and my own personal experience; most games I have bought in the past 10 years have been off of recommendations from r/gamingsuggestions before Reddit went to crap and Lemmy came into existence; and even moreso when it is a personal friend recommending things to me.
Mods, feel free to nuke if this feels too close to advertising or better-suited for [email protected] (my own community); I mean it more as a discussion piece but I don’t run the place.
EDIT: The “not” in the title is optional; I’m asking about both successful and failed recommendations.
When the first one came out everyone was ranting and raving over it so I picked it up for my PS3. Granted the beginning of the game was an absolute gut punch and I thought I was hooked, I was not. I found the rest of the game so damn boring. I didn’t like the story, I felt it was forced fed to the player, and honestly I just never bothered finishing it. for me it wasn’t fun.
For me it suffered from “show, don’t tell” problems. There are numerous weeks long skips between scenes and you’re just supposed to understand that Joel and Ellie became close during that time. But as a player, you’re basically being asked to babysit someone you’ve known for 10 minutes. It was basically one long escort mission and the “OMG SO AMAZING SCENE” is… giraffes walking by. Like really? That’s what it takes to wow people? Some giraffes walking outside the building???
The world was a generic apocalypse setting, the “story” can be described in a few bullet points, and the big “emotional gut punch” at the end is so cliche.
I’ll die on the hill that it didn’t do a single groundbreaking thing. Nothing about the game wasn’t already done before and better. It’s the equivalent of a summer blockbuster movie: a fun mindless take on an idea but otherwise generic.
Witcher 3, rdr3. I know they are popular games and all my friends who also like single player rpgs love them but I just can’t with the fixed personality main characters who act in ways that frustrate me. I mean last of us was good but that was more where the player character being forced to be a dick is the main plot point, instead of a thing we are meant to ignore.
Weird to say that of Rdr2 (i think you meant 2) because as the main, like, its fairly big arc that the whole game takes. I can get on board with that being an issue in Witcher3, but like, idk, to some extent is this because as an open world game they cant “force” you to play in a linear evolution?
Admittedly I only did the tutorial area and first town after before I lost interest. I did definitely have it pitched to me as a fully open world game which it really isn’t as I would define it. I have been told since that Arthur has a good arc and growth potential but…I guess it just took too long to get to that. It seemed to rely a bit on past game context too that I didn’t have
Yeah, i remember being so bored of it because i literally just click the enemy and everyone explode, and only occasionally spongy enemy. I also remember i can’t progress much in that 8 hours i put in, thing feel and play the same for that long. It just wasn’t my thing.
Yes! I played Grim Dawn for about 8 hours before i quit, and according to Steam, i dip in a whole 30 minutes before i uninstall it. I can’t remember about the game at all and why i quit, i assume it has the same issue with Grim Dawn.
Breathedge has the subnautica kinda feel to it, though it might be tuned a bit on the pain in the ass side (I’m still early in to it and haven’t yet decided if I like it, but it has that feel).
Or for a game with more of a crafting/building emphasis, Planet Crafter also gives some of those vibes.
The not was absolutely intended as optional! I’m wondering if other people are seeing it as required judging by the count of responses talking about negative experiences I got…
The Witcher 3 felt very sloppy to me, controls wise. I felt like combat had me sliding all over the place. Blocking, parrying, and dodging didn’t feel satisfying or responsive.
Just couldn’t get into it at all because of it.
I ended up running around and talking to everyone I could, then realize there’s a ton of combat stuff to do and nobody else to talk to and I just turned it off
Undertale was zero fun. Interesting story and I liked the graphics and music but the combat got extremely annoying, and I say this as someone who plays 8 bit (heck even 4 bit) combat games. I quit it.
I beg to differ. It was a lifechanging game for me. I can trace a half a dozen major life decisions and events to the people I met through the Undertale fandom. It has some deep personal sentimental value, too.
There are definitely lots of things in life that I personally fail to see any value for myself in; but that I respect specifically because I know it brings lots of other people happiness.
This is kind of tangential to the question, but an incredibly irritating former friend would not shut the fuck up about Elden Ring for months after it came out and kept telling me to get it. I told him I didn’t like souls-like games and he said ER was “different” without explaining how. I still haven’t played it, even with recommendations from other people I trust. Same guy ensured I’ll never play Death Stranding, too.
Both of these games are very well made, but they both cater to a special type of gamer.
Elden Ring being incredibly well designed as an introduction to souls-likes, it still has the mechanics and difficulty like most of From Software’s games, with slight variation. If you’re not a gamer who likes overcoming a challenge, the game is likely not for you.
Death Stranding I think is quite the unique game, but much thanks to its weirdness. It has a lot of curious elements to it, but its incredibly story heavy. With different difficulty options you can make it a very casual experience, but it can be quite slow at times still. If you don’t like several dozen hours of cutscenes, the game might not be for you.
I personally see Elden Ring as the second-most “Dark Souls” game after Dark Souls 1. It’s the first of the FromSoft soulslikes with an open world afaik, and while Dark Souls 1 doesn’t have an “open” world, exactly, everything is so well-connected that it feels like an open world to me.
I don’t understand why people keep saying Elden Ring is so different from Dark Souls, because it’s really not different at all. I say this as someone who enjoys these games: if your issue with Dark Souls was the base gameplay loop and not the map, Elden Ring will not fix that.
Probably not entirely on topic, but I ignored Dark Souls for a long time even with tons of recommendations from people I know share my tastes because the main thing they all said was that it was super hard.
It wasn’t being hard that made me ignore it but that from watching it, I knew it was just pattern recognition, which–to me–isn’t all that hard.
But now it’s my favorite genre. Because, yeah, it is pattern recognition in a 1v1 fight; but the layout of a room, the placement of the enemies and traps, and what those enemies snd traps are make so much more of a difference in the difficulty. It’s so much more satisfying somehow to learn the whole game and conquer it than just memorizing when to dodge and attack bosses like many games prior and similar to DS were like.
I totally agree. It isn’t that hard, and honestly I think the players ruined the game for a lot of people with that idea. A lot of people will hit a boss they can’t defeat and resign themselves to trying to grind out a win, hearing the game is hard and this is just the way it is.
In reality, the game provides all the tools you need to win. You just have to pay attention and find them. If you’re struggling with a boss you aren’t supposed to grind it until you win. You’re supposed to go and get stronger. Level your player and gear, and find new items to help you. Maybe even find a path around them.
The game is easy, but struggling players think they’re struggling because the game wants them to, because of the reputation. It doesn’t. It wants you to explore.
Counterpoint: Dark Souls is hard, because it gives a lot of options from the get go, and no information on which ones will be approachable or not. NO other major Soulslike I’ve played does this in the way DS did.
It also relies very hard on death alone as a teaching tool even when it says nothing. Players don’t see “You died. This boss is too tough! Maybe you should go back and upgrade your weapons.” They just see “You Died.” and interpret “Should have dodged that 87th swing!”
Worse, it has BAD lessons through the lost souls system. It makes sense as a pressure tool to make you fear death, but it teaches new players the wrong thing: For players to immediately beeline for the spot of their death without considering exploration, build changes, etc.
Counterpoint: Dark Souls is hard, because it gives a lot of options from the get go, and no information on which ones will be approachable or not. NO other major Soulslike I’ve played does this in the way DS did.
I disagree with this. I think Dark Souls does tell you which are approachable or not. It’s just not as obvious as other games. Some games will have a sign for the player that says “this path is dangerous” but DS doesn’t. It has characters talk about venturing into the catacombs. It has characters point out the aquaduct is the path to the first (and at the time the only you know of) Bell of Awakening. It tucks the elevator into New Londo behind the bonfire, where stuff will be later but you won’t see yet. It also tells you a lot about locations in item descriptions.
I’ll also say the only bad path is The Catacombs, because the climb out is so bad. I think there’s leftover stuff indicating a different start, so maybe it’s a fluke it’s this big an issue. Every path has a benefit though. New Londo is easy at the start, and has the first blacksmith you can get access to. The Catacombs has the Bonfire Ascetic. The Aquaduct has the Bell of Awakening, and is the critical path. None are that hard when entering. You just get pushed out of getting deep into most.
Most games talk to the player. FS talks to the character almost always. It’s less obvious to the player, but it makes the world feel richer. It doesn’t hold the player’s hand though.
It also relies very hard on death alone as a teaching tool even when it says nothing. Players don’t see “You died. This boss is too tough! Maybe you should go back and upgrade your weapons.” They just see “You Died.” and interpret “Should have dodged that 87th swing!”
Yeah, I don’t know how to fix this without speaking to the player. I guess they could take the typical Crestfallen Warrior character, but instead of getting depressed and dying he upgrades his kit and talks about how upgrading helped him overcome a challenge?
Worse, it has BAD lessons through the lost souls system. It makes sense as a pressure tool to make you fear death, but it teaches new players the wrong thing: For players to immediately beeline for the spot of their death without considering exploration, build changes, etc.
I agree with this. I think the need to have an infinite homeward bone item from the start. There should be a way to return to your bonfire once you recover, because yeah, sometimes people get stuck in FOMO mode and can’t give up a few souls. Once you’re used to the games it becomes obvious the souls are next to worthless and to not worry about it. You can always farm more. But for the struggling new player I agree, it re-enforces a playstyle.
I disagree with this. I think Dark Souls does tell you which are approachable or not. It’s just not as obvious as other games. Some games will have a sign for the player that says “this path is dangerous” but DS doesn’t. It has characters talk about venturing into the catacombs. It has characters point out the aquaduct is the path to the first (and at the time the only you know of) Bell of Awakening. It tucks the elevator into New Londo behind the bonfire, where stuff will be later but you won’t see yet. It also tells you a lot about locations in item descriptions.
That’s…false.
The very first NPC you find at Firelink Shrine tells you there are two bells - one above, and one far below. It strongly implies both are equal options. There are at least 3 ways out of Firelink Shrine; one happens to go below, just like your friend the NPC said, to New Londo.
For players still acclimating to the basics of the combat, New Londo is a terrible novice experience. It requires perfectly tight positioning on teensy platforms barely visible through the water, and relies on limited items to even make a single attempt through the ghost-ridden area. That is a ton of mechanics that would be fine to slowly introduce players to, but it’s like putting the “Allspice Turducken while in a tornado” level of Overcooked first.
Then you’re talking about the Catacombs? The area whose entrance has infinitely respawning skeletons? Give up, man.
Dark Souls’ failure isn’t talking through NPCs - dozens of games that give your character a radio do just that. It’s from literally lying to you with misleading tripe and having no interest in any form of teaching - be it Half-Life 2’s nonverbal teaching or any verbally direct form. I had to play games by other devs, imitating the better parts of their formula, to learn FromSoft is just uniquely TERRIBLE at it.
Like I said, Ne Londo has the first blacksmith you can get to, so going there isn’t bad, and that’s before the ghosts. Yeah, you’re going to need to back out once you get to the ghosts. If you try to force your way through that then yeah, it’ll be bad, but that one is really obvious you shouldn’t be doing it.
I talked about the Catacombs a lot, in how it failed. I think you ignored it. It’s supposed to be approachable for new players, but it failed, mostly in the escape. The necromancers are solvable with a divine weapon. They can’t revive skeletons killed by them. You’re supposed to back out of it at the very start, but return once you get a divine weapon. Again, it failed at what it was supposed to do, but the goal was for struggling players to go there are get the Rite of Kindling. That’s why Pinwheel is such a joke. He’s supposed to be fought early.
I haven’t played it, but I’ve watched it. I think Demon’s Souls actually probably does a better job. It’s very similar, but less ambitious without a connected world. Obviously Elden Ring also does it better, but it makes it somewhat boring too. It’s almost trivial.
These people don’t seem to learn the lesson the game teaches you right from the start by having the asylum demon stomp your ass until you figure out you should try a different path.
I was the same with the Dark Souls games. I just had no interest in them because they just looked way too punishing.
Then I discovered the lore. I’m a huge lore nerd. I mean I absolutely love Warhammer 40k and I’ve never played it and don’t know how to play it. I don’t have any of the minitures but man the lore for that is awesome. It was the same for the Dark Souls games. I just stumbled across a video by that VatiiVidya guy and I was hooked. Now I wanted to play and just pick up everything and read the tiny bits of lore attached to every item in the games and then piece together this universe.
Dark Souls 3 being my favourite. That story once you discover what’s REALLY happening is amazing. The lore for DS3 really turns the whole playing experience on its head. Suddenly you go from thinking you’re the good guy trying to save this fucked up world to realizing that “wait, am I the baddie?” Like you have to return these guys to their thrones but you begin to understand WHY they don’t want to sit on their thrones and in the end you honestly don’t blame any of them for abandoning their task.
I absolutely love creepy atmospheric games that aren’t outright horror. If you’ve ever played the Playdead games (Limbo and Inside) you know what I’m talking about. BioShock does it a bit too. Anyway, due to this being my absolute favourite type of media to consume, and not at all knowing how to find more of it, I made a post on here a couple years ago asking for advice, as well as a few friends and other communities, and Control was the overwhelming majority suggestion. So obviously I gave it a shot, but I just didn’t enjoy the way it, ahem, controlled. Not sure how well to describe it other than that, but movement just felt off to me. Maybe I’ll have to give it a try again in the future, but I couldn’t put in more than an hour or two without getting annoyed. It looked pretty neat, and I’ve seen screenshots of later points in the game which look pretty awesome, but for whatever reason I couldn’t get past the movement. It’s not an issue I’ve had in any other game and I’m not sure why it bugs me so much in this one.
This is probably my pick too, and it frustrates me. Because like, look. I love Remedy games. I love Alan Wake 1 and 2 to death. I just bought a 200 dollar book about Alan Wake. I really vibe with Control’s aesthetic and setting. Ahti is great. I have beat Control before, but ever since then, whenever I think “oh, I should go back and replay Control” I get about five hours back into the game before I just sit there and think man, I am not having any fun. Just about all of these characters feel like cardboard cutouts with neutral faces drawn on them, the plot is kinda dull, when it bothers to show up, and if the game can’t really get excited about itself I’m not sure how I’m supposed to. I’ll always love launching a forklift at some Hiss at 200mph but it doesn’t take me far enough.
That being said, yes, I will still be playing Control 2 day one. Even if it’s garbage, Remedy will always deserve the chance for me.
I found the combat to be incredibly repetitive, and the story was unsatisfying to me. Have you tried Soma? That sounds like it would scratch your itch, but I haven’t played it.
Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines
I didn’t get around to playing this game until about a decade after its release, and I seriously don’t understand who could find that game enjoyable except 13yo edgelords.
I mean most of the people shilling it probably were teens at the time they played it. It’s like Neon Genesis Evangelion: teenage drama that’s “deep”, but when you watch it as an adult it just doesn’t hit.
I played it and had a great time a few years ago and I’m certainly no 13yo or edgelord.
Vtmb has a very unique setting, good writing and a great soundtrack. The gameplay is probably the worst part about it though, it’s also quite unfinished in the later parts. Don’t open it.
I got one! The very first Assassin’s Creed when it came out!
My childhood friend would NOT shut up about it! He would talk over and over again about the lore, show me extended cutscenes, videos, sent me lore theories, it was a whole thing!
Years later I finally get to play it and holy shit, what a disappointment… the entire game is just the same 3 missions over and over again… like no effort into hiding anything… literally the same 3 missions copied and pasted ad nauseum with different enemy names. I’m still shocked he sat through all of this bullshit to get to the awesome lore he went on and on about for weeks.
Bonus story with the same friend: we were talking about Devil May Cry and he said “I wish I could find another game like it…” and I noticed he said “game” and not “games” or “franchise” so I asked “Did you play the sequels? DMC3 is incredible!” and he goes “What sequels? I’m sure it’s only one game…” and I swear I screamed at the realization he’s talking about the reboot DmC: Devil May Cry and had no clue the original franchise even exists 😂 That was right after DMC5 came out too, which’s wild.
I recommended starting with DMC5 because the story isn’t great anyway and DMC1 or even DMC3 may feel a little dated. He ignored my advice because he wanted to experience the story from the beginning, picked up the HD collection, hated both DMC1 and DMC3 because they felt too stiff, and never touched the franchise again.
I agree, but the main problem is the “years later” part of your experience. Assassin’s Creed had many gameplay innovations with (for the time) amazing graphics that shaped certain game mechanics for years to come, but gaming has evolved…
That’s why many of these former “innovations” have lost their shine and sometimes even became annoying (e.g. climbing a tower to unlock parts of the map).
“years later” does not matter in my case because it wasn’t that many years later—l probably played it only 3 or 4 years after release, and I don’t play western action RPGs or stealth games. I think the first Assassin’s Creed is the only Ubisoft game I played, for example, and it surely did not influence any of the games I actually play: Bayonetta, The Wonderful 101, Hellsinker, or Guilty Gear.
Pretty sure I would’ve had a problem with it on release because it’s shitty repetitive design.
Half Life 2. Wasn’t a big fan of the first one, but the second had tons of hype, so I gave it a shot. The physics stuff was cool, but the gameplay, story and characters were boring and flat. And the “revolutionary” storytelling method of locking you in a box to talk at you rather than making a proper cutscene still sucks.
HL2 has better, more realistic and detailed and believable mouth and facial animations than many current AAA games, they just have higher res textures and fancier lighting.
That’s not to say no game has exceeded it, thats not what I mean, some clearly have.
But… the other side of this is that a lot of modern AAA games, with 20 years of improved/new tech… still can’t figure it out.
AAA games that market themselves as being very graphically detailed/realistic/immersive.
I’m not trying to say waaagh how can you not personally have thought HL2 was amazing!
I’m trying to say that the technical advancements it made, which you do not find compelling, well, a good deal of game devs still haven’t even reached that level from 20+ years ago, when they say they are trying to.
Back when I was first getting into gaming and learning about this Steam thing a friend told me I needed to play the Half Life games. I snagged them on sale started playing and every one I tried I ended up putting down pretty quickly because I’m just not a shooter fan.
Funnily enough I actually like more combat-oriented games more now but I’ve played too many newer games that were at least partially inspired by Half Life so I have a feeling I’ll go play it and find it’s too unpolished and not aged too well
This game was what pulled me into PC gaming, but when I’ve watched novices return to it even with all the time I spent listening to their commentaries on good teaching…players don’t learn the things they want well, and I can’t blame them on reflection. Even things like where to go are tough for reasons they shouldn’t be.
Dark Souls 2. A coworker gave me a steam code for it after I told him I wasn’t really a big fan of games where you just have to memorize opponent movesets. He said he’d gift it to me if I gave it an honest try, and I did.
And I didn’t like it. Didn’t understand the hype, didn’t have any idea what was going on with me dying and transforming or something, or why there were weird ghosts of other players all over the map. Maybe it makes sense if you know the genre but I didn’t like the gameplay and didn’t get any lore/story, so I ditched it.
Everyone kept praising Baldur’s Gate 3. I even watched gameplay of it.
It was buggy on the supposed release, especially with a quest that had been part of the beta FOR YEARS rendering itself incompleltable and stealing my items in the process.
Then I got sucked into a party wipe, and a fight I had beaten earlier suddenly became an impassable slogfest.
$90 AUD for 3 hours of gameplay and a piss poor character creator. Because orcs had fuckall compared to the other races.
My friend said it was the best D&D experience he ever had. I love D&D and also had hundreds of hours in Solasta. I immediately bought 2 copies of BG3 so I could play with my SO.
BG3 sucked for me. It’s like pretend D&D, with the whiniest, most burdened companions they possibly could have created, and a terrible UI to boot.
We tried it again after the ‘final’ patch (still buggy, but better). Ended up pretending it’s not D&D and tried to ignore all the terrible nonsensical gameplay mechanics. Made it all the way to Act 3 before giving up again.
I love the studio for their behavior towards players, but I hate their games and their terrible combat mechanics. Every goddamn inch is some kind of trap or environmental hazard designed to ruin your experience
Anyone that says it’s like playing D&D is just not correct. It’s a fun game that can simulate some of the rules and mechanics pretty well, but never does it feel like actually playing D&D.
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Last of Us.
When the first one came out everyone was ranting and raving over it so I picked it up for my PS3. Granted the beginning of the game was an absolute gut punch and I thought I was hooked, I was not. I found the rest of the game so damn boring. I didn’t like the story, I felt it was forced fed to the player, and honestly I just never bothered finishing it. for me it wasn’t fun.
For me it suffered from “show, don’t tell” problems. There are numerous weeks long skips between scenes and you’re just supposed to understand that Joel and Ellie became close during that time. But as a player, you’re basically being asked to babysit someone you’ve known for 10 minutes. It was basically one long escort mission and the “OMG SO AMAZING SCENE” is… giraffes walking by. Like really? That’s what it takes to wow people? Some giraffes walking outside the building???
The world was a generic apocalypse setting, the “story” can be described in a few bullet points, and the big “emotional gut punch” at the end is so cliche.
I’ll die on the hill that it didn’t do a single groundbreaking thing. Nothing about the game wasn’t already done before and better. It’s the equivalent of a summer blockbuster movie: a fun mindless take on an idea but otherwise generic.
I ended up giving up at one of the clicker sequences.
The game lore says they’re blind and navigate by hearing. The game code does not.
Witcher 3, rdr3. I know they are popular games and all my friends who also like single player rpgs love them but I just can’t with the fixed personality main characters who act in ways that frustrate me. I mean last of us was good but that was more where the player character being forced to be a dick is the main plot point, instead of a thing we are meant to ignore.
Weird to say that of Rdr2 (i think you meant 2) because as the main, like, its fairly big arc that the whole game takes. I can get on board with that being an issue in Witcher3, but like, idk, to some extent is this because as an open world game they cant “force” you to play in a linear evolution?
I never played RDR2 because I played 1 and GTA 4 and I just don’t like how Rockstar games play.
Admittedly I only did the tutorial area and first town after before I lost interest. I did definitely have it pitched to me as a fully open world game which it really isn’t as I would define it. I have been told since that Arthur has a good arc and growth potential but…I guess it just took too long to get to that. It seemed to rely a bit on past game context too that I didn’t have
It is a big and slow arc, and the game is… just… massive. Its a long game.
Same. I reached the first town with no idea what to do, cumbersome controls, and a lot of apathy by this point.
Grim Dawn. “hey remember Diablo 2,the best ARPG ever? This is that but better!”
No it’s not. It’s not bad, but it just doesn’t click.
TBF a good portion of the appeal is finding the combination of skills and equipment that tickles you the most at the moment
The rest of the game is pretty much just the xp you need to level up and the training dummies to determine how effective your build is
Yeah, i remember being so bored of it because i literally just click the enemy and everyone explode, and only occasionally spongy enemy. I also remember i can’t progress much in that 8 hours i put in, thing feel and play the same for that long. It just wasn’t my thing.
Have you tried Path of Exile?
Yes! I played Grim Dawn for about 8 hours before i quit, and according to Steam, i dip in a whole 30 minutes before i uninstall it. I can’t remember about the game at all and why i quit, i assume it has the same issue with Grim Dawn.
Weird, path of exile is pretty much as close as you can get to diablo 2 and it still being a new game.
Assuming the (not) is optional, I loved both Soma and Subnaitica. Two great recommendations
Breathedge has the subnautica kinda feel to it, though it might be tuned a bit on the pain in the ass side (I’m still early in to it and haven’t yet decided if I like it, but it has that feel).
Or for a game with more of a crafting/building emphasis, Planet Crafter also gives some of those vibes.
You might like Astroneer!
The not was absolutely intended as optional! I’m wondering if other people are seeing it as required judging by the count of responses talking about negative experiences I got…
There’s a lot of games people recommend me based on cozy things which is good cause I do like them.
Then they get confused when I’m going deep into the Warhammer or the rogue likes/lites cause those are not very cozy.
And I do not like visual novels despite being in the demographic.
The Witcher 3 felt very sloppy to me, controls wise. I felt like combat had me sliding all over the place. Blocking, parrying, and dodging didn’t feel satisfying or responsive.
Just couldn’t get into it at all because of it.
I ended up running around and talking to everyone I could, then realize there’s a ton of combat stuff to do and nobody else to talk to and I just turned it off
and just feels mushy. eh
Maybe you’d prefer Monster Hunter or Elden Ring combat.
I love elden Ring! I’ve played through and beaten it several times.
Recently started playing it and yeah, the combat feels pretty wobbly
I got it for free, installed it and got into the tutorial. There I soon realized that the combat system wasn’t my bag.
Undertale was zero fun. Interesting story and I liked the graphics and music but the combat got extremely annoying, and I say this as someone who plays 8 bit (heck even 4 bit) combat games. I quit it.
I beg to differ. It was a lifechanging game for me. I can trace a half a dozen major life decisions and events to the people I met through the Undertale fandom. It has some deep personal sentimental value, too.
There are definitely lots of things in life that I personally fail to see any value for myself in; but that I respect specifically because I know it brings lots of other people happiness.
Oh sure. By all means play what you enjoy. Just wasnt what I enjoy.
This is kind of tangential to the question, but an incredibly irritating former friend would not shut the fuck up about Elden Ring for months after it came out and kept telling me to get it. I told him I didn’t like souls-like games and he said ER was “different” without explaining how. I still haven’t played it, even with recommendations from other people I trust. Same guy ensured I’ll never play Death Stranding, too.
Both of these games are very well made, but they both cater to a special type of gamer.
Elden Ring being incredibly well designed as an introduction to souls-likes, it still has the mechanics and difficulty like most of From Software’s games, with slight variation. If you’re not a gamer who likes overcoming a challenge, the game is likely not for you.
Death Stranding I think is quite the unique game, but much thanks to its weirdness. It has a lot of curious elements to it, but its incredibly story heavy. With different difficulty options you can make it a very casual experience, but it can be quite slow at times still. If you don’t like several dozen hours of cutscenes, the game might not be for you.
I personally see Elden Ring as the second-most “Dark Souls” game after Dark Souls 1. It’s the first of the FromSoft soulslikes with an open world afaik, and while Dark Souls 1 doesn’t have an “open” world, exactly, everything is so well-connected that it feels like an open world to me.
I’d consist Dark Souls 1 open world, there just isn’t a lot of open space and you have to fight to get anywhere.
I don’t understand why people keep saying Elden Ring is so different from Dark Souls, because it’s really not different at all. I say this as someone who enjoys these games: if your issue with Dark Souls was the base gameplay loop and not the map, Elden Ring will not fix that.
Probably not entirely on topic, but I ignored Dark Souls for a long time even with tons of recommendations from people I know share my tastes because the main thing they all said was that it was super hard.
It wasn’t being hard that made me ignore it but that from watching it, I knew it was just pattern recognition, which–to me–isn’t all that hard.
But now it’s my favorite genre. Because, yeah, it is pattern recognition in a 1v1 fight; but the layout of a room, the placement of the enemies and traps, and what those enemies snd traps are make so much more of a difference in the difficulty. It’s so much more satisfying somehow to learn the whole game and conquer it than just memorizing when to dodge and attack bosses like many games prior and similar to DS were like.
I totally agree. It isn’t that hard, and honestly I think the players ruined the game for a lot of people with that idea. A lot of people will hit a boss they can’t defeat and resign themselves to trying to grind out a win, hearing the game is hard and this is just the way it is.
In reality, the game provides all the tools you need to win. You just have to pay attention and find them. If you’re struggling with a boss you aren’t supposed to grind it until you win. You’re supposed to go and get stronger. Level your player and gear, and find new items to help you. Maybe even find a path around them.
The game is easy, but struggling players think they’re struggling because the game wants them to, because of the reputation. It doesn’t. It wants you to explore.
Counterpoint: Dark Souls is hard, because it gives a lot of options from the get go, and no information on which ones will be approachable or not. NO other major Soulslike I’ve played does this in the way DS did.
It also relies very hard on death alone as a teaching tool even when it says nothing. Players don’t see “You died. This boss is too tough! Maybe you should go back and upgrade your weapons.” They just see “You Died.” and interpret “Should have dodged that 87th swing!”
Worse, it has BAD lessons through the lost souls system. It makes sense as a pressure tool to make you fear death, but it teaches new players the wrong thing: For players to immediately beeline for the spot of their death without considering exploration, build changes, etc.
I disagree with this. I think Dark Souls does tell you which are approachable or not. It’s just not as obvious as other games. Some games will have a sign for the player that says “this path is dangerous” but DS doesn’t. It has characters talk about venturing into the catacombs. It has characters point out the aquaduct is the path to the first (and at the time the only you know of) Bell of Awakening. It tucks the elevator into New Londo behind the bonfire, where stuff will be later but you won’t see yet. It also tells you a lot about locations in item descriptions.
I’ll also say the only bad path is The Catacombs, because the climb out is so bad. I think there’s leftover stuff indicating a different start, so maybe it’s a fluke it’s this big an issue. Every path has a benefit though. New Londo is easy at the start, and has the first blacksmith you can get access to. The Catacombs has the Bonfire Ascetic. The Aquaduct has the Bell of Awakening, and is the critical path. None are that hard when entering. You just get pushed out of getting deep into most.
Most games talk to the player. FS talks to the character almost always. It’s less obvious to the player, but it makes the world feel richer. It doesn’t hold the player’s hand though.
Yeah, I don’t know how to fix this without speaking to the player. I guess they could take the typical Crestfallen Warrior character, but instead of getting depressed and dying he upgrades his kit and talks about how upgrading helped him overcome a challenge?
I agree with this. I think the need to have an infinite homeward bone item from the start. There should be a way to return to your bonfire once you recover, because yeah, sometimes people get stuck in FOMO mode and can’t give up a few souls. Once you’re used to the games it becomes obvious the souls are next to worthless and to not worry about it. You can always farm more. But for the struggling new player I agree, it re-enforces a playstyle.
That’s…false.
The very first NPC you find at Firelink Shrine tells you there are two bells - one above, and one far below. It strongly implies both are equal options. There are at least 3 ways out of Firelink Shrine; one happens to go below, just like your friend the NPC said, to New Londo.
For players still acclimating to the basics of the combat, New Londo is a terrible novice experience. It requires perfectly tight positioning on teensy platforms barely visible through the water, and relies on limited items to even make a single attempt through the ghost-ridden area. That is a ton of mechanics that would be fine to slowly introduce players to, but it’s like putting the “Allspice Turducken while in a tornado” level of Overcooked first.
Then you’re talking about the Catacombs? The area whose entrance has infinitely respawning skeletons? Give up, man.
Dark Souls’ failure isn’t talking through NPCs - dozens of games that give your character a radio do just that. It’s from literally lying to you with misleading tripe and having no interest in any form of teaching - be it Half-Life 2’s nonverbal teaching or any verbally direct form. I had to play games by other devs, imitating the better parts of their formula, to learn FromSoft is just uniquely TERRIBLE at it.
Like I said, Ne Londo has the first blacksmith you can get to, so going there isn’t bad, and that’s before the ghosts. Yeah, you’re going to need to back out once you get to the ghosts. If you try to force your way through that then yeah, it’ll be bad, but that one is really obvious you shouldn’t be doing it.
I talked about the Catacombs a lot, in how it failed. I think you ignored it. It’s supposed to be approachable for new players, but it failed, mostly in the escape. The necromancers are solvable with a divine weapon. They can’t revive skeletons killed by them. You’re supposed to back out of it at the very start, but return once you get a divine weapon. Again, it failed at what it was supposed to do, but the goal was for struggling players to go there are get the Rite of Kindling. That’s why Pinwheel is such a joke. He’s supposed to be fought early.
I haven’t played it, but I’ve watched it. I think Demon’s Souls actually probably does a better job. It’s very similar, but less ambitious without a connected world. Obviously Elden Ring also does it better, but it makes it somewhat boring too. It’s almost trivial.
These people don’t seem to learn the lesson the game teaches you right from the start by having the asylum demon stomp your ass until you figure out you should try a different path.
I was the same with the Dark Souls games. I just had no interest in them because they just looked way too punishing.
Then I discovered the lore. I’m a huge lore nerd. I mean I absolutely love Warhammer 40k and I’ve never played it and don’t know how to play it. I don’t have any of the minitures but man the lore for that is awesome. It was the same for the Dark Souls games. I just stumbled across a video by that VatiiVidya guy and I was hooked. Now I wanted to play and just pick up everything and read the tiny bits of lore attached to every item in the games and then piece together this universe.
Dark Souls 3 being my favourite. That story once you discover what’s REALLY happening is amazing. The lore for DS3 really turns the whole playing experience on its head. Suddenly you go from thinking you’re the good guy trying to save this fucked up world to realizing that “wait, am I the baddie?” Like you have to return these guys to their thrones but you begin to understand WHY they don’t want to sit on their thrones and in the end you honestly don’t blame any of them for abandoning their task.
+1 for dark souls. It just felt like playing Space Ace all over again
“It’s just pattern recognition!” Bestie, you just described the only thing the neocortex does.
…I’m being real sarcastic for a guy who couldn’t beat DS1 without playing a sorcerer.
Try big hammer. Lizard brain and monkey brain meet.
Don’t crucify me, but Control.
I absolutely love creepy atmospheric games that aren’t outright horror. If you’ve ever played the Playdead games (Limbo and Inside) you know what I’m talking about. BioShock does it a bit too. Anyway, due to this being my absolute favourite type of media to consume, and not at all knowing how to find more of it, I made a post on here a couple years ago asking for advice, as well as a few friends and other communities, and Control was the overwhelming majority suggestion. So obviously I gave it a shot, but I just didn’t enjoy the way it, ahem, controlled. Not sure how well to describe it other than that, but movement just felt off to me. Maybe I’ll have to give it a try again in the future, but I couldn’t put in more than an hour or two without getting annoyed. It looked pretty neat, and I’ve seen screenshots of later points in the game which look pretty awesome, but for whatever reason I couldn’t get past the movement. It’s not an issue I’ve had in any other game and I’m not sure why it bugs me so much in this one.
This is sort of how I felt about Pikuniku. The controls pissed me off into not gaming for an entire year.
This is probably my pick too, and it frustrates me. Because like, look. I love Remedy games. I love Alan Wake 1 and 2 to death. I just bought a 200 dollar book about Alan Wake. I really vibe with Control’s aesthetic and setting. Ahti is great. I have beat Control before, but ever since then, whenever I think “oh, I should go back and replay Control” I get about five hours back into the game before I just sit there and think man, I am not having any fun. Just about all of these characters feel like cardboard cutouts with neutral faces drawn on them, the plot is kinda dull, when it bothers to show up, and if the game can’t really get excited about itself I’m not sure how I’m supposed to. I’ll always love launching a forklift at some Hiss at 200mph but it doesn’t take me far enough.
That being said, yes, I will still be playing Control 2 day one. Even if it’s garbage, Remedy will always deserve the chance for me.
I found the combat to be incredibly repetitive, and the story was unsatisfying to me. Have you tried Soma? That sounds like it would scratch your itch, but I haven’t played it.
I haven’t. It’s on my wishlist though, so maybe on the next sale I’ll pick it up.
Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines I didn’t get around to playing this game until about a decade after its release, and I seriously don’t understand who could find that game enjoyable except 13yo edgelords.
I mean most of the people shilling it probably were teens at the time they played it. It’s like Neon Genesis Evangelion: teenage drama that’s “deep”, but when you watch it as an adult it just doesn’t hit.
I played it and had a great time a few years ago and I’m certainly no 13yo or edgelord. Vtmb has a very unique setting, good writing and a great soundtrack. The gameplay is probably the worst part about it though, it’s also quite unfinished in the later parts. Don’t open it.
I got one! The very first Assassin’s Creed when it came out!
My childhood friend would NOT shut up about it! He would talk over and over again about the lore, show me extended cutscenes, videos, sent me lore theories, it was a whole thing!
Years later I finally get to play it and holy shit, what a disappointment… the entire game is just the same 3 missions over and over again… like no effort into hiding anything… literally the same 3 missions copied and pasted ad nauseum with different enemy names. I’m still shocked he sat through all of this bullshit to get to the awesome lore he went on and on about for weeks.
Bonus story with the same friend: we were talking about Devil May Cry and he said “I wish I could find another game like it…” and I noticed he said “game” and not “games” or “franchise” so I asked “Did you play the sequels? DMC3 is incredible!” and he goes “What sequels? I’m sure it’s only one game…” and I swear I screamed at the realization he’s talking about the reboot DmC: Devil May Cry and had no clue the original franchise even exists 😂 That was right after DMC5 came out too, which’s wild.
I recommended starting with DMC5 because the story isn’t great anyway and DMC1 or even DMC3 may feel a little dated. He ignored my advice because he wanted to experience the story from the beginning, picked up the HD collection, hated both DMC1 and DMC3 because they felt too stiff, and never touched the franchise again.
I agree, but the main problem is the “years later” part of your experience. Assassin’s Creed had many gameplay innovations with (for the time) amazing graphics that shaped certain game mechanics for years to come, but gaming has evolved…
That’s why many of these former “innovations” have lost their shine and sometimes even became annoying (e.g. climbing a tower to unlock parts of the map).
“years later” does not matter in my case because it wasn’t that many years later—l probably played it only 3 or 4 years after release, and I don’t play western action RPGs or stealth games. I think the first Assassin’s Creed is the only Ubisoft game I played, for example, and it surely did not influence any of the games I actually play: Bayonetta, The Wonderful 101, Hellsinker, or Guilty Gear.
Pretty sure I would’ve had a problem with it on release because it’s shitty repetitive design.
Yep it absolutely was a problem on release.
I enjoyed playing ac1 back then but it was very repetitive.
Time was cheap back then.
Half Life 2. Wasn’t a big fan of the first one, but the second had tons of hype, so I gave it a shot. The physics stuff was cool, but the gameplay, story and characters were boring and flat. And the “revolutionary” storytelling method of locking you in a box to talk at you rather than making a proper cutscene still sucks.
Because I can’t help myself from countering:
HL2 has better, more realistic and detailed and believable mouth and facial animations than many current AAA games, they just have higher res textures and fancier lighting.
That’s not to say no game has exceeded it, thats not what I mean, some clearly have.
But… the other side of this is that a lot of modern AAA games, with 20 years of improved/new tech… still can’t figure it out.
AAA games that market themselves as being very graphically detailed/realistic/immersive.
I’m not trying to say waaagh how can you not personally have thought HL2 was amazing!
I’m trying to say that the technical advancements it made, which you do not find compelling, well, a good deal of game devs still haven’t even reached that level from 20+ years ago, when they say they are trying to.
Damn, that is a hot take.
Honestly impressive for a 20+ year-old game to still inspire hot takes.HL2 remains undefeated.
Fuck yeah!
Back when I was first getting into gaming and learning about this Steam thing a friend told me I needed to play the Half Life games. I snagged them on sale started playing and every one I tried I ended up putting down pretty quickly because I’m just not a shooter fan.
Funnily enough I actually like more combat-oriented games more now but I’ve played too many newer games that were at least partially inspired by Half Life so I have a feeling I’ll go play it and find it’s too unpolished and not aged too well
I watch Freeman’s Mind and wanted to play. Yeah totally not my cup of tea.
This game was what pulled me into PC gaming, but when I’ve watched novices return to it even with all the time I spent listening to their commentaries on good teaching…players don’t learn the things they want well, and I can’t blame them on reflection. Even things like where to go are tough for reasons they shouldn’t be.
Dark Souls 2. A coworker gave me a steam code for it after I told him I wasn’t really a big fan of games where you just have to memorize opponent movesets. He said he’d gift it to me if I gave it an honest try, and I did.
And I didn’t like it. Didn’t understand the hype, didn’t have any idea what was going on with me dying and transforming or something, or why there were weird ghosts of other players all over the map. Maybe it makes sense if you know the genre but I didn’t like the gameplay and didn’t get any lore/story, so I ditched it.
Everyone kept praising Baldur’s Gate 3. I even watched gameplay of it.
It was buggy on the supposed release, especially with a quest that had been part of the beta FOR YEARS rendering itself incompleltable and stealing my items in the process.
Then I got sucked into a party wipe, and a fight I had beaten earlier suddenly became an impassable slogfest.
$90 AUD for 3 hours of gameplay and a piss poor character creator. Because orcs had fuckall compared to the other races.
I am never trusting popular opinion again.
My friend said it was the best D&D experience he ever had. I love D&D and also had hundreds of hours in Solasta. I immediately bought 2 copies of BG3 so I could play with my SO. BG3 sucked for me. It’s like pretend D&D, with the whiniest, most burdened companions they possibly could have created, and a terrible UI to boot. We tried it again after the ‘final’ patch (still buggy, but better). Ended up pretending it’s not D&D and tried to ignore all the terrible nonsensical gameplay mechanics. Made it all the way to Act 3 before giving up again.
I love the studio for their behavior towards players, but I hate their games and their terrible combat mechanics. Every goddamn inch is some kind of trap or environmental hazard designed to ruin your experience
I love BG3; used to love D&D as well.
Anyone that says it’s like playing D&D is just not correct. It’s a fun game that can simulate some of the rules and mechanics pretty well, but never does it feel like actually playing D&D.