I can see why messages can turn people off but there are messages that impart information that you will be happy to see.
Flasks should be put on your quick bar via your inventory.
Iād still call them Action RPGs. Weapon stats, attributes, etc increase damage, health, poise, etc. Thereās a lot of systems determined by character skill. Of course the player still has to perform, and can even outperform the need to level up, but thatās not normal.
Sekiro is Fromās pure Action game with the RPG systems gutted completely.
Yep, they are there, I just canāt seem to use them. Iāll have to do a search of key bindings to figure out what Iām supposed to press I guess.
Itās amazing how important first strike is to some of the battles. If you get hit and stagger then the opponent often gets the opportunity to hit again before you recover, and repeat. Not on bosses, of course, but anyone else.
This isnāt a game where you can spam the attack button. I remember my first hours playing Dark Souls 1 were a lesson in learning to value the stamina bar. I still rely on a shield too much as even blocking burns stamina.
So I loaded the game. The flask for me is in the Quick Item slot #1. It should be on the d-pad usable by pressing the X button.
Yes, the ghostly runed-archway icon means you can use a Spirit Ash.
Overall yes, diving deep into the underground is a surreal experience that nothing even other From games can match, and those were pretty crazy too. Itās mostly all seamless too, I think there might be one loading screen in total, I forgot.
It also has to do with what incentivizes the exploration, and in From games this means good unique loot.
Looking back at other RPGs, there are only two that I remember that drive the player to really look everywhere and end up being properly rewarded for it, and that would be Baldurās Gate 2 (still the best loot in any fantasy game ever) and UnderRail (crazy good TB mechanics). UnderRail was absolutely insane before they introduced a map, you could legitimately get lost in there.
But From games are special, not only they have crazy medieval architecture with entire castles you can explore, there are so many hidden areas and paths to uncover that you often have no idea where you are. And apart from DS2 that had some consistency issues (lava level) itās all logical, just a carefully crafted interconnected world.
I just want to point out that Elden Ring is quite different from the other Soulsborne to games in regards to itās linearity, or more lack there-of. Even the legacy dungeons are much more open with multiple paths.
Stormwall castle for instance took several runs through to see and find everything.
I totally get what you are feeling about Elden Ring. I love open world games that let me create my own storyline and do what I want when I want. Bounced of Demons Soul several times but the open world of ER drew me in. But itās an odd experience, for me.
When I finally beat the boss I had to beat to get my Moonveil after maybe 20 tries there was a feeling of satisfaction that is rare in gaming. BUT - I really donāt enjoy having to replay something over and over and over. It feels like an arcade game at that time. I got up to level 100 something, but I realized it really felt like an arcade game in some amazing graphical settings. Replay over and over and over until you get it right, It took a LOT of the open world feeling away from me when bad guys and creatures Iād worked hard to defeat were right where they were before when I rested or was killed. So now what was a surprising ambush was an expected ambush. Not only is everything/everyone placed back in their previous location, their pathing etc. is exactly what it was before. Arcade game.
I realized when I was away from the game for a while I had no great desire to jump back in. Glorified but extremely well done arcade game. I also hated the lack of information of even the simple things, like what the status symbols represented. No tool tips, nothing. So much I had to look up online. And Iām told thatās not lazy design, thatās how they create community! Yeah, right.
In summary I think itās impressive in doing what it does, but just not for me, not a true open world RPG in terms of what Iām looking for.
Yep, thatās where Iām at. Kill one guy down on the beach on third attempt, after getting killed three times by some giant creature on the way there, and I bow out of the game because itās too much repeat. And theyāre going to be back again so Iāve accomplished nothing.
Thatās the critical part: lack of accomplishment. Itās because what they want you to gain is levels and loot to get better at leveling and looting. Itās just so damn slow and boring. If this paced like the Diablo games thatād be different.
So Iāll likely keep going just to get my moneyās worth and see if it gets better. If I hit a point where it is just frustration Iāll bow out.
In many instances, not all, once you know what awaits you you can just run past enemies. And loot is rarely worth dying for, but can always just do a suicide run to get something.
Itās really kind of unique for me, because I could REALLY get caught up in it while playing. The graphics and world are pretty amazing. When I moved into the new area that you enter when you put the two parts of an amulet in something and things turn upside down, etc. I looked around and was awestruck. The flora and fauna and sounds were like a different world. They do that very well.
But I discovered I was more focused on getting that next cool sword I read about, and getting the rare stones to level them up, than I was about being immersed in some world with my āstoryā i.e. the role playing part. For me it really does play like the most amazing arcade game ever. But I absolutely do see why people can love it.
The game has so much in it that when I log into it I can do specific things that session: explore new areas, search old areas for secrets, search for specific weapons, grind to level up, do some quest lines, fight those circle underground enemies, fight bosses, get new spells to try, etc. I played around 70 hours in 2022 and just deleted all my saves and started anew and love it just as much as before. Amazing game.
I think the action RPG label is probably more descriptive than arcade game. Diablo type games are no different. Repeating enemies, useless story, and a strong drive to get cool gear.
Thatās where I disagree, though. Diablo games are very different because of the speed of them. In one minute in Diablo, Iāll have killed more enemies and gotten more loot than I have in my entire play time in ER so far. Itās definitely more arcade-like as @JeffL described; it reminds me of exactly all those quarter-eaters in my younger years, just a lot more pretty and not side-scrolling.
Wait, so an arcade experience is slower then? Diablo you got loot faster and killed more critters per minute so thatās an arpg while this one is coin op? Seems like it would be the other way around.
Edit: In any case, both games are squarely in the arpg category. If folks are looking for similarities to pacman they can find that in any game. If the arcade term is being used to somehow diminish Elden Ring, HOGWASH.
For me, the use of the term āarcadeā to describe Elden Ring is solely based on the try-fail/succeed-try-fail/succeed progression with enemies that immediately respawn. Thatās the way arcade games played. You learn what to do to progress by replaying it over and over. In ER, itās all about learning enemy moves and tells until you can succeed.
Itās not so much diminishing it as it is slotting it into a slightly different category. Sure, they have their own category of āsouls-likeā but that refers to the overall difficulty of it, too.
I hadnāt thought of it in those terms until it was mentioned earlier but it really does fit very well now that Iāve had it described to me, and I canāt shake it. It may actually make me feel better about the game if I go into it with the idea that itās an arcade game, because thatās something I grew up on. Not my favorite pastime anymore, but at least itās familiar even if itās stamped into an open-world RPG that looks like ER does.
To be clear, the difference with Diablo games is the speed at which you can kill all those opponents, and Iāve played entire games of Diablo without a single death, even on first attempt. Thatās very different than arcade games and ER.
This was my first souls/from game. I was warned and wasnāt expecting an RPG, but I did try. I gave up. Near as I can tell this is the story:
The works is a horrible mess. Everyone and everything is probably going to be horrible. You are here to make it worse.
((And in the end, like the Mass effect series: you can make it worse in several different colors!))
But by then, no one gets mad. Because you stopped caring about the story.
Ok, so difficulty then. I canāt remember how many times I tried to kill diablo on legendary difficulty. About the same as the worst From boss. I probably die more in From games, but not that much more. But then, Iāve gotten used to that style of action role playing game :)
In Diablo, enemies respawn when you log out and log in. Elden Ring, they respawn also when you die. Diablo has random placement (I think), but there are plenty of arpgs where everything is handcrafted with static placement.
I suppose Gauntlet is very Diablo like and that was a coin op game, so I can see the ancestry for sure. Itās like calling DCS an arcade game because of similarities with Afterburner though. Or calling some Homo Sapien a Neanderthal because he has an extra heavy brow ridge.
Nah, these are not decent examples to back up your point unfortuantely. Try some decent examples
Probably right, but really should be unnecessary.
Elden Ring is not an action RPG. Itās an arcade game. Or perhaps Elden Ring has arcade like elements as does every other video game made.
Good conversation and moving on.