Think of it more as a “my dude is too tiny” complaint.
-Tom
It actually does zoom in and out a little during gameplay, but it’s not specific to when there are enemies nearby and I think it’s more to highlight a moment. Really the problem (I think) is that people are watching the game in a video instead of it being a full screen experience, and then making this complaint. When I am playing it for myself, being the guy whose input is making things on the screen happen, it’s nothing I think about. In the image you presented from BF, the original argument against zooming was something about how it’s designed to be playable and understandable at that scale, and I find that accurate.
Not that the game is without flaw. Going back and trying to find my body without the lantern is as problematic as I thought it would be when I first understood this mechanic (just last week during the Game Informer video), and the lack of (at least in the first 3 floors, I have only put a toe into floor 4) interesting “loot” kind of turned me off, so far. I was hoping you could find cool weapons, armor, consumables that aided you on the journey, but I don’t think it’s quite that “rogue” of a game.
I could only play less than an hour but I’ve noticed it has the Dark Soul’s style parry.
That stuff is all about perfect timing and reading enemy animations, so I thought that the zoomed out visual wouldn’t help when the gameplay is about precise timing.
I’ve also had a few problems parsing the different controls and actions and interactions with the environment. I definitely missed some stuff, like there were some splotches on the ground that you could gather and I’m not sure if they come from insects you walk over because they might be very small. I’m sure after playing the game some more all this stuff becomes simple, but at the beginning it’s not that easy to have a good idea of all these small mechanics.
But it’s less because it’s so small you miss stuff and more that you have a suspicion you’re missing something. Being dark and small it gives me that feeling I must have missed something along the way, constantly. Whether true or not (that I missed something) it’s a feeling that affects the experience.
Umm… ok!
Take that headline and apply it to Eve Online and it applies to me as well.
I don’t know if that was on purpose, but this read quite like his exposed theory: he had committed to write about Below, and couldn’t allow himself to stop. Maybe someone should write an article about the article.
I got this off Gamepass over the weekend and I’m digging it. It’s hard. I like hard games. Definitely seeing the Dark Souls inspirations, with the track backs and the corpse runs.
The music is fantastic when it kicks in. The atmosphere is excellent.
I do wish the character was like 1.5x bigger. Once you get into the Crypts (I don’t know what they’re called, its the area with the candles and zombies) the camera zooms in more which makes the game so much easier to play. Of course, the enemies are that much harder there, so it balances out.
Well, this certainly seems to have panned out.
I wanted to like the game, but gave up on it after dying to spike traps I couldn’t see twice in a row. Not in an interesting troll-y kind of way, just… insta death traps out for no reason. This was only on the third or fourth level. Maybe I would’ve seen them if I was sitting with a monitor instead of tv across the room, I don’t know.
Didn’t seem like a rewarding way to spend time. That intro!
I had no problem seeing what was happening, and found the game relaxing and fun, but also boooooring as hell. Maybe more happened later, but by the time I died every time I did, I never seemed to find anything cool to keep me forging ahead. I think I wanted more of a rogue like RPG/loot game than this ended up being. I do love the visuals though, and may try to get back into it down the road.
How do you play this?
This is my fundamental problem with BELOW. Not the gameplay itself but the knowledge gap between how i’m supposed to open the inventory or use an item physically, like, literally what buttons am I supposed to press sort of questions.
And that’s why i’m probably never going to get close to finishing it - i’m barely able to play it when I put it down and pick it up again, months later.
The only solution, I’ve found, is to literally start over so I can learn wth i’m supposed to do, again, how things work, what i’m supposed to press, how i’m supposed to use the UI. If I remember next time I do this, i’m going to set a 4x6 card next to me and make a list of “how do I play BELOW” because I’ve rarely faced a game that makes no sense to me. How do I light a fire? How do I use that lantern, and where did it go? Why / how does water work, inventory, ect?
Basically the game asks of me a kind of mental commitment to learning it’s idiosyncratic design, and apparently that’s a mental commitment too far. I guess i’m interested in learning the game and not learning how to play the game.
But, let’s be honest, there probably isn’t going to be a next time. There are times where its downtempo minimalism seems like the right speed for a game. Too bad about the game itself.
OTOH, this might do well if they, ever perhaps, port it to something like the Apple TV or Apple Arcade. Capy games are best as mobile games anyway, and maybe doing that would force them to streamline the horrible control schemes as they exist now.
I died in some kind of techno death labyrinth and my lantern is stuck down there. I tried to get it like 4 times then gave up on the game forever. There’s a black smoke monster that just kills you if you don’t have the lantern and I don’t know how you’re supposed to get it back once you lose it in one of his levels.
I really wanted to like this game, but reports like these and the price have just kept me from taking the plunge. I could justify five bucks maybe for something I very well may hate, but I cannot justify $25. Alas.
Reports like these even kept me away from the game while it was on Game Pass! It wouldn’t have cost me anything extra.
I thought the dev patched in an easier mode?
Yes: I gather that before its release, you were dying in one the three previous levels trying to recover it!
Not shocked, just about everyone said it was too hard, hence not fun in its current state.
The most interesting bit to me was that it’s coming to PS4, which is by far my preferred gaming platform these days.