Elden Ring

[Coldgrip]

...unfortunately not even Maliketh with all those annoying gnome mercenaries he hires can't weed the stuff out.

Considering the Vulgar Militia are shunned from grace, maybe they're dragging their feet on wiping it out? I know, silly answer, but considering the militia is spurned for being short, maybe it's not so far fetched.

 

[Miquella]

This is just patently false though.

Piecing the lore together is as big an aspect as overcoming the difficulty. You’ll find hundreds and hundreds of hours of people deep diving the lore on YT to millions of views. Some YouTubers made their entire profitable careers off it.

That’s not even getting into the forum/Reddit/X/TikTok side of lore diving. The unique way the story is told is a hook to autists and non-autists alike.

I play for the lore and fashion souls and admiring the modelling of bosses, don't really get into multiple playthroughs and build theory, some PvP but not much. I think a lot of people are the same

 

[Spud]

Bloodborne came out in 2014. How is that not the modern audience?

Back then a modern audience meant people who enjoy playing video games. Today it means people who want their flavour of politics to infect every aspect of a video game.

 

[Left Ass Cheek]

Would anyone else have liked a version of Elden Ring that was like Demon's Souls? Instead of an open world you instead teleport directly to the legacy dungeons in each region from roundtable hold?
They'd probably need to combine areas together to make each dungeon feel extra lengthy, like Morne Castle/Stormveil Castle, Carian Manor/Raya Lucaria, Subterranean Shunning Gounds/Leyndell... you get the gist. Maybe I'm just impatient, but my latest playthrough of the base game made me resent just how much fucking time it takes to get from point of interest to the next.

 

[Lizard Machine Bugs]

Would anyone else have liked a version of Elden Ring that was like Demon's Souls? Instead of an open world you instead teleport directly to the legacy dungeons in each region from roundtable hold?
They'd probably need to combine areas together to make each dungeon feel extra lengthy, like Morne Castle/Stormveil Castle, Carian Manor/Raya Lucaria, Subterranean Shunning Gounds/Leyndell... you get the gist. Maybe I'm just impatient, but my latest playthrough of the base game made me resent just how much fucking time it takes to get from point of interest to the next.

I'd prefer the layerd and maze-like level design of DS1 and Bloodborne, Worlds like in Demon Souls still have the problem I have with a a lot of locations in the Lands Between in that it feels too video gamey.
Some areas and placements are fine, I think generally bossess and such have a good reason to be in their arena, but the locations themselves feel like they lack the authenticity of being a once great locale turned too ruin. The best areas do avoid this, and provide neat sidepaths like moving across the rooftops in Stormveil, or how there's that drop down to the area that leads you to Godwyn's Corpse Surrogate.
I also do like the non-linearity, and some of the early fights like the Beast-man of Farum Azula boss who's probably a better tutorial boss than the Scion or the Erdtree sentinel. Some of the Catacombs like the Leyndell, Hero's grave, Giant's catacomb, and Azura side are nice so I'd like them to be saved. With them getting turned into another area underneath the Subterranean Shunning Grounds, that way you have this cool effect where the catacombs become more maze-like and dangerous as you get further and further towards the Frenzied Flame.
Culminating in you getting to the Moghwyn palace grounds where the final barrier to the Frenzied Flame is Mohg, since he already has a clone preventing people from getting to the Three Fingers in the base game and he and Morgott ran into the Formless Mother underneath the Shunning Grounds so putting the Mohgwyn dynasty there makes sense.
That and cut out the annoying parkour section, seriously it's just annoying especially since it also leads to the back entrance to the Namless Eternal City.

 

[ShiftyBoi]

Plague of gripes is premiering a video today discussing the differences between Dark Souls and Elden Ring. I'm a big fan so I'm interested to see what he has to say about it.
Full disclosure, Plague does not like Elden Ring and actually quit making his extensive play through of it because of how frustrated he was with a lot of the enemy designs. So be prepared to hear a lot of that.

 

[Left Ass Cheek]

Plague of gripes is premiering a video today discussing the differences between Dark Souls and Elden Ring. I'm a big fan so I'm interested to see what he has to say about it.
Full disclosure, Plague does not like Elden Ring and actually quit making his extensive play through of it because of how frustrated he was with a lot of the enemy designs. So be prepared to hear a lot of that.

I listened to the final video of his ER playthrough and he sounded fucking depressed lmao. I think I can already guess what he's going to say the core difference is. I'm paraphrasing this, but I recall that he said something to the effect of how ER bosses tend to be more "solution driven" rather than "experience driven." I think I get what he means, I don't really intuit things when I'm fighting bosses in ER, I just figure out the timings of each attack in the boss moveset to trial and error my way to victory. There's a difference between the adventurer roleplaying mindset I have when I'm immersed in exploring and the autistic fighting game-esque mindset I have when I'm figuring out how to deal with attacks like waterfowl.

 

[Nameless One]

Local furry porn artist in the making discusses a series thats been bled dry and adds nothing to the pool of YouTube videos. More at 3:00. Something new-ish on Soulstube is a fucking retarded nigger named domo defending DSII with far too little backlash which is probably him censoring comments.

 

[Left Ass Cheek]

Local furry porn artist in the making

Nothing "in the making" about it, he is a furry porn artist. You click on his channel and it's almost the first thing you'll notice.
Pretty sure you meant to put a different vid, but I think I know the guy you're talking about. I don't even mind people defending DS2 (or in his case, Scholar of the First Sin specifically) but this retard does that insanely fucking annoying thing where he makes an overly long response critiquing someone else's already overly long critique video. He can't just settle for one, either, he has to have his own series where he sucks off Scholar of the First Sin to stand parallel to Mauler's equally shitty and long series where he dumps on Scholar of the First Sin and Hbombercuck. I'm just not going to watch any of it.

 

[Nameless One]

Nothing "in the making" about it, he is a furry porn artist. You click on his channel and it's almost the first thing you'll notice.
Pretty sure you meant to put a different vid, but I think I know the guy you're talking about. I don't even mind people defending DS2 (or in his case, Scholar of the First Sin specifically) but this retard does that insanely fucking annoying thing where he makes an overly long response critiquing someone else's already overly long critique video. He can't just settle for one, either, he has to have his own series where he sucks off Scholar of the First Sin to stand parallel to Mauler's equally shitty and long series where he dumps on Scholar of the First Sin and Hbombercuck. I'm just not going to watch any of it.

I put that video because it's the ultimate counterpoint against the modern fromsoftware souls formula since DSIII and Elden Ring only bandaged or addressed some things Matt listed in a roundabout way. When you post any eceleb video that has critiques of Fromsoftware it all eventually comes down to what Matt hit on the head years ago but they'll reach slightly different conclusions. I'm hoping Matt at least does a pastebin for Elden Ring like with Bloodborne with a bucket list of how Fromsoftware can actually improve their souls games, but it isn't the type of content he wants to do judging by his Twitter reply, so it is what it is.

The domo guy, I won't recommend because I don't want him getting attention or enable hatewatching but you'll find him if you search for "debunking MauLer's claims about DS2".

 

[YumeNoHero]

Would anyone else have liked a version of Elden Ring that was like Demon's Souls? Instead of an open world you instead teleport directly to the legacy dungeons in each region from roundtable hold?
They'd probably need to combine areas together to make each dungeon feel extra lengthy, like Morne Castle/Stormveil Castle, Carian Manor/Raya Lucaria, Subterranean Shunning Gounds/Leyndell... you get the gist. Maybe I'm just impatient, but my latest playthrough of the base game made me resent just how much fucking time it takes to get from point of interest to the next.

Like others have said, I prefer DS1's interconnected levels design instead of teleporting from a hub, the world just feel more organic and way bigger than they actually are. As with Elden Ring's case, the world is just too big for its own good with very little happening in between, and once you discovered all of the areas, unless you are looking to collect a specific item or enable coop/invasion area, there is no reason to visit them again outside of mandatory objectives (burn the tree etc.)

SOTE came quite close to DS1's map in terms of layered and hidden paths to access certain areas but ultimately the area they lead you to is inconsequential outside of Abyssal Woods and Jagged Peak with not much meaningful reward. The map size again hinders it and the interconnected-ness is nowhere to be found outside of Shadow Keep and the paths connecting Enir-Ilim and Belurat. The rest of the map are dead ends, literally, just a straight line from start to finish. Finger ruins are just... why are they even there outside of lore and NPC questline reasons? It feels like too much was cut out from this DLC and it shows.

Bigger or lengthy dungeons won't help, but complex ones do. I'd prefer each legacy dungeon to be smaller with several paths connecting different area within the same dungeon or leading to a different dungeon, sort of like a maze that you have to figure out which way to go, with puzzles to unlock certain path or items or even enable certain advantages against the dungeon's boss if you manage to find it. Call me pessimistic but FromSoft has different priorities when designing their game now compared to DS1's time so it's not gonna happen.

 

[Edgy But Dull]

Finger ruins are just... why are they even there outside of lore and NPC questline reasons? It feels like too much was cut out from this DLC and it shows.

It was really weird to hear people sperg about "lol this is WAY BIGGER THAN LIMGRAVE, BLESS YOU MIYAZAKI". Abyssal Woods is very minimal, Finger Ruins is empty, and the whole bottom right of the map is the 3 boss fights for the Bayle questline (2 of which are recycled bosses). All 3 of these zones are right next to each other, so it's very easy to see how 30% of the map has barely any content whatsoever.

 

[YumeNoHero]

It was really weird to hear people sperg about "lol this is WAY BIGGER THAN LIMGRAVE, BLESS YOU MIYAZAKI". Abyssal Woods is very minimal, Finger Ruins is empty, and the whole bottom right of the map is the 3 boss fights for the Bayle questline (2 of which are recycled bosses). All 3 of these zones are right next to each other, so it's very easy to see how 30% of the map has barely any content whatsoever.

When I first heard that it was the size of Limgrave, not counting Weeping Peninsula, I was really hyped, not because of the size, but rather it is because of how small Limgrave is compared to the rest of base map. It gives more opportunity to vertical map design, which SOTE does but somewhat confusing to navigate at times. But now that the actual map size is close to 2/3rd of base map, I feel they should just cut out the Finger ruins, Abyssal Wood and Jagged Peak entirely. Pack the Finger Ruins and Jagged Peak into a Godwyn DLC, and Abyssal Wood should be further expanded into it's own DLC and explore more on Melina's motivation, her vision of fires and actually explains the end of Frenzied Flame ending where she shows up as Gloam Eyed Queen instead.

 

[Nameless One]

It was really weird to hear people sperg about "lol this is WAY BIGGER THAN LIMGRAVE, BLESS YOU MIYAZAKI". Abyssal Woods is very minimal, Finger Ruins is empty, and the whole bottom right of the map is the 3 boss fights for the Bayle questline (2 of which are recycled bosses). All 3 of these zones are right next to each other, so it's very easy to see how 30% of the map has barely any content whatsoever.

All I saw across the map during my playthrough, was "why the fuck didn't they put content here?". Probably the most dry DLC besides Ashes Of Ariandel. It's way worse since its an open world and theres even MORE empty spaces, very jarring and makes me wonder what REALLY took them two years to make this DLC?
Probably the modelling or how to reuse or can the cut content I guess.
I ask this because DSI and even DSIII were only made for like 2 years and people were coping HARD claiming this dlc would be the size of Dark Souls 1 which I immediately knew would be bullshit or its filler empty areas would pad out the time alongside their archaic vague quest and map designs.
>Demon's Souls from 2009 has better and more meaningful levels than an Elden Ring DLC in 2024, whose scale can easily fit in intricate and cool levels throughout the world
Really just feels like a fan mod at times or more like they didn't give it their all and just wanted to rush through it to get ER over with, I don't blame them but it feels hamfisted like DSIII's dlcs that never elaborated on elements that raised more questions, and ALSO simply reused more cut content for time instead of being a proper expansion but this goes back to DS1 I guess, but at least DS1 directly hinted at Oolacile in the main game.

 

[Left Ass Cheek]

Like others have said, I prefer DS1's interconnected levels design instead of teleporting from a hub, the world just feel more organic and way bigger than they actually are.

I wouldn't be opposed to that, if only because I think it'd be a way for Fromsoft to prove that they could actually do the interconnected world thing for an entire game instead of completely fucking it up halfway through DS1. I know dunking on DS1's second half is tantamount to making the coldest take of all time, but it is criminal how much the game transitions from being the best world in all the Souls games to being a much worse Demon's Souls in almost every regard.

 

[Gondolindrim]

Uh oh, redditors are getting mad that people aren't living up to their hecking hero Let Me Solo Her

 

[YumeNoHero]

Uh oh, redditors are getting mad that people aren't living up to their hecking hero Let Me Solo Her

View attachment 6222777

Good. Letting other people beating a boss for you while you watch is cuck behavior. Trying to be the next legend is also gay and retarded.

 

[Anti Lolicon Bomb]

korok seed difficulty scaling lmao still fucking laughing at this shitshow!

 

[Tri-Tachyon'sClown]

Good. Letting other people beating a boss for you while you watch is cuck behavior. Trying to be the next legend is also gay and retarded.

I can get wanting to be a legend, but for God's sake be your own rather than copying someone else.

 

[Spectre Saren]

Nothing "in the making" about it, he is a furry porn artist. You click on his channel and it's almost the first thing you'll notice.
Pretty sure you meant to put a different vid, but I think I know the guy you're talking about. I don't even mind people defending DS2 (or in his case, Scholar of the First Sin specifically) but this retard does that insanely fucking annoying thing where he makes an overly long response critiquing someone else's already overly long critique video. He can't just settle for one, either, he has to have his own series where he sucks off Scholar of the First Sin to stand parallel to Mauler's equally shitty and long series where he dumps on Scholar of the First Sin and Hbombercuck. I'm just not going to watch any of it.

Domo's videos are actually cool. You can even learn some tricks for a DS2 playthrough by watching them. His response is extensive because Mauler just can't stop himself from bullshitting his audience in their face for hours on end. For example: Mauler will die like a scrub on an avoidable ambush and sperg about how unfair it was to his build, yada yada. Domo shows how easily avoidable it was to be ganked to death with a couple of different builds.

Mauler will bitch about some runbacks and Domo went through the effort of actually timing all the runbacks and discussing their design.

Bottomline: Mauler is a huge faggot with a retarded audience who keep eating his shit a decade later and I'll suck Domo dry one day.