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From Software Elden Ring - From Software's new game with writing by GRRM

Joined
Mar 3, 2018
Messages
7,877
Just your average open world summoner.
20220304143808-1.jpg
 

Bigg Boss

Arcane
Joined
Sep 23, 2012
Messages
7,528
I farmed the Banished Knight some more and finally got his sword. That thing is sexy. It's definitely going to be my main once I can get it leveled up more. Anyone know a way to farm smithing stones 2&3?

My #1 goal is to eventually wield the Grafted Blade Greatsword. That beast requires 40 strength to use, good lord.

Catacombs.
 

Lyric Suite

Converting to Islam
Joined
Mar 23, 2006
Messages
58,601
BTW guys, i just leveled up! I'm now SL10 lmao.

I'm still fucking around Limgrave. Granted i have limited time to play, but this area never ends. I've done everything i can in both the west and eastern side of it, and all that's left is that southern section (which however i don't think is actually part of Limgrave) and the Siofra River which i'll skip for now and head to Stormveil instead.

So far i've clocked 36 hours altogheter, all though i did spent a lot of time doing co-op. The summoning staff you get is just so convenient. My weapon is still at +0 too so i get ton of connections within the span of minutes.
 

Haplo

Prophet
Patron
Joined
Sep 14, 2016
Messages
6,606
Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
I farmed the Banished Knight some more and finally got his sword. That thing is sexy. It's definitely going to be my main once I can get it leveled up more. Anyone know a way to farm smithing stones 2&3?

My #1 goal is to eventually wield the Grafted Blade Greatsword. That beast requires 40 strength to use, good lord.

That means 27 Str when two-handing. And you can get a +5 Str amulet, therefore 22. You can even go down to 19 with that scourge amulet that gives +3 to physical stats.
Easy peasy.

My favorite weapon is the Greatsword with Bloodhound Step, though. Really lovely mobility, range + evasion. The enemies don't see what's coming...

Ruins Weapon Art is cool for mobs, though.
Still not as broken as Hoarfrost Stomp... that Arts' FP cost should probably be tripled.
 
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SumDrunkGuy

Guest
Have my Banished Greatsword at +11 right now and it's a fuckin monster. A true big dick weapon. Can't wait to get it even stronger.
 

deem

Arbiter
Joined
Oct 3, 2019
Messages
421
I'm still fucking around Limgrave. Granted i have limited time to play, but this area never ends. I've done everything i can in both the west and eastern side of it, and all that's left is that southern section (which however i don't think is actually part of Limgrave) and the Siofra River which i'll skip for now and head to Stormveil instead.

I think exhausting Limgrave is good to do before moving on. I kind of migrated to Caelid underleveled and messed around there for a while and then did Stormveil and moved on to Liurnia. Upon returning to Limgrave to tie up loose ends I found myself massively overleveled.
 

Lyric Suite

Converting to Islam
Joined
Mar 23, 2006
Messages
58,601
My criteria for leveling is when i see my weapon doing no damage or if i start getting one shotted. So far that hasn't happened in the entire Limgrave. The whole place seems to be designed for the same level. I expected things to be harder when i moved to the eastern side but it's just the same as the western side.
 
Joined
Aug 10, 2012
Messages
5,914
I mean, the game has a STAGGERING amount of UNIQUE-LOOKING landscapes, places, spots, buildings and areas.
It doesn't even just have "a lot of them", you could argue that is pretty much UNMATCHED in the amount it offers for a single player title. I can hardly think of anything below Rockstar-tier budget that comes even close (and this still towers over the average Rockstar game for the variety of gameplay situations).
It also has a very interesting landscape to navigate in general, with plenty of unmarked and cleverly hidden place, subtle and less subtle visual cues to draw your attention in the right place organically, etc.

But sure, let's fucking go into full weaponized autism and scream "Travesty!" about a few similar-looking ruins and churches every now and then.
"a few similar-looking ruins every now and then" is just hilarious. Every area has multiple (3-4) ruins and they all look exactly the same even though the areas themselves are distinct enough. Not only are they mechanically and functionally the same - find a hole in the ground that either has a chest or a boss and a chest - but they're visually identical. Do you really not think that it detracts from the game when some ruins in Mountaintops of the Giants, a region that's been cut off from the mainland for ages, looks exactly the same as the first bogstandard ruins you encounter in Limgrave?

That's bordering on delusion. But I guess it's just easier to use silly catchphrases like "weaponized autism" than try to defend a point.
 

NJClaw

OoOoOoOoOoh
Patron
Joined
Aug 30, 2016
Messages
7,678
Location
Pronouns: rusts/rusty
Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture
Do you really not think that it detracts from the game when some ruins in Mountaintops of the Giants, a region that's been cut off from the mainland for ages, looks exactly the same as the first ruins you encounter in Limgrave?
I guess that, for me, what you do and see between those repetitive and formulaic activities is varied enough to make me want to praise the game instead of bashing it. Still, those copy-pasted elements are the exact opposite of what I loved about this series, and I would happily live without them.
 
Joined
Jun 6, 2010
Messages
2,395
Location
Milan, Italy
"a few similar-looking ruins every now and then" is just hilarious. Every area has multiple (3-4) ruins and they all look exactly the same
The point is ruins don't mean shit in the grand scheme of things.
It's like visiting Prague and ignoring all the monuments and landmarks that make one of the most stunning cities in Europe just to complain that all traffic lights and crossroads across the city look pretty much the same.
 
Joined
Aug 10, 2012
Messages
5,914
I'm not bashing the game - I like it enough to spend 80 hours on it and finish it!

However, that doesn't mean I can't think some elements could be vastly improved. Why is it that when you provide valid criticism of a certain element of a good game, people think you're "bashing" it?

"a few similar-looking ruins every now and then" is just hilarious. Every area has multiple (3-4) ruins and they all look exactly the same
The point is ruins don't mean shit in the grand scheme of things.
It's like visiting Prague and ignoring all the monuments and landmarks that make one of the most stunning cities in Europe just to complain that all traffic lights and crossroads across the city look pretty much the same.

No, it's not like that at all. Analogies are a midwit argumentation tactic. I'm not "ignoring" anything else, I'm talking about a specific design choice, which makes everything else feel worse.

But let's go with it for a minute. By your logic, if "ruins don't mean shit in the grand scheme of things" they're expendable/irrelevant, no? So why are they in the game? If you're putting something in the game for which there is no point, then certainly there might be a case to be made for them not to be in the game at all. If there is a point to them - and there is, cool weapons, ashes and spells, not to mention some decent fights - then why not them make them a little more unique? It would fit with the theme, with the world, and it would be mechanically superior. It's a cost-saving measure and a checklist feature that caters to fans of Ubishit, not me.

If ruins (and by extension, mines, catacombs, etc.) are expendable, rote elements of open-world design, the fact that From decided to put them in the game is, to me, a sign of deep decline. In the past, Souls had few gratuitous, pointless mechanics and/or places in general. Areas with bad design, sure - but they were uniquely bad.

I'm really done arguing against people defending expendable copypasta. You're the decline.
 
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Silva

Arcane
Joined
Jul 17, 2005
Messages
4,927
Location
Rio de Janeiro, Brasil
Do you really not think that it detracts from the game when some ruins in Mountaintops of the Giants, a region that's been cut off from the mainland for ages, looks exactly the same as the first bogstandard ruins you encounter in Limgrave?
They could do it like in Bloodborne's chalice dungeons, which had different tilesets depending on "region" (Pthumeru, Loran, Isz, etc).
 

Agame

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 29, 2015
Messages
1,707
Location
I cum from a land down under
Insert Title Here
I'm still fucking around Limgrave. Granted i have limited time to play, but this area never ends. I've done everything i can in both the west and eastern side of it, and all that's left is that southern section (which however i don't think is actually part of Limgrave) and the Siofra River which i'll skip for now and head to Stormveil instead.

I think exhausting Limgrave is good to do before moving on. I kind of migrated to Caelid underleveled and messed around there for a while and then did Stormveil and moved on to Liurnia. Upon returning to Limgrave to tie up loose ends I found myself massively overleveled.

If you are doing everything in every area then you will massively out-level the entire game world pretty quickly, From clearly designed the game assuming people would only do parts of it and leave some areas for replays.

And agree with people saying the upgrade system is nonsense, only being able to reliably level up one, maybe two weapons during playthrough? WTF is the respec system even in the game if I cannot use any different weapons for a different build?

Also starting to think if they are so set on pop-a-mole open world they should just have level scaling in all areas, with obviously some areas set at a higher minimum. If you are going all in on Ubishit school of open world design then may as well double down and go all the way.

Going back to look at previous areas and killing bosses in a few hits is so lame, and making me even more tired of playing this game (which is amazing as I thought I had hit the floor of boredom level, apparently not.)
 

Agame

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 29, 2015
Messages
1,707
Location
I cum from a land down under
Insert Title Here
I'm really done arguing against people defending expendable copypasta. You're the decline.

Yeah this shit is equally as bad as Oblivion copy pasta dungeons, yet of course you will have people defending it because 'muh Miyazaki cult'.

The mines, ruins etc are garbage and could easily be removed from the game at no detriment. They already have the 'secondary dungeon' areas like the castle in weeping peninsula that are like mini legacy dungeons. Instead of spamming generic ruins and mines all over the place there should have been made in that style, with less in the game overall as its obviously more work to build.
 
Joined
Aug 10, 2012
Messages
5,914
Nah, they're not nearly as bad as Oblivion copypasta because there's hand-placed loot and non-level scaled enemies. I actually enjoyed a few catacombs (there's a lot more mechanical variation in them than ruins even if they look the same).

Regarding mini dungeons I really liked Castle Morne in the peninsula and the poison one in the plateau. The others were pretty mediocre, though (the one in Mt. Gelmir where you get the badass red hammer, the one in Mountaintops of the Giants and the one in Caelid). I guess Castle Sol was alright too.
 
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deem

Arbiter
Joined
Oct 3, 2019
Messages
421
If you are doing everything in every area then you will massively out-level the entire game world pretty quickly, From clearly designed the game assuming people would only do parts of it and leave some areas for replays.

I see your point. Perhaps the intended playstyle is doing part of an area and moving on, and visiting places you've missed on a second character.
 

ADL

Prophet
Joined
Oct 23, 2017
Messages
4,190
Location
Nantucket
Whoever designed the mandatory godskin duo fight can suck the shit out of my asshole. Half of the optional bosses are just as bad. From Software's games took a sharp turn being challenging but fair to straight up creating the most artificial difficulty levels of bullshit known to man to uphold their reputation of being ~soooooooooooooo hard~.

There's no tactics behind the fight. There's no interesting mechanics. They both just charge at you in a shitty boss arena and if you manage to kill one, they just resurrect and charge at you again until you defeat their shared health pool.
 
Self-Ejected

Zizka

Self-Ejected
Joined
Jan 15, 2020
Messages
429
I don’t know if this was mentioned before but:

It turns out that, despite the fact that Elden Ring has been estimated by one of its own development team as taking 30 hours,

Elden Ring's map size is huge, and Kitao stresses that the dev team designed the game with a 30-hour cap in mind early in development.

The 30-hour estimate was revealed in an extensive interview on Taipei Game Show 2022’s special broadcast with Elden Ring producer Yasuhiro Kitao.
Source: https://screenrant.com/elden-ring-how-long-beat-hidden-open-world/

In a different interview, Kitao said:
One thing fans may have noticed from the Elden Ring beta was just how powerful magic is- many enemies just aren’t prepared to deal with a long-range attack, leading fans to see it as overpowered.
Source: https://www.gamerbraves.com/elden-r...overtuned-for-beta-and-more-in-new-interview/


I'm really done arguing against people defending expendable copypasta. You're the decline

It’s pretty depressing when people recognise something is a flaw and then excuse said flaw with:
a. Game X also has that flaw and it’s a good game, ergo it’s not really a flaw.
b. But it’s a big world, but they didn’t have enough money, but it also has the following positives…
c. It’s a flaw but I choose to ignore it….

Just find a way to get rid of the shortcoming instead of trying to find ways to justify it. Why promote mediocrity? Having the ability to identify what could be improved upon in order to make something excellent even better is a pretty desirable character trait in my opinion.
 

deem

Arbiter
Joined
Oct 3, 2019
Messages
421
Whoever designed the mandatory godskin duo fight can suck the shit out of my asshole. Half of the optional bosses are just as bad. From Software's games took a sharp turn being challenging but fair to straight up creating the most artificial difficulty levels of bullshit known to man to uphold their reputation of being ~soooooooooooooo hard~.

There's no tactics behind the fight. There's no interesting mechanics. They both just charge at you in a shitty boss arena and if you manage to kill one, they just resurrect and charge at you again until you defeat their shared health pool.

And that turn happened with the release of Dark Souls 2 when From Soft took the marketing gimmick of Dark Souls and adapted it into, as Miyazaky put it in recent interview, their identity.
 

deem

Arbiter
Joined
Oct 3, 2019
Messages
421
It’s pretty depressing when people recognise something is a flaw and then excuse said flaw with:
a. Game X also has that flaw and it’s a good game, ergo it’s not really a flaw.
b. But it’s a big world, but they didn’t have enough money, but it also has the following positives…
c. It’s a flaw but I choose to ignore it….

Just find a way to get rid of the shortcoming instead of trying to find ways to justify it. Why promote mediocrity? Having the ability to identify what could be improved upon in order to make something excellent even better is a pretty desirable character trait in my opinion.

We are not designing a game, we are playing it so none of our criticism will improve anything. It's engaging to critically discuss various aspects of the game, that's what I'm here for, but I also want to like every game I play.

What I find
depressing
is that some people see nothing but flaws and generally seem to hate their hobby.
 

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