I’ll start. pokemon. doesn’t matter if the game’s old or new I just can’t get into how it plays. idk the gameplay just gets old to me pretty quickly, palworld is an upgrade in every way tbh
One piece
Animal crossing.
And back when this was a thing, Candy Crush.
Any of the big popular RPG series. I got through Mass Effect 2 (it was on offer for a quid) but have no desire to go back, and I know that’s one of the more action-based games. I also played Witcher 3 up to Skellig but just can’t bring myself to finish it.
Pokemon - having to watch animations and not being able to speed anything up killed my interest
Skyrim - tried a melee run recently and the combat feels like you’re whacking air
The legend of Zelda - played Tears and the story and puzzles were a bit too kid friendly
Doom - I really tried to like it but I felt like I didn’t get anything out of it. It doesn’t scratch that itch I get out of FromSoft’s Souls games where I want to learn a boss’s patterns and die to it a million times.
In general I don’t think I can do story games anymore
the combat in Skyrim always felt so stiff so i get you, just didn’t feel enjoyable to me
Couldn’t agree more with Skyrim, Oblivion was the same when I tried that too I just can’t stand it. Easily some of the most over rated games IMO.
Also agree with Zelda but I think the same about all of the Nintendo IPs, they are just boring and the fan base makes me dislike them even more!
Same for me, but starting with Morrowind. The leveling system was too weird, compared to other RPGs of that time. I remember I missclicked, fallen out of the window of some tower, got an Acrobatics skill improved and a level up.
well falling out of a tower window is quite the experience, and if you survived you learnt a lot about how to cope with deep falls, so the level ups are well earned
In general I don’t think I can do story games anymore
Wow, that’s the complete wrong take if you ask me! It sounds like your problems with these games are mostly in the gameplay, not the story? Have you ever played Outer Wilds or The Talos Principle? Unique puzzle games with a great story.
I’ve played both of those, and I really enjoyed Talos 2 since it mostly just fed you lore while you were trying to do a puzzle, but don’t ask me what the story was because I couldn’t tell ya.
I didn’t mean I couldn’t connect with the story in just those games, but in games in general. So when I talk about a game, I don’t really put much weight into my thoughts on the story, just the mechanics.
The legend of Zelda - played Tears and the story and puzzles were a bit too kid friendly
It’s actually a kid friendly franchise, all of it. The only surprisingly mature themed zelda game is Majora’s Mask, it deal with death and loses and hopelessness way more than BOTW is comfortably touch, and it’s made in a year.
Twilight Princess is worth mentioning too. It was rated Teen, and had this scene (no gore or sex or anything, just weird surreal horror).
Zelda is such a diverse franchise it really depends on the game. I love Twilight Princess and Majora’s Mask, but didn’t like BotW or Windwaker at all. It’s almost like 2 or 3 different franchises crammed into one.
Up until Breath of the Wild, maybe Skyward Sword, the Zelda series didn’t shy away from being a bit fucked up. There’s an entire torture-themed dungeon in Ocarina of Time. Majora’s Mask is an exploration of impending doom, Twilight Princess features a botched execution. These games used to have characters in actual danger, scary enemies, confronting themes…Breath of the Wild is post apocalyptic and everyone is just happy clappy.
Pokemon - having to watch animations and not being able to speed anything up killed my interest
That’s why I play on emulator most of the time, especially for games I’ve already beaten
Yeah that’s the way to go, sadly. Funny enough I was eventually able to enjoy Pokémon through the fan game Pokerogue then a RuneScape rom hack called pokescape
i think you can disable the animations in the console games for pokemon, unless they changed it for the new games.
They removed the options to skip battle animations for the newer games. There’s an option that removes cutscenes, but that doesn’t affect anything in battles like the ten minute long terastallizations.
i see, they did that for the online card game too. in the older ones i removed the animations so i can progess through the battle tower faster. good thing i never gotten into the post- burnt out masuda games.
Modern DooMs are… strange. The legendary status of Doom is granted by Doom 1 and 2. And those games are very different from Doom 3-5.
Original gameplay is quite saved by GZDoom and similar projects. Add there something like BrutalDoom add-on and you’ll get the best from both worlds: old Doom gameplay and more modern graphics.
I still need to finish Dark Age but the level design was quite good. Felt way more like the original Jaquays type maps, lots of loops and alternate paths you naturally explore.
Project Warlock is still better tho
Pokemon. Never played one, never will. Hot take is it’s a gateway into IRL hunting which is honestly just very cruel. Do not approve.
hot take
You weren’t kidding
I’m enjoying the idea of someone going IRL hunting and their only training is the Pokémon games.
Just out in the woods, gently tossing pokeballs at very confused deer.
that is a swealtering take if I’ve ever seen one
Kinda like how GTA produces violent killers right?
All of them.
About 10 years ago, I was playing BioShock. It was fun, but I kept losing interest. Which was weird, because it was pretty much a game that was made for me - a pretty deep plot, a cool adventurous aesthetic, exploring and discovering different places on the map. I realized I was getting distracted thinking about all the other things I wanted to do - hanging out with my friends, figuring out how to talk to girls, studying so I could get good grades and a good job, learning all about things that interested me, going backpacking and rock climbing - and so I finished the game out of habit, and then set down the controller and didn’t pick it back up for a while.
My last game was Red Dead Redemption, which I blasted through in a marathon play-through while spending a month crashing my sister’s couch between semesters. My sleep schedule got all fucked, I ate like shit, and I felt like shit. Once I got to the end of the game, I packed up my XBox and put it in a box box. The next semester I sold it to get money to buy climbing gear.
Now I just do the Wordle.
At least you chose a fantastic game to go out on. RDR2 is like one of the most amazing games ever produced! I still go back to it when I run out of stuff to play despite beating the ever living hell out of it.
Thanks for sharing your story. It’s interesting to hear about the feelings you had and the choices you made. Hope the climbing has been a blast!
A friend tried to get me into Half-Life multiple times and I just cannot get into it.
It’s a fast-paced FPS game, which means I’m likely to get dizzy after some time but something about the ambience makes it worse than usual. I can play Skyrim for up to 1.5 hours at a time, Minecraft or Fortnite for 45-60 minutes, but I’d be lucky to play 20 minutes of Half-Life without my head pounding.
Plus, it’s a linear, story-based game, and I’m more into games based more on mechanics and progression (like Pokémon, Factorio, Cities Skylines, Civ, Balatro, and incremental games) than story. And at least for as long as I’ve tried to play it, there isn’t even much of a story.
Have you tried Portal? I ask because it’s half life but worse, for you, it sounds like.
You might like Dyson Sphere Program, and Vintage Story, given the list you named. They’re both early access and cheap.
I’ve never tried Portal but I know what it is. I’d imagine this would f*ck with my head even more than Half-Life.
Funny enough, DSP is on my “purchased backlog”, games I decided to buy on sale on a whim but never got around to actually playing.
Never heard of Vintage Story before.
Souls games.
I really want to like them too, but they seemingly aren’t compatible with how I play games. I need to be able to put a game down for a couple of weeks and not feel like I’m back at square one because the specific muscle memory for that game has gone.
Just kinda kills the fun when the game is effectively telling me to get good, when I don’t actually have the amount of free time IRL necessary to do that.
Soulslikes are fucking boring. I did that beat my head against the too-hard boss fight 289348923x when I was a kid because that was the only option and I had all the time in the world. Neither of those is still true.
Same for me!
Try Jedi Fallen Order. It’s got a lot of the ingredients, but a lot shallower learning curve.
I feel similar. After having tons of people tell me for years I need to get into them, I finally played Bloodborne, which multiple people have told me is their favorite.
I pushed through it on my own first. I actually didn’t die quite as much as I expected, though I definitely had to spend time watching YouTube videos and reading 3 different fan-made wiki’s to figure everything out. I managed to finish it, but I didn’t think it was worth it and would not have finished it if not for wanting to be able to talk about it with my friends.
Then I did another playthrough with a friend doing co-op. When it worked (ugh) it was a way better experience. Partly because of my previous experience - I had a better feel for how to build my character, I remembered most of the environments and enemy placement, and still had that muscle memory from my first run. Partly because it’s better as a cooperative experience. Having an ally makes the world feel less desolate. Having another player to take aggro so you can heal is huge- some bosses almost feel like they were designed for multiplayer. And it’s fun just cracking jokes and hanging out, making fun of how ridiculous some of the stuff is.
I still don’t have the love for it that other people do though. I agree 100% on the aesthetic: everything in Bloodborne is just dark and wet and looks the same. FromSoft makes a LOT of game design decisions that are different from most other developers in terms of what they prioritize. Which is fine, but there are aspects of design where they clearly cut corners and the fanbae seems to laud it as a desirable artistic choice. I shouldn’t need to spend hours watching YouTube and researching fan sites to learn how to play the game, and I would argue I shouldn’t have to do that to appreciate the story. They simply do not respect my time.
The multiplayer barely works. It’s restricted to bosses and the areas leading up to them, and costs Insight (a valuable and kind-of finite resource) to use. Simply connecting is a tedious pain. You can only play either completely online or offline, so if you want to play with a friend you have to accept your whole world cluttered with annoying and distracting messages from random players and the specters where other players died. And that also opens you up to having hostile players gank you. Like… Why can’t my friend and I just pair up and play through the whole game together without inviting the rest of the internet too? Why does it cost Insight? Why are the caps for stats never communicated to the player? Why does the Hunter’s Axe do primarily Blunt damage while the KirkHAMMER does almost no Blunt damage, and for that matter why aren’t the damage types explained anywhere? I’m still not sure why some gems increase Attack, others increase Physical Attack, and others increase Blunt or Thrust, plus there are hidden damage types.
The game feels like it was designed to really get good on your second playthrough and beyond. Especially NG+, although even starting a fresh file again is much better than the first playthrough. Kinda reminds me of how some MMO fans like to say “it gets good after the first 100 hours”. For most developers, the player onboarding experience is one of the most important parts to be developed, but FromSoft basically skills over that and outsources it to their community of hardcore fans.
The only real way to play full co op is using the Seemless Co-op Mod. Also disables other players jumping in to kill you. You would have to play on PC though.
for me it feels like they don’t respect me as an adult. i need to be able to pause and save games. sometimes i get phone calls. sometimes the power goes out. sometimes i spill my drink. but no, it’s all just “get gud”.
also i just can’t handle the aesthetics .
Could you talk a little more about the aesthetics thing? I have no intention to pick a fight with you or tell you that your opinion is wrong, I’m just curious because I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say that about them before
Also yes the no pausing thing is very frustrating
everything is dark and gray and meaty and slimy and gory and bloody and disgusting and sad and lonely and unpersonal and depressing and hopeless and evil and hateful and murderous and dead and off and…
even screenshots fucking wreck my mental health.
Try “Death Door”. It is as hard but fun to play.
bro the difficulty is yet another reason why i don’t want to get into it. you really think i’m in a mental state to be beaten to a bloody pulp after a rant like that? i gave up on tunic because the combat was too hard.
it is my firm belief that soulslikes have ruined metroidvanias because they now apparently all need to beat you to death for attempting to enjoy them.
There are some stunningly beautiful scenes too though. I get what you mean regardless, its a grimdark setting for sure.
yeah just me just wade through this ocean of death so i can see a dying sun set over a dead world.
things may be beautiful in isolation but the context is what gives them meaning, and the meaning in most fromsoft worlds (and things inspired by them) is “look at how awful everything is here; it’s your fault if it doesn’t get better”.
“haunting” is a better word than “stunning” there.It’s okay if grimdark doesn’t appeal to you. I like stories about people doing the right thing in a hostile setting,
that was my point yes
I disagree with you completely on this but I really enjoy your point of view here
i’m glad.
The intended meaning of most of from soft games is perseverance in spite of objective futility and the failure of society.
The world has died, society has failed, the powerful both good and bad have failed. No one, no matter their intentions can change the world for everyone around them let alone themselves by themselves. The good can not make the world better and the bad can not make it worse.
To inact change requires people to sacrifice and push forward. Even if it means their doom, even if it’s pointless. For no good ever comes from half measures, from hiding away, or from denying that which is around them because it is unpleasant.
For only with perseverance and the lasting memory and hope of change being taken up be each successor can true change be made.
And even still, to fight to hold that change still, and deny the next generation their right to enact change is just as futile and harmful as not trying at all.
This not including the additional horrors and commentary from their armored core games or spin offs such as Bloodborne. Even those series still have this under lying messaging.
While you arnt wrong on the aesthetics and what they give off on a surface level. You clearly lack the context of the world and story of the main souls games beyond only what is on the cover. You are very much in the wrong and deeply at that, over what the meaning of the worlds of from soft games.
Haunting IS a better word to describe it then stunning tho.
For as “nuanced” as people like to claim the from soft games are. They are very very blunt with their messaging, even if the stories they tell are terribly convoluted.
You clearly lack the context of the world and story of the main souls games beyond only what is on the cover.
…yes? i don’t know how much more clearly i can spell out that what’s on the cover is preventing me from playing the games.
You are very much in the wrong and deeply at that, over what the meaning of the worlds of from soft games.
until this sentence i was completely certain that you were agreeing with me
Omg I feel seen. Yeah I might not be fully unappreciative of the aesthetic, but shit can be dark and grim in real life as it is and it feels edgy and emo to go all gore gothic all the time. Every videogame trailer that starts with “shit’s horrible around here” is an instant “next”. Also I’ve always had a problem with eternal unliveable dungeons that make no architectural sense. Even though it is fantasy, it makes it far more childish, which matters if they’re trying to take themselves seriously.
Is it particularly more your fault that things don’t better in Souls games than in any other game in which you are meant to save the world? I think the only difference is that in the Souls ones and others like them, the world is already horrible and needs repaired in some way rather than on the verge of becoming horrible
Interestingly Elden Ring went for quite a different direction. The world is, unquestionably, still an enormous mess that would be horrendous to live in, but they’ve left in far more of the beauty. I particularly like how every so often you hear hostile NPCs playing music or singing if they haven’t spotted you yet, and how there’s a little puzzle side quest about a painter; people are still making art in this ongoing apocalypse. One important allied NPC even actually openly makes an argument that the world is worth preserving if it looks like you’re going for the “destroy everything” ending
Of course the atmosphere and gameplay are still heavy going, both in the Souls trilogy and Elden Ring. I get why that wouldn’t be for everyone. It’s like playable Cormac McCarthy stories, except you can punch your way out of most of the misery if you get it right
idk i can barely look at the games without feeling awful, im just going off of the opinion of others
Yeah. Heard so much about Elden Ring, and watched the kids play it, so I thought I’d give it a shot.
After about 45 minutes of wandering aimlessly and nearly as many deaths, I decided I wasn’t having a good time.
I finally had the Get Good moment where everything clicks recently, its very real. Now im on Nightreign like its crack.
Level your Vigor, people. Farm that little village with the soldiers and get a few levels into your health bar. And boom! Now you don’t die bc you missed a dodge. There’s good starting gear there too.
Once you “get it”, suddenly Elden Ring becomes like the coolest DnD game ever from an old-school perspective. Honestly, its not much different from Zelda - if you can play that, you can play Elden Ring i think.
The beauty of Elden ring is that you can explore without actually killing much. Eventually you’ll find some cool weapons or smithing stones to upgrade your current weapon and some runes to get a couple of levels (putting points on vigor helps a lot early on)
And then the game starts feeling less rough.
But I can definitely understand why it’s not for everyone.
That has been my experience with it too. It’s probably more fun with good gear, but i just see hours on the couch in my future that I don’t want to spend.
The gear would not have saved you. The game gets substantially more difficult as you progress, even accounting for your character getting stronger, and if you don’t do a decent job of levelling up appropriate skills that will compound the issue. The starter gear for most of the classes is actually perfectly viable all the way to the end of the game for most players too, it’s not notably weak at all
I love Elden Ring, but I can absolutely respect why it wouldn’t be for everyone. No sense in playing it if you’re not enjoying it, the point is still to have a good and/or interesting time
Is Satisfactory a franchise? I just don’t get it; it’s a worse Factorio. It’s poorly paced and it doesn’t have the tools you need to build big, like priority splitters.
It does actually have priority splitters and mergers
Oh, cool, they added that a few months ago; it only took them over 5 years to add it. I still don’t get why everybody likes it, it punishes you for building big and it has the slowest opening of all factory games I’ve ever played. I’d like to say I’d give it another try, but it runs like dog ass now, so I can’t play it anymore.
The game only officially released last year, everything before was Early Access, so yes it did release with the game.
I don’t think you’re wrong for disliking it, but you’re oddly hostile to it. Just say it’s not for you. Everyone else in this thread is mostly just saying how they disliked game A or game B. You don’t have to like every game. You don’t need to understand why others don’t enjoy it, you just don’t, and that’s okay.
I personally like it’s pacing, how it adds functionality, and how it takes over over time. I personally dislike Factorio - I find it tedious and repetitive. Tried it a few times, just can’t get into it. But hey, that’s okay, and so is not liking Satisfactory. We don’t need to shit on each other because we have different opinions.
I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, that was not my intention, but I can’t interpret your message any other way, as all I did was say “I don’t like this popular thing”.
Also, no, look at the wiki. The priority splitters came out after 1.0.
Priority mergers came out at 1.1, splitters were around Update 5 or early access
Name any sports title ( NHL, NFL, NBA, MBA, etcetera )that isn’t a zany, over the top SuperTuxKart or Cartoon Network Racing style kart racer and I’m out.
Same goes for any PVP shooter games such as Call of Duty, TF2 Counter Strike, etcetera. Anymore I really find no interest in them because I don’t feel like breaking things over some 6 month old who can squad wipe me, all while getting their diaper changed and slinging slurs my way.
Tried Minecraft multiple times. Can’t stand the game. Weird part is that I absolutely love both Terraria and Vintage Story.
I found a huge surface vein of olivine in a peridotite cliff face earlier while searching for bauxite, only to realize that I was about 50 blocks to the east of the Resonance Archives entrance, which my world put in a damn near inaccessible valley between K2 and Everest.
If I can find some bauxite I have a ton of iron to make some steel and between that and my huge harvest of flax and honey, I will have honey sulfur poltices, and the eidolon should be a cakewalk.
Same with me. Can’t get into Pokémon. Love the show though. Same with zelda…super boring.
RE and Silent Hill and Fatal Frame and Alien Isolation. I just can’t get over the horror aspect.
Pokemon. I was in highschool when it came out and had no time for it followed by being too poor and busy trying to survive directly after it. With no nostalgia for it, there seems to be no reason to try it. I gave pokemon go like 20 minutes and I was over it (though I did play dragonquest walk for around a year)
Yea the gameplay is just far too repetative for my liking lol but i get some people are into that
Outer Worlds. The premise was so great. A criticism of restrictive hyper capitalism in space? With an art Nouveau flair? Made by people who made Fallout? Sounded right up my alley!
But it just sucks! The intro is trying to be like Rick and Morty, you don’t personally have to deal with any restriction from the capitalistic society (hell at least BioShock threw in pay toilets once in a while) and the story just didn’t get me at all. You’re just kind of there. You don’t feel like you’re rebelling against the system or indulging it, you just are an observer. You don’t feel like an oppressed worker you feel more like a documentary crew. But even then it doesn’t really feel like the situation is really bad. And there isn’t really any tutorial to speak of. Sure, if you have played games a lot you know pretty much how everything works, but the mechanics are just dumped in your lap.
I’m just some schmuck on the Internet and I could’ve written a way better start to this game that lets you actually feel something.
When a fan made rap video makes you feel more of the alleged theme than the actual game does, then you’ve kinda screwed up.
