Cethin

Like I said, Ne Londo has the first blacksmith you can get to, so going there isn’t bad, and that’s before the ghosts. Yeah, you’re going to need to back out once you get to the ghosts. If you try to force your way through that then yeah, it’ll be bad, but that one is really obvious you shouldn’t be doing it.

I talked about the Catacombs a lot, in how it failed. I think you ignored it. It’s supposed to be approachable for new players, but it failed, mostly in the escape. The necromancers are solvable with a divine weapon. They can’t revive skeletons killed by them. You’re supposed to back out of it at the very start, but return once you get a divine weapon. Again, it failed at what it was supposed to do, but the goal was for struggling players to go there are get the Rite of Kindling. That’s why Pinwheel is such a joke. He’s supposed to be fought early.

I haven’t played it, but I’ve watched it. I think Demon’s Souls actually probably does a better job. It’s very similar, but less ambitious without a connected world. Obviously Elden Ring also does it better, but it makes it somewhat boring too. It’s almost trivial.

Counterpoint: Dark Souls is hard, because it gives a lot of options from the get go, and no information on which ones will be approachable or not. NO other major Soulslike I’ve played does this in the way DS did.

I disagree with this. I think Dark Souls does tell you which are approachable or not. It’s just not as obvious as other games. Some games will have a sign for the player that says “this path is dangerous” but DS doesn’t. It has characters talk about venturing into the catacombs. It has characters point out the aquaduct is the path to the first (and at the time the only you know of) Bell of Awakening. It tucks the elevator into New Londo behind the bonfire, where stuff will be later but you won’t see yet. It also tells you a lot about locations in item descriptions.

I’ll also say the only bad path is The Catacombs, because the climb out is so bad. I think there’s leftover stuff indicating a different start, so maybe it’s a fluke it’s this big an issue. Every path has a benefit though. New Londo is easy at the start, and has the first blacksmith you can get access to. The Catacombs has the Bonfire Ascetic. The Aquaduct has the Bell of Awakening, and is the critical path. None are that hard when entering. You just get pushed out of getting deep into most.

Most games talk to the player. FS talks to the character almost always. It’s less obvious to the player, but it makes the world feel richer. It doesn’t hold the player’s hand though.

It also relies very hard on death alone as a teaching tool even when it says nothing. Players don’t see “You died. This boss is too tough! Maybe you should go back and upgrade your weapons.” They just see “You Died.” and interpret “Should have dodged that 87th swing!”

Yeah, I don’t know how to fix this without speaking to the player. I guess they could take the typical Crestfallen Warrior character, but instead of getting depressed and dying he upgrades his kit and talks about how upgrading helped him overcome a challenge?

Worse, it has BAD lessons through the lost souls system. It makes sense as a pressure tool to make you fear death, but it teaches new players the wrong thing: For players to immediately beeline for the spot of their death without considering exploration, build changes, etc.

I agree with this. I think the need to have an infinite homeward bone item from the start. There should be a way to return to your bonfire once you recover, because yeah, sometimes people get stuck in FOMO mode and can’t give up a few souls. Once you’re used to the games it becomes obvious the souls are next to worthless and to not worry about it. You can always farm more. But for the struggling new player I agree, it re-enforces a playstyle.

I totally agree. It isn’t that hard, and honestly I think the players ruined the game for a lot of people with that idea. A lot of people will hit a boss they can’t defeat and resign themselves to trying to grind out a win, hearing the game is hard and this is just the way it is.

In reality, the game provides all the tools you need to win. You just have to pay attention and find them. If you’re struggling with a boss you aren’t supposed to grind it until you win. You’re supposed to go and get stronger. Level your player and gear, and find new items to help you. Maybe even find a path around them.

The game is easy, but struggling players think they’re struggling because the game wants them to, because of the reputation. It doesn’t. It wants you to explore.

It sounds like you may not like slow or self-guided games. That’s fine though. I’m curious, do you like The Outer Wilds?

I agree combat shouldn’t change with a remake. However, how the player interacts with it I think should, at least for PC. The UI/UX is not great, and we’ve figured out better ways to do things since then, even for controllers.

I saw promotional stuff to it and thought it looked interesting. Then a watched gameplay and there really isn’t gameplay. You just walk from one place to another, but you’re a cat. I’m fine if other people enjoy that, but I know it’s not for me. I’m fine with walking Sims too, but the whole point of those is they’re telling a story while you play. Stray technically has a story, but it seems very minimal and not engaging. They’re giving you so little to do so you can think ideally. It shouldn’t just be a meaningless story that doesn’t engage you if the gameplay also doesn’t engage you.

Some people are saying DS is free. I agree with them, but also there are issues.

For example, early players who are struggling should go down into the catacombs, because they can unlock The Rite of Kindling, allowing you to get even more estus at a bonfire if you’re having a hard time. However, almost every guide will say not to do this, and I agree. It’s at the bottom of a giant pit with enemies that are more annoying than you’ll have faced before. If you get a divine weapon than it’s probably fine though, but getting back out will still not be trivial.

Dark Souls is all about giving players options, and giving them the tools to deal with problems. The issue is you need to pay attention to the world and read. The problem with the example above is the necromancers revive enemies, unless they’re killed by a divine weapon. This isn’t obvious though, and it also isn’t obvious where you might find a divine weapon, or where to unlock the ability to upgrade a weapon down the divine path.

There are just too few signposts to guide new players who are getting frustrated. There’s plenty for people enjoying their time, reading, and exploring. For the people who are slamming their head into a wall on a boss trying to brute force it, like most games would require you to do, there’s not enough to guide them out of this tactic.

Oh, I didn’t even notice what the middle one is. Definitely bad taste and I’m certain it’s against FB policy. Showing that around to random people is pretty fucked up. Still, it isn’t illegal by any means.

If you replace “wiped out” in the title of the OP with decimate then it’d be exactly as wasteful, would use the word as it’s understood in modern English properly, and you’d get to use the original meaning too. Sure, it’s redundant (sort of) but it doesn’t take any extra time or space than what’s already written.

Yeah, I think you’re right. The one on the left is stretched and has fewer pixels vertically than the right one, so it isn’t showing quite the same thing.

I’m with you. This doesn’t seem right. I know CRTs have an anti-aliasing effect, but this seems to have increased detail. Look at his ascot, for example. It seems to have more detail than the image on the left.

Yeah, most food has been processed. That’s why we have the term ultra-processed for most American food.

To be fair, there is evidence of harm by fluoride. It’s not as significant as they make it out to be though, and it potentially helps a lot of people. That said, I do somewhat agree with the stance. The US is (currently) a developed nation that has plenty of access to toothpaste with fluoride. Fluoride deficiency is not really a concern here. With that, and the harm it causes, I’m slightly in favor of its removal from water. However, it needs to be done in a way to prevent fear mongering and taking things beyond this.

Recursion is amazing for a small selection of problems. Most of the time you don’t need, or want, it. When it is useful though, it tends to be really useful.

I don’t understand people’s issue with it. I always found it easy. Maybe that’s why I feel this way. Maybe if you find it challenging you want to avoid it, even when it’s a good solution.

This isn’t smart. This is clever. It’s a way to solve a problem in a novel way. It isn’t the best, or even most obvious, way to solve the problem. It’s just interesting.

I guess fair enough, though every other federated site I know of uses some other algorithm, and you seem to have been talking about the fediverse in general, not Mastodon, except for the example. Still, Mastodon’s sort is still an algorithm. You can’t display anything without an algorithm. That word just means a set of rules to complete a task. Mastodon uses one that only uses who you’re following and time to decide what to display.

Algorithms aren’t the issue. We can have sophisticated algorithms that help users find the content they want. That’s great. It’s when there is an incentive, and ability, to influence the algorithm by the platform controllers when there’s an issue. The fediverse solves this not by ditching algorithms, but by having no singular controller.

I’m curious how the Counter Strike subreddit was. It wasn’t that bad I don’t think a long time ago, before Reddit was as large as it became, and also before it was free. Now that Reddit is a hell-hole and the game is free, is the subreddit horrible too? I’d imagine it is, but I’d expect it to lean a little toward older audiences than the other games, so there’s a chance it’s fine.

I hate this phrase. There are several algorithms. There’s new, hot, rising, etc. There’s no company manipulating content discovery. That’s the difference. Algorithms are great. For-profit companies with an incentive to control content is bad.

Maybe a paintball gun would be effective? I’d make sure you aren’t in view and wearing proper equipment though.

I use KeePass. It’s just a local file (which you can sync/host how you see fit if you need to). I don’t understand why people choose to use password managers hosted by other people. You almost certainly don’t need that, and it introduces issues and vulnerabilities with little upside.