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Maleh-Vor posted:If Dark Souls had a Boss Rush mode unlocked after beating it, while incredibly gamey and counter to the whole experience and mood of Dark Souls, I'd just do that all day and never play anything else. As far as corpse runs go, I think that there is something valuable in giving the player time to consider what made them die last time and how to avoid it before putting them right back in the action, which means they're less likely to just keep trying the exact same thing over and over again. It also gives them the chance to get back into a groove of doing things correctly so they don't feel like the entire game has become an unrelenting series of deaths. It can take a long time to actually convince yourself that no, really, as an SL1 on NG+ you need to be even more defensive than that against O+S, stop trying to get in that extra Great Combustion and pull back already, and stop letting yourself get boxed in on the sides of the room. Downtime helps.
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| # ? May 24, 2013 20:58 |
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| # ? May 25, 2013 08:38 |
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Paracelsus posted:Downtime helps. x infinity! I can definitely, conclusively say that if I got to spawn right outside the boss door every time, dying to the boss would mean much, much less. I need some time to cool down and figure things out, whether that means turning off the game, going to try something else, or just getting back to where I was. A boss russ would be fine but it's not this game. When are you going to get invaded during a boss russ mode?? ... I guess the answer would have to be, "while fighting a boss." I'm down with the idea now. 
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| # ? May 24, 2013 21:30 |
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superh posted:... I guess the answer would have to be, "while fighting a boss." I'm down with the idea now. I really hope there's some way to involve invasions and bosses in DS2 
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| # ? May 24, 2013 21:33 |
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Paracelsus posted:Downtime helps. In my first playthrough O&S was an impassible wall for me. I just could not do that boss fight. I walked away from the game for a few days and when I next booted up the game I managed to kil the buggers. Same with the 4 kings, Artorias and Manus. I just don't think that downtime needs to be enforced by the game, nor do I think that replaying sections of gameplay is proper downtime.
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| # ? May 24, 2013 21:46 |
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Raygereio posted:That I will agree with. Is this how you've felt about every action game ever? There are so many games that have boss runs it's hard to count, have you people been bitching for the past thirty years or what?
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:16 |
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I've been wanting to do some co-op. I'm level 76 or 77, and I have a friend who isn't above level 10 yet. If we both use the GFWL friend mod thing, would it override the level range when playing co-op?
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:20 |
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Snix posted:I've been wanting to do some co-op. I'm level 76 or 77, and I have a friend who isn't above level 10 yet. If we both use the GFWL friend mod thing, would it override the level range when playing co-op? Sorry, it only jumps around the connection pool logic, it doesn't break the summon range logic. Roll a new character and join him? It shouldn't take too long.
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:23 |
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Snix posted:I've been wanting to do some co-op. I'm level 76 or 77, and I have a friend who isn't above level 10 yet. If we both use the GFWL friend mod thing, would it override the level range when playing co-op? EightBit posted:Is this how you've felt about every action game ever? There are so many games that have boss runs it's hard to count, have you people been bitching for the past thirty years or what?
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:33 |
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Raygereio posted:actually progress. Every moment you are progressing though. If the game rolled back to last save, then yeah, that's annoying but that isn't what dark souls does which is what makes the bloodstain system so good. You can keep everything you've gotten on those runs, practice makes perfect, etc etc.
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:35 |
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Raygereio posted:I have a strong dislike of checkpoint save systems in general. I will have the exact same complaint with every other game that forces me to replay gameplay sections that I've already cleared before I can attempt to actually progress. So there shouldn't be any punishment for death? In a game like Meatboy you have to play through the same bits to get to where you've died, even though that's a game that's based on skill. The difference is the amount of time it takes to do so. Almost every game has some punishment for dying, otherwise what would be point of getting better?
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:37 |
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I definitely got better at the beginning doing runs back to Taurus, and the Capra run made me say "gently caress this" and go explore Darkroot, leading to some pretty sweet items and the understanding that poise is a Good Thing. The run to O&S helped me work on my dodges greatly, since by then I hadn't figured out anything but "two-hand this zweihander, beat the poo poo out of everything" and eventually convinced me to try a safer, quicker BSS w/ shield option. Once I worked that out, I learned parrying, which while it isn't a critical skill, makes a lot of the game easier and makes you feel like a badass. Also, I didn't have the Rite of Kindling, so if I messed up at the beginning and was two Estus' down, I was actually at a disadvantage. On the other hand, Manus' was worthless. BoC was also stupid, but that was more the boss and clearly rushed nature of the area than any deliberate decision on the part of the devs.
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:53 |
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EC posted:So there shouldn't be any punishment for death? <snip> Almost every game has some punishment for dying, otherwise what would be point of getting better? As for what the point would be: How about not dying and continuing to play? I don't punishment as a motivator for that. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that checkpoint system shouldn't exist. If you enjoy that mechanic, then I'm perfectly fine with that. The way I see it proper saving features can be implemented alongside checkpoint systems, allowing player to go with whichever one they prefer. So to come back to Dark Souls for a moment. Let's say there's a soapstone-like item that allows you to mark a location and warp to it from the bonfire. What would be the problem with that? You can just not use it if you don't want to. Raygereio fucked around with this message at May 24, 2013 around 23:28 |
| # ? May 24, 2013 23:20 |
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Raygereio posted:Some consequences for failure? Sure. But I don't feel like make me redo gameplay sections is a good punishment. Walking through the exact same level and dealing with the exact same enemies and obstacles in the exact same way eventually becomes tedious to me, no matter how much I enjoy the gameplay. And I don't think that the consequences for failure should get in the way of having fun. Maybe if you die too much Solaire can show up at your door and play the game for you since you can't seem to play Dark Souls properly. The current system is pretty good. Learn from your mistakes. Don't repeat said mistakes.
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| # ? May 24, 2013 23:44 |
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Raygereio posted:Some consequences for failure? Sure. But I don't feel like make me redo gameplay sections is a good punishment. Walking through the exact same level and dealing with the exact same enemies and obstacles in the exact same way eventually becomes tedious to me, no matter how much I enjoy the gameplay. And I don't think that the consequences for failure should get in the way of having fun. Lazy Programming made the point earlier, but in Dark Souls you're always progressing. As for your hypothetical soapstone idea, I'm afraid if I call it laughably bad again I'll be accused of repeating myself. quote:How about not dying..? I agree completely.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 00:08 |
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EightBit posted:I really hope there's some way to involve invasions and bosses in DS2 I miss the monk boss in Demon's Souls that would be possessed by a random invader.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 00:19 |
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a medical mystery posted:I miss the monk boss in Demon's Souls that would be possessed by a random invader. I felt so bad the one time I was actually human near that boss, because I died on my way up the tower to one of the black phantom cthulhu's, after getting the invasion notice. Embarassing...! 
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| # ? May 25, 2013 00:30 |
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EC posted:So there shouldn't be any punishment for death? In a game like Meatboy you have to play through the same bits to get to where you've died, even though that's a game that's based on skill. The difference is the amount of time it takes to do so. Almost every game has some punishment for dying, otherwise what would be point of getting better? The reason this argument falls a little flat for me is because, in Dark Souls, for all its vaunted difficulty and supposed old-school sensibilities*, there aren't really any real consequences to dying aside from having to (possibly) tediously repeat a section. And yes, I am advocating removing that rather dubious consequence too, because I don't see that it adds anything real to the game. Also, I don't think there needs to be any 'punishment' for failure. The punishment for failure, in a game, is that you haven't succeeded yet. Anything beyond that suggests to me that you don't have confidence in your game's ability to make that success meaningful in its own right. Which I don't think anyone could actually argue about Dark Souls; beating a boss or completing a milestone genuinely feels like you've accomplished something. On the other hand, I genuinely enjoy (for certain values of 'enjoy') throwing myself over and over again at the meat grinder that is Blighttown, so what do I know? And honestly, again, I enjoy the standard player-vs-environment stuff a lot more than I enjoy the boss fights, usually. I'd be all for a version of Dark Souls that didn't have boss fights at all, and instead just through more and more, worse and worse, standard enemies at you, forever. I imagine I'd be largely alone in that, though. ___ *Most of my reaction to this description is, admittedly, just me wincing whenever people describe games from, like, 2000 as "old-school". In fairness to this argument, many of the games that I would consider old-school, if you died (or if you died enough times), you wouldn't just respawn at a bonfire, you'd have to start the whole drat game over again. We all had more patience for that sort of thing in the mid-'80s. (Or I did, because I was a 12 year old nerd and what the gently caress else was I going to do with my time?)
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| # ? May 25, 2013 00:57 |
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For Dark Souls 2 I think there should be either a new covenant or like a Darkwraith covenant ring that invades people (even if they're hollow) to try and steal their bloodstains. Maybe you're eligible for invasion depending on the number of souls in your bloodstain -- like anybody who could get a full level from it could invade. Invaders would be able to hurt/be hurt by the host and monsters but would get no reward if the host died. They'd have to get to the bloodstain first. Maybe spawn them in at the bonfire with the host. I dunno, seems like it could be an interesting dynamic.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 01:01 |
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Only if this music plays during the race to the bloodstain. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-otEdq-Ozo Maybe add some orchestral chorus singing in there somewhere.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 01:24 |
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Boss runs have a practical gameplay value of allowing invasions if you want to do it while human (for summoning). If you could always spawn right outside the boss door on death, the amount of possible invasions would go down dramatically. That's probably one of the biggest reasons why they don't do that. They want their invasion and co-op systems to have meaning and for their to be proper risks and rewards for your actions. Being able to revive, summon a guy, and face the boss with zero opposition would almost completely remove the non-consensual PVP from the game, which is a pretty important part of the game, IMO.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 01:34 |
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Nah. The check point system is because they want to make a dungeon crawler. It's about successfully understanding, not merely completing, entire "chunks" of the game as a whole. The estus is designed around this. Perform well here and there and you have healing there. Perform poorly there and you do not have healing here. Bosses are sufficiently challenging to be a threat all on their own, but the game (almost?) ALWAYS asks you to complete a portion of the level before hand, and that is directly a result of the challenge never being ONLY about the boss. If you need every resource to beat the boss, then you had better be able to deal with the lead-in perfectly. If there were a save scum, then why have healing at all? Because the player doesn't have to use it? I'm all in favor of organic difficulty and self imposed challenges, but we're really talking about a fundamental design here, and something like a no-consequence save system would really work counter in all ways to this. Blood stains for example: if you can complete a portion of the level up to your blood stain, then no big deal. You are not significantly punished, the time penalty is generally trivial. If you haven't "sufficiently" beat a portion of the level, then that blood stain is in limbo. It isn't what killed you that is a threat, but everything you think you have "beat". Save scum? There is literally no point. It's there for people like me who enjoy it? I guess, but there are so many other dynamics built upon the assumption of repeating content. Just mentioned above were invasions. Say what you will about invasions, how in the world would a quick save feature work relative to this? If you're not advocating quick saving, then I am at a loss. Do you just want the player to lose all souls but respawn right there? The current system is both more forgiving, and arguably less repetitive, since it keeps the RPG dynamics in play, allowing you to advance in level relative to the amount of times you fail. Every soul you accrue in the mean time continues to stack, adding to your over all progress toward completing the next "chunk", and these are only forfeit if you die to content you have "beat". If that happens, did you really "beat" that chunk? If you don't even want that, then why even a health bar? I guess there is a lot more to the arguments than a couple of quotes I've seen, so there is definitely more to your argument than I am aware, so I'll just close out with the next paragraph by insisting the check point system runs WAY too deep to really propose anything dramatic, keeping this more "general". "Souls" games are dungeon crawlers, not so much action games. They are dungeon crawlers, not so much RPGs. They are about the dungeon, not the individual components that comprise them. The boss is a part of the dungeon, not a challenge all its own. The skeletons, pitch-black "lighting", and even your check point limited resources (estus/sorceries/etc) are part of the dungeon. The checkpoints are, arguably the best way to reinforce this philosophy. Kiggles fucked around with this message at May 25, 2013 around 01:54 |
| # ? May 25, 2013 01:50 |
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So I just beat bed of chaos for the first time...um yea...that was like dragon's lair all over again.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 02:53 |
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Raygereio posted:So to come back to Dark Souls for a moment. Let's say there's a soapstone-like item that allows you to mark a location and warp to it from the bonfire. What would be the problem with that? You can just not use it if you don't want to. And you complainers could just play another game. DS doesn't have to be everything you want it to be. Kiggles posted:Nah. The check point system is because they want to make a dungeon crawler. It's about successfully understanding, not merely completing, entire "chunks" of the game as a whole. This sums it up quite well. It's not about understanding only the bosses, but the entire level.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 03:51 |
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Calidus posted:So I just beat bed of chaos for the first time...um yea...that was like dragon's lair all over again. Do you mean Dragon God from DeS or the game Dragon's Lair? I could see both a bit.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 04:14 |
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Professor Wayne posted:My caestus only run came to a screeching halt at the twin gargoyles. Must have taken me at least 8 tries to whittle them down with my tiny punches. Onto the capra demon for my next stop to becoming a
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| # ? May 25, 2013 05:58 |
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(Dark Souls Superstar!)
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If there's one thing this game could handle better, it's bows. I've died a couple of times when fumbling with the darn thing.
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| # ? May 25, 2013 06:05 |
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| # ? May 25, 2013 08:38 |
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Does anyone have experience with previously-stable p2p connections breaking down? I was summoned by a guy 4 different times (mostly on different bosses, but he did get insta-gibbed by Quelaag once) just fine, but on the 5th he couldn't get the sign to work. I was summoned by someone else the first time he tried before the 5th boss, which might affect things. I was under the impression that once you made a stable connection it was supposed to remain that way as long as you were both in the lobby, so what could have happened?
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| # ? May 25, 2013 06:12 |
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