1) You do not play the same thing over and over again if you learn from your mistakes. One of the main appeal of the game is the satisfaction you get from advancing.
Yes you do, you make a mistake, then you replay the level from where your last check point was.. which is essentiall the beginning of a level up to a boss, so you play that sectoin over and over again
Then you learn from your mistakes. Play differently, summon blue phantoms, read messages, go to another area, soul farm. The game doesn't force you to bang your head against the wall, it gives you the tools, and you can choose to use them by swallowing your ego or to keep banging your head until you get tired of it.
2)No skill? Play PvP, get invaded, whatever. It's far from a difficult game. Memorizing patterns is part of all gaming skill btw, I hate this concept where skill only involves hand-eye coordination (which is quite necessary in the Souls games)
combat in this game isn't what I'd call having higher level functions, its pretty basic and especially sucks when you get invaded by people intending tothere is little skill in wether or not you designed your character for PVP and are capable of defending yourself, or your outright boned, and yes memorization is low on the totem poll of skills that are required,
Memorizing a map is essential to all FPS btw. Try playing Starcraft without memorizing the hotkeys, the maps, the unit stats etc. What pros do basically is to play it so often that it becomes basic muscle memory without even thinking. Demon's Souls didn't have much to memorize from my own experience. It's more along the line of discovering/familializing.
This game's combat is not meant to be super duper complex, which is a good thing. It's simple, functional and accessible. It's strong point is the its preciseness, not its pretentiousness. It just emphasizes on qualities that do not involve spamming buttons like a hack'n slash. It's rather the Souls haters that often want to cry about how hard or complex it is...while in fact down its core it was a very simple game with relatively very few items compared to other RPGs.
As for bosses that kill you in 1-2 hits, you probably messed something up if they do that in the first playthrough. For NG+, use Warding/Second Chance.
Yah you mess up a lot the first time you play a boss, didn't know that hit was gonig to come like that, now I need to find a way to heal quickly before he strikes again... or am already dead go back to the starting area of this section, and hopefully I memorized everythign so I can get their with health items
Some levels allow you to unlock shortcuts for that reason. (Maneater, Phalanx, etc)
Also, a common trick to use and abuse is to quit game right after you die, before you respawn. You will come back to the save prior to your death. I used it quite a bit especially when I had lots of souls on me.
Your progress isn't all lost when you die either you only lose souls, plus you get a chance to recover them
savagetwinkie
Its not outright lies, the best skills you need in this game are #1 patience, #2 memorization... If you want difficult combat play ninja gaiden black on the harder difficulties, or if you want tactics there are plenty of strategy games... this game is all about player griefing, from the single player to the mulitplayer...
(The lies part was not specifically responding to your post. I agree what you said here btw. However it's flawed to take one element of a game to compare it to others like that, you can have the best strategy/difficulty but the other elements can drag it down. What was good about the Souls games is in the execution of the entire concept. )
The game's combat is easy, its not very complex, and 90% of survivability is anticipating where the next cheap shot is going to pop out from. So what you get is a game that takes 0 skill to actually fight an enemy, all you have to do is hang back and bow an ememy down and when he gets up to you, stab him a lot, t
then you get to the boss you havn't been to before, likely get killed, repeat bow/stab combo all the way back up to where you were,
(You could just be careful you know, *brag alert* I have beaten bosses on first tries without trial and error, prepare well and make some good/lucky decisions */brag alert*, and I'm far from the only one.)
fight the boss again... oh look you learned of another new attack! You might be dead already, in which case, repeat the above steps again... or heal since likely you can't take two hits, and just keep chugging along hopeing he doesn't pull anything new on you.
Exactly what is so difficult about that?
Well...what's this? Downplay it with oversimplication? Oh no you wouldn't. :P It's exactly that which most Demon's Souls fans will tell you, that it's not that difficult. Actually it seems that the antifans are the ones that likes to think that the game is godly difficult.
What's so difficult about CoD games? You spawn, you run around for a bit, you frantically spray your bullets to the first thing that pop, use your streaks if you can, you die, and respawn to repeat again.
What's so great about *insert game*? You *insert starting phase*, then you *insert consequent phase with derogatory terms*, and then it's just over and over again. (Don't get me started on MMOs...)
You seem to be missing the point, the fans don't like it for the difficulty, which only contributes to make you feel like a boss when you finally beat it. People enjoy the game not just for the combat, but the overall package which provides an extremely satisfying ride with a great atmosphere. What you describe as "cheap shot" is simply the game being unforgiving, while providing a challenging atmosphere similar to that of a survival horror (I got wayyy more scared when being invaded for the first time than playing something like Dead Space). Combined with the message system it creates an sense of lonely camaraderie that worked pretty well. All of this is why this has been a cult hit.
Again, it's not for everyone. It wants you to really dive in and bend over a bit to enjoy it.
What I really don't understand is why some people who couldn't get into it likes to insult those who do, as if they personally know everyone who played the game just because they had some experience with it. It's like they go on a crusade to try to convince that everything is the game's fault. I don't like certain series of games, but I don't feel the need to bash their fans no matter nor do I wish the games to stop existing simply based on my own taste.
Is our generation so entitled that a slightly punishing video game can provoke this?
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