I don’t mean this in the sense of “The beginning and end of a soulslike should be equally hard” or “They need to be easy”, but more like how DS3 is way harder than DS2 or Bloodborne. I feel like whenever there’s a new soulslike, instead of letting me rely on my skill of other games, they have to add something to make it harder and more challenging and frustrating with every new game.

Essentially, I feel like, throughout my journey with all kinds of soulslikes, I’ve already built up skills in those games and I’d rather be able to use those skills in new ways instead of building up new skills I’ll only be able to use in that specific game.

Like, perfect parries, perfect dodges, reflections in Khazan are awesome, but only really good for this game. The combat is awesome and lots of fun, but since its combat is so different to its contemporaries, the skill you build is not really transferable, at least not fully.

I guess in a sense I get why soulslike get so much more difficult these days: fans of the genre had years of practise with other titles, so the challenge needs to be upped to accommodate for their skill. However, unless you accommodate for the rise in difficult and offer difficulty options, which some soulslike have started to adopt recently, it also artificially bars people from playing the game, be it because they lack the necessary mechanical skill or because they lack the patience/tenacity/perseverance to keep at it. Some bosses still just feel absurd (shoutout to Khazan’s final boss who’s easily comparable to Sekiro’s)

I’m just not a huge fan of this arms race that soulslikes have fallen into where every new soulslike has to have the new hardest boss or whatever. I didn’t like it with Elden Ring, even though I appreciate a lot of its boss designs, or Lies of P or Khazan. Just let me feel good about being good again lol. And maybe focus a bit on other aspects of the genre that are so beloved: storytelling, world building, level design, atmosphere

What do you think?

  • MalikMuaddibSoong@startrek.websiteEnglish
    6·
    2 days ago

    They can make it harder by adding features that reduce the effectiveness of player skills sharpened in previous titles.

    In Elden Ring, jump is sometimes better than roll but you only discover this by facing bosses where jump is much much better then roll. Radagon fight comes to mind but there’s probably many others.

    In a sense they made the game harder for those skilled at rolling by offering a complementary way to avoid damage. Now the skill ceiling has raised to knowing when to use which one instead of just knowing when to roll.

    This adds both difficulty for veterans and easiness for first-timers.

    • Amnesigenic@lemmy.ml
      1·
      1 day ago

      They had a similar mechanic in Sekiro, enemy power attacks with a special tell/warning & smaller window for normal parries that come in two varieties, thrust and sweep. Thrust attacks can be negated with mikiri counter, step dodge towards the attack during the normal parry window to step on the blade and drive it into the ground. Sweep attacks can be jumped over and have a unique follow-up option, press jump again on top of the enemy’s head to do a bunch of posture damage. There’s also a handful of enemies & bosses with lightning attacks where you can jump, catch the lightning, and throw it back at them, but if you catch the lightning & fail to throw it back before you hit the ground you take full famage from it. You can dodge the lightning entirely and avoid the risk, or catch it and potentially do a lot of damage by returning it to sender. I fucking love Sekiro.