Alright it's been dissected and distilled to hell and back. Everything about it is known, all the systems, the numbers, the combinations. Why can't we replicate it?
Other games don't get why it worksFor example, Dark Souls 2 copies the "die and lose currency" system, but being able to warp anywhere prevents it from mattering.
>>735529204not enough yellow paint to guide players
>>735529272>Dark Souls 2 copies the "die and lose currency" system, but being able to warp anywhere prevents it from mattering.You just described every single fromsoft soulslike made after DS1, not just DS2
>>735529204There many games that replicate the shittiness of Slop Souls
>>735529204>Why can't we replicate it?Cuz they don't want to? Not even From? They set out to make a modernized action-adventure role playing game, with a lot of influence from King's Field and Ico for Demon's Souls. Each subsequent sequel refined the game down to just what the fans want. Turns out they don't actually want to explore a real world they want an action game with big bosses and rolling. They strip the games down to what the fans resonated with most, and it was not the adventure, the world building, the setting, it was the bosses, the orchestral boss music, rolling and fast paced action. Elden Ring and Dark Souls III are exactly what the fans want, and what people *think* "souls" games are, and it's what the industry is copying.
>>735529481>Turns out they don't actually want to explore a real worldI want this though! What games are there that have the atmosphere of DS1 and PS3 Demon's Souls?
>>735529204I mean DaS2 improved on this game pretty much on all points, but then From turned the series into hack 'n slash boss rush.
>>735529630You wont play it and thus wont understand.Outward.
>>735529204Better question - why would you want to? The only two groups of people who like this game are Indians and people who never played it.
>>735529481DS1's interconnected world is fun until you actually try to wander around it and find that backtracking is overly inconvenient for the entire half of the game where you'll want to do it. Making the run back from the conventional entrance to Blight Town up to the Undead Merchant that sells Toxic Moss sucks in a way that really doesn't impress the player with how things interconnect, but makes them wish they could just teleport closer to the merchant already.
>>735530003scholar remains peak dark souls to this day
DS2 couldn't replicate it because they just took the "le hard game" meme and went with it. Hell you get an achievment for dying.DS2 is the game bad players think DS1 is but it's actually real this time. "This is a SUPER HARD GAME, don't you go dying against this 10 enemy gank!"
>>735531410It's supposed to be a semi-punishment to have to walk back to wherever you need to go and also make you respect the hostile world you're inhabiting. Being able to warp anywhere is in fact a quality of life feature I appreciate (I think Darksiders 2 has one of the best implementations of it.), but not every game has or should have a warp system.
>>735530003>>735531529>Play DAS2 Scholar for the first time>Most areas are okay except for No Man's Wharf, which is a stand out in design for me (Shulva is my favorite but it's DLC so I don't count it)>Find out later that the bridge shortcut was only added to Scholar and it wasn't in vanilla DAS2This game SUCKS
>>735529204Most developers are aware how negatively their game would be received if it was as poorly made as Dark Souls 1.
>>735531590Oh so this was a pasta then.
>>735531623Scholar is a copypaste too so you should be able appreciate it.
>>735531545I don't think it is a bad design or bad game for it, but I also don't completely see it as a merit. It really comes off as cooler if you are just heading forwards the entire time and not backtracking, because you'll find yourself looping back in cool ways that you didn't expect. But if you are backtracking to merchants regularly or the like, then in my experience, I got a bit annoyed with having to run a rat maze every time I wanted to buy some overpriced spell or weapon or whatever while I still remembered which merchant had it and they didn't disappear on me yet.
>>735530142NTA but I heard that game sucked, is it actually any good?
>>735531590Imagine being a massive dark souls 1 fan and seeing all the trailers and developer previews of Ds2 and knowing that you were supposed to get a full game of no mans wharf tier levels. Now you know why people were mad. The game got downgrade in a catastrophic way.
>>735529204because really good level design is hard and time consuming, and not even Fromsoft have been willing to put that kind of effort into the level design since DS1
>>735531812ds2's only downgrade was the lighting engine
>>735531410I didn’t actually enjoy ds1 until my third play through as a mage where I looked up all the gear and locations for my build and was running around the place grabbing the next piece as it became available. The shortcuts and map knowledge actually matter in navigating to your next objective with the least resistance or greatest payoff, and the world feels much more alive and immersive when encountering the regulars of each zone. Even knowing the map by that point it was fun to just wander around and try to see what I could find on my own, even if it took a little backtracking. Every following title was just so focused on the “next zone, next boss, next upgrade” ds1 is almost a fluke in how it draws you to the world than a blueprint.
>still have never played a souls game in 2026>still haven’t finished SkyrimWoW killed medieval RPGs for me and I’m not ashamed to admit it.
>>735531812DAS2 is still playable and I could never hate a game with Shulva in it (easily one of the best areas in any Souls game), but the base game that you have to pay money for, there are so many mid areas.No Man's Wharf (at least in Scholar) is the best designed area, Iron Keep probably has the coolest concept for an area. I mean come on, The Gutter? Blighttown 2.0 without anything cool to look at? There's not a single "I just changed the environment" wow moment like the New Londo Ruins washing out of the bodies.
>>735531410It makes it feel like an actual world, having to go to specific areas for specific items and equipment. Instead of being able to teleport everywhere and have merchants appear at a hub. The slow travel is what makes dying a punishment. Later From games fail to realize this. That's where the "difficulty" comes from, not just making bosses faster with tons of HP. You unlock teleporting once the game starts to fall apart in the second half. Having it from the start changes how the entire game plays and how the player will think about their actions. Modern devs think that rewarding players = letting them skip parts of the game. Instead of just making every part of the game work together.
silksong already mogged it though
>>735531542>DS2 couldn't replicate it because they just took the "le hard game" meme and went with it.DS1 did that first. Hell, even DeS had muh difficulty marketing. Of all the things wrong with DS2, this isn't one of them.
>>735532649Dying is a punishment within levels. Later games have too many bonfires, I agree. But there's no reason for transit to be overly inconvenient between levels. I'm going to stick with the scenario I laid out before but slightly modified. Lets say I just beat the Gaping Dragon and got a bunch of souls to spend. In this hypothetical I'm a Pyromancer with probably only a few spells to my name. So my first move is to run all the way back to Firelink and buy out as much of Laurentius's stock as I can afford and dump whatever else I got into upgrading my pyromancy flame. And then I have to turn around and run all the way back to where I started from to continue the game. This just consists of me going through several minutes of walking back and forth across the aqueduct and up and down through the Depths (hopefully I was smart enough to get the shortcut) and then finally I can continue from where I left off through an area I already cleared. That is my issue with the system. Within levels, I don't mind being punished for failure. But when navigating between levels is tedious, the player isn't really doing anything wrong so the annoyance isn't justified in the same way.
>>735533136Andre matters more because of his placement, presenting a friendly face and place in a hostile world, especially as that place connects to a few areas, meaning that the area will call to you naturally. "Ah man I should get back to Andre" and then you begin making plans in your head for a trip back, with potentially other people you want to sight see or avoid.
>>735533004People read one line in an interview with Miyazaki that "difficulty wasn't the point of these games", and then forever think that these games weren't intentionally all made to be difficult. Like yeah, Fromsoft could make a way harder game than even Elden Ring's DLC if they wanted. Just make it so random spots on the ground are pitfalls that kill you instantly or have a bunch of enemies that delevel you to level 1 if they grab you. It'd be trivial. But all the same, from Demon's Souls on, the intent was for the game series to be challenging and for you to die a bunch. Fromsoft had a lot of experience making hard games and Miyazaki himself likes stuff like Berserk that was all about suffering and difficulty in its narrative.
>>735533398The Andre Pilgrimage is a big part of the game, yeah. But Fromsoft basically admitted that it was going to be too much by letting you upgrade your weapon (but not ascend) from the bonfire. IME, you don't even need ascensions until you head up to Sen's Fortress anyhow. And then you're given access to both Andre and the Anor Londo Giant at the same time.
>>735533725Rickert, too, actually. He's right at the other end of Firelink, so not a hard guy to get to by the time you need him.
>>735529204This but Diablo 2. Everything you could possibly want to know about numbers and droprates was always available. Souls at least has the excuse making actual combat and good environments is a huge investment and cutting corners to just have parry corridors takes no effort. Lords of the Fallen is the only game that actually copied Souls and it's great. Everything else is just trying to use it as a marketing term.
>>735529272I don't see what warping has to do with anything. The 'problem' with the newer games having save points before bosses is that you don't build up that pile of souls you gather on the run back that is an ever increasing incentive to keep trying. It also enables the bullshit boss creation that has happened.
>>735531410The toxic dart guys don't respawn. An actual concern is getting cursed.
>>735529630>atmosphere of DS1 and PS3 Demon's Souls?Those two have different atmospheres.
>>735529204>Why can't we replicate it?Because it isn't the systems or numbers that make this beast, it's just having a fun interconnected world with minimal exposition, unique encounters and being perfectly suited to defensive play but rewarding aggressive replays.It's just the attitude of pure discovery that isn't too concerned you not finding most of it, and making sure that everywhere has something worth finding.
>>735533540>People read one line in an interview with Miyazaki that "difficulty wasn't the point of these games", and then forever think that these games weren't intentionally all made to be difficult.This is fucking insane to me too, "people" think that the entirety of Dark Souls was just accidentally designed in a way that happens to be hard for most players, but it also happens to be fair because fuck you, and then came Dark Souls 2 and it was actually artificially difficult because fuck you. Soulsfags are an insane bunch of inbred subhumans.>>735538441>having save points before bosses is that you don't build up that pile of souls you gather on the run back that is an ever increasing incentive to keep trying.Most people will learn the lesson of not going into the fog gate with souls on their asses by the first boss so they either trek back to the bonfire for 5 minutes straight or use a homeward bone and repeat the entire runback without killing any mobs. It's just tedious.
>>735533540I'm not the same anon but the question isn't whether fromsoft has made them harder over time, it's whether the type of game it is benefits from a certain kind of difficulty. Demon Soul's and Elden Ring are fundamentally different games. They don't have the same priorities design-wise. It's obvious Miyazaki has changed his approach. The question is whether a game like Demon Soul's is more or less fun if the focus is placed on a combat system and difficulty that is at odds with the core design philosophy. Yeah you could say you like the approach of elden ring more than demon soul's, but that is not the same as saying Elden Ring is an improvement on Demon Souls's even though they have different goals and therefore can't be compared in that way.
>>735529204I think the key elements to take away from it without just retreading the same formula over and over are>no map>no fast travel>no overbearing narrative elements>interwoven world design>punishing combat to keep tension and engagement >meaningful rewards for combat and exploration The item descriptions were a bit of genius, where when even you didn't get a weapon you would use, you still were rewarded with a bit of information about the world. I don't think the setting is that important for something to replicate the feel, I could see a sci fi shooter, or a modern day horror game ticking all those boxes
>>735531410The journey to and from blighttown to ring the second bell on the first playthrough is the peak of the game, and the feeling is only possible due to lack of fast travel.
>>735540007Is this any different from a good metroidvania
>>735540259In my experience metroidvanias do not have the same feeling with combat, and they almost always have a map
>>735540259Metroidvanias are just 2d arpgs.
>>735529272>For example, Dark Souls 2 copies the "die and lose currency" system, but being able to warp anywhere prevents it from mattering.I could argue the opposite, that Soul Memory means it really matters and that ignoring your dropped souls has actual consequences, while DaS1 fucks up hollowing in the first place so dying functionally just turns off multiplayer with little negative consequence.I'm surprised the games don't force you to remain human to read other soapstone messages anyway, it feels like you get too much help hollowed out.
>>735532140The Gutter and Glutch both allow you to use fire to light up tourches and oil pools and have cool hidden sections.
>>735529204Play Demon's Souls.
>>735540576I was gonna say, lighting every torch in The Gutter and looking around, seeing the place lit up, that felt as impactful as New Londo to me. Now has any of the other games come remotely close to a discovery as cool as Ash Lake? No. A hidden area so cool it doesn't even matter that it's total trash to play.
s+s will always be my favorite soulslike. my biggest criticism, however, is that it has fast travel and completely imo makes all of the looping shortcuts and pathways put into the game useless, which is a damn shame. but it brings a bunch of fun new mechanics and has a goofy newgrounds artstyle and pretty cool (but unfortunately short) soundtrack. also every weapon class in the game is good. and it has guns.ds1 is still untouchable by my standards, ultimately.
>>735534946The game doesn't do enough to make him useful in the early game. You can randomly find dropped titanite shards from enemies, but the lack of pickups mean that you're better off just going to Andre instead of deliberately returning. It would be cool to be able to make use of him immediately after getting to Firelink.
>>735532127Dark Souls is like the one 'modern' game that is actually a must play. WoW is irrelevant and not even slightly similar, you have to be superficial as fuck to think otherwise.
>>735540769He makes more sense before the soul drop buff happened.Since the game was much harder to get through on account of it being harder to level, Rickert was a viable avanue for a struggling new player coming more from the RPG side of thigns who was trying to brute force their way through the early game via grinding.As the Japanese are known to do.
