As someone who enjoyed the DLC while also being aware of its flaws, I'd like for Theo to tone down the hyperbole a little bit, because he's got a very good base, and is super correct on many accounts. He makes so many points that are absolute truth nukes here, like "There is now no longer any connection between the visual information presented to you and what your reaction should be, it's pure guesswork until you can memorize the timings." or "Souls game combat is really not that advanced", but for every point like that, he says something bizarre like "This game/DLC is basically Skyrim." You can sense the split in the community with this DLC, and bosses like Consort Radahn exemplify it. That boss is insanely hard in a way most people don't seem to enjoy, but if you try to break down why (constantly flashbanging you with particle effects, terrible camera that gets obscured by Mickey's hair, half of his attacks in phase 2 are extremely unintuitive as to how you're supposed to dodge them, etc.) you'll be met with a wall of "git gud" and "here's a vid of Ongbal no-hit beating him at RL1 with a USB steering wheel." We could really use a reasoned, polite and well-argumented breakdown here. I hope Theo can keep his rage in check for his video and not go full CURSE YOOOUUUU, ELDEN RIIIIING like he did here, because if you open with "This was the most unpleasant experience I've ever had with a game," you'll instantly piss off most of the people who liked this DLC, rather than win them to your side. Matthewmathosis, where are you?
Yeah like I think it's both hard for people in the souls community to take criticism as Game Journos and outsiders to the community typical crap on the franchise because it's "too hard", but also tough to take real criticism seriously when people say hyperbolic stuff like, "it's the most unpleasant game I've ever played"
if you play the game trying to learn the move sets and not beating using craft/summon to stack ridiculous amount of power, its really anoying to learn anything in this DLC.
And theo needs to realize 90% of his criticisms can summed as "it's not simple enough for me." Well jesus wept guy, im sorry fromsoftware is the fastest growing video game company in the workd and trying new things. Maybe go back to dark souls 1 because simplicity seems to be his speed. I on the other absolutely ADORE being surprised by these boss mechanics. Makes me feel like im fighting something intelligent.
@@mrkennady So like my main criticism of Souls combat is that it lacks depth. This is a criticism of it being *too* simple. I would rather play deeper action games
“I have done shit that you people could not believe souls games” I watched a guy play through all of dark souls 3 with bananas hooked up to wires as his controller, I guarantee you you have not done that
The first Elden Ring Stream was Theo sh*ting on the game for 4 hours then everyone giving the game a 7 or 8 out of 10 except him. He dominates the conversation and is boring on this topic.
I don't understand how FromSoft seriously improved the camera in Sekiro, the way it could zoom out or pan up to match the boss, and then completely throw that out for Elden Ring. I distinctly remember fighting the Guardian Ape and how the camera would move up when it was about to throw its entire body in the last sword attack of its combo, then it would zoom in on Wolf after parrying. That's fantastic camera work that gives you visual clarity of the boss's movement, then immerses you in how strong the attack was by keeping Wolf in 40% of the frame, probably reeling from how much force he had to put not only into blocking, but not falling over immediately afterward. Fighting Ulcerated Tree Spirit for the first time in Fringefolk Hero's Grave, not having even opened the gate to Limgrave, gave me motion sickness. And to the point about boss design, I was watching Theo's gameplay while still listening to what he had to say. I think Theo is too rigid in his gameplay style, but I understand his arguments to the bosses being too damn anime. Elden Ring is the first Souls game where I felt shields were fantastic to use instead of just throwing a Grass Crest Shield on my back and calling it a day. Theo is trying to play it like Dark Souls where you roll through everything because bosses were way slower. I will do that for magic attacks, but if I know it's full Physical damage, then I won't hesitate to throw up my Brass Shield, probably the best shield you can get immediately, because I have enough stamina to tank it and get a counterattack in. Guard Counter attacks do way more 'Posture' damage to open enemies to ripostes, and that drastically changed how I played the game by that point.
Same. As a developer, I'm telling you that it's not about the "company" - it's about the team. Consider how different DS2 feels, because a different team (sans Myazaki) built that one, and that is why it feels like a cheap third-party soulslike clone. Different teams also work on different code branches, so elden ring may have branched off of the DS3 code and not sekiro, and thus improvements can't come across as a matter-of-course and may have to be re-implemented. This explains sekiro's excellent PC performance versus the sh*t-show that was elden ring's PC release. In my professional opinion, FROM isn't a technically proficient developer and I don't think they have good development practices in managing code-bases. See Mathew Mattosis's comment on the lack of improvements in the souls games.
This is Metal's gameplay, not Theo's. I think there might have been one short clip shared by Theo to demonstrate camera wonkiness in one of the boss fights, but everything else was livestream recordings from Metal's playthrough.
In short, Theo sucks at the game and doesn't understand 80% of the mechanics at all...only valid complaint is the camera, it needs some fixing, everything else he bitches about is utter nonsense.
Something to add to the "anime" criticism, every fucking boss in the dlc either has 2 swords, spins unnecessarily and unintuitively, or both. It is a very cringe experience watching everything turn into a beyblade reenactment just because it "looks cool".
random things being the only thing that give people joy in life is the only thing that gives me joy in life I love that this joke has become such a community fixture lol
It's fine to like it, I just hope you(anyone reading) would have the self-awareness to identify the Quality of what they are playing, and this is Very bad People had a lot of fun with the SW Sequels, it was very bad, its fine to like them, it's bad that so many people are insecure to admit the bad quality of them, and the same thing is happening here, people doing a nearly dogmatic defense of something of very bad quality that they happen to like, the Objectivity really goes out the window when their favorite thing is the target of criticism, and it's dissapointing.
@uneterostardust8233 I just think the people complaining about difficulty, just don't know how to make builds. Damage negation is very very important, not just vigor.
@@MilkT0ast I just think anyone complaining about the ST are just Bigroots ~~youtube censor~~ I mean, if that's your argument, K, basically just another dogmatic dismissal, "everything is the player's fault and never the game's", kinda true for DS1, but the rest have issues of the game itself, DS2 my friend how hath thou damaged the games and community..
@@lustrazor44 TLJ is not bad, it's very obvious, did you not find the Lighspeed rush A-MMMaaaazing? it's Excelent. gosh gee them bigroots homophonics reycisms /s, obviously
I find it respectful to defend your opinion with logical arguments against thousands of people on a livestream despite almost everyone disagreeing with your point. I'm not sure i would handle such pressure. I would probably conform to the norm or shut the fuck up entirely unless the truth is absolutely obvious and disagreeing is ridiculous.
@@AscendantStoicI don't know where u got this idea from considering he beat the dlc with heavy self-imposed restrictions. Are u sure you were listening?
It is for the first playthouth. Other games are more replayble but that first one in Sekiro is miles above everything else imo. And i'm someone who nevery plays parry if they don't have to.
One of the only things I disagreed with Theo on in this video is how he implies Sekiro is actually not that good compared to other action games. I absolutely adore Sekiro and would need massive unpacking of that claim before ever agreeing with it.
@@OldyAlbert It does have re-playability. Sekiro has 4 endings, one of which is extremely different from the others including its own unique boss fight. The boss gauntlets are challenging and fun. There are different ways the conversations can go depending on factors like the Sake and ending you are committing to.
@@ThePetriaxI literally just get on the game, do reflections of strength, and get off. If demon of hatred didn’t exist I would give it a perfect 10/10, instead it’s only a 9.9/10
This is the point. The game gives you the tools to win. If you still aren't having fun after all that then you just don't like the game and probably never will. So why play?
In the next FromSoft Souls game, they're gonna have bosses that will raise their weapon and just stand there, occasionally making a mocking motion as if they're about to strike and then pull it back and say "Haha, you flinched!" and then after 10-20 seconds of doing that they'll oneshot you in half a frame. Now that will be the next level of pattern learning, I can't wait to read the guides for that boss. "Ultermaximus will wait 3 seconds, after that the tell for his attack will be either him calling you gay, or trying to tell you about ligma".
@@nickh4354 who are you even talking about? Both me and Theo beat this game with the dlc. I'd bet money that I've beaten more souls likes than you've played games in your life.
@@He-who-wakes 10000x easier? By god, can this game made for casual shitters get even easier? What is panic rolling by the way, is that something you tourists to the genre do?
Heres a quick tip for any one struggling with the dlc. Focus on "physical damage negation" Use the Dragon Crest Great Shield Talisman (20%) Use the Opline Hardtear in the Physiks Flask. (10%) Eat Boiled crab (20%) And cast Golden Vow (10%) That's a total of 60% off the damage you would normally take. And this is NAKED. if you wear heavy armour, it can get up to 80%. And all this for 25 faith. And 1 talisman slot and 1 physics slot. Very very low investment for such a strong build. And if you don't want faith, just don't use Golden Vow.
@@DozleZabi sure I get that. But the other builds are viable as well. I have a sheild build that no enemy can bypass. I also have a glass cannon build. Where I can one shot bosses, but they can one shot me too. I also have a status effect build. Where I can proc bleed, scarlet rot, frost and poison all at once. And all of these builds are viable...you just gotta dodge correctly. And you can still get your damage negation up.
then stack 1-3 consumables that give damage, amulets that give 15-20 each and use mimic tear, Boss design? game design? nah man i will just skip using the stupid mimic tear/craft system
For me, the glaring issues with the DLC is that a lot of cool areas feel barren, empty, with nothing to do other than embracing the atmosphere. Don't get me wrong, each section is beautifully crafted, it is like looking at an awesome painting, but it loses all meaning when there isn't anything keeping you occupied in said area. Second issue is the last boss for me, it ended up being the most unfun thing I've ever had to deal with on the entire DLC.
I’m curious what Theo thought abt Midra. Like Messmer he was a vos that I could easily get into a flow state, his attack strings weren’t very long and well telegraphed, and his openings were pretty plentiful. Also on Messmer, his big anime snake moves are surprisingly easy to dodge; not obnoxiously delayed, and longer punish windows than normal Messmer
I don't mind Midra. I don't particularly love him, but I thought he was okay. I appreciated how readable he was, but he was also a bit simple, funnily enough. So consider that a non-disparaging 'he was okay', if that makes sense
The main issue I've had is the performance of the game has been awful since the dlc came out. Used to get a solid 60fps now some areas are mid 20fps, my pc more than meets the requirements.
Yes that is an issue. I believe its because it has all areas loaded in so you can quickly jump from map to map. Strange trade off but thats what they picked
When was Theo introduced again? I recall them plucking him from chat while watching one of his videos I think. I've been wanting to rewatch that but I forget what episode it's in.
I love Elden Ring, but Theo has some very solid criticisms. He’s spot on about the camera having major issues (even after they handled it near perfectly in Sekiro), the over-the-top anime moves, and the garbage visual clutter of particle affects are way too common. My problem with other criticisms however is that they come across as hyperbolic and just ignores any positive aspects the game has. I personally try to fight bosses without deliberately remembering attacks because I agree that memorization shouldn’t be a prerequisite. It isn’t what makes these games engaging. Memorization naturally occurs when facing a challenge repeatedly, so it’s going to happen naturally if you do. People think this is what they enjoyed about it, but there’s much more to it than that. Otherwise, taping a picture of a dragon to a game of Simon would be considered peak design. This faulty logic basically became a meme and a repeated point of praise and I think From Software listened and incorporated this feedback into many of the boss and enemy designs with delayed attacks and bullshit like waterfowl dance. There should be reasonable tells that convey to the player a general idea of what is going to happen and when it’s going to happen. The “skill” doesn’t come from remembering when something is supposed to happen and simply dodging, it’s about managing your resources/stamina and responding by applying your build or playstyle to deal with the threat. However, the vast majority of attacks do not require memorization. I had no problem dealing with most attacks by reading tells and movements. Positioning is important too, so it’s not just about dodge timing. Positioning yourself for an opening to attack or into spots where bosses will need to readjust giving you time to regain stamina or heal is crucial. This is the vast majority of attacks in the games but there are also plent that are barely, if not entirely, unreadable before memorizing them. Even with that being the case, I can see how this can sour the feeling of it entirely and it’s a legitimate complaint, but it also doesn’t mean that every aspect of the attacks and combat are fucked. It took me a while to come to grips with the fact that it is not meant to be played like the Souls games. There are entire new mechanics to utilize like stance breaking, block countering, and jumping/jump attacks that all add new approaches to combat. Another important aspect is finding openings within enemy attack chains / combos to get hits in rather than having a back and forth between being on the offensive and defensive as it would often be in previous games. Realizating this made the seeming relentlessness of bosses feel much more manageable. This, when combined with the greater emphasis on adjusting to enemy resistances and using consumables if needed, makes it a game where both skill and knowledge are equally important to success. I’m also mixed on the open world and it’s design. It’s nice to see that they tried to experiment with their formula, but it had varying degrees of success. On one hand, it’s not as fleshed out or well-paced as the more self-contained area / level design from previous games and the implementation of some world bosses and the locations they inhabit is just awful, but on the other hand I can clearly see how many aspects of their level design were applied to the layout of the world and it resulted in in a design that, even with it’s faults, still greatly surpasses many other open world games from developers that had been doing it for a long time. I would like to see FromSoft do something DS1 in both world design and tone again, and will happily support a push for that in future games, but I don’t let that paint my perception of Elden Ring because it’s own thing. If I remember correctly, Miyazaki had said this game was meant to be much different because it’s about facing off against great deities and have a more grand presentation. Being different doesn’t make it bad, I’d be way more critical if it was Dark Souls 4, but it’s not for a reason. Of course we should criticize and point out the problems we see, but we shouldn’t act like the entire game is a trashfire and every aspect of it’s design philosophy should be tossed because some aspects were handled poorly or didn’t work (especially when there’s a lot of good aspects as well) and because it’s different from a company’s past work. It’s also just as awful to dismiss any criticisms without good reasoning. My enjoyment if Elden Ring isn’t hindered by acknowledging the flaws, but it is when I think about how people just seem to ignore them and refuse to talk about them. I want their future games to be even better, but they can only do that if we’re honest, both in criticism and praise. I’ll end saying I’m not worried about From Software “losing their way” so to speak when it comes to their presentation. They still have that “soul” that helped make DS1 so great. Shaman Village in the DLC was powerful. The subdued, strange, and eerily somber track of Metyr and the Ancestral Spirits is reminicent of Gherman and Gwyn. The beauty and atmosphere of Leyndell and discovering the fate of the nomads in the Shunning Grounds below. The reveal and splendor of the rivers and Eternal Cities below ground. The central figure of the Erdtree looming overhead, both beautifully awe-inspiring and ominously foreboding. These are the kinds of things only the people who made Dark Souls could pull-off.
The part when they were saying that ALL souls games are pure memorization is complete bullshit. Most games in general require some sort of memorization, but never like this. In every souls game until now you could intuitively roll and react to attacks, sure some specific attacks needed to be learned, like artoris's ground smash that he would cancel into another one if you attacked him to soon, most will not see this coming. But in this dlc you have to memorize EVERYTHING, right down to the seconds it takes for the delay attack to come down, ive never had to do that before, even with fucking GAEL.
Based take, Elden Ring reminds me of DS 2 in the sense that its major concern is to kill you... It has the tightest openings, the most input reading, the bosses with the most health, the most stamina, the most poise, and weird combos that stop or keep going depending on your distance... this isn't to say that that Elden ring isn't without excellent boss fights like Radagon, Godfrey or Placidusax, even the DLC has fantastic fights like Midra, Mesmerr, and Rallana... This is to say that we have completely abandoned the idea of Hard but fair...
I'm sorry but if you did the Igon Questline and say you didn't feel anything well i really don't know what to say but to each his own. Damn but still damn
@@TheottreeI completely understand your perspective about how no other game could replicate the emotional highs of ds1 for you. I didn't have the same experience with it, but since it's pretty subjective, I can get where you're coming from with that. Sif and Artorias are just too damn effective, man. As a side note, I genuinely believe fromsoftware has the worst fanbase in videogame history in terms of Stockholm syndrome, largely due to not experiencing the stand-outs in the genre. This comment section has been driving me insane.
I don't get the hate for it, had a great time, felt challenged, overcame the challenge, kicked Rellana's ass by smacking her with the big black knight great hammer like she was a piñata. I definitely think people's builds are part of why they have a good or bad time as well as expectations coming in, and not understanding the full breadth of the mechanics. Jumping for one is incredibly underrated and gets you out of many of the jams that rolling doesn't, there's also just understanding what makes a good build and a bad one. It's more complicated than Theo says, but not as complicated as some make it out to be. What I've seen is stubbornness contributes to a lot of headache and combined with having expectations for how you expected your character to perform, it can definitely lead to a bad time.
Stubbornness has to be at least 50% or more of why people call the game unfair. If I'm struggling I try different builds and strategies. But what I hear other people say is, "If I have to change my build then it's not fair. I should be able to use my build for everything!" But the problem isn't they can't use a specific build, it's that they aren't good enough to use it.
I've had a great time too, but there is a lot that should be rightly hated. The power scaling of the enemy damage and health especially are so borked and the scadutree fragments don't "fix" that.
I wonder if we double boss attack speed and make it that every instance of damage is a 1 shot kill is it still balanced and a skill issue ? Some people will be able to beat the dlc like that. Im asking what is the difference between unfair and a simple skill issue. If the answer is that its unfair as long as your not skilled enough gaming discourse is dead because i can add skill issue to almost any sauce.
@griffiththechad9483 is this sarcasm? If not: how?! Why?! When did humanity make you the standard for difficulty in games? You could be very good, you could be a liar, you could be stubborn, etc. That's just silly.
Given that Theo's a big DMC guy, his complaints are actually perfectly valid; Fromsoft experimented with new active (IE, reflex-based) combat mechanics in Sekiro and then basically reverted to the tried and true, sturdy but simple hack n' slash they've been refining since Demon Souls when Elden Ring came out. Now to be clear, the distinction I'm drawing is that DMC combat has systems, hidden systems, intended mechanics, exploit mechanics, and a level of commensurate combat complexity that the moment-to-moment of Elden Ring doesn't match. What I'm not saying is that Elden Ring's combat is bad, or that they didn't add new systems; it's just that few of them have to do with the things other action titles have explored, like juggling, form-changing, weapon-switching for unique attacks (Bloodborne touched on this a little bit, one of its cooler decisions), or basing combat essentially all upon your ability to successfully craft combos (This is because DMC usually has sparse defensive options, so you're attacking, dodging by running manually away from attacks, jumping for i-frames, hitting the Royal Guard button, or you're dead). In other words, the pace of combat is slower and has less room for player innovation, which makes sense because Souls games also just don't have the tone of a high-speed 3D fighter game like Bayonetta or Vanquish or any other "spectacle fighter" game as Totalbiscuit called them (Vanquish is a fighting game, this is not a debate). However, Souls games have much more *broadness* in their mechanics - your total number of functioning strategies is much larger, and the content covers more things than just the combat mechanics; this also means all valid strategies must be balanced against one another for replayability, at least by the standard of the dev's attempts to do so. DMC, Bayonetta, these are games where you walk through a level that's basically a hallway and literally see a "level end" screen once you finish them, because every encounter is a tightly curated experience. So while I definitely see his point, I also do support the argument that it's not a matter of effort on either team's part, but rather design focus. You're not learning lore in DMC, you're usually not exploring hidden areas unless they're hidden combat trials, and generally a spectacle fighter has a smaller roster of enemies that each have unique attack patterns and traits, while in a Souls game most enemies are magical humanoids or animals that slash at you or fire magic from afar and have a relatively standardized set of attacks and reactions. This template allows for good-enough combat across a large open map with curated zones, but also accounts for the resource drain players experience when their "level" is basically the space between Bonfires and thus variable player-to-player, because not every player will stop at the first next rest zone that they see, and not every player will take a totally linear path through exploration. Both types of game are good, this isn't a discussion of absolute value, it's just that both have explored other strengths in their game design owing to their history of development (DMC was a Resident Evil game that got reworked after they found cool potential for combat systems in an early build, Elden Ring is descended from dungeon exploration games that focused heavily upon finding items and gear to fight simpler enemies who will damage-check you unless you're prepared) and that's why they court narrower (DMC) and broader (Souls) audiences. Now I'll hand Theo this as well; Elden Ring is in sort of an awkward place, because From clearly wants to achieve something closer to spectacle fighter combat but also wants a big open-world game, so they're building a huge amount of combat around a simple combat system. In other words, his complaint about the "roll and wait to hit them" combat being overtaxed by increasingly shorter timing windows is also apt; you can't go into Witch Time to land free damage on the Lion boss, you can't pop your Devil Trigger to unlock a new moveset that can stun-juggle Old Radahn for a certain amount of time, and so the player's "cheat ability" that improves their odds in Elden Ring is basically just summoning adds. Elden Ring has cool summons, but they do ultimately exist to just divide boss attention in two directions as opposed to letting you cope with the boss's abilities with your player character. TL;DR - Miyazaki just wasn't brave enough to turn the Malenia fight into a GoW sex minigame and that says a lot about the games industry in 2024.
I think these games, DMC and Elden Ring exist in parallel but different genre's to be honest. I don't think it's necessarily comparing apples to apples here. I don't think Elden Ring or any Fromsoft game has ever been similiar to a DMC game. I don't even know if I would say that Elden Ring/Soulsborn games are hack and slash. You aren't trying to build up a combo meter or use super abilities to chain attacks and juggle enemies around or doing fancy insane moves and having quick time events. It's a much more bare bones combat system true, but that is what Fromsoft has designed it to be on purpose. It's supposed to be somewhat methodical, based on timing your attacks to openings that the enemy either present or you create and balancing risk and reward for each attack, dodge, heal, and everything else. I think they are just in two different genre's and so is God of War for that matter. Lies of P, Lords of the Fallen, even side scrollers like Salt and sanctuary are more like Darksouls. I wouldn't like a Darksouls game to be more like DMC, it wouldn't be a Darksouls game then. (edit)I probably misunderstood what you were getting at, and my comment might be more of a comment on what Theo had been saying and comparing the two games like he did, I don't know, but in general, I prefer DMC and Elden Ring/Dark Souls to remain seperate genre's of action games.
"Reverted to" Bro they've made two games since Sekiro and one was AC6. Elden Ring was a huge project stretching back from before Sekiro was started. The DLC isn't going to have a completely different combat system to the base game.
@@fastenedcarrot9570 Damn!!!!!!! Respond to the central conceit or I don't care, because you know that's not the core of my point. Nobody expected a new combat system for the DLC, it's stupid to assume I meant that in a post about Elden Ring as a whole. It's also pure waterbrain to assume that in a "huge project since before Sekiro came out" that nobody had resources or time to consider updating the combat like they did for - Sekiro - which you've already observed was a smaller project.
@@vaaaasa Huh, I never really thought of that. But I mean... exploring it a second time is far easier due to being a lot more familiar with the map, but even so the fragments aren't required to beat them if you really don't want to look for them again. They seem pretty on the path to wherever you are going anyway.
It was pretty apparent the Fromsoft saw the game was too easy, as people streamed multiple no hit runs and dance mat controllers, and said we need to make them cry. Heck I saw someone, not 2 days after the dlc came out, beat the final boss with no armor and just a club. Ironpineapple went into the dlc at level 1.
@@sayLeotardbutsayitChinese I think it recently came out in an article that he played Elden Ring himself and said he is actually bad at it. Or hasn't been able to beat it.
With regards to the "why is it reviewing so well" question, i feel Theo needs to appreciate that while he just wants a boss rush, the majority of players really enjoy exploration and the world.
the world in the dlc is disapontly empty compared to base game, a lot less dungeons and shit to do, plus lots of uselless upgrade materials (if i'm in the DLC, LV 150, why tf do i need a somber 2 or smithing 5) making the exploration boring after the first playthrough
I find the exploration in ER to be far, far less interesting than the previous, tighter-designed games. It's beautiful, but my urge to explore is killed knowing that 9/10 things I'll find are recycled tileset minidungeons/ruins/fortresses.
Thing is, I don't want a boss rush. I want quite the opposite; my favourite game in the series is DS1, the game with by no means the best boss roster. What I want is more focus on those other aspects or, if the games are gonna keep being really combat-focused, more expansion of what's going on in the combat. And I can't exactly take away anyone else's enjoyment of the world for sure. But I certainly didn't enjoy the open world or the exploration of it; I felt it was very frequently unrewarding (I don't mean this just in a sense of 'I didn't find big powerups for my build' for what it's worth)
So what you have to spend time learning the moveset 😂 Earn it. Or use the tools the game gives you 😂 If you dont want to use those tools then you have to put more time in.
I don't think Theo's arguments are bad here, like a lot of people seem to think. I can see the logic behind most of them. I just don't agree with a lot as well. For instance, the idea that the games visuals, or the boss attacks, are lying to you is something I don't understand on a fundamental level. I would need a visual to go along, because in my head, seeing a delayed attack just means, okay, I need to dodge later instead of impulse dodging. Now, of course, the first time that'll probably catch you, and that's fair. But beyond that, I do not understand the complaint of not knowing what to do against certain attacks. I've found very few attacks that aren't telegraphed and reactable. Mind you, I didn't say NONE. There are absolutely some BS attacks. However, one thing that I have been very annoyed with for a lot of the community, is the idea that the final boss is bad lorewise. I'm not here to defend his moveset, though, I think it is a bit more telegraphed then people say. However, Theo saying that the Final Boss is tasteless, irks me to no end. I'm not gonna lie and say I didn't like the base version, but I didn't love him as much as everyone else. But the idea that it is tasteless is INSANE to me. If you don't know the lore, then yeah, I could see your perspective. But things will come out of nowhere in every Souls game if you don't pay attention to or know the lore. If you do the NPC quests, it is made explicitly clear what is coming and how. Again, I am NOT defending the actual design of the moveset itself. That's a separate issue. But the idea that the final boss is tasteless or just fanservice completely negates the story entirely. Could be just me overreacting to it, but I've seen so many people dog on it lorewise because they didn't understand the lore itself, and that frustrates me to no end. But overall, I disagree with a lot of what Theo says, BUT I can understand where he is coming from. Mostly.
I don't think you are overreacting at all. Like the fact that a lot of people wanted Godwyn for the Final Boss is something that is fine for them to want, but at the same time, when one looks into it a little bit, it completely breaks lore in so many ways if that were to happen. (Like ahh yes, what was the point of the night of the black knifes even? What was the point of his death storywise?) Thus the only reliable realization one can have when it comes to Godwyn, is that Miquella tried to ressurect him, perhaps because the concept of "a true death" is something that sounds too abstract to a lot of the characters in universe, but that when he realized he couldn't, for whatever reasons, regardless of if he wanted him as his King Consort or if it was simply because Miquella really liked Godwyn (as most did) as a display of HIS character, he then eventually had to give up. The lore is incredibly vague, and ironically/not-so-ironically is also really difficult to get into, which means most things happening while the Player naturally plays the game will just sound insane. Kind of one of the things I am not too wild on, but regardless of that, this thing with Radahn and everything regarding Miquella, I actually thought was really well done when looking into it and thinking about it. I despise the Boss fight, but the things going on there are really interesting, and I find it really hard to agree with the notion that it is tasteless. Which is surprising, because I hate that Boss so much that by all means my bias should tell me to agree, but I cannot after everything I have read. Doesn't mean it is perfect, but tasteless? Nah, that seems like it is just the bitterness some people felt from the DLC seeping into areas that it may not have been the best to allow it in.
They are the same old straw man attacks that every low skill player throws at the game in frustration when they fail. I've seen this over and over with new players. And it's not exclusive to From, the game cheated on me" was probably used on Space Invaders back in 1977.
@@qing7902 So check literally ANYbody else. There's valid complaints but they are NOT what Theo is offering. Look up Only Waifu, Ratotoskr, Youwy, people that actually care about the game and won't just complain that it isn't Dark Souls AGAIN
@@qing7902 yesss. Like I don’t absolutely hate the DLC, there’s a lot of good in it, but it was a really awful experience on many occasions. High highs, low lows, and I’d love to hear someone talk about those lows
Aye. Here is hoping that the next From project is something closer to that, rather than Elden Ring 2. I am just tired of this combat system. Dark Souls 3 was a fine sendoff for this kind of stamina-based system. ER really needed something better (bloodborne trick weapons + faster player speed probably would have worked well).
38:02 in what way is dodge rolling the “almost only” way of defense in Elden ring. There are multiple types of shields, damage negation spells, items, and consumables, your armor stats matter, summoning, and there is parrying. I can agree with Theo on a few things about ER but when he says shit like this all it tells me is that he refuses to use tools given to him by the devs and only wants to play this game like dark souls which it is not.
Dodging in ER is absolutely the most optimal way to avoid damage. No amount of gimmicks and cheese builds is going to beat the 100% damage reduction at a single button press that can be done nigh infinitely.
I finished the final boss sword and board, relying much more on blocking with a shield than rolling out of attacks. It's very doable, you just need the Greatshield Talisman and a strong shield.
Essentially what the other reply said. Dodging is fairly close to strictly better than blocking, outside of builds optimised to block that trivialise the game in a way that I don't enjoy. I don't want damage negation and defences to help me facetank, that's not my issue - I want to play ball with the boss and learn to avoid everything it throws at me. I want to master it. So I guess in that sense yeah I do refuse to use tools. But since my problem is not primarily the level of difficulty, and using these tools would not change the gameplay outside of making it easier, I don't think they would improve my opinions of anything I interacted with. Blocking is the only one I did use, and that was only when the game borderline forced me to by presenting attacks that cannot be rolled through consistently if at all.
I LOVED Elden Ring, but I kinda agree with a lot that he was saying. Something has been changing and I think it definitely culminated in this DLC. I can't wait for his video to drop. I had loads of fun with the game back during launch, I'm a huge fan of the Horizon games (Zero Dawn & Forbidden West, not the racing games xD) and Elden Ring just completely took over at that time and made me abandon Forbidden West until a later date. But in the last "Third" of the game, it started gradually becoming more and more unenjoyable. I had my vigor soft-capped and I was dying in 2-to-3 hits from basic enemies in Forts or Dungeons in the Mountaintops of the Giants area for example. And then at that point almost every boss had "anime sh*t" (its funny that I called it this too while ranting to my gf at the time who was also playing it, goes to show how it really is unfitting in the game lol) And if it wasn't anime sh*t, then it was AoE, AoE, AoE and flurries after flurries of moves. It started taking away the fun and making me just.. straight up not feel enjoyment whenever I beat a boss. I still felt accomplishment when I finished the game but there was a hint of a feeling of having finished a chore. A game should never feel that way. But there's this mentality within the souls community where complaints are unnaceptable. There's complaints I still did back then but it wasnt of the difficulty, it was of the open world design. A lot of "ArTiClEs" and YoUtUbErS" would post sh*t saying that FromSoft open world design should be the industry standard, and for other companies to pay attention as exploration was perfect in it, etc. I do agree that having a screen cluttered with sh*t blips a la Ubisoft is terrible. But Elden Ring's lack of quest logs, direction, NPC locations, and utterly insane obscure triggers for quest progressions makes it that people have to open up guides on the internet to figure sh*t out to get specific endings or simply complete sidequests. That's not good game design at all in my opinion and saying it was always met with toxic feedback. So I never really mentioned the "artificial difficulty BS" that was ALLLLL OVER this game's end-game areas. I kinda just sucked it up, took pride in that I finally beat it, and that now I could beat anything. Now the DLC released and it takes the bullsh*t of that Endgame and cranks it up to 11. 🤣 And nobody can say anything because the community is so toxic and cult-like that nobody can criticize FromSoft. Without this criticism, FromSoft may not learn that this direction they're headed is terrible and completely antithecal to the original design ideas of the souls series. Needless to say, I'm concerned about their future games, and UNNNBELIEEEVABLY GLAD that Sekiro was made *BEFORE* Elden Ring. I have a feeling it'd be caked with sh*t present in this DLC otherwise.
76 can be fun if you have people to play it with, solo it's not worth it and just boring. Gollum is funny in how busted it is. No man's sky.... if it's release version I agree, if it's the new version then I'd be hesitant to agree but it'd have many asterisks and footnotes attached to anything I say about NMS. Suicide Squad? yeah I could agree
I honestly can't take anyone seriously if they have this opinion. Is this his first From game? It sounds like the same critique ever From newcomer posts when they die one too many times.
50:08 I really hope Fromsoftware creates a new boss Called "Theo Of The Erdtree" who amongst many other long bs attacks chains, has the ability to steal your heal elixirs when successfully grabbing you as an input-read heal punish.
They made it to where people with a level 70 character and a character that's level 300 can have a fresh difficulty. If you explore then you'll likely destroy the last half of the bosses no problem.
Not true. I explored almost everything 1 level before max sacrurdtree blessing, last boss was a nightmare. I dont agree with all of theo's points but I think the game has issues.
@@brendancoulter5761yeah I’m with you on this. There’s definitely something that feels off. Some further fine tuning and tweaking would be great. For starters, if the final boss stopped flash banging me with every move in phase 2, that’d be nice :D
you realize that if there's no inbetween of either getting fucked by bosses or just destroying bosses with no problem, then the game is badly designed, right?
Biggest gripe I can throw against SotE is that it shares the issue of base Elden Ring where the endgame bosses have been scaled too high damage wise. I dont think its fun to have vit pumped to hard cap and still get two shot by damn near every major boss. I said it when ER dropped that those endgame bosses are about as hard as you can make bosses while still making them enjoyable to fight. Phase 2 of final boss strays past that into cheap territory imo. Aside from that i had a lot of fun with the DLC. Enjoyed the lore revelations, the new gear, and a bunch of the new bosses.
Try using physical defense. (Dragoncrest great shield / Golden vow/ black flame protection / boiled prawn and then a heavy set of armour I have 87% physical negation. And now Radhans has to do 2 full combos to kill me. (Which is like 12 hits)
@MilkT0ast I beat the game dude, it's not worth examining how I could minmax out more defense. My criticism is that I don't like that EVERY boss has 2 to 1 shot levels of damage and long ass combo strings , any two of which can kill you and also have swing delays. I'm just saying that Fromsoft doesn't continuously need to escalate their difficulty for their own fanbase because I think difficulty has diminishing returns on overall fun with a game of you increase it past a point and Elden Ring endgame reaches that point
@@that1guy375 Much like Skyrim I enjoyed Elden ring, but I can't help bit wonder why they retained all the bad design choices from previous games, while changing much of the good stuff. I can see the comparison like that.
maybe, fromsoft really need to fix the game design from Elden Ring, just for start wtf is a stagger system without a stagger bar, and why summons and crafted items so strong?
@@naruroGCS Every game can be improved and he has plenty of valid arguments like tracking is never fun especially when its just guys doing 360s because its lazy af, but a good portion of them were things in almost every other souls game I can think of like bosses baiting you to react and even big dumb anime attacks I also vaguely remember the discussion on the base game years ago and his complaints where mostly the similar so of naturally you wouldn't like more of the same turned to 11 or 12 in his case. I might also be wrong but someone also said that they didn't like that the genre itself was getting popular and if that was him then of course Elden Ring 2: Electric Boogaloo never had a chance to be even remotely enjoyable and playing it would be a chore.
I disagree with Theo's comments about the souls combat being just dodge and light, that is true for DS3 but definitely not Elden Ring. In Elden Ring you are much more incentived to use more of your actions in combat, jumping for extra distance or avoiding AOEs, roll or coruch attacks if you need a quick punish during a boss' combo, charge attacks to do large poise damage, or jumping attacks to also damage poise, dodge, and low profile during a combo. The bosses are more aggressive in Elden Ring yes, but there are more opportunities to damage a boss during their attacks rather than waiting for them to finish a combo, then attacking. There's also Ashes of War which add an extra level of complexity.
@@_CrimsonBlade no its more like run and strafe, charge up a heavy, dodge, dodge, light attack, jump heavy and low profile. You could diminish pretty much any game to "Ooohh woooow, so it's just _____, so deep".
@@Fintank_ stop lying to yourself theres only like two bosses with an attack you can jump over and the attack rarely comes out…elden ring is rolling simulator theo was right you press circle till the boss stop attacking then r1 that literally how everyone plays the game but keep lying to yourself
@@_CrimsonBladehe is not really lying cause he is absolutely right, i can recall four bosses of the top of my head that used attacks that were jumpable: Godrick, Crucible knight, Hero of Zamor, chrysalid and all these examples are just in limgrave. You are just wrong
I'm still baffled they haven't done an EFAP covering Lies of P. I'm curious what they all think about that game especially with all the conversations about Souls titles they go into when talking about FromSoft stuff. Unless they did talk about it in a different stream and I missed it.
There are plenty of options to dodge other than the rolls, like jumping, blocking, and AoWs: the Sidestep and the Blood-Hound Step. What highlights Theo's actual problem is that when frustrated of getting killed, he picked up the Noob-Spammer-9000, amplifying his damage instead of fixing his real issue: not being able to dodge attacks efficiently.
IDK, I definitely agree SotE isn't the best... I still think Old Hunters is the best From DLC, but I think Theo is a bit harsh. Maybe it's me though, I feel like every From game has lots of jank, but I've just kinda ignored it because I feel like the highs outweigh the lows. Significantly so in the case of Bloodborne and Elden Ring.
I like how he says the scadu blessings are just everywhere on the ground but also ignores that he also pointed out bosses drop them. Also large enemies in the world drop them like the random hippos. Not each scadu gives a blessing, you need more and more for each upgrade you get, getting 1 doesn't give you anything. Npc bosses can be staggered constantly, why not take advantage of that? Any boss delaying their move is a boss you can just walk behind and they'll miss There are plenty no hit runs on the final boss relax
I do want to see Mauler play Armored Core. Likely not his cup of tea, but all the same I think he'd have a good time of it. As for Theo, I left a long comment in the actual video so I wont copy paste it here, but just to say, I think he brings a valuable view to things, and while I won't agree to everything he said, I do feel many of his points, such as the camera or the ever zany boss animations, timing, and weights. I really do feel like the series wants to move past the current gameplay systems to something faster and more aggressive, similar to AC or Sekiro, but retaining the feel of the souls game, and its starting to tear at the seams a little as the two visions clash without the extreme leap they will need to make in order to achieve that, and they likely don't want to alienate portions of their audience in doing so. Not a great position to be in, but we shall see in the next iteration of the series. Now if we could only get that Bloodborne remaster in the meanwhile....
Many of Theo's observations and criticisms are valid and completely fair. But the fact he has such venomous hatred for the game is why he gets push back and why his takes are unpopular. And he himself is the reason why he doesn't enjoy the game. He is not willing to engage with it as it's own thing, he's trying to play it like FromSoft's past games.
@@Kanaleah As they mentioned in this session, that its more of him ranting rather than giving measured responses and breakdowns. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and will await to see his own video on things to see exactly where he stands, as the issues people may have with him here will be likely addressed and very well may be already something he has accounted for in his criticisms, but did not convey well here in his frustrations. Heart vs the mind and all that. More than happy to let someone vent when they seek an outlet, and this stream more or less acted like that for him. Now if his video on this is more or less the same tone and the like, then you'll likely have your own answer methinks, until then, benefit of the doubt is the better path methinks. No need to assume the worst intentions or motivations, we all have our ways of conveyance.
@@Kanaleahthis is exactly on point. He gets so mad because everyone points out how mad he gets from the souls games that he just is toxic to the community and the game developers. Like to say that people who defend elden ring are brainwashed into liking it is a really stupid take.
Sekiro is not aggresive, is defensive. AC6 definitely aggresive and fast paced. Elden Ring falls in between both gameplay styles and you can lean into one or the other depending on how you play, which is why some people struggle with it.
@@EatThePath-7 Im not so sure I would call Sekiro Defensive, when the player is able to be as aggressive as most enemies with minor exception, unless you mean that engagements tend to be more of a planned affair, with planning the amount of enemies you engage at a time and the like.
People need to take advantage of stance breaking in Elden Ring more often; I had way more fun when I did a stance break build then when I was just going for a more "honest" build
Everytime i hear ppl complaining about the game being "to hard" or "scaled badly" it always turns out they just refused to level, refused to use ashes, refused to use consumables or some combination. Play the game how you want, BUT if you straight up ignore half the tools the game gives you to progress the game isnt hard, you are making it hard. Which again is fine, just dont complain that your challenge run is to hard.
I think Theo is right about the readability of attacks, particularly the partical effects and timings not matching the attack animation. I feel that he is a bit stubborn, rufusing to change tactics to suit the different fighting styles of bosses.
I don't feel like timing has been an issue for me, but visual effects have been for many bosses. Doesn't help the game has such a narrow FOV... and i know first hand that widening can help since it's possible to do it with mods on PC, it's a world of difference dealing with tall enemies with a wider FOV.
I agree with soooo much of what Theo says, and Elden Ring is one of my least favorite Souls Games purely because of how much faster and more "anime" the combat is. But it is absolutely a matter of stubbornness. Elden Ring is not aa game suited to my preferences- I can still beat it and do well, but I prefer Dark 1, Bloodborne and Sekiro. I prefer positioning and timing, and some of these Elden Ring bosses are just map-wide AoEs and eye-searing amounts of particles and effects and... I just like the simpler times.
That's not to say I don't disagree with some of his criticisms, there are some legitimately awful experiences and bosses in the DLC, but I cannot agree with his overall hatred of Elden Ring when I probably share the same vitriol for Dark Souls 1.
I could have better experiences with worse games because it would affect me less. I don't make it a habit to play bad games, but I know for a fact I've played games worse than Elden Ring. Doesn't change the fact that this is the least enjoyable gaming experience I can recall. That's the operative thing here, it's my worst *experience* with a game, not the worst *game* I've ever played.
It's a good thing FromSoft has a great art direction going for their titles. It's easier to forgive game design decisions and conflicting ethos when you're enamoured with the setting. It isnt buckling under the weight of bad design, constant glitches, and in-game advertising like a lot of games these days.
I would say going into a game I expected to enjoy only to not is a way worse experience than going into a bad game knowing you could likely not enjoy it. I'm sure Theo wanted to like ER or the DLC when they dropped but ended up not. I'm in the same boat for my own reasons.
Iron pineapple started the DLC at RL1 and only used items from the DLC and did fine, which while not a R1 run entirely really does show how it’s not “too hard” and people absolutely have the chance to do better. One thing I notice is 100% of the people saying bosses are too hard don’t jump over sweeps and stomps, and fast enemies they don’t parry.
Just to be clear, the iron pineapple example doesn’t really prove anything other than iron pineapple can do what he did. When criticizing the game design, you have to generalize to the average player experience. If there’s a solid percentage of the player base complaining about difficulty, then a solution to the given challenge isn’t being properly communicated by the designer. Games should be challenging, but fair. The argument against the DLC seems to be that if you handicap yourself it becomes beatable, but unfair. If you use all the resources at your disposal it becomes exploitable, and unfair.
@@BS-gk2cb Counter point: the average perso and by extension gamer is stupid and doesn't know what they actually want and trying to appeal to them only makes your game worse.
@@fastenedcarrot9570I don't know if I've ever read a more pretentious comment. It's always people like you who neber believe they're part of that group.
@@reactiondavant-garde3391Theo loves ultrakill, of course he doesn't hate difficulty. Fucking hell these people have never played anything outside of fromsoftware, they just don't know how much better gameplay can be for these genres.
lol somone in chat said " 'brute force' = play the game as intended" .... not that the games can't have a different play style/meta, but it doesn't mean that just becuase it's new/different that it's good or enjoyable. like mauler said, the majority of players (casual and hardcore) is a combinaiton of rolling a favorable moveset from the boss and ganking with a +10 mimic/'insert broken summon here'
I get Theos argument, and even agree with some points, but frankly I hard disagree on the idea that some of it is in any way objectively bad. Like for example he mentions the spear drag messmer does for a big attack, and refers to the follow up, drag, snap as a point of egregious delay. But for many, myself included, it was an easy to read attack. There are a lot of tells in the game that by his logic are bad because they delay in an abnormal sense but I never once felt it was bad or hard to predict. That’s just one point and on some of it (some attacks do have ludicrous tracking or unclear hitboxes) has merit, but for the most part I feel his point largely boils down to personal preference.
The point is that it's a stupid attack to have, why would messmer scrape his spear against the ground in a fight against you outside of the "meta" of it being a delayed attack.
@@BigGuy1989 not really seeing an issue there. There are plenty of exaggerated or impractical attacks in these games, heck, in media generally. It fits both for the visual appeal and the fact that yeah it’s for the delay.
@@CrispyChaos38 the problem is that it's immersion breaking. Instead of him doing attacks that look and feel like an attempt of messmer to kill you he's now doing the delay attack. On top of that it's likely something similar to Radahn's quintuple spin charge, in that when you see it, you just roll your eyes.
@@BigGuy1989 except it’s clearly not immersion breaking for the vast majority of people. And again by that same token of logic just about any fight in anything ever can be pointed to as immersion breaking. Besides wouldn’t the counter point be messmer was dragging his spear intentionally? That the entire point was fake out on purpose? I’m more inclined to believe Theos issue would be the idea of an attack with a set up followed by an unexpected delay, something which personally I see no issue with in that case.
@@CrispyChaos38 the vast majority of people also still pretend that FromSoft hasn't become a parody of itself, I wouldn't take their impressions on things for much in this case to be honest. I agree that it can be hard to define what breaks immersion to some degree and that this is up to the person, but Elden Ring specifically does it by overruling any kind of momentum you would think is logical for that sake of a delay. I've seen delays in other games and delays in general are perfectly fine for me, I would just like it if they had some fucking restraint, which is something FromSoft no longer has.
39:33 - 40:40 THANK GOD I'm not the only one constantly getting merked by that!!! I always die or get hit by that attack 9/10 times, and it gets even worse in phase two with all the beams of light following each swing, who the hell thought that was a good idea?!!?
I am kind of tired of the Fromsoft critic cycle. Ironic since these games have cycles as a big thematic element. I have been showing people posts from the DS3 and Old Hunters days where people are saying the exact same stuff as SotE, "This time it's way too hard, From has lost their way, the bosses have unreadable and unreactable attacks", etc. No less than Joseph Anderson said the same stuff about ER's base game. But every time, without fail, within months, people will be saying it's actually too easy because people will have gotten used to it. And of course now people are already doing RL1 and no hit runs of SotE. You don't have to like it, I'm just saying maybe when the pattern is this specific, MAYBE we should just chill out and be patient and see how it sits after the DLC has become a normalized part of the game. And then everyone get your bingo card ready for when people say the same stuff when the next game comes.
The thing is is that people shit on the ER endgame, and when it came out I thought that Malekith was the most BS stupid boss, super agile does a fuckton of damage. Now he's one of my favourite Fromsoft bosses ever.
@@phillidaadamus4349 I died to Maliketh SO many times during my first playthrough lol, but I think I've done him in one attempt ever since then. I could tell there were things happening that I could probably take advantage of during the fight but I didn't know how. I've since learned that the positioning for him matters more than almost anything else. The thing is, I'm actually pretty bad at these games, I feel like if I can do it, then almost anyone can.
At least new god of war has an undeniably powerful narrative and thematic throughline. Elden rings narrative and thematic throughline is "lmao", and even then this dlc somehow manages to destroy it with the stupid chadahn final boss
@@dragonpaulz_gameplay>>>>>>>>>narrative If your games selling point is its narrative over fun engaging gameplay, then you’ve made a bad game. You can have a great game with a terrible narrative, you can not have a good game with terrible gameplay
@@TheChilipepper77 okay but I'm not talking about God of war as a game. I understand as a GAME, new god of war is not good. But my point is at least new god of war has SOMETHING going for it. Elden ring and it's dlc suck ass in both categories
I've been enjoying it a lot BUT I play with mods to make it easier because I suck and don't feel like stressing myself out to get good for a few months. In short, I hit harder, I take less damage, I have a lot more stamina and I can turn status effects off. So that drastically changes my interactions. That said, I played the base game with the same settings I started the DLC with and I immediately found myself dying a lot more vs the base game. Even now with many fragments, it's still clear to be a lot "harder". I'm not saying anything about whether that's good or not, just sharing.
Skill issue. "The game cheated! The combat is bad! The world is empty!" all these I've seen thrown at every From game from the first Dark Souls. What he is saying is nothing new or interesting, he's just trying to make a name for himself by being contrarian.
I agree that there is a problem with non-intuitive telegraphs. I think that the Lion Dancer is the worst boss in the DLC because even if it tried to telegraph anything, the camera does not let you see it. I disagree that it's a universal problem though. There's always "that move" with some of the bosses that you can't intuitively avoid and ends up being an annoyance. But the rest are fine. I think that the overtuned damage levels in Fromsoft's vain attempt to "balance" incoming players with arbitrary levels reinforce a confirmation bias that makes those problems seem more prevalent than they are, because when it happens, you probably die instantly. So, that one unintuitive telegraph is what you end up remembering. -Because the second to last main boss is completely fine, with perfectly readable telegraphs on every single move. Same with the optional boss in a secret area in the north.
DS2 is getting some undue comparisons and hate. If you hate it, hate it for the right reason. The issues with ER and DS2 are not the same. DS2 did not have overcorrection on enemy attacks. DS2 did not have extreme enemy damage. Enemies didn't have overly long and ridiculously flashy attack chains. One of the things DS2 did correctly was poise. Weapon weight was directly related to stamina consumption and poise damage. Another thing was that you didn't get super-poise from swinging great weapons and they weren't unparriable. You could also guard break shields.
@@yanribeiro7108 Tell me about it, was hyped for the Elden Ring DLC, but now i'm real deep into Nioh 2 on NG+++ trying to master every weapon type. going back to elden ring is hard, it's so slow and shallow.
On the memorization of combat; I somewhat agree. Although I was able to beat a few of the bosses on a first try, most of the timings of attacks were so frickin bizzarre that you kinda just had to face tank fights until you memorized the combos (putrescence being the most agregious, in my opinion). On the fragment upgrades; I think it was a good idea that was poorly executed. I wouldve preferred they were either far more abundant (like flask charge items) or were standardized with bosses like Sekiro. On the over-indulgence of bosses; I also somewhat agree. There's not much of a contrast between the bosses when all of them fly around and shoot lasers like Goku. They probably should've reserved the crazy movesets for a select few bosses, as compared to everyone
For anyone who cares, I believe the Super Meat Boy boss that Mauler is talking about was pure trial and error memorization. It's the boss from the end of the 4th world Hell. That game's bosses can be removed and the experience would be 100 times better imo.
@@moonraven6145 If that boss was in Elden ring, it would've been good. Or rather, if super meat boy's fanbase gargled as much of the creator's cum as they do here, then that boss would've never become the quintessential example of bad trial and error he is today.
The double slash into X from rhadan is 100% avoidable but its rly hard, you gotta backstep first slash (pressing roll without direction input) and then you can roll the next two attacks there is no rng or position requirement its just simply very difficult to do.
39:10 god slayer main here what helped me shred bosses was basically buffing with flame grant me strength, golden vow, flame/ oppaline tear with shard of Alexander and some good mitigation talismans and just ate bosses helth for dinner. Lvl 122 50 dex 27 Strength 30 faith. It's not even the best damage that you can get but for what I had it did me wonders i love the GodSlayer.... That being said trying to dodge with colossal greatswords is a pain but we knew that we signed up for that that's why we trade but trading is kind of hard and the DLC so what I suggest is trying to get more mitigation abilities, talismans your damage might suffer but you should be already doing pretty decent damage anyway at lvl 171 if you got the stats in the right place. I agree with your criticism I think obviously things are on a scale. We don't want completely unreactive attacks that you either have to sit for countless amount of time to memorize or to cheese the AI in such a way that they do the attack that you want because that leads into less interesting gameplay. I'm not done with the DLC yet but I've gotten pretty far and I've done most things I'm a completionist and I'm trying to get everything. It's really weird to see people just say skill issue when there's a bigger overall conversation going on it's quite reductive. And just so people can hear it in the back know just because people in a couple of months will be able to know hit the game does it mean the game was easy all along it just means there are people who sat there and took time and effort to cultivate a skill at knowing what attack there is or how to manipulate what RNG they want. There are people who can know hit run and speed run bad games that does not mean they are instantly good now these are not the same things and they are separate.
I miss being able to get in slap fights with bosses. It's my favorite way to play ds1 and is the only game you can reliably do that in. You and I are going to hit each other until one of us dies.
@@lolbuster01 you can do it in this game but to me it doesn't feel the same. I gotta go grab all these random talismans and tears and buff myself all the time to do it consistently. Why do all that when I can just get some heavy armor and a big sword and we can just go at it. Let's see who will last longer
The only issue I can agree with is the camera. Other than that, memorization has been apart of souls games since demon souls. This argument that having to adapt to new moves shown is just plainly wrong. From artorias, to Fume knight, to nameless king and Pontiff. It is in fact a skill issue, sorry that you struggle... but it is what it is. On the basis of upgrading skippidy fragments, I understand where theo is coming from but its not an objective issue. A lot enjoy exploring which was the part of the main love for base elden ring. If you didnt like exploring base game, then what the hell did you expect with its dlc? Lmao
I really didnt like exploring in the dlc cause you can easily miss over half of the content, areas and questlines from not checking passages and holes that arent visible or hinted at in the map. It's like the secret to get to Ash Lake on ds1 but with every zone in the map
It's not just learning the moves though, it's how the moves are conveyed to the player, in shadow of the erd tree what the bosses are doing visually is completely irrelevant to how you are actually supposed to counter, unlike artorias' and fume knight's moves
See, the problem with newer FromSoft Souls entries is what I call "animation creep". In the first couple of games, animations made sense, the games were slower and you could rely on your eyes for dodge timings. Once people got used to it and FromSoft became aware of it, they started looking for ways to create difficulty by subverting those animations and dodge timings. So they started adding more and more delayed timings. More and more. They kept going and now you have attacks that require you to roll 5 times in a row nonstop, sometimes in different directions. And I'll be honest, when the boss starts spamming the long attack and you have to jump around for 20 seconds in a row like a spasming paraplegic, it's starting to really test my patience. This is beyond just "remembering attacks and patterns", this is just goofy and bizarre. Like, what kind of armor wearing giant sword wielding warrior rolls around like Sanic Hedgehog for 20 seconds? This is looney tunes now. And guess what, you're arguing for it now, but it's gonna get worse. Are you still gonna go the route of "it's always been this way" when you're playing dance dance revolution dressed as Artorias for an entire minute straight at a time? You'll right back here, arguing Theo's points. See, Malenia's water dance is only cool if only she has it. Once everyone has it, then it's just tedious. And that will happen, because they seem to have exhausted their ideas.
I sorta feel as though they could have gotten away without the Scadu system. Anybody who's above level like 150 probably should be into a NG cycle. I havent checked yet but I'm genuinely dreading if the blessing resets each NG cycle bc i dont think anybody wants to spend the same amount of time on requisite exploration each playthru. Its a shame because, numbers notwithstanding, I friggin love it.
I kinda agree with Theo but not so harsh. The enemies do feel a bit bullet-spongey, I also dont like the way they handled power scaling with collectibles. But I do see why they did it, to encourage exploration as opposed to just running through the bosses straight away
People can't see that there is a world were Theo is correct and people still enjoy the game. All I see playing the base game now is gibberish in the movesets of most things. Sure it just becomes pattern recognition as in all souls games but there is something annoying about how any attack can come from anywhere. Goombas transition a downward swing into a 360 spin that leaves explosives to catch you mid roll. The example of everything changing weight or having altered gravity has examples everywhere in elden ring. It nay not bother sone people but I can see it botheeing others because any grounding of the bosses as real enemies that exist in the same world as you gets shot out the window when you see how obviously the moveset is constructed.
This is why I hate mohg so much. His trident slides back and forth in his hand, changing the timing and range of his attacks from what they look like they should be visually.
Theo to Elden Ring is what Igon is to Bayle. While I agree with him on the matter of bosses that have bloat in the form of wonky telegraphed attacks and delays out the ass, and long ass combos that you CANNOT attack in the middle of, it sounds a lot like he tried too hard to play as if it's Dark Souls. Elden Ring is not Dark Souls. There are many other strategies than dodge-rolling that are viable in this game, whereas Dark Souls 3 especially had dodging as a far superior method of defense than this game does. No, I'm not just talking about summons, the mimic tear is still really, really good, especially on some builds, but you also have various items and spells that give you defensive buffs. My strategy to make the final boss more bearable, even fun, was to stack physical defense in the first phase, and holy defense in the second one, and to me it has always seemed like the game really tries to push you to try different avenues by making the classic dodge strategy way harder than it has been. This is not me "skill issue'ing" you, Theo. If you truly did beta the DLC with only dodge-rolling, you are far better than me, though in the end it might have soured your experience by refusing to try different strategies. As for hating Elden Ring because it has taken the Dark Souls "brand" in a direction you hate, I really doubt that Miyazaki doesn't recognize what made Dark Souls 1 work. Just because he has made a different game doesn't mean that he'll never make something like it again. I'd say Sekiro and Bloodborne are other examples, but I don't know your stance on those games. I'd love to actually talk to you about game design to this caliber because I really feel like I would agree with the reasons you hold Dark Souls 1 in such high regard, even if I also hold Dark Souls 3 and Elden Ring in high regard, if only slightly lower.
Okay so I don't *want* to facetank the boss. I want to beat the boss on its own terms. I want to, theoretically, learn how to avoid every attack, deal with every string, find every punish window, so that's how I play. That's what rolling lets me do. I'm not really interested in measures that let me pay less attention to what is going on in the boss in order to beat it in a fewer number of attempts, even with bosses I don't really like. At that point, if I'm down to change my build to facetank or otherwise trivialise the boss, I'd rather just play something else. What I mean by this is that what you are suggesting to me only reduces difficulty, when difficulty is not the core issue. Difficulty can exacerbate things, but my issue is with how things are designed, and only secondarily with how that difficulty arises from this design. Fundamentally this game is very much like Dark Souls - it plays extremely similarly to Dark Souls 3, with some more minor alterations, and overall more stuff. The way I can play the game is, fundamentally, the same - with the exception of like 2 moves in the final boss exactly and 1 move outside of that, everything is designed around being rollable, so I'm going to keep rolling, as that's how I want to play the game. I want to play ball with the bosses, rather than run them over. I hope this makes sense.
@@Theottree I get it. I just feel like the game doesn't want you to, because the roll-baiting makes that particular strategy so hazardous. If you're looking for the classic souls experience, you won't find it in elden ring, which seems to be a very conscious choice by the devs. Which I don't necessarily think is a bad thing. When I actually utilized the tools I had, it made the experience so much more enjoyable. And no, that is not an excuse that the bosses don't have to be well designed, of course should every part of a game at least try to be as good as it can be, but at some point it might seem like you're hitting your head against a wall. There might be cracks after a while, but your head is in an even worse state. Sorry if some of these tangents seem incomprehensible, english is not my first language.
@@Theottree So it’s to Hard to explore and get Scadutree fragments……. But not hard to Get Flask Charges, Memory Slots for spells and Smithing stones for weapons. Get Filtered tourist
@@Theottree sorry for all the “Git gud” talk your getting. Personally I don’t agree with most of the points I’ve heard thus far since to me at least they come off as more opinionated than actual issues. That said you DO have some legit points. Some enemy attacks have absurd tracking or hit boxes that aren’t clear. Sorry you didn’t enjoy the dlc.
"you never played it, you suck ,you're the worst" thats true friendship.
"Friendship?! Again?!" - Shao Kahn
Okay Lewis
Metal to Theo: "Should I talk or do you just want to spit hot lava immediately?" LOL
This was the most passion Theo ever showed, save for Unicron.
BLACKHOLE MIMICRY!?!
@@heikira438 Theo has triggered Calamity Hell
Quiet, Rags. The adults are talking.
*makes the gesture*
i've understood that reference!
Yeah fr
adult's's's's
But it's time to let the children play?
As someone who enjoyed the DLC while also being aware of its flaws, I'd like for Theo to tone down the hyperbole a little bit, because he's got a very good base, and is super correct on many accounts. He makes so many points that are absolute truth nukes here, like "There is now no longer any connection between the visual information presented to you and what your reaction should be, it's pure guesswork until you can memorize the timings." or "Souls game combat is really not that advanced", but for every point like that, he says something bizarre like "This game/DLC is basically Skyrim."
You can sense the split in the community with this DLC, and bosses like Consort Radahn exemplify it. That boss is insanely hard in a way most people don't seem to enjoy, but if you try to break down why (constantly flashbanging you with particle effects, terrible camera that gets obscured by Mickey's hair, half of his attacks in phase 2 are extremely unintuitive as to how you're supposed to dodge them, etc.) you'll be met with a wall of "git gud" and "here's a vid of Ongbal no-hit beating him at RL1 with a USB steering wheel."
We could really use a reasoned, polite and well-argumented breakdown here. I hope Theo can keep his rage in check for his video and not go full CURSE YOOOUUUU, ELDEN RIIIIING like he did here, because if you open with "This was the most unpleasant experience I've ever had with a game," you'll instantly piss off most of the people who liked this DLC, rather than win them to your side.
Matthewmathosis, where are you?
Yeah like I think it's both hard for people in the souls community to take criticism as Game Journos and outsiders to the community typical crap on the franchise because it's "too hard", but also tough to take real criticism seriously when people say hyperbolic stuff like, "it's the most unpleasant game I've ever played"
What if it was tho
if you play the game trying to learn the move sets and not beating using craft/summon to stack ridiculous amount of power, its really anoying to learn anything in this DLC.
And theo needs to realize 90% of his criticisms can summed as "it's not simple enough for me." Well jesus wept guy, im sorry fromsoftware is the fastest growing video game company in the workd and trying new things. Maybe go back to dark souls 1 because simplicity seems to be his speed. I on the other absolutely ADORE being surprised by these boss mechanics. Makes me feel like im fighting something intelligent.
@@mrkennady So like my main criticism of Souls combat is that it lacks depth. This is a criticism of it being *too* simple. I would rather play deeper action games
“I have done shit that you people could not believe souls games”
I watched a guy play through all of dark souls 3 with bananas hooked up to wires as his controller, I guarantee you you have not done that
@@TheChilipepper77 legit saw some chick do a no hit run on a dance dance revolution mat, shit was funny af 🤣
You have not seen what I have seen
@@ViolentMessiah666I saw that too but thought the banana was more impressive
@@TheChilipepper77 never seen that one, might have to check it lol, all I know is that girls cardio was very impressive 😅
A guy coached his goldfish to beat Malenia.
Obligatory "Hi Wolf".
I remember missing your channel dearly, great to see you're doing fine. Have an amazing day!
So we've a distinction between us, now.
The Theo who rages against Shadow of the Erdtree
And
The Theo that doesn't play Souls games
The first Elden Ring Stream was Theo sh*ting on the game for 4 hours then everyone giving the game a 7 or 8 out of 10 except him.
He dominates the conversation and is boring on this topic.
if braindead praise is what you want, you are on the wrong channel
Nope, he was actually clear and interesting in his points unlike fromtards, who can't ever be honest.
I don't understand how FromSoft seriously improved the camera in Sekiro, the way it could zoom out or pan up to match the boss, and then completely throw that out for Elden Ring. I distinctly remember fighting the Guardian Ape and how the camera would move up when it was about to throw its entire body in the last sword attack of its combo, then it would zoom in on Wolf after parrying. That's fantastic camera work that gives you visual clarity of the boss's movement, then immerses you in how strong the attack was by keeping Wolf in 40% of the frame, probably reeling from how much force he had to put not only into blocking, but not falling over immediately afterward. Fighting Ulcerated Tree Spirit for the first time in Fringefolk Hero's Grave, not having even opened the gate to Limgrave, gave me motion sickness.
And to the point about boss design, I was watching Theo's gameplay while still listening to what he had to say. I think Theo is too rigid in his gameplay style, but I understand his arguments to the bosses being too damn anime. Elden Ring is the first Souls game where I felt shields were fantastic to use instead of just throwing a Grass Crest Shield on my back and calling it a day. Theo is trying to play it like Dark Souls where you roll through everything because bosses were way slower. I will do that for magic attacks, but if I know it's full Physical damage, then I won't hesitate to throw up my Brass Shield, probably the best shield you can get immediately, because I have enough stamina to tank it and get a counterattack in. Guard Counter attacks do way more 'Posture' damage to open enemies to ripostes, and that drastically changed how I played the game by that point.
Same. As a developer, I'm telling you that it's not about the "company" - it's about the team. Consider how different DS2 feels, because a different team (sans Myazaki) built that one, and that is why it feels like a cheap third-party soulslike clone. Different teams also work on different code branches, so elden ring may have branched off of the DS3 code and not sekiro, and thus improvements can't come across as a matter-of-course and may have to be re-implemented. This explains sekiro's excellent PC performance versus the sh*t-show that was elden ring's PC release. In my professional opinion, FROM isn't a technically proficient developer and I don't think they have good development practices in managing code-bases. See Mathew Mattosis's comment on the lack of improvements in the souls games.
This is Metal's gameplay, not Theo's. I think there might have been one short clip shared by Theo to demonstrate camera wonkiness in one of the boss fights, but everything else was livestream recordings from Metal's playthrough.
In short, Theo sucks at the game and doesn't understand 80% of the mechanics at all...only valid complaint is the camera, it needs some fixing, everything else he bitches about is utter nonsense.
Something to add to the "anime" criticism, every fucking boss in the dlc either has 2 swords, spins unnecessarily and unintuitively, or both. It is a very cringe experience watching everything turn into a beyblade reenactment just because it "looks cool".
He's playing it like ds because it is ds
Theo ranting about things he hates is the only thing that gives me joy in life.
random things being the only thing that give people joy in life is the only thing that gives me joy in life
I love that this joke has become such a community fixture lol
The fact that this meme has become a community fixture is the only thing that brings me joy in life
@ViolentMessiah666
The fact that this meme having become a fixture that brings you joy is the only joy I have in life.
I understand Theo’s frustration. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love the dlc
It's fine to like it, I just hope you(anyone reading) would have the self-awareness to identify the Quality of what they are playing, and this is Very bad
People had a lot of fun with the SW Sequels, it was very bad, its fine to like them, it's bad that so many people are insecure to admit the bad quality of them, and the same thing is happening here, people doing a nearly dogmatic defense of something of very bad quality that they happen to like, the Objectivity really goes out the window when their favorite thing is the target of criticism, and it's dissapointing.
@uneterostardust8233 I just think the people complaining about difficulty, just don't know how to make builds. Damage negation is very very important, not just vigor.
@@lustrazor44 My guy, you clearly didn't listen to any of his complaints.
@@MilkT0ast I just think anyone complaining about the ST are just Bigroots ~~youtube censor~~
I mean, if that's your argument, K, basically just another dogmatic dismissal, "everything is the player's fault and never the game's", kinda true for DS1, but the rest have issues of the game itself, DS2 my friend how hath thou damaged the games and community..
@@lustrazor44 TLJ is not bad, it's very obvious, did you not find the Lighspeed rush A-MMMaaaazing? it's Excelent. gosh gee them bigroots homophonics reycisms
/s, obviously
I find it respectful to defend your opinion with logical arguments against thousands of people on a livestream despite almost everyone disagreeing with your point. I'm not sure i would handle such pressure. I would probably conform to the norm or shut the fuck up entirely unless the truth is absolutely obvious and disagreeing is ridiculous.
Add "frantically lash out" to the list and that's my expectation for myself in that position.
Except Theo didn't use any logical arguments, he just sucks at the game.
@@AscendantStoic Well, someone wasn't listening...
@@AscendantStoicI don't know where u got this idea from considering he beat the dlc with heavy self-imposed restrictions. Are u sure you were listening?
@fabiof.8152 I listened and it was nothing but nonsense.
Sekiro is indeed peak Fromsoft, Mauler. Thank you.
Sekiro is my 10/10 single player game. Fantastic characters, story and gameplay.
It is for the first playthouth. Other games are more replayble but that first one in Sekiro is miles above everything else imo. And i'm someone who nevery plays parry if they don't have to.
One of the only things I disagreed with Theo on in this video is how he implies Sekiro is actually not that good compared to other action games. I absolutely adore Sekiro and would need massive unpacking of that claim before ever agreeing with it.
@@OldyAlbert It does have re-playability. Sekiro has 4 endings, one of which is extremely different from the others including its own unique boss fight.
The boss gauntlets are challenging and fun.
There are different ways the conversations can go depending on factors like the Sake and ending you are committing to.
@@ThePetriaxI literally just get on the game, do reflections of strength, and get off. If demon of hatred didn’t exist I would give it a perfect 10/10, instead it’s only a 9.9/10
I use summons, ashes, and magic. Things die and I have fun.
Exactly. I domt understand these arbitrary limitations.
If uou are struggling use a summon. No shame in it
And all power to you friend
It’s almost like the game was designed around using them
This is the point. The game gives you the tools to win. If you still aren't having fun after all that then you just don't like the game and probably never will. So why play?
@@brandondrake69 The base game no, the dlc maybe
In the next FromSoft Souls game, they're gonna have bosses that will raise their weapon and just stand there, occasionally making a mocking motion as if they're about to strike and then pull it back and say "Haha, you flinched!" and then after 10-20 seconds of doing that they'll oneshot you in half a frame.
Now that will be the next level of pattern learning, I can't wait to read the guides for that boss. "Ultermaximus will wait 3 seconds, after that the tell for his attack will be either him calling you gay, or trying to tell you about ligma".
this guy got stuck in the catacombs and quit elden ring
Stop fucking panic rolling and the game gets 10000x easier
@@nickh4354 who are you even talking about? Both me and Theo beat this game with the dlc. I'd bet money that I've beaten more souls likes than you've played games in your life.
@@He-who-wakes 10000x easier? By god, can this game made for casual shitters get even easier? What is panic rolling by the way, is that something you tourists to the genre do?
@@crimsonpotemkin explain how I'm a tourist in detail please. You knuckle dragging redditor
Heres a quick tip for any one struggling with the dlc.
Focus on "physical damage negation"
Use the Dragon Crest Great Shield Talisman (20%)
Use the Opline Hardtear in the Physiks Flask. (10%)
Eat Boiled crab (20%)
And cast Golden Vow (10%)
That's a total of 60% off the damage you would normally take. And this is NAKED. if you wear heavy armour, it can get up to 80%.
And all this for 25 faith. And 1 talisman slot and 1 physics slot.
Very very low investment for such a strong build. And if you don't want faith, just don't use Golden Vow.
I want to play my build the way I built it tho, I dont want to feel like I need to do these things just to get it over with
@@DozleZabi sure I get that. But the other builds are viable as well.
I have a sheild build that no enemy can bypass.
I also have a glass cannon build. Where I can one shot bosses, but they can one shot me too.
I also have a status effect build.
Where I can proc bleed, scarlet rot, frost and poison all at once.
And all of these builds are viable...you just gotta dodge correctly. And you can still get your damage negation up.
Golden Vow is an item you can craft now.
then stack 1-3 consumables that give damage, amulets that give 15-20 each and use mimic tear, Boss design? game design? nah man i will just skip using the stupid mimic tear/craft system
You can still have Golden Wov AoW on a dagger...yes its weaker but YOU CAN!! ;-)
For me, the glaring issues with the DLC is that a lot of cool areas feel barren, empty, with nothing to do other than embracing the atmosphere. Don't get me wrong, each section is beautifully crafted, it is like looking at an awesome painting, but it loses all meaning when there isn't anything keeping you occupied in said area. Second issue is the last boss for me, it ended up being the most unfun thing I've ever had to deal with on the entire DLC.
I’m curious what Theo thought abt Midra. Like Messmer he was a vos that I could easily get into a flow state, his attack strings weren’t very long and well telegraphed, and his openings were pretty plentiful.
Also on Messmer, his big anime snake moves are surprisingly easy to dodge; not obnoxiously delayed, and longer punish windows than normal Messmer
I don't mind Midra. I don't particularly love him, but I thought he was okay. I appreciated how readable he was, but he was also a bit simple, funnily enough. So consider that a non-disparaging 'he was okay', if that makes sense
@@TheottreeHey Theo, always great to hear your input. Love how passionate you are about these things, never change mate.
The main issue I've had is the performance of the game has been awful since the dlc came out. Used to get a solid 60fps now some areas are mid 20fps, my pc more than meets the requirements.
Yes that is an issue. I believe its because it has all areas loaded in so you can quickly jump from map to map. Strange trade off but thats what they picked
7:52
Skibidi tree fragments fucking killed me.
When was Theo introduced again? I recall them plucking him from chat while watching one of his videos I think. I've been wanting to rewatch that but I forget what episode it's in.
Was a Joseph Anderson episode wasn't it? One of the primordial episodes
EFAP #16
@@TheRedGauntlet Wait, was Theo the guy who wrote that incredible comment criticising Joseph Anderson, and they got him on for a chat about it?
@@NintendanGX Yes
It was Joseph Anderson being a massive.
I love Elden Ring, but Theo has some very solid criticisms. He’s spot on about the camera having major issues (even after they handled it near perfectly in Sekiro), the over-the-top anime moves, and the garbage visual clutter of particle affects are way too common. My problem with other criticisms however is that they come across as hyperbolic and just ignores any positive aspects the game has.
I personally try to fight bosses without deliberately remembering attacks because I agree that memorization shouldn’t be a prerequisite. It isn’t what makes these games engaging. Memorization naturally occurs when facing a challenge repeatedly, so it’s going to happen naturally if you do.
People think this is what they enjoyed about it, but there’s much more to it than that. Otherwise, taping a picture of a dragon to a game of Simon would be considered peak design. This faulty logic basically became a meme and a repeated point of praise and I think From Software listened and incorporated this feedback into many of the boss and enemy designs with delayed attacks and bullshit like waterfowl dance.
There should be reasonable tells that convey to the player a general idea of what is going to happen and when it’s going to happen. The “skill” doesn’t come from remembering when something is supposed to happen and simply dodging, it’s about managing your resources/stamina and responding by applying your build or playstyle to deal with the threat.
However, the vast majority of attacks do not require memorization. I had no problem dealing with most attacks by reading tells and movements. Positioning is important too, so it’s not just about dodge timing. Positioning yourself for an opening to attack or into spots where bosses will need to readjust giving you time to regain stamina or heal is crucial. This is the vast majority of attacks in the games but there are also plent that are barely, if not entirely, unreadable before memorizing them.
Even with that being the case, I can see how this can sour the feeling of it entirely and it’s a legitimate complaint, but it also doesn’t mean that every aspect of the attacks and combat are fucked.
It took me a while to come to grips with the fact that it is not meant to be played like the Souls games. There are entire new mechanics to utilize like stance breaking, block countering, and jumping/jump attacks that all add new approaches to combat.
Another important aspect is finding openings within enemy attack chains / combos to get hits in rather than having a back and forth between being on the offensive and defensive as it would often be in previous games.
Realizating this made the seeming relentlessness of bosses feel much more manageable.
This, when combined with the greater emphasis on adjusting to enemy resistances and using consumables if needed, makes it a game where both skill and knowledge are equally important to success.
I’m also mixed on the open world and it’s design. It’s nice to see that they tried to experiment with their formula, but it had varying degrees of success. On one hand, it’s not as fleshed out or well-paced as the more self-contained area / level design from previous games and the implementation of some world bosses and the locations they inhabit is just awful, but on the other hand I can clearly see how many aspects of their level design were applied to the layout of the world and it resulted in in a design that, even with it’s faults, still greatly surpasses many other open world games from developers that had been doing it for a long time.
I would like to see FromSoft do something DS1 in both world design and tone again, and will happily support a push for that in future games, but I don’t let that paint my perception of Elden Ring because it’s own thing.
If I remember correctly, Miyazaki had said this game was meant to be much different because it’s about facing off against great deities and have a more grand presentation. Being different doesn’t make it bad, I’d be way more critical if it was Dark Souls 4, but it’s not for a reason.
Of course we should criticize and point out the problems we see, but we shouldn’t act like the entire game is a trashfire and every aspect of it’s design philosophy should be tossed because some aspects were handled poorly or didn’t work (especially when there’s a lot of good aspects as well) and because it’s different from a company’s past work.
It’s also just as awful to dismiss any criticisms without good reasoning. My enjoyment if Elden Ring isn’t hindered by acknowledging the flaws, but it is when I think about how people just seem to ignore them and refuse to talk about them. I want their future games to be even better, but they can only do that if we’re honest, both in criticism and praise.
I’ll end saying I’m not worried about From Software “losing their way” so to speak when it comes to their presentation. They still have that “soul” that helped make DS1 so great. Shaman Village in the DLC was powerful. The subdued, strange, and eerily somber track of Metyr and the Ancestral Spirits is reminicent of Gherman and Gwyn. The beauty and atmosphere of Leyndell and discovering the fate of the nomads in the Shunning Grounds below. The reveal and splendor of the rivers and Eternal Cities below ground. The central figure of the Erdtree looming overhead, both beautifully awe-inspiring and ominously foreboding. These are the kinds of things only the people who made Dark Souls could pull-off.
Bed of Chaos is still my top pick for worst boss of the Souls series. It shouldn't really count as a boss, closer to an obstacle course.
@@rollandingo760 I'd still rather fight it 3 times in a row than go up against Ludd and Zalen.
@AdmarilDarius that might be the the worst boss run back ever. Having to go through the whole frigid outskirts for each attempt.
@@rollandingo760 Even today it boggles the mind that they made a run back even worse than the iron passage and Sir Allone's.
The part when they were saying that ALL souls games are pure memorization is complete bullshit. Most games in general require some sort of memorization, but never like this. In every souls game until now you could intuitively roll and react to attacks, sure some specific attacks needed to be learned, like artoris's ground smash that he would cancel into another one if you attacked him to soon, most will not see this coming. But in this dlc you have to memorize EVERYTHING, right down to the seconds it takes for the delay attack to come down, ive never had to do that before, even with fucking GAEL.
Based take, Elden Ring reminds me of DS 2 in the sense that its major concern is to kill you... It has the tightest openings, the most input reading, the bosses with the most health, the most stamina, the most poise, and weird combos that stop or keep going depending on your distance... this isn't to say that that Elden ring isn't without excellent boss fights like Radagon, Godfrey or Placidusax, even the DLC has fantastic fights like Midra, Mesmerr, and Rallana... This is to say that we have completely abandoned the idea of Hard but fair...
I'm sorry but if you did the Igon Questline and say you didn't feel anything well i really don't know what to say but to each his own. Damn but still damn
I liked Igon!
@@TheottreeI completely understand your perspective about how no other game could replicate the emotional highs of ds1 for you. I didn't have the same experience with it, but since it's pretty subjective, I can get where you're coming from with that. Sif and Artorias are just too damn effective, man.
As a side note, I genuinely believe fromsoftware has the worst fanbase in videogame history in terms of Stockholm syndrome, largely due to not experiencing the stand-outs in the genre. This comment section has been driving me insane.
I don't get the hate for it, had a great time, felt challenged, overcame the challenge, kicked Rellana's ass by smacking her with the big black knight great hammer like she was a piñata. I definitely think people's builds are part of why they have a good or bad time as well as expectations coming in, and not understanding the full breadth of the mechanics. Jumping for one is incredibly underrated and gets you out of many of the jams that rolling doesn't, there's also just understanding what makes a good build and a bad one. It's more complicated than Theo says, but not as complicated as some make it out to be. What I've seen is stubbornness contributes to a lot of headache and combined with having expectations for how you expected your character to perform, it can definitely lead to a bad time.
Stubbornness has to be at least 50% or more of why people call the game unfair.
If I'm struggling I try different builds and strategies. But what I hear other people say is, "If I have to change my build then it's not fair. I should be able to use my build for everything!"
But the problem isn't they can't use a specific build, it's that they aren't good enough to use it.
thats none of the points
I've had a great time too, but there is a lot that should be rightly hated. The power scaling of the enemy damage and health especially are so borked and the scadutree fragments don't "fix" that.
@@BaldorfBreakdownsthat part of the reason why they made point reallocation so easy in this game
@@Alpharisus Yep.
But these people refuse to engage with any mechanic that could, and probably would, help them.
I wonder if we double boss attack speed and make it that every instance of damage is a 1 shot kill is it still balanced and a skill issue ? Some people will be able to beat the dlc like that.
Im asking what is the difference between unfair and a simple skill issue. If the answer is that its unfair as long as your not skilled enough gaming discourse is dead because i can add skill issue to almost any sauce.
You ever look up what a Kaizo game is? Provided you have are you going to be dumb enough to ask this question the same way?
Some guy will be able to beat it with a complex fruit network, therefore it's fair.
Ironpineapple beat the game on SL 1 so that means the game is fair.
@griffiththechad9483 is this sarcasm? If not: how?! Why?! When did humanity make you the standard for difficulty in games? You could be very good, you could be a liar, you could be stubborn, etc. That's just silly.
can't beat a hacker in (PvP game)? Skill issue, (Pro gamer 69) beat a hacker once
It's absolute brainrot
Given that Theo's a big DMC guy, his complaints are actually perfectly valid; Fromsoft experimented with new active (IE, reflex-based) combat mechanics in Sekiro and then basically reverted to the tried and true, sturdy but simple hack n' slash they've been refining since Demon Souls when Elden Ring came out.
Now to be clear, the distinction I'm drawing is that DMC combat has systems, hidden systems, intended mechanics, exploit mechanics, and a level of commensurate combat complexity that the moment-to-moment of Elden Ring doesn't match. What I'm not saying is that Elden Ring's combat is bad, or that they didn't add new systems; it's just that few of them have to do with the things other action titles have explored, like juggling, form-changing, weapon-switching for unique attacks (Bloodborne touched on this a little bit, one of its cooler decisions), or basing combat essentially all upon your ability to successfully craft combos (This is because DMC usually has sparse defensive options, so you're attacking, dodging by running manually away from attacks, jumping for i-frames, hitting the Royal Guard button, or you're dead). In other words, the pace of combat is slower and has less room for player innovation, which makes sense because Souls games also just don't have the tone of a high-speed 3D fighter game like Bayonetta or Vanquish or any other "spectacle fighter" game as Totalbiscuit called them (Vanquish is a fighting game, this is not a debate).
However, Souls games have much more *broadness* in their mechanics - your total number of functioning strategies is much larger, and the content covers more things than just the combat mechanics; this also means all valid strategies must be balanced against one another for replayability, at least by the standard of the dev's attempts to do so. DMC, Bayonetta, these are games where you walk through a level that's basically a hallway and literally see a "level end" screen once you finish them, because every encounter is a tightly curated experience.
So while I definitely see his point, I also do support the argument that it's not a matter of effort on either team's part, but rather design focus. You're not learning lore in DMC, you're usually not exploring hidden areas unless they're hidden combat trials, and generally a spectacle fighter has a smaller roster of enemies that each have unique attack patterns and traits, while in a Souls game most enemies are magical humanoids or animals that slash at you or fire magic from afar and have a relatively standardized set of attacks and reactions. This template allows for good-enough combat across a large open map with curated zones, but also accounts for the resource drain players experience when their "level" is basically the space between Bonfires and thus variable player-to-player, because not every player will stop at the first next rest zone that they see, and not every player will take a totally linear path through exploration.
Both types of game are good, this isn't a discussion of absolute value, it's just that both have explored other strengths in their game design owing to their history of development (DMC was a Resident Evil game that got reworked after they found cool potential for combat systems in an early build, Elden Ring is descended from dungeon exploration games that focused heavily upon finding items and gear to fight simpler enemies who will damage-check you unless you're prepared) and that's why they court narrower (DMC) and broader (Souls) audiences.
Now I'll hand Theo this as well; Elden Ring is in sort of an awkward place, because From clearly wants to achieve something closer to spectacle fighter combat but also wants a big open-world game, so they're building a huge amount of combat around a simple combat system. In other words, his complaint about the "roll and wait to hit them" combat being overtaxed by increasingly shorter timing windows is also apt; you can't go into Witch Time to land free damage on the Lion boss, you can't pop your Devil Trigger to unlock a new moveset that can stun-juggle Old Radahn for a certain amount of time, and so the player's "cheat ability" that improves their odds in Elden Ring is basically just summoning adds. Elden Ring has cool summons, but they do ultimately exist to just divide boss attention in two directions as opposed to letting you cope with the boss's abilities with your player character.
TL;DR - Miyazaki just wasn't brave enough to turn the Malenia fight into a GoW sex minigame and that says a lot about the games industry in 2024.
You had me at sex minigame.
I think these games, DMC and Elden Ring exist in parallel but different genre's to be honest. I don't think it's necessarily comparing apples to apples here. I don't think Elden Ring or any Fromsoft game has ever been similiar to a DMC game. I don't even know if I would say that Elden Ring/Soulsborn games are hack and slash. You aren't trying to build up a combo meter or use super abilities to chain attacks and juggle enemies around or doing fancy insane moves and having quick time events. It's a much more bare bones combat system true, but that is what Fromsoft has designed it to be on purpose. It's supposed to be somewhat methodical, based on timing your attacks to openings that the enemy either present or you create and balancing risk and reward for each attack, dodge, heal, and everything else. I think they are just in two different genre's and so is God of War for that matter. Lies of P, Lords of the Fallen, even side scrollers like Salt and sanctuary are more like Darksouls. I wouldn't like a Darksouls game to be more like DMC, it wouldn't be a Darksouls game then.
(edit)I probably misunderstood what you were getting at, and my comment might be more of a comment on what Theo had been saying and comparing the two games like he did, I don't know, but in general, I prefer DMC and Elden Ring/Dark Souls to remain seperate genre's of action games.
*cough* Nioh 2 *cough*
"Reverted to" Bro they've made two games since Sekiro and one was AC6. Elden Ring was a huge project stretching back from before Sekiro was started. The DLC isn't going to have a completely different combat system to the base game.
@@fastenedcarrot9570 Damn!!!!!!! Respond to the central conceit or I don't care, because you know that's not the core of my point. Nobody expected a new combat system for the DLC, it's stupid to assume I meant that in a post about Elden Ring as a whole. It's also pure waterbrain to assume that in a "huge project since before Sekiro came out" that nobody had resources or time to consider updating the combat like they did for - Sekiro - which you've already observed was a smaller project.
But you dont need to pick up the fragments again? I did a ng+ and my things stayed at their level
Exactly. He doesnt even know what hes talking about.
@@theredknight9314 I'm just confused cause Metal seems to use that as a point against the dlc when he clearly hasn't checked that
tbh i always play new characters not ng+ so i think he is talking about that
@@vaaaasa Huh, I never really thought of that. But I mean... exploring it a second time is far easier due to being a lot more familiar with the map, but even so the fragments aren't required to beat them if you really don't want to look for them again. They seem pretty on the path to wherever you are going anyway.
he was probably talking about starting a new save
It was pretty apparent the Fromsoft saw the game was too easy, as people streamed multiple no hit runs and dance mat controllers, and said we need to make them cry.
Heck I saw someone, not 2 days after the dlc came out, beat the final boss with no armor and just a club.
Ironpineapple went into the dlc at level 1.
Maybe if Miyazaki wants to make it hard he should actually play his own games
@@sayLeotardbutsayitChinese I think it recently came out in an article that he played Elden Ring himself and said he is actually bad at it. Or hasn't been able to beat it.
Unicron's bs powers unlocked a passion inside Theo. I aprove of these rants.
With regards to the "why is it reviewing so well" question, i feel Theo needs to appreciate that while he just wants a boss rush, the majority of players really enjoy exploration and the world.
the world in the dlc is disapontly empty compared to base game, a lot less dungeons and shit to do, plus lots of uselless upgrade materials (if i'm in the DLC, LV 150, why tf do i need a somber 2 or smithing 5) making the exploration boring after the first playthrough
unless you count killing drake nº 240582 with a reskin a meaningfull exploration
I find the exploration in ER to be far, far less interesting than the previous, tighter-designed games. It's beautiful, but my urge to explore is killed knowing that 9/10 things I'll find are recycled tileset minidungeons/ruins/fortresses.
@@Chasseur_dProserpina i could not believe my eyes when a saw another dragon in the dlc 😢
Thing is, I don't want a boss rush. I want quite the opposite; my favourite game in the series is DS1, the game with by no means the best boss roster. What I want is more focus on those other aspects or, if the games are gonna keep being really combat-focused, more expansion of what's going on in the combat.
And I can't exactly take away anyone else's enjoyment of the world for sure. But I certainly didn't enjoy the open world or the exploration of it; I felt it was very frequently unrewarding (I don't mean this just in a sense of 'I didn't find big powerups for my build' for what it's worth)
So what you have to spend time learning the moveset 😂
Earn it. Or use the tools the game gives you 😂
If you dont want to use those tools then you have to put more time in.
I don't think Theo's arguments are bad here, like a lot of people seem to think. I can see the logic behind most of them. I just don't agree with a lot as well. For instance, the idea that the games visuals, or the boss attacks, are lying to you is something I don't understand on a fundamental level. I would need a visual to go along, because in my head, seeing a delayed attack just means, okay, I need to dodge later instead of impulse dodging. Now, of course, the first time that'll probably catch you, and that's fair. But beyond that, I do not understand the complaint of not knowing what to do against certain attacks. I've found very few attacks that aren't telegraphed and reactable. Mind you, I didn't say NONE. There are absolutely some BS attacks.
However, one thing that I have been very annoyed with for a lot of the community, is the idea that the final boss is bad lorewise. I'm not here to defend his moveset, though, I think it is a bit more telegraphed then people say. However, Theo saying that the Final Boss is tasteless, irks me to no end. I'm not gonna lie and say I didn't like the base version, but I didn't love him as much as everyone else. But the idea that it is tasteless is INSANE to me. If you don't know the lore, then yeah, I could see your perspective. But things will come out of nowhere in every Souls game if you don't pay attention to or know the lore. If you do the NPC quests, it is made explicitly clear what is coming and how. Again, I am NOT defending the actual design of the moveset itself. That's a separate issue. But the idea that the final boss is tasteless or just fanservice completely negates the story entirely.
Could be just me overreacting to it, but I've seen so many people dog on it lorewise because they didn't understand the lore itself, and that frustrates me to no end. But overall, I disagree with a lot of what Theo says, BUT I can understand where he is coming from. Mostly.
I don't think you are overreacting at all.
Like the fact that a lot of people wanted Godwyn for the Final Boss is something that is fine for them to want, but at the same time, when one looks into it a little bit, it completely breaks lore in so many ways if that were to happen. (Like ahh yes, what was the point of the night of the black knifes even? What was the point of his death storywise?)
Thus the only reliable realization one can have when it comes to Godwyn, is that Miquella tried to ressurect him, perhaps because the concept of "a true death" is something that sounds too abstract to a lot of the characters in universe, but that when he realized he couldn't, for whatever reasons, regardless of if he wanted him as his King Consort or if it was simply because Miquella really liked Godwyn (as most did) as a display of HIS character, he then eventually had to give up.
The lore is incredibly vague, and ironically/not-so-ironically is also really difficult to get into, which means most things happening while the Player naturally plays the game will just sound insane.
Kind of one of the things I am not too wild on, but regardless of that, this thing with Radahn and everything regarding Miquella, I actually thought was really well done when looking into it and thinking about it. I despise the Boss fight, but the things going on there are really interesting, and I find it really hard to agree with the notion that it is tasteless.
Which is surprising, because I hate that Boss so much that by all means my bias should tell me to agree, but I cannot after everything I have read.
Doesn't mean it is perfect, but tasteless? Nah, that seems like it is just the bitterness some people felt from the DLC seeping into areas that it may not have been the best to allow it in.
I read this whole thing... where's the lore, and why is it not tasteless?
All of his criticisms are tainted by his self imposed restrictions, therefore they cannot be taken seriously.
@@mrkennady People keep saying this, is there a stream or a video where I can see examples of this?
They are the same old straw man attacks that every low skill player throws at the game in frustration when they fail. I've seen this over and over with new players. And it's not exclusive to From, the game cheated on me" was probably used on Space Invaders back in 1977.
I can't wait to link this to my Elden Ring friends who hated the DLC with a burning fiery passion.
Can't wait for Theo's video, I neeeed someone to be even the slightest bit critical of this dlc lol
@@qing7902 So check literally ANYbody else. There's valid complaints but they are NOT what Theo is offering. Look up Only Waifu, Ratotoskr, Youwy, people that actually care about the game and won't just complain that it isn't Dark Souls AGAIN
@@qing7902 yesss. Like I don’t absolutely hate the DLC, there’s a lot of good in it, but it was a really awful experience on many occasions. High highs, low lows, and I’d love to hear someone talk about those lows
@@totallyofftaskwhich ones? I’m curious to other peoples experiences cause i have yet to hit a low
@@qing7902there’s a few videos out that are critical. They’ve gotten lots of hate and disagreements but I still liked them.
If Theo didn't want to play Elden Ring to begin with, why did he play the DLC?
The most important thing is that sekiro is still the best souls game
Aye. Here is hoping that the next From project is something closer to that, rather than Elden Ring 2. I am just tired of this combat system. Dark Souls 3 was a fine sendoff for this kind of stamina-based system. ER really needed something better (bloodborne trick weapons + faster player speed probably would have worked well).
the lack of skill is apparent
Indeed, these are the same bs arguments every non skilled player throws at these games until they win.
38:02 in what way is dodge rolling the “almost only” way of defense in Elden ring. There are multiple types of shields, damage negation spells, items, and consumables, your armor stats matter, summoning, and there is parrying.
I can agree with Theo on a few things about ER but when he says shit like this all it tells me is that he refuses to use tools given to him by the devs and only wants to play this game like dark souls which it is not.
Dodging in ER is absolutely the most optimal way to avoid damage. No amount of gimmicks and cheese builds is going to beat the 100% damage reduction at a single button press that can be done nigh infinitely.
@@TheBlastmeistershields can have 100% physical negation.
I finished the final boss sword and board, relying much more on blocking with a shield than rolling out of attacks. It's very doable, you just need the Greatshield Talisman and a strong shield.
Essentially what the other reply said. Dodging is fairly close to strictly better than blocking, outside of builds optimised to block that trivialise the game in a way that I don't enjoy. I don't want damage negation and defences to help me facetank, that's not my issue - I want to play ball with the boss and learn to avoid everything it throws at me. I want to master it. So I guess in that sense yeah I do refuse to use tools. But since my problem is not primarily the level of difficulty, and using these tools would not change the gameplay outside of making it easier, I don't think they would improve my opinions of anything I interacted with. Blocking is the only one I did use, and that was only when the game borderline forced me to by presenting attacks that cannot be rolled through consistently if at all.
@seafoam6119 good thing all bosses only do physical damage, right?
Oh shit. It's Theo!
I LOVED Elden Ring, but I kinda agree with a lot that he was saying. Something has been changing and I think it definitely culminated in this DLC. I can't wait for his video to drop.
I had loads of fun with the game back during launch, I'm a huge fan of the Horizon games (Zero Dawn & Forbidden West, not the racing games xD) and Elden Ring just completely took over at that time and made me abandon Forbidden West until a later date.
But in the last "Third" of the game, it started gradually becoming more and more unenjoyable. I had my vigor soft-capped and I was dying in 2-to-3 hits from basic enemies in Forts or Dungeons in the Mountaintops of the Giants area for example. And then at that point almost every boss had "anime sh*t" (its funny that I called it this too while ranting to my gf at the time who was also playing it, goes to show how it really is unfitting in the game lol)
And if it wasn't anime sh*t, then it was AoE, AoE, AoE and flurries after flurries of moves. It started taking away the fun and making me just.. straight up not feel enjoyment whenever I beat a boss. I still felt accomplishment when I finished the game but there was a hint of a feeling of having finished a chore. A game should never feel that way.
But there's this mentality within the souls community where complaints are unnaceptable. There's complaints I still did back then but it wasnt of the difficulty, it was of the open world design. A lot of "ArTiClEs" and YoUtUbErS" would post sh*t saying that FromSoft open world design should be the industry standard, and for other companies to pay attention as exploration was perfect in it, etc.
I do agree that having a screen cluttered with sh*t blips a la Ubisoft is terrible. But Elden Ring's lack of quest logs, direction, NPC locations, and utterly insane obscure triggers for quest progressions makes it that people have to open up guides on the internet to figure sh*t out to get specific endings or simply complete sidequests. That's not good game design at all in my opinion and saying it was always met with toxic feedback.
So I never really mentioned the "artificial difficulty BS" that was ALLLLL OVER this game's end-game areas. I kinda just sucked it up, took pride in that I finally beat it, and that now I could beat anything.
Now the DLC released and it takes the bullsh*t of that Endgame and cranks it up to 11. 🤣 And nobody can say anything because the community is so toxic and cult-like that nobody can criticize FromSoft.
Without this criticism, FromSoft may not learn that this direction they're headed is terrible and completely antithecal to the original design ideas of the souls series. Needless to say, I'm concerned about their future games, and UNNNBELIEEEVABLY GLAD that Sekiro was made *BEFORE* Elden Ring. I have a feeling it'd be caked with sh*t present in this DLC otherwise.
says he has never had less fun playing a game.
Has he ever played fallout 76?
Sewerslide Squad? No mans sky? Gollum?
For those there was still entertainment value in making fun of how bad they are.
Meanwhile here it's just sad.
And the Souls like franchise is one he Cares about a lot so that may be a you ruined it kind of thing
76 can be fun if you have people to play it with, solo it's not worth it and just boring.
Gollum is funny in how busted it is.
No man's sky.... if it's release version I agree, if it's the new version then I'd be hesitant to agree but it'd have many asterisks and footnotes attached to anything I say about NMS.
Suicide Squad? yeah I could agree
Gollum is the most fun I had in a while, it's like watching a monty python sketch, the last boss in the dlc is like watching paradise PD
I honestly can't take anyone seriously if they have this opinion. Is this his first From game? It sounds like the same critique ever From newcomer posts when they die one too many times.
50:08 I really hope Fromsoftware creates a new boss Called "Theo Of The Erdtree" who amongst many other long bs attacks chains, has the ability to steal your heal elixirs when successfully grabbing you as an input-read heal punish.
Incredibly based
They made it to where people with a level 70 character and a character that's level 300 can have a fresh difficulty. If you explore then you'll likely destroy the last half of the bosses no problem.
Not true. I explored almost everything 1 level before max sacrurdtree blessing, last boss was a nightmare. I dont agree with all of theo's points but I think the game has issues.
@@brendancoulter5761yeah I’m with you on this. There’s definitely something that feels off. Some further fine tuning and tweaking would be great. For starters, if the final boss stopped flash banging me with every move in phase 2, that’d be nice :D
Eh I would say people will cheese it regardless so just let people play how they want the blessing BS just takes away freedome of the players.
you realize that if there's no inbetween of either getting fucked by bosses or just destroying bosses with no problem, then the game is badly designed, right?
Which was a mistake.
Biggest gripe I can throw against SotE is that it shares the issue of base Elden Ring where the endgame bosses have been scaled too high damage wise. I dont think its fun to have vit pumped to hard cap and still get two shot by damn near every major boss. I said it when ER dropped that those endgame bosses are about as hard as you can make bosses while still making them enjoyable to fight. Phase 2 of final boss strays past that into cheap territory imo. Aside from that i had a lot of fun with the DLC. Enjoyed the lore revelations, the new gear, and a bunch of the new bosses.
Try using physical defense.
(Dragoncrest great shield / Golden vow/ black flame protection / boiled prawn and then a heavy set of armour
I have 87% physical negation. And now Radhans has to do 2 full combos to kill me. (Which is like 12 hits)
You should already have that endgame vigor for the DLC though and you have the fragments in the DLC.
@@fastenedcarrot9570 I did and I got up to 18 blessing level. The bosses still do metric fucktons of damage in their long ass combos
@@fenris5932 what's your "defence /dmg megation" for Physical?
@MilkT0ast I beat the game dude, it's not worth examining how I could minmax out more defense. My criticism is that I don't like that EVERY boss has 2 to 1 shot levels of damage and long ass combo strings , any two of which can kill you and also have swing delays. I'm just saying that Fromsoft doesn't continuously need to escalate their difficulty for their own fanbase because I think difficulty has diminishing returns on overall fun with a game of you increase it past a point and Elden Ring endgame reaches that point
Elden Ring is far from my favorite Fromsoft game but calling it Skyrim is crazy hyperbole.
Skyrim is way better.
@@shanecoyle8053 No lol.
@@that1guy375 Much like Skyrim I enjoyed Elden ring, but I can't help bit wonder why they retained all the bad design choices from previous games, while changing much of the good stuff. I can see the comparison like that.
It's so extreme that it's disqualifying. It's like when the Elden Ring gameplay trailer dropped and salty gamers said it looked like a PS3 game.
Judging by his complaints does Theo like souls games anymore?
maybe, fromsoft really need to fix the game design from Elden Ring, just for start wtf is a stagger system without a stagger bar, and why summons and crafted items so strong?
@@naruroGCStheres never been a stagar bar. Clearly you havent played a souls game in your life LMAO.
@@naruroGCS Every game can be improved and he has plenty of valid arguments like tracking is never fun especially when its just guys doing 360s because its lazy af, but a good portion of them were things in almost every other souls game I can think of like bosses baiting you to react and even big dumb anime attacks
I also vaguely remember the discussion on the base game years ago and his complaints where mostly the similar so of naturally you wouldn't like more of the same turned to 11 or 12 in his case. I might also be wrong but someone also said that they didn't like that the genre itself was getting popular and if that was him then of course Elden Ring 2: Electric Boogaloo never had a chance to be even remotely enjoyable and playing it would be a chore.
I disagree with Theo's comments about the souls combat being just dodge and light, that is true for DS3 but definitely not Elden Ring. In Elden Ring you are much more incentived to use more of your actions in combat, jumping for extra distance or avoiding AOEs, roll or coruch attacks if you need a quick punish during a boss' combo, charge attacks to do large poise damage, or jumping attacks to also damage poise, dodge, and low profile during a combo.
The bosses are more aggressive in Elden Ring yes, but there are more opportunities to damage a boss during their attacks rather than waiting for them to finish a combo, then attacking.
There's also Ashes of War which add an extra level of complexity.
Oooh wooow so it’s circle sometimes x and then r1 sooo deep😂
@@_CrimsonBlade no its more like run and strafe, charge up a heavy, dodge, dodge, light attack, jump heavy and low profile.
You could diminish pretty much any game to "Ooohh woooow, so it's just _____, so deep".
Oh so Sekiro is just parry sometimes, jump and attack sooo deep
@@Fintank_ stop lying to yourself theres only like two bosses with an attack you can jump over and the attack rarely comes out…elden ring is rolling simulator theo was right you press circle till the boss stop attacking then r1 that literally how everyone plays the game but keep lying to yourself
@@_CrimsonBladehe is not really lying cause he is absolutely right, i can recall four bosses of the top of my head that used attacks that were jumpable: Godrick, Crucible knight, Hero of Zamor, chrysalid and all these examples are just in limgrave. You are just wrong
idk who Theo is but I demand more content
I'm still baffled they haven't done an EFAP covering Lies of P. I'm curious what they all think about that game especially with all the conversations about Souls titles they go into when talking about FromSoft stuff. Unless they did talk about it in a different stream and I missed it.
Mauler did a lets play
@@SecundumMagnusStultus
Yeah I saw some of his streams but it would be cool to see the whole panel do a full discussion.
@@gregrothschilds8453 i guess I have nothing to add then, sorry
They seemed to like it but they'd rather talk about remakes instead it seems.
There are plenty of options to dodge other than the rolls, like jumping, blocking, and AoWs: the Sidestep and the Blood-Hound Step.
What highlights Theo's actual problem is that when frustrated of getting killed, he picked up the Noob-Spammer-9000, amplifying his damage instead of fixing his real issue: not being able to dodge attacks efficiently.
IDK, I definitely agree SotE isn't the best... I still think Old Hunters is the best From DLC, but I think Theo is a bit harsh.
Maybe it's me though, I feel like every From game has lots of jank, but I've just kinda ignored it because I feel like the highs outweigh the lows. Significantly so in the case of Bloodborne and Elden Ring.
"they need a boss that reaches into your bag and chugs your estus" Kingdom Hearts 3, bro. Check it out
@@Coaltergeist yozora truly is the peak of funny in the entire series.
I like how he says the scadu blessings are just everywhere on the ground but also ignores that he also pointed out bosses drop them. Also large enemies in the world drop them like the random hippos. Not each scadu gives a blessing, you need more and more for each upgrade you get, getting 1 doesn't give you anything. Npc bosses can be staggered constantly, why not take advantage of that? Any boss delaying their move is a boss you can just walk behind and they'll miss
There are plenty no hit runs on the final boss relax
I do want to see Mauler play Armored Core. Likely not his cup of tea, but all the same I think he'd have a good time of it. As for Theo, I left a long comment in the actual video so I wont copy paste it here, but just to say, I think he brings a valuable view to things, and while I won't agree to everything he said, I do feel many of his points, such as the camera or the ever zany boss animations, timing, and weights. I really do feel like the series wants to move past the current gameplay systems to something faster and more aggressive, similar to AC or Sekiro, but retaining the feel of the souls game, and its starting to tear at the seams a little as the two visions clash without the extreme leap they will need to make in order to achieve that, and they likely don't want to alienate portions of their audience in doing so. Not a great position to be in, but we shall see in the next iteration of the series.
Now if we could only get that Bloodborne remaster in the meanwhile....
Many of Theo's observations and criticisms are valid and completely fair. But the fact he has such venomous hatred for the game is why he gets push back and why his takes are unpopular.
And he himself is the reason why he doesn't enjoy the game. He is not willing to engage with it as it's own thing, he's trying to play it like FromSoft's past games.
@@Kanaleah As they mentioned in this session, that its more of him ranting rather than giving measured responses and breakdowns. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and will await to see his own video on things to see exactly where he stands, as the issues people may have with him here will be likely addressed and very well may be already something he has accounted for in his criticisms, but did not convey well here in his frustrations.
Heart vs the mind and all that. More than happy to let someone vent when they seek an outlet, and this stream more or less acted like that for him. Now if his video on this is more or less the same tone and the like, then you'll likely have your own answer methinks, until then, benefit of the doubt is the better path methinks. No need to assume the worst intentions or motivations, we all have our ways of conveyance.
@@Kanaleahthis is exactly on point. He gets so mad because everyone points out how mad he gets from the souls games that he just is toxic to the community and the game developers. Like to say that people who defend elden ring are brainwashed into liking it is a really stupid take.
Sekiro is not aggresive, is defensive. AC6 definitely aggresive and fast paced. Elden Ring falls in between both gameplay styles and you can lean into one or the other depending on how you play, which is why some people struggle with it.
@@EatThePath-7 Im not so sure I would call Sekiro Defensive, when the player is able to be as aggressive as most enemies with minor exception, unless you mean that engagements tend to be more of a planned affair, with planning the amount of enemies you engage at a time and the like.
Never played any of the Souls games so im just enjoying the fire
People need to take advantage of stance breaking in Elden Ring more often; I had way more fun when I did a stance break build then when I was just going for a more "honest" build
Playing Stellar Blade actually helped me get past Rellana, took like 30 something attempts but I wish they made a talisman for that deflect ability
Everytime i hear ppl complaining about the game being "to hard" or "scaled badly" it always turns out they just refused to level, refused to use ashes, refused to use consumables or some combination.
Play the game how you want, BUT if you straight up ignore half the tools the game gives you to progress the game isnt hard, you are making it hard.
Which again is fine, just dont complain that your challenge run is to hard.
I think Theo is right about the readability of attacks, particularly the partical effects and timings not matching the attack animation.
I feel that he is a bit stubborn, rufusing to change tactics to suit the different fighting styles of bosses.
I don't feel like timing has been an issue for me, but visual effects have been for many bosses. Doesn't help the game has such a narrow FOV... and i know first hand that widening can help since it's possible to do it with mods on PC, it's a world of difference dealing with tall enemies with a wider FOV.
I agree with soooo much of what Theo says, and Elden Ring is one of my least favorite Souls Games purely because of how much faster and more "anime" the combat is.
But it is absolutely a matter of stubbornness. Elden Ring is not aa game suited to my preferences- I can still beat it and do well, but I prefer Dark 1, Bloodborne and Sekiro. I prefer positioning and timing, and some of these Elden Ring bosses are just map-wide AoEs and eye-searing amounts of particles and effects and...
I just like the simpler times.
@@lustrazor44 he says he spam rolls...how bout trying to time them instead??
No more dances, just a make the bosses fast and hit harder, give them dumb anime moves so now every boss is sister friede in her third form
What's Theo's Channel name? I wanna see his piece on SOTET.
It's in the description on the section 'Featured RUclipsrs'
Man I would love to sit down with Theo and have a chat about Elden Ring.
If this is Theo's 'worst experience playing any game' I don't think he knows what a genuinely bad game is.
That's not to say I don't disagree with some of his criticisms, there are some legitimately awful experiences and bosses in the DLC, but I cannot agree with his overall hatred of Elden Ring when I probably share the same vitriol for Dark Souls 1.
I could have better experiences with worse games because it would affect me less. I don't make it a habit to play bad games, but I know for a fact I've played games worse than Elden Ring. Doesn't change the fact that this is the least enjoyable gaming experience I can recall. That's the operative thing here, it's my worst *experience* with a game, not the worst *game* I've ever played.
It's a good thing FromSoft has a great art direction going for their titles. It's easier to forgive game design decisions and conflicting ethos when you're enamoured with the setting.
It isnt buckling under the weight of bad design, constant glitches, and in-game advertising like a lot of games these days.
@@cdubsb3831 For sure
I would say going into a game I expected to enjoy only to not is a way worse experience than going into a bad game knowing you could likely not enjoy it.
I'm sure Theo wanted to like ER or the DLC when they dropped but ended up not. I'm in the same boat for my own reasons.
What I got from this is:
Local man Malds that game doesn't conform to his playstyle, seethes for hours.
You love a good Theo rant
I hope Theo's Homelander speech will stay as a meme.
Iron pineapple started the DLC at RL1 and only used items from the DLC and did fine, which while not a R1 run entirely really does show how it’s not “too hard” and people absolutely have the chance to do better. One thing I notice is 100% of the people saying bosses are too hard don’t jump over sweeps and stomps, and fast enemies they don’t parry.
Just to be clear, the iron pineapple example doesn’t really prove anything other than iron pineapple can do what he did. When criticizing the game design, you have to generalize to the average player experience. If there’s a solid percentage of the player base complaining about difficulty, then a solution to the given challenge isn’t being properly communicated by the designer. Games should be challenging, but fair. The argument against the DLC seems to be that if you handicap yourself it becomes beatable, but unfair. If you use all the resources at your disposal it becomes exploitable, and unfair.
@@BS-gk2cb Counter point: the average perso and by extension gamer is stupid and doesn't know what they actually want and trying to appeal to them only makes your game worse.
It is a good thing then because Theo don't argued about the game's difficulty in general, but the *way* it is difficult.
@@fastenedcarrot9570I don't know if I've ever read a more pretentious comment. It's always people like you who neber believe they're part of that group.
@@reactiondavant-garde3391Theo loves ultrakill, of course he doesn't hate difficulty. Fucking hell these people have never played anything outside of fromsoftware, they just don't know how much better gameplay can be for these genres.
lol somone in chat said " 'brute force' = play the game as intended" ....
not that the games can't have a different play style/meta, but it doesn't mean that just becuase it's new/different that it's good or enjoyable.
like mauler said, the majority of players (casual and hardcore) is a combinaiton of rolling a favorable moveset from the boss and ganking with a +10 mimic/'insert broken summon here'
Neither Mauler, you, nor anyone else can accurately say what the "majority of players" do because no one sees them do it lmao
My character is lvl 350 can’t wait to see how crazy it’ll be for me next month
I wonder if you could find the clip where Theo was spitting truths about the clone wars. Hilarious!
I eagerly await theo’s video on the subject
I get Theos argument, and even agree with some points, but frankly I hard disagree on the idea that some of it is in any way objectively bad. Like for example he mentions the spear drag messmer does for a big attack, and refers to the follow up, drag, snap as a point of egregious delay. But for many, myself included, it was an easy to read attack. There are a lot of tells in the game that by his logic are bad because they delay in an abnormal sense but I never once felt it was bad or hard to predict. That’s just one point and on some of it (some attacks do have ludicrous tracking or unclear hitboxes) has merit, but for the most part I feel his point largely boils down to personal preference.
The point is that it's a stupid attack to have, why would messmer scrape his spear against the ground in a fight against you outside of the "meta" of it being a delayed attack.
@@BigGuy1989 not really seeing an issue there. There are plenty of exaggerated or impractical attacks in these games, heck, in media generally. It fits both for the visual appeal and the fact that yeah it’s for the delay.
@@CrispyChaos38 the problem is that it's immersion breaking. Instead of him doing attacks that look and feel like an attempt of messmer to kill you he's now doing the delay attack. On top of that it's likely something similar to Radahn's quintuple spin charge, in that when you see it, you just roll your eyes.
@@BigGuy1989 except it’s clearly not immersion breaking for the vast majority of people. And again by that same token of logic just about any fight in anything ever can be pointed to as immersion breaking. Besides wouldn’t the counter point be messmer was dragging his spear intentionally? That the entire point was fake out on purpose? I’m more inclined to believe Theos issue would be the idea of an attack with a set up followed by an unexpected delay, something which personally I see no issue with in that case.
@@CrispyChaos38 the vast majority of people also still pretend that FromSoft hasn't become a parody of itself, I wouldn't take their impressions on things for much in this case to be honest. I agree that it can be hard to define what breaks immersion to some degree and that this is up to the person, but Elden Ring specifically does it by overruling any kind of momentum you would think is logical for that sake of a delay. I've seen delays in other games and delays in general are perfectly fine for me, I would just like it if they had some fucking restraint, which is something FromSoft no longer has.
39:33 - 40:40 THANK GOD I'm not the only one constantly getting merked by that!!! I always die or get hit by that attack 9/10 times, and it gets even worse in phase two with all the beams of light following each swing, who the hell thought that was a good idea?!!?
I played the dlc soul level 1and there are only 2 bad bosses if you have problems just use a fast roll
I am kind of tired of the Fromsoft critic cycle. Ironic since these games have cycles as a big thematic element. I have been showing people posts from the DS3 and Old Hunters days where people are saying the exact same stuff as SotE, "This time it's way too hard, From has lost their way, the bosses have unreadable and unreactable attacks", etc. No less than Joseph Anderson said the same stuff about ER's base game. But every time, without fail, within months, people will be saying it's actually too easy because people will have gotten used to it. And of course now people are already doing RL1 and no hit runs of SotE. You don't have to like it, I'm just saying maybe when the pattern is this specific, MAYBE we should just chill out and be patient and see how it sits after the DLC has become a normalized part of the game. And then everyone get your bingo card ready for when people say the same stuff when the next game comes.
The thing is is that people shit on the ER endgame, and when it came out I thought that Malekith was the most BS stupid boss, super agile does a fuckton of damage. Now he's one of my favourite Fromsoft bosses ever.
@@phillidaadamus4349 I died to Maliketh SO many times during my first playthrough lol, but I think I've done him in one attempt ever since then. I could tell there were things happening that I could probably take advantage of during the fight but I didn't know how. I've since learned that the positioning for him matters more than almost anything else. The thing is, I'm actually pretty bad at these games, I feel like if I can do it, then almost anyone can.
"Just consume the product, man"
My main issue is the map layout, getting the top left map is a fucking atrocity if youre looking for it
I think I’m more tired of the whiny souls bros who say everyone is bad instead of accepting criticism
I have played a few games that are so much less enjoyable than this, they are God of War 2018 and God of War Ragnarok
Theo probably wouldn't disagree with you much there.
At least new god of war has an undeniably powerful narrative and thematic throughline. Elden rings narrative and thematic throughline is "lmao", and even then this dlc somehow manages to destroy it with the stupid chadahn final boss
@@dragonpaulz_gameplay>>>>>>>>>narrative
If your games selling point is its narrative over fun engaging gameplay, then you’ve made a bad game. You can have a great game with a terrible narrative, you can not have a good game with terrible gameplay
lol I’ll give you that. I felt bad for not being able to finish Ragnarok.
@@TheChilipepper77 okay but I'm not talking about God of war as a game. I understand as a GAME, new god of war is not good. But my point is at least new god of war has SOMETHING going for it. Elden ring and it's dlc suck ass in both categories
I enjoyed the DLC more than the base game, but I also agree with most of what Theo is saying
From soft have stretched souls combat to it's absolute limits and it shows with this dlc.
I've been enjoying it a lot BUT I play with mods to make it easier because I suck and don't feel like stressing myself out to get good for a few months. In short, I hit harder, I take less damage, I have a lot more stamina and I can turn status effects off. So that drastically changes my interactions.
That said, I played the base game with the same settings I started the DLC with and I immediately found myself dying a lot more vs the base game. Even now with many fragments, it's still clear to be a lot "harder".
I'm not saying anything about whether that's good or not, just sharing.
Whole lotta whining
Skill issue. "The game cheated! The combat is bad! The world is empty!" all these I've seen thrown at every From game from the first Dark Souls. What he is saying is nothing new or interesting, he's just trying to make a name for himself by being contrarian.
I agree that there is a problem with non-intuitive telegraphs. I think that the Lion Dancer is the worst boss in the DLC because even if it tried to telegraph anything, the camera does not let you see it. I disagree that it's a universal problem though. There's always "that move" with some of the bosses that you can't intuitively avoid and ends up being an annoyance. But the rest are fine. I think that the overtuned damage levels in Fromsoft's vain attempt to "balance" incoming players with arbitrary levels reinforce a confirmation bias that makes those problems seem more prevalent than they are, because when it happens, you probably die instantly. So, that one unintuitive telegraph is what you end up remembering. -Because the second to last main boss is completely fine, with perfectly readable telegraphs on every single move. Same with the optional boss in a secret area in the north.
PLEASE wolf, do more Theo highlights
DS2 is getting some undue comparisons and hate. If you hate it, hate it for the right reason.
The issues with ER and DS2 are not the same. DS2 did not have overcorrection on enemy attacks. DS2 did not have extreme enemy damage. Enemies didn't have overly long and ridiculously flashy attack chains.
One of the things DS2 did correctly was poise. Weapon weight was directly related to stamina consumption and poise damage.
Another thing was that you didn't get super-poise from swinging great weapons and they weren't unparriable. You could also guard break shields.
Playing nioh 2, having a fantastic time
That game is fantastic, one of my favorite combat systems of all time. Vastly better boss design than anything in elden ring, too.
@@yanribeiro7108 Tell me about it, was hyped for the Elden Ring DLC, but now i'm real deep into Nioh 2 on NG+++ trying to master every weapon type. going back to elden ring is hard, it's so slow and shallow.
Very good game, great series of weapon types as well.
On the memorization of combat; I somewhat agree. Although I was able to beat a few of the bosses on a first try, most of the timings of attacks were so frickin bizzarre that you kinda just had to face tank fights until you memorized the combos (putrescence being the most agregious, in my opinion).
On the fragment upgrades; I think it was a good idea that was poorly executed. I wouldve preferred they were either far more abundant (like flask charge items) or were standardized with bosses like Sekiro.
On the over-indulgence of bosses; I also somewhat agree. There's not much of a contrast between the bosses when all of them fly around and shoot lasers like Goku. They probably should've reserved the crazy movesets for a select few bosses, as compared to everyone
0:15:15
So... could the Erdtree's shadow defeat Unicron? Or IS it a vestige of Unicron himself?
Hi Wolf!
For anyone who cares, I believe the Super Meat Boy boss that Mauler is talking about was pure trial and error memorization. It's the boss from the end of the 4th world Hell.
That game's bosses can be removed and the experience would be 100 times better imo.
Yeah but, is it worth losing little slugger's theme for it?
@@yanribeiro7108 I actually don't remember that theme... So maybe I'll go back and listen to see what I think. Maybe it will redeem the fight for me 😂
@@moonraven6145 If that boss was in Elden ring, it would've been good. Or rather, if super meat boy's fanbase gargled as much of the creator's cum as they do here, then that boss would've never become the quintessential example of bad trial and error he is today.
Memorization is a part of every video game ever. Sounds like a skill issue.
@@phonepunk7888 Go be stupid somewhere else
The double slash into X from rhadan is 100% avoidable but its rly hard, you gotta backstep first slash (pressing roll without direction input) and then you can roll the next two attacks there is no rng or position requirement its just simply very difficult to do.
39:10 god slayer main here what helped me shred bosses was basically buffing with flame grant me strength, golden vow, flame/ oppaline tear with shard of Alexander and some good mitigation talismans and just ate bosses helth for dinner. Lvl 122 50 dex 27 Strength 30 faith. It's not even the best damage that you can get but for what I had it did me wonders i love the GodSlayer.... That being said trying to dodge with colossal greatswords is a pain but we knew that we signed up for that that's why we trade but trading is kind of hard and the DLC so what I suggest is trying to get more mitigation abilities, talismans your damage might suffer but you should be already doing pretty decent damage anyway at lvl 171 if you got the stats in the right place.
I agree with your criticism I think obviously things are on a scale. We don't want completely unreactive attacks that you either have to sit for countless amount of time to memorize or to cheese the AI in such a way that they do the attack that you want because that leads into less interesting gameplay. I'm not done with the DLC yet but I've gotten pretty far and I've done most things I'm a completionist and I'm trying to get everything. It's really weird to see people just say skill issue when there's a bigger overall conversation going on it's quite reductive.
And just so people can hear it in the back know just because people in a couple of months will be able to know hit the game does it mean the game was easy all along it just means there are people who sat there and took time and effort to cultivate a skill at knowing what attack there is or how to manipulate what RNG they want. There are people who can know hit run and speed run bad games that does not mean they are instantly good now these are not the same things and they are separate.
I miss being able to get in slap fights with bosses. It's my favorite way to play ds1 and is the only game you can reliably do that in. You and I are going to hit each other until one of us dies.
@@lolbuster01 you can do it in this game but to me it doesn't feel the same. I gotta go grab all these random talismans and tears and buff myself all the time to do it consistently. Why do all that when I can just get some heavy armor and a big sword and we can just go at it. Let's see who will last longer
The only issue I can agree with is the camera. Other than that, memorization has been apart of souls games since demon souls. This argument that having to adapt to new moves shown is just plainly wrong. From artorias, to Fume knight, to nameless king and Pontiff. It is in fact a skill issue, sorry that you struggle... but it is what it is. On the basis of upgrading skippidy fragments, I understand where theo is coming from but its not an objective issue. A lot enjoy exploring which was the part of the main love for base elden ring. If you didnt like exploring base game, then what the hell did you expect with its dlc? Lmao
An improvement in any way
@@lolman1207 what improvements did the base game need then? Like name some if you're gonna be snarky
I really didnt like exploring in the dlc cause you can easily miss over half of the content, areas and questlines from not checking passages and holes that arent visible or hinted at in the map. It's like the secret to get to Ash Lake on ds1 but with every zone in the map
It's not just learning the moves though, it's how the moves are conveyed to the player, in shadow of the erd tree what the bosses are doing visually is completely irrelevant to how you are actually supposed to counter, unlike artorias' and fume knight's moves
See, the problem with newer FromSoft Souls entries is what I call "animation creep". In the first couple of games, animations made sense, the games were slower and you could rely on your eyes for dodge timings. Once people got used to it and FromSoft became aware of it, they started looking for ways to create difficulty by subverting those animations and dodge timings. So they started adding more and more delayed timings. More and more. They kept going and now you have attacks that require you to roll 5 times in a row nonstop, sometimes in different directions. And I'll be honest, when the boss starts spamming the long attack and you have to jump around for 20 seconds in a row like a spasming paraplegic, it's starting to really test my patience. This is beyond just "remembering attacks and patterns", this is just goofy and bizarre. Like, what kind of armor wearing giant sword wielding warrior rolls around like Sanic Hedgehog for 20 seconds? This is looney tunes now. And guess what, you're arguing for it now, but it's gonna get worse. Are you still gonna go the route of "it's always been this way" when you're playing dance dance revolution dressed as Artorias for an entire minute straight at a time? You'll right back here, arguing Theo's points. See, Malenia's water dance is only cool if only she has it. Once everyone has it, then it's just tedious. And that will happen, because they seem to have exhausted their ideas.
I do really like elden ring but as a Theo-enjoyer i cant wait to see what my man is cooking. He didn't bring the stove he brought a nuke
He brought a fuckin' DUD
I sorta feel as though they could have gotten away without the Scadu system. Anybody who's above level like 150 probably should be into a NG cycle. I havent checked yet but I'm genuinely dreading if the blessing resets each NG cycle bc i dont think anybody wants to spend the same amount of time on requisite exploration each playthru.
Its a shame because, numbers notwithstanding, I friggin love it.
They don’t. Scadu and Revered ash carry over to NG. So you’ll be Regular boss fights latter on
I kinda agree with Theo but not so harsh. The enemies do feel a bit bullet-spongey, I also dont like the way they handled power scaling with collectibles. But I do see why they did it, to encourage exploration as opposed to just running through the bosses straight away
People can't see that there is a world were Theo is correct and people still enjoy the game. All I see playing the base game now is gibberish in the movesets of most things. Sure it just becomes pattern recognition as in all souls games but there is something annoying about how any attack can come from anywhere. Goombas transition a downward swing into a 360 spin that leaves explosives to catch you mid roll. The example of everything changing weight or having altered gravity has examples everywhere in elden ring. It nay not bother sone people but I can see it botheeing others because any grounding of the bosses as real enemies that exist in the same world as you gets shot out the window when you see how obviously the moveset is constructed.
"Goombas transition a downward swing into a 360 spin that leaves explosives to catch you mid roll."
That sounds like actual cancer.
This is why I hate mohg so much. His trident slides back and forth in his hand, changing the timing and range of his attacks from what they look like they should be visually.
Theo to Elden Ring is what Igon is to Bayle.
While I agree with him on the matter of bosses that have bloat in the form of wonky telegraphed attacks and delays out the ass, and long ass combos that you CANNOT attack in the middle of, it sounds a lot like he tried too hard to play as if it's Dark Souls.
Elden Ring is not Dark Souls. There are many other strategies than dodge-rolling that are viable in this game, whereas Dark Souls 3 especially had dodging as a far superior method of defense than this game does. No, I'm not just talking about summons, the mimic tear is still really, really good, especially on some builds, but you also have various items and spells that give you defensive buffs. My strategy to make the final boss more bearable, even fun, was to stack physical defense in the first phase, and holy defense in the second one, and to me it has always seemed like the game really tries to push you to try different avenues by making the classic dodge strategy way harder than it has been.
This is not me "skill issue'ing" you, Theo. If you truly did beta the DLC with only dodge-rolling, you are far better than me, though in the end it might have soured your experience by refusing to try different strategies.
As for hating Elden Ring because it has taken the Dark Souls "brand" in a direction you hate, I really doubt that Miyazaki doesn't recognize what made Dark Souls 1 work. Just because he has made a different game doesn't mean that he'll never make something like it again. I'd say Sekiro and Bloodborne are other examples, but I don't know your stance on those games.
I'd love to actually talk to you about game design to this caliber because I really feel like I would agree with the reasons you hold Dark Souls 1 in such high regard, even if I also hold Dark Souls 3 and Elden Ring in high regard, if only slightly lower.
Okay so I don't *want* to facetank the boss. I want to beat the boss on its own terms. I want to, theoretically, learn how to avoid every attack, deal with every string, find every punish window, so that's how I play. That's what rolling lets me do. I'm not really interested in measures that let me pay less attention to what is going on in the boss in order to beat it in a fewer number of attempts, even with bosses I don't really like. At that point, if I'm down to change my build to facetank or otherwise trivialise the boss, I'd rather just play something else.
What I mean by this is that what you are suggesting to me only reduces difficulty, when difficulty is not the core issue. Difficulty can exacerbate things, but my issue is with how things are designed, and only secondarily with how that difficulty arises from this design. Fundamentally this game is very much like Dark Souls - it plays extremely similarly to Dark Souls 3, with some more minor alterations, and overall more stuff. The way I can play the game is, fundamentally, the same - with the exception of like 2 moves in the final boss exactly and 1 move outside of that, everything is designed around being rollable, so I'm going to keep rolling, as that's how I want to play the game. I want to play ball with the bosses, rather than run them over. I hope this makes sense.
@@Theottree I get it. I just feel like the game doesn't want you to, because the roll-baiting makes that particular strategy so hazardous.
If you're looking for the classic souls experience, you won't find it in elden ring, which seems to be a very conscious choice by the devs.
Which I don't necessarily think is a bad thing. When I actually utilized the tools I had, it made the experience so much more enjoyable.
And no, that is not an excuse that the bosses don't have to be well designed, of course should every part of a game at least try to be as good as it can be, but at some point it might seem like you're hitting your head against a wall. There might be cracks after a while, but your head is in an even worse state.
Sorry if some of these tangents seem incomprehensible, english is not my first language.
@@Theottree
So it’s to Hard to explore and get Scadutree fragments…….
But not hard to Get Flask Charges, Memory Slots for spells and Smithing stones for weapons.
Get Filtered tourist
@@Theottree sorry for all the “Git gud” talk your getting. Personally I don’t agree with most of the points I’ve heard thus far since to me at least they come off as more opinionated than actual issues. That said you DO have some legit points. Some enemy attacks have absurd tracking or hit boxes that aren’t clear. Sorry you didn’t enjoy the dlc.
@@CrispyChaos38 I appreciate the sentiment dude, thanks.
Knowing Theo's thoughts on the base game, it isn't surprising lmao. Like he said, it's Elden Ring turned up a notch
I really want a stream of metal mauler and theo going through their criticisms of bloodborne and dark souls 3 they dont talk about these games enough
51:34 you can roll them all if youre far enough away, and its simple to bait out. Nowhere near as difficult as that.