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Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

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Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#171

Post by isk517 »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #119
nikanj wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And there's zero enemy scaling, and no level cap. If you want, you can go grind yourself to an absolute unit, then come mop the floor with the boss

Kind of. It helps, but especially in Bloodborne it's no guarantee. And Sekiro goes against that as well. While you do get some improvements in things like health, healing ability and weapon strength, the game still leans mainly on your own skills. It doesn't have an RPG style leveling system, any improvements are thanks to your own exploration and victory. It's really gratifying to get the deflects timed just right.…

Sekiro doesn't have the RPG style leveling system but having the correct prosthetic attachment or combat art equipped can really trivialize a lot of boss fights.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#172

Post by Pulcinella »

I think some of the perceived difficulty comes from Miyazaki’s games requiring practice. Generally quite a bit more practice and learning than more mainstream RPGs and action games require (though less in certain ways than character action games like Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden).

That level of practice is honestly not for everyone and that is ok. Fighting Games require a very, very large amount of practice. For someone like me it’s too much, especially because there aren’t even any community events near me. If I am going to practice that much, for the stage of life that I am in with how little free time I have, I would rather practice something else. And that’s fine too. That doesn’t make fighting games bad or “too difficult,” they are just not for me.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#173

Post by SnowingXIV »

me_me_me wrote: post #148
Trasmatta wrote: post #7

The popular discourse seems to focus on the difficulty of From's games, but that's just one part of the entire experience. FromSoft has a holistic approach to game design that very few other studios manage to match. There's just an incredible amount of depth to their world building, and the gameplay, difficulty level, online mechanics, level design, characters, music, story, and themes all work to reinforce and compl…

Genichiro Ashina fight from Sekiro took me 3 days of multiple 15-20 mins sessions. With each attempt you learn the attack patterns and tells of which move-set boss will use. Its immensely satisfying to slowly learn and see yourself improve. When I eventually beat the boss I felt like a badass. But most importantly its memorable experience, something that is hard to create. From Soft can created hard but fair experien…

Ugh, Isshin the Glock Saint. Thorn in my side, as someone who loves the entire soulsborne series, beat most of them (not including DLCs) - he did break me. Sekiro is one of the tightest, most well designed games, it's super fluid, you feel incredible and animations are on point. This game is the hardest of the series because it is not something you can stat-pad against at least not as harshly as you could grind on the other games.

I spent many, many tries against him to get to the later phases but still would die. Like you multiple days, many sessions but against Isshin.

I moved on and came back to my save years later, that muscle memory was lost and did way worse. Realizing this may be a boss I simply don't conquer.

Elden Ring has sparked joy.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#174

Post by jmount »

I like the FromSoft games. I think the difficulty is a bit of a cross-cutting issue. What I like is the diegetic treatment of death in the games. There are reasons in game or in story reasons the player character and the monsters re-animate, and it has consequences in the game. In fact much of the theme of the game is arranged around this.

For games like Doom the player sees their character die, but from the monsters' point of view these are alternate timelines that didn't happen- the monsters see one one selected timeline where the played didn't happen to die.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#175

Post by slothtrop »

Trasmatta wrote: post #7

The popular discourse seems to focus on the difficulty of From's games, but that's just one part of the entire experience. FromSoft has a holistic approach to game design that very few other studios manage to match. There's just an incredible amount of depth to their world building, and the gameplay, difficulty level, online mechanics, level design, characters, music, story, and themes all work to reinforce and compl…

The difficulty is definitely an overstatement. It can be rendered trivial with in-game options, the right build, co-op. The quality that these games have is forcing players to be tactful. It's not a mindless affair, but it doesn't require fast reflexes either to excel either.

However, ways to approaching the game are unclear at the outset and they don't hold your hand either, which is a double-edged sword. There is value in discovering things through trial and error or communication with other players, though on the other hand if reading a starter guide drastically improves first-time experience then the games could benefit from better direction. I see that Elden Ring has implemented more guidance, though the open-world nature has created another confusion. You have to kind of enjoy not knowing where to go exactly. But the option to read a guide is there.

Someone made the puzzle game analogy and I think that works. There's always talk about whether an easy mode would be appropriate: would one also demand that puzzle games hold your hand through every puzzle effectively solving it for you? It would miss the point.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#176

Post by t3rmi »

SnowingXIV wrote: post #173
me_me_me wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genichiro Ashina fight from Sekiro took me 3 days of multiple 15-20 mins sessions. With each attempt you learn the attack patterns and tells of which move-set boss will use. Its immensely satisfying to slowly learn and see yourself improve. When I eventually beat the boss I felt like a badass. But most importantly its memorable experience, something that is hard to create. From Soft can created hard but fair experien…

Ugh, Isshin the Glock Saint. Thorn in my side, as someone who loves the entire soulsborne series, beat most of them (not including DLCs) - he did break me. Sekiro is one of the tightest, most well designed games, it's super fluid, you feel incredible and animations are on point. This game is the hardest of the series because it is not something you can stat-pad against at least not as harshly as you could grind on th…

The secret to beating Isshin is you dont try to kill him. Think of him as a friend you’re trying to hang around and not let go. Once you get muscle memory for all his movesets you can sense that you can end the game whenever you want.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#177

Post by ssully »

aixi wrote: post #129
didibus wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The games are easier then I thought they'd be. I waited to play them for a long time, because of how hard people made them out. But you only really need a bit of patience, slow down what you do in the combat, and give bosses a few try. I find plenty of other games were a lot harder for me, like Hades, Celeste, Meat Boy or Returnal for example. I think actually the genius about Souls games is that unlike Roguelikes or…

>Having said that, I still think they should add some accessibility features that can make the game easier. What they do in Mario Kart or Celeste I think is great. Instead of making difficulties which means some of them won't get proper design and balance. Focus on a single difficulty, but add accessibility features that can make it easier. I think it's important to do that so people who have handicaps, are younger,…

Having a difficulty selection doesn't remove anything from the game. Those who want to play on easy can, while those who want the "standard" experience can stick with the regular difficulty.

When I play Doom (be it classic, or 2016/Eternal), at a minimum I play on Ultra Violence because I personally think that's how the game is meant to be played. Believe it or not, there are plenty of people that play those games on the lower difficulties and it doesn't impact my experience whatsoever.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#178

Post by brimble »

aixi wrote: post #156
aordano wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is more akin to having Dostoevsky on big print and in Open Dyslexic font, on thick pages easy to grab and handle. Is not about easing the media itself or diluting its essence, it's about making it approachable to people that want to experience it and is not able to. I am not disabled in any relevant way, but i know intimately people that is, and having a big chunk of the world unreachable like that is very demor…

No, that's not akin to having Dostoyevsky on big print --- that is how you consume the content, not the content itself. Those things would be comparable to having a controller that a disabled person can use, which Souls games don't limit: you can play them with whatever controller you want. Requesting an easy mode, or a god mode, is more similar to requesting for the author to modify complex prose, or avoid using wor…

People's response times go to shit as they get older. Games without some kind of affordances for that (or just difficulty settings) are much, much harder for older folks than they were intended to be.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#179

Post by MisterBastahrd »

Trasmatta wrote: post #7

The popular discourse seems to focus on the difficulty of From's games, but that's just one part of the entire experience. FromSoft has a holistic approach to game design that very few other studios manage to match. There's just an incredible amount of depth to their world building, and the gameplay, difficulty level, online mechanics, level design, characters, music, story, and themes all work to reinforce and compl…

I guess I'm at a loss then.

I've enjoyed the Souls series and have beaten all the games multiple times. They're also the only RPG I've ever played where I have absolutely no idea what's going on with the character past the entrance cinematic. I go into areas, kill things, fight named bosses until they die, and then go somewhere else. I'm sure it's a thematic part of the experience, but it makes the games feel like empty shells past the combat to me.

Re: Hidetaka Miyazaki sees death as a feature, not a bug

#180

Post by burnished »

jjj123 wrote: post #164
idle_zealot wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is essentially the easy mode everyone wanted but the core souls fans. This easy mode has been in every From game I’ve played. It’s the reason core fans don’t want the much-demanded difficulty settings.

Most of the demands for an easy mode are about accessibility concerns. If you’re working with a motor impairment you may be blocked out of ever playing a souls game. A mode with slower enemies or more forgiving dodge timing would allow those people to experience the game in some form.

I've watched some one beat the game using wired bananas as the input method. The game just does not demand a lot from players in the form of twitch reflex or even particularly precise inputs. Basically, there may not be a accessibility menu but the design is already very accessible.
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