My take is that prevous souls games were hard but fair. You had opprotunities to attack and the enemies follow the same rules as you. In Elden Ring there are so many variables of how hard your Elden ring playthough is. Your Build, your level, your tree fragments, ect. Just because a player can beat a boss at level one or beat Malenia hundreds of times no ine talks about the hundreds of times someone like LetMeSoloHer died to Malenia. The concept of soulslike games isnt hard. Its tough but fair. Personally I don't view Elden Ring bosses as hard. I view them as not fun to learn.
This doesn't make sense build and level where just as important in Dark Souls. The only outlier are the scadu tree fragments for the DLC. How did Manus or Ornstein and Smough follow the same rules as the player did? Elden Ring is not perfect by any means hell the 2 boss encounters aren't even fit to stand near the shadow of Ornstein and Smough. But other than that yeah you can't just dodge out the combo and have them patiently wait for you to fire some attacks the windows are narrower but they are still there positioning matters. If you're a more cautious player i can understand it's tedious but the moments are there for more active ones.
No, @leeroy2752 is right. One problem I have with phase 2 Malenia and some DLC's bosses is that they are so aggressive that you're constantly on the defensive, and one mistake leads to other 3 until you die. They are punishing to the point where it ceases to be fun. They either tone down the aggressiveness and increase the damage, or keep the aggressiveness but reduce the damage they deal. Both at the same time is asfixiating. I completed the entire game with no summons, I am not talking out of spite for not being able to finish the game. It's simply a matter of common sense. If the game becomes so hard that it ceases to be fun, there is no point. There are other ways to make a boss challenging other than make them chase you 24/7 and have 10 hit combos that remove your entire health bar. There is a reason why almost 70% of the players have used the same build to beat the final boss, and the reason is a fundamental design flaw.
@@lordodin5755 You are right in there being openings within elden ring boss attacks, mostly mid combo in the delayed ones. However, most of it is memorization. Orenstien and Smogh followed the same rules as the player, one is a spear build with miracles and the other one is an oversized one with a great hammer. When they finish their combo they run out of stamina and stand still for a bit. The onlu things making them unlike the player is their inability to heal and some of their unique attacks, however, they have a worse dodge to compensate. In elden ring many bosses are decked out in armor, doing backflips, using magic, having infinite stamina ect.
People complaining about the DLC difficulty were ignoring things like Scaudtree fragments, which are required to boost your attack power and negate damage from the DLC enemies. That is why they thought the DLC was "too hard".
