Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: fromsoft

Time to say goodbye…maybe (part two)

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In yesterday’s post, I was talking about FromSoft. When Demon’s Souls came out in 2009, it was a last-ditch effort by FromSoft to get something out of a game they deemed to be a failure. They put one of their devs in charge, a cog in the wheel named Hidetaka Miyazaki, and they allowed him to do anything he wanted with it. Because, and I cannot emphasize this enough, he was expected to fail. Or rather, the game was. The company had no faith in it and just wanted it off their hands.

It didn’t sell exceedingly well, but it got a very enthusiastic cult following–and a request (demand) for it to be ported to the PC. It never got that port, but the game did well enough for Miyazaki to be allowed to make another game. It was a sequel called Dark Souls, and that was the beginning of the slow, but steady rise for the little company that could, FromSoft.

Once again, the requests (demands) for a port to the PC was loud. And there was one, but it was terrible. TERRIBLE. Fortunately, a modder came up with the dsfix which made it bearable on the PC. By the time I decided to play the game, it ran decently. I did not have the Blighttown two FPS issue, and I was able to play the game without many technical difficulties. Did I suck at it? Of course I did. Did I hate it by the end of the playthrough? I certainly did! Did I vow I would never play it again? Yup.

Ha! I have to laugh at my previous self because I was so far off track as to what would happen on my FromSoft journey. I did put it away for a bit, but then the sequel came out. And despite myself, I was intrigued.

I cannot overstate how much of a love-hate relationship I had with the original Dark Souls game. I was very proud that I finished it, but it made me feel so tired. So very tired. This is how I feel when I finish every game, by the way. It’s partly my fault because when a new From game comes out, it’s all I want to do. I become obsessed and play hours at a time, and they are not short games.  Plus, the fact that I will take at least twice as long as normal players to play a From game, well, that can veer on grueling.

I waited until the Scholar of the First Sin edition of the second game before playing it. And, yes, Miyazaki was not behind this one. Yes, it’s considered the unloved child in the FromSoft family of games, and yes, it’s both hated and loved (by different people), and there are even some people who consider it the best Souls game. I am not one of them (that would be the third game), but I did end up liking the game very much–as long as I didn’t hold it to rigid Dark Souls standards.

Side note: I have said this so many times that the sequel had no way to win. If it had been just the same as the first game, people would have complained that it wasn’t innovative. In the ways it actually deviated from the original, people hated it. Hated it. I’m not going to say that all the innovations were great, but I’m also not going to say they were terrible, either. In fact, I would say that the things I liked least about the game was when they doubled down on making things HARD BECAUSE THAT’S HOW THE FIRST GAME WAS.


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What is niche vs. what is mainstream

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It’s 82F right now. I had to run to the pharmacy to pick up a med, and it was hot. H-O-T, I say. It seems we’ve skipped spring altogether and went straight to summer. Except, we have a low of 41F for Tuesday, so winter may not be done with us yet. That is the weather in Minnesota right now, but not what I want to talk about.

Oh, and my sleep has been creeping back again. But I did get over eight hours of sleep last night, so that’s good. But I don’t want to go to bed past three in the morning. That’s my goal. Four at the latest (which I did not meet last night). I let myself fuck around too much last night–and I found out.

One thing, though. I don’t want to let one off day completely wreck my schedule. I have the habit of giving up if I mess up once. I know that’s not a good thing, so I’m trying to not spiral.

Also, I want to up my daily writing from one hour to two (for the fiction side of it). That’s very doable as I used to write 2,000 words a day before my medical crisis. One hour is nearly 1,000 words, so I should be able to do 2,000 in two to three hours if I’m diligent.

That’s not what I want to talk about today, though. That would be my love for things that sit somewhere in the shadowy (heh) realm of niche and mainstream. There are two things I want to discuss, both in pop culture. Today, I will focus on FromSoft–I have not talked about them for a while.

Below, I have included a video of someone no hitting my BAE, Messmer, with what I think are the Dryleaf fists. (The martial arts weapons in the DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree. Very cool, but not my style.) I absolutely adore this OST and this boss. Funnily enough, he was the face of the DLC so everyone assumed he would be the last boss. Not even close. FromSoft loves to fuck with fans like that. Not saying he’s not important because he is, but his fight is roughly halfway through the DLC (if you do tihngs properly, which I did not).

I still get chills watching this boss fight and listening to the OST. It’s just so epic and grand. I love how From has major setpiece bosses, and this is definitely one of them. In fact, many of the bosses in tthe DLC for Elden Ring are major spectacles.

I’ve been thinking about how FromSoft went from the little studio that could (back in the 10s) to the powerful juggernaut it is today. Now, every game that is anywhere near the action adventure genre adds Fromlike elements to their games, and games in other genres do so as well. There has been a different focus at different times, and right now, it’s on the deflect/parry. Which, yuck. I hate it so much. Not only is it ableist (which it most definitely is), it’s just so boring.


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More speculation about remakes, remasters, and sequels

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I want to talk more about remasters, remakes, and sequels. I talked about it a bit in the past post beacuse I was ranting about PlayStation closing Bluepoint Games. I did not think it got enough ink because of what happened the next day (Phil Spencer ‘retiring’ and Sarah Bond ‘resigning’–from Xbox.) It never fails. Every time PlayStation fucks up, Xbox is determined to one up them. It’s as if Xbox could not stand to give up the limelight for a second, even if it’s for a negative reason.

I’m tired. It’s hard being a ‘gamer’ these days. I put that in quotes beacuse I have never really concerned myself a gamer. I mean, I play games, yes, but I don’t like the whole gamer life. Come to think of it, I don’t like any fandom. It’s not a Groucho Marx thing (does anyone know who he is these days?), but just that I don’t like to conform to other people. I don’t like people telling me what to do, and I certainly don’t like people telling me what to think.

In addition, I can usually see all sides to things, which makes it hard for me to be a team player. Some people say I’m contrary. Some people would be right. Though I’m not contrary on purpose. What I mean is that I’m not doing it to be a dick. I’m not doing it just to be contrary. I just see things differently. I try to keep it to myself most of the time because I know it’s not welcome in polite company.

Side note: I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing that I learned at a very young age to hide my true feelings. I buried that shit deep because the reaction if I didn’t was very negative. It’s one reason I live alone. I can’t let my mask down if there is anyone else around. Even online. I put it on so automatically, it’s just a part of me by now. It’s only when I’m at home alone that I can be myself. Or when I had my cat/s. They accepted me as I was (as long as I fed them and gave them love, obviously).

I had never felt as accepted as I did by my cats. They were very different, but they both had positive feelings about me. In fact, I lived with both Raven and Shadow for nine years and with Shadow for an additional seven+ years. I lived with Shadow longer than I have with anyone else. I used to say Raven was my heart and Shadow was my soul.

It’s only in the last few months that I’ve even thought of adopting another cat, but every time, I start casually looking, my heart squeezes and says no. I know some people adopt new animal friends soon after losing one, but I just can’t. I wish I could because I think I would like to share my space again, but I just can’t.


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Why I don’t play certain games (part four)

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I have more to say about games I play/don’t play/the state of the industry. I mean, there’s a lot going on there. Most of it is extremely shitty at the moment. I wrote about it in yesterday’s post, but I have more to say today. It’s pretty fucking bleak. I can’t stop thinking about how PlayStation announced on Thursday, February 19th that it was closing Bluepoint Games. People were talking about it (of course), and I thought it would carry us to the weekend. Most people were furious about it, and I thought that would take us into the weekend.

But, no. Xbox, as they have done for the past few years, said to PlayStation: Hold my beer! In their 25th anniversary year, on a Friday, Microsoft announced that Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox had ‘retired’ and that the second in command (president), Sarah Bond ‘resigned’.

Look. This is just bullshit. I mentioned it yesterday, but I wanted to say it again. It’s fucking bullshit. I don’t doubt that Phil Spencer was planning on retiring sometime soon, but I highly doubt that he would choose to it right before the 25th anniversary (November). And Sarah Bond ‘resigning’? Naw, son. She was presumed to be Spencer’s heir apparent, and there’s no way she would resign abruptly on a Friday night.

This is all ridiculous. And I’m mad that PlayStation seems to be getting away with shitcanning Bluepoint Games.

Side note: Ok. We have to talk about the elephant in the room. A Bloodborne remake. Bear with me. Ever since remakes have become the rage, there’s one that comes up time and time again. Bloodborne (FromSoft). It’s actually pretty funny to watch From fans bring it up every time there’s a big event, only to have their hopes dashed once again.

I’m not in the know at all, but it has always been obvious to me that From did not want to do a remake/remaster/touch it at all. In fact, I would gather than Miyazaki did not like to think of a game once he was done with it. He doesn’t like to do sequels. He had someone else direct Dark Souls II and some say Dark Souls III, though Miyazaki is credited with being the director of the third game. With the latter game, there are conflicting opinions on why he did that game. Some think he did it to make up for the shortcomings of the first game because he did not have the time to finish that one in the manner in which he would have preferred.

Others think that it was just a cynical cash grab. Or rather, that they did the third game in order to make money to do other things. I have not seen anything that supports or validates the second opinion, but of course people are going to say that. I’m not saying that it’s not true. It does seem like he doesn’t like to repeat himself, so I can see that he might have done the sequels begrudgingly. But he did do them.

This is my long-ass way of getting to the point. Which I’m not there yet.


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My 2025 game awards, part eight

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I have one more post in me in which I lavish praise upon Elden Ring (FromSoft). I have to say that no matter where FromSoft goes from here (and I have a feeling I may not be along for the ride), I will always have Elden Ring. Before I get into it, here is the post from yesterday in which I just gush about Elden Ring and Shadow of the Erdtree.

I don’t believe in perfection, but this is as close as it gets for me. They got rid of several of the things that made previous games frustration such as excessive boss runs, elaborate upgrading systems*, and weirdly named stats. They added a guard counter in addition to the parry and a dedicated jump button. Plus, Torrent, the spirit speed, which makes traversal much easier. Horse combat isn’t great, but it’s passable.

I’m doing the DLC with my dex(ish) character, and I’m astounded at how much easier it is when I just attack endlessly. I love my incants, but I need to use them sparingly. I did not put all those points into dex and endurance just to fiddle around the edges with my spells. Though I do love my spells. So much.

It’s funny because I’m a big pyro person in From games. That’s not the funny part; the funny part is that  I don’t use that many fire spells in Elden Ring. I use some, but there are so many great sorceries and incantations in the game, I like to keep a wide spread. One thing I appreciate about Rory (the R in RKG) is that he will try something new just for shits and giggles. And he will drop things without thinking twice about it, even if he absolutely loved it for several episodes. In the previous games, he was mostly a sword and board guy. In this game, he had a lot of fun dabbling with the incantations.

It sparked so much joy when he showed love to the Lightning Spear, Rotten Breath/Ekzyke’s Decay, and Swarm of Flies. I never thought he would becomeso enamored with the dragon heads, but it was great to see.  He cycled through weapons every few episodes. Mostly because he got bored, but also because the lads insisted he change it up now and again.

His build was all over the place because Krupa let him put his points pretty much wherever he wanted, which meant he spread them all over the place. That’s what I do, even though I know it’s not optimal. i can’t help myself, so it was nice to see Rory do it as well. One of the guys affectionately nicknamed it the smorgasbuild, and the name stuck. Many people were frustrated with it and urged him to do a real build. There were plenty of people who had Very Strong Ideas as to what those builds should be.


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My 2025 game awards, part seven

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Let’s talk more about Elden Ring (FromSoft) just becaause I can. This is my FromSoft game of the year, and here is yesterday’s post why Nightreign is not the one. It feels weird to not give the award to a FromSoft game that released within the calendar year, but I just could not do it.

I’m doing a dex(ish) run in Elden Ring, and I am in the DLC. As with many FromSoft games, getting to the DLC is not as easy as firing it up. It’s not hard to access, per se, but you have to be pretty far into the game in order to do so. Well, technically, you can get there fairly early, but you have to be really good in order to do that. If you go along the normal path, then you probably won’t do the second thing you need to do until the last fourth of the game.

This was one of the reasons that people were not happy with Shadow of the Erdtree being nominated for Game of the Year last year–the fact that you have to play three quarters of the base game in order to access the DLC. I don’t quite get that as sequels are considered fair game to be game of the year as well.

I mean, I do understand that it’s asking a lot. FromSoft always asks a lot from the player in order to access the DLC. The first game is notorious for how elaborate it was to get into the DLC. You had to kill the hydra in the lake in Darkroot Basin. Then, you had to kill the golden golem in the lake to release Dusk of Ooolacile who was imprisioned within. Then, you had to go to the Duke’s Archives to kill a specific crystal golem to get a necklace. Then, you had to go back to  the lake to access a portal at the very end of it.

You can’t even get to the Duke’s Archives until the second half of the game. FromSoft had to tell reviewers how to get the DLC because no one figured it out. Dark Souls III isn’t so bad, and the entrance to the DLC is in the first fourth of the game.

With Shadow of the Erdtree, there are two bosses you have to kill. The first one makes sense, and it fell in line with what people speculated would happen. The second, though, was a complete mystery. There was a lot of speculation why that particular boss needed to be killed in order to access the DLC, but there was no good answer until the DLC was dropped.

I have to say, I really don’t understand the furor over the SotE nom for game of the year last year. In addition to the aforementioned complaint, another gripe I heard was that Elden Ring already got its recognition, so it should sit down and shut up (basically). This also didn’t make any sense to me because as I said, sequels can be nominated for game of the yaer, so why not DLC? Any other company could have called this game a sequel and gotten so much praise for it. It’s very meaty–it took me over seventy hours to finish it. And I fucked up all the NPC questlines, which probably shaved off an hour or two.

In comparison, I put in over 200 hours for my first playthrough of Elden Ring. So the DLC was roughly a third the size and cost under half the price. That’s way more than most companies would do. Miyazaki has jokes for days when it comes to the size of his games. Before the DLC dropped, he said it was about the size of Limgrave (the first area of the base game). Well, yes, if you don’t count how vertical the DLC  is. It may be the size of Limgrave horizontally, but boy, did it go deep. I have not heard/seen so many people say/write the word ‘vertical’ over one game.

It’s apt, though. Miyazaki is known for his exquisite level design. Any game in which he is the lead shows how immaculate he is in this area. Well, at least when he has the time to execute it properly. And he went over the top with the DLC for this game.


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My 2025 game awards, part six

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Now we’ve come to the part of my awards giving where I’m the most conflicted I’ve ever been. Here is yesterday’s post on Hades II (Supergiant Games), a game that reall yhad me conflicted. I felt really weird that I wasn’t more enthusiastic about the game, but I can only be honest–I prefer the oreginal. The sequel is an excellent game, but there is nothing new in it that blew me away. And, I preferred much of the original to the sequel.

That was hard, but today is even harder. I have had an ongoing schtick in which I bestow an award to  FromSoft game every year, regardless of if they release a game that year or not. In a year in which they launch a game, it’s unheard of that I would not give that game the FromSoft award. Even if I could not play the game or it did not gel with me, it would automatically get the award.

Until this year.

Elden Ring Nightreign dropped this year. It used the assets from Elden Ring, but it was a standalone game. I knew from the trailer that it was not going to be my thing, but I hoped.

Why did I know it was not going to be my thing? Because it included everything I hate in a game. Multi-player, fast-paced, no time to  stop and think, very little story and lore, and RNG for each run (sort of).

What do I love about FromSoft games? The exploration; the slow, deliberate pace; the gorgeous level design; the NPCs; and the feeling of overcoming difficulties. I have no qualms over-leveling if I can and making the boss fights as easy as possible.

I’m split on the boss fights themselves. Yes, the bosses are incredible and memorable, but From has been making them harder and harder over the years. I have known for several games that I will one day be not able to play one of their trademark hard-as-nails action adventure games, and we’re almost there.

I tried to like Nightreign; I really did. I put dozens of hours into it, playing the Recluse (the witch). I lucked out in that the first run I had was with two incredible randos, and we beat the first Night Lord (the big boss at the end of three days that is incredible hard. I mean, this one is the first one, so not as hard, but still).

That gave me a false sense of hope, and I did not come close to victory again for dozens of hours. I was mostly playing with randos because the people in the Discord are all PlayStation people and because I suck so badly, I felt bad playing with–well, anyone beacuse I was the one dragging everyone down. It did not help that the Recluse is the hardest character to play, well, one of them, anyway. The other character I liked (the Revenant) was considered difficult, too. Plus, unlocking her was a pain in the ass as well.


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What games define me, part six

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I have one last post in me talking about the ten games that define me. Or, more to the point, the one game that is my favorite game of all time AND that is important to who I am now. Here was my post from yesterday, which was also about Elden Ring (FromSoft) and what it means to me. I also want to expand more on why it’s so important to me and how I fear that it’s the last FromSoft game I will play.

Let’s tackle the last part first. Ever since the DLCs of Dark Souls III, I have noticed that the content has been getting incrementally harder. That’s only to be expected given the nature of the games and how they became known for being hard. That’s not why I play the games, though, so it made me uneasy to see the constant upping of the difficulty. When I played Sekiro: Shadows Died Twice, I realized I had hit the upper limit of my ability. Granted, that’s a different kind of game and you can’t summon human beings, but still. It made me realize that my time playing From games was short, and I should just enjoy the ones I can play until I can’t.

Speaking of can’t. Sigh.

Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon came out in late August of 2023. I knew from the trailer that it wasn’t going to be for me, but it was FromSoft so I had to buy it and try it. I started it up with little hope in my heart. It wasn’t my kind of game at all, and it looked antithetical to anything I enjoyed in a game. And yet.

There’s always giong to be a part of me that thinks I’ll warm up to any From game if I just give it enough time. I tried; I really did. I made it to the tutorial boss, and I just could not do it. Parrying was a big thing in the game, much to my dismay. Or rather, deflecting like you do in Sekiro. Plus, there were two different boost buttons, which broke my brain. In addition, you could go out of the fighting area, and you would be rudely reminded that you could not go in that direction. It wasn’t just a wall that you run into–it was, if I remember correctly, flashing red lights.

In addition, you had to boost in order to fly, and I just could not get the hang of that. Oh, and there was definitely fall damage in the game–lots of it. If you don’t land on a platform, you take damage. Since I have almost no depth perception, landing correctly was not happening with any consistency.

I fought the tutorial boss for over an hour. I was not getting it. I’m stubborn, though, and I kept going. I eventually got the boss, but I didn’t enjoy it. Nor could I tell you how I got it. Could I do it again? Probably not. I did a few missions after, but I did not enjoy that, either. After dying several times by not being able to boost properly and falling over and over again, I put it aside. I wasn’t enjoying it, and it was not for me.


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A very different FromSoft point of view

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I have been a FromSoft fan for over a decade. I hated the first Dark Souls game when I finished it (Prepare to Try Edition, which included the DLC, and I vowed never to have anything to do with it again. Even playing it was fraught as I almost-quit several time and rage-quit once. I didn’t play it for a year, and then went back to it when I decided I wanted to try to play the sequel.

I know I could have played the sequel without playing the first game, but that’s not my style. I would have felt weird the entire time, so I went back to start the first game over and trudged my way through. I managed to do it plus the DLC in 150 hours. Yes, it took me that long because I am that shit at the games.

But I fucking did it. And I vowed never to play the game again.

That’s a joke as I’ve played the first game at least a dozen times. I’ve started it more than that, but I usually quit halfway through. I have the plat, and when the remaster came out, I sailed through it. I went from struggling with every area and every boss to one-or-two-shotting all the bosses. I played most of the game offline because on launch day, there was a PC hacker who invaded people’s worlds and killed Andre, the first and very important blacksmith. He (and let’s face it. It was overwhelmingly likely the hacker was a he) had done it to several people, and when I found that out, I immediately  quit out of that game and started a new one.

Why? Because Andre is very important, and, yes, there is a way to bring him back, but it was laborious and would take some time.I decided it would be easier to start another game and race my way to where I was, playing off line so I could not be invaded.

That’s when it struck me that I was actually decent at the games because that was my conclusion rather than raging about it. I was irked, yes, and thinking nasty thoughts about the hacker, but I knew I could get back there quickly. I felt bad for anyone he did it to who was playing the game for the first time, but I knew that it would not be an issue for me. And it wasn’t. I got back there in about an hour. The first time, it probably took me ten hours to get there.

I’m bringing this up for two reasons. One, to establish how shit I was at the games and still am, actually. At least on a first playthrough. I take at least twice as long as other people to play a new From game, and not just because I’m very thorough in my exploration–which I am, by the way. In the main game, I finished my first playthrough in 225+ hours. I didn’t miss any caves or catacombs (without looking shit up), and I’ve only seen a few minor new things watching RKG play the game.


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