A while ago, I foolishly decided to spend $40 to get Dark Souls: Prepare to Die edition on Steam. The controls were so atrocious--both in the default choice of key bindings and in the control execution that made me feel as though my character was wading through Vaseline--that I found it completely unplayable.
A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
41–50 of 75 posts
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#42A while ago, I foolishly decided to spend $40 to get Dark Souls: Prepare to Die edition on Steam. The controls were so atrocious--both in the default choice of key bindings and in the control execution that made me feel as though my character was wading through Vaseline--that I found it completely unplayable.
Ah, yes... the PC version should come with a giant red warning that says "DO NOT ATTEMPT TO PLAY THIS WITHOUT A CONTROLLER".
There's still a learning curve even with a controller, but once past that the controls have a beautiful simplicity and responsiveness that I've seen in very few other games.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
It reeks of autism. You know it's bad because it forces you out of the game to look at some web page. It's basically showing total contempt for the aesthetics and fantasy of the game in favor of the endless cataloging and retrieval of pointless information.
This is just not true. You can play the game fine without the wiki, and I did so on my first playthrough... with a kb+mouse. You just can't min/max without the wiki. And if you want to PvP, then sure, you need to min/max... but if you're PvPing, you're going to be going to a wiki anyway.
What's not true? I didn't say you were forced as some kind of hard requirement to use the wiki - just that the use of the wiki forces you out of the game and that it is clearly designed to be used in conjunction with a wiki. It should be taken as read that it can be played without it. I mean, who wrote the wiki? The requirement for guessing and repeating segments is just so high that it detracts from the experience. This isn't about knowing every little detail for "min-maxing" either - it's about basic organization to make discovery of information systematic rather than being a sheer time sink. So tell me: how do you figure out that for the Demon Firesage - located in a fiery area, covered in fire - the weakness is.. fire? Trying a bunch of stuff, in this case totally counter-intuitive. What reason would you have to think Gwyn can be parried, when no other boss in the game can be? By trying a bunch of stuff and stumbling upon it since, again, it is counter-intuitive. In other words: by having complete and utter contempt for the value of your own time.
It completely takes away from the sense of fantasy, as well. The whole point with these open world games is to feel like you have the freedom to make your own choices. But if you know that your best best is to go everywhere and pick up every item you can then it feels like janitorial work, not a grand adventure.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#44A while ago, I foolishly decided to spend $40 to get Dark Souls: Prepare to Die edition on Steam. The controls were so atrocious--both in the default choice of key bindings and in the control execution that made me feel as though my character was wading through Vaseline--that I found it completely unplayable.
Ah, yes... the PC version should come with a giant red warning that says "DO NOT ATTEMPT TO PLAY THIS WITHOUT A CONTROLLER". There's still a learning curve even with a controller, but once past that the controls have a beautiful simplicity and responsiveness that I've seen in very few other games.
What's the point of playing a PC game with a controller? If I wanted to play a game with inferior controls, I would just use a console.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#45What really annoys me about Dark Souls is the shitty PC port. They're still selling tons of copies of the game for PC because of all the silly hype around it, and yet the game is virtually unplayable - even with all the mouse fixes, mods, etc. Why is it acceptable for game developers to completely abandon their customer base and continue to sell a broken product? I picked up the game during a Steam sale, spent a good…
> What really annoys me about Dark Souls is the shitty PC port.
With DSFix, it's actually better than the PS3 version, which I never go back to any more.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ah, yes... the PC version should come with a giant red warning that says "DO NOT ATTEMPT TO PLAY THIS WITHOUT A CONTROLLER". There's still a learning curve even with a controller, but once past that the controls have a beautiful simplicity and responsiveness that I've seen in very few other games.
What's the point of playing a PC game with a controller? If I wanted to play a game with inferior controls, I would just use a console.
In the case of Dark Souls, kb/m is by far the inferior control scheme.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#47Dark Souls is a bigger, less polished version of Demon's Souls. It has a problem with hidden information that can only be discovered through trial-and-error. Demon's Souls was like this too, but the scope was small enough that it didn't cause big problems. Not sure what there is to praise about the character builds. In both games there's an easy and obvious way to get a bulletproof character: plow everything you have…
there seems to be a lot of misplaced praise out there for the trial-and-error, but this part of the game really just sloppiness. I have to disagree. I thought the "here is the whole map, figure it out" aspect was brutal but brilliant. Dark Souls is the modern equivalent of Zelda for NES. You immediately have access to paths you have no business entering at the start of the game. But that makes it all the more gratify…
So what's your argument? You think it's kind of like Zelda? So what? Did you even read what I said? It's problematic in Dark Souls precisely because of how big and complex it is. Demon's Souls is cut out of the same clothe - but it is smaller and simpler, so these things don't become a pressing issue. None of the qualities you list, e.g. having access to deadly areas, are against what I'm saying.
It has nothing to do with "guest logs, way points and real time navigation". None of that is necessary to fix the game. I can't play games like Skyward Sword where there's some asshole computer jumping out of your sword dropping the most ball-achingly obvious hints. What's needed are carefully placed clues, of which there are very few. I think it's fair to say that the game is deliberately counter-intuitive in ways that serve only to waste your time.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#48The author neglected to mention my favourite trap in Sen's fortress. There's an elevator you can get on that if you don't get off in time will bring you headfirst into a bunch of spikes. The genius part is the elevator floor is covered in blood, a hint you would certainly notice if you take your time and proceed cautiously. This is the sort of thing that makes every death feel deserved, which is pivotal to the souls…
There are lots of little clever details like this. You might have also noticed that in Ornstein and Smough's chamber there are two elevators: a large one (for Smough) and a small one (for Ornstein).
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the point of playing a PC game with a controller? If I wanted to play a game with inferior controls, I would just use a console.
In the case of Dark Souls, kb/m is by far the inferior control scheme.
Yes, that's why the game is horribly, horribly broken.
Re: A Close Look at Dark Souls’ Ingenious Difficulty
#50Having played both Demon and Dark souls, I think Demon souls was only better in that it flushed out the Maiden and the monumentals in a way which was deliberate and set the tone of the game. Dark Souls could have used something along these lines, but in every other respect it's the better game. From the improved enemy AI, to balance in the weapons and crafting, to the variety of locations and enemies, and don't forge…
I just got it on sale for $7.50. I had a pirated version I played a few hours in (wanted to see how the port was; as you say, it's pretty bad) that circumvented GFWL, storing my save in a local 4-meg file rather than on some server somewhere. And I can't restore him! I'M VERY SCARED TO START AGAIN. But I might just do so with the fix.
Even when playing in online mode, the savegames are still on your computer. (Somewhere in the C:\Users\yourlogin\ mess...)