Post by spidershinobi on Jul 9, 2016 3:49:18 GMT
This is more of an opinion piece than anything else, but I hope we can get into any discussion regarding this.
Yesterday I had a video-game achievement. I started playing Dragon's Dogma again, and as many of you know that game was overlooked at release in favor of Dark Souls and Skyrim, and not without reason: it was neither a truly western game with that expected american jank, nor was the gameplay as on point as something from the Souls series. Some time passed (little time, actually) and Dark Arisen was announced, I got interested because I knew that gameplay balance was the only flaw there, and when Mark Bussler reviewed that version I got it.
"So what happened yesterday?" Well, I got my lvl 39 character and pawn and went to the Bitterblack Isle (BBI for short how I wish it was Bitterblack Kontinent), the area that came with Dark Arisen. But you guys know me, right? That file is currently on Hard mode, so the player character takes double damage and spends double the stamina to do stuff. Now, when Dark Arisen was announced, someone from Capcom said that the BBI content was recommended for players as soon as they hit level 40, something that Pat from the Zaibatsu thinks to be BS, because as most people would notice the challenge is very real there, immediately higher than the last parts of the regular quests in Dragon's Dogma. But still, I went there, I had been there 3 times before with other characters, so it couldn't hurt, uh?
What happens if you enter BBI as a lvl 40 character is that you are faced with some of the smartest design choices for an action game (don't worry stratogustav, this is definitely an action-RPG, so it could be one RPG for you). The first trouble there is a group of canine beasts, they aren't super strong, just a bit above dire wolf levels of strength - they totally can kill you, just gotta be careful - and right after that you meet a group of hobgoblins, and for level 40 that's ok, actually! As soon as you meet the hobgoblins, though, you are faced with Death himself, the first instance of you being encouraged by the game to run the f!%$ away! The interesting part of this is that at level 60, in normal mode, most monsters that you'll meet ahead in this first BBI area (out of 3) should be fine to face directly, no fears involved, but at level 40 a goregoblin can kill you, fast (like when I talked about Huntsman: Winter's War goblins). That's when I noticed how smart was the game designing: by meeting Death early on, the game isn't only warning players about the level of difficulty, but also advising them to quickly explore the surroundings in moments of danger to be able to escape stronger enemies while advancing in this isle at the same time.
But that wasn't my achievement. Under this limitation of having enterered BBI rather early, I progressed down to the first boss, after escaping about 5 heavily unfavorable enemy encounters, having fought at least 2 considerably unfavorable others. The boss, Gazer, is fought in a room consisting of a downward spiral "tower", and the Gazer is like a D&D Beholder, except with a few different skills, and his skill set is very intelligent. Initially I approached it as I did before: as a high leveled warrior I just jumped ahead and grabbed on to his huge eye inside his mouth and smacked the hell out of it, except that it didn't work so well this time: I was at level 41, my pawns couldn't handle his tentacles very well all over the place, and my damage output wasn't enough for the items (drugs, really) I had with me; plus, his second strongest move - a huge tentacle spawning from the floor, at high speed, directed upwards - could kill my character in one hit coz hard mode. As hard headed as I was, I remained trying, and losing, losing, losing, and losing some more. That's when I noticed that whenever his "tentacle uppercut" hit me while I was grabbing his eye, he would immediately get stunned as the game over screen would show, and suddenly I realized: the Gazer fight is the best gimmick/puzzle boss fight I ever saw.
The trick is that for characters vastly underleveled like I was, possibly on hard mode, maybe even with one pawn less, its tentacle uppercut is also the way to defeat it. As soon as his hardcore hentai pattern starts, you can synchronize the next uppercut with the Gazer's own position, making it "punch" itself, getting stunned, and becoming open to taking hits and leaving you free to do that as his tentacles also return to his body as he is stunned. And that was how I managed to defeat this boss while underleveled, in Hard mode.
And why am I saying this? Well, the answer is simple: The Legend of Zelda. Most bosses in the 3D games have been gimmick bosses: you figure out what you have to do and finish the job. The problem with that approach for me is that it undermines a lot of character traits in the main character, specially the one that is "he is a warrior and carries a sword". If the majority of the situations are solved by employing unconventional tactics, what is the point in the traditional? That's a question those games never try to answer, but then there is Dark Arisen and the Gazer. The Gazer is a boss that features multiple attack patterns, a convenient weak spot, and a gimmick, and yet he can be approached as a regular boss, specially if your character is a ranged attacker (or overleveled, of course). The core of my critique lies here, why can't Nintendo get it right after doing it for so long? Why did it take another company to make the sword and shield approach great? And why did it take another company to make the gimmick approach coherent?
Yesterday I had a video-game achievement. I started playing Dragon's Dogma again, and as many of you know that game was overlooked at release in favor of Dark Souls and Skyrim, and not without reason: it was neither a truly western game with that expected american jank, nor was the gameplay as on point as something from the Souls series. Some time passed (little time, actually) and Dark Arisen was announced, I got interested because I knew that gameplay balance was the only flaw there, and when Mark Bussler reviewed that version I got it.
"So what happened yesterday?" Well, I got my lvl 39 character and pawn and went to the Bitterblack Isle (BBI for short how I wish it was Bitterblack Kontinent), the area that came with Dark Arisen. But you guys know me, right? That file is currently on Hard mode, so the player character takes double damage and spends double the stamina to do stuff. Now, when Dark Arisen was announced, someone from Capcom said that the BBI content was recommended for players as soon as they hit level 40, something that Pat from the Zaibatsu thinks to be BS, because as most people would notice the challenge is very real there, immediately higher than the last parts of the regular quests in Dragon's Dogma. But still, I went there, I had been there 3 times before with other characters, so it couldn't hurt, uh?
What happens if you enter BBI as a lvl 40 character is that you are faced with some of the smartest design choices for an action game (don't worry stratogustav, this is definitely an action-RPG, so it could be one RPG for you). The first trouble there is a group of canine beasts, they aren't super strong, just a bit above dire wolf levels of strength - they totally can kill you, just gotta be careful - and right after that you meet a group of hobgoblins, and for level 40 that's ok, actually! As soon as you meet the hobgoblins, though, you are faced with Death himself, the first instance of you being encouraged by the game to run the f!%$ away! The interesting part of this is that at level 60, in normal mode, most monsters that you'll meet ahead in this first BBI area (out of 3) should be fine to face directly, no fears involved, but at level 40 a goregoblin can kill you, fast (like when I talked about Huntsman: Winter's War goblins). That's when I noticed how smart was the game designing: by meeting Death early on, the game isn't only warning players about the level of difficulty, but also advising them to quickly explore the surroundings in moments of danger to be able to escape stronger enemies while advancing in this isle at the same time.
But that wasn't my achievement. Under this limitation of having enterered BBI rather early, I progressed down to the first boss, after escaping about 5 heavily unfavorable enemy encounters, having fought at least 2 considerably unfavorable others. The boss, Gazer, is fought in a room consisting of a downward spiral "tower", and the Gazer is like a D&D Beholder, except with a few different skills, and his skill set is very intelligent. Initially I approached it as I did before: as a high leveled warrior I just jumped ahead and grabbed on to his huge eye inside his mouth and smacked the hell out of it, except that it didn't work so well this time: I was at level 41, my pawns couldn't handle his tentacles very well all over the place, and my damage output wasn't enough for the items (drugs, really) I had with me; plus, his second strongest move - a huge tentacle spawning from the floor, at high speed, directed upwards - could kill my character in one hit coz hard mode. As hard headed as I was, I remained trying, and losing, losing, losing, and losing some more. That's when I noticed that whenever his "tentacle uppercut" hit me while I was grabbing his eye, he would immediately get stunned as the game over screen would show, and suddenly I realized: the Gazer fight is the best gimmick/puzzle boss fight I ever saw.
The trick is that for characters vastly underleveled like I was, possibly on hard mode, maybe even with one pawn less, its tentacle uppercut is also the way to defeat it. As soon as his hardcore hentai pattern starts, you can synchronize the next uppercut with the Gazer's own position, making it "punch" itself, getting stunned, and becoming open to taking hits and leaving you free to do that as his tentacles also return to his body as he is stunned. And that was how I managed to defeat this boss while underleveled, in Hard mode.
And why am I saying this? Well, the answer is simple: The Legend of Zelda. Most bosses in the 3D games have been gimmick bosses: you figure out what you have to do and finish the job. The problem with that approach for me is that it undermines a lot of character traits in the main character, specially the one that is "he is a warrior and carries a sword". If the majority of the situations are solved by employing unconventional tactics, what is the point in the traditional? That's a question those games never try to answer, but then there is Dark Arisen and the Gazer. The Gazer is a boss that features multiple attack patterns, a convenient weak spot, and a gimmick, and yet he can be approached as a regular boss, specially if your character is a ranged attacker (or overleveled, of course). The core of my critique lies here, why can't Nintendo get it right after doing it for so long? Why did it take another company to make the sword and shield approach great? And why did it take another company to make the gimmick approach coherent?
