām getting the hang of things now.
1 Like
I just beat Genichiro Ashina finally. This fight more than any other made clear to me how creative youāre allowed to be with this gameās combat system. I had been fighting him and doing decently well using a totally ridiculous looking strategy: I was constantly running in circles around him, dodging out of attacks and punishing him in tiny windows of vulnerability, chipping his health down slowly until I could get the visceral attack on him. Occasionally I was throwing down fireworks too, to get an extra free hit in.
This was working but it took forever, and when I got to his final form it was no longer as viable of a strategy. So I watched a youtube video of the fight and the person was doing something completely different! Instead of running, dodging, and slowly whittling him down, this person was running right up into his face, hitting him to initiate counterattacks, and then parrying those counterattacks as often as possible. In this way, they barely hit his health but knocked his posture down quite rapidly, getting that visceral hit like 5 times faster than I had been.
So I decided to try and replicate this playstyle, and what do you know, it worked! My other style was totally viable, but playing this way (probably closer to how the developers intended) was much quicker and more consistent.
You gotta love that the game allows this kind of variability. I feel like the combat manages to be more creative than Souls games, even after eliminating builds and constraining your armor and weapon choices. Itās pretty impressive design!
6 Likes
This is exactly what I love about the game! You nailed it! These are the best boss fights From has ever done because, for the first time, it feels like I can invent my own strategies to play. Compare the Genichiro fight to Gascoigne and its night and day how much more rewarding it is to take on Genichiro
4 Likes
Yes, and not only that, when I switched fighting styles, I didnāt have to respecc, or go upgrade a different weapon type, or anything like that. I just played differently. If this were a Souls game, Iād have had to spend hours completely redoing my build in order to shake things up this much.
2 Likes
This is objectively wrong and Iāve already covered it upthread, but to reiterate, you take MORE posture damage than just blocking if you mash L1. You CAN mash L1 because you can get a feel for the timing that way, and any accidental deflects you get can increase the posture damage on your opponent
2 Likes
Anyway, I fought and beat the secret optional end-game boss and it took meā¦ 4 tries? to beat it. It sucked, because I had to play it like I was playing a bloodborne boss fight, but it wasnāt too tortuous. It takes way too long, and its entirely based on stabbing the boss in his big chungus (which hilariously shakes with every hit) but nonetheless.
So I started new game plus! It took me 1.5 hours to get back to Ashina Castle this time around, even though now the game mechanics were tweaked to be less forgiving! 0 deaths on any minibosses or bosses so far.
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Again, mashingās a reliable strategy that will allow you to beat every boss. Iād recommend it for a first playthrough or at the very least a first attempt. Many experienced players and speedrunners are still doing it, so regardless of what happens, itās more effective to mash than not. Itās a better fallback strategy than trying to get the timings if youāre not 100% confident, because losing health costs a lot more than losing posture (also, the difference between mashing and not mashing is marginal in terms of damage to posture - whereas damage to your health is much more likely if you arenāt mashing).
Right, all Iām saying is it is not a 100% no-drawbacks strategy.
It becomes more of a drawback in new game plus where even regular deflects give you posture damage, so mashed deflects are a great way to completely fuck up your posture.
I didnāt learn how to kick in dark souls until new game plus, which meant that I fought those really basic shield enemies by just circle strafing them until i was behind them.
Whatās wrong with a fromsoft game having a combat system with secret techniques to be found only through experimentation?
3 Likes
This is true, and Iāll retract my earlier statement about there being no drawbacks to it. I simply wasnāt aware of them because they didnāt seem like there were until I started paying a lot more attention to how the posture gauge was filling. I didnāt really focus on the gauge when I was focusing so much effort on getting all the timings down. I simply didnāt have time to focus on it and I couldnāt take eyes off the fight to watch it until I introduced mashing into my play.
I think itās another failing of the design that thereās not a better visual cue thatās indicated where your character is so you can see it on them rather than having to look up, but a lot of the UI elements in this game are honestly really awkward regardless so itās not too surprising.
Again, just stating this as someone whoās never been able to get timings down and has to rely on this strategy to a greater degree than most, I suspect.
1 Like
Anyway, I went into this game actively pretending that I had never played a souls game before, assuming that no souls mechanics would show up. This game clicked almost immediately for me, because I spent zero time trying to reframe the tutorial messages into a mentality of āthis is like dark souls but with this thing changed.ā
I went through hanbeiās tutorials to make sure I understood how the combat worked and I literally thought the main complaint about this game would be that it was too easy for a fromsoft game. Itās seriously the easiest time Iāve ever had playing through one of their games! Iām the person who overused co-op to get through every Souls game and I was able to finish this faster than most, by myself. So, indeed, while this wasnāt without challenges, it was never something that totally overwhelmed me.
2 Likes
I certainly think there are a lot of people who have had quite a lot more trouble with it than you. What the reason is for that Iām unsure (the reasons seem pretty varied), but thereās stuff all over the place about how difficult it is, so I think you getting it down might just be that it clicks with you. And Iāve heard that, āit just clicksā from a fair amount of players as well, and they seem to go through it fairly quickly and have very few problems. But I think more players than not find this game far tougher than previous From games.
Iām finding it easier than Dark Souls in the same way itās easier to eat a live porcupine than it is to eat a brick. At least one of them seems possible
5 Likes
I just spent 4 hours on L.B., who fell to the swiftness of my sword as so many have fallen before
The upgraded shuriken + follow up slash (whatever itās called) owns hard, you cover so much distance. I didnāt figure that out until the end and I think that technique was what put me over the top.
Yeah last boss is trying, Iāve got a couple hours like 30 tries and knew how to control the fight by like a dozen in - thing is it can be very drawn out and exhausting so for the first time in ages, straining on my right wrist! And thatās how the last phase gets slippery. Gotta take a breather will do so much better when I return.
Fuck yeah one of my favorite boss fights ever
1 Like
on new game plus, beat genichiro in the tutorial, and the genichiro rematch isnāt to be fucked with. But, 4 hours in, Iām already going for the senpou temple boss, which is a charming and straight forward one. Iām an idiot and Iām going to try for one of the endings that has extra bossfights, in a position where the gameās challenging my skills all over again.
Anyway, thereās some great storytelling tricks in this game that you only see on replay. A lot of things that were obscure the first time through are self evident now. The storytelling is some of the most straightforward From has done but its still well executed and there are plenty of side mysteries to occupy the lore nerds.
Obvious one, but Robertās Firecrackers and the knight shouting Robert when he dies, seems pretty clear that the knight was seeking a means of immortality to save his kid
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finally challenged Lady Butterfly last night. tough cookie! need to try working the shurikens in
i love my rope dad
1 Like