I’m still playing Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Sandfall Interactive), andw I have many more thoughts about it. MANY. I wrote a lot about the game in yesterday’s post, and I ended with the thought that the more I play the game, the less I enjoy it.
I am in the extreme minority in this, I fear. Everyone else loves this game, and I mean LOVES it. Obsessed with it. Can’t stop playing it. Can’t stop gushing about it. Whereas I…
Sigh.
Why do I have to be that person again? I could not play Blue Prince (Dogubomb), which I really loved, but got nauseous because it’s first problem. No matter how much I fiddled with the options, I could not play more without getting a severe headache. I maanged to do two days (two runs) on two consecutive days (each), and then put it down forever. I adored the game, but I could not stomach the first-person view.
Back to Clair Obscur.
Let me say clearly that this is a great game. I knew from the moment I started it that it was very special. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I adore Lune and Gustave and could spend hours with them. I’m neutral about Maelle so far, but I do like her fencer abilities.
I have to say that each party member is distinct in terms of abilities. Gustave is the hit hard and be blunt guy, and he has a firearm as well. Lune is the mage with all the elemental attacks. She is so damn powerful, and I love her. Maelle is the fencer and has difference stances.
Here’s where things get complicated.
deep breath
Each character has a LT ability. I have no idea how many times you can use it until you run out of ability because it seems to be different for each character. Gustave shoots; Lune does a blast of elemental damage; Maelle does a slash. I can shoot with Gustave’s gun four or five times in a row. I do know that if I do perfect dodges and/or parries, I build up some kind of points which I can then use to overchange the gun? Or something.
Then, there are skills, and they also take the same kind of points. Each character have six or so skills that they can use. I can do one skill before doing an action. Oh, and the LT attacks don’t count as moves. With some of the skills and some of the actions, I have to do quick-time events (pressing the A button at the right time) to maximize the damage. It’s not just a ‘press A when it flashes’, oh no. That would be too easy. It’s a ‘let the A fill up (it lights up bit by bit) and then press at the exact right time’.
I get it maybe a third of the time. If I’m lucky. Hah! I wrote ‘If I’m sucky’ at first, which is very true.
By the way, the video I have included above, is by James Stephanie Sterling about how she adores Clair Obscur, but cannot play it. And she mentioned her review of Sekiro, which I have cited umpteenth times before. She, like I, love Clair Obscur but is not getting on with the combat. That’s how she felt about Sekiro, too.
She mentions that all the available accessible options don’t help with the problem she is having–which is that she can’t recognize the tells for all the different enemies. I saw a video about audio cues, but I can barely hear them under the cacophony of the action plus the music. Also, my reflexes SUCK, so even if I can hear the cue, I can’t react in time.
One thing Sterling mentions is that the timing is so unforgiving and varying in this game. And that you HAVE to be able to parry and/or dodge because the enemies can kill you in a few hits. I’ve been over-leveling like mad so I can stand a few solid hits per fight, but I know that is not going to last later in the game.
Sterling also talks about how each enemy attack is different and there are so many of them. Plus, there are combos. And enemies start having shields so you have to break each one before you can do any damage to the enemy itself. She talked about how you have to do damage fast and not take damage in order to move on.
In addition, she said she’s still sucking on easy mode, which does not fill me with confidence.
Every time I start a fight, I sigh in frustration. I do it because I need to level up, but I don’t like the combat system at all. I read in the Discord everyone who is grooving with it, and I am filled with envy.
I don’t vibe with the combat at all. If I get the parry or dodge, I’m surprised and don’t know what to do with myself. I don’t feel the rhythm. I turned off the video I was watching on the side to focus on the game, and I still could not hear the attack for the life of me.
Plus, there is one enemy who I still cannot really see its attacks. I know that I should just try to block, but parry + riposte is so much better. It’s a trap, though, becausue if I cannot get the parry, then I take more damage. It’s better to negate the damage completely.
When I started up the game for the second hour session, I sighed and girded my loins. I did not want to do it. I did not want to do the combat. Or be overwhelmed by all the different systems. Or just feel like I have no clue what I’m doing. It’s similar to Sekiro. Everyone says, “It’s like a rhythm game once you get it.” No it’s not. Rhythm games are steady in their flashing. I did a bit of DDR back in the day. Not much, but I was decent at it. This game and Sekiro, too, are all about fucking up the rhythm.
I mean, the parrying in the Souls games are also different for different enemies, but you don’t have to parry to win those games.
I’m done with it for now. I will write a third (and probably finally) post about it tomorrow.