From Software's Design Has A Big Problem 

Their biggest problem is making every other dev studio look like incompetent money grabbers

Miyazaki will be weeping into his mountain of gold

One thing that I would love for every Fromsoft game to have is somekind of Boss rush or gauntlet. I wouldn't have too get through another new game plus cycle just to challenge the boss again. This feature just makes me love Sekiro even more, and I hope Fromsoft adds it to all their titles moving forward.

Funnily enough, Balteus was hard but felt very beatable so the multiple attempts didn’t feel frustrating. “I’m so close, I got this!” I’d say to myself. But when I hit Ibis, I wound up putting the game down for a few days because it felt like I needed a 5hr session to feed myself to the meat grinder and hope I won via luck. Extra feel-bads when I came back to a nerfed Ibis and nuked it first try, which made me think “was I just tilted and needed a break or did they neuter Ibis THAT much?”

I don't mind fighting in a closed space where my weapons bounce off the walls. I mind that the boss's weapons do not. There's tons of unfair bullshit like that in Souls games. Projectiles going through other enemies so they still kill you. Enemy weapons literally hurting you through the walls. Same with fire.

After Balteus, I don’t understand any of the controversy with the difficulty spikes in ac6- it’s a game about experimentation and adaptation and if you can manage that then the game’s difficulty is fine

On the other hand: Balteus kinda teaches you that tweaking your mech is an option. A lot of playes prefer to enclose themselves into a box of sorts in any Fromsoft game. Decide on a build early, ignore other tools and just keep bashing their head against any wall they see until it eventually breaks.

I just wanna say that Rykard was such a breakthrough in Fromsoft boss design. We’ve gotten so many garbage gimmick bosses over the years, such as ceaseless discharge, yhorm, Wolnir, and executioner’s chariot. Rykard actually showed us how good a gimmick boss could be, by giving the weapon used to defeat him a varied and dynamic moveset, allowing him to be fought with other methods like spells, and genuinely making him methodical and hard to dodge, with small homing attacks constantly peppering you during the second phase. Fromsoft finally evolved the gimmick boss into what it was supposed to be: a Mario boss that’s nuanced and nails your balls to the floor.

I feel like the biggest problem is that most of the time they make the bosses and enemies just go against the core mechanica of the games. All of them do this but for the first chapters i think its ok, the camera system was new to them too (kinda at least) but with Ds3 i started getting bitter about enemies just janking the camera during combat. With Elden ring, after more than 10 years of working with the same camera feature, its a cardinal sin to me. Because you can put one Ulcerated tree spirit in a place where half of it doesnt fit, but at after you do that for i dont know how many times just fuck off. I love how elden ring goes against the most basic idea of “dont try to screw yourself up” every time it can. The problem to me is that, fuck balancing on lategame bosses they are also kinda meant to be straight up unfair. Not elden beast though, its just kinda boring unfortunately.

This video makes more fair points that I assumed. I also very much agree with your take on the unfair stuff in these games, like with dying to a mimic or getting hit by a fire barrel, which is unfair sure, but you can come back later and know what to do next time. But something like the bed of chaos just has no ways to prevent death sometimes

You're actually fighting a pulse shield mini-mini(micro?)-boss in the mission with the stealth enemies. Which is also a mission that focuses heavily on aerial movement especially in the last section. And this mission comes pretty much directly before Balteus. Maybe even exactly before Balteus, can't quite remember. You're also given the bubble guns right before that which absolutely destroy his shield and deal significant burst damage which is great for punishing stagger windows. All things that make Balteus rather simple. So you definitely have the tools to beat him and the game does prepare you for at least 2 of the mechanics that make his fight difficult. Absolutely cannot agree with those criticisms. However his moveset is just really difficult to read and avoid without any I-frames and multiple tries and there is just no preparing for that other than practicing the general gameplay flow. And that difficult to dodge moveset was one of the things they nerfed actually. Wasn't a numbers downgrade or artificial nerf (if that is even a thing) it was a slight change in behaviour to make it more forgivable and easier to adjust for a new player. E: Walter also repeatedly reminds you to use your aerial movement to your advantage starting from the very first mission where he tells you to dodge the helicopter's grenades by getting into the air. The game does give you hints. They're just not super in your face and maybe a lot of people miss them because it can be easy to miss dialogue when you're busy fighting for your life.

I thought the same thing about malenia when i first fought her, i looked up "waterfowl parry" to see how to do it and was extremely disappointed.

I love this video. You articulated exactly what my unintelligible monkey brain was thinking about Fromsoft's recent approach to difficulty and the hasty nerfs these bosses are getting. The recent boss nerfs in Life of Pi also made me feel this way when the patch came in during my playthrough. I don't mind bosses doing bullshit, I just want a way to solve and punish that bullshit and do a "no u". I think that why Sekiro feels so satisfying to play. And also I didn't get to play Elden Ring on release, so when I did defeat Radhan I felt lowkey sad because I was unable to experience the frustration that everyone else felt and I wish I got to fight him in his prime

Oh yeah "tough but fair" is BS, but since it's a difficult game I think for a lot of people the instinct is to say "I'm not good enough so it's on me". Like when I complain about the inconsistent input buffers, people who don't understand what this is say there is no issue for them 😤 There's also that trend in the Souls community to play a very specific way with a pretty specific build that not only makes the games easier (despite what they say) but also avoids encountering a lot of the issues. So unless you talk to people who invested *a lot* of time and are good enough, you don't see a lot of meaningful criticism. Anyways all this to say good video, refreshing to hear. Also the mention of poise inevitably makes me think back to Elden Ring which basically didn't have a poise system until patches a few months later. That's the kind of stuff that makes you think "was this really playtested though?" Because when 90% of the spells are useless it's weird enough. But when they all suddenly get buffed patch after patch to a thing that seems obvious and what people were asking for, it does look like they just didn't finish making the game. Same for the AC6 shop system honestly, I haven't played it but from what I've heard/saw there's really no reason for it being presented that way and not being more permissive. People are usually not switching strategies in games when it's free and easy.

Your description of learning how the movement works in AC6 is exactly why they emphasized before the game came out that "This is an Armored Core game, NOT a soulslike." They operate on fundamentally different systems.

Im gonna disagree with one thing here. You stated that, before the Balteus encounter, the game makes the tools given hard to access. That doesnt make alot of sense to me as you can buy and resell any parts in the shop without values being altered, so you never really lose money. You just temporarily misplace it. The design on this portion of the game was very on point if you ask me. The reason i feel that way is because AC6 doesnt overwhelm you with hundreds of part combos. It gives you a basic version of each type of armament and keeps you limited to all types of builds you could possibly need to beat this boss AT THAT POINT IN THE GAME. This allows the players to sift through only a few choices at a time without overly strict consequences or wasted time and thought. This also teaches the player a very critical part of AC6: Adaptation and critical thinking. Examples being: If im not tanky/fast enough, alter frame. If im not breaking its shields, add pulse damage. Missles overwhelming me, rework booster system. To summarize, Balteus is an encounter that has the singular purpose of showing the player that there is no such thing as the perfect build, and that you will forever be adapting and reworking things according to the situation.

Elden Ring had too many cheap deaths thrown in. Obviously there were a lot of times where I saw the mistake I'd made right before I died and thought "yeah, that's a learning moment" but a lot of the time I just died and was left thinking "Well I guess I'll just keep doing what I was doing and hope the RNG doesn't throw an unavoidable 1 hit kill with no tell at me again" or "Oh good, input reading. Guess those mechanics are off the table".

I just wish they would make seamless co-op. I don’t have a problem getting through the games alone it’s just more fun with friends. Especially Elden Ring.

This is an extremely good analysis video! Great work. When it comes to Dark Souls 1, I like to call it a masterclass in hostile game design. Because it does exatly these things you described. It's meant to infuriate and be unfair. It uses its bad camera to fuck you over, for example. I'm not saying it's not allowed to do that, as you mention, there's definitely an aspect of "overcoming the game itself", but to claim it's a fair game is delusional. :D

"I'm not even complaining, I'm just analyzing, which is the same thing but more pretentious" 😂

In my opinion, i think fromsoft wants to balance the casuals and hardcore players to play fromsoft games that's why the difficulty design has no balancing, you can make the game either easy or hard depends on your build. That's what i think

This is like the first good take I’ve seen about this, I love Elden ring but I think you handled this really compellingly and maturely! Good job 😊

I personally didn't understand why people had so much trouble on balteus. I killed him 1st try (pre nerf). I just stayed close as much as possible. Used the ransetsu rf, haldeman, missiles, and the pulse blade. It was close but I got him. Then again I did come in to ac6 with a much better idea of how to play it well. I'm an AC veteran of the series. Also I'm a loser that plays way too much video games and I tend to get VERY good at games rather quickly. Understanding how to make effective use of the games verticality is super important. Also I've seen a lot of people really mess up capitalizing on stagger windows. The most effective builds follow a formula. You have a few weapons that are meant to build stagger, then you have either one or two weapons meant to do damage in acs overload. You really can't go wrong with this set up. Unfortunately AC6 has a few weapons that I believe are FAR too powerful and make the game pretty trivial. But you absolutely DO NOT need to use these on any bosses to beat them. I went through the game completely avoiding all the well known broken weapons on purpose to make it more challenging. Despite doing this I never once spent multiple hours on any boss. Hell I don't think any boss took me over like 20 deaths. Most of them I beat in under 5 tries or I one shot them. Idk if my perspective is just very skewed because I'm a freak, but in all honesty this game is nowhere near as hard as some people are saying it is. It's super fun. I enjoyed the hell out of it and I can honestly say that if you are struggling with it and are relying on the OP stuff. Try branching out. There's a lot more fun weapons and builds in this game. Don't just fall back on the same cookie cutter meta that everyone does. The game is the most fun when you use builds that you put together yourself that's unique. Don't just download code someone else's powerful build to beat it.

Balteus didn’t have its health lowered in the patch. The only thing touched was the missile tracking.

As a ds1 fan. I really only struggled with early game elden ring bosses, late game were difficult but not frustrating. It was more just going through the motions, die a few times, learn the moves. Nothing of note. I wouldnt say it was fun tho. More just something I finished because I started it.

This has been the exact thing thats been bothering me with their last few games. Worried not because they're bad but because I'm worried the pendulum might be swinging to fat in the opposite direction. I remember when Orphan of Kos was the peak difficulty boss in their games. And they have like 3 bosses with maybe equivalent difficulty in Elden Ring and AC6 I think videos like Joseph Anderson's and theDeModcracy's critiques of the boss design seem to confirm that this is something being felt across the board. And its hard to talk about because I think people take the critiques as meaning that the game is bad when it isnt. It could just be better Edit: Thank you for being controversial. Ive found myself disagreeing with as many of your videos as I wholeheartedly agree with. Its refreshing if not a painful experience to have my preconceived notions challenged. There's a need for people who push the boundaries and critique established ideas. But there's less of an audience. Its comfortable and pleasing to hear people reaffirm my feelings but it necessary to have them challenged. Thank you.

as a huge malenia hater, I really appreciated this video, as I think the biggest problem with malenia is how little the game does to prepare you to fight her my biggest problem with elden ring in general is actually that it's too easy, and a big part of that is how poorly it prepares you for the few challenges it does present

15:10 I agree she didn't need a nerf. But also machine guns work fine on her. I beat her using two cheng submachine guns, a laser dagger swap and a sweet sixteen swap on a light build. I think they nerfed her tracking on her melee wave attacks. But if you know how the targeting system works in this game it becomes really easy to dodge. Most attacks in this game shoot out where you are going to be. Not where you are. So if you are moving left, dont dodge left. Dodge to the right. The attacks track your movement so you need to dodge in the opposite direction that you were just going in to confuse the fcs tracking.

Tbh, I've only played elden ring, it was an amazing experience for me, every fight was challenging yes, but, I've never fought one boss more than 5 times before beating them, I don't understand why people dislike the difficulty, I've got platinum and I'm sitting at ng+7 on my longest save ... I've loved every moment and never found it too hard

Haha, you’ve got excellent taste in games brother. For me, it’s Sekiro on top for having the best combat mechanics ever. 2- Elden Ring 3- Bloodborne Interesting perspective on Fromsoft. I can’t say I agree 100% but you make some good points. Good video, thanks! 😎👍

I very much appreciate someone actually calling out the constant B.S in FromSoft game design and putting an end to the endless wank 🙏🏾😭.

I think some of it stems from the Souls games being designed with an experienced player base in mind. Dark Souls 2 felt like they were placing enemies to prevent people running through areas. As the games went on, (especially after Bloodborne) enemy attack strings got longer. One of the reasons I dropped off the Dark Souls 3 DLCs was due to bosses that send hit after hit your way. But then how do you grow along with the players without adding more swings and bigger numbers?

Elden Ring and lies of p both implement a summons system to help struggling players with certain fights, and both are an absolute necessity for those late game boss fights if you don't want to simply "git gud". I really like these implementations because they still kept the boss experience epic and fun, while also not making it too easy. Lies of P has like eight of the eleven story bosses have second phases or second health bars which gave them entirely new move-sets and status effects. Having a summon to tank agro while I finished the first phase was really nice because it allowed me to learn combos and parry timings for those second phases while also allowing me to retain my heals. I really liked the summons implementations in these games but they're not for everyone. I didn't summon for Simon manus or Melania because I really enjoyed those fights and felt like I was depriving myself of that feeling that I am simply built different upon their defeat. Idk, cool system. And I know most soulsbornes have a summon system, but being able to summon a copy of myself is sick asf

I actually don’t mind the Capra demon. The point wasn’t to throw the player off, but to show the player that using the arena to your advantage can trivialize what at first seems to be an impossible gank.

I am still hoping they create a game engine that allows for dismemberment, that combined with the weighty combat would be sick.

btw, you can buy a torch to see in the dark areas (it aplies to every souls game + elden ring :d)

FromSoftware games became less Fair and Balance from DS3 on. And it makes sense,we have learn from Demon Souls/DS1/DS2 how to play this games and there is no way You can keep "Hard but Fair" forever. They had to find another way to keep the FromSoftware challenging gameplay or fanboys would have start bitching that "The game is too easy" or "This doesnt feel like a Souls Game".I love Elden Ring,but that game is a shit fest of unfair and unbalance,haha. And I take ir,because I understand FS is an víctim of there own fame and "Game concepts",they can't do "normal fair/balance games" like un the old days anymore.

The combat follows a fluid set of rules that changes frequently, but ok

But AC6 does teach you to fly to avoid attacks. They explicitly tell you to fly over missiles in the tutorial boss. The chopper's two main lessons are to fly over missiles and to be aggressive. Same with the Juggernaut. You need to get close, assault boost over it and hit it's weak spot, ideally while still flying because it's elevated behind armor and then you need to fly over its land mines. Even the Strider teaches you to manage your flight. But players suck at learning new systems and if you tell them what to do, they'll forget about it right after they've won (like flying over missiles) so Fromsoft needs a wall, they need a do or die situation to hammer the game's play style into the players' minds. I actually think Balteus' biggest difficulty is the shield as it prevents stagger which means a lot of the most powerful builds in the game don't work against him but that is necessary to force players to get the message. The power of stagger is an imbalance that plagues the entire single player campaign but that's not really a flaw with Balteus. And yes, they did put that one mini-boss before Genijiro but Geni was still a massive wall for most players because we are trained to be stubborn

The problem with Melania isn't any of her moves, it's the fact that in an action RPG she invalidates builds. You wanted to build you character with an emphasis on sheilds now that they actually gave some love to shield builds. No, she heals through the shield. Perhaps you created a paladin as thats super popular throughout all the souls games No, she has 80% holy resist People will say just respec into something for her but that shouldn't be the point of an RPG at all.

My example is the Dark Souls 3 Ringed City DLC. Dark Souls 3 is mostly on point in terms of overall gameplay challenge/ fairness feel. My list of complaints is basically just the Curse Rotted Greatwood being a test of your ability to wrestle the free aim camera,, Deacons of the Deep are a bit obtuse, the command grab of the Jailers is kinda jank, along with a small smudge on the Nameless King fight, where the combination of featureless ground and invisible walls was a bit eh. The Dreg Heap and Ringed City feels... different. Taps from small enemies deal very high damage, enemies in hitstun are no longer safe, and the sort of intuitive feeling of threat assessment gets broken, at least for me. It's like suddenly playing a different game. Which, maybe as the final DLC, that was intentional. I love Dark Souls 3, but the Ringed City is a bit of a sore thumb that feels more tedious than challenging to run into, If that makes sense.

Eh. It is more normal not to see health bar. Just like in AC Last Raven. And even in Armored Core 4 and AC For Answer, the player and enemy ACs have an infinite regenerating PA (in exchange of having a fixed nerf mechanic of repair kits) which will fix the complaint about the problem of ACs in AC6 having comebacks in terms of health. In ACV=, there is a more useful scan mode with a more detailed use case. AC6 is easy but also hard because a lot of things are not present like inside parts, extension, back radars, arm shields, energy weapons and energy blades using energy inside of having a overheat and cooldown.

Good video, but they're absolutely not even close to being the best game developer. Their PC ports are, at best, average, and they seem to essentially only release the same game repeatedly.

Umm a hard or at least annoying enemy with pulse shield is placed before Balteus in an earlier mission. The helicopter teaches you how to dodge salvos of missiles and even looking for visual and ambient clues to when a big attack is coming. The bubble blower is also available very early in the game. You are given and taught everything needed to kill Balteus. Heck right before him, you fight an AC with a very viable build against him.

In Elden Ring you should need an easier progression to follow. I mean, once you beat Margit (from level 30 is manageable) you beat Godrick and then Rennala and these three feel balanced in progression. However, your next boss should be Radahn and he is ... well, too much difficult than Rennala (and also boring, because of the arrow thing). Then it becomes again balanced, because after that Leyndall and Ranni's mission are well balanced (even with astel, another pseudo-arrow bullshit thing). But then you get to late game and it becomes pain after pain. Enemies hit so hard you can't learn well how to deal with them, and you end up cheesing them. I didn't have this sensation in Bloodborne or Dark Souls 3 (however, I don't like the DLC bosses in the latter as they feel a bit over the top for my taste for the same reasons the ones in Elden Ring do). I would rather have the games teach me how to play them than they just being difficult. I loved Dark Souls 1 and I still love it. I did enjoy a lot Demon's Souls for the same reason (and Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3). And some parts of Elden Ring. On the other hand, I think I should give Sekiro a second chance (I beat it, but I did not enjoy it as much as a Dark Souls because it was a bit frustrating and I had the sensation my character died too soon and I have to play it perfectly everytime, which destroyed the feeling of adventure I had in DS).

People no hit these games everyday, level 1 playthroughs, consumables only....the games are perfectly fair.

The boss with the staircase was specifically designed to help you cheese/get away from the boss without being overwhelmed by the dogs….I use those stairs specifically to separate the 2 dogs from the boss so I can than 1v1 that boss.

You dont know what you are saying. You just made a video just cz you have to.

Props to you for offering critique to these fromsoft games. Folks like to be critical to soulslike while singing all fromsoft games praises when the very same criticism would apply to them. You gave a good example with the ds1 boss in a confined space with minions. If that was a level in Nioh everyone would clip and ship that shit up to RU-vid to trash it.

From should stop nerfing the bosses & instead only tinker with tools of the trade.

Tough but fair to me means that although their games can be hard at times, all the games have many ways to make them easier and in some cases there are ways to straight up make the difficulty a joke. Some games, when they are hard are just hard and your going to struggle for hours and either get lucky or give up. I honestly believe anyone can beat the from games even if they have to look up some strats, some game, no amount of googling will help you with the game.

Yeah a _huge_ problem..... it's community 💀

"Single best game developer in the world" ... sorry, but... no. Absolutely not. Look, I like (a number of) their games, but not only is that sort of statement a ridiculous supposedly objective assertion where an objective assertion doesn't make sense, but their games - while they are probably among the very best at catering towards a specific niche massively and excellently - have way too many issues to justify that kind of completely over the top claim.

Yeah, the "hard but fair"-stuff was always nonsense - and actually it's part of the charm, because the game plays unfair and you beat it anyways. But I think there are differences - unfairness doesn't bother me at all when it comes from the game-world: Mimics, traps, enemies that get the jump on you. All if this is fine and usually quite funny. What annoys me is when they weaponize the inadequacies of their games against the player. You already mentioned the cameraman having a stroke - the same goes for my weapon bouncing of a wall while the sword of an enemy just phases through two trees before it hits me. Also, I hope there is a special place in hell for whoever keeps putting platforming sections into these things.

Balteus is by far the hardest challenge in AC6. Honestly the knowledge from the fight alone makes you ready to tackle everything the game as the offer with relative ease, I'm by no means an expert at AC 6. I played under 30hrs, but I went back and beat him with the default AC equipped only with the pulse blade

Fromsoft game difficulty be like: if your laying on your side or half awake or just lacking in a few braincells I can be the hardest game ever made” meanwhile ghost and goblins be like: you pressed the start button, now go back to the last checkpoint.

The absolute worst thing about From Software is their fandom. If you say anything negative about their games, they start frothing at the mouth going "RRREEEEEE!!!" and cancel you. I am not a fan of From Software. I do not like Dark Souls or the Souls-like genre. But I am a fan of Armored Core, and have been since the 90s, but I strongly dislike AC6. I respect AC6 for what it is: an entry-level installment to the franchise to onboard a new generation of fans, but at the end of the day it's Armored Souls, not Armored Core. I feel FromSoftware's recent success is both largely circumstantial and from people turning a blind eye to its flaws. AAA games were trending towards being easier during the 2000s, and people were getting bored with easy games. Then Demon Souls and subsequently Dark Souls came around to give people what they craved. Classic Armored Core games used to get panned all the time for being too hard and overwhelming, but I would say they're far more fair than any Souls game. People just don't like mechs for some weird reason. I see souls-like games as a peek into the past on how games used to be: unfair. Games used to be unfair by design because it was a holdover from the days of the arcades. Arcades were made to consume as many of your quarters as possible, it was good business. It's how things were, but that doesn't make it good, right, or acceptable. It wasn't good then, and it doesn't mean it's good now. Dark Souls only saving grace is its abuse of respawning. You don't have to pay quarters to start over from the very beginning every time you die. I also feel Miyazaki has turned From Software game design from being "overall challenging with resource management to encourage smart gameplay," to just "kick your ass with broken boss fights." This approach is heavily showcased in AC6. Nobody talks about X mission in AC6, or debt, or heat, or ECM, they only talk about bosses. This approach to game design has led to difficulty spikes instead of difficulty progression, and most of the bosses also amount to little more than damage sponges, and IMO, all of that is objectively bad game design.

I actually think the reason these games are so addictive and fun is because of it's unfairness. The game is actively spitting on you, and it's nice when I get to spit back. It's just always a challenge because you can truly never be sure you're safe.

I like how you still end up saying, "But do I really dislike it though?" The question I ask myself every time. FromSoft ruined my life with good these games are. 😆

10.13-10.20 that's actually bad imo. it means that the normal mechanics don't mean shit. it's either you have the required item, or you don't. it's also unfair in cases like lady butterfly where you can't farm the required item. this is something i had about consumables in these games: so many of them are so limited, that it discourages experimentation: if you use them early to try out new ideas, then you won't have them later on when you've learned more about the boss. but if you want to us them late, then you have to first develop a very specific, very strict way of fighting the boss, before you get to try anything new

starting off with a wild opening statement imo, I don't think from software have done anything revolutionary since 2009

I will never respect Malenia. I have a small recording where I used third party tools to see statistics of enemies. When EVERY OTHER enemy in the game reached 0 Stance, they staggered for a critical hit or counter damage. When Malenia reached -200, she was STILL water fowl dancing, grabbing, thrusting, scarlet aeonia'ing and all this other bulls**t. This was patch 1.06, it was ALREADY ADDRESSED and yet, negative stance values still to this day in 1.10 deny player agency and control. Keep in mind, Malenia has a stance value of 80, the same as Margit/Morgott. I lost respect for Elden Ring, I am losing respect for From. They had such great games from DS 1, DS 3, Bloodborne, Sekiro, then Elden Ring happened and boy, what the f**k did they do? Day 1 release Radahn was funny the first time you got stunlocked from his pull into a rock hitting you into the slam, but it's not so funny when his meteor slams hitbox "sometimes" just was a game-wide nuke hitting anywhere for max damage. Rykard's minute long attack with homing skulls, WHILE HE IS STILL ABLE TO ATTACK, and has environmental AoE damage preventing you from getting near, AND CAN HEAL (with one attack) for 10% hp through all of this, having the shared highest stance with Radahn at 200, but only able to take about 30 stance every 12 seconds during that phase means you cannot interrupt him, which is a fundamental flaw when in the tutorial they teach you the importance of stance damage, Margit they teach you how vital stance damage is, flying enemies they teach you how vital stance damage is, then to have a goliath snake swinging a sword and spamming spells, not care? Then Elden Beast (like you pointed out) with it's 160 stance, able to Elden Stars, Cosmic Explosion Breath, Flame Thrower then immediately follow through with 4 beams is bloody stupid. From is getting lazy. They aren't caring about polish anymore. "We're known for difficulty, so let's blatantly cheat in the game so the player has to get lucky, not skilled" is their new mind set I swear. If I wanted bulls**t luck like this, I'd just go to the casino, gamble my life savings, go all in and not even look at the cards dealt to me. Anyways, I'm going back to Dark Souls 3. It in itself is not perfect, but when compared to Elden Ring, is a f**king 9/10 game to that "thing's" 2/10. Such a let down, and to think I got excited when it released...

Armored Core 6 to me was a mess. The missions sucked, and were boring. Only the bosses were the cherry on top. Some of them , lol.

If you want my honest opinion, get a shrink. I have one on speed dial any time I start a new Souls or Souls like game. It really helps.

have you seen CAVES's danmaku games? where in SDOJ CAVE stops giving a damn and made the secret boss impossible to kill "legitimately"? also the difficulty of most AC games is that numbered entry = easy, non-numbered entry sequel is harder case in point AC4-ACfA, ACV-ACVD, AC3-ACSL, AC:Nexus (technically "sequel" to Silent Line)-ACLR go and boot up Last Raven and do Zinaida path from the get go you will understand difficulty is harder to explain in AC1-AC:AA but they are also by no means "easy" either... like in AC1 get Karasawa = instant win button understandably they are still understanding the overall design also counter arguement though the fact some of the AC CCs even the newky joined Vaati was able to beat Balteus during a "closed" demo shows its not "hard" but understanding the "concepts" of doing if big gun doesnt work add bigger gun infact my first time beat Balteus defaulted into that mind set use BIGGER GUN, missiles to harrass his pulse shield even though your pulse blade is "more than" enough to deal damage if not mistaken Balteus's balance is that low energy defense, mid explosive defense and mid kinetic, which was why shotguns could melt it likewise ohh yeah and the healing mechanic in AC6? uhhhhhhhh have you tried Pile Bunker with Basho arms? it simply...."deletes" them of course tank legs wont be insta gibbed but... the thought counts

18:09 But that’s exactly what’s happening with each game FromSoftware make in the Soulsnorne genre. I was fine with it in Dark Souls 3 because it was a sequel to the other two Dark Souls games and it’s now over 7 years ago, but Elden Ring (which was marketed as a new IP) could’ve done so much more than just be a new Dark Souls in an open world, which is partially why I was very disappointed with Elden Ring. I think it’s time to let this genre end for FromSoft, especially when so many other games takes inspiration from them), because if they don’t, the Souls genre will end up stale like ubisoft games, in fact they’ve already started with Elden Ring being the equivalent to Assassin’s Creed Origins. I can only imagine how many people are waiting for "Odyssey" or "Valhalla" or "Mirage" in Souls-style now. I hoped and wanted Elden Ring to take a new step out in the RPG genre, not to be like Dark Souls, Fallout/Elder Scrolls, or Final Fantasy RPGs, but a new type of RPG, that was my expectations, a game so innovative that it would join the ranks with Morrowind, New Vegas. Dark Souls, Final Fantasy VII, etc. as groundbreaking, innovative games in the genre, keep in mind the RPG genre is a very broad genre, and I knew FromSoftware could’ve done it better than making Dark Souls 4, and nobody can change my mind that that wasn’t what they made with Elden Ring. I call it one of the most lost potential-cases in videogame history.

deserves more views, great video with great editing. thoroughly explained with quick and abundant examples of each point. jokes were funny and illustrative too. i appreciate the representation of the sentiment we all feel about shit being annoying or obtrusive and overcoming it sometimes being the point and the conflicted feelings around it. i feel like these are problems most felt by the people who love the games the most. also cool AC

1:55 they are not that bad this is my first from soft game I feel like a lot of people don’t understand Elden ring gives you options 24 months ago you had, bleed builds, magic builds and mimic tear to fold anything that remotely looked at you and correctly currently You can a incantations build, magic build or Proc as many status as possible It’s only painful because you’re inflexible bastard if you want the game to be be easier without cheesing golden vow, plus dragon crest, great shield, talisman, pretty much alleviates and 90% of the problems you will have in the game when it comes to damage you’ll be taking and if for some stupid reason you’re like level 80 squaring up against Radagon the mimic tear and use black flame incantations this will get the job done. In fact, it will work on the majority of major bosses however it will not work with malekith or malenia but with enough elbow, grease and spit shine in the right kind of build centered around that one attack you beat pretty much everything in Eldon ring while your meat shield take some most of the damage you can also use magic or just malekith’s swords when you get a healthy level 150-180 is enough to make it to where you shouldn’t have to attempt the boss more than 20 times provided you’re paying attention my character is level 316 and you can just steamroller everything with enough level investment around this level, you start approaching the power of the demigods themselves with the right set up around 250 you can legitimately trade with them in combat and win. elden ring’s bosses aren’t unfair you’re just stagnant the game gives you too many tools to beat ass for you to complain and even so there’s nothing a higher level will not do in Elden ring remember people try to say the difference is marginal between levels 150 and 713 No the difference is astronomical between level 150 and 200 and the power gap is even more severe at level 300 in terms of PVP it’s irrelevant, but in terms of PVE you’re practically Unkillable when you’re trying

Good video, i agree with you for the most part. But honestly, some of things you said uhh... Well okay let's start like this. This balancing problem started with Elden ring... well the game is just very big, and such a big game is going to be very unbalanced in many ways. It's just how it is. And it's understandble. I mostly want to talk about AC6. Because otherwise it's going to take to long and it's the most recent game. I think you wrong about the part that AC6 teaches you poorly to fight Balteus. First of all i think FromSoft tried to appeal not only to Souls players, but experienced AC players such as myself. Which leads to difficulty for Souls player that don't have experience in this games. Balteus took me less than thirty minutes to beat. This game is litteraly easiest in the series, and every old AC fan agrees with that. And the main problem is the players themselves, mostly Souls players. They are trying to play AC6 like Souls games. Literally the first boss "AH12: HC Helicopter" teaches you to get advantage of your mobility constantly charging at enemy and retreat when it's needed, using your boosters to fly off the ground to escape his one specific attack. People just ignored this lesson. That why they had big problems with Balteus. And about healing, it's used ONLY by other AC type enemies, they using the same mechanic as you do, and that is pretty fair, because they using the same type of mech as you. Would it be cool if they added a counter, so you can know how much is left? Yeah. But it's don't mean that they need to get rid of this entirely. Because it's always cool to see that enemy AI using same mechanics as a player.

While Sekiro did do this with the mid-game Genichiro, the Guardian Ape, and the endgame Genichiro, I feel like the main one that it feels infuriating with is Genichiro. Struggling through all that for him to suddenly get a second wind and go "by the way, I can yeet lightning at you now." While it was hinted at with the Eel's Liver in the room prior with the Ashina Elite, it still would have been nice to see the final phase in the health bar beforehand to give a more cinematic transition and not just a "Surprise, have another phrase, fuckwit!" With the endgame Genichiro prior to Isshin, it didn't feel _as_ egregious, since it was a single health bar and all of his lightning stuff had been replaced with, if I remember right, a single move from the Black Mortal Blade, which is just the Enhanced Mortal Draw that Sekiro can also use. That fight screamed, "Okay, wait a second, this can't be the final boss, no way it's this simple," and then BAM, Isshin comes out.

You like these games, but wait a minute, you are a gaming professional, isn't that it? Does this mean you have a high capacity to play these games? Oh I see, that's probably why I don't like these games, the only one I'd take off that list is Elden Ring. It's the complete disregard for telling the story in an organized manner that simply prevents you from going back to these games, at least I don't return for power and items. Have I obtained what I need in the game why return? What kind of games do people come back to play, and what are the reasons? Power and items are not what makes anyone return to a game, especially one with an entirely vague storyline. Ask people who have played these games, interview them, ask them what they remember about the game, what the narrative is, the story behind the characters, the name of the protagonist if there is one, who the main enemies are, and what the narrative motivation is. You will understand that their response will likely be, 'I don't know. Ask these people who is Commander shepard, Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Liara T'Soni, Master Chief, Cortana, Leliana, Morrigan, Varric, Karlach, Shadowheart, Raziel, Ada Wong, Leon Scott Kennedy... Even though it's not known who the characters are and where they are, he knows that they are part of something much greater than just a beautiful and challenging game.

Every time I beat the game, I wish the game was harder and harder. Because once you learn how to dodge and parry everything, the game becomes incredibly easy. That's why you start playing without raising the level, etc. Because you can beat the game anyway. And when I hear complaints that the game is too difficult, I just don’t understand, well, you’ll beat the game and what’s the fun, just seeing the credits faster. DLC for Elden Ring will be released soon, I hope it will be very difficult, I won’t even play games on purpose so that my gaming skills will drop.

You seem to be not a fan of difficulty spikes, because it generally sounds like bad game design. But on the other hand it marks something like a "hero's journey". You have to go against a challenge, that's way too hard & you loose, because of that. But then you as the hero don't give up, you transform and get better and eventually overcome this challenge. It is what creates some of the most memorable entities and moments in gaming. I'm completely with you with erasing game play jank as a form of difficulty, but I think difficulty spikes are necessary to create the most memorable moments in souls games. You remember Balteus and you will always remember this damn fker. And you will likely remember what you had to do and how you finally beat him. Come on, even in this video I can see how proud you are, that you beat him, that you figured out how to over come him and then to realize, that what you've learnt with this boss fight now makes the rest of the game easier thanks to your new found knowledge. You have lived through a hero's journey experience. By the way here is what I'm talking about, when I mention the hero's journey: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27s_journey#/media/File:Heroesjourney.svg I am very sure this is a deliberate design choice. And in todays time I think more of this type of difficulty should be added. Because everyone and his mom, that don't like this kind of difficulty spike can and will go into the internet and follow a guide. But the ones that enjoy this kind of challenge (like me) will deliberately avoid any spoilers and guides to have the chance to figure it out themselves. To overcome this challenge on their own. Very few games have these encounters, because "iT's BaD gAmE dEsIgNe". Yet there's a niche player group, that very much enjoys it how it is. Ultimately there's enough games out there, that have no such difficulty spikes and difficulty sliders, etc. that'll give you the smooth experience, most people crave for. Why does every game have to be like that? Why does every game have to be seemy samy? This is one of the reasons why AAA titles become more and more disappointments. They all feel kinda the same. Chasing the perfect formula to lure maximum amount of people in without fully satisfying any of them. So thanks for sharing your opinions, I hope you understand my point of view.

Fromsofts big problem is teaching players how to play their games and fight the amazing bosses that they make, this issue is exasperated in ER boss design, the bosses are fine I consider them the best that from has made but how do you think I learned how to fight them the way I think from intended through RU-vid video essays defending the bosses that I hated. The main video I learned how to fight those bosses was a video from feeble king called: in defence of ER boss design. Going into AC6 I already knew I wasn’t going to like it, not because of the inherent gameplay, but because of how Fromsoft teaches me how to play their games, so before even starting the game I watched tutorials from people I trust and consider experienced to learn how to play AC6, which allowed me to enjoy that amazing game and the gameplay it provided. Just so you know I played AC6 with a light weight mech and did a blind play through, because I’m a dex purist.

Pre-nerf Balteus is the hardest boss I faced, and I'm about to finish NG1. I took 2 hours on him. 20 minutes on Ibis, 1 hour 30 minutes on the final boss for the fires of raven ending (both who died immediately after I took a missile boat out because I was tired of their dodge spamming at ranges farther than most weapons). Though to be fair, I was trying to keep my distance from Balteus when fighting him, because I thought that's what the game wants you to do. Part of the reason why I kept distance is because in a lot of shooters, you want to keep distance so you don't take damage, so I wanted to reduce as much damage as possible so I could live. Then on top of that the helicopter would shred me anytime I tried to close the distance, and it regularly goes out of bounds so you can't melee it even if you do try. So I thought the game was supposed to be played at range (also I didn't know about the richochet mechanic until the tutorial. I just never see it in gameplay). Doesn't help that I assumed the starter core was supposed to represent the "intended way to play", and the turner is rather long range and I had a lot of fun sniping things with it in the earlier levels until I replaced it. Turns out the entire game is all about closing the distance and being super aggressive. I only learned this with Balteus because I was getting so friggin bored of the boss fight that I wanted to do something silly and with the double Ludlows. This then made everything else in the game a cakewalk. In NG I played Balteus after the nerfs. My gosh they nerfed him so hard, I beat him on my first try. Only real difference is that I use 2 starter rockets, had 1 ludlow in the right hand, and had a pile bunker in the left hand. I was even being extremely sloppy. Gotta way for the next NG to out-missile Balteus now. I constantly ran out of ammo with Balteus and Spider before the nerfs, so it's weird to be able to mow them down with plenty of ammo to spare. The random difficulty spikes/whatever generally breaks the fourth wall so hard whenever I play AC 6. I had to take breaks a few times because of it. I'm just here to experience the pretty visuals, skating mechs, and story. (maybe pvp later)

Absolute banger of a video man. Bringing up the criticisms people have, and also taking a deeper look and considering more complicated issues, and giving ideas on how to improve the games you mentioned. All great stuff. I agree with a lot of the things you brought up here. Fromsoft has been argued to be the hard but fair developer for over a decade now. And with a lot of their latest releases, they've been putting a lot of overbearing combat encounters that frankly... I just don't find that fun. You can make endgame bosses difficult. That's fine. But there's a limit to how much junk you pile on before it just becomes obnoxiously overbearing. I don't wanna be a dick but way too many people are pretending like its good game design, and that its good because its hard. Sekiro was good and difficult. So is Ultrakill. So is Sifu. And you know what? All of those games give you plenty of tools to deal with what's being thrown at you. You just have to learn to use them right, and execute it all well. You can do it. You just have to put in the work. Elden Ring feels like getting a new job at an office but they give you a tablet instead of a computer. Sure I can do it, but it would be way more convenient to have a computer. Hell, you could even add more things to do since I'm able to deal with it all properly with the right tools.

"Lies of P would be worse if fable arts had poise" Possibly, the DUMBEST take you can have on lies of p. The rest of the vid is just taking the most basicist commonist criticisms and expressing them in 32 sentences when 2 would've done the job. 5/5, love you.

I don’t get the complaints about Balteus. I beat him pre nerf without looking up any guide or tips just fine. Ya it was hard and took several attempts and changing parts. Which all felt appropriate given how the game hypes this fight as being the point in the story when you go from just earning a rep to plot getting thicker and the fight being setup as a fight for survival. It’s very much a “okay we gave you time to really get used to the controls, do some customization and get familiar with how missions and some bosses work. Now here’s the REAL test of what you’ve learned and earned so far.”

My only problem with DS2 is that nobody could ever beat it without a guide. There’s so many very specific and often obscure things you have to do to progress the main game. It’s a minor nitpick because I otherwise love the game, and this issue can be solved by using a guide, but I feel like the main way forward should be clear even on a blind playthrough. In Elden Ring, the only time I ever had an issue playing blind was figuring out that you have to rest at gatefront to gain the ability to level up. Otherwise, the path forward is either clear, or an alternative is pretty easy to figure out with exploration, such as climbing the precipice if you don’t know about the dectus medallions.

"Even though Sekiro is hard as shit, there's nothing that stands out as uncharacteristicaly difficult outta nowhere" Seven. Ashina. Fing. Spears. Hard disagree, that bastard was straight up the hardest fight in the entire game and made the supposed main boss of the level (Genichiro) look like a joke in comparison. Still absolutely love the game though, of course.

Sorry mate, but after having watched this whole video I still have no idea what their ‘big problem’ is. To be fair I’ve been smoking a lot of stuff so it probably went right over me unnoticed. Would you consider explaining this ‘big problem’ in a few sentences? Thanks 😎👍

Ac6 issue is balancing when it comes to your equipment. By the end of the game I only had 2-3 builds all of which used mostly the same weapons and parts. Elden rings main issue is having endgame bosses being designed like sekiro but not having sekiro counters. Sekiro does this by forcing you to fight demon of hatred like a souls boss but you have access to the combat of ds3 but in ER you don’t have deflects or any other mechanic to counter boss spam.

At no point did anyone at From Software intend that that crazy people would run around in the Tomb of the Giants without a lantern. You're supposed to trust patches and be kicked down directly to the lantern. Complaining about "shuffling around in the dark" is not a complaint about level design, and it's not unfair because no one should attempt that... And the complaints about the camera is mostly due to foolish players obsessively locking on for some reason...

The fact they made Sekiro and AC6 as good as they did tells me they are more than just great Souls-like devs. They are IMO the top developer in the world right now. Personally I would prefer their next game be more Sekiro than Elden Ring but I would not be upset if the next game is Elden Ring 2.

I think there is also an argument to be made about the... QUESTIONABLE state of PVP in souls games... buuuuut that's a can of worms not everybody wants to open. Plus the points in the video were exclusively made about the PVE side of the games

9:19 correct my first I want to say about five hours playing Elden ring felt very unfair I thought rennala was fairly annoying but that’s because I didn’t take it vantage of the games mechanics a couple Prather’s later and I realize that you’re supposed to kill the tree sentinel first take it’s halbert beat the shit out of everything in Godrick’s castle and you can get flame grant me Stength extremely early on. It’s cheap enough to meet the requirements for and gives you a huge boost

there's a mini boss at the end of the invisible enemy mission with pulse shields before Balteus though??? the pulse gun's description even says it's strong against pulse shields??? enemy ACs are the only ones that heal since they have everything you can have??? Walter even tells you to take to the air to avoid getting hit??? why does it feel like people playing ACVI can't pay attention??? or read??? I "got it" immediately and it was my first AC game?????????

Nah, more games need to be hostile to their players. The unfair "fuck you" moments make the worlds they build feel raw and dangerous. Besides, AC6 is just like Sekiro in that once you master the mechanics and timings you will rarely die and feel like an unstoppable badass.

7:08 so funny to me, because this is exactly what warframe does it just increase health and damage and and yet it’s extremely popular game with 3/4’s the concurrent players of Eldon and has been steadily growing overtime and has been around for 13 years all I can is hey sometimes that model works

The start of the video has already made me lose interest. From software is good but they are nowhere near the best game devs in the world. Their games are always filled with exploitable glitches, lifeless npcs, weak cutscenes, their games just become a boss rush on subsequent playthroughs, their graphics are not top tier, lackluster story and some mumbo jumbo is thrown together and called lore. From software is good but they have too many flaws to be called the best.

the thing that is good with fromesoftware is how they deliberatly choose there to be really fucking bad. just clunky, unfair, irritating. By doing it right they somehow get this accent of a good texture troughout the most part of their games. there is no real mistakes if what you done feels amazing. actually people forget that most of uninspiring games like the dawgshit that ubisoft publishes is a really polished solid work without anything standing out. no rights no wrongs, just pure established formula

placing enemies before a boss to ‘warm you up’ to the mechanics of said boss isn’t the only solution to new boss mechanics. For instance, I personally felt ac6 encouraged the use of different weapons and testing builds for different challenges, when i was met with balteus i tested new weapons, and ended landing on pulse blade and pulse guns for their effectiveness against pulse shields and critical damage. Players who ignored this and try to brute force their way through encounters with a single build will be punished by this.

This appears to be the same as the Veteran Compensation a lot of mods implement. It seems that fromsoft is trying to challenge the most experienced players because they are the vocal minority. If you want to know how it ends up I advise you to look up how Gothic 2 ended up because of it. Also, I find it concerning that there is still a bug that disables torrent in the elden beast fight.

I played hollow knight and it‘s one of my favourite games because its hard but fair. What I think is a prime example is that in hollow knight the health is displayed in steps. Every hit deals one damage. This leads to the game having to make the bosses harder by design and not just seemingly random damage output.

The HP bar is more of a psychological thing. Seeing your hits do tons of damage to a boss feels good ans will affect your approach. Seeing your weapon do a miniscule amount of damage will make you feel weak as fuck. Also, we all know how frustrating it feels dying to a boss with a small amount of health because you got greedy.

Dude you just made one of my comment argument threads to a video .Fsoft is sadistic in design and uses everything to annoy u and F u up But u forgot to mention enemies don't have stamina limitation . I promis even AC6 doesn't have EN limitation for enemies their attack passes through walls but yours stops why can't u reset levels or change anything with no limitation or loses a f boss that can go out of boss room or out of your reach and attack u

utterly reasonable analysis & commentary. thanks! i don't think i disagreed with a single thing. =)

5:10ff Everyone has a lizard brain, because that's just an old term for the basal ganglia. You literally couldn't even move your eyes without those. People need to stop using that as an insult, it makes anyone who uses it look silly.

Every time this game is "unfair" its actually VERY fair, because you get one more shot to get your souls EVERY time you die. You just cant make the same mistake twice. How is that not fair?

Buying a book doesnt mean that you will understand all of the wirtten text Buying a game doesnt not mean that you will get to experience everything within it (because of your limited skill) Being an interactive medium means that your input matters.....