For the past week or so, I was pondering God of War (Santa Monica Studio) versus Monster Hunter Rise (Capcom). They are both ‘old’ games that just got PC ports, which is why I’m interested. Even though I have a PS4, I am not going to buy any game for that console if I can avoid it. In addition, I don’t care if I play a game when it first comes out so it wasn’t that I HAD to buy one of the games right at this moment. However, I’m going to be playing Elden Ring (FromSoft) from the moment it comes out (hopefully, February 25th) to the end of time.
I want a game to tide me over until that date, not that I can’t play Dark Souls III until then. I’m currently in NG+4 on the Road to Sacri–wait. No. I beat the Crystal Sage, I think. Maybe? Anyway, I’m around there. No, I think I still have to fight the CS in this cycle. And I’m still dipping in Cozy Grove every day as well as Dorfromantik. But I hunger for a new game because I’ve been playing those three games for the past several months. Cozy Grove, it’s been nine months. Dorfromantik has been at least four. As for Dark Souls III, well, I’ve been playing that game since 2016.
It’s a bit strange to me that I was considering a new game that I would only play for a month-and-a-half. I mean, I could play it past then, but let’s be real. Once Elden Ring drops, that’s all I’m going to be playing for the foreseeable future. I might still check in on Cozy Grove, but I don’t like to play two action adventure games at the same time–in part because the buttons are never the same. Any time I go back to Dark Souls, I come perilously close to hitting an NPC. One time, I had a controller that eventually broke the B button. I broke it. Not on purpose, but because I use it so much. B is run/roll/dodge/quickstep in Souls games and I’m pressing in almost constantly as I play the games.
I asked my brother what I could do and he said I could map roll to another button. I laughed because that’s unthinkable. Soulslikes are always trying to differentiate themselves and one way is by having different buttons. Which, fine. Go for it. But do not touch the B button–just don’t. I found out many years after I started playing Souls games that their button scheme is considered weird and bad, but it’s all I know so it’s default for me. Anyway, one soulslike I actually liked was Salt and Sanctuary by Ska Studios, which was a cartoon-y soulslike. It was an homage–veering dangerously close to copying. It’s clear that they love Souls games and wanted to do something that was very similar–in 2D. Anyway, they put roll on…either RT or LT. And it wasn’t rebindable. I watched a few people play it and every single one mentioned that particular tidbit. By the time I got around to buying it, it was rebindable, thankfully.
I don’t mind games having different attack buttons, but I hate when they mess with roll and interact. Hades (Supergiant), which I recently played again, has interact on RB. I am not a fan of that. And it’s hard to switch back and forth between a game like that and Souls. RB in Souls is a light attack so, yeah. When I play Nioh, I can’t play Souls at the same time. There is just no way for me to play those two franchises at the same time. It’s the same with Mon Hun and Souls. The former has attacks on Y and B–and with some assist from RT. Interact is A. X is use item–which is like Dark Souls. A is dodge/roll in combat, which is a bit confusing. For whatever reason, though, it’s not as intrusive–probably because I put 300 hours into Monster Hunter World.
The demo did not make me feel warmly towards the game. I wasn’t going to get it, but then I watched Ian stream it a bit. He had audio issues, but I was completely enamored with the quirky and charming graphics. I will say, though ,that Japanese games need to sort themselves out when it comes to their depiction of women. There are these two twins who creeped me the fuck out in the beginning of the game. They became tolerable once they separated (one is the village quest maiden and the other is the hub quest maiden), but their introduction was really cringe-inducing.
Ian hyped up the game and I decided to go for it. Part of what drew me into MHW was the village side of things, which was a definite part of the loop. After each hunt, I would do my rounds, visiting all the NPCs and petting the Poogie. Ian said that the loop was just as satisfying in MHR, which pushed me towards buying it. Also, it’s under 20 GB. That’s unheard of these days! So I bought it, installed it, and jumped in.
I have to say that the loop IS satisfying. I haven’t gotten to know the NPCs that well yet, but I like just wandering around and exploring. And, it’s funny, but the training quest that took me nearly the entire amount of time in the demo took maybe ten minutes in the game proper. Probably because it’s the second time I did it, but for whatever reason, it made more inherent sense the second time around. One of my biggest issues with MHW that is proving to be an issue in MHR as well is the map. I have spatial issues and a lousy sense of direction. In the mon hun worlds, there is a lot of verticality and my brain just can’t handle it. When I look at the map and see that something should be within centimeters of where I am and yet, I can’t see the thing, it’s irritating as fuck, It’s on a higher or lower level, but it’s not easy to access. They’ve added the wirebugs that make it easier to traverse vertically, but I have still lost a lot of time trying to get to a certain spot on the map.
It’s funny. for as much as Dark Souls games are called esoteric and impenetrable, I’ve never really had a problem with traversing the worlds. They don’t have a map (except Sekiro, which has a joke map), and the way you learn about the worlds is by dying over and over again. Putting the shitty platforming aside, they don’t make traversal difficult as far as getting from Point A to Point B. I’m not explaining this well, but the difficulty isn’t about not being able to figure out the physical layout of the worlds–at least not for me. Which is funny because I’m terrible with it in real life and in most other games. But something about the FromSoft games meshes with my brain–especially the Dark Souls games.
I’ve put two hours or so into the game so far. One thing I’m hoping is that the weapons are crazier than they were in MHW because those weren’t funny or silly at all. I just watched a video of all the funniest/silliest weapons in MHR, which gives me hope. There’s a great sword that is a big floppy shark and a hammer that is a jack-o’-lantern. In the old MH games, there is a whole set of cheese-related weapons, which I find hilarious. The weapons in MHW were really elaborate and gorgeous, but they were definitely not funny. I think it’s because they were able to make the game photorealistic (it was on PC) and they wanted to show off the flashier side of their graphics. Which, understandable, but it was a shame that there were no zany weapons. I’m glad they’ve rectified that in MHR. I’m also glad they didn’t bring back paintballs and literally having to load new areas when crossing the boundaries. I have the vague feeling that they wanted to, but decided not to make it harder for the n00bs.
I’m excited to get stuck in and to see if I glom onto MHR the way I did MHW. If I do, it’ll be interesting to see how I deal with it once Elden Ring comes out.