Giant Bombcast 09-20-2011

@Egge said:

Once again the Giant Bomb staff (at least those who haven't played the game) are genuinely puzzled by the phenomena of Demon's Souls and Dark Souls and, more importantly, seem to both misunderstand and misrepresent what these games are all about. The design philosophy of From Software's newer titles should be likened - if not necessarily qualitatively compared - to something like the original Metroid. Nintendo's genre-defining classic emphasized methodical exploration and gradual immersion in an alien game world as well as in some rather unusual gameplay mechanics, and DS does more or less the same thing in the context of a level-based action RPG rather than a side-scrolling platformer.

While it could be argued that those elements in and of themselves don't strictly require a high difficulty and steep learning curve, remarks made during the podcast about "one-hit kills" and "masochism" are inaccurate in so much as they both assume an almost insurmountably high level of difficulty as well as outright cheapness in the design of the game's challenges. As Vinny partially explained, Demon's Souls' difficulty is all about the need to plan ahead, be patient and observant and approach each individual challenge in a careful manner and - as has been said many times before - not being too afraid to fail because failure is inevitable and not the end of the world. Yes, scaring off weak-minded noobs and build credibility with the King's Field veterans (all three of them) does play some role in the developers' master plan, but it's a much smaller part than what's being suggested in this podcast.

One can certainly question From's implementation of some of these design ideas, but misrepresenting Demon's Souls as a game with an abundance of cheap, instant deaths and as being a product "designed for masochists" gets us absolutely nowhere in that analysis.

This is 100% accurate and the constant misrepresentation of these games that comes out of Giant Bomb is extremely annoying. I commented on the Dark Souls Quick Look saying "These games evoke, engage, and use human emotions more than any other game I have ever played" and this is the exact reason I loved Demon's Souls and will most likely love Dark Souls. You have to learn to control your want to rush through things and you have to teach yourself to use patience when playing. There were times when I went hours without dying because I was taking my time because these games are a lot about controlling your emotions and sticking with it. When you realize this the game is actually extremely fun.

I also think, when it comes to games like this, there is a tendency for these guys to bitch that "its too hard" simply because every system isnt explained and they dont understand it. Yes, everything isnt explained right up front but just like you said, neither was everything in the first Metroid game and that game was awesome (and Im sure many of these guys would agree). Half of the excitement of these games is learning the systems and figuring out they way you want to play. My one professor says "Not everything worth doing is easy", and its cheesy but its true. Sometimes I think the GB guys have a tendency to call a game bad or not worth their time when in fact, they just dont understand or arent good at the game, and then they give up out of frustration way too easily.