So I played Demon's Souls to completion 7 years ago and since played sporadically half of Dark Souls and then Bloodborne - both having such terrible streaks of boss battles that I quit after contemplating I wasn't having any fun anymore. A friend of mine motivated me to start 3, though, so here we are.
I finished the base game and defeated all bosses other than the Demon King which I didn't feel was worth tracking down after checking up on what I've missed on my playthrough. Some random thoughts:
- it is the most flawless Souls game experience; it stays consistent throughout every inch unlike every other From Software game. No truly awful boss battle, consistently solid level and enemy design, solid art design/graphics, a great deal of build variety and nice sound design accompanied by a good score.
- but you also might call it the most inoffensive Souls game to date. The bosses don't do anything you haven't seen in previous games already, more than ever short cuts are always incredibly telegraphed by the same levers/locked doors/elevators, the enemy design is in almost all facets a complete retreat of past games, and the art design and thematic settings are iterative to the point of absurdity. While trying to make as few mistakes as possible they also did try to take as few risks as possible. What you then get may be a consistently good but rather unremarkable experience.
- item placement is way too neat and tidy which heavily reminded me of Sekiro (which I called quits after beating the third boss) but is a bigger eyesore in a RPG. It felt like you were on-rails on which items you can and can't get all the time in comparison to past games. This is, of course, also in part of its more linear nature in general but both aren't mutual entities.
- I don't see any reason why you can't level up and do other systematic things at bonfires and have to instead always teleport back to the shrine. This has been cumbersome in basically every Souls game and it's still here.
- the story and characters are also rather uninspiring but they aren't intrusive either so it's whatever
- there is a reason why I finished this game and didn't Bloodborne or Dark Souls though. Inoffensive is the right term as in there wasn't any roadblock and there wasn't anything stopping me from having fun. There were no bad boss battles, no bad areas or even bad moments in general (other than the utterly bullshit black serpent-like monstrosities that come out of a very few ordinary enemies). I was enjoying it from beginning to end.
Nameless King is my favorite boss in the game and Lothric Castle my favorite location. The first had a great cinematic feel which I enjoyed and the latter reminded me of the Hyrule Castle raid from Wind Waker which is one of my favorite moments from that game.
I finished the base game and defeated all bosses other than the Demon King which I didn't feel was worth tracking down after checking up on what I've missed on my playthrough. Some random thoughts:
- it is the most flawless Souls game experience; it stays consistent throughout every inch unlike every other From Software game. No truly awful boss battle, consistently solid level and enemy design, solid art design/graphics, a great deal of build variety and nice sound design accompanied by a good score.
- but you also might call it the most inoffensive Souls game to date. The bosses don't do anything you haven't seen in previous games already, more than ever short cuts are always incredibly telegraphed by the same levers/locked doors/elevators, the enemy design is in almost all facets a complete retreat of past games, and the art design and thematic settings are iterative to the point of absurdity. While trying to make as few mistakes as possible they also did try to take as few risks as possible. What you then get may be a consistently good but rather unremarkable experience.
- item placement is way too neat and tidy which heavily reminded me of Sekiro (which I called quits after beating the third boss) but is a bigger eyesore in a RPG. It felt like you were on-rails on which items you can and can't get all the time in comparison to past games. This is, of course, also in part of its more linear nature in general but both aren't mutual entities.
- I don't see any reason why you can't level up and do other systematic things at bonfires and have to instead always teleport back to the shrine. This has been cumbersome in basically every Souls game and it's still here.
- the story and characters are also rather uninspiring but they aren't intrusive either so it's whatever
- there is a reason why I finished this game and didn't Bloodborne or Dark Souls though. Inoffensive is the right term as in there wasn't any roadblock and there wasn't anything stopping me from having fun. There were no bad boss battles, no bad areas or even bad moments in general (other than the utterly bullshit black serpent-like monstrosities that come out of a very few ordinary enemies). I was enjoying it from beginning to end.
Nameless King is my favorite boss in the game and Lothric Castle my favorite location. The first had a great cinematic feel which I enjoyed and the latter reminded me of the Hyrule Castle raid from Wind Waker which is one of my favorite moments from that game.
