goodratt
Goodratt
goodratt

My god I hated that FFXV felt like a GQ road trip. I mean, I didn’t hate that, I actually loved *that*, it was gay as shit and I made that subtext text in my headcanon, but it was so weird seeing hyper-real looking models in all black silk and leather—camping. Running around in the mud and the dirt and sleeping in

I agree (especially with FF7r, what a mess that game was, I STILL don’t understand how so many people give it not only a pass, but glowing reviews as though the combat was some revolutionary gold standard), EXCEPT for 12—I really liked 12, and I thought it was a good evolution of ATB. Setting up gambits wasn’t just a

You could normalize damage in PvP so that (conceptual example) instead of invader dealing 350 damage per swing even though easy-mode player has 1500 health instead of the base 1,000, invader deals 35% of whatever the player’s health is—this would normalize PvP such that extremely overpowered but *technically*

From frequently spends a lot of time and mechanics making you *unlearn* what the last franchise taught you, BUT since Elden Ring is mechanically almost identical to Dark Souls this is definitely less the case. Bloodborne and Sekiro though? Might actually be harder (in some respects) if you are familiar with Souls.

That’s how I also felt about Doom 2016 versus Eternal. I didn’t play either until just a few months ago (picked the first up on sale for like the price of a latte). I instantly fell in love with 2016, it was just amazing—such a lean (but robust) economy of design, such elegant and interlocking systems, such confidence

Yeah, it’s interesting how things cycle around. Some games benefit from RPG style XP leveling, while others benefit from having challenges and feats unlock more focused skills and abilities. I think exploring the latter is very interesting for soulslikes—for the former, I feel like a lot of games don’t need it (like

Oh, 1,000%. Sorry, again, about the wording, and you’re totally right—I can see how some of the stuff I said might have suggested that I think there’s a correct way to play these games. There’s not—beating it is beating it, and it sucks that they can be so unfriendly to people who might otherwise get a lot out of the

I’m sorry we’re not on the same page. That’s probably my fault, I’m long-winded—I don’t think we actually disagree though.

It’s SO good! And the God mode thing helped a lot of people get into it, who otherwise wouldn’t have (my husband was one of ‘em—and now, he’s beaten it on a fresh, no GM file and plays with all the Heat levels turned on! Meanwhile, he tried Bloodborne and just did not get to engage with it, despite beating Cleric

I get what you’re saying but that’s not really what I’m driving at.

I know several people who are varying degrees of “gamer” (from pretty much not at all on up) who got to enjoy and appreciate all the amazing things Hades has to offer, *and have the same overall experience and trajectory with it as I did,* who look at Bloodborne with disdain.

That’s especially wild to me—this game sold, what, 12 million copies in a week? More than any other in their catalog has *yet* to sell, something like that?

It’s the predicted GOTY and it’s open world and every (gushing, 100/10 masterpiece greatest of all time) review talks about this one being more accessible than

I’ve been saying for a minute that this is already something Sekiro began to answer, and then Hades beat them to it. I didn’t like Sekiro as much as Bloodborne (just not quite my vibe compared to BB, which is my favorite not only of their library but of all time) but both games made some smart, elegant refinements

I stopped playing a couple weeks ago—just wasn’t enjoying myself anymore, too much of the game felt like a step backward to make up for the things I did like—but I’m heartened to see somebody with clout and a voice speak out against that toxic “git gud” mentality. Maybe it’ll get through to some people.

I was thinking this as I read this article too (I haven’t played the game yet). It extends not just from a lot of RPG written material but to the table’s behavior, too—in my experience, anyway.

I’m sorry for being unclear, but I feel like we’re focusing on something I’m not really driving at. I’m not talking about removing any of that, or even changing it on the player’s end—I want to preserve a sense of progression, this exact one, so that you can become overpowered if you like.

Sure, and me too. But like I said to the other poster, it’s a bit more complicated than that.

I don’t think that overleveling to stomp everything is the experience of most players *in these games specifically.* You mention yourself that you can still be one-shot, and I think it should be acknowledged that *most* of your damage output comes from weapon upgrades (most of your defense is what comes from leveling).

The number of people (defensively?) saying “I just don’t understand why so many dum-dums missed it” is an interesting dichotomy against... the number of people missing it.

(not that anybody asked for my opinion)