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Edge 249: Dark Souls II. To be more "direct," "straightforward," and "understandable"
- Thread starter Visualante2
- Start date
Your first paragraph contradicts your second. The Taurus Demon's weakness literally doesn't matter. The cool sword is a secret, and you'd think to try it when you fight the belltower boss and notice that cutting off it's tail gives you a weapon, and thinking back to seeing another tail previously. Lastly, you realize you can summon in body form when you go in body form to kindle a bonfire and see summon signs. All this stuff is either straight forward, irrelevant, or purposefully a secret with a hint. These things are this way for a reason, and the game would lose a lot imo to change that.
The Xtortionist
Member
The first two are very minor in the long run so I'd just let player messages take care of them (and they often do). Totally agreed about summoning. I bring that up a lot and probably need to stop. Don't want it to become the new "slide into cover".
There's no way they'd go that far.
Why do you MUST have knowledge of what an enemy is weak to? that's what the community is for right? a message on the floor saying weak to X or cut tail.That's why they purposely stopped voice chat to boost in game mechanics.
And the pop up thing yeah that's an awful idea.Just expand upon the explanations given.Screenshot below has parameter determining equipment load res to bleed etc that explains what the stat does but it isn't well though out for most of them.
And the pop up thing yeah that's an awful idea.Just expand upon the explanations given.Screenshot below has parameter determining equipment load res to bleed etc that explains what the stat does but it isn't well though out for most of them.
I definitely would say I doubt they'd go that far as well, I'm just responding to RedSwirl's line about what needs to be hinted at/made clearer. His line is far too liberal.
That kind of thing is not good game design. You shouldn't need forum buddies or a wiki to understand aspects of the game. I think this is the kind of thing the director of the game was talking about.
jim-jam bongs
Member
you learn about kindling when you arrive at firelink
you can see what humanity does by looking at the description of it in your inventory
every single stat in the game is explained on the stats page in detail
does the game make you work for it? a little, but it's not as though the information isn't there, and I'd rather the game work for it so that I have moments of wonderful realisation which make the experience of playing dark souls fucking incredible.
for reals. it's like some people think that if they can't platinum/1000 point clear a game the first time they play it then it's poorly designed, personally I love the fact that I know there's still content I haven't seen after 350 hours playing dark souls.
you can see what humanity does by looking at the description of it in your inventory
every single stat in the game is explained on the stats page in detail
does the game make you work for it? a little, but it's not as though the information isn't there, and I'd rather the game work for it so that I have moments of wonderful realisation which make the experience of playing dark souls fucking incredible.
for reals. it's like some people think that if they can't platinum/1000 point clear a game the first time they play it then it's poorly designed, personally I love the fact that I know there's still content I haven't seen after 350 hours playing dark souls.
I never even noticed cutting off the bell tower bosses' tails gave you weapons.
I vehemently disagree. You don't NEED to read wiki's to understand dark souls so that's not a sound criticism anyway. What you could say is that there will be players that need outside help in order to beat the game or to understand the majority of the game. But! I content that that is actually good game design. Not having that be the case means that the game must be understandable and beatable by everyone; which just leads to a bland, boring design who's focus is to think lowly of the intelligence of the player.
And that's okay! Not everyone should notice everything and have the same things happen to them. Having the game be complex and varied enough to allow epiphany moments in the player is a good thing!
jim-jam bongs
Member
TESTIFY BROTHER
I disagree. Making that information more esoteric does nothing good for anyone. I'm not saying to make the game more "direct" in the sense that a guy explicitly tells you, but systems like World Tendency and covenants in the past have not been very intuitive, having effects so specific that you'll be running to the Internet every two seconds for comprehension.
H_Prestige
Banned
None of that stuff you mentioned is required to complete the game. The game doesn't need to spell everything. Hell, I literally just found out about the fire weakness after reading your post. So what?
jim-jam bongs
Member
can you name one thing about dark souls which would be impossible to find out without reading a wiki?
Agreed. I think a good summarization of the argument is, gamers who play these games need to pay attention, close attention and apply what they learn/experiment. And that holds true for the story, gameplay and mechanical understanding. And if in doubt or need ask for help.
There's something to be said for designers who use and demand lots of inference, inspection and curiosity.
Fine Ham Abounds
Member
It seems illogical to me that the systems are impenetrable if there are answers on the internet. Wikis don't write themselves.
As has been mentioned, MMOs do this sort of thing a lot, and it leads to a lot of community involvement. People simulating and theorycrafting and what-not, sharing that with others, people testing things in-game. Maybe it's too much of a metagame to some, and I can certainly understand why people might want to play the games as purely single player experiences.
Overall, I'm all for less obfuscating of basic systems because I don't feel it would have a direct negative effect on that sort of community, and at the same time it should benefit everyone. People thought WoW would ruin MMO communities because grouping wasn't required to level. Obviously we're not comparing like things here, but my point is just that the community will find other things to dig deeper into.
And for those who wish not to see it, why not the ability to turn such info off?
I still think the greatest danger here is "accessibility" meaning an overabundance of explosions or exposition.
As has been mentioned, MMOs do this sort of thing a lot, and it leads to a lot of community involvement. People simulating and theorycrafting and what-not, sharing that with others, people testing things in-game. Maybe it's too much of a metagame to some, and I can certainly understand why people might want to play the games as purely single player experiences.
Overall, I'm all for less obfuscating of basic systems because I don't feel it would have a direct negative effect on that sort of community, and at the same time it should benefit everyone. People thought WoW would ruin MMO communities because grouping wasn't required to level. Obviously we're not comparing like things here, but my point is just that the community will find other things to dig deeper into.
And for those who wish not to see it, why not the ability to turn such info off?
I still think the greatest danger here is "accessibility" meaning an overabundance of explosions or exposition.
Like I said earlier, World Tendencies (which, hey, were removed for Dark Souls because the designers thought they weren't communicated well) and covenants are too important mechanics for a game like this to just brush it off. Yes, you can get through the game without knowledge of them, but it just always seemed strange to me how you really need to look it up elsewhere to figure this stuff out.
Eh, just because there are wikis written by people willing to spend 800 hours navigating a labyrinthine bit of gameplay nuance doesn't mean that feature must therefore be "accessible."
The type of people who really spend time writing FAQs and Wikis are not a good weight against even a very above-average gamer. These people are typically top-of-the-class time sinkers who will play games dozens of times to try to figure out the best way to get a +1 stat advantage.
I still think the Demon/Dark Souls games would be basically perfect if it simply had a little clearer translation and directness in terms of gameplay quirks, though. It hardly needs an overhaul. Exploring and discovering mechanical advantages and gameplay nuances and stuff like that is part of the fun.
jim-jam bongs
Member
but like fine ham says, someone had to work these things out for there to be wikis about them right?
Not impossible. But like his example, understanding the covenants by yourself is unlikely unless you have a ridiculous amount of free time to experiment by yourself.
I don't really care, myself. I don't mind looking stuff up on the wikis and asking for hints and such. But a lot of Souls players seem to scoff at new players doing that.
AlimNassor
Banned
Imo, what the next game should do is instead of outright telling you, it should hint at it via game. if you were paying attention, and did your homework you would understand things. But, i doubt it will happen.
D
Deleted member 30609
Unconfirmed Member
Dark Souls already had easy mode. Drake Sword.
I DO like to have the chance to play with/against other people though, not to mention that in my experience blatant hackers were the exception, not the norm. My biggest gripe was the invading just after going human, and even then my biggest non-hacking issue can be solved just by putting in a 5-10 minute grace period. Being invaded is your risk to summon people into your game, it shouldn't be something you have to take a chance on when IMMEDIATELY kindling. Or they should just let you kindle without being human, but it's still nice to not immediately get invaded (or for them to ATTEMPT to invade anyway) the second you turn human or in the case of Demon's Souls enter a stage.
That's not an easy mode, those are training wheels. And just like training wheels you can't use it forever.
Most of the covenants are pretty obvious in that they have an NPC you report back to and they eat humanity or other item and give you more stuff for it. Forest Hunters is obvious, way of white and sunbro is pretty obvious as they don't do too much. Some of the others can be figured out from covenant specific item descriptions. I can't think of any that are just impossible to figure out.
Considering the popularity of Wikis though, I don't see anything wrong with someone relying on them to figure stuff out. You don't absolutely need to either way.
The Drake Sword should have been better. Less damage at +0, slightly shorter range, much better once upgraded. Would love to have seen a real honest dragon weapon standby for multi-classes... All the other dragon weapons aren't terribly useful in that way.
Lumination
'enry 'ollins
Moonlight Greatsword is decent for INT builds.
All of them are useful depending on misc builds, but it'd be nice to have a "Longsword-type" utility for a broad range of builds.
Riposte
Member
I don't know, how does it? Did you think I was factoring everyone else in? (I actually don't want you to answer this question.)
lol. What an absurd and snarky way of describing the universal phenomena called TASTE.
Uh-huh. I didn't expect you to relate, it is a weird concept for most I figure, but you can at least not pretend I didn't make the post where I explained my reasoning. Judging by the rest of your post didn't seem like anything stuck as it passed through you, so no harm done I suppose.
RedSwirl, with your specific examples you are asking the game to give you the easy path. Here you see the line that can blur between tutorials and guides (one and the same).
Obsidian Greatsword.
That weapon wasn't available until a year after the game was released though.
lemon__fresh
Member
black knight great axe... get up in there!
Yeah, I actually really like this, still need to level up a decent amount to use it though... But I was sort of referring to weapons that were in the stock. But yeah, glad they had this in the DLC, my fav new weapon.
Not a dragon weapon. I used it a bunch back on PS3, didn't they nerf this a bit with the newer patch?
Ghost_Protocol
Member
I'd say 99% of players would not be able to save Solaire, find Kaathe, or join Nito's covenant without a wiki.
Also, getting all the treasures in the great hollow (ALL of them) requires the patience of a god. I know most people gave the fuck up after the 10th fall to their death.
Yep they nerfed the R1 damage, left the speed the same. The speed of the attack is what made it unbalanced.
The R2 still does the same damage.
jim-jam bongs
Member
but my argument is that we shouldn't deprive the 1% of the magic they would feel for having discovered something by persevering when other players would have given up.
Phonomezer
Banned
This is so amazingly accurate. Should be in the OP of every Dark Souls related thread.
vikingvessel
Member
Triggering NPC storylines in Dark, where there are rewards on the line based on seeing 3-5 instances of a storyline through in a specific form didn't come naturally. Game is still totally completable and no different than any game that you can finish without experiencing everything in one playthrough. It is still hard to digest how the things that they did differently (by essentially doing certain things the way they were done favorably in earlier generations) that elevated these games are now negatives. Preserving the sense of wonder is a major component. I wouldn't change a thing. I am fine with Dark Souls: Next Day.
haha, that is pretty accurate. trial-and-error gameplay is like that part in Limbo where you see a pressure switch on the floor and then jump to avoid it, and then two seconds later you see something else that also seems like a pressure switch on the floor, which looks exactly the same, but when you jump to avoid it like the one right before you get crushed because it's not a switch, the area right around it which looks nothing like a switch is the switch. That gameplay I don't like because it's just tricking the gamer, it's not really reliant on any particular skill except the ability not to learn from things the game teaches you five seconds before.
In Dark Souls, when you die, it's almost always your fault for not honing your skills or learning from past mistakes or whatever.
onimushroom
Member
That's exactly why I really disliked Limbo.
In Souls you usually can see what's coming by examining the clues in the environment and by manipulating the camera. For example, you see Asylum Demon through a hole in the wall even before opening the doors. That hole is there to show you that a monster is ahead.
Well, Limbo (I personally loved the game) pretty much used trial and error as a narration technique to transport the player into the purgatory in which the boy's in. You're basically gruesomely killed and forced to go into scary and horrible places (and that spider) over and over again because you're in purgatory and are being punished, just like the boy is, and if you die, you just get to try again.
I thought it was pretty good use of mechanics and narrative, but I wouldn't use it as an example of the Souls series in the slightest.
It's actually very easy not to die all the time if you familiarize yourself with the mechanics and just act cautious. It gets harder when the game puts you out of your comfort zone, with bosses and multiple enemies, etc.
I thought it was pretty good use of mechanics and narrative, but I wouldn't use it as an example of the Souls series in the slightest.
It's actually very easy not to die all the time if you familiarize yourself with the mechanics and just act cautious. It gets harder when the game puts you out of your comfort zone, with bosses and multiple enemies, etc.
onimushroom
Member
Not an example of the Souls series, but of trial and error gameplay, compared to the perceived trial and error gameplay of the Souls series. Other than that, the games are quite different indeed.
As far as Limbo goes, I can understand that the game was supposed to be played by constantly dying and learning, but I don't have to like it. Cautious approach, for me, meant that I usually missed a time-sensitive action and had to die to try again.
Oh, and the "
"... Felt like I had just wasted my time. Was not happy.
Agreed, however, I think that Dark Souls had a few more sections where your deaths aren't exactly your fault, at least in comparison with Demon's Souls. Just to be clear, most of the game isn't like that and you can easily say that both games are fair.
In other words this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r86NLwCYXfk
Isn't what you should expect from a Souls game. (And sadly, many think it is)
The series complexity and harshness is it's strength. You take that away and all you have generic hack and slash. (Example: Darksiders)**
Making things more understandable or smoothing out the learning curve is fine, but don't cave From. You're the only Japanese developer that doesn't need a complete remake, don't start now.
**: I like Darksiders, but I find the game to less fulfilling than Dark Souls.
Making things more understandable or smoothing out the learning curve is fine, but don't cave From. You're the only Japanese developer that doesn't need a complete remake, don't start now.
**: I like Darksiders, but I find the game to less fulfilling than Dark Souls.
Perfect!
And how the fuck were you supposed to know that you needed a specific object for one character to be able to talk to you revealing a really great background information about some characters. They should have added:
Quest added:
Get object XXX to be able to hear what character YYY wants to say
No, they fucking shouldn't. Because it's really great to find out about that for yourself at some point (ESPECIALLY BECAUSE OF THE ACTUAL BACKGROUND INFO, you will feel really sad after hearing it). And then figure, that you are possibly one of the very few people that found out. The youtube video, which shows the dialogue, has many comments like "omg, I never knew, I feel so sad".
There is so much stuff in Dark Souls. So much hidden stuff, it's insane. There are even whole LEVELS that not everyone knows about. You are not required to get through those or even know about those to finish the game. Which is a great thing.
I personally thought I would at least know every single path. And guess what, replayed the game a few months ago and found out that there is another hidden path, that I totally missed. Which is awesome.
Kaathe is not problem to find. You just don't talk to Frampt after getting the lord vessel.
Wait, seriously? Because I was doing a hit and run tactic on him for 10 minutes while I had about 10 firebombs. Actually, in my second play through I just straight took him on with my +9 Claymore. Wow, this blew my mind.
The more you know.
The more you know.
Dark Souls can easily be broken in the first hour. As the video shows, not even 10 minutes is needed to violate the entire game.