I dont get why people think the difficulty with souls likes is so cool. It isnt difficult in a sense that you have to think a lot but rather that you memorise what moves the boss has and press your buttons fast enough. In a deep multiplayer game like dota2 or other strategy games you have real people who wont just do what they are programmed to. Heck i would say a auto battler like mechabellum is “harder” because i have to think on what to do… but do what you love…
What you describe strikes me as reaping enjoyment from technical accuracy. I think of it like mastering Moonlight Sonata as opposed to riffing something jazzy with friends. Both enjoyable, but quite different.
Depends on how reductive you’re being. To me, your initial assertion that Dark Souls isn’t difficult (or is not as difficult as an online game) because it’s ultimately just a test of your pattern recognition / memorization and reflexes is ignoring the forest for the trees. If I applied that same mindset to playing an instrument, I could argue that, mechanically, they’re the same. You learn a boss’ pattern (I.e. learn the sheet music) and then it’s just a matter of moving your fingers to hit the requisite inputs.
Of course, I think most people would balk at describing making music as nothing more than playing the right notes at the right time, and rightly so. We tend to attach a certain amount of ineffable poetry to that act. I’m not saying that they’re 1:1 equivalent, mind you, but I’ve heard enough folks discuss a Souls boss fight in musical terms (tempo, rhythm, crescendos, etc.) to see the parallel.
Yea i get your point, i have to clarify that i ddont think that there is no skill involved but rather that the skill is more on the line of learning a pattern not of making descisions and understanding and adapting. If the music anology is used my point would be that learning sheet music is hard but understanding hoq music works to play together with a few people without giben sheet music is a whole other level. My point is that you dont just remember the pattern but that you have to adapt and no jam session is “the same” as in no other (musical) ülayed just plays the same pattern off notes every time.
I dont really care what is “harder” but i hate the culture in the souls like community where people think they are soo hardcore because they learned the sheet music/boss patterns.
No I hear you. I just think you’re letting your negative perception of that element of the game’s community weigh in a little too heavily on your analysis of the game. People being annoying by talking about the game like beating it is a badge of honor (spoiler alert guys, you’re meant to beat the game) and your assessment of the Souls-like gameplay loop are, at best, tangentially related.
No shade to you, by the way. How the culture receives and talks about media is as big a part of its legacy as any constituent element of the text, and it’s a worthy subject for criticism. It’s just that, in my opinion, criticism is sharpened when the author is very clear about when they cease to review the game/book/movie and when they start to review the phenomena around that media.
Fwiw, this subject has been on my mind since reading a review of the movie Eddington in which the author talked about the temptation to stop talking about the movie and start talking about the subjects the movie was touching upon. I have been making a concentrated effort to improve my critical writing this year, and that line resonated with me. So, this diatribe has been fermenting in my head for awhile now, and your post was my excuse to get it out. By no means do I mean to lecture you on how you should feel about Dark Souls or it’s fandom.
I was just making fun of it because all the players i see pretend this is the hardest shit ever. I dont really care if a game is hard or not, you are meant to enjoy it and if someone enjoys this well great but please people dont be so elitist there are plenty games that you arent good in because the gameplayloop doesnt suit the way you learn this game.
I still think that there is a fundemental difference of skill level when it comes to games. The nature of ranked style multiplayer will always mean every enemy will act different every time and strategy evolves. The skill ceilling gets higher with every hour the game exists you dont have that with single player games like this. The enemy you meet at the first playthrough is still the same in your 100th one. If every player did speedruns and only the top 10% would jeek each other off the community would be very quiet.
The community praises the game for being hard and itself for being super skillfull because they beat it. This sentiment is part of the media. If as a community you do that and as developer you make fun of people who dont have enough “skill” you deserve to receive flak and maybe made fun of. If people think the button pressing has to be so perfectly timed they should go to a tekken competition or something and see how that will go when the enemy is a person that can change their moves and also klick buttons fast.
Yea true, but a good part of the souls like people really get high from playing the “”“hardest”“” game. Not dimbing down mechanics is great…for multiplayer so “good” players see that they are better. Giving every player in a fps a aimbot wouldnt be fun, the fact that lots of shooters go further in the direction of less skill ceilling is propably the reason why stuff like arma, tarkov or squad gets players. Dying and getting shit on is as much of the fun in these games as is winning imo.
isnt difficult in a sense that you have to think a lot but rather that you memorise what moves the boss has and press your buttons fast enough.
I see this a lot, but that wipes out like most games. Baldur’s gate you just click on stuff. Tekken you just hit buttons. Tetris is just moving blocks around.
Also you often don’t rote memorize the moves. People play by reaction or without knowing exactly what’s coming.
I dont think this would rule out baldurs gate, yea if you play your 19384728 playthrough and you already know the whole lore, what every dialog option would do and the respective dc what is the skill? In a normal playthrough you have to be generally smart about what you do. You have tons of options you can think of and you can solve problems in a bunch of different ways. Yea if you just do things and if it doesnt work out you reload i dont think there is much “skill” required to beat the game. But i also dont think that baldurs gate would be a game where skill matters. My point is that one is memorizing the awnsers for the test from trying it 300 times and the other is understanding the material so you could write any test without first failing it as soon as you are confronted with a new question…
And i would still argue that baldurs gate is inherently not as “hard” as a multiplayer game where matchmaking exists. The fact that in games with that, you will only win 50% of your games if it works half decently is something you wont get in a single player game. The game wont get harder on your second playthrough.
Sure, but that seems like a separate, closely related, topic.
I was mostly objecting to the idea that souls games are just memorizing and pushing buttons. That accusation could be leveled at most single player games, but people seem to mostly bring it up to denigrate souls games.
Multiplayer often has less memorization though, as you say.
I dont get why people think the difficulty with souls likes is so cool. It isnt difficult in a sense that you have to think a lot but rather that you memorise what moves the boss has and press your buttons fast enough. In a deep multiplayer game like dota2 or other strategy games you have real people who wont just do what they are programmed to. Heck i would say a auto battler like mechabellum is “harder” because i have to think on what to do… but do what you love…
What you describe strikes me as reaping enjoyment from technical accuracy. I think of it like mastering Moonlight Sonata as opposed to riffing something jazzy with friends. Both enjoyable, but quite different.
Yea i understand that at some point but i would argue that there is a lot more to playing a instrument that good then to beating yxz soul.
Depends on how reductive you’re being. To me, your initial assertion that Dark Souls isn’t difficult (or is not as difficult as an online game) because it’s ultimately just a test of your pattern recognition / memorization and reflexes is ignoring the forest for the trees. If I applied that same mindset to playing an instrument, I could argue that, mechanically, they’re the same. You learn a boss’ pattern (I.e. learn the sheet music) and then it’s just a matter of moving your fingers to hit the requisite inputs.
Of course, I think most people would balk at describing making music as nothing more than playing the right notes at the right time, and rightly so. We tend to attach a certain amount of ineffable poetry to that act. I’m not saying that they’re 1:1 equivalent, mind you, but I’ve heard enough folks discuss a Souls boss fight in musical terms (tempo, rhythm, crescendos, etc.) to see the parallel.
Yea i get your point, i have to clarify that i ddont think that there is no skill involved but rather that the skill is more on the line of learning a pattern not of making descisions and understanding and adapting. If the music anology is used my point would be that learning sheet music is hard but understanding hoq music works to play together with a few people without giben sheet music is a whole other level. My point is that you dont just remember the pattern but that you have to adapt and no jam session is “the same” as in no other (musical) ülayed just plays the same pattern off notes every time.
I dont really care what is “harder” but i hate the culture in the souls like community where people think they are soo hardcore because they learned the sheet music/boss patterns.
No I hear you. I just think you’re letting your negative perception of that element of the game’s community weigh in a little too heavily on your analysis of the game. People being annoying by talking about the game like beating it is a badge of honor (spoiler alert guys, you’re meant to beat the game) and your assessment of the Souls-like gameplay loop are, at best, tangentially related.
No shade to you, by the way. How the culture receives and talks about media is as big a part of its legacy as any constituent element of the text, and it’s a worthy subject for criticism. It’s just that, in my opinion, criticism is sharpened when the author is very clear about when they cease to review the game/book/movie and when they start to review the phenomena around that media.
Fwiw, this subject has been on my mind since reading a review of the movie Eddington in which the author talked about the temptation to stop talking about the movie and start talking about the subjects the movie was touching upon. I have been making a concentrated effort to improve my critical writing this year, and that line resonated with me. So, this diatribe has been fermenting in my head for awhile now, and your post was my excuse to get it out. By no means do I mean to lecture you on how you should feel about Dark Souls or it’s fandom.
I was just making fun of it because all the players i see pretend this is the hardest shit ever. I dont really care if a game is hard or not, you are meant to enjoy it and if someone enjoys this well great but please people dont be so elitist there are plenty games that you arent good in because the gameplayloop doesnt suit the way you learn this game.
I still think that there is a fundemental difference of skill level when it comes to games. The nature of ranked style multiplayer will always mean every enemy will act different every time and strategy evolves. The skill ceilling gets higher with every hour the game exists you dont have that with single player games like this. The enemy you meet at the first playthrough is still the same in your 100th one. If every player did speedruns and only the top 10% would jeek each other off the community would be very quiet.
The community praises the game for being hard and itself for being super skillfull because they beat it. This sentiment is part of the media. If as a community you do that and as developer you make fun of people who dont have enough “skill” you deserve to receive flak and maybe made fun of. If people think the button pressing has to be so perfectly timed they should go to a tekken competition or something and see how that will go when the enemy is a person that can change their moves and also klick buttons fast.
Ninja Gaiden
Ninja gaiden for Xbox was such a good game.
The difficulty always felt fair. When I died it felt like it was because I wasn’t good enough, and there was a lesson to learn. It never felt cheap.
“you get a sense of pride and accomplishment”
I’m partially joking but it it can be satisfying to figuring out and executing the series of patterns in good timing.
The thing is thinking that you’re so cool for it :P … I never see an issue with someone enjoying the game for the story or whatever else.
Yea true, but a good part of the souls like people really get high from playing the “”“hardest”“” game. Not dimbing down mechanics is great…for multiplayer so “good” players see that they are better. Giving every player in a fps a aimbot wouldnt be fun, the fact that lots of shooters go further in the direction of less skill ceilling is propably the reason why stuff like arma, tarkov or squad gets players. Dying and getting shit on is as much of the fun in these games as is winning imo.
I see this a lot, but that wipes out like most games. Baldur’s gate you just click on stuff. Tekken you just hit buttons. Tetris is just moving blocks around.
Also you often don’t rote memorize the moves. People play by reaction or without knowing exactly what’s coming.
I dont think this would rule out baldurs gate, yea if you play your 19384728 playthrough and you already know the whole lore, what every dialog option would do and the respective dc what is the skill? In a normal playthrough you have to be generally smart about what you do. You have tons of options you can think of and you can solve problems in a bunch of different ways. Yea if you just do things and if it doesnt work out you reload i dont think there is much “skill” required to beat the game. But i also dont think that baldurs gate would be a game where skill matters. My point is that one is memorizing the awnsers for the test from trying it 300 times and the other is understanding the material so you could write any test without first failing it as soon as you are confronted with a new question…
Is this describing Baldur’s gare or elden ring? Because it seems to apply to both to me
Was saying this about bg.
Right. But I think that applies to both. Lots of options and ways to solve problems, not just memorizing and following a recipe.
And i would still argue that baldurs gate is inherently not as “hard” as a multiplayer game where matchmaking exists. The fact that in games with that, you will only win 50% of your games if it works half decently is something you wont get in a single player game. The game wont get harder on your second playthrough.
Sure, but that seems like a separate, closely related, topic.
I was mostly objecting to the idea that souls games are just memorizing and pushing buttons. That accusation could be leveled at most single player games, but people seem to mostly bring it up to denigrate souls games.
Multiplayer often has less memorization though, as you say.
Yea but baldurs gate players dont pretend they are gods because they beat the HARDEST game(s)…
Yeah, that archetype of player is annoying, but I think it might be just a loud minority.