>>12521423
it's not unless you're trying for 100%

>>12521423
It's not harder than any of the Souls games. The Souls games are extremely difficult and harder than pretty much everything but the absolute most ball-bustingly brutal games like Battletoads NES deathless or second loops of CAVE/Psikyo shmups.

The only people who act like Souls games are easy are those with a massive amount of experience who retroactively try to call it easy only AFTER they've spent hundreds of hours learning and improving at the game (and looking up guides/tips).

>>12521423
must... not... soiquote...

>>12521521
for pretty much every souls boss you can get an NPC summon. because of that i think there's aspects of DKC2 that actually could be harder than souls games, mainly the levels. DKC2 bosses actually aren't that bad (end boss is actually one of the easier ones too sadly).

>>12521521
lol ?

>>12521521
It just takes more time because of the RPG elements, so people will spend more time reading guides, but actual execution souls games aren't more demanding than the hard 2D platformer/sidescrill action games.

>>12521539
So no RPG in existence is hard because you could spent 100 hours powerfarming to max level? Souls series does a great job with balancing the RPG mechanics between the extremes of feeling like you steamroll the game when overleveled and feeling like you lose a statcheck when underleveled. Even when you are high level, enemies hit hard and a dumb mistake can easily get you killed.

You say the same thing about Zelda 2 (a game that has FAR easier execution than Souls) when you remove the grinding crap and people lose their mind btw.

>>12521532
The same is true for tons of games, but most people don't abuse guides and co-op to beat a game, as that would diminish the pride of overcoming a challenge fair and square.

Stuff like CV and Mega Man are easy with the right weapons/strategies, shmups have safe spots and routing, JRPGs have braindead cheese strats or powerfarming, etc.

I replayed DKC2 last year after not playing it since the '90s. It's pretty brutal. Save-stating it would absolutely be cheating because of how it's laid out.

>>12521521
trvke

>>12521521
No it's really not very hard

>>12521521
>The only people who act like Souls games are easy are those with a massive amount of experience
You can say that with literally any fucking retro game too...

>>12521583
Not saying Souls doesn't have any challenge but you do spend a lot of time minmaxing and farming you know it to be true. While part of the fun for those who enjoy RPGs, the actual execution isn't terribly demanding. Souls are laggy games that reward patience and pattern memory. 2D sidescroll action games are way snappier and have way more apm than Souls do. In the same frame you can do an action in Souls you can do three in a classic 2D game

>>12521478
It's not if you're trying for full completion either.
Animal Antics is the most difficult level, and that's not even that tough after the entire game.

>>12521521
>The Souls games are extremely difficult and harder than pretty much everything
How to say you're bad at video games, without saying that you're bad at video games.

>>12521713
Post clears so I can laugh at you

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>>12521423
Modern games can't compete with DKC2's dynamic thinking AI that can strategize and learn on the fly.

>>12521423
Just learn to roll.

>>12521521
if you want to discount limited continues that's an argument you need to make because souls definitely is not harder than the average limited continue.

>>12521908
It absolutely is. It took me less time to go from first time playing Contra to a deathless clear than it did just to beat the first fucking area (1-1) of Demon's Souls.

What are these limited continue games that are harder? I'm not saying they don't exist, it's just there is *very* few of them outside of like hardcore niche shmups

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>>12521423
CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP

>>12521921
>What are these limited continue games that are harder?
basically all of them barring the easiest representatives like streets of rage 2 and sonic. if you aren't lying you have some kind of eccentric issue with souls that makes them harder than they are for most people.

>>12521970
>can't name a single example
Whatever you say, no clears retard.

>>12521990
revenge of the shinobi.

>>12522012
I beat it and Shinobi 3 both Expert no-miss, absolutely not even close to Demon's Souls in difficulty.

Fuck off.

>>12522014
are you one of the resident evil spammers that got bored and had to find another way to destroy the board?

>>12521942
lol

>>12522019
Yep, change the topic now. Shitter with no clears tries to blab his mouth about things he knows nothing about.

>>12522024
>not even close to demon's souls in difficulty
no reasonable person would say this about the easiest souls game and a fairly tough genesis game.

>>12522029
>easiest Souls game
Only if you're a bandwagon retard who played it after all the other Souls games with hundreds of hours of experience and using a guide and the most OP cheese build. Demon's Souls was the first of its kind and was much more punishing in terms of soul form and invasions.

I don't think you realize the reputation Demon's Souls had around launch and for even a good decade later. It was always seen as a very niche, very difficult, very hardcore game. This was not some casual's viewpoint, even those who were hardcore and underground universally acknowledged it as an extremely difficult and even obtuse game, viewed as far tougher than even old school Nintendo-hard games.

Shit like Shinobi does not hold a fucking candle to this game, it folds after just a few hours of practice and you run circles around. Souls has been a cultural phenomenon for 15+ years, people have hundreds if not thousands of hours of experience, and every aspect of the games have been analyzed to find the most optimal and braindead cheese strats for every single thing in the entire game as public knowledge. Only after ALL of that, is it seen as "it's definitely very tough and punishing, but you can overcome it if you stick with it and know what to expect".

Part of it is just because the games are so good, they are immersive and engrossing. You want to keep playing them even as you get your shit pounded in. Compare that to Contra where a zoomer plays it for 5 minutes, drops it, and dismisses it as "omg da hardest game evar!!!!"

You are a shitter with zero clears and zero perspective or context. This is why you really shouldn't talk on subjects you know nothing about

>>12522040
>This is why you really shouldn't talk on subjects you know nothing about
I got to the credits of both games and grinding levels in demons was the more mild experience. certainly wouldn't say revenge 'wasn't close'.

>>12521521
Man I'm not even getting past this ridiculous work of trollery and/or incompetence, this thread is over for me, gonna have to hide it. Dark Souls harder than Battletoads DEATHLESS of all things, for god's sake man, you've gone too far

>>12521521
Souls is obviously way easier because it's a heavily knowledge based game with minimal technical/reaction tests if you know what to do that can also be grinded and brute forced through summons, high poise armor, bows, magic etc.

Super Mario Bros. is ridiculously harder than Dark Souls unless you're a noob who doesn't understand how it systems work and how they can be exploited.

>>12522049
You are an illiterate retard, so no great loss.

>>12522049
Nta, but if you read it again, he explicitly said Souls isn’t harder than Battletoads deathless.

>>12522050
>>12521705
I think you vastly overestimate the execution difficulty of vast majority of retro games. Stuff like Contra, Zelda II, Mega Man, Castlevania, Ghosts N Goblins, etc. have very low execution difficulty, it's basically all about knowing the strategies/routing and exploiting them. Unless you are going for speedruns, very few games are going to have high execution difficulty, even for 1CC or deathless.

Souls not only has much more complex strategies, but also much longer levels, and much greater punishment for failure. In a NES or SNES game, a strategy might be as simple as standing in a safe spot or instantly bursting a boss with a certain weapon, but in Souls, it's entire complex routes and long high risk bossfights. Not to mention a single zone in Souls is as long as many entire retro games. Length IS a major part of that difficulty, something like Castlevania but 20x longer would absolutely be a significantly more difficult game.

>>12522040
>>12522072
>and every aspect of the games have been analyzed to find the most optimal and braindead cheese strats for every single thing in the entire game as public knowledge

You're still massively overstating the 'base technical difficulty' of Souls compared to so many NES games. Like, you don't remotely need to know the games on an 'internet optimal' level or anything close to that deep to understand how to exploit things (if something has a dozen exploits, you know need to know 1 or 2), once you do (my experience is that it took me 30 hour to 'get' Dark Souls to the level that I understood it was 'about' taking advantage of shit over technical skill) the games become, not at all trivial, but you understand that there will be few situations that aren't essentially knowledge/gear checks unless you deliberately hold yourself back.

Like, when you start playing Souls, it will be excessively brutal because of a combination of how immediately punishing it is and how much stuff there is to learn though the game in total. The difference is that familiarity and knowledge reduce the difficulty so massively compared to oldschool games that still retain a level of speed/finesse tests that basically get cut out of most of Souls if you're actually taking advantage of basic exploits and mechanical knowledge.

Souls can remain brutally hard, but at some point only if you're going "oh, I'm doing a level 1 run where I don't use x and y" and stuff like that. With uncapped use of game mechanics you end up being tested by barely anything, especially given dying only takes you back to your last bonfire and even lets you keep items.

>>12522098
Souls takes average first time player like 50-75 hours to barebones beat by any means necessary with guides and cheese methods.

In that time you could clear like over a dozen NES games.

Again, if you think games are harder, fucking NAME THEM.

>>12521521
>Battletoads NES deathless
the traditional slavic passtime

>>12522072
>and much greater punishment for failure
this would only maybe be true for permanent progress games like castlevania and megaman, not any limited continue game.

>>12522106
The entire game of CV1 and MM1 is about as long as a single zone from Souls. Plus most NES games are pure braindead muscle memory, so getting back to where you were is just a minor inconvenience of a few minutes wasted

>>12522104
>Souls takes average first time player like 50-75 hours to barebones beat by any means necessary with guides and cheese methods.
I'm not denying this, I'm just comparing the essentially required technical skill needed to beat these games, and Souls just gives you so many possible ways to exploit it that anyone with a certain amount of basic knowledge will be able to use that to make the majority of situations barely offer a challenge.

>In a NES or SNES game, a strategy might be as simple as standing in a safe spot or instantly bursting a boss with a certain weapon
That is exactly the kind of shit you do in Souls. Like, just using good armor, a 100% physical shield and leveling vitality and endurance is enough to outright tank most shit in Dark Souls and win via actual button mashing, even without having to learn any complexities of the fights at all. You don't seem to knowledge or understand just how trivially busted the game is. You can't just beat the back half of Ninja Gaiden like this like you can Dark Souls.

>>12522131
>Like, just using good armor, a 100% physical shield and leveling vitality and endurance is enough to outright tank most shit in Dark Souls and win via actual button mashing
It's really not, try actually playing the game. Even massively overleveled, you can still very easily die from a simple mistake.

>>12522118
by default in souls you don't have to repeat a single boss in order to get back to where your progress left off. in retro games it's routine to have to go through an entire game's worth of bosses several times in order to get a completion.

>>12522131
Ninja Gaiden is only harder on MNM added in Black.
DMC1/DMC3 is never harder as items completely trivialize the game. SS-ranks are harder, but that's a self-imposed challenge run beyond just merely beating the game

Ninja Gaiden absolutely does have cheese strats, boss loops, item spam, etc. that massively trivialize the game, outside of MNM

>>12522136
Bosses in CV1 and Mega Man you literally just stand in one spot and mash attack, Souls bosses are orders of magnitude more difficult and complex. A boss in these NES games is less of a challenge than a random trash mob in Souls

What an utterly retarded and disingenuous statement.

And once again, still not naming any games.

which button do I need to press to kill everyone that posted in this thread

>>12522104
>Souls takes average first time player like 50-75 hours to barebones beat by any means necessary with guides and cheese methods.
inherently bloated length by being an rpg series
>In that time you could clear like over a dozen NES games.
an average player you mention above would absolutely not be able to do this for difficult retro games with limited continues.

>>12522146
Souls is one of the few action RPGs that avoids the pitfalls of jarpiggy grinding crap. It does a great job with balancing the RPG mechanics between the extremes of feeling like you steamroll the game when overleveled and feeling like you lose a statcheck when underleveled. Even when you are high level, enemies hit hard and a dumb mistake can easily get you killed, while at the same time a SL1 run does not feel tedious or like you're super underpowered.

Not to mention you can also speedrun the game in a couple hours, there is basically non-existent filler or bloat

>>12522139
the argument was about punishment. 8 bosses is more punishing than a boss runback.
>A boss in these NES games is less of a challenge than a random trash mob in Souls
no

>>12522152
What game are we talking about here? Castlevania and Mega Man have unlimited continues and Contra's bosses are an absolute joke with most taking under 5 seconds.

NES games are so easily learned because they are so shallow and static (the vast majority at least).

>>12522146
Average zoomer puts 5 minutes in a retro game before getting bored and dropping it. That's not comparable to Souls where they get engrossed and want to learn and improve and spend many dozens of hours learning and mastering the game. NES games are a cakewalk if you can stand to stick with them

>>12522134
>It's really not, try actually playing the game
You're telling me, but this is exactly how I beat every boss from O&S onwards. A single mistake can be potentially devastating, but you quickly learn how to not get fucked up by this stuff. Like, there are things in the Tomb of the Giants that can fuck you up hard, but knowing where they appear mostly reduces the problem to being prepared for whatever to pop out. Learning the layout of levels and where enemies appear so as to not get ambushed takes a certain amount of time and deliberate thought, but once you have that down the technical skill involve dives down hard, and any mistakes at most push you back a few minutes to the previous bonfire.

My argument is not that there's no or even little difficulty, but that the difficulty dies incredibly hard to knowledge and gear and is often reduced to timing tests that give you a massive 1/3 of a second window. Actively controlling and using Mario's momentum is much harder to both get used to and master.

>A boss in these NES games is less of a challenge than a random trash mob in Souls
Souls actual trash mobs let you hold shield, wait to get hit and then press attack as they recoil. Something like BB's Kos Orphan second stage, or even the Bell Gargoyles undergeared, are actually horribly brutal to fight consistently, but just beating the games never forces you to do anything approaching the full difficulty of either.

>>12522163
Mario is one of the very few retro games with hard execution difficulty due to its momentum/movement tech. I still suck at controlling Mario despite many hours in the games and could never do a deathless run, but the games are also extremely short and have warp zones/cape/warp whistles and methods to farm a ton of lives.

But yes, I would agree with you that SMB3 is quite difficult and is harder than Contra, Castlevania, NG, Shatterhand, Rescue Rangers, Ducktales, Zelda (including II), Mega Man, etc. But still not as hard as Souls or even close

>>12522157
>What game are we talking about here?
gradius. replaying the game from the last level is more punishing than a soul's runback. swap that out for any other limited continue game that's not the most vanilla example you can think of.

>>12522165
you're that autist that was making the super mario bros is harder than ng bait threads?

>>12522168
Gradius (at least arcade) is mostly a one life game due to the power-loss, although you can recover from some sections and limp your way through. High level players have all the recoveries from every checkpoint, even for high loops, obviously THAT would take a ton of practice, but a basic one loop shitclear is extremely far removed from that. But a one loop clear of Gradius is like 15 mins long and the game is pretty easy outside of a couple somewhat tricky sections. It doesn't take more than a couple hours to learn the entire game and half the time and just flailing around works well enough for the first loop if you have a shield and upgraded ship

Also the NES version is way easier than the arcade version, which is already not all that difficult of a shmup, especially if you're not going into higher loops.

However, I already conceded that shmups (mostly arcade 1CCs, console shmups are way easier) are about the only games that are more difficult than Souls, so I'm not sure why you're bringing them up, even though a Gradius 1cc still isn't more difficult.

>>12521942
Severely underrated

>>12522173
Racing games can offer stupidly hard challenges. I'd like to see how well you do on Micro Machines.

>>12522168
Contra? Easier
Super C? Easier
Rescue Rangers? Easier
Rescue Rangers 2? Easier
Super Mario Bros? Easier
Super Mario Bros 2? Easier
Ducktales? Easier
Ducktales 2? Easier
Jackal? Easier
Silver Surfer? Easier

Again, what game are we talking about?

>>12522173
I was pointing out the absurdity of you claiming soul's runbacks are more punishing.than completing nearly an entire game's worth of content.

>>12522189
I never said runbacks, I said one zone in Souls/the time between checkpoints is as long as an entire NES game, and it's more difficult as well, especially since you have no extra lives and can die very easily, unlike most retro games.

Runbacks are more of a thing in later Souls games where you sprint past everything, Demon's Souls doesn't really let you run past enemies as easily, although shortcuts do make it faster to reach a boss if you fail

>>12522194
>I said one zone in Souls/the time between checkpoints is as long as an entire NES game, and it's more difficult as well
there is no person that would realistically consider a random bonfire to bonfire trek in a souls game as being more difficult than an entire arcade style limited continue game.

>>12522208
>arcade style limited continue game.
Notice how you refuse to actually give concrete examples

And yes, I absolutely would, see >>12521921

>>12522185
>>12522215
How about:
Ghouls and Ghosts
Castlevania 3
Ninja Gaiden 1-3
Spelunker
Splatterhouse
Actraiser
Actraiser 2
Aladdin (Genesis)
The Lion King
Phantasy Star 2
Outrun
Space Harrier

>>12521424
*your

>>12521521
Anon is right, even though I'm a bit rusty. I know the ins and outs of the game, and I can pull off some crazy plays because I know the mechanics. They're definitely not easy—even a simple encounter with an “easy” enemy can be tough for a newbie, or just something that's there for an experienced player.

I’ll add that much of the difficulty in older games stems from the fact that concepts like “i-frames,” hitstun, recovery, and all that crap didn’t really exist. Recovery was an anti-softlock mechanism; i-frames and even hitstun existed largely to prevent the player from getting stuck on the level geometry. Unlike later, when it became a mechanic intentionally designed by devs—like in SMW, where you can exploit i-frames because the designers intended Mario’s flicker to make him invincible—or just like fighting games, which made this a fundamental pillar of their design.

>>12522745
>Ghouls and Ghosts
No, maybe Super GnG 2all no deaths on professional, but merely beating it? Not even close
>Castlevania 3
No (unlimited continues). There are some tough parts but it's a short game and you will eventually overcome, it's mostly just memo
>Ninja Gaiden 1-3
No, magic tears these games apart and they all have unlimited continues, even no death is easier
>Spelunker
Never played but probably no
>Splatterhouse
No (even for no death)
>Actraiser
FUCK no
>Actraiser 2
Never played but almost certainly no
>Aladdin (Genesis)
Lol no
>The Lion King
Tricky but no, short + muscle memo
>Phantasy Star 2
No, why the fuck are we naming random jarpigs lmao, how desperate are you?
>Outrun
No
>Space Harrier
No, even no death, although I haven't actually spent all that much time with it

Again, Souls will take an average first time player 50+ hours to beat assuming minimal guide use and not abusing co-op, most of those games you named even a deathless run will take a small fraction of that

>>12522834
Lol you haven't even played all of those and you think you can speak to them.

Time to mastery is no great measure of difficulty. Dragon Quest 7 takes more than 100 hours to complete. Is that a more difficult game than Dark Souls?

>>12522940
The difference is Souls games can be beat in just an hour or two glitchless and it's entirely game knowledge and execution whereas your average shitty turn-based jarpig for retards is bloated as all hell, full of braindead tedious farming of trashmobs, watching cutscenes, reading dialogue, and walking around towns. The time you are actively challenged and playing is extremely low compared to Souls.

I don't need to play every single game ever released in existence to know that it's not a 99.9th percentile difficult game more difficult than Souls.

I have 100+ no-miss clears of various arcade and retro games, and only a handful were harder than a Souls game for a first-timer, but again that's for a no-death challenge run significantly harder than just beating the games by any means necessary. Then you talk about SL1 or melee only or no death Souls run, and that goes right back to being significantly harder

>>12522963
>Then you talk about SL1 or melee only
I've been playing through DaS1 like this, SL1+melee only+no shield+no summons+limited upgrades per stage. There are spikes in difficulty where this is extremely hard to do, and actually comparable to challenge runs of classic arcade games, but most of the game isn't even close to that hard in comparison even with this kind of stringent restriction.

Relax these restrictions and most of the game's challenge gets chipped away from spending a basic amount of time learning it. The vast majority of the difficulty relates to being able to judge if a given action is 'good' in the moment, and there are plenty of ways to reduce this greatly. You are never weaving carefully through bullets, only in a few cases need to accurately manual aim quickly, rarely are forced to react on short notice to things you couldn't anticipate once you're prepared, and barely even need to worry about knowing attack timing if your poise is good enough and you grind enough HP to tank shit. It's capable of offering severe challenge, but only on artificially restricting yourself once you know it well enough, but the kind of challenge it gives you isn't of a particularly technique based nature.

Super Smash Bros: Melee, Rocket League, F-Zero etc. offer levels of challenge quite far beyond what Souls can offer.

>>12523031
We're not talking about challenge runs, anything can be exceedingly difficult if you put an arbitrarily high score or speedrun or restriction requirement on it. Plus you have hundreds if not thousands of hours experience in the Souls games, no shit it's not as hard for you, you fucking moron. Meanwhile your average retro game usually folds to just a few hours of practice.

Souls games are much more expansive, deeper, longer, more punishing, require a ton of in-depth knowledge on complex enemy and boss movesets and behavior as well as mechanics and systems, and a very high execution skill. Compare that to your average retro game where just knowing a few very basic tips/strategies and you can beat most of them blind in a single day on original hardware.

You don't have any clears and you refuse to give specifics, you just don't play these fucking games to see how easy they are. Now you're going on and trying to compare Souls to racing, fighting, and fucking Rocket League an 8th gen PvP esports game... fucking what????

Just say you're a fucking zoomer shitstain who doesn't play retro games and has zero interest in actually learning or mastering them and move the fuck on. It has nothing to do with difficulty, you just don't play and don't want to play them. I already described your type in a previous post before you even entered this thread.
>Compare that to Contra where a zoomer plays it for 5 minutes, drops it, and dismisses it as "omg da hardest game evar!!!!"

>>12523031
Post clears. That's really what it comes down to. Nothing you're saying is making sense and it's because you're a poser speaking out of your ass.

I've 100% all the Souls games and 1CC well over 100 retro games, most of those deathless.

I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Souls is harder than basically any and every retro game just to beat, and you have to put a bunch of qualifiers and restrictions on retro games just to make them have even a fighting chance to be as hard as Souls. Even deathless runs, the only ones I've found harder are all shmups (a genre had next to no experience with just a couple years ago).

If you know others, feel free to name them. I want specifics from either you or someone who is a known and trusted player (Scoop, Mariax, Iconoclast, Pearl, PEG, Vrocs, Pasky, Juno, dumplechan, etc.)

>>12523071
>>12523090
didn't read lol
stay mad

>>12523090
>I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Souls is harder than basically any and every retro game just to beat, and you have to put a bunch of qualifiers and restrictions on retro games just to make them have even a fighting chance to be as hard as Souls.
More like you have to use a bunch of self restraint in order to make Dark Souls hard. Just knowing the timing for i-frame dodging makes the games a breeze on their own.

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Lets post games harder than Dark Souls

>>12521423
>be me
>8th birthday party
>get DKC2 from mom and dad
>been dreaming about playing it for months, and I’m 10x as autistic about videogames as my friends
>start playing as soon as the party winds down for a bit, and a few friends are staying the night
>I end up beating the game in one setting, probably 6-7 hours of straight gameplay
>look around me, it’s 2am, all my friends fell asleep, and I ignored them all night to game, not to mention beating it the day I got it
>feel a deep sense of shame

Anyone else ever have a similar feel? I feel like this type of thing wouldn’t be seen as weird today, but that’s a bad thing and I was right to feel like an indulgent self centered piece of shit afterwards.

And I guess all that is to say, I don’t think it was crazy hard by the standards of the time

>>12523298
Nobody even knew what i-frames were or spammed roll back in the day. You're really showing your ass here zoomer

As a kid i missed 1DK medal and only Godknows how much I gave searched. Only as an adult I discovered by pure luck that the medal was hidden Inside a bonus level.

>>12523421
>Nobody even knew what i-frames were or spammed roll back in the day.
2011 was not "back in the day"

>>12521887
Stage end guardian? What exactly is this guy talking about? Can’t remember enemies in any level acting different on a playthrough

>>12523709
The one in mineshaft level with the parrot bonus level?

>>12524275
15 years ago was indeed back in the day.

>>12521521
the only souls game that could be considered harder than dkc2 is DS2