Elden Ring

[Fencers]

The use of alleyways and elevation in this game. So fantastic!

This entire encounter space blows me away.

[minteK917]

I think they defined lore and difficulty okay for main fights.
For example Godrick is mentioned as being pretty pathetic and he is lol.
The two strongest fighters Rahdan and Malenia both are very challenging fights if fought 1v1, like yeah these people probably never lost any fights before lol.
The final fight is also logical when you think about it, Marika/Radagon were locked up for who knows how long in their shattered bodies, so they are a decent fight. I think people think too much of how powerful the elden beast is, if they think its power is lacking.

Remember what Gedeon says in his fight just before. Hes literally blocking your path from killing the elden beast. He says a man cannot kill a god, not even you. He doesent mean you cant, as in its not possible. If he knew it was impossible, he wouldnt try to stop you. He means that you shouldnt. Meaning that Gedeon the all knowing, knows that you are powerful enough to kill the elden beast. So its a good visual fight and just strong/weak enough to make sense that Gedeon would be afraid that you will kill the Elden beast if allowed to.

[dope_danny]

Messing about on my frenzy pvp character i guess if you kill the raider horses are not actually hostile? i was expecting a good tramplin'
https://twitter.com/Dope_Danny/statu...74425509797897

[Fencers]

Something worth considering for whatever From does with the franchise next, DLC or a sequel, is I think they ought to look at the runes/rewards for mundane and boss monsters. Some enemies are frankly just a free rune farm; that is fine to provide design width for the game. However, some encounters and enemies needed to progress the game can feel deflating in practical reward gain by comparison. The encounter is largely the reward, and that too is fine as a design choice.

Though I think it gets skewed too heavily when you really climb up in power. Basically, Atlus Plateau and beyond. It's just strange some enemies can be a real kick in the butt and give out 2-4k runes (even bosses) then a couple of snake guys or gargoyles give you 4-5k runes with little effort.

Maybe some more aggressive diminishing returns on runes relative to level or something.

Playing a mage-y type with Comet Azur is simply ridiculous how I can demolish enemies and get tons of runes to level and + up all my stuff with little effort.

[Aydinx2]

Using the carian slicer I legit killed patches because it does too much damage

I went to his dungeon after a friend pointed out that he's there (I had completely missed the entrance). Only I was already in the capital after clearing Mt Gelmir.

I was mid swing when he begged for mercy... At least I got his gear.

[xmirrors]

Difficulty spike hit me like a truck. Not enjoying the game at all atm. Don't want to be forced to change my build just to beat it. Sigh.

What a roller coaster. I've gone from "damn I never want this game to end" to "please God let this game end".

[Fencers]

This encounter design is just off the fucking charts.

Jumping over a low wall into a broken building, I wanted to grab an item. Unbeknownst to me, in the nearby bushes, I was leaping right into a nest of basilisks. Like 8 of them instantly turned to me with bulging eyes. Sheer fucking terror ran through in the span of a half-second. What a moment!

I didn't even see this area on my first playthrough. Nothing of particular note is special about the area and players can totally miss it for no reason at all, as I did on my first go. But From built this little space to give you a moment and had the artistic courage to say, "It's okay if a player doesn't find it."

A lesser-designed game would have placed an objective marker, obviously valuable item, or otherwise funneled the player into the encounter. From Software just had an ordinary mushroom potentially lead to this encounter.

The skill, the daring, the balls to do it and allow players to never see/experience it just for the sake of the moment!

Goddamnit, this is what video games ought to aspire to without restraint!

[kail]

Difficulty spike hit me like a truck. Not enjoying the game at all atm. Don't want to be forced to change my build just to beat it. Sigh.

What a roller coaster. I've gone from "damn I never want this game to end" to "please God let this game end".

Just curious, what build?

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This encounter design is just off the fucking charts.

Jumping over a low wall into a broken building, I wanted to grab an item. Unbeknownst to me, in the nearby bushes, I was leaping right into a nest of basilisks. Like 8 of them instantly turned to me with bulging eyes. Sheer fucking terror ran through in the span of a half-second. What a moment!

I didn't even see this area on my first playthrough. Nothing of particular note is special about the area and players can totally miss it for no reason at all, as I did on my first go. But From built this little space to give you a moment and had the artistic courage to say, "It's okay if a player doesn't find it."

A lesser-designed game would have placed an objective marker, obviously valuable item, or otherwise funneled the player into the encounter. From Software just had an ordinary mushroom potentially lead to this encounter.

The skill, the daring, the balls to do it and allow players to never see/experience it just for the sake of the moment!

Goddamnit, this is what video games ought to aspire to without restraint!

This is the game where I feel like the Devs are the most authentic DMs (Dungeon Master) so far. So much hidden paths and ways to fuck the player over. While on paper it can feel frustrating to the completionist, its so rewarding to the players asking "what if I tried X". The entire sewer system under the capital, which is entirely required to beat the game just speaks to the developers' effort in hidden content.

[Mojo03]

What's this beef I keep seeing about the endgame all the time? I honestly don't get it. What's really so bad about it that it makes people go "ugh 2/10 game, avoid like it's herpes"? Is it really that bad for you that it ruins the entire game or is this some form of gamer behavior?

I mean, at one point there's this guy entering the forum with his whole debacle that he can't beat the final boss, that it takes him like 10 minutes when at that stage of the game your character is pretty fucking strong if you explored even a little bit.

Then there's another whining about the difficulty, that everything oneshots his character, even though he keeps forgetting what type of game he's playing.

Are those really reasons to make people go "it's a horrible game, worse than Superman 64, definitely don't recommend"?

There's a saying in the Soulsborne community, everyone knows it so I'm not gonna say it, but it starts with git.

I didn't think it was that bad. I was 120's when I did the giants mountain and the tornado place.

It's also a hard game and why wouldn't the end be harder?

Elden Beast did suck though as melee though, mostly just because it felt like I was running 90% of the time and it just got tedious and annoying as fuck. Plus that homing ability was awful as far as visual noise.

- - - Updated - - -

I am still a little unclear on why Marika/Greater Will stripped Godfrey and the Tarnished of grace.

I am assuming there is some explanation when I take out Radagon. Because it seems she engineered a way for the Tarnished to stop the Greater Will.

How would the Greater Will not see this coming and further give Grace to the Tarnished?

Edit: I am also thinking Radagon/Marika having incestuous children and the emperyans basically being born incorrectly cause this to be a last ditch effort to break from the Greater Will. Since the Amber egg always produces malformed children.

Marika and the greater will are different things. The Greater Will is basically a godlike entity that gave Marika the Elden rings an her power from my understanding.

There's strong theories that Marika actually want the tarnished to come to the Erdtree, probably to kill Radagon and the Elden Beast for some reason.. For example, the blacksmith in roundtable hold says he was put there by Marika to build a weapon for a tarnished to take out a god (when you kill Elden Beast, it says "god felled")

And yes, her and Radagon are technically the same entity, but she also created Radagon and he was also an independent thing. We see her husk at the very end, but she can't actually be dead because the rune of death is not attached to the Elden Ring (the greater runes basically act as concrete laws of reality and since it's not attached, death isn't possible)

One theory is that Marika found out about the Greater Will grooming Ranni to potentially take over for Marika and because of this she shattered the Elden Ring and went a little crazy. Radagon literally being the "order' great rune had an issue with this and imprisoned her inside the Erdtree with him and the Elden Beast (which is controlled by the Greater Will)

It's very possible we can't actually be an Elden Lord and she used us just to free herself. We probably won't know until the DLC or whatever comes next.

[Very Tired]

I can get how the game can have some deep lore to dig into. Heck, I would hope it does if George R.R.R. Martin is involved. But as far as the way the story is actually conveyed in game to the average player? It's a flat out 0/10.

The entire story of the game was basically go to this tree for vague reasons, not at all aided by the fact that everyone in the game refuses to speak plain english. Can't get into the tree because of some vines, okay, so do what any normal person would do and burn the entire tree down instead of just the vines. All along the way you fight boss after boss with little to no clue as to what their actual beef is with you. And in the end you "rule" over the Lands Between, which is basically just a post apocalyptic wasteland full of creatures who want to kill you on sight, and the only people who were sane and talked to you are probably dead from the tree burning business.

[Aydinx2]

I can get how the game can have some deep lore to dig into. Heck, I would hope it does if George R.R.R. Martin is involved. But as far as the way the story is actually conveyed in game to the average player? It's a flat out 0/10.

The entire story of the game was basically go to this tree for vague reasons, not at all aided by the fact that everyone in the game refuses to speak plain english. Can't get into the tree because of some vines, okay, so do what any normal person would do and burn the entire tree down instead of just the vines. All along the way you fight boss after boss with little to no clue as to what their actual beef is with you. And in the end you "rule" over the Lands Between, which is basically just a post apocalyptic wasteland full of creatures who want to kill you on sight, and the only people who were sane and talked to you are probably dead from the tree burning business.

Some people enjoy finding out what the plot is for themselves instead of having someone just tell it to you. The fact that your character isn't told a lot is a plot point in itself.

You are very explicitly told why you need to go to the tree in the starting cinematic. And no, you can't only burn the vines. The reason for that is also explained (the tree is essentially a god and the only way to harm it is to use something that will burn the entire thing down).

Yeah the game doesn't give you all the lore, but the few points you complained about are probably the few things they literally just tell you.

[Mojo03]

Difficulty spike hit me like a truck. Not enjoying the game at all atm. Don't want to be forced to change my build just to beat it. Sigh.

What a roller coaster. I've gone from "damn I never want this game to end" to "please God let this game end".

You can literally beat the game as a naked level 1. There are videos.

It's not your build.

Just takes practice and patience for the bosses. You'll feel great after you learn and master them.

If the regular mobs get too annoying you can run past 99% of them.

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I can get how the game can have some deep lore to dig into. Heck, I would hope it does if George R.R.R. Martin is involved. But as far as the way the story is actually conveyed in game to the average player? It's a flat out 0/10.

The entire story of the game was basically go to this tree for vague reasons, not at all aided by the fact that everyone in the game refuses to speak plain english. Can't get into the tree because of some vines, okay, so do what any normal person would do and burn the entire tree down instead of just the vines. All along the way you fight boss after boss with little to no clue as to what their actual beef is with you. And in the end you "rule" over the Lands Between, which is basically just a post apocalyptic wasteland full of creatures who want to kill you on sight, and the only people who were sane and talked to you are probably dead from the tree burning business.

I mean, it's a lot like actually navigating through that world if it were real, which I think is part of what makes the immersion so great in it.

It's not a theme park that has a specifically designed experience, it's much more natural and gives much more freedom to explore it and experience it how you want. If you want to learn more lore, you have to go places and interact with people and read the item descriptions on your own. Like human life before the internet (or watch YouTube videos from people that have done all the work for you)

[Aydinx2]

Difficulty spike hit me like a truck. Not enjoying the game at all atm. Don't want to be forced to change my build just to beat it. Sigh.

What a roller coaster. I've gone from "damn I never want this game to end" to "please God let this game end".

What difficulty spike? I have been through the game 4 times now and haven't seen any spike in difficulty.
If you're doing Caelid after Limgrave, don't do that. Just because you can go somewhere that is no reason to actually go there.

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You can literally beat the game as a naked level 1. There are videos.

It's not your build.

Just takes practice and patience for the bosses. You'll feel great after you learn and master them.

This is a non argument. Nobody in the community expects people to be as good as those who do SL1 runs.
And yes, it can very easily be the builld. There is no reason why something can't be changed to make things easier for a player.

Enjoyment > "git gud".

[hellhamster]

I am still a little unclear on why Marika/Greater Will stripped Godfrey and the Tarnished of grace.

I am assuming there is some explanation when I take out Radagon. Because it seems she engineered a way for the Tarnished to stop the Greater Will.

How would the Greater Will not see this coming and further give Grace to the Tarnished?

Edit: I am also thinking Radagon/Marika having incestuous children and the emperyans basically being born incorrectly cause this to be a last ditch effort to break from the Greater Will. Since the Amber egg always produces malformed children.

I have no idea my dudette, I just smash things with my double giant hammers. I don't ask why bananas grow crooked (yes I know it's gravity, thank you).

[xmirrors]

Just takes practice and patience for the bosses. You'll feel great after you learn and master them.

Except I don't. I've killed every boss now up to the Elden Beast and the last handful have not been enjoyable experiences. There is no dopamine, only a "thank God that bullshit is over with". I will literally never do Malenia again as long as I live. I refuse.

I've played all the Fromsoft games. Bloodborne is my favorite game of all time. I've cleared Sekiro's boss rush mode. Throughout all of my experience with those games I've died. A lot. In some entries I died more than I have in Elden Ring by far. The thing is, though, for the most part I felt the deaths in previous entries were more "fair". When I learned the boss mechanics I got that feeling you are describing. The dopamine and feeling like I finally figured out the puzzle that was the boss.

I'm just not getting that anymore. For the first time since my original Demon's Souls playthrough I've full tilted. My recent boss kills have not been rewarding. They've been chores. I'm simply not enjoying the game.

Naturally my experience is my own, but the sentiment is starting to come out more and more on places like Reddit. Yes, yes, it's anecdotal and there's truth to the saying that there is a loud minority. It's there, though. There's something about Elden Ring's endgame difficulty spike that is not clicking with a lot of people.

[Mojo03]

What difficulty spike? I have been through the game 4 times now and haven't seen any spike in difficulty.
If you're doing Caelid after Limgrave, don't do that. Just because you can go somewhere that is no reason to actually go there.

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This is a non argument. Nobody in the community expects people to be as good as those who do SL1 runs.
And yes, it can very easily be the builld. There is no reason why something can't be changed to make things easier for a player.

Enjoyment > "git gud".

Person was saying they felt they HAD to change their build to beat it. I'm saying no, that's not actually true, it's possible on lvl 1. Hence being level 100 or whatever they likely are, should be enough with that many points allocated in bsaically anything.

Weapon upgrades would probably do more, if they currently are lacking.

[hellhamster]

I can get how the game can have some deep lore to dig into. Heck, I would hope it does if George R.R.R. Martin is involved. But as far as the way the story is actually conveyed in game to the average player? It's a flat out 0/10.

The entire story of the game was basically go to this tree for vague reasons, not at all aided by the fact that everyone in the game refuses to speak plain english. Can't get into the tree because of some vines, okay, so do what any normal person would do and burn the entire tree down instead of just the vines. All along the way you fight boss after boss with little to no clue as to what their actual beef is with you. And in the end you "rule" over the Lands Between, which is basically just a post apocalyptic wasteland full of creatures who want to kill you on sight, and the only people who were sane and talked to you are probably dead from the tree burning business.

A lot of people still don't know this, but Miyazaki grew up enamored with European folklore and mythology, but he couldn't quite understand the finer plot points because he could only speak Japanese. He then formed his own plotlines to make sense of things.

This is what he did with Dark Souls, and has been doing it ever since, with the exception of Sekiro, which was a loveletter to Japanese folklore and mythology.

[thilicen]

Except I don't. I've killed every boss now up to the Elden Beast and the last handful have not been enjoyable experiences. There is no dopamine, only a "thank God that bullshit is over with". I will literally never do Malenia again as long as I live. I refuse.

I've played all the Fromsoft games. Bloodborne is my favorite game of all time. I've cleared Sekiro's boss rush mode. Throughout all of my experience with those games I've died. A lot. In some entries I died more than I have in Elden Ring by far. The thing is, though, for the most part I felt the deaths in previous entries were more "fair". When I learned the boss mechanics I got that feeling you are describing. The dopamine and feeling like I finally figured out the puzzle that was the boss.

I'm just not getting that anymore. For the first time since my original Demon's Souls playthrough I've full tilted. My recent boss kills have not been rewarding. They've been chores. I'm simply not enjoying the game.

Naturally my experience is my own, but the sentiment is starting to come out more and more on places like Reddit. Yes, yes, it's anecdotal and there's truth to the saying that there is a loud minority. It's there, though. There's something about Elden Ring's endgame difficulty spike that is not clicking with a lot of people.

I hear you. First half of the game I felt I could really learn bosses and figure when to move in, out, when to strike and so on. Last half just felt like bosses were all about spamming roll and hoping you somehow land inside an opening.

[hellhamster]

Except I don't. I've killed every boss now up to the Elden Beast and the last handful have not been enjoyable experiences. There is no dopamine, only a "thank God that bullshit is over with". I will literally never do Malenia again as long as I live. I refuse.

I've played all the Fromsoft games. Bloodborne is my favorite game of all time. I've cleared Sekiro's boss rush mode. Throughout all of my experience with those games I've died. A lot. In some entries I died more than I have in Elden Ring by far. The thing is, though, for the most part I felt the deaths in previous entries were more "fair". When I learned the boss mechanics I got that feeling you are describing. The dopamine and feeling like I finally figured out the puzzle that was the boss.

I'm just not getting that anymore. For the first time since my original Demon's Souls playthrough I've full tilted. My recent boss kills have not been rewarding. They've been chores. I'm simply not enjoying the game.

Naturally my experience is my own, but the sentiment is starting to come out more and more on places like Reddit. Yes, yes, it's anecdotal and there's truth to the saying that there is a loud minority. It's there, though. There's something about Elden Ring's endgame difficulty spike that is not clicking with a lot of people.

I feel there are some builds that are just lacking at the endgame, that give people the sense they are banging their head against a wall, and of course that's not a good sensation.

But as the other person pointed out, if you max out your weapons, learn the fights and dodge properly, it should be a rewarding experience.

You can also leave a boss for later if you feel you haven't explored enough. Someone who shared the same opinion as you said he didn't explore volcano manor, leyndells sewers and quite a bit of atlas plateu. That might easily be 20 levels+.

Also use rune arcs. You can gain 40 levels with them.

[Mojo03]

Except I don't. I've killed every boss now up to the Elden Beast and the last handful have not been enjoyable experiences. There is no dopamine, only a "thank God that bullshit is over with". I will literally never do Malenia again as long as I live. I refuse.

I've played all the Fromsoft games. Bloodborne is my favorite game of all time. I've cleared Sekiro's boss rush mode. Throughout all of my experience with those games I've died. A lot. In some entries I died more than I have in Elden Ring by far. The thing is, though, for the most part I felt the deaths in previous entries were more "fair". When I learned the boss mechanics I got that feeling you are describing. The dopamine and feeling like I finally figured out the puzzle that was the boss.

I'm just not getting that anymore. For the first time since my original Demon's Souls playthrough I've full tilted. My recent boss kills have not been rewarding. They've been chores. I'm simply not enjoying the game.

Naturally my experience is my own, but the sentiment is starting to come out more and more on places like Reddit. Yes, yes, it's anecdotal and there's truth to the saying that there is a loud minority. It's there, though. There's something about Elden Ring's endgame difficulty spike that is not clicking with a lot of people.

I personally didn't find the endgame THAT much worse on difficulty than the rest of the game, though I do think the game after Leyndell is not as good as the rest.

It's possible you're just burnt out a bit and didn't quite experience that with other From games because they weren't nearly the length, but I'm speculating.

And I mean you can literally find like minded people for anything you're feeling on reddit.

I can relate to the feeling. I was at 100 hours by the time I got to the end and as much as I liked the game, part of me was sick of it and wanted it to be over. 100 hours is a long ass time for one game and I played it for basically 2 weeks non stop.

I got pretty tilted on quite a few bosses/areas. Said "fuck this game" a few dozen times. Threw my controller a few times. I can relate.

I actually thought Malenia was an amazing fight, but I'd agree Elden Beast is easily the worst fight in the game. I'd suggest beating Radagon 1v1 and using a good ranged summon on beast (I used ancestor spirit)