Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: dark souls

FromSoft again? You bet! Part eight

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I have one more post in me about FromSoft. Let’s be real. I could write about them endlessly, but for now, I’ll stick to one post at a time. In the last post, I talked about why Patches is a better representation of the From games than is Solaire. Oooooh yes. I know that’s so controversial of me to say, but it’s how I feel deep in my heart.

Ian and I have discussed plenty of times whether Miyazaki loves his fans or hates them. I’ve said this before, but here are the arguments for both sides.

Miyazaki hates his fans: His worlds are so bleak and actively out to get the player. It’s pure misery everywhere you go, and everyone is hurting in one way or the other. Hell, one of the main points of the first game is that if you go Hollow, you’ll lose your reason to live. That’s when you lose your mind and it’s just a mercy to kill you. There are more than one NPC in the first game that you can mercy kill after they lose their minds (Griggs of Vinheim, Big Hat Logan, Oscar of Astoria, Crestfallen Warrior, Reah of Thorolund, Laurentius of the Great Swamp, to name more than a few. And, of course, the big man himself, Solaire).

That’s just off the top of my head–there might be more. I don’t do them all every time, but I have done them all at least once. Hm. That might actually be my next playthrough–doing all the NPC mercy killings.

By the way, many people like to kill all the NPCs at the end of the playthrough and before NG+ to get the items that they drop. I’ve done that, but I felt really bad about it. I don’t do it any longer.

It’s amazing to me how I can remember every corner of the game–at least in the first half. I did those runs so often, I can do them in my sleep. I will admit that I’m not quite as good at the second half of the game, but I know the general layout and most of the enemies. You kind have to when you die a million times on the way to the boss.

It’s also wild to me that I’ve played this game at least two dozen times, and I still find new things/hear new things about it. I’m sure that there are no secrets left to be found, but that doesn’t mean I’ve heard/seen it all.

One of the best things about playing a From game real time is the sense of community that happens when everyone is looking for secrets and commiserating about how hard certain bosses/areas are. This has happened since Demon’s Souls, and it’s one thing that makes the games incomparable. People are divided as to whether Miyazaki meant it to be that way or not, but my god, it has paid off in spades.


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More about FromSoft (and stuff), part six

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So, apparently there are rumors that FromSoft is working on a pirate game, code name Cerusean Onslaught. Before I go further with this into the realm of pure speculation, here is the post I wrote yesterday. Now, let’s go on with baseless spinning of what probably isn’t happening. Cerulean was a key word in Elden Ring for two reasons. One, it was in the name of the flask for casting magicks (Flask of Cerulean Tears) and two, it was the name of an area in the DLC.

*Spoilers from here until I’m done theorizing*

The area is called the Cerulean Coast, and as has been pointed out, the–ok. It’s like this. In each of the four cardinal points it the DLC, there is a a mauseoleum. In each of them, there is a powerful enemy you can fight for some pretty tasty rewards. In fact, the first one you can come across within the first five minutes of the DLC. He wrecked my shit for an hour and was the sole reason I respecced my health so he could not kill me in one hit. I went from 38 Vigor to 60 (the recommended amount of Vigor for the game in general), and that made such a big difference. No way I would have had fun doing the DLC with less than 40 Vigor.

Fun fact; I played the first hundred hours of the base game (which was roughly half the game)  with 18 Vigor. I do NOT recommend that at all! I didn’t plan on doing that, but I always found something else to put the points in. It was only when I wanted to use the best spirit ash in the game–and that took 21 Vigor (instead of Mind, which is what the Flask of Cerulean Tears is for). If it weren’t for that, who knows how long I would have went with only 18 Vigor?

Back to the mausoleums. The one in the Cerulean Coast has a boss who is a woman who is a dancer. But also looks like a pirate–sort of. If you squint. There is also a marooned (what looks like a) pirate ship near the ocean in this area.

FromSoft has a habit of putting an NPC in the DLC of a game who signifies what the next game is going to be like. They put Marvelous Chester in the first Dark Souls DLC as a nod to Bloodborne. Then, in Bloodborne’s DLC, they had Old Hunter Yamamura, a hunter from a foreign eastern land who was a nod to Sekiro.

I see that some people consider the Armored Warrior (a boss) in Sekiro, a heavily armored person who came from a distant land to find a cure for his sick child to be a harbinger of Elden Ring, but I’m not so sure I buy that one. I mean, yes, the Armored Warrior doesn’t fit the aesthetics of Sekiro, but that wasn’t the only thing that people noticed about the out-of-place NPCs who seemed to indicate what the next game was about. In the other game, it was in the DLC, and it wasn’t a boss.


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Still more on FromSoft (and other shit), part five

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I am always amused/bewildered/confused by the console gamers who are so vitriolic against PC gamers. I mean, I don’t get console wars at all because who the fuck cares? Play what you want to play on what you want to play it on. That’s pretty much my belief. It’s also wild to me that after years of people saying that exclusivity is bad, there are a bunch of hardcore Xboxers who are now demanding exclusivity once again.

I mean, I get it because PlayStation is still sticking to their exclusivity as is Nintendo. PS has said that they will not be porting their games to PC any longer. If certain platforms stick with their exclusives, then Xbox has to do the same if they’re serious about being a meaningful console. But, and bear with me, if it seems as if consoles are dying out as far as brand loyalty, then so be it.

Also, if Xbox is going to truly be exclusive, meaning not being on PC, then I think that’s the wrong way of thinking. I’m not in the industry, obviously, but at this point, going with exclusives that are truly only on the Xbox seems so regressive. Gamers have been advocating to get rid of exclusivities for quite some time, and now, a small minority of them are suddenly pushing hard for them once again?

Look.

I’m not someone who is brand loyal to anything that is a product. I’m also not a team player or anything like that. I don’t get having undying loyalty for something/someone who cannot by nature give you the same kind of loyalty in return.

This is true of teams, celebrities, and especially for products–which video games are. It’s a slippery area beacuse they can also be art, which is more difficult to put a price on. But, lik a piece of art that I might buy–it’s worth what I’m willing to pay for it. To me, I mean–not in general.

FromSoft is probably a ‘brand’ that I’m more loyal to than almost any other brand. I have said in the past that–oh, this is my post on them from yesterday. In which I rambled about this, that, and the other thing. I will buy any From game I can immediately. In fact,  they are the only games I’ll preorder. I am always willing to give my money to FromSoft.

Until now. I did not like either Elden Ring Nightreign or  Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon. Or rather, I could not play either of these games. Because of several issues I have, I simply could not do the things necessary to play these two games. Not “didn’t” or “wouldn’t”, but couldn’t. I can’t do anything that requires being able to gauge spatial distances accurately nor twitch responses. Nor any kind of deflection/parry.

Devout fans of FromSoft say, “Trust Miyazaki. He’s earned it.” (And to be fair, he did not direct either of the two games in the previous paragraph.) He is directing The Duskbloods. I’m uneasy with giving unconditional loyalty to anyone I don’t know personally, no matter how genius they are.


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More FromSoft musings (part four)

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I got a decent amount of sleep last night, and it just feels so good. I have no idea why I’m such like a toddler when it comes to going to bed, but I wish it weren’t so difificult for me to go to bed. I know it’s in part a neurospicy thing, but that doesn’t make me feel any less silly/guilty/ashamed that I can’t make myself go to bed earlier.

In fact, it’s been inching back again. I put a hard stop to that, and I managed to make it to bed by 3:30 a.m. last night. I think part of the problem is that I’m giving myself a generous window in a case where a hard stop would be better. In some cases, I’m fine with giving myself a generous deadline. In other cases like this, I’m going to push it because I can. I know myself. This will just be what I do.

I can be sitting at my computer and literally watching the clock tick, tick, tick. My brain will be saying, “I should be going to bed” while I continue to sit there, motionless, for the next hour or three. Usually, playing a casual comfy game that I can just do without thinking.

And, oh what the hell. It’s 59F right now, which is right on track with what it should be around this time of year. It’s really green outside, though, which means thunderstorms. We had one last night, which made me happy. I like a good thunderstorm.

Back to FromSoft games. I have a character in Dark Souls in which I just finished Big Hat Logan’s quest–which meant I got his big hat. And it’s a very big hat. I rarely do his quest because it’s very intricate and laborious. Plus, you have to buy all his spells which costs a pretty penny. I did it on a recent run just for funsies. It’s supposedly an intelligence run, but it’s not. Oh, and here’s my post from yesterday in which I talked about the worst boss in all of FromSoft’s games.

My issue is that I am wedded to a certain build–and a certain weapon. I adore the Zwei, which takes 24 Strength and 10 Dex. Because I’m a caster, I don’t need that many points in Strength. I do like to put 12 into Dex so I can use a bow. The Battle Axe, which is a decent enough weapon for a Pyromancer, takes 12 Strength and 8 Dex.

I am firmly a strengthcaster. That means even when I focus on casting, I want to be able to wield the Zwei. You can wield it two-handed at somethnig like 16 strength (it takes 60% of the Strength stat to wield a weapon two-handed, I think), but I don’t like to two-hand weapons (yes, I know that’s ironic giving the weapon I’m talking about).


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Double Fan Form: nearing the end, part four

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Double Fan Form. It’s so fucking hard. The whole post could just be that, but I’m going to unpack it even further. I was talking about my family history for most of the post because that’s how I roll. I am a strong writer, but I tend to meander all over the place. Why use one word when ten will do? Writing is esy for me; editing is hard. I do edit as I go, which I shouldn’t do.  I talked with my Taiji teacher about that today because I have to actively resist doing th same with my forms.

My teacher has told me several times that I should learn a form first and then do the refinements. Obviously, that means actually learning the steps. I tend to fudge them sometimes, so I will occasionally go back and reteach them to myself. That’s what I did when I realized I didn’t know chunks of the Fan Form.

By the way, my memory is shit now. I thought I had taught myself the Fan Form before my medical crisis (which was in September of 2021). When I was looking through my emails to find something else, I stumbled across emails to my teacher from February of 2022 in which I said that I was going to teach myself the Fan form. That was five months after my medical crisis, which is amazing in and of itself.

Earlier this year or late last year, I was teaching myself the left side of the fan. It was going pretty well when I reached a spot that I had no idea what came next. I thought back to the right side of the form, and I could not make that pull. I went back to the video (which I had to dig around to find because my teacher sent it to me, an I did not put it any place reasonable), and then I realized I had messed up several postures in the form. Not only that, I had completely omitted several more later in the form (very much near the end).

I blame my medical crisis. I did not have much long-term ramifications from it, but one thing that was affected was my memory. Now, given what I went through, this was to be expected. Even though I had a great memory before my medical crisis, I did not take it too hard when my memory suddenly became like Swiss cheese. I will say that it’s come back to about 75%, which I’m fine with.

It’s weird, though. As I get older, I start wondering if the small ailments I’m feeling are because of my medical crisis or because of my age. When I have a memory lapse, is it because of my brain getting hit so (metaphorically) hard? Or is it just because I’m getting older? Or is it both?


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Double Fan Form: nearing the end, part two

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I want to talk more about the Double Fan Form because I’m reaching the end of the form. Well, I mean, I have seven postures left to learn, but they are hard. I watched to the end one of the three videos I’m using to teach myself, and damn. Here is the post from yesterday, in which I talk a lot about my triple shots day and not as much about my Double Fan Form.

There is a truism in Taiji that the last part of any form is the expert part of it. Meaning, this is the part that is going to test your mettle and kick your ass. You’re going to have to put all the knowledge you have gained through the rest of the form together and take your game to the next level.

That’s it for my pep talk. Let me drop that and emphasize yet again that this is by far the hardest weapon form I’ve learned. There was a time early on when I considered giving up. We’re talking in the first quarter of the form. I remember struggling so much and wondering if I would ever get it. I tend to look at how long the journey is, which makes me discouraged when it’s not going well. I also have a very low frustration tolerance level, which doesn’t help.

I’m glad to be back at it again. I’m still not quite a hundred percent, but I’m close enough to get back to teaching myself the Double Fan Form. I am proud of myself for sticking with it, to be frank. It’s a weird trait of mine that if I’m into something, I will be obsessed with it. Until I hit my limit, and then I’m done with it. It’s not a good thing, but it’s how my brain works.

Both in microcosm and macrocosm, really. I do that with things like friendships, websites, and hobbies. Not the hobbies as a whole, but projects in my hobby. Well, let me put it this way. I give up easily. Usually. The reason is because when I was a kid, my parents were very exacting. There is the stereotype of the Tiger Mom, and it’s pretty apt.

I had to be busy all the time. In addition to school, I had to play an instrument (I chose cello), take dancing lessons from the age of two (which I mostly enjoyd until en pointe ballet entered the conversation), and I played ping-pong, tennis, and softball. I liked them all to some extent. Oh, and I had to go to summer school every summer as well. And it had to be an enrichment kind of summer school, too. I went to T-CITY (Twin Cities Institute for Talented Youth) for five years, taking writing twice, acting twice, and Latin once. We had class all morning, then had sports (against the other classes) after lunch. It was also fun for the most part, and I met my first boyfriend there.


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Double Fan Form: the Dark Souls of Taiji weapon forms

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It is a month and a half since I got three shots on the same day. My second shingles shot, my pneumonia vax, and my regular blood work shot that I have to get every year. That was NOT a smart idea, especially as the second shingles shot was notorious for being an extra-impactful one. Or rather, I had heard that everyone who got the shingles shots felt one or the other disproportionately hard. K had difficulty with the first one and thought she would have to go to the emergency room after getting it.

I am sensitive to shots in general, anyway. When I got my first Covid vax, I had a swollen bump until I got the second shot–six weeks later. It was pretty small and not hot by the time I got the second one, but it was still there.

I got the first one and was pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t bad–for me, anyway. Yes, I reacted to it. Yes, my arm was hot, swollen, and throbbing for a week or so, but that’s what I expect when I get vax shots. Yeah, I was a bit feverish, too. But, again, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I was at half-mast for maybe three weeks in total.

The second shot? My god. It was brutal. Absolutely brutal. I have never had a reaction like that to a shot before. Again, it did not help that I had gotten my pneumonia vax on the same day (different arm), but that was a walk in the park compared to the second shingles shot. It wiped me out, and I didn’t do any Taiji for several days. Then, I started to cautiously add to my practice day by day, and it’s only yesterday that I finally felt ready to teach myself more of the Double Fan Form.

Before I get to that, I have to mention that on the day of the three shots, I got one in each arm and one in the back of my left hand. About a decade ago, I d discovered the wonder of butterfly needles. I don’t remember how, but probably a phlebotomist suggested it once, and now, I bring it up whenever I need to get a shot. It’s not always viable, but when it is, it makes blood drawing easy-peasy. I don’t want to insult any phlebotomist, but I know that using a butterfly needle is going to make it so much easier for both parties.

Even before I had to take time off to recover from my shots, the Double Fan Form was kicking my ass. I am used to learning weapon forms with ease. Yes, the Saber Form was difficult as my second form, but that was because I was looking at it like it was just a bigger sword. Once I realized that it was its own thing, I was able to learn it in a brisk fashion.


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Talking more about soulslikes

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Let’s talk a bit more about soulslikes. I brought up WUCHANG: Fallen Feathers (LEENZEE) yesterday beacuse it’s coming out soon, and the RKG Discord is going mad over it. Supposedly, a games journalist said that it’s to Dark Souls what Lies of P did for Bloodborne, and several people in the Discord were so hyped about it.

Once again, I felt as if I were a weirdo in a weird world. I have heard enough good things about it that I’m mildly curious, but I also know what’s going to happen. If I have any hope in my heart, it’ll be ruthlessly stomped on as I play the game.

Side note: The game is on Game Pass. Aaaargh. That makes it way too easy to try it out. In fact, that’s how I played Lies of P (Round8 Studio/NEOWIZ)–yes, the whole game. And Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Sanfall Interactive).

This game has been universally praised as one of the best (if not the best) soulslikes to date. That is quite high praise, indeed. The Backlogs, a channel I watch sporadically, did a video on whether he could beat the game with magic. Since I heard from another YouTuber that the magic gets less useful as you go along, I am keen to hear what The Backlogs has to say. But, the video is over an hour long, and he was asked by the developer to break the game. And he could show everything but the ending.

I’ve included the video below. I’m about fifteen minutes in, but I don’t know how much I’ll watch. If I am going to play the game, I don’t want to spoil myself too much. In fact, if I do play it, I have watched more than I normally would before playing a game.

I’m installing it. Yes, even someone as jaded as I am can still have hope, apparently. Even though I have been disappointed countless times before, I still want to believe that the next game will be different.

I will say that I’m glad there’s transmogrification beacuse I just cannot with the ridiculous armor. It makes me angry that this is still a thing in 20 fucking 25.

I think, though, that my time with soulslikes is coming to an end. I have not enjoyed a single one since Salt and Sanctuary (Ska Studio), and I only finished Lies of P because of my stubborn pride. I cheesed my way through it, and I did not feel a sense of accomplishment at the end. I have no desire to try the DLC, and a large part of that is because i would have to play the game again in order to get there. Roughly two-thirds of the game, at any rate. And, yes, they put in different modes, but still. Also, I would have to pay for it because it’s not on Game Pass any longer.


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Sequel to the third, yes one more post

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I want to talk about sequels some more because I can. This is the fourth post about sequels, and I want to talk specifically about the Cozy Grove sequel. I wrote about my impressions of it (Cozy Grove: Camp Spirit (Spry Fox)), but I got stuck on the idea of sequels.

I went deep into the rabbit hole of the different Dark Souls II launch trailers, which I have not seen before, as I was thinking about sequels. FromSoft trailers always go hard, and one reason I skip them is because they give so much away. Yes, it’s hard to tell what is what without context, but still. They show late-game bosses, which is just wild. In fact, for Dark Souls III, the final boss was the box art.

I have not played more of Cozy Grove: Camp Spirit, and there are several reasons for it. But first, I’d like to reiterate that this is a mobile game. The only reason I played it at all was because I was somehow included in the Netflix beta, which I did not know until I went to Netflix for the first time in quite some time. It’s funny because I went there to cancel my membership (another post for another day), and to my surprise, I was able to play Cozy Grove: Camp Spirit on my PC. I was stoked because there was no way I was going to play the game on mobile.

By the way, in searching for the reveal trailer, I stumbled on a Reddit thread from Cozy Grove fans who were heartbroken than the game was going to be a Netflix exclusive AND a mobile game. A few people were scolding the people who said they were mad/upset/disappointed because games cost money! Yes, they do. And as I stated in my quick look at the sequel, I am not upset at Spry Fox for grabbing that Netflix money. They need to get paid and they need to eat.

However. I am also with the stalwart fans who are upset because in order to play the game, you have to keep your Netflix membership in perpetuity AND you have to play the game on your cell phone. With a teeny tiny screen. Someone pointed out that the cheapest subscription is $7.99 a month, which is $95.88 a year. It might have been a bit cheaper when the game came out because they raised their prices fairly recently, but it wouldn’t have been that much cheaper.

I wonder how many people have played the game versus the first game, but I don’t think it would be easy to find that data. I don’t think Netflix would be freely letting that out into the wild. Also, please stay in your fucking lane, Netflix. I mentioned this earlier as well, but I don’t think they are doing the right thing as they try to get into the games biz.


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Sequel to the sequel about sequels

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I want to talk about sequels in video games one more time. In the last post, I pointed out some positive things about Scholar of the First Sin, the sequel to the first Dark Souls game. I ended it by talking about a popular FromSoft content creator who was pissed as hell that Elden Ring was designed around spirit summons. I’m not naming the guy, but he’s someone I watched casually in the past. A few months after Elden Ring was released, this guy put out a video that said in time, Elden Ring would be considered the worst FromSoft game. Ever.

I laughed in bemusement because one, it was only a few months after the game had come out. Two, who the hell was this guy to be the final arbiter on what was the worst FromSoft game of all time? Three. He was just wrong–and it was sour grapes. Four. It very much reminded me of fans of a hipster band who got angry when that band got big. “I was a fan before they were popular!”

Did FromSoft take a different tack with this game than with their past games? Yes. Did they balance the boss fights around spirit summons/human summons? Yes. More the former than the latter, but they made it pretty clear that the game was very summon-friendly. They also made it harder to get invaded in that you had to be using the multi-player aspect in order to be invaded. In past games, you could get invaded simply by being human–and in the case of Dark Souls II, when you weren’t human, too. I haaaaaaated that about the sequel because I suck at PvP and was mad that there was no respite from being invaded in that game. In fact, I think the more curse you had, the easier it was to get invaded. So, the opposite of the other games.

It’s funny to me how people claim they want something different, but then insist on playing the games in the exact same way. I watched a video arguing that fighting the bosses solo in Elden Ring was playing on hard mode, and it was a choice players made for themselves. Before this game, I was someone who did fight all the bosses solo (with some exceptions, but I’m not going to get into that).

It’s funny how death changes you, though. Or at least it did me. When I came back form the dead, I was grateful to have another Miyazaki world to explore; I did not care about soloing. At all. I mean, I have done all the main bosses with just the spirit summon, which is this game’s soloing the bosses.

Anyway. Here’s my point. We rail at developers for putting out the same game over and over. And then we rail at them when they change things up. This has always been my observation about Dark Souls II. If it had been called something completely different, I don’t think it would have gotten half the shit it did. But as I said in the last post, it was caught between a rock and a hard place.


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