I’m a big fan of souls-likes, but it wasn’t always like this. For a long time I looked askance at fans of the genre with sincere misunderstanding. Everything I knew about these games repulsed me, and only Bloodborne managed to interest me and open my eyes to a whole direction.
How did he do it? It’s actually quite simple: with your visual style. The Gothic spiers against the backdrop of a fiery red sunset turned out to be so impressive that I couldn’t resist buying the game. But even at the time of purchase I didn’t believe that I would get through it, and therefore I specifically waited for the next discounts. Naturally, I had heard a lot about the high complexity of From Software projects, and therefore my expectations were quite low: wander through the first locations, look at the local architecture with great interest, soak in the atmosphere of Yharnam, and after several dozen deaths, abandon the game without regrets and never return to it. It turned out a little differently: more than a dozen playthroughs, platinum, fan art, voluntary help for newcomers during the distribution of the game in PS Plus, dozens of additional hours in dungeons (my cups). Why, I even convinced a girl to play. No joke.
Why am I doing this?? Besides, it seems to me that souls-likes have a problem with positioning. If they pushed players away in the early stages of playthrough, it wouldn’t be so bad. But they often repel potential buyers at the outset.
Take, for example, the setting of what seems to be the majority of well-known projects in the genre: fantasy, even “dark”, is so boring and basic in a bad sense that this alone was enough for a dramatic drop in the level of my interest. For the same reason, I have always been somewhat dismissive of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion – even though it has a lot of interesting decisions and findings, the very aesthetics of classic fantasy without distinctive features makes it look much weaker than other games in the Scrolls series.
Moreover, in the case of Dark Souls, this opinion is unfair. It (as well as its sequels, Demon’s Souls, and Elden Ring) has enough unique visual solutions, all sorts of stuff and game, and at least just unusual designs. However, in promotional materials and even in many video essays, the emphasis, as a rule, is on castles, knights, dragons and other standard fantasy stuff. Of course, with the right degree of interest, you can notice a huge flying stingray with a landing of small stingrays, and crystal caves with invisible paths, and a huge aggressive tree with eggs, and much more. But where does this interest come from if the first impression is already negative??
You could argue that these would be spoilers. But, to be honest, all the really important spoilers for the first experience in these games lie rather in the gameplay area. Roughly speaking, there is absolutely nothing wrong with demonstrating the appearance of the boss – it is enough not to demonstrate a winning tactic. Or a secret third phase.
In addition, you can see that this is an area of taste. That’s all true – and, probably, there are even big fans of dark fantasy who sincerely rejoice at any new game with a similar aesthetic. But still, imagine if you saw a promotional video for any part of Dark Souls at some conventional Summer Game Fest among a bunch of other projects – and at the same time you would have no idea what kind of series it is and who From Software are. Would you be interested in what’s happening on the screen?? Or it would mix with the rest of the white noise from games whose names you can’t even remember ten minutes later? "Immortals of… what? Shadow of… whatever you call it?»
Finally, we can say that these games generally do not “sell” themselves through their appearance. For that matter, none of them could boast of high-tech even at the time of release – well, except for the Demon’s Souls remake for PS5. The main thing is to convey the idea of complexity and darkness to the hardcore audience. That these projects do not pity you, but challenge you.
So: this is related to my second complaint about positioning. As I mentioned above, stories about complexity only turned me off. It’s not that I was afraid of it: if a project interested me, I was happy to replay it on maximum difficulty, even if it was not very well balanced. For example, I completed Alien: Isolation on Nightmare without any problems – the same difficulty level where even the motion sensor fails, glitches and is not a reliable tool for tracking the Alien’s position. Even raising the difficulty right during the first playthrough, if I felt that “Normal” did not offer me enough challenge, has happened more than once: I remember, among others, Assassin’s Creed: Origins (in my opinion, the best part of the “mythological” trilogy).
But when the entire identity of the game is formed around overcoming, there is a feeling that there is no special value in it anymore. That this is almost one of the so-called rage games for loud streamers, the whole point of which is precisely the suffering of the player for the amusement of the public.
Only thanks to video essayists from their YouTube subscriptions, who analyze games in depth, I found out that the appeal of the same Dark Souls is not at all. What’s interesting about it is that it has interesting lore – this whole theme about the fading world, as well as a diegetic explanation of video game conventions like "why neither the player nor the enemies die for good"?» That it has an excellent design of the gaming space with interconnected locations in the spirit of metroidvanias. That many battles are truly epic and exciting. That the game itself is quite flexible, and with a strong desire to make it different – one hundred percent legitimate! — in ways you can simplify it for yourself almost to the point of “press X to win”. I wouldn’t have known this from the advertising campaign or the prevailing discourse around the series.
Who is more to blame for this?? The toxic part of the community that gave birth to the “git gud” meme and still, judging by the discussion around Shadow of the Erdtree, uses it rather unironically? Or the marketers who enthusiastically seized on this, excuse me, selling point, happily giving the complete edition of the first Dark Souls the “motivating” subtitle Prepare To Die? To be honest, it’s not very important.
Another thing is more important: it seems to me that all these games would have benefited if there had not been this aura of inaccessibility around them. Because the scary truth is that they… are not complex. You just need to learn how to play them – like any other game. And yes, the “language” that Dark Souls “speaks” differs from the “language” of conventional Ubisoft games or Sony exclusives more than the latter do with each other. Therefore, it takes a little longer to learn this “language”. But it’s still not rocket science. Ordinary perseverance and attentiveness are much, much more important and useful here than reaction speed or some other natural talent.
If I had known this, I would have jumped into souls-likes much earlier. And many of the potential players or even fans have not yet “jumped in”. And there is absolutely nothing good about this – well, unless, of course, you are an elitist who gets moral satisfaction from the knowledge of belonging to a small group of gamers who have completed a (supposedly) difficult game. But if you are one of them, I can recommend you something in the spirit of rom hacks for Mario. Or those legendary custom levels for Super Mario Maker, whose completion percentage hovers around 0.01% of those launched.
Personally, I don’t have any objection to the idea that more people will play souls-likes. For me, these are all positives: for developers and publishers – increased sales, for fans – more discussions and fan content in general, as well as partners for a fun co-op.
I think we should stop seriously calling these games difficult. In the end, Elden Ring is no longer much more complicated than some “The Witcher” or modern “Assassins” – and almost any problem in it can be solved in the same way not only with a well-assembled build, but also with a banal overlevel. The exception here is perhaps Sekiro, which is why I don’t deliberately mention it, but it’s usually not even included in full-fledged souls-likes.
The rest of From Software’s games are very free and allow you to experiment a lot or even openly “abuse” yourself. They are not complicated – at most, complex. But even this complexity is more accessible than, say, in 4X strategies. If only because interaction with deeply hidden mechanics and soul-like systems is entirely at the discretion of the player, and to get through to the final credits, some simple and accessible tactic like “hide behind a shield and counterattack in time” is sufficient. If you describe the passage in such terms, then somehow it doesn’t at all look like “hardcore”, does it??
These games deserve a bigger audience. These worlds deserve more inhabitants. These lanterns deserve more little messengers crowding around.
Let’s not discourage people from enjoying https://fruitychancecasino.uk/games/ these projects.
P.S. In fact, my opinion is even more radical: for all the malleability of souls-likes, they would absolutely do well with more traditional difficulty settings. Just as they didn’t interfere with other complex games: Darkest Dungeon, Celeste, Dishonored – the list goes on for quite a long time. But you may not be ready for this conversation yet.
P.P.S. Well, if I interested you with the phrase that I managed to convince my girlfriend to play Bloodborne, then I have great news for you. We have a whole episode of our podcast “Gamer Girl” just about this! And about exactly what arguments I used, and about how she eventually completed the game and what she liked most. We will be glad to all listeners :3
Dark Souls
Dark Souls II
Bloodborne
Dark Souls III
Elden Ring
Demon’s Souls (2020)
Best comments
I’m about to be crucified here on a cross, hanged and burned, but I honestly don’t understand what’s so funny about memorizing all the Boss’s attacks, and then just attacking him in time. No, of course this happens in many games and in slasher films, but a mistake literally costs you your life. For what?? Sitting and smothering yourself for hours sometimes, so that? Get satisfaction from lost nerves? I am Maxim Saladilov’s henchman, I just start to get furiously furious with such games and it doesn’t bring me any bliss.
Otherwise the temperature will rise or they will stop selling beer?
I’m frankly sorry to waste time tryharding bosses and delving into Miyazaki’s specific presentation of the plot; I’d rather play something that will definitely bring pleasure and won’t consume so many resources.
But I just like the visual (well, except for these anime crap the size of an oar).
I’ve been steadily trying to get into the genre for a long time, because everyone likes it, everyone adore it, these games change the mind, provide a unique gaming experience, bring back joy to life, etc.d., and I consistently fail at it. Because every time at some point you ask yourself: why am I even doing all this?? To what? For what??
I tried The Surge, Nioh, Code Vein, Sekiro: Shadows Dies Twice, Asterigos: Curse of the Stars, Lies of P, Dark Souls and Flintlock: Siege of Dawn. I liked the feature of cutting off limbs in The Surge, but after clearing the first location the game got boring. Nioh broke me even at the training stage, locking me in the same room with two enemies: after almost half an hour I tried unsuccessfully to kill them over and over again, I realized that something was very wrong with me, and put the game in the far corner of the backlog. In Code Vein, Asterigos and Flintlock I just didn’t like the combat, everything felt kind of unresponsive and with micro-delays, most likely, in fact, everything is fine with them and it’s just me being an asshole. In Sekiro, on the contrary, I really liked the combat system, but after three hours spent in the same corridor from the fire to the mini-boss in the first memory, all the pleasure from it evaporated. I liked Lies of P until opponents appeared with delays in attacks of a couple of seconds – what’s that all about?? I liked Dark Souls the most out of the entire list, largely due to the level construction, but the constant Groundhog Day at some point just got boring. And in all these games I don’t like the gameplay enough to sit and spend hours killing the same spearman with a shield in a narrow passage in order to move on and die through a couple of opponents.
And now I read all these joyful posts and discussions in which people describe what a thrill they get from overcoming difficulties, that, they say, how cool it is when after n attempts you kill the hated boss, and I don’t understand why I don’t have such and such? Why don’t I experience, after successfully completing a segment that has been jacked up several dozen times or killing a boss on 15-25-35 attempts, nothing but irritation, disappointment, fatigue and self-contempt?? What am I doing wrong, what is wrong with me? Every time I feel inferior, because everyone likes this gameplay, everyone enjoys it, but I can’t get into it. At the same time, I love Sifu, which is not soulslick, but also kind of complex and designed for replaying the same segments. Why souls don’t click anything, I just don’t understand. I’ll continue to eat cactus, apparently.
So the funny thing is that you don’t actually need to memorize the attacks. Well, maybe just a couple of the most dangerous ones. And so – you need to learn how to play. If you have a good feel for the combat and how enemies in souls-likes can generally behave, then you already intuitively feel the moments in which it is permissible to attack, and the moments in which it is not worth it. In this case, many bosses can be completed literally on the first try.
I still couldn’t get into this genre. And these games are really, for the most part, not difficult, but tedious and annoying. The combat is based on rolling or blocking with a shield when locking on the enemy. You can say that there is a parry, but the devil knows which attack of this shapeless carcass can be parried and which cannot. Running from the fire to the boss is tiring. Reducing max HP upon death is annoying. Console control is annoying. And although respec is possible, all the words about its ease are a lie. And if everything is simple with stats, then for normal enchantment you have to farm and farm fluffs. In general, I think that the need to upgrade weapons is one of the main disadvantages of such games.
It’s also very annoying that opponents are always faster, stronger and taller than you. You are a bug who defied the gods. Yes, in fact you win. But I never liked the feeling of an unequal battle.
Why eat a cactus if you don’t have to eat a cactus?.
It bothers me more that other games are starting to push soulslike combat and elements.
The funny thing is that of all the From creations, I was only interested in Sekiro. Well, I got interested, I did everything I could in it and completed it 6 times for sure
Dark souls repelled me not even with their complexity, but with their curvature and attitude towards the player. All 4, in my opinion (except Bloodborn, I haven’t played that) are designed to be difficult. But the difficulty lies in the crooked performance and dishonest attitude towards the player. From hitboxes the size of Mexico to very logical riddles that require you to bring a key from one end of the map to a stone at the other and go on a date with it so that it shows you where to use the key. At the same time, the bosses, for all their famous “impossibility,” are actually not very difficult. They have quite learnable patterns. It’s even nice to fight with them. Until reading inputs and combos of 40-odd hits appear. And all this together makes me perceive souls not as something difficult, but as something dishonest.
Well, the lore and visuals haven’t attracted me since the first part, because 2 Souls, 3, and Elden Ring are the same game in terms of visuals.
But I gave the blog a plus. Cool written
You won’t believe it, but I don’t drink beer and I’m not a fan of alcohol in general, but from this wonderful bracelet, you can understand that I also visit a sports complex and I know what physical muscle pain is and, by the way, it relaxes well, unlike a battle with some Raddan, so there’s no need to make hasty conclusions about other people here. Based on your statements, one can easily think that the only thing you are proud of is completing these very souls, and if everyone is given this opportunity, you will simply disappear into the stream of people, because everyone will be able to beat any boss and your words “I played in pristine difficulty” will be of no use to anyone. After all, there are always hardcore players and other people have a neutral attitude towards them, because they can play on their own difficulty. So as long as you hold a whole niche of games that are not available to everyone, you are proud of it. But is this a reason to be proud??
I like that even neutral comments from true soul connoisseurs sound very condescending
Listen, well, I agree about the choice of difficulty or some other similar settings (see. postscript in the article). You can make one option the main one and even warn the player that this is how the game is intended, but still allow him to at least move the sliders in the options menu if he can’t cope with something. Actually, that’s what the developers of Darkest Dungeon or Celeste did.
The challenge that the same game poses to me (a slow player with a rather slow reaction) and, for example, to my brother (who passes even the most difficult levels on pure reflexes) is still very different. That is, the honesty that gamers love to talk about, in fact, is not in this.
Yes, it’s not the second, but the tenth, judging by the list. But if you like to bang your forehead against the wall – please, his forehead is his.
The first take still seems like a strong taste. To you, it seemed to me that everything is fantasy, it seems boring. I agree that Demon Souls and Dark Souls (before DS3, it seems to me) did not have any visual feature of their own that could catch the eye, but at the time of the release of these games it’s not that this was critical.
I agree with the second take. Positioning the game as difficult is detrimental to attracting new players and the balance of the game itself (Shadow of Erdtree), but I strongly disagree with the fact that flukes from froms need an easy difficulty level.
Well, why, it will be easy for you, and for those who can’t do it in the usual way, they will have at least some chances. See how it’s done at Scars Above. It’s just that if the enemies are less fat and stronger, then the gameplay will not change from this. I would love to play wukong, but they would just beat me with a stick there. I can fight Virgiriyam in DMS3 and defeat Mundus in the first part and all this will not be the first time, so Elder Ring, on a lower difficulty, will not be a summer walk in the park for me.
This guy’s answer is more condescending. I just gave an example that he might understand. What Solsy is as a recreation asset. What did he do? He really got personal and said the typical “geeeey stupid gamers have achieved nothing in life except playing games geeyy” Well, yes, we are lenient :)))
“Gee stupid gamers are playing with toys here, I came to a site about games and I’m attracted to the physique gee, I’m cool and I’m actually doing something and not playing with your stupid toys gee” And who’s proud of anything here? ?) you started whining that you don’t understand these games and you don’t have time for them, why did you forget then? I tried to give you an example from reality because it’s easier since you yourself cannot master this genre for any reason. Why did you take it specifically on yourself about beer, I don’t know, this was an example not specifically about you and there was no need to flex it with the gym lol) If you don’t have time for games and you don’t understand them. Shock, games need to be played and it is advisable to complete them to the end in order to understand them and why someone loves them and for what exactly. Naturally, you won’t understand if you, like a nervous child, throw your gamepad at the wall after a couple of failures because “I don’t have the desire to puff for hours wasting my nerves.”
Sifu just makes a very cunning move, namely multiple and instant resurrections. Yes, you die often, but at the same time you are resurrected immediately and you don’t have to run the same route from the fire every time. Roughly speaking, you can die ten times, but these ten will not knock you out of the battle. You will continue to fight with the enemy, continue to memorize his moveset, maybe even win. Yes, most likely you will still have to retake the level to pass with a better age, but it will be easier and faster to do this.
Plus, Sifu herself isn’t that big. Each level can be completed in less than an hour. And it doesn’t have a huge number of consumables and builds that need to be micromanaged.
Roughly speaking, sifu is less complex and simpler in terms of filling, which is why there are fewer variables in it, and as a result it is easier to understand. And at the same time, even though the enemies hit you hard, the game itself doesn’t punish you so much for mistakes and because of this it’s easier to get involved in it.
I myself only played the first Souls game and gave up on Plague City. And literally that week I finished Sekiro. And the more I played it, the more I realized that From games were not for me. I liked almost everything about the game except the difficulty. The pleasure that victory gives me is simply not enough to cover all the irritation and anger that I experienced during the battle.
And although I wouldn’t dare to call games from from bad, from now on I will most likely only play their proven clones like Steel rating or Jedi.
Yes, Astro Bot is the perfect game for everyone, for beginners and experienced players, for adults and for children. Suitable for everyone. I want him to win game of the year.
Who forbids making complexity that is intended by the developer, divine right or political reform? I don’t have the desire to puff and puff for hours, wasting my nerves to defeat the boss, but at the same time, I would be interested in playing but so as not to be strangled at the same time.