If you want to play this today on a modern PC, get "Sword of Moonlight: King's Field Making Tool" (from the Internet Archive, for instance). It's a dungeon creation program that From Software published in 2000, and it includes a recreation of King's Field in that new engine. It's vastly superior to the Playstation version, while staying completely true to the original, and you can play it right now on a modern Windows PC with a controller without any difficulty.
Next video will be "Was it Good? King's Field" as Josh mistakenly played king's field instead of king's field so the footage of king's field doesn't go to waste.
Nah since Josh can not go any video without Dark Souls, he should go with the strange "Demon's Souls is a sequel to this game if you squint hard enough" classic, Lost Kingdom for the Gamecube.
I saw this title and went: "Oh wow I remember King's Field! This should be great!" Then I realised that I hadn't actually played King's Field, for this was in fact King's Field, and not King's Field.
Watching Josh's first combat experience in this game as someone who's played it and read up on it is hilarious. And an accurate portrayal of what new players go through.
Dude to this DAY its stupid. I spent an hour straight trying to play FF6 and i kept downloading the japanese version or FF3. For those who dont know, the U.S. got FF6 instead of 3, but was still called ff3 because i guess it was still the U.S.'s third game idk. So to some americans who werent aware, the ff3 game they played was actually ff6.
What intrigues me, in seeing the very first King's Field having nearly all the hallmark characteristics of its successors... Is that THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN HERE. Players will happily name Miyazaki. All the time. Like Miyazaki made any of this. No. This is FromSoftware at its core in its entirety. Miyazaki comes much, much later. Yes, he refined everything into Demons' Souls, a much superior product, but he isn't the brains of the operation that we make him to be. He keeps giving it better directions, but the soul itself has always been there.
My first From game was Lost Kingdoms. You can also see proto-elements of Demon’s Souls in there as well, since the plot is all about an evil mist flooding a kingdom and causing monsters to appear, with a wicked king being the one responsible for the whole mess.
King's Field 4 is the true masterpiece in my opinion. One thing you left out is that there's a full remake of the original King's Field with new graphics included with Fromsoft's official "King's Field maker" called Sword of Moonlight. Meaning that there are actually 4 different King's Fields (OG, english retitled KF2, rerelease, remake on SoM). Should note also that Martin Ramirez likely wasn't Martin's real name, as an NPC in KF4 is named Ramirez Martin.
Oh god the aspect ratio of this video is hiding his health bar. I wonder if Josh is just doing this to fill the video up with as much screen as possible or he's just protesting 3:4...
Seeing a lot of Ultima Underworld influence in this, especially the way the in-game map looks. It even has a ridiculously dangerous headless enemy. FromSoft were clearly big fans.
It should be said that Dragon Fruit's aren't the only way to continue after dying. Those golden crosses you see on the wall are save points, and dying without reviving will restart you there, instead of at the start of the game. You can also load these saves from the games pause menu, where you can change your equipment and use items. Under "System" you can press load, and see your 3 save slots. This is also where you can quit the game without turning your console off, aside from the credits screen. You are actually stuck there as far as I know.
@@pseudosanct5253 my favourite are his darkseed videos. the way his style of humor and commenting vibes with that goofball protagonist is just chefs kiss
I know how cliche it is, but I remember when that list of supporters was about twelve names boldly plastered across the screen, Josh really is a man of his word. I've seen the dedication and hard work he has put into his craft. I'm elated to see how successful his channel has become. And yet, it's bittersweet, as this level of professionalism deserves much more recognition than the channel currently has. I have faith that my favorite second monitor content creator will continue to grow well beyond half a million subscribers.
45:15 this speech right here, if I ever needed something to feel inspired and start working on my plans for the future, this right here is what would’ve started that, kudos
I also just finished playing through King's Field 1 Japan English translation. I thought it was really cool seeing so many familiar things from modern FromSoft games (like the Sens Fortress snakes, Moonlight Greatsword, illusory walls, etc.). It would be so cool to see FromSoft remaster or remake the older King's Field games.
the idea that kings field was what they improved on to make the souls series makes a lot of sense when you know that miyazaki joined from later and his sole reason for joining was that he loved the kings field series
25:15 i wish fromsoft would go back to contextualizing the lore dumps like this. They did it with dark souls 1, whereby all of the lore you know was picked up from the stories you heard in the prison you were rotting in. So when you pick up a Glove Of Dudebro, you know from the prison a fleeting piece of lore about where he came from and what his story was. Every other game has simply relied on the trope of delivering the story through item descriptions, so the perspective of the lore descriptions is suddenly just The Narrator.
Honest question, it’s not that I don’t believe you but where is that particular bit of info from? I haven’t heard that explanation for the item descriptions before.
This game reminds me of the first Alone in the Dark - the atmosphere, the spinning inventory items, the collapsed bridge, attack animations of gargoyles, transparent ghosts and knights, even the final boss has strong resemblance to Reinhardt III.
*Josh* was *not* lying, the music *got* _FuNkY._ 🤘🏼👹 _@_ 35:07 _The original PlayStation was such a masterpiece. So many awesome titles and memories that thing brought/holds. I always appreciate your work, thank you._ 🫱🏼🫲🏽 “What a game!” 🗿 Your commentary is what truly makes your content top notch. 👨🏻🍳🤌🏼
@@S0ulGh0st It's a joke about a Brazilian Computer Server being only able to function if it doesn't turn off, so the responsible for it marathons Josh's channel to keep it on.
I think you're the first reviewer I've seen really encapsulate what makes this game special in a succinct and palatable way. The conclusion of the video really sums things up well. I enjoyed this a lot was very well done
King's Field is one of the best series ever. The only reason I even consider Dark Souls or Elden Ring. So stoked to see Mr. Strife Hayes playing one of my faves. Cheers!
Josh should totally do a WIAG of Ultima Underworld I The Stygian Abyss. You can find a whole load of themes and ideas that would find their way into pretty mich every fantasy game since
those hand drawn maps looked amazing! back in the day people couldnt get a new game to play every week. they were not only expensive but games didnt release as often and there wasnt much to pick from. So people would replay games all the time!
To be fair most games are made in an odd (but understandable) order where the first level is one of the last actually designed in order for a game to put its best foot forward.
No, this game was a test to prove to Sony that they could actually FINISH a game. Before this FROM was making office software. Sony was impressed enough that King's Field was published as a launch title for the PS1. Kings field 2 was their actual first game game and is basically a remake of this one, and then they made Armored Core. Armored Core was one of the first "greatest hits" titles, back when selling a million copies was an actual feat.
One thing that was very apparent to me is that most all of the enemies I see you fighting in Kings Field exist in some form in Dark Souls. It's actually quite remarkable. Heck, the skeleton you encounter in the first secret are the exact skeletons in visual concept that you see at Firelink Shrine. The lizard man with the single armor piece is a staple of Sen's Fortress and became the magic shooting ones and the big sword boys. The big slow moving skeleton with the knife arms resembles the ghosts in New Londo, which hey! This game has the ghosts minus the knife hands. The plant creatures arguably got split into at least two enemies. The plant dudes in Darkroot Garden, the weird crystal clam things in the Duke's Archives, there's a linear progression from King's Field to Dark Souls in almost every conceivable way.
@@Fedorchik1536 Hell yeah! I remember seeing that as a kid (it was old then) and being fascinated with the stop motion animation. That cemented my love for all things fantasy.
Had an awesome time using Boosteroid! My PC isn’t capable of running modern games, but the cloud gaming service made it all possible. Smooth gameplay, no hiccups. A must-try for those with older setups.
I've watched a hundred of your episodes! Good/bad MMOs, Josh Stife Plays. Give us a tier list! Any and all tier lists from your giant brain would be gold. TRUST ME. I'm a Lord.
45:25 "They wanted to make Elden Ring, so they started with King's Field and slowly improved." This is genuinely inspirational and goes to show that you gotta start somewhere, anywhere, if you want to eventually make your masterpiece.
What Josh didnt say, or doesnt kmow is that FROM was making offimatic programs just before this. Whatever demon possessed a respectful software company to shift gears and start making games is unknown. But Sony basically asked them to showcase they could finish a game before granting them a license. This is them HALFASSING EVERYTHING.
True. He used the evolution of King’s field’s/shadow tower’s gameplay and expanded upon it more with the souls series. But the original games had nothing to do with him.
Backlogs once covered the entire king's field series and his words still remain in my mind Welcome to Demon Souls, Prepare to die Welcome to Dark Souls, Prepare to die Welcome to King's Field, **** You
I would argue that the first 3D RPG (i know of) would be Alternate Reality (1985). Totally blew my mind when i saw that "run" on a C64 back then. Not sure if it would be worth a video checking that out.
Also the flashing colour room isn't the only full heal, the fountain you respawn at is a full heal to MP and HP. Also the feather boots let you run over pits that drop you to death as well, I'm not sure how many there are but theres definitely 1 that has a chest behind it.
The Mind-Boggling Effects were the adorable low-poly enemies we befriended along the way. This makes me wish there was some kind of elaborate mod to turn all of Elden Ring's graphics into these low poly ones.
I want that mod for a _lot_ of modern games. I would honestly rather look a duplo with legs and _imagine_ how horrifying the monster is, than have a 500mb jpg of "pale guy with big mouth and tentacles #3407".
I begged my mom for this game when I was younger. Me and my vest friend loved RPGs and this looked amazing. We played it quite a bit but never made much progress.
Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss came in 1992 for PC, the same year when Wolfenstein 3D, but it was much better looking with height differences. It was unbelievable at the time. Seems like this game was also very good at the 90's.
@@cattysplatah yes, RPGs used sprites for very long after the first fully 3D role playing games most people played was either Morrowind or Neverwinter Nights, both almost a decade later... Or MMOs, I think World of Warcraft popularized actually drawing everything with polygons instead of pre-rendering either sprites or Bg.
I had a playstation and kings field but couldnt afford a memory card. My brother and i took turns playing it starting all the way over every time we died. It was our only game at the time I think its where i got my love for roguelikes
King's Field is a hard look at what happens when business software development staff slowly comes into their own as a game developer, with an enormous batch of creative ideas coming through in an overall unrefined experience. SirTech (of Wizardry) and (if my understanding of events is correct) Squaresoft were similar success stories. From Software arguably had it worse, because they had to hit the ground running in an industry where established veteran companies at the time were themselves spinning their wheels to figure out this whole 3D console game thing.
@@Chinothebad I myself have just become a fan by way of Armored Core, and seeing the rich history this developer team has is just... wow. massive respect to these guys. I see why people love their games to death now. I've played the Armored Core series from Gen 1 thru to Gen 4. what can I say, I'm addicted!
From Soft did what it seems like almost no other devs do. They continued to build on their original idea without drastic changes to gameplay or overall style. They perfected their first idea for decades. THATS how you can get the closest to making the perfect game. That's why elden ring is a masterpiece and won game of the year. So many other companies think they need to completely change the style and gameplay to succeed. Using metrics to make games that try to appeal to everybody. That's why we've gotten so many good awful games recently. Or at least a big part of the reason.
I feel that Monster Hunter is in a similar boat. Having played the games for over a decade, the feel and overall gameplay loop has hardly changed, yet they've really honed in and perfected many aspects. One thing I respect Fromsoft for over Capcom, however, is sticking close to their hardcore reputation by constantly increasing difficulty as their player's skill increases. Some of Capcom's recent "quality of life" decisions for MH don't quite agree with the spirit of the hunt.
Larian did the same. I played original Divine Divinity until memory leaks on bloated game state made it unplayable. Same with BG3 lol, they both have that gimmick that every item in the world is movable and you can bring crates and barrels into your home. And NPC reaction system, writing style and even atmosphere in Baldur's Gate 3 is closer to older games by same team than original Baldur's Gate. speaking of that, Bioware used to be that dev who made the same game but more streamlined every few years, you can easily see how Mass Effect or Dragon Age are still following BG2 formula with NPCs and a base, tons of dialogue to solve quests without sacrificing gameplay... Hell, Elder Scrolls have he same pattern, Arena was trying to make Skyrim wig sticks and stones.
King's Field, Armored Core, Eternal Ring, Dark Souls, Elden Ring, Echo Night... And then there's The Adventures of Cookie & Cream. A very colorful and charming puzzle/platformer game. A bit quite the oposite of what their other games are. lol Great video as always, Josh. Kudos!
My only memory of that is some dude harassing me on the dark souls wiki to force me to become an admin on his cookie wiki, annoying me to the point I used my unconsensually given admin powers to ban him from his own wiki
i love these games, the atmosphere is so incredible. It's a lot like dark souls (especially the first game) in _that_ sense as well. it's just got such a dreamlike feel, and the playstation 1 aesthetic is so fantastic.
5:15 There was a way to run: I noticed when pressing interact to look for hidden walls and secrets in barrels that it would prevent my stamina from recharging. Eventually, I connected the dots and realized that holding down the interact button would deplete stamina and allow you to move faster, essentially being a sprint button.
If you want to play this today on a modern PC, get "Sword of Moonlight: King's Field Making Tool" (from the Internet Archive, for instance).
It's a dungeon creation program that From Software published in 2000, and it includes a recreation of King's Field in that new engine. It's vastly superior to the Playstation version, while staying completely true to the original, and you can play it right now on a modern Windows PC with a controller without any difficulty.
15:34 Shoutout to Martin Ramirez and his daughter! So great to see such lovely work of art!
Next video will be "Was it Good? King's Field" as Josh mistakenly played king's field instead of king's field so the footage of king's field doesn't go to waste.
Ngl this would go hard
Nah since Josh can not go any video without Dark Souls, he should go with the strange "Demon's Souls is a sequel to this game if you squint hard enough" classic, Lost Kingdom for the Gamecube.
This makes more sense than I'd like to admit.
"Yo dawg, he heard you like King's Field..."
[Laughs in Xzibit]
Omg. I thought the same thing lol. He's gotta do it.
Holy crap....that screen saver unlocked a core memory
Can't help but smile at the idea of a dad and daughter mapping out the whole game together.
Moonlight greatsword is so iconic its even in indie fieldlikes
I saw this title and went:
"Oh wow I remember King's Field! This should be great!"
Then I realised that I hadn't actually played King's Field, for this was in fact King's Field, and not King's Field.
Watching Josh's first combat experience in this game as someone who's played it and read up on it is hilarious. And an accurate portrayal of what new players go through.
Your explanation of the titles at 2:40 just gave me flashbacks of trying to figure out the Final Fantasy titles when I was a kid. Thanks, Josh.
You think that's bad, look into the titles of Kingdom Hearts!
@@majorkhajiit kh's titles are weird, but they have absolutely none of the problems of final fantasy or king's field
We didn't have this problem in Europe 😎
Because we didn't get any FF before VII 😢
Mystic quest?
Dude to this DAY its stupid. I spent an hour straight trying to play FF6 and i kept downloading the japanese version or FF3. For those who dont know, the U.S. got FF6 instead of 3, but was still called ff3 because i guess it was still the U.S.'s third game idk. So to some americans who werent aware, the ff3 game they played was actually ff6.
Yea it is great to see that they stuck with the core idea around their games and kept improving them.
my god.... an entire field of kings....
You have to be careful when growing kings, one revolution and you can lose the whole crop...
I wonder if each of these kings has a throne of their own. If so, that means theres a Thronesfield out there somewhere
@Tarso333 do the kings bloom from them like flowers
@@RandallMiller-eh6wm Wouldn't crowns be the flowers?
Shockingly, there are no fields until KF3.
Another great video, I give it A like/10.
Also, pretty sure at least one person will not understand and maybe comment something like "Why a tenth of a like?"
The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects.
It has always been more about the quality and creativity of the developer over the actual hardware.
@renmcmanus
It's a meme, you dip
@nickoliekeyov746 sorry I'm not brain rotted. Wait... I'm not sorry. Sorry not sorry.
I've never seen such realistic skeletons since.
can confirm, my mind was boggled
the bit at the end about fromsoft starting from this to eventually make Elden Ring really made me feel empowered for some reason
46:49 Remember what? What Josh?!
King's Field has to be the King's Field of all time and for the ages.
Holy fuck, those skeleton effects are mind-boggling.
I see you
I can‘t wait for the follow-up „Was it good? - King‘s Field“
"No not that one"
But... I thought this one was King's Field... o_O
@@minecreeper98 nah, this was King's Field, not King's Field
@@fulnaz3164 Ah ok, thanks for clarifying ^^
Ta-da! He made it lol.
"the furtive pygmy so easily forgottten"
oh man I just got chills..
my favorite second monitor creator
"So behold, combat!
- Strife, Josh
i would buy such a shirt
So much fields of King's to explore
king's field is my favorite fromsoft creation, thanks for covering this.
FINALLY someone understand King's Field.
Fun fact: King's Field was named after the Director's favorite Golf Club.
Anyone else fall asleep to JSH?
what kind of ques… zZZ
What intrigues me, in seeing the very first King's Field having nearly all the hallmark characteristics of its successors... Is that THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN HERE.
Players will happily name Miyazaki. All the time. Like Miyazaki made any of this. No. This is FromSoftware at its core in its entirety. Miyazaki comes much, much later.
Yes, he refined everything into Demons' Souls, a much superior product, but he isn't the brains of the operation that we make him to be. He keeps giving it better directions, but the soul itself has always been there.
That's the power or narratives for you. The guy was enshrined as the sole responsible for Demon Souls and later Dark souls.
Ya. That's why I always say.miyazaki is a wild story crafter... But it's the devs themselves that have crafted the frame it's built on.
My first From game was Lost Kingdoms. You can also see proto-elements of Demon’s Souls in there as well, since the plot is all about an evil mist flooding a kingdom and causing monsters to appear, with a wicked king being the one responsible for the whole mess.
Nah they almost forgot it during ninja blade but thank god Miyazaki is also making demon souls at that time.
Hes like a really good filter
Literally DOZENS of polygons. And TEXTURES! More than one!
King's Field 4 is the true masterpiece in my opinion. One thing you left out is that there's a full remake of the original King's Field with new graphics included with Fromsoft's official "King's Field maker" called Sword of Moonlight. Meaning that there are actually 4 different King's Fields (OG, english retitled KF2, rerelease, remake on SoM). Should note also that Martin Ramirez likely wasn't Martin's real name, as an NPC in KF4 is named Ramirez Martin.
Thanks, Joshua. You are a short king's field 🤴 👑 ❤
Oh god the aspect ratio of this video is hiding his health bar. I wonder if Josh is just doing this to fill the video up with as much screen as possible or he's just protesting 3:4...
I hope he notices how it looks for viewers
He's hiding his invulnerability😁
yeah the weird zoom-in is driving me insane lmao
Yea i noticed this too and it was driving me crazy!!!
He's doing it just to mess with us.
Forgot i played and beat this game back when it came out on the playstation. This video held my hand as i took a little walk down memory lane.
Thinking about beating this game without a guide, like a TON of other games at the time, seems impossible.
in japanese?!
@@disturbownzall took me & my friend like 500 hours to figure it out & beat it.
Seeing a lot of Ultima Underworld influence in this, especially the way the in-game map looks. It even has a ridiculously dangerous headless enemy. FromSoft were clearly big fans.
From Softwares first software made was for agriculture. It was used to calculate feed for pigs.
Wait,really?
I choose to believe this!
"Josh Circle-Strafe Hayes"
It should be said that Dragon Fruit's aren't the only way to continue after dying. Those golden crosses you see on the wall are save points, and dying without reviving will restart you there, instead of at the start of the game.
You can also load these saves from the games pause menu, where you can change your equipment and use items. Under "System" you can press load, and see your 3 save slots. This is also where you can quit the game without turning your console off, aside from the credits screen. You are actually stuck there as far as I know.
that was an angry fade from existance after the "sequels need to use numbers"
Majuular does a great 3hr video on this game series. I'd never heard of it before and it was an interesting watch.
I was like "Again, josh? I'm sure I heard Josh review this..." and check'd history, and it was Majuular, to my surprise.
I love Maj's ultima series
@@pseudosanct5253Yes same. He said Ultima 6 video will likely be out around mid september !
Majuular is the man. So is ofc our josh ❤
@@pseudosanct5253 my favourite are his darkseed videos. the way his style of humor and commenting vibes with that goofball protagonist is just chefs kiss
I know how cliche it is, but I remember when that list of supporters was about twelve names boldly plastered across the screen, Josh really is a man of his word. I've seen the dedication and hard work he has put into his craft. I'm elated to see how successful his channel has become. And yet, it's bittersweet, as this level of professionalism deserves much more recognition than the channel currently has. I have faith that my favorite second monitor content creator will continue to grow well beyond half a million subscribers.
45:15 this speech right here, if I ever needed something to feel inspired and start working on my plans for the future, this right here is what would’ve started that, kudos
wow i hope martin and his daughter are doing ok today. that map is seriously awesome!
Me too, what a legend for making that map!
I also just finished playing through King's Field 1 Japan English translation. I thought it was really cool seeing so many familiar things from modern FromSoft games (like the Sens Fortress snakes, Moonlight Greatsword, illusory walls, etc.). It would be so cool to see FromSoft remaster or remake the older King's Field games.
the idea that kings field was what they improved on to make the souls series makes a lot of sense when you know that miyazaki joined from later and his sole reason for joining was that he loved the kings field series
I wasn't ready for the teacup at the end, wtf
25:15 i wish fromsoft would go back to contextualizing the lore dumps like this. They did it with dark souls 1, whereby all of the lore you know was picked up from the stories you heard in the prison you were rotting in. So when you pick up a Glove Of Dudebro, you know from the prison a fleeting piece of lore about where he came from and what his story was. Every other game has simply relied on the trope of delivering the story through item descriptions, so the perspective of the lore descriptions is suddenly just The Narrator.
Honest question, it’s not that I don’t believe you but where is that particular bit of info from? I haven’t heard that explanation for the item descriptions before.
This game reminds me of the first Alone in the Dark - the atmosphere, the spinning inventory items, the collapsed bridge, attack animations of gargoyles, transparent ghosts and knights, even the final boss has strong resemblance to Reinhardt III.
*Josh* was *not* lying, the music *got* _FuNkY._ 🤘🏼👹
_@_ 35:07
_The original PlayStation was such a masterpiece. So many awesome titles and memories that thing brought/holds. I always appreciate your work, thank you._ 🫱🏼🫲🏽
“What a game!” 🗿
Your commentary is what truly makes your content top notch. 👨🏻🍳🤌🏼
not gonna lie that skeleton looks pretty cool
the ps1 was capable of producing mind boggling effects after all
@@morsintus8323😂
Kinda looks like a undead version of Zan from Monster Rancher. Its the back wing claws that make me think of it.
I love how the dragon sword is still a Berserk reference back then
@T.E.XT-ME-JoshStrfePlays yo this has the worst scam I’ve ever seen lmao
Oh thank God, Brazil keeps running for another day.
At least for 46 minutes more
kkkkkkkkkkkkk koéééé
Quê??
Brazil mentioned 🎉🎉
@@S0ulGh0st It's a joke about a Brazilian Computer Server being only able to function if it doesn't turn off, so the responsible for it marathons Josh's channel to keep it on.
You forgot to mention that the Dragon is a large Black Dragon with a single Red Eye. Familiar!!
"He is Dead" appearing right when you say "Let's be real, he's probably dead" was really good lol
Was about to say how excellent that was.
King Field 2 (USA Version) is one of my favorite games of the era!
I think you're the first reviewer I've seen really encapsulate what makes this game special in a succinct and palatable way. The conclusion of the video really sums things up well. I enjoyed this a lot was very well done
King's Field is one of the best series ever. The only reason I even consider Dark Souls or Elden Ring. So stoked to see Mr. Strife Hayes playing one of my faves. Cheers!
Seeing the mic in a cup gets me everytime.
Lol yea I love it
But it really is very pragmatic if you're going to do a standing setup.
I remember getting King's Field as a kid and it was so difficult that I couldn't get anywhere
Josh should totally do a WIAG of Ultima Underworld I The Stygian Abyss. You can find a whole load of themes and ideas that would find their way into pretty mich every fantasy game since
Second that, he's always pointing out design choices and it's interesting what was already working in Ultima Underworld and what wasn't.
those hand drawn maps looked amazing! back in the day people couldnt get a new game to play every week. they were not only expensive but games didnt release as often and there wasnt much to pick from. So people would replay games all the time!
1:32 "The Playstation can produce mind-boggling graphics"
I have fever dreams about PS1 games like the army guy helicopter game and there was one with a pirate ship stuck in rivers that gave me PTSD.
It did
@@FumblsTheSniper Army Men Air Attack?
@@arciks11 yeah that one was a good time. The final boss was my crucible.
the kings field games are spooky as hell even in ways that are probably unitentional, i love it
Dudes will hear that outro and just say Hell Yeah
They probably put more effort into the early monsters because they knew most people wouldn't get very far.
The plant ones remind me of OOT plants sticks monster. Crazy.
@@slybird411 Both are inspired by the venus fly trap plant of real life.
To be fair most games are made in an odd (but understandable) order where the first level is one of the last actually designed in order for a game to put its best foot forward.
No, this game was a test to prove to Sony that they could actually FINISH a game. Before this FROM was making office software.
Sony was impressed enough that King's Field was published as a launch title for the PS1.
Kings field 2 was their actual first game game and is basically a remake of this one, and then they made Armored Core.
Armored Core was one of the first "greatest hits" titles, back when selling a million copies was an actual feat.
They knew what they were doing with that dragon tree leaf
One thing that was very apparent to me is that most all of the enemies I see you fighting in Kings Field exist in some form in Dark Souls. It's actually quite remarkable. Heck, the skeleton you encounter in the first secret are the exact skeletons in visual concept that you see at Firelink Shrine. The lizard man with the single armor piece is a staple of Sen's Fortress and became the magic shooting ones and the big sword boys. The big slow moving skeleton with the knife arms resembles the ghosts in New Londo, which hey! This game has the ghosts minus the knife hands. The plant creatures arguably got split into at least two enemies. The plant dudes in Darkroot Garden, the weird crystal clam things in the Duke's Archives, there's a linear progression from King's Field to Dark Souls in almost every conceivable way.
And don’t forget that the final boss is pretty much The Bed of Chaos
The one eyed dragon as well being inspo for kalameet is so cool!
The "Ice" Golems becoming the Crystal Golems too.
I just want to remind that skeletons with swords and small shields are a cinema classic from Jason and Argonauts
@@Fedorchik1536 Hell yeah! I remember seeing that as a kid (it was old then) and being fascinated with the stop motion animation. That cemented my love for all things fantasy.
Those last three minutes were amazing
the skeleton labeled "he is dead" is the most fromsoft thing in the game
RIGHT WITHIN LIIKE WHAT THE FIRST MINUTE OF THE GAME.
Had an awesome time using Boosteroid! My PC isn’t capable of running modern games, but the cloud gaming service made it all possible. Smooth gameplay, no hiccups. A must-try for those with older setups.
I've watched a hundred of your episodes! Good/bad MMOs, Josh Stife Plays. Give us a tier list!
Any and all tier lists from your giant brain would be gold.
TRUST ME. I'm a Lord.
When you talk about the harp and map design, is when I realized this game had the potential to be a 3D Symphony of the Night
We're practically there as soon as he talks about the sequel.
I remember seeing a boxed, physical copy of King’s Field at a Geek Shop for 100$
The actual title of this video should have been "Was it good? King's Field 0 (1994)"
Great video! Thank you! I clearly missed out on a ton of gaming history by not owning a PS1.
I tried King's Field, though I never got to the end because I got lost, but I've played King's Field and finished that game.
all the kings fields please brother!
45:25 "They wanted to make Elden Ring, so they started with King's Field and slowly improved." This is genuinely inspirational and goes to show that you gotta start somewhere, anywhere, if you want to eventually make your masterpiece.
Hidetaka Miyazaki has said he is not quite done. He still has ideas to make, in his opinion, the ultimate RPG.
What Josh didnt say, or doesnt kmow is that FROM was making offimatic programs just before this.
Whatever demon possessed a respectful software company to shift gears and start making games is unknown.
But Sony basically asked them to showcase they could finish a game before granting them a license.
This is them HALFASSING EVERYTHING.
@@louieberg2942 Let the man cook.
@@louieberg2942 Hidetaka Miyazaki didn't join From when they made this series.
True. He used the evolution of King’s field’s/shadow tower’s gameplay and expanded upon it more with the souls series. But the original games had nothing to do with him.
Played it when it came out and spent months on it. Was awesome for the time.
Damn shawty wasn't lying, the playstation really can produce mind boggling effects
Am I the only one that immediately thought of the Crestfallen Knight when they saw the night sitting there looking at the fire?
Backlogs once covered the entire king's field series and his words still remain in my mind
Welcome to Demon Souls, Prepare to die
Welcome to Dark Souls, Prepare to die
Welcome to King's Field, **** You
Is this video deleted? Can’t seem to find it.
that challenges channel? He did one? Might be one of those deleted reviews on my saved playlist...
Wasn't that mr. Iron Pineapple who did the video you mentioned? More specifically the video about King's Field: The Ancient City.
@@SolarSAG This is correct. It was Iron Pineapple, not Lemon.
@@TheKrangled aww man I wanted to watch lemon suffer... I mean play this
Loved that ending speech
I would argue that the first 3D RPG (i know of) would be Alternate Reality (1985).
Totally blew my mind when i saw that "run" on a C64 back then.
Not sure if it would be worth a video checking that out.
Wizardry was 1981 on the Apple II, but true 3D would be Ultima Underworld in 1992.
@@resetsurvivordidn't they all use 2D sprite enemies? Full 3D is Morrowind or NWN, or earlier games with Quake graphics not Doom but with swords.
Also the flashing colour room isn't the only full heal, the fountain you respawn at is a full heal to MP and HP. Also the feather boots let you run over pits that drop you to death as well, I'm not sure how many there are but theres definitely 1 that has a chest behind it.
For those interested in a modern Kings Field: Lunacid was heavily inspired by KF and Shadow Tower, and made by the people who did Lost in Vivo.
lunacid was amazing!
Love it!!
I will second this. Grew up loving King's Field. Lunacid is it's own beast but theres enough KF inspiration to give me the happy chemicals.
Love lunacid but the final boss is super dissapointing.
@@sirrealism7300 The Secret Boss is very difficult.
24:45 These lizardman are thiccc.
The maps were made based off the 2006 English patch, you say?
Sgt. Foley: "Ramirez! Map out the entirety of King's Field!"
I came here for King's Field and all I got was King's Field
The Mind-Boggling Effects were the adorable low-poly enemies we befriended along the way.
This makes me wish there was some kind of elaborate mod to turn all of Elden Ring's graphics into these low poly ones.
I want that mod for a _lot_ of modern games.
I would honestly rather look a duplo with legs and _imagine_ how horrifying the monster is, than have a 500mb jpg of "pale guy with big mouth and tentacles #3407".
I begged my mom for this game when I was younger. Me and my vest friend loved RPGs and this looked amazing. We played it quite a bit but never made much progress.
Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss came in 1992 for PC, the same year when Wolfenstein 3D, but it was much better looking with height differences. It was unbelievable at the time. Seems like this game was also very good at the 90's.
Those were both 2D sprites using trickery to look and feel 3D. King's Field has everything rendered in engine as 3D.
@@cattysplat True! I didn't remember that.
@@cattysplatah yes, RPGs used sprites for very long after the first fully 3D role playing games most people played was either Morrowind or Neverwinter Nights, both almost a decade later... Or MMOs, I think World of Warcraft popularized actually drawing everything with polygons instead of pre-rendering either sprites or Bg.
I had a playstation and kings field but couldnt afford a memory card. My brother and i took turns playing it starting all the way over every time we died.
It was our only game at the time
I think its where i got my love for roguelikes
before Dark Souls, before Armored Core, there was... King's Field
Not to be confused with king's field
or more affectionately called, King's Field. ❤
King's Field is a hard look at what happens when business software development staff slowly comes into their own as a game developer, with an enormous batch of creative ideas coming through in an overall unrefined experience. SirTech (of Wizardry) and (if my understanding of events is correct) Squaresoft were similar success stories. From Software arguably had it worse, because they had to hit the ground running in an industry where established veteran companies at the time were themselves spinning their wheels to figure out this whole 3D console game thing.
Everything the Souls gamds had from snake people and the moonlight sword to a stamina bar and all, traced back to King's Field.
@@Chinothebad I myself have just become a fan by way of Armored Core, and seeing the rich history this developer team has is just... wow. massive respect to these guys. I see why people love their games to death now. I've played the Armored Core series from Gen 1 thru to Gen 4. what can I say, I'm addicted!
It's amazing how far they've come T-T
From Soft did what it seems like almost no other devs do. They continued to build on their original idea without drastic changes to gameplay or overall style. They perfected their first idea for decades. THATS how you can get the closest to making the perfect game. That's why elden ring is a masterpiece and won game of the year. So many other companies think they need to completely change the style and gameplay to succeed. Using metrics to make games that try to appeal to everybody. That's why we've gotten so many good awful games recently. Or at least a big part of the reason.
pretty much...
I feel that Monster Hunter is in a similar boat. Having played the games for over a decade, the feel and overall gameplay loop has hardly changed, yet they've really honed in and perfected many aspects. One thing I respect Fromsoft for over Capcom, however, is sticking close to their hardcore reputation by constantly increasing difficulty as their player's skill increases. Some of Capcom's recent "quality of life" decisions for MH don't quite agree with the spirit of the hunt.
Larian did the same. I played original Divine Divinity until memory leaks on bloated game state made it unplayable. Same with BG3 lol, they both have that gimmick that every item in the world is movable and you can bring crates and barrels into your home. And NPC reaction system, writing style and even atmosphere in Baldur's Gate 3 is closer to older games by same team than original Baldur's Gate.
speaking of that, Bioware used to be that dev who made the same game but more streamlined every few years, you can easily see how Mass Effect or Dragon Age are still following BG2 formula with NPCs and a base, tons of dialogue to solve quests without sacrificing gameplay... Hell, Elder Scrolls have he same pattern, Arena was trying to make Skyrim wig sticks and stones.
I lust for more games like this.
King's Field, Armored Core, Eternal Ring, Dark Souls, Elden Ring, Echo Night... And then there's The Adventures of Cookie & Cream. A very colorful and charming puzzle/platformer game. A bit quite the oposite of what their other games are. lol Great video as always, Josh. Kudos!
And also Ninja Blade, a shitty and absolutely ridiculous ninja game.
My only memory of that is some dude harassing me on the dark souls wiki to force me to become an admin on his cookie wiki, annoying me to the point I used my unconsensually given admin powers to ban him from his own wiki
@@THEPELADOMASTER I mean, video game companies aren't perfect. Not every single game they make is gonna be great.
@@historicflame972 That serves him right, hopefully.
Don't forget about Thousand Land, an RTS featuring 🌰s as your soldiers
I could have sworn Josh did one of these videos on King's Field 4.
The field is right there. 43:00
i love these games, the atmosphere is so incredible. It's a lot like dark souls (especially the first game) in _that_ sense as well. it's just got such a dreamlike feel, and the playstation 1 aesthetic is so fantastic.
5:15 There was a way to run: I noticed when pressing interact to look for hidden walls and secrets in barrels that it would prevent my stamina from recharging. Eventually, I connected the dots and realized that holding down the interact button would deplete stamina and allow you to move faster, essentially being a sprint button.
That's in King's Field 2.
@@arciks11 I just relaunched both of them to check, and I believe that you're right on that. I probably conflated the two.