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Capri Sun Tzu posted:I think Joni's Blessing should be removed, lifeblood stacking trivializes a lot of bosses. I beat all the dream bosses with some combination of Jonis/Heart/Core. For what it's worth, that's how I feel about how strong nail damage upgrades can be. And I think a lot more people feel that way about Quick Slash (though not for all bosses, since a lot of them will move/blink away). If you're actively trying to make the game easy, it lets you.
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Feb 5, 2018 19:12
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Dancer posted:For what it's worth, that's how I feel about how strong nail damage upgrades can be. And I think a lot more people feel that way about Quick Slash (though not for all bosses, since a lot of them will move/blink away). If you're actively trying to make the game easy, it lets you.
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Feb 5, 2018 20:27
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Or keep it in because being able to facetank is the only way a lot of people are going to be able to get through the game  Instead of removing stuff from the game it would be cooler if they added a hard mode or something.
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Feb 5, 2018 21:38
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Your Computer posted:Or keep it in because being able to facetank is the only way a lot of people are going to be able to get through the game
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Feb 5, 2018 21:43
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Arbitrarily removing rewards to difficult quests to satisfy an unreasonable criticism of the game - namely, that it gives players the opportunity to make bosses easier by accomplishing other things - would be stupid.
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Feb 5, 2018 21:52
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Capri Sun Tzu posted:I think games are better when there is one difficulty level that is intentionally designed around, I'm not a fan of the choose your own difficulty model. Sure, I agree. And it is! Hollow Knight is an amazing game and everyone deserves to be able to play it. Joni's Blessing and Nail Upgrades/Quick Slash/Fragile Strength do make the game easier and that's completely intentional. If you think they make the game too easy, congratulations, just don't use them. Like I said, for a lot of people those things are the only thing allowing them to get through the game and see the ending and I think that's exactly why they should be left in. I just think the "this thing is overpowered and makes the game too easy, they should remove it" type of thinking is very selfish, especially if you can choose not to utilize those things.
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Feb 5, 2018 21:55
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I've found that the only difficulty setting that works reliably is Normal & Easy, since it's easier for players to decide which one suits them. Hard just mucks things up since it could be anything from "normal is actually easy mode and hard mode is the fun one" or "hard mode is a terribly balanced mess and normal actually works". Very Hard makes it even worse, and god forbid the game doesn't let you change difficulty on the fly, though that thankfully seems to be a thing of the past from what I can tell. I still probably prefer a single difficulty, though. One of my favorite things about Dark Souls is that while it technically only has one difficulty, the summoning of players sorta gives it a easy mode that's also fun and interactive. I've always wondered about other ways to do disguised easy modes like that because it seems like the best solution of all. Pigbuster fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Feb 5, 2018 |
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Feb 5, 2018 21:57
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Pigbuster posted:I still probably prefer a single difficulty, though. One of my favorite things about Dark Souls is that while it technically only has one difficulty, the summoning of players sorta gives it a easy mode that's also fun and interactive. I've always wondered about other ways to do disguised easy modes like that because it seems like the best solution of all. And wouldn't you know it, a lot of very vocal funhaters in the Souls community (but I repeat myself) want summoning removed from the games because it makes them too easy
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Feb 5, 2018 21:59
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Part of me agrees that nail damage shouldn't apply to bosses just so their difficulty is more consistent. Some bosses become noticeably easier with even a single nail upgrade. Flukemarm has been mentioned but the Collector is also a much harder fight if your nail can't oneshot his spawns. On the other hand upgrading the nail is an obvious way for a player struggling against a boss to get an advantage so that alone is a good reason to keep it in. Besides If you really wanted the difficulty of all bosses to be 100% consistent, just never upgrade your nail! Your Computer posted:And wouldn't you know it, a lot of very vocal funhaters in the Souls community (but I repeat myself) want summoning removed from the games because it makes them too easy I don't want summoning removed, I just want From to compensate scaling difficulty for it so its actually fun. 4 players stunlocking Friede in a corner is not a rewarding experience for anyone involved.
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Feb 5, 2018 22:02
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I mean it's possible to handle different difficulties well. Look at Furi for example. It has Promenade (easy mode for people who just want the story), Furi (standard mode, challenging but not unfair) and Furier (actually revamps the boss attack/bullet patterns, exists for masochists). I never played Promenade, but Furi and Furier are both very well balanced and fun.
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Feb 5, 2018 22:13
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Your Computer posted:Sure, I agree. And it is!
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Feb 5, 2018 22:35
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Pigbuster posted:I've found that the only difficulty setting that works reliably is Normal & Easy, since it's easier for players to decide which one suits them. Hard just mucks things up since it could be anything from "normal is actually easy mode and hard mode is the fun one" or "hard mode is a terribly balanced mess and normal actually works". Very Hard makes it even worse, and god forbid the game doesn't let you change difficulty on the fly, though that thankfully seems to be a thing of the past from what I can tell. Actually no, every game should have as many difficulty settings as possible, so everyone can choose the one that suits them the best.
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Feb 5, 2018 23:18
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Capri Sun Tzu posted:I disagree with your perspective although its cool and good for people to have different opinions especially about trivial things like video games. I think games shouldn't include a way to make them easier, but rather should challenge the player to try harder making final victory much more rewarding. I also don't want to act like I'm getting too wound up over something as inconsequential as ~video game difficulty balance~, but I think that, at its core, the thing you are suggesting is a tad condescending. People, arguably, should be able decide for themselves what is an appropriate level of difficulty to them. The majority of people, specifically because they do play video games for an entertaining challenge, will avoid making a game too easy. There will be people out there for whom an easier Hollow Knight will be as challenging, and as rewarding to beat, as vanilla Hollow Knight is to us, and it is fairly likely that that "rewarding final victory" that you refer to will either never come, or will be made bitter because of how frustrating the journey was. I would like to direct you, in case you haven't gotten yourself, to the very recent platformer Celeste. Besides being really good and having an insanely good soundtrack, it also offers "Assist mode" which allows the player to give themselves a variety of gameplay advantages, up to and including outright invincibility. The devs also very explicitly and intentionally even award exactly the same achievements regardless of whether and how you use Assist mode (cue random dudes on steam forums being very angry because this "makes those achievements meaningless"). Admittedly, Celeste is a game where that choice is very thematic, for slightly spoiler-y reasons. On the other hand of the spectrum you have Getting Over It, where one might argue that the game is explicitly designed to induce a certain kind of frustration, and in that very specific context, the experience might be ruined by offering easy mode as an "escape valve" to prevent the frustration. For reasons akin to this, I do believe that offering outright invincibility in Hollow Knight *might* (I'm not sure) be pushing it maybe a bit too far, but I don't see how that would take away from my (and, presumably, your) experience of the game. I would like to conclude by emphasizing that, if it came across this way, I really don't mean to be contrarian or aggressive in this post. I don't think you're arguing in bad faith, or that you're dumb to believe what you do, I just happen disagree on a rather fundamental level (which is okay).
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Feb 5, 2018 23:32
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All games, even the boshies of the world, are trivially easy compared to things that take thousands rather than dozens of hours to get good at. There might be an optimal level of difficulty that makes the instant gratification that games offer slightly more gratifying and less instantaneous, and that's ideally what normal mode would be. I don't mind players choosing to play on easy if the devs communicate that normal is the recommended mode.
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Feb 5, 2018 23:42
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Dancer posted:I just happen disagree on a rather fundamental level (which is okay).
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Feb 5, 2018 23:48
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No Wave posted:All games, even the boshies of the world, are trivially easy compared to things that take thousands rather than dozens of hours to get good at. Like what? There are people who devote thousands of hours to trying to get good at specific games to compete at high skill levels. There are games with defined end goals but there are also ones where your only measure of skill is against other people.
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Feb 5, 2018 23:51
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Pro starcraft being totally relevant to a discussion about single-player difficulty settings... a fatal omission on my part.
No Wave fucked around with this message at 00:07 on Feb 6, 2018 |
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Feb 6, 2018 00:03
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Philosophies about video game difficulty aside, lifeblood stacking is grossly overpowered compared to the other charm combinations. It seems like a developer oversight, not an intended way to cheese the game.
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Feb 6, 2018 00:06
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Capri Sun Tzu posted:Philosophies about video game difficulty aside, lifeblood stacking is grossly overpowered compared to the other charm combinations. It seems like a developer oversight, not an intended way to cheese the game. So? If you don't want to cheese the game, don't stack lifeblood. Why should other people not be allowed to do so just because you don't want to?
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Feb 6, 2018 00:38
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I mean Team Cherry clearly has some desire to balance charms. They nerfed Quickslash from 2 notches to 3 notches and later buffed the damage of Flukenest and Glowing Womb
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Feb 6, 2018 00:42
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Mymla posted:Actually no, every game should have as many difficulty settings as possible, so everyone can choose the one that suits them the best. I totally respect the attitude behind this; I may not understand people who play on easy but it is cool and good that they can also have fun with a thing I might like. In practice, however, it usually ends up turning into a guessing game for the reasons Pigbuster mentioned. If I start a new game and it has seven difficulty modes, how other than wasting a ton of time on trial and error am I to determine which one suits me best? I can only imagine this being even more irritating if I was a more middle of the road-oriented player and had to consider more than the top two options. Modular approaches to difficulty are probably a better approach than completely uninformative easy/normal/hard labels, but that's better done explicitly outside the game systems. Just having some charms be strictly superior to others leads to the complaints you're seeing in here, and is less likely to benefit the people who actually want to make it less difficult since they're still capped on how many charms they can have active - which anyway said limit makes it look to the casual observer like this isn't supposed to be how you select your difficulty at all, it's supposed to be how the different possible charm loadouts are kept relatively balanced with each other. I think all parties would be better served by having a section in the options menu that just straight up includes poo poo like "take damage? y/n" or "reduce damage taken by 50%? y/n".
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Feb 6, 2018 02:35
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Somehow beat the game with 102% percent  Still haven't finished the Trial of the Fool or done the flower quest. I figured out how to get to The Radiance, but, eh, wasn't in me to attempt it tonight. Fun game though, for not digging it last year, I'm really surprised how much I dig it now, how little of a slog it feels with the upgrades. RIP all my qt bug friends though 
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Feb 6, 2018 09:35
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The addition of the Grimm Troupe DLC added 6% more completion to the game.
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Feb 6, 2018 10:19
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Mymla posted:So? If you don't want to cheese the game, don't stack lifeblood. Why should other people not be allowed to do so just because you don't want to?
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Feb 6, 2018 16:19
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Nothing comes of it other than it giving some people an optional opportunity to move past parts of the game that they may have otherwise struggled with for whatever reason. Even if it is "too good", it doesn't matter. A game's quality is not determined by how hard it tries to make people not enjoy it.
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Feb 6, 2018 16:52
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just started playing this the other day, pretty neat little game. Definitely feel rather lost in what I'm doing but I figure that just exploring around is basically what you're supposed to do. Just got the dream nail when I was trying to backtrack somewhere else e: without spoilers is there anything I really really should do in a first run?
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Feb 6, 2018 17:09
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Levitate posted:e: without spoilers is there anything I really really should do in a first run? Explore 
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Feb 6, 2018 17:13
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Levitate posted:e: without spoilers is there anything I really really should do in a first run? e. there is actually one thing I wish I knew because it precludes some optional boss content later on: Dont let Zote die Capri Sun Tzu fucked around with this message at 17:40 on Feb 6, 2018 |
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Feb 6, 2018 17:16
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Capri Sun Tzu posted:I disagree with your perspective although its cool and good for people to have different opinions especially about trivial things like video games. I think games shouldn't include a way to make them easier, but rather should challenge the player to try harder making final victory much more rewarding. I feel like you're making this comment from massively high up on the "can play Hollow Knight" curve. I had a very tough time with some parts of the game; I fought several of the bosses dozens upon dozens of times before progressing, and was pretty close to giving up on the Radiance before Windows ate my save file. I have, I guess, a huge capacity for frustration, probably because that there were a lot of things I really loved about the game. But when I did finally manage to get past, say, the Watcher Knights I didn't feel much sense of reward; just a sense of relief that I could get on to more good bits.
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Feb 6, 2018 17:27
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Hollow knight has a lot of real challenging parts that's for sure. I probably fought soul master like 50 times and don't get me started on Radiance. In my opinion games are more compelling when they are tough and you have no way to skip the tough parts. How other people play games is up to them but I think if you want to stick in an assist mode it should be explicit and not by using some overpowered in-game system that isn't clearly labeled as such. Again, in my opinion.
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Feb 6, 2018 17:37
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I guess just don’t use that particular combination of charms, then.
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Feb 6, 2018 19:51
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Soul Master made me curse and say nasty, awfully rude things to my monitor. Then I accidentally figured out how to avoid almost all of his attacks when going up against Soul Tyrant. My fuel for the fire: Game is modular. Do or do not install the components you want to tailor the experience to your dexterity and available time on hand to play video games. Also: Do try for the sub-5 hour speedrun achievement after you've beaten the game and preferably found the optional "true ending" inverted castle bullshit this genre loves. You'll easily have time to pick up a few extra upgrades along the way, die repeatedly against bosses for probably 2.5 hours, and finish with like a 4.5-hour in-game timer.
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Feb 7, 2018 00:51
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Guys I made a new friend while exploring!   I knew something was up, but I didn't expect him to turn into the monster from The Thing 
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Feb 12, 2018 15:05
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Capri Sun Tzu posted:Hollow knight has a lot of real challenging parts that's for sure. I probably fought soul master like 50 times and don't get me started on Radiance. In my opinion games are more compelling when they are tough and you have no way to skip the tough parts. How other people play games is up to them but I think if you want to stick in an assist mode it should be explicit and not by using some overpowered in-game system that isn't clearly labeled as such. Again, in my opinion. I think Hollow Knight might just not be the game to have challenges with no flexibility. I think exploration rewarding the player with power increases is a hallmark of metroid/metroidvania style games. It's something that's sort of present in Souls games as well. There's an immense satisfaction in overcoming something difficult through sheer skill, but there's also something I really enjoy about being able to step back, explore more, and find something hidden that gives me that extra edge. I don't feel like the powerful charm combination is something that's made immediately obvious. It's something you have to work to get and put together yourself (unless you just look it up or are told by someone) - I think that sort of discovery or rewarding cleverness is a great part of games. I think it's fine if you think there should be an explicit assist mode, but in my opinion that feels so much of a lazier design then allowing players to organically craft difficulty for themselves. It's way more satisfying to a player to find some new powerup, or combo, or trick that helps them overcome a challenge then to just turn the difficulty down.
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Feb 12, 2018 16:04
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"Organically craft difficulty for themselves" is a way of saying "use strategy." The charm system is great in that it allows you to add some strategic decision making to get through tough bosses or areas. It's a little flawed that one charm combination so far outweighs all the others for all the late-game bosses, is what I'm saying. It's an interesting idea in theory: you trade the ability to heal for more base health but when stacked with other lifeblood charms it gives you so much health that you can stand in place and mash the attack key and race the bosses down. I think having it be so far ahead devalues the strategy part of the game. Sure, I have opinions about difficulty in video games, but this is just a balance discussion.
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Feb 12, 2018 16:20
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...Cloth.... 
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Feb 15, 2018 22:23
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Jerusalem posted:...Cloth.... It’s all good, she had a death wish anyway.
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Feb 16, 2018 00:27
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Jerusalem posted:...Cloth.... If you hadn't talked to her, she'd still be alive.
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Feb 16, 2018 02:32
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Oxxidation posted:It’s all good, she had a death wish anyway. Yeah all her dream dialogue suggests she wanted to die a warrior's death so she could face her girlfriend proudly in the afterlife.
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Feb 16, 2018 03:48
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Zaggitz posted:Yeah all her dream dialogue suggests she wanted to die a warrior's death so she could face her girlfriend proudly in the afterlife. ...huh. So, I always interpreted that as "Huzzah! I survived the fight and became a great warrior! I can't wait to go home to my also-alive girlfriend!! Hey, tiny warrior, what are you doing with that shiny na–", since her dialogue seemed to imply that Nola is still alive. But I looked on the wiki and Cloth's dialogue if she survives seems to imply that Nola is DEAD, so... I'm not really sure anymore.
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Feb 16, 2018 05:44
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