Games like King's Field? - This is NOT A Soulsborne thread

skykiii

skykiii

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So recently I learned there's apparently a cottage industry of people trying to make "King's Field clones."

This may sound hipsterish to say, but I loved King's Field before From Software got popular, and I remember a time where I was the only person I knew talking about these games. Seems the world has caught up with me, as I've heard of games called Lunacid (Steam early access) and Monomyth (Kickstarter) that apparently are trying to be KF-like.

And from the footage I've seen... they're close. I immediately got the right vibes from the footage you can find online.

Lunacid (Cvit's video)

Monomyth (Dungeon Chill's video)

Sooo... you may be noticing I explicitly said in the subtitle "this is NOT a Soulsborne topic." Anyone who thinks Demon Souls, Dark Souls, or Bloodborne are spiritual successors to King's Field has been lied to. The biggest similarity they have is a darkish fantasy environment. But King's Field is more about adventure and exploration, Souls is all about challenging combat (KF was never exactly a hard game).

At the very least, can we agree a game only counts if its first-person?

Anyway... personally I would like to play more KF-like games. I've played the original four games to death. I know them like I know your mom.

I need more.

Feed me.

TL;DR Name/recommend games that are like the King's Field games please.
 
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skykiii said:
Okay, it kinda sucks that all the people making games I might actually want to play are also always some sort of socio-political nutbag.
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It's because to make a game basically by yourself a person often needs a touch of the 'tism.

HRT is to various nerd communities as crack was to black communities.
 
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Obvious one you likely already know. Shadow Tower was FromSoftware's spin off series. Impressive graphics, great atmosphere, bad hit detection and trial and error gameplay.

Not exactly King's Field, but there was a spiritual sequel to Ultima Underworld that got a lot of hype on Kickstarter, then I never heard anything after that. I forget the name, but Razorfist did a stream of the demo.

I've also heard of an old PC games called Arx Fatalis. The whole game is a dungeon crawl that takes place underground.
 
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Asian tech support said:
Isn't it still full of out of place weebshit npcs?
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Yes, I should have refunded when I got to the hub and saw this shit. It doesn't fit the rest of the games aesthetic and there's another one later on.

cringe.jpg
 
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The problem is that I really want to say that's a nod to Shadow Tower's Rurufon. Who is an out-of-place waifu character that wields a scythe and has horns.
 
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there's no scratching the itch really

the closest you'll get are dungeon crawlers like wizardry llylgamyn saga
and most of them are fan-servicey weebshit these days
 
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You are best off playing the King's Field games themselves, along with both Shadow Tower games, there are English patches available. There aren't really any games that capture the same feel. You can try out Sword of Moonlight, the King's Field maker tool Fromsoft released in the early 2000s, there are a bunch of fangames for it but setting it up on modern PCs is a pain in the ass. https://www.swordofmoonlight.net/
 
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X Prime said:
The problem is that I really want to say that's a nod to Shadow Tower's Rurufon. Who is an out-of-place waifu character that wields a scythe and has horns.
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It is, but Rurufon fits the aesthetic of shadow tower. She's not a sudden and very jarring cutesy anime character in a grim dark fantasy setting.
 
Asian tech support said:
Isn't it still full of out of place weebshit npcs?
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DOUBLE_WHEEL said:
It is, but Rurufon fits the aesthetic of shadow tower. She's not a sudden and very jarring cutesy anime character in a grim dark fantasy setting.
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I might be mistaken here, but I thought the NPCs in Kings Field games were anime style? Granted, they didn't have the texture budget to draw faces, but their proportions and head shape were usually anime? Shadow Tower has a more realistic look.
 
Judge Dredd said:
I might be mistaken here, but I thought the NPCs in Kings Field games were anime style? Granted, they didn't have the texture budget to draw faces, but their proportions and head shape were usually anime? Shadow Tower has a more realistic look.
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I wouldn't say they were anime styled and they fit the games styling. Looking at King's field: the ancient city or eternal ring the NPCs are more realistic as well. None of these games have a giggling anime demon girl.
 
Judge Dredd said:
Obvious one you likely already know. Shadow Tower was FromSoftware's spin off series. Impressive graphics, great atmosphere, bad hit detection and trial and error gameplay.
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The hit detection isn't really "bad," its just.... really specific.

Shadow Tower I do need to revisit. A long time ago I learned there's a finite amount of enemies in the tower and actually a screen that shows you whether or not you've 100% killed all enemies in an area (open the menu and press triangle) and I've been wondering what happens if you kill everything... assuming anything happens at all. First time I tried this though, there was one room that was permanently stuck at 99%, the last enemy would just never spawn, and I never knew why.

I finally got a PC capable of emulating PS2 games so Abyss is definitely something I need to check out.

BTW.... one memory I have of Eternal Ring (and Armored Core 2) is that it had this bug where certain sound effects would get stuck on loop. This was on real hardware (yes I own a physical copy of the game, store-bought from back in the 2000s). I wonder if fans ever patched that? Last time I played Eternal Ring it happened during the ending which was... kinda annoying.

EDIT: Funny thing, Shadow Tower also came up in another thread where I bitched about Japanese Horror.

DOUBLE_WHEEL said:
Yes, I should have refunded when I got to the hub and saw this shit. It doesn't fit the rest of the games aesthetic and there's another one later on.

View attachment 5758448
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I'm gonna have to look up videos or else actually play the game before I can speak, because just from this image I have no idea how she's "out of place."
 
So....

I have a new PC now and I decided to try out a game I've always been curious about: Shadow Tower Abyss.

So far it runs flawlessly on PCSX2. In fact the only issues I've noticed seem to have to do with the translation patch (there's some weird formatting and that thing where punctuation marks are replaced with ?fs I often used to see on websites back in the day).

.... And man, its amazing to me these games didn't leave more of an impact. Both Shadow Tower games have aspects to them I wish had become standard.

In particular;

Every equipment is unique. Even two that have the same name might not necessarily be the same thing.

Enemies are finite so its possible to 100% clear the game.

And instead of experience, every kill makes you more powerful immediately, just in small increments. This system especially is one I'm shocked more games with RPG elements don't do in favor of sticking to standard experience levels, though I guess it would be broken as fuck if not also paired with "enemies are finite so you can't just stop to grind."

Probably the best durability mechanic ever (take notes, Breath of the Wild).

In fact the only odd point so far is I don't see why this game has Magic Points. You need a ring to cast magic and rings have durability which goes down super-fast, which is already a good reason to not just spam projectile spells.

..... I also wish From Software still made games like this, instead of being pretty much the Soulsborne company now.
 
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