Sekiro Shadows Die Twice (translator's note: Sekiro means ninja fuckery)

[Don Rumata]

are you shitting me with that trash camera in final boss 3rd phase? 

My brother just beat the guy, seemed like a pain in the ass (though at least not a shit fight like Demon of Hatred).

[kingv]

I'm grinding mobs (8000 XP in about 4 minutes) till I get 20 Attack Power before trying the last 3 boss fights (LISS, O2, DoH). Every little bit, little percentage helps and I already have 65 hours on the save file so already got my money's worth.

Can't say I will even finish this game and that kind of sucks. Oh well... already started Guacamelee! 2 in the meantime.

You can grind attack power?! I thought it was a boss drop.

[paprikastaude]

first time ever I'm having zero progress after several hours - but only because the camera can't keep up with the main attack of the boss halfway through designer of this deserves his hands broken. there's already been some other times the developers didn't understand that their camera is trash (i.e. every time they were idiotic enough to put a mini boss in small corridors), but at least that was few and far between and not that tedious to manage.

[Don Rumata]

first time ever I'm having zero progress after several hours - but only because the camera can't keep up with the main attack of the boss halfway through designer of this deserves his hands broken. there's already been some other times the developers didn't understand that their camera is trash (i.e. every time they were idiotic enough to put a mini boss in small corridors), but at least that was few and far between and not that tedious to manage.

This seems to be a common problem in FROM games.
Everytime you had to fight a big beast in BB (which is most of them) locking-on made it a shit show.

[Coax]

HUD mod that allows disabling various indicators such as awareness markers, stealth crouch vignettes, etc. I use DS4 button UI mod so good to see more HUD tweaks available.

The 21:9 mod I'm using already includes and kind of necessitates disabling the stealth vignette and low health indicators since they're in 16:9 ratio but even without that mod I'd appreciate such options.

[HardcoreRetro]

Almost got the optional super boss (Bloodborne's Blood-starved Beast). He is super easy compared to the Final Boss (still not dead) and the other optional one (still not dead - I cannot even touch him before he kills me, WTF?!?)

RE: Attack Power

Upgrading it is A MISTAKE. I upgraded to 20 after 4 hours grind and it just does not make any difference. What I gathered on the web is that it increases by like 1% each step... Attack Power 99 means you area dealing exactly 2x the damage that on Attack Power 11 (mega WTF).

In other words: do not grind for Attack Power. I would already have the All Skills Trophy in New Game 0 (!!!) if I didn't waste those 45 Skill Points on AP, eh. Now I need 50 000 EXP for 1 Skill Point so like 50-hour grind.... GTFO.

Bad vibes thread.

Well.... For you. It's making me laugh my ass off. Like the thread.

[kingv]

Beat down the flaming bull after a few more tries.

Camera sucks so bad in that fight, that I was actually having even more trouble with the no lock on method.

I ended up beating him primarily by partying his ass on a charge, dodging to his back and punishing.

I never even got the burning status effect up.

I need to figure out what to do next

[Nintex]

Contemplating on buying this game. I never got into the 'Souls' games but I finished Ninja Gaiden 2 on Master Ninja back in the day. 

[MMaRsu]

Ninja gaiden 2 is the easy one tho can u finish ngb

[Coax]

Empowered Mortal Draw doesn't seem worth it from videos I've seen. I have enough spare skill points (25) to be able to obtain it with a little more farming but the delay to charge appears like twice as long as Mortal Draw and doesn't seem to deal a terrible amount of damage so idk.

In terms of combat arts so far Shadowrush and Mortal Draw have been the most useful. Any other suggestions on what to spend it on? Haven't delved into the monk skill tree, anything useful there?

[Don Rumata]

Tried

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Owl 1

[close]

4 or so times, only once got to the second phase. 
Honestly it's probably my favorite fight so far, despite being harder than anything i've fought up to this point.
I like fights where you have to parry, against other humanoids, instead of big monsters where you have to run around for 2 hours.

Also since we're speaking prosthetics, i found the shield incredibly useful, it made the fight against Snake Eyes almost trivial (almost), as you can just nullify her grab move by deploying it, no timing required.
Axe was great against shielded enemies (including those annoying af blackhats) and against the ROBERTOOOO guy, too.

The only one that really disappointed me so far, was the mist raven thing.

Everything else i've used here and there, and i always try to integrate them as much as i can with bosses, it's half the fun for me.

[Coax]

Axe was great against shielded enemies (including those annoying af blackhats) and against the ROBERTOOOO guy, too.

Latter is my fav mini boss. Interestingly despite not really enjoying the fight per se I think I appreciated the background to O'Rin second-most. The grace, subtle music, admirer story. Was a nice mix.

As for combat arts I probably find them more useful than tools for fights where it counts, especially since they can continue to be utilized without emblems. Attack power upgrades past a certain point seem to be not be worth it though, for sure. Tested with a couple skill point conversions just prior to Borys' post and found it didn't change the damage noticeably so have just been accumulating them since. Have to spend them on something!

[Don Rumata]

While i like prosthetics and combat arts, and think they are mostly useful (in selected situations, and depending on play style, clearly), i can't say the same for objects in this game.

Much like SoulsBorne, the constant autosaving means that using an object that can't be infinitely bought or refilled indefinitely, is to throw it away, 90% of the time.
This just pushes you to never even consider using stuff like Parsimmons and similar "rare" items, because you'll probably die anyway, and just might as well learn to do the boss without 'em.
It's just such a stupid design choice.

I'm fine with having only 1 of X rare object in the whole game, but if i die in any one attempt, i should get it back at least.

The way it is now, you just throw it in the pile of "too rare to use" items, and eventually get so good, that they wouldn't make a difference anyhow.

[Let's Cyber]

The only one that really disappointed me so far, was the mist raven thing.

Being able to avoid damage and then teleport above an enemy for multiple free hits is pretty great tbh. Its been my go-to for quite a few mini-bosses.

[Joe Molotov]

https://twitter.com/playasia/status/1112099133039484936

For you, bork.

https://twitter.com/HardDriveMag/status/1115675081517293570

[Svejk]

If Sekiro added big Anime titties, they would be the hardest boss ever.

[bluemax]

are you shitting me with that trash camera in final boss 3rd phase? 

Anyone still playing FROM games in 2019 should know that the camera is gonna be trash. FROM either doesn't give a fuck or is somehow incapable of hiring someone capable of programming a working camera system.

[Don Rumata]

While i like prosthetics and combat arts, and think they are mostly useful (in selected situations, and depending on play style, clearly), i can't say the same for objects in this game.

Much like SoulsBorne, the constant autosaving means that using an object that can't be infinitely bought or refilled indefinitely, is to throw it away, 90% of the time.
This just pushes you to never even consider using stuff like Parsimmons and similar "rare" items, because you'll probably die anyway, and just might as well learn to do the boss without 'em.
It's just such a stupid design choice.

I'm fine with having only 1 of X rare object in the whole game, but if i die in any one attempt, i should get it back at least.

The way it is now, you just throw it in the pile of "too rare to use" items, and eventually get so good, that they wouldn't make a difference anyhow.

It's been this way since Demon's Souls. I appreciate it very much because it is the unique flavour of the genre.

However, since FROM SOFTWARE under Activision pressure caved in and removed two distinct flavours of the genre in Sekiro:

- no pause button
- falling off the cliffs

While adding:

- Call of Duty UI markers
- music in the overworld

I expect the next FROM game (whatever that will be) will also find a way to dumb down/ mainstream the unique Items Usage either via save states or some other means. And the next game from that will also feature a minimap!

In 15 years they will destroy the genre they have created.

FROM GIVETH
FROM TAKETH

A lot of FROM staples design choices, were dumb shit, anyway.

I doubt adding music and a pause button were Activision's pressuring, but they are appreciated.
Not every FROM game has to be a carbon copy of Demon's Souls till the end of time.

[kingv]

Hot take:

From software gameplay, in general, isn’t really that good.

They just made it so you can only take 7 hits total, or two from a boss.

I like Senior pretty well, but I’m not sure that I think the combat and systems are great... so much as they are just very tense because the margin of error is so low.

The camera is utter dog shit though. It’s the most dangerous enemy.

[demi]

So last boss has 4 phases.

Phase 2 is the easiest - he almost did not touch me and I can see it being beaten with 0 hits. But Phase 3... ... ... ...  come the fuck on. *When* are you supposed to damage him? Can't find an opening. And there is still Phase 4, jeez. Guess leave Firecrackers for the last phase because Kunai doesn't work shit on him.

People have already beaten the game with no hits. You arent special, nerd

[Coax]

However, since FROM SOFTWARE under Activision pressure caved in and removed two distinct flavours of the genre in Sekiro.

I expect the next FROM game (whatever that will be) will also find a way to dumb down/ mainstream the unique Items Usage either via save states or some other means. And the next game from that will also feature a minimap!

In 15 years they will destroy the genre they have created.

I mean, for several pages you admitted Sekiro is a 'pure action' game, distinctly different from their previous number of games ('*NOT* a Soulsbourne', emphasis yours) to now saying they're destroying the 'genre they created' with things like optional music and a pause function. If it's intended as its own thing and not another Souls entry I don't see the problem, really.

About the one useful thing that could have been added from that list is optional awareness markers, a setting found in most stealth-action games, though one can always disable the HUD entirely or if on PC use a mod. Not ideal but hardly sky is falling for the type of game they made.

[paprikastaude]

They didn't remove anything, they made a new IP.

[Don Rumata]

Genichiro on top of the Castle 1st try in NG+, LOL. Every boss up to him as well. Game is mega easy in NG+.

How much is the lack of Kuro's charm affecting you? Figure that's how the game was meant to be played, to avoid parry spamming.

[MMaRsu]

Friend, I do not parry. The only times I used this mechanic is Monk and Centipiedes. So I cannot answer your question. Everything has more health but kinda takes the same amount of hits as in NG0. You take lots of damage but you have 10 Prayer Necklaces so it evens out.

So you are just playing this as a hack & slash?

Are you having difficulty parrying? Just mash fucking L1 or L2 or whatevs

[paprikastaude]

https://twitter.com/gematsucom/status/1116358989158154243

That Activision marketing? Sold faster than all Dark Souls games.

[Coax]

Steelbook arrived



Beside my only other gaming Steelbook from The Witcher 3. Heights don't match for some reason but whatchagonnado.

[Don Rumata]

Heights don't match for some reason but whatchagonnado.

Bluray format for Sekiro, classic dvd format for Witcher, it looks like.
Anyway, i like the Sekiro one, i don't think the clean white, fits Watcher's tone all that much, but the art is great.

[Coax]

Bluray format for Sekiro, classic dvd format for Witcher, it looks like.
Anyway, i like the Sekiro one, i don't think the clean white, fits Watcher's tone all that much, but the art is great.

The Witcher one has a subtle light gray watercolor texture to it though probably can't be seen there (also both the expansions used pure white backgrounds for their promotional art so I suppose it's not that unusual but I can see where you're coming from).

Wish Dishonored 2 had a more interesting Steelbook as I had such an enjoyable time with it (the architecture, interior and object designs ).

[kingv]

I went back to the reservoir after the bull and killed some dude in a well... and then I found a guy by the pagoda young boi was in... is there anything else to do in that area?

[Coax]

I went back to the reservoir after the bull and killed some dude in a well... and then I found a guy by the pagoda young boi was in... is there anything else to do in that area?

The only other thing in that general direction is the enemy past the bridge at that point in the game.

[Don Rumata]

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/409794182
He's back.

[chronovore]

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/409794182
He's back.

That guy has a limited vocabulary.

[paprikastaude]

Current Speedrun WR

- 27 minutes 8 secs
- by Distortion
- Horse skip
- Bull skip
- stealth deathblow of Corrupted Monk (!)
- tanks Ape's terror attack (!)
- crazy Snek skip/ glitch





Current No-Damage Run

- 1h 41 minutes
- by Faraaz (the guy that did Sigrun LVL1 no damage)

The English translation seems pretty off, to say the least. Owl ending with "that's my boy"?

[Let's Cyber]

Senpou Temple and Fountainhead Palace might be two of my favorite From areas, at least visually.

I think Bloodborne is still my favorite overall but this game is damn good. Better than any Dark Souls IMO.

[Cerveza mas fina]

Current Speedrun WR

- 27 minutes 8 secs
- by Distortion
- Horse skip
- Bull skip
- stealth deathblow of Corrupted Monk (!)
- tanks Ape's terror attack (!)
- crazy Snek skip/ glitch





Current No-Damage Run

- 1h 41 minutes
- by Faraaz (the guy that did Sigrun LVL1 no damage)

These people are machines

[BobFromPikeCreek]

Currently doing NG+ without Kuro's Charm. Chip damage takes this game to another level.

[kingv]

The thing that wears me out with this game is the same thing that does it in dark souls.

I get stuck on a boss and end up getting frustrated with repeating the journey to the boss.

Really feeling it on Drunk Boi and the ninja hunter on the bridge (who is actually ended up just skipping).

Drawing out every enemy is just so painful.

[Don Rumata]

The thing that wears me out with this game is the same thing that does it in dark souls.

I get stuck on a boss and end up getting frustrated with repeating the journey to the boss.

Really feeling it on Drunk Boi and the ninja hunter on the bridge (who is actually ended up just skipping).

Drawing out every enemy is just so painful.

Those are probably the worst boss trips in the game if it helps.
Most bosses later on have a bonfire next to them, or near next to them.

There are still a couple of mini bosses with annoying paths to them, but they're the minority (plus it usually means you can sneak and stealth kill one bar away, at least.

[paprikastaude]

Rushing through NG+ reconfirms the ogre as the worst boss. Not only is his pattern annoying, but the game teaches you the wrong playstyle by putting him in the very beginning. It makes you think dodging is way more important than it is, while later enemies barely every have any grabbing attacks.

[Coax]

Rushing through NG+ reconfirms the ogre as the worst boss. Not only is his pattern annoying, but the game teaches you the wrong playstyle by putting him in the very beginning. It makes you think dodging is way more important than it is, while later enemies barely every have any grabbing attacks.

Watched a fighting game player (Maximilian Dood) stream some of Sekiro a little ago who considered that ogre BS as well, mostly for the sweeps that don't connect at a reasonable distance yet count.

Later in the VoD I saw he beat the final boss in like three attempts with the fight lasting just a few minutes. Someone in the chat complained he cheesed it merely because he was too fast

[paprikastaude]

[kingv]

In a 30 minute stretch managed to kill drunk boi and the shining hunter.

The shining hunter can be massively cheesed, as he cannot cross the bridge leading up to him under any circumstances. He will always start backing up once on it.

One thing I am not 100% clear on is which attacks the mikiri  counter works on and which don’t.

I have had this trouble with Shinobi hunter and seven Spears.

Some of the attacks look like thrusts to me, but then it seems like my counter isn’t registering even though the timing feels right. Not sure if I’m missing the timing or some attacks look like thrusts but the game doesn’t count them as thrusts.

Specifically, on seven spears, it’s that scoop thrust where he digs the spear into the ground.

[Coax]

Some of the attacks look like thrusts to me, but then it seems like my counter isn’t registering even though the timing feels right. Not sure if I’m missing the timing or some attacks look like thrusts but the game doesn’t count them as thrusts

Specifically, on seven spears, it’s that scoop thrust where he digs the spear into the ground.

Clipped this GIF from a video that shows his thrust (if that's the one you mean) countered vs the sweep from that fight, if it helps

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

Couple of other couple things to keep in mind: the counter is activated more reliably using Forward+Dodge and the counter is triggerable when the enemy begins to move the weapon forward (the glint on the weapon is a bit of a visual cue) rather than just following the appearance of the symbol itself.

Late edit: Forward+Dodge correction.

[paprikastaude]

Not checking every water straight after getting diving?

[MMaRsu]

[Don Rumata]

Couple of other couple things to keep in mind: the counter is activated more reliably using Forward+Block and the counter is triggerable when the enemy begins to move the weapon forward (the glint on the weapon is a bit of a visual cue) rather than just following the appearance of the symbol itself.

The method i use for the Mikiri, is i press dodge right when the warning symbol starts disappearing.
It worked out well so far, with most attacks.

[Bebpo]

Finally started playing this and I fucking suck at it. Took me an hour to beat the chained ogre (had missed the flashback area and the flame vent subweapon and didn't know you could stealth a lifebar off, so was just whittling him down both life bars head on but kept getting grabbed and losing 90% HP before I could kill him). Doing the flashback area now and stuck at both Spear boss and Drunkard boss who both kill me in 1-2 hits and have tons of mobs around them. After I quit for the night I found out that I was doing the Mikiri counter wrong because I was trying to counter the spear like a sword counter with L1 on PS4, now I know how to do it with dodge so I'll try to stealth off the mobs and one lifebar from him and counter him. My only experience with the drunkard was a buddy samurai guy running out and getting killed by mobs in 10 seconds and then I'm surrounded by mobs and this huge guy that 1 hit kills me. I read that the trick is to take the mobs out and run away and reset the encounter without mobs and then activate the sword guy and double team him so will try that next.

Like the game a lot, but yeah I suck at these bosses!

[Coax]

The method i use for the Mikiri, is i press dodge right when the warning symbol starts disappearing. It worked out well so far, with most attacks.

Interesting. When I began practicing it was the timing differences between enemies threw me so I instead looked at their movement but good to know this as well.

I only just noticed I posted 'Forward+Block' rather than 'Forward-Dodge' (which I was thinking of). Brain fart. Corrected.

[Don Rumata]

Finally started playing this and I fucking suck at it. Took me an hour to beat the chained ogre (had missed the flashback area and the flame vent subweapon and didn't know you could stealth a lifebar off, so was just whittling him down both life bars head on but kept getting grabbed and losing 90% HP before I could kill him). Doing the flashback area now and stuck at both Spear boss and Drunkard boss who both kill me in 1-2 hits and have tons of mobs around them. After I quit for the night I found out that I was doing the Mikiri counter wrong because I was trying to counter the spear like a sword counter with L1 on PS4, now I know how to do it with dodge so I'll try to stealth off the mobs and one lifebar from him and counter him. My only experience with the drunkard was a buddy samurai guy running out and getting killed by mobs in 10 seconds and then I'm surrounded by mobs and this huge guy that 1 hit kills me. I read that the trick is to take the mobs out and run away and reset the encounter without mobs and then activate the sword guy and double team him so will try that next.

Like the game a lot, but yeah I suck at these bosses!

The start is honestly the worst part of it.
There are definitely harder bosses and mini bosses coming, but at the start you die with a spit, and you still don't know how to play.

It gets easier.

I'm at the True Monk boss (late game boss) now, and i'm starting to think Bloodborne was harder than this, despite thinking the exact opposite, when i started playing.
I do think Bloodborne's difficulty is mostly due to the worse gameplay though, i don't think i'd ever be able to go back now.

[Bebpo]

Finally started playing this and I fucking suck at it. Took me an hour to beat the chained ogre (had missed the flashback area and the flame vent subweapon and didn't know you could stealth a lifebar off, so was just whittling him down both life bars head on but kept getting grabbed and losing 90% HP before I could kill him). Doing the flashback area now and stuck at both Spear boss and Drunkard boss who both kill me in 1-2 hits and have tons of mobs around them. After I quit for the night I found out that I was doing the Mikiri counter wrong because I was trying to counter the spear like a sword counter with L1 on PS4, now I know how to do it with dodge so I'll try to stealth off the mobs and one lifebar from him and counter him. My only experience with the drunkard was a buddy samurai guy running out and getting killed by mobs in 10 seconds and then I'm surrounded by mobs and this huge guy that 1 hit kills me. I read that the trick is to take the mobs out and run away and reset the encounter without mobs and then activate the sword guy and double team him so will try that next.

Like the game a lot, but yeah I suck at these bosses!

The start is honestly the worst part of it.
There are definitely harder bosses and mini bosses coming, but at the start you die with a spit, and you still don't know how to play.

It gets easier.

I'm at the True Monk boss (late game boss) now, and i'm starting to think Bloodborne was harder than this, despite thinking the exact opposite, when i started playing.
I do think Bloodborne's difficulty is mostly due to the worse gameplay though, i don't think i'd ever be able to go back now.

Interesting.

See my experience with Dark Souls/Bloodborne was that they were inverse difficulty curves and this was almost entirely because of weapon upgrades. Like they were hard at the start but as you got more and more upgrade levels they became jokingly easy games. You can tell they were and had to be balanced for lower weapon levels because to max weapon upgrades required grinding and secrets and stuff the average player wouldn't do. But that meant if you did that stuff (which I always do as soon as I can) you'd be super OP. Like in Bloodborne I don't even know if Margo's Wet Nurse had moves, at Weapon lvl.10 with the start short blade you just mash slash and the fight's over in 10 seconds.

The Dark Souls games & Bloodborne literally go from YOU HAVE TO LEARN EVERY BOSS PATTERN AND EXECUTE THEM PERFECTLY to you can run up and mash attack and beat bosses on your first try. My Dark Souls 1 run was with a blood element max Katana and I think I killed the final boss in like 4 slashes.

I don't remember if Demon Souls was as broken since it's been too many years since I played it.


My thinking from a couple hours of Sekiro was "no weapon levels? oh shit, there's no way to break this one", and since you only increase weapon power/hp after you beat the bosses/mid-bosses it feels like From Soft could really control the balance and increase the boss damage and HP to match your increases so it remains the same level of challenge throughout, but idk, maybe not?

Yeah I mean it would be kinda nice to not run to a new boss area and die in 1 hit (if not topped off 100%) before learning anything and then res and die in 1 hit and then run back to the boss area and die in 1 hit and res and die in 1 hit later on. After I beat spear guy and drunk guy I'll have my 4 beads (left Ashino right after beating Ogre before progressing further) and I'll see what kind of difference an upgrade there makes.

[kingv]

Drunk boi and shinobi boi can both be sort of cheesed.

Drunk Boi: that little pond where the Ashoka helper is... instead of going through the center of it all, go around the rocks. From there you can aggro drunk boi without alerting the mobs because he can see a lot farther.

After he starts to round the corner in the pond, start running until he starts to walk back to his spot, then do a stealth backstab while he’s going back. Then draw him back to the middle and get your buddy. He’s pretty trivial at that point.

Shinobi hunter you can make him a lot easier by drawing him down to the bridge right before him. He cannot cross it so you can always jump back across the bridge if you need a break. Using it you can really control his aggressiveness by kiting him.

[Bebpo]

Man, I dunno about this game. I finally got the 4 prayer beads and I got...+1 vitality? So I still do the same pidly damage and my health is barely noticeably any longer? Guess there is no upgrade system to make things easier in this haha.

My only issue with the whole "draw the mobs out first, reset the boss and stealth and then fight the boss" is that when you spend 10 mins setting this up and then you die in 20 seconds and have to do it all again it's not fun. This happened on the dumb shinobi guy for me, then I tried to just fight him with all the enemies still alive and that went bad, then did the whole kill all grunts first and then beat him but yeah that was annoying. Same thing happened on drunk boi, stealthed and cleared all the grunts and activated samurai guy only to still get killed WHILE TALKING TO THE SAMURAI GUY ACTIVATING HIM and then lolz when I resurrect I get hit while resurrecting and die instantly for a 2nd time. Just feels like a huge waste of time taking out the grunts each time. Next time I took out the grunts quicker and didn't get hit while activating samurai guy and shot him with oil and fire and slices from behind and it was no problem.

Tried fighting Lady Butterfly. I'd heard she was ridiculously hard, so I was kinda surprised when after a few deaths of getting the hang of dodging all her moves and staying in her face with single slashes between each of her attacks, I killed her without taking almost any damage on like my 3rd attempt. THEN PART 2 and yeah fuck that I don't have the skillset in this game yet to deal with dodging her attacks again this time while getting mob stabbed from ghosts behind me and then she did that move where they all turn back into light and then explode me for instant kill, ehhhhhh.

Guess I'll go back to Ashino now and make some progress in that direction and come back to Butterfly later. Was hoping that getting the 4 pray beads would make a noticably difference in feeling stronger but nope, maybe after the second group of 4 I'll get +1 on my strength and then I'll notice a change? I'm not even sure what skills I should be getting so I'm mainly just grabbing stealth skills for now.

[Bebpo]

Actually I didn't realize that the ghosts go away at some point and then it's just the same fight but with her throwing explosions here and there. Ehhh, I think I can do this. Got her down to 50% HP on 2nd part just now.

[Bebpo]

Man, this fight is annoying. It's really good but there's one move that is absolutely destroying me. I can handle every attack she throws out, I can run around the ghost bois like no tomorrow without taking hits. But I take damage at 2 spots:

First is after ghost bois when I'm fighting him but she keeps shooting 2 sets of butterflies at a time. I'm circle strafing around her hitting her and doing damage but my HP is slowly getting chipped down as these pass through me while I circle around her.

Second is the big one. After I dodge the ghost bois and she turns them all into a giant clusterfuck bomb of butterflies, I can't seem to dodge this and it does 100% HP damage. I made it past the first set of this with 1 death and got her kinda low on life in phase 2 but then she summoned another set of ghost bois and did this again and it killed me. I swear if I had 2 fucking snap peas I'd beat this fight no problem But I used the one I got and I have none.

[Don Rumata]

For the skills, i'd prioritize Mikiri Counter (and all related skills), and whatever lets you do "block" and "attack" while in the air first.
The game doesn't get "easy", but it does get less tedious in the way you're describing, as i said the first 2 areas (Ashina Outskirts and Hirata Estate) are among the worst in that sense, in my opinion.

At least, until the end game phase, then it ramps up again in bullshit, but by then you're expecting it.

[Bebpo]

Ok, read that the pillars block the butterfly bomb after the ghosts. Tried once more after learning that and beat it on first try after. YES +1 attack, now I should feel stronger.

[Bebpo]

The scripted

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Snake

[close]

bit is kinda annoying lol

[Bebpo]

Beat the horse general on first try, seemed pretty easy if you just stay back and use the green arrows to swing in and get some hits. Still was pretty greedy on my hits. Had one death + resurrection in battle and then I beat him with this much life left:



But hey, another attack +1, up to 3 now and oh wow that is a big tool upgrade tree! Here I thought this was going to be a short game.

[Bebpo]

Open world doesn't sound good with From though. One of their really strong strength is their level design in these games. Unless the open world actually just means hub that connects to the levels, just don't see it working.

I'd say their level design, enemy variety, enemy & boss attack patterns (hell even Chained Ogre has like 6 unique moves), combat design, atmosphere and storytelling is what makes their games great.

I really liked Demon Souls when I played it. The player-controlled monk boss was amazing and the seaside place with the giant manta rays and of course that defiled place with the holy chick and her knight. That being said I felt like the gameplay got much better at Dark Souls, but then in Demon Souls I played a ranged spell caster that would run and shoot missiles, while in all the Dark Souls games I went different melee builds and Bloodborne/Sekiro are melee so it might just be that.

[Bebpo]

I also feel atmosphere/story-wise nothing outside Bloodborne can hold up to Dark Souls 1 when you're including the expansion. The knight and the wolf, the scaleless dragon's library, the serpents and Anor Londo, the story and atmosphere in the 2nd half from Anor Londo on is freaking amazing and is the best Berserk game ever.

Bloodborne is so different in being cosmic horror that it's hard to compare but for what Bloodborne does in story/atmosphere, it does really well.

Honestly if I could have From Software make any game next I'd have them make Bloodborne 2. I still feel a little annoyed that Demon/Dark Souls got 4 medieval fantasy games and we got 1 horror title that was the best lovecraft game ever made and then just sorta moved on. I get they probably don't want to make exclusives anymore since they have a wide fan base across platforms, but they could demon -> dark souls it and just do another cosmic horror themed souls game with an action focus.

Also I've got nothing against Dark Souls 2. I played it years later right before Dark Souls 3 and it was about as good as Dark 1/3/Demon Souls except that the gameplay balance was even more shit and broken than Dark Souls 1 and the DLC area in the snow where you run for 5 mins to die in 10 seconds in the 2 wolves is complete bullshit as is one of the missile spam areas towards the end of the main game. But let's not kid ourselves that Dark Souls 1 didn't have some shitty sections too like the lava stuff. The story in DS2 is pretty interesting! It's also kinda interesting because it's like 85% complete and then just leaves certain things unanswered to make your own theories. It gets a lot of unfair hate imo.

I'd actually say Dark Souls 3 has the weakest story/atmosphere out of all those games. Played great and was pretty balanced and looked really pretty though.