Game Theory:Does Dark Souls ACTUALLY SUCK?!?

Lulu_lulu is that you? :p

Agreed with some of the points. Still love the game to death though. lol

People really like to praise From Software to high heaven. But there's no denying the Souls games are flawed. Even with those flaws though there's no denying these games are incredibly engrossing and have an unparalleled sense of discovery and that's what makes them good.

That said though some things need to be explained in either the game or the manual.

For example: Exactly which stat does what.

ii haven't seen the video nor do i plan to, the thing is, i don't think any dark souls fan ever has said the game is perfect, the game IS flawed and has several issues, but at the end of the day what matters in a game is how much you enjoy it, and dark souls for a or b reasons makes people love it, even with its flaws, and if a game can manage that, is simply because it is a great game.

inb4 lulu spam and kills any kind of intelligent discussion.

He is the nightmare of every souls fan. lol

not really, he just spams and derails threads but if mods are useless that is their problem, after all, he only spams and never uses any kind of intelligent argument, just ignorant replies and nonsense.

When we want to have arguments about souls series we just ignore him, like we did when bloodborne came out, as much as he spammed that thread, people only find him annoying for his incessant crying.

The games aren't perfect by any means. Their biggest problem IMO is somewhat faulty hit detection caused by clipping. But that doesn't make the Souls series and Bloodborne bad at all.

Betteridge's Law of Headlines.

So no it is. :p

No surprise there. I have read numerous times on this board the perfection of the game when as far as I am concern there are mechanics which can be argued as being flawed.

would like to see any quote at all of someone saying the game is "perfection" mr troll.

in b4 excuses of yet another forum troll.

If I didn't know better I would conclude you are stalking my posts. :)

thats @Lulu_Lulu hes on youtube now

Sigh....... you tagged me for this ?

While the games may have some things that can be worked on I do think that they are excellent games. There is nothing wrong with a game wanting you to pay attention to every enemy, carefully examine the environment, play cautiously, etc.

The misleading item descriptions can't be defended. Everything about that feels like some major mistranslation or oversight.

That's what the game is though. Is uses stupid methods to artificially make the game more difficult, none of which have anything to do with player skill. Like having a lantern reduce stamina regen... The entire game is built on causing the player to take longer than necessary to perform an action and calling it difficulty when it is in fact poor game design.

Souls games have flaws and a lot of times these flaws are given a free pass. But at the end of the day, these games are great,,, just not for everyone. That's what makes them even more likeable.

@Archangel3371:

There is if it kills you and wastes your time anyway despite doing all those things.........

You learn by dying, pure and simple...... save your humanity and other other limited resources for after you've discovered whatever cheap tricks the game plans on using to send you back to the bonfire.

What cheap tricks, specifically?

@KHAndAnime:

An example would be your first trip to New Londo, The Catacombs or The Crystal Caves........ and what the hell.... might aswell throw in The Tomb of Giants.

For the most part the game takes advantage of your lack of Knowledge....... including not telling you what all your controls do.

Lulu might be a bit spammy with his posts but he is still right in one thing and that is . Dark Souls is a terrible flawed game and all it does is play on the same mechanics which would make you put quarter after quarter into a arcade machine. Nothing else.

You are right in one thing and that is the mods are useless , because your post here is nothing but personal BS against another user and they do not seem to care one bit.

But what about you not making another wrong and keep the personal BS away from this thread? or like you said just ignore Lulu

This debate is way too late.

I can't actually watch the video..... whats that dude talking about anyway ?

Same thing you said in every dark souls thread.

@Gamerno6666:

Thats highly unlikely.... my bashing of the souls games (from Dark Souls specfically) comes from playing the game offline, I would assume the Game Theorist would have more to say because I assume he played it with all the online features....... right ?

Not really the video brings up good arguments for why dark souls is good and bad.

Its a decent video.

Nope nothing wrong with learning from dying either. They're not cheap tricks, you learn by exploring and doing. These games aren't merely hack 'n slash action games, not that there is anything wrong with those, they are games that require a high degree of methodical playing.

@Archangel3371:

getting killed off cheaply is methodical now ?

I already said that it wasn't cheap.

So now dying is considered cheap? Playing any game for the first time will have at least a certain level of unknown to it, some just have more then others. Once you play and explore the game the unknown becomes known and you learn and adapt to it. These games require a higher degree of methodical gameplay from the player.

@Archangel3371:

Saying its not cheap doesn't mean anything.... after all I can say just as easily say Bioshock is a puzzle platformer... It means nothing if I don't explain it.

One of the unknowns of Dark Souls is how to jump, I have looked everywhere for the message that shows the controlls for jumping and I couldn't find it....... fast forward to me dying in the undead burg and attempting to run past all the enemies only for my character to jump when I try dodge one of them...... that my friend, is cheap.

Would you like another example ? I have 9 playthroughs worth of cheapness. Sadly I can't list them in order but I can try.

Folks, this is a reminder about the Golden Rule:

Don’t be a jerk.

Go forth and be awesome.

@BranKetra:

Can't we go sideways and be awesome.... going "forth" is scary. :(

@Lulu_Lulu: What is the issue, again?

@BranKetra:

Nothing..... ;)

So where do you stand on this whole Dark Souls does or doesn't suck issue ?

@Lulu_Lulu: Neutral. I have not played it, much.

Not cheap either. Cheap would more likely be something like the game reading the player's controller inputs and/or the AI controlled opponent doing similar moves as the player could do but without say the time needed to do the moves. Take a fighting game for example. If the computer controlled character can dish out an attack without the say time required typically to charge up the attack then that can be considered cheap. Cheap gets thrown out too much because people get upset about dying. Instead of taking time to learn something most of the time people just go with the immediate knee-jerk emotional reaction of crying foul ie. "cheap", "op", etc. It's certainly understandable but it doesn't make it true.

@Archangel3371:

Really.... you don't think the game neglecting to tell you something as simple as one of its controls and it resulting in your death is cheap........... ?

Atleast a fighting game doesn't go oops.... by the way you jump with X.... its not even a good example, ofcourse the AI cheats, the genre was designed for Playing against people....

but lets move on...... The Hellkite Drake.... also cheap.... after killing any boss in the game the first thing they should do is let you save your progress.... but nope... From Software in their infinite wisdom decided that your reward for killing the Taurus Demon is to get one shotted by a giant Drake..... before you can reach the short cut or the bonfire..... dropping your souls where you can't pick them up without getting hit again.

The "debate" seems like a bunch of fluff statements with no really well thought out points.

"But this is a game where death finally matters... you lose your experience point and start at the last checkpoint" doesn't really say anything unique about the concept of death or the thematic use of death in the souls series. They only touch, poorly, on mechanics without going into any thematic consequences that those mechanics have for the game. I think pairing the mechanics with the themes the game sets up create the uniqueness of dark souls.

Another point constantly brought up is how esoteric the game is; however, there is no mention of why the game was designed that way or the creators intention of sharing his childhood experience of confusion in reading western mythology.

@Lulu_Lulu: No I don't think the game neglecting to tell something is cheap, although outright lying to the player probably is, but even that might not be so depending on the context of the game.

Anyway I've said my piece on the game and the matter and I really don't feel like discussing this topic ad naseum with you so I'm done.

I have not played the game nearly enough to make a judgement if it sucks or not. I will say that its difficulty seems a lot more artificial than games that are actually hard.

What I mean by that is if you look at a game that is hard for the right reasons(lets just use super meat boy as an example), it takes skill and practice to get through each section of that game. You look at a level, you know exactly what to do and you bust your ass until you get it right. Executing levels properly takes lots of skill, practice, and mastery of the gameplay.

From my short play time with dark souls it feels more cheap than hard, in general traversing an area is very easy, but then you take a wrong turn(with no way of knowing it is a wrong turn) and face quick death, now you know not to take that turn again, but you are stuck traversing a long, boring, super easy patch of land making your way back to that point.

IN fairness to souls I only played it a few hours(I rented it for a weekend) and recently bought it on sale so I will reserve final judgment until I give it a more thorough playthrough.

@Archangel3371:

Its the samething.... you die because of miss information. the only time its okay to with hold information is if theres no objective.... that way your free to experiment as you see fit......... but if a game tells you to go two bells then every failure caused by not knowing something is cheap... lazy and stupid.

Don't ask for examples if you can't handle them.

@pook99:

That happened to me.... I went looking for the 2nd Bell in The Catacombs and New Londo because that dude said I should go down....

This was no accident, that writers deliberately made his dialogue confusing just to waste your time going to into areas you're not suppose to be in yet.

You know what's really funny.... theres not a single Navigational tool in the environment to let you know where you are or where you going !

How do you know you're in The Undead Burg ? Because theres a giant text that appears on the screen telling you are in the Undead Burg.... but theres no signs or crests or a single piece of writing in anywhere.... how the hell do people get shit done in this universe ? How do you ask for Directions when theres no street names, building signs or anything to let you know where you're going or where you are ? "Sorry sir could you please direct me to Post Office"..... how the hell do you even get mail when theres no addresses or anything like that.... does the messenger just run around asking everybody who they are ?

Sigh......its one thing to have no map but the environment still allows you to navigate without a hassle but since when do we praise a game with no means of navigation at all Besides the ambiguous ramblings of an NPC with a dark sense of humor ?

Couldn't get in to it myself, but I don't think it's a bad game, just requires a lot of patience and trial/error repeating.

@Lulu_Lulu: if really cheap deaths are what you're looking for, play the original Castlevania OR Ninja Gaiden. You get knocked back with each hit, but you can't do the same to enemies, resulting in a lot of pit falls or getting knocked into a mob with very few invincibility frames. From normal enemies, no less. At least in Dark Souls, you only get flinched from most normal enemies, and in return you can knock them back (parrying). Plus, you're given plenty of time to either dodge or block the next hit.

As for the missing information, why is that such a bad thing? Makes you pay more attention to the level design, dialogue/item descriptions, and everything else, which is what good game design is all about: giving you information through the game rather than have a tutorial or exposition fairy explaining it all for you. If anything is to be faulted in Dark Souls, it's the somewhat finicky hit boxes, annoying frame drops, and the confusing covenant system. If you don't wanna pay that much attention to the game and its mechanics showing you what to do and where to go, then I don't know what to tell you. And with that, I bid this post adieu.

What are you talking about? I didn't ask for examples. You're the one who initiated this whole conversation. Like I said previously I already stated my opinion on what I consider cheap and my view of the games in question. It's not my problem that you can't handle someone having a different opinion then you.

Video sucked. Guy arguing against souls had many incorrect facts. The souls games are amazing- in my opinion the flaws are the frame rate, and occasionally the hit detection. FromSoft makes amazing games, but I scratch my head at why the framerate doesn't perform well. The games are not visually demanding at all.

@Archangel3371:

Couldn't careless about your oppinion...... Dark Souls sucking is a fact.

@mastermetal777:

Theres a boat load of Enemies in Dark Souls you can't knock back unless you have a really really big weapon..... which you'l never get a chance to swing because its way too slow..... They even have bosses who kill you by knocking you off ledges.

The shear hypocrissy of your Post, of course it should be expected... Only Dark Souls gets a free pass for shitty design.

Paying more attention is not going to stop you from Dying...... its pointless..... thats what makes it cheap, if there was a practical way to avoid getting killed then atleast that would be something but scan the enviroment all you want, it barely makes a difference. Not to mention there are many instances when you the game doesn't even give you the oppertunity to do the very thing that could supposedly save you alot of Frustration. The item Descriptions are hit and miss, the Covenant of Artorias tells you what it does and thats very helpful..... The Peculiar Doll however, does not, among several other items.

When a door is suppose to open from the otherside.... it will say so but if it needs a key it just says its Locked......"oh really ? Thanks Genius, I thought it wouldn't be open because its shy... "

Fixing the frame rate and hitboxes and all the other technical aspect is only half the problem.

Came for the Lulu.