Haven't played Elden Ring. Is it good or is this all hype?
i've never played a souls game, if im interested should i start from DS1 and try to plow thru or is there a better title for beginners?
Elden Ring has an actual tutorial on its mechanics, and helpful tooltips to learn about items. That alone makes it head over shoulders better than DS1, at least in terms of playability. And that is coming from someone who replays DS1 at least once a month.
Bloodborne might be the best one for newcomers in my experience. The base game is the easiest out of all of them (DS2 is, but it’s not the best starting point imo), the rally mechanic is very forgiving and no shields = more satisfying playstyles (hbomberguy has a segment dedicated to this). The upgrade paths for weapons are straightforward unlike DS1, which can get tricky if you want to start infusing or use boss souls. The environmental obstacles are a tad less overwhelming than in DS1 (Sen’s Funhouse, Anor Londo Archers, Tomb of Giants, etc etc)
Overall, DS1 would be better as your second entry, with Bloodborne being your first foray.
It's pretty good, world is nice, plot is pretty good to the extent it can be comprehended (still can't even get the timeline down).
I'm not playing it "How it's supposed to be played" apparently, but since I hate souls-like melee, it's a lot more fun sniping from the other side of the map while my summons tank.
It's a souls-game, the way it's "supposed to be played" is any way that allows you to progress.
Yes, or to quote Morrowind, "Reach Heaven Through Violence" (or cheese, or Co-Op, or bugs, or unbalanced items, or modding the game and reducing all the bosses to 1hp).
The only thing that matters in Souls games is that you're alive and they're dead. However you make that happen is your business.
And when player's say that they mean it. Find every advantage you can. Snipe enemies from inaccessible places. Use poison and stack debuffs. The first time through winning is all that matters. You can always impose limits and challenges on yourself in subsequent playthroughs.
Really good imo. If you're a fan of Dark Souls you'll probably love it. If Dark Souls isn't your thing Elden Ring probably won't be either.
i've never played a souls game, if im interested should i start from DS1 and try to plow thru or is there a better title for beginners?
You can honestly start wherever without missing out on too much, but DS1 is still a great starting point since it lays the foundation for some lore stuff that's explored more later in the series. That's only if you're okay with it being a lot more clunky and slower paced due to it's age though.
If you're willing to risk the money or have a safe way to get it for free, Elden Ring might actually be the best one to start with. It has a few good QOL updates and if you get hard-stuck on a boss you can almost always go explore somewhere else much more easily than in DS. Also the story and lore are brand new so it doesn't matter if you've played the other fromsoft games.
Elden Ring is probably the most accessible of them, with a lot more room to just go and do things without crawling through punishing dungeons first. It also has a downright ridiculous number of bosses that range in difficulty from barely more than a trash mob to ludicrously difficult - the very first two bosses you see are pretty high on that scale, though neither needs to be beaten.
There's also considerable QoL changes like the ability to just teleport straight to any of your discovered sites of grace (checkpoints where you can level up, basically) and more resources that revolve around capacity instead of finite resources (a big strength of the series is the whole "estus flask" mechanic where you get X many healing pots per rest so that if you're bashing your head against a boss or tough area you're not burning a resource that you'll eventually run out of or will have to go and farm just to heal, and elden ring sort of expands that mechanic to throwables and a general buff pot).
It still has a lot of the fundamental problems with the other games, like a camera that's one of your deadliest enemies and a bunch of really fucking awful control decisions like aggressive camera tethering and making your dodge happen on button release instead of press, but everything they do well it does as well or better (except for some things in Sekiro, which mechanically made a ton of mechanical improvements that should have been kept on but which were ditched instead).
The good news is that it doesn't really matter which game you play first because there isn't a particularly continuous story between each one. There's a development of themes, to be sure, and references to the previous games in the series dotted around, but you won't miss too much. They're in chronological order but there is, to be purposefully vague, a focus on the idea of endlessly repeating cycles, so that doesn't overly matter.
DS1 is a kinda rough game to be your first game because, despite the sense of superiority its fans give it over the other titles, it does have some flaws that are rectified by the later games. Performance issues in some areas, wildly broken metas in multiplayer (though later titles never fundamentally address this issue, only bandage some parts), and in my experience, it's quite easy to get lost or wonder what you're meant to do next, especially if you don't have great memory or don't note down the location of every locked door you find. But that is counterbalanced by the "non-linearity" of the environment, at least in the sense that you theoretically have a lot of choice in where you can go. In practice, the enemies just being too strong in certain areas that you can access from almost the beginning limits you a great deal, but even so. Start here if you want to have a more complete understanding of the lore and are fine with a fair amount of challenge in exploration and navigating the world, and like having lots of ways to go.
DS2 is a black sheep as it was developed by a different group of people, and so while it receives a lot of criticism online, I think that's mellowed out over time. I only actually finished it a year or so ago and I really enjoyed it. It's actually probably the least linear game in the series on a technicality, but that won't matter to you. It certainly has its flaws, including a... controversial rolling i-frame system, but it's also the most... goofy? game in the series, at least for me. Still has the dark and gritty atmosphere and all that but it's also got comically large swords and weird armor sets. It also allows you to warp between bonfires right from the beginning, that is, checkpoints, which massively simplifies world exploration. Start here if you want a slightly more modern experience than DS1 and want to use swords that look impossible to even hold, and don't mind a bit of floatiness and jankiness every now and then.
DS3 is, as you might imagine, a more modernized Dark Souls game and developed by the same people that made DS1. It's really got a combination of things from both of its predecessors - there's a lot more references to DS1 than in DS2, but also has e.g. the ability to warp between bonfires from the beginning, which is super convenient. It's seen as quite non-linear, and that is to some extent true - it has some arbitrary roadblocks set up in some areas and it's very likely that you'll go down the same paths at the same times as other players, with only a few real crossroads. But I still think it's got a good balance of having a choice between where to go, and a progression path that is fairly clear to follow. It's my favourite of the three games and while every Souls games has awesome DLC, I think the DS3 DLC, in combination, are at or near the very top in my opinion. Start here if you want a more modernized experience with better graphics and QoL, and don't mind not being able to go down every path for as long as you can survive it without roadblocks.
The most important thing to know about Dark Souls 2 going in is that the Adaptability trait controls how many i-frames you get when rolling and you need to at least hit the first break-point at 12 points of adaptability to get 11 i-frames on your roll.
If you like Soulsbourne games it's great. It has a lot of features that make the game much easier to get in to and understand, and also systems to alleviate some of the difficulty and make it more approachable to less hardcore players. The open world is huge and densely packed with things to do and places to explore. There's a lot of neat weapons, armor, and spells to discover. There are many, many, many different viable playstyles and builds, so you can do try all kinds of different ways to play. I'm running a spellsword who uses a sword and board to conserve mana then unleashes massive burst damage on bosses and tanky enemies, backed up with utility spells and debuffs. One of my friends is has a PvP build where he disguises himself as an out-of-place statue and when people walk up to investigate he blows himself up dealing massive AOE damage. Another friend is doing a faith and miracles based assassin character fighting with dual magic claws made out of holy words. And yet another friend went straight for massive weapons and heavy armor and is just smashing his way through the world with a sword bigger than he is.
If you really like exploring and finding new secrets and places and enjoy the challenge and unique boss fights then it's a great game. It captures the same sense of wonder and adventure as a dame like Skyrim, but with a focus on an extremely well designed and polished combat system instead of Skyrim's focus on quests and characters. Not to say there aren't quests, but the focus is much more on the fighting and the free form exploration.
Tarnished are those who have lost the Erdtree's grace and were banished from the Lands Between/died. The Erdtree just wants you to get the Elden Ring back duh. I forget who (maybe Varre or the santa merchant) in the beginning after the tutorial goes into detail about the lost sites of grace, but from what I've gathered it is basically the erdtree yearning for someone to reclaim the elden ring and become elden lord. Highly recommend people rewatch the opening cinematic after Godrick it helped me understand a little bit more of what the fuck im doing
everyone treats you like shit (foul tarnished) because they're demi-gods
What abc said, but to clarify
spoiler
Godfrey was murdered by [REDACTED] and Marika shattered the Elden Ring in grief. For their failure, his personal guard were stripped of grace and banished.
Uh, EDIT I mixed up Godwyn and Godfrey. Godfrey lost faith and was banished with his men fighting the giants, Godwyn was his son and successor and was killed sparking off the whole shattering. GRRM don't use only characters with your initials challenge.
still have no idea why the tarnished were banished.
I'll have you know I just spent the last hour running through Limgrave areas trying to find relevant lore and turns out, Melina will tell you at the Church of Marika/Pilgrimage site of graces if you talk to her while resting:
slight spoilers depending on how far you may be in the game?
[Marika] Spoken echoes linger here. Words of Queen Makira, who vanished long ago. If you wish, I will share them with you.
In Marika's own words. My Lord, and thy warriors. I divest each of thee of thy grace.
With thine eyes dimmed, ye will be driven from the Lands Between. Ye will wage war in a land afar, where ye will live, and die.
[Pilgrimage] Then, after thy death, I will give back what I once claimed.
Return to the Lands Between, wage war, and brandish the Elden Ring.
Grow strong in the face of death. Warriors of my lord. Lord Godfrey.
God, I missed that entirely. I apparently missed many opportunities to talk to Melina.
Souls games are pure dogshit at storytelling actually
they're arcade games
um actually you just have to die a lot and get good to understand why the story is actual good and not just "a guy did something hubristic and now everyone is a monster" 6 times in a row.
To sum up - Tarnished are a bunch of dead heroes that were resurrected to try to become the Elden Lord, restore the broken Elden Ring, and revive the Golden Order that ruled the world prior to the Shattering. The Shattering was an apocalyptic civil war between the Demi-gods, children of the great godess Marika. The war started when the Elden Ring shattered and the demi-gods became mortal and able to die. Your character is Tarnished, part of a group of quasi-immortal humans who serve the Two Fingers religious faction and can gain immense power. Most of them are dead heroes from a bygone age resurrected to repair the aforementioned Elden Ring, but your character is an outlier - A nobody, with no power and no great accomplishments, resurrected for unknown reasons.
That's a basic sum-up of the Lore that is presented to the character in the opening introduction. Not that some narrators may be unreliable.
Question: I've never played a Souls game, but I am familiar with complaints about their difficulty. Are there no cheats or mods to make it easier?
There are a lot of in-game systems to keep the difficulty manageable.
The first, and most important, is that the game isn't linear. If you're having trouble beating a particular boss you can fuck off somewhere else and level up or find new gear then come back when you feel more prepared.
Second, almost every boss and area can be done co-op. You can "Summon" up to two other players to help you out beating a boss or clearing an area. The boss gets a little stronger, but 3 on 1 really improves your odds.
If you don't want to use multiplayer there's a system called spirit ashes that let's you summon NPC AI to fight for you. Some of them are very powerful and can make fighting a boss much easier.
There are fairly frequent checkpoints in the game, so you're rarely very far from a checkpoint (called a "Site of Grace" in game) if you die and need to run back to pick up your runes/xp points.
Is it challenging? Yes. Is it demanding? Yes. Are there bosses that will absolutely kick your ass twenty times in a row before you eke out a win on the 21st try? Definitely.
But it is also the easiest Soulsbourne game for players new to the series to get in to. The biggest things to remember going in are a.) You will die a lot and that's a normal and expected part of gameplay and b.) You can always go somewhere else if you're having trouble with a particular boss, or summon other players to help carry you through.
There's co-op that makes most bosses a lot easier. You can summon up to two other players to help you with bosses. Also the open world aspect lets you leave a hard boss and get experience or better gear and come back later.
But no cheat codes or mods at all? Is that part of the draw of their games? Kinda sucks to buy a single player game with no hope of progressing past a difficult section.
It's not really a single player game. Coop is very important. You can use cheatengine to modify your character, but it's unclear if this will result in your account being banned.
Seriously, though, give it a try. If you're getting beat up by a boss you really can call in help and most of the time a team of three can take down the boss in a few tries. It's a very different game experience. It's not for everyone. It's a little bit like getting used to an unfamiliar exotic food dish - It takes some adjusting but once you're used to it you can appreciate new flavors you haven't found elsewhere.
There are almost certainly cheat engine tables you could use; I've never tried.
I think Sekiro is significantly harder than Elden Ring since in ER you can explore somewhere else when you get stuck, level up, try different playstyles. In Sekiro you simply must keep trying
Nah when you open it up for the first time it says something like “improper activity detected, using offline mode.”
I imagine given enough time people will maybe learn how to use private servers or something but the online aspect is definitely disabled, I’m having to get through it with summons lol
Cool good to know. It's kinda what I figured. It's the first game I actually spent money on in forever because I wanted to play with my friend. If only the online worked anyway in the pirated version.
The only game I've found pirated with the online working is Jackbox games.
