All I know is I don't want LotF to fail. I like it enough that I want to see them continue to patch it and eventually come out with a DLC and new ending.
They released big ass content roadmap. So content will keep pileing up for sure. I hope they will work on enemy variety and make them difficult, not just reusing them and multiplying them by 3
After noticing several similarities to DS1, I tried the old "exit the game during a boss fight" method and wouldn't you know it, when I came back, I'm standing right outside the boss room wall, lol. Awesome!
Despite it's many flaws, I adore Lords of the Fallen. Makes me wonder what story elements I am missing from the original that'd give me additional context to what's going on in the setting. What really sparks this curiousity is with Judge Cleric, my favorite boss in the game so far. Her first phase had me fighting this warrior priestess in her prime and it makes me wonder just what led to such a hard fall from grace. By most accounts, the Hallowed Sentinels and Judge Cleric were noble... Though madness crept into them long before their corruption. Years upon years of watching over a dreadful enemy that could resurface at any time and lay waste to the world would not doubt take their toll even on an immortal. The best bosses of any action RPG are the ones that give me the Tears of Awe: so beautiful in the emotion and spectacle of the fight that each rematch brings tears to my eyes and a smile on my face. The only other bosses to do that are the Successors of Code Vein and Lu Bu in Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty. Makes me wish every soulslike/action RPG had a boss rematch mechanic: I could fight first phase Judge Cleric all day. I don't ask for perfect games. Maybe this is just me coming from Skyrim and Fallout, kept alive solely by their wonderful modding communities, but I don't keep my standards too high: if it can pull me into the setting, I'm satisfied.
I like your point of view! I stoped playing lotf in NG+ the moment I failed against cleric the hmm 40th time because Ive had terrible graphical bugs on her first fase (she looked like a texture flickering fan) + problems with the camera locking system and some of her mechanics had some absolute terrible hitbox on my runs. I gues if everything of those mentioned things gets fixed/changed somehow I might replay this again to finally beat her on ng+
@@XandersFlavor I've never encountered those bugs, though I haven't even finished the game with any of my characters yet either. I'm willing to bet those issues are very likely patched now, though I can't say anything to help with camera troubles. My advice is to always be on the move, especially when she does either of her ultimates: though be careful just sprinting for it or may get caught in follow up attacks. Phase two is especially tricky, as she gains her flying spear charge attack: though the Infernal spikes don't have as big of a radius as the heat distortion may have you believe.
@@Cosmic-Sorceress-17 Ive had more problems with fase one were she has already empowered herself and then after attacking multiple times steping forward with a stab + burst.. and this burst has the worst hitbox in the entire game. you can def dodge it but not like me xD You should complete your game once and try out ng+ now it has tp points again. All bosses (except cleric) feel so much better in ng+ this really spices things up. this was my personal favorite if seen so far. "LOTF BOSS FIGHT - Rapturous Huntress of the Dusk [NG+ 1]" Same camera issues like me in this video.. want to relock it and it snaps in some random direction... this triggers a lot if you fight a boss like her and she keeps on jumping away making you lose the lock on her... am glad I managed to clear the huntress of dusk on ng+ atleast xD
@@XandersFlavor Will do: almost finished as both my Holy and Inferno characters, anyway. Rapturous Huntresses are always a tough fight for me: they have a lot of scary moves and can easily close distance and strike from range when I try to cast. May try and get more practice in at the Empyrean.
We are approaching the point where there needs to be a difficulty for newbies and one for veterans in these games. I want that feeling of an insurmountable challenge, but the barrier to entry is getting ridiculous for new players. Lies of P for mamy veterans felt very reasonable, but for new players it was insane.
I really liked the bosses in LOTF. Just because they did a mix of lore/skill bosses just as you get in DS2. You don't always need a forehead-to-the-wall extremely hard boss every single time. There is a beauty to story telling, boss design, and overall fun to games that is missing and not appreciated by so many newcomers to the genre.
Well, most of the bosses in ds2 are poor or mediocre, so that isn't helping this game's case. You're correct that bosses don't always have to be super hard, but it also seems like your standards are pretty low.
@@loubloom1941hahaha this is why things will never get better. Just pre order your game and hop online to say whatever dumb jumbled thoughts that you're thinking at the moment
It has nothing to do with standards, they made a completely valid point. People also fail to realize that FS has done this repeatedly with boss design and does gimmick bosses and silly mechanics all the time. The original demons souls had some very, very simple boss design. But everyone gives them a pass because it’s FS and everything they touch is gold. I would argue that while lords is easy I’m the realm of bosses by comparison I think the story element is there like they said, and I think it’s also meant to be played more than once. Once you get into NG+1, or 2 etc I think you will see some difficult times. Same mechanics, but much harder. I don’t want to face Elianne on any NG+, and several other bosses.
On the contrary. Your standards are being the low one here, and your arrogance is embarrassing. DS2 bosses are mostly fantastic. They all have unique mechanics and quirks like: Flexile Sentry having 2 different sides and therefore movesets, Pursuer can be defeated with ballistas or fought normally. It also has a hidden "second phase" if you get stabbed by his cursed blade, his moveset changes. Even the very first boss, The Last Giant is very interesting with its lore implications, it being angered of seeing you, as it met you in the past before, falling at your hands. Executioner's Chariot is also very interesting, it requires you to quickly explore and judge your surroundings, find cover and find a way to defeat it, it is not sraightforward. Do I need to go on? Because I can. These bosses offer different challenges, unique spectacles, and more often than not, they reward you for formulating different strategies, and thinking on your feet quickly to figure out a way to overcome them. But for people with extremely low standards like yourself, you only need bosses that require ONE STRATEGY, and are ENTIRELY ONE NOTE: press the roll button at the right time, NO USAGE OF ACTIVE BRAINPOWER NECESSARY. You want bosses that require absolutely ZERO strategy other than avoiding attacks with the circle button. YOU are the one with EXTREMELY low standards for bosses. You must have never in your life played any other video games with bosses than Dark Souls 3, Bloodborne and Elden Ring, because sure as hell you have no clue about interesting boss design.@@loubloom1941
I still haven’t bought the game, I’ll give it a year before I do. Since the first gameplay showcase I knew the game would have plenty of issues and I guess I was right… Hopefully Lies of P or Elden Ring DLC are not too far away.
Literally the updates went to better to worst. I finally couldn’t deal with it and uninstalled. The silly decision to change an upgrade path of the boss weapons was the final straw. The lock on still sucking after so many other updates is inexcusable. Picking up your vigor is a troll. The soul flay and vacuum for parasites is way too slow.
Hi Ziostorm. I'm one of Manni's subs. This game looks great. I played Raid for quite a while and got mega bored with it. This game looks a lot more exciting. Thanks for the game intro.
Not worth it for the constant gank across the level. You cleared the level once and that's it. Next you are going to run through everything. The enemies are so bland to even engage with.
@@glowie5811i dont have the stuttering issue even tho I'm playing on not optimal 3060ti, but more hours you play the more your fps drops. You need to constantly reload your game after 2 hours of playing😢
You make a fantastic comparison between this game and DS1 that I think is a huge part of the divisive reception of the game. Players coming strictly from ER that may not have played Ds (1,2, or 3) could feel let down that there is no Malenia tier difficulty to overcome. I actually really enjoyed the environment and direction of this game. It wasn’t particularly difficult, but it definitely wasn’t easy and it certainly didn’t hold my hand. I felt like I was immersed into a world where I needed every tool on my belt to survive and needed to actually search for where to go next. I loved it, for me it’s a masterpiece that I will absolutely be playing again
This game compares to DS2 which is usually viewed negatively by many Souls fans. DS2 was a game tying to replicate the DS1 formula but be different. Instead of trying to remain like a souls game I would have liked more care with Umbrel and the lamp.
This is disingenuous. We didn’t expect the game to have Malenia tier fights. But something comparable to Margit would have been perfectly fine. The bosses in LoTF are extremely janky.
You're right, I definitely noticed this with many people who came straight from Elden Ring. LOTF is much more comparable to ds1 and 2 imo. The interconnected environments, enemy mobs, the difficult areas, that feeling of just trying to survive, and I even tried the "exit the boss fight" method to see where I would appear after coming back and, of course, I was right outside the boss room wall, lol. I loved LOTF and I'm still playing it in ng+. I'm interested to see how ng+ 3 feels without the vestiges and with more enemy mobs. Let's go!
@@ELDENLORD89bruhhhh Mate, Margit is what Fromsoft has come to after developing these types of games for 10 years. What are you smoking. The animation, the combat design, the voice acting, the voice directing, the sound design... Fromsoft has a company has largely gotten better and better at that, and Margit is one of the more complex fights when looking at souls bosses overall.
Good thing I'm not good at Souls games "like that", and I found all the bosses super difficult, so it became a lil overwhelming that the progression of each area in the game could be so oppressive with the sheer amount of enemy density (made worse if you're sent to Umbral). Overall, the beautiful level design and art direction made the stress easier to overcome. I loooved the enemy designs.
@@tomasdelcampo2 tbh I don't even know what "balanced" vs "unabalanced" looks like because I'm ass at any Soulslike, but I have fun struggle bus anyway lmao
Bruh the bloodborne style dodging made the game super easy for me after I figured my build😂 I just first tried half of the bosses in the game and other half never took me more than 3 tries😢
I am a big fan of humanoid bosses that you can actually fence with and parry their attacks, it is super satisfying when you parry each hit of a 4-5 hit combo. One thing that I could do without were parts of the boss fights where you were waiting for the boss to do their thing without much to do: Lightreaper dragonrides and hushed saint dicking around on his horse come to mind. Even if you use that time to heal up or buff your weapon, they are way too long and break the pace of the fight.
I genuinely hope more souls like games go for more spectacle and fun bosses instead of brickwall difficult bosses. I love difficult fights but the things that I love the most about the souls genre has always and will always be the lore and atmosphere, not the fights. I liked Gwyn's fight, for example, despite being one of the easiest, because he was supposed to be easy. That was the lore, that was the reason for the depressing music. I liked the Adyr fight because it was about the lore, having him talk to us, explain his pov, and then being possibly proven right when Orius kills everyone. A custom boss that wasn't a mob fight would have been neat but it genuinely wasn't a dealbreaker for me, I loved the setting and the lore we got. It's genuinely getting boring that souls is known for difficulty now instead of lore and setting, it really is. I want bosses and music and characters and settings that make me give a shit about it, not min max a build and go "okay, what moves will deplete 75% of my max level hp in one hit" or "time to wait out another 20 hit combo because that's the norm now". Lords of the Fallen isn't perfect and I doubt it ever will be, but I will happily slot it as one of my favorite games ever because it gave me reasons to actually enjoy the setting and the atmosphere. I liked that the bosses weren't impossible, I liked that they were built for spectacle and atmosphere, I liked that I can blend whatever I wanted into the game, which was carrying a giant ass sword while playing around with actually good magic while having the ability to dodge properly or parry my way through.
How are the bosses in Elden Ring not interesting charachters with interesting lore ? You can have difficulty, lore and atmosphere at the same time. Also it's more about the depth of the boss than the difficulty, if there isn't any depth to the bosses it can kill replayability
I hope not. Also, why am I not surprised that you complain about "a 20 hit combo." In ER you don't even have to wait out combos in their entirety. The correct dodge or correct positioning will work as well.
@@loubloom1941 because they're fucking boring, I never said it wasn't doable. Elden Rings 20 hit combos you just have to wait out or run around, there's no reaction to anything else you do. Since we're on elden ring now, for some reason, fine I'll talk about it: a boss that has no reaction to the player until their magical poise bar is broken is boring, and long combos, while doable, is just there to fill in the gap that should have been reaction. Outside of npc bosses, normal enemies turned into bosses and Malenia, who already has shit poise to begin with, most every boss just takes a hit and keeps going until their invisible bar is broken and you can go in for a critical. This is a feature that persists outside of Elden Ring, but you decided to bring this specific one up. Now I'm going to compare it to another game: Sekiro, which Lies of P, for example, draws a lot of combat inspiration from. Only the absolute largest and most unique enemies in Sekiro chug through your attacks and moves, every fight feels like they react to you as a character and a player instead of taking hits and then cooling down while you punish. You can dodge or counter them, or you can force them on the defensive by being aggressive. Lords of the Fallen isn't a perfect game but I love it because it gives you tools to take advantage of enemy regardless of what build you run and throws you in this weighty world that feels like it reacts to your hits. Again, not perfectly, but that's what I feel. Whether it's against an Enchantress, a Rector sword dude, a normal mob, a higher tier mob, or more humanoid bosses, I felt like there was a clear reaction, to me at least, when they got hit and when they were gonna react. Only the truly giant ones felt like they didn't, but at least their combos didn't drag on. The bosses weren't overtly difficult but it felt like their presence was felt more in how they moved and what they did. "But Elden Ring did that!" To an extent, yes. However they had no reaction to what you did beyond the bare minimum. Elden ring bosses stagger *eventually* . Their invisible poise bars drain *eventually* . Until then, you're dealing with a nonstop attacking entity that only pauses after a long combo is forcefully gone through or you get good enough with a parry shield to tank it and go for that parry. There was no reason at all for them to react to you beyond the bare basics, unless you spec into jump attacks, master parrying or learn how to run behind them and spam r1 or r2, you get no real fight. I would have liked a Lords of the Fallen/Sekiro parry style put into elden ring to actually force the enemies to react to you, but there isn't one. You just have to run in circles and wait for the combo to end if you can't get behind them. You have no presence in that game, at all, not unless you're fighting a basic mob or a somewhat high tier mob that was turned into a mini boss. Lightreaper felt like it gave me more reaction to what I did than Morgott. The only bosses I can think of that had good reactions to the player was Malenia, since she can do random parries and jumps away, and the respec lady fight since she's a mage who runs away at every opportunity.
@@ni9274 "it's genuinely boring that souls is known for difficulty now instead of lore and setting". I never said souls games didn't have it, I said that's all they're known for, and everyone that tries to mimic the games or fall into the souls genre is increasingly focusing more on "difficulty" over depth and interest. Lies of P for example. A wonderful game with extremely fun combat and wonderful bosses, yet the world was boring af. I genuinely couldn't find it in me to care about the setting at all, ever. The bosses and npcs? Sure. The setting? Nah.
@@Pie_Smackersounds like a you problem, cus I felt the exact same about lords of the fallen, couldn’t give a SHIT about the lore, god did I not care, I tried, I platinumed the game for Christ sakes, and I still hate the game, yes, I played through because I spent $70 on the piece of broken easy ugly trash. Lies of P actually left me with a full belly and still wanted seconds. Lords of the fallen my god I couldn’t wait for the credits to roll so I could put it on OfferUp up and get as much of my money back as possible.
I'm playing this with my brother so every boss we do is co-op and it kind of shows that the game was not balanced with this in mind. We'll often beat a boss first try. As far as boss design I think theming will be a bigger part of bosses. Fast bosses should be fast and nimble, tanky bosses will be tanky, magic bosses will tricky and flashy. I think the lore bosses are a good example of what a boss should be. Not every boss should be able to counter every style of play but should instead be made with showing what that boss is about. So yes a fast player should run rings around a slow boss but a tanky player should face tank a quick but weak boss. These can also help sell the fantasy of what the player is trying to be. A quick ninja that out skills the brute or the brute that gets hit looks at the boss and says I pity the fool. (slight exaggeration in these examples but just trying to sell what the experience should feel like)
I found the game extremely enjoyable and fun. My only complaints are with the Hollowed Crow and Adyr fights. Both bosses have stunning design that is underutilized and would've been amazing for an actual boss fight. Due to lore implications I understand the design choices and they are very fitting but they're not enjoyable. As for difficulty, I found the game to be more challenging than DS titles, excluding Nameless King. The game becomes much easier once you start parrying. The parry system in LotF definitely seems much more generous or easier than in the souls titles. Onw thing is for certain, the devs are putting a lot of work into the game and deeply care about it.
I honestly hope this "arms race" continues until it reaches levels only a few can overcome. Maybe even none. Imagine a boss that is just outside of human capability... the community would flip it's lid! (Shouldn't be mandatory to beat the game though)
I didn't mind it. It's main boss only for one ending out of three and it is set right after the king. Not like you are having whole set-up location just for him. Tbh Radiance ending is akin to Shura ending in Sekiro, other ending have just way more into it
I thought this game has some of the best bosses in soulslikes. Pieta, hushed saint, lightreaper, spurned progeny, dervla, sundered monarch, elianne, tancred, judge cleric, and the iron wayfarer.
Bosses were such a hit or miss in this game. The main bosses like the Pieta, Dervla, Hushed Saint, Lightreaper, Tancred and Judge Cleric were amazing and memorable for all the good reasons, meanwhile many others were just "meh", and some others like The Iron Wayfarer were among the most egregious examples of bad game design I've ever seen. Like seriously I'm still so livid about how garbage that boss fight was because that's supposed to be a cool callback to their first game. Lords of the Fallen had tons of potential, and still has in my opinion, it has excellent level design, build options, unique game mechanics, cool story and characters, but it all feels so wasted because even with all the updates and patches, it's clear that the game needed to be refined and some aspects of it needed to be modernized, and it's still way, way too much rough around the edges. There are no perfect games, even Elden Ring has a lot of problems despite being arguably the peak in this genre, but I think videogame devs need to understand that in order to make the best possible product you have to work like you WANT and CAN achieve perfection. Look at Elden Ring DLC, I ain't mad at them taking 2 years to make it because I just know that whenever we get it, it will be the most unforgettable experience in videogame history. So I really hope that the devs learn from this experience and consider their mistakes with this title for their next IP, or even an ipothetic sequel, and work with this objective in mind, to reach as close as they can to perfection BEFORE releasing the game. Patches should not be included in the game develoment process, they are a form of customer support. A good game shouldn't really need many patches tbh. I really appreciate how receptive they were to criticism and how fast are they working to fix the issues, it gives me hope. It's definitely a step in the right direction, for sure. Let's hope this is a turning point for videogames development.
Hard agree with this. It's also worth notice that some Masterpieces from other genres stubble in some areas but don't detract much, which it isn't the case for this gsme. I disagree with the notion that great game don't need patches when even DS3 received 14 of them, and Bloodborne also received a couple, but it's true that some design choices aren't fixed just by patching things up (AC Unity is a perfect example of this).
lmao wayfarer fight pisses me off so much every time it's just a cum simulator with a bunch of unnecessary staggers especially when he locks me in the corner and starts blasting that jizz i feel raped hello it's lotf hotline? i was gangbanged by a single guy
@@johnhuddleston1986lol ah, yes, the super duper kid friendly themes of genocide, torture, dismemberment, and existentialism were surely much too bright and happy 🤡 Might wanna do another playthrough and/or get new eyes there champ 👍
Dark souls 3, to me, is the pinnacle even after elden ring. ER was good but very safe, whereas DS3 still feels like the culmination of several From games combined.
Honestly the main bosses were great, they had great ideas, variety and music etc... However Adyr was simply a giant disappointment, which is sad cuz the he could've had an amazing fight since his music, spectacle, setting and sense of finality was really there.
I really do agree that the bosses did feel a bit easy comparatively speaking. However the jump to ng+ is a significant jump and I had no idea they were gonna go from squishy to spongey in one ng+! I was like wait wtf?
In my opinion the bosses in the first PT were way too easy. I first tried almost all of them. NG+ did make up for it partially though. The later bosses are a lot more challenging in NG+ and especially the umbral ending boss is insane in NG+. Elianne is one of the most difficult (and coolest) bosses I have ever fought. Because of her massive healthbar in NG+, you really have to learn every move she does and because her attacks are telegraphed well, it was a lot of fun to learn.
dude I'm on tancred rn in NG+ and holy shit I've died like 15times or maybe more the ramping of difficulty went soooo much higher I love it. Cant wait to see if NG++ makes the earlier bosses even crazier haha
Lords of the fallen really really feels like a drag to get trough. It was fun on the beginning but the bosses just where so gimmicky and bad that i didnt really care about the story anymore. Some of the areas are also WAY to long I just run through it because there is no way i am beating 5 elite enemies at ones.
I am struggling to finish the late game area, the level of enemies and gank squads just makes it not fun, and the boss fights very often fall in to cheap artificial difficulty
The enemy repetition just makes the game tiring. You can say that the enemy ganks are worse in DS2 but at least it's not the same enemies over and over repeated throughout the game.
Edit: Yeah, I didn't get the irony 🤦♂️ "It almost seems like hexworks is lacking the decades of experience..." It's literally the studios first game 🤨
Yes, that was the point I was making in a humorous form, bud 🙂 What it means is: People need to cut Hexworks some slack and allow them some time to perfect things, too
as an experienced souls player I really only struggled with the Hushed Saint, and this was because my weapon and catalyst were only +2. I blame myself cause I could have left and upgraded more. Several of the bosses I cheesed with poison. the boss of the game I was waiting for another phase and wished they had made it a bit more challenging. Lies of P's Nameless Puppet fight was one of the most challenging bosses I've faced in a long time, so it is possible to challenge players like myself but I enjoyed Lords of the Fallen bosses overall, hopefully we'll get some actually challenging bosses through DLC.
broo what im saltiest about is the co op . I wish i could just leave my summon sign down for newer players but instead im put in a random que where i might get to help a level 20 one moment and then a level 200 the next. Really wish we could decide what bosses or portions of the game we co op in .
Bought it due to people praising it within the souls community, played it till the first boss and dropped it. Coming from Lies of Pi this was a flop I still don't know how people can recommend this at 70$
Man, you're entitled to your opinion and I respect that. I'm not sure why, but it feels like you're schilling a bit. I think you're view on a different perspective is fair, now that I consider it. That said, we can't accept Super Mario Bros 3 levels of gameplay because 'noobs'. Bottom line (imo), LOTF has some cool stuff and I'm looking forward to their next iteration. That said, I feel like some S Koreans (I know. I hate to keep beating that drum but.....) took a better first shot
Souls games may need difficulty settings. But I don’t want more health or damage for bosses. That can be apart of it but I think difficulty in souls should change how bosses move and maybe add add attacks. This means on first play through you can get a feel for the bosses but on second and third you can up the difficulty and see new moves and attacks that you were not prepared for. That does mean this puts a even heavier load on a studio where half the players are never going to see the content you made but it might just set a new souls like standard that we can all get behind
Now for me the problem are not the bosses but more the difference between the level and the bosses, you can fall casually in one big room against 2 Raiders, 1 Pyromancer, a fuck ton of dogs with a Skeleton warrior where you are lucky to run through without being hit because everyone knows how to 360 noscope in this game and then you end up against a boss you 3-5 try...(I died more like 30 times in that room) It just feels frustrating...Elden Ring also used bosses in early game as normal enemies later BUT at that point they feel like normal enemies here they still feel like mini bosses everytime I met them.
100% felt like the combat was the main reason for the divisiveness and easy bosses. It feels more hack and slash than souls like and I wish attacks required more commitment like in lies of p
This is a massive problem I have with souls games in general that Matti brought out, where the stage is filled too much with just annoying and difficult enemies that it’s just frustrating so you just run through it. Each game I’ve ever played had that area, it was Blighttown in DS1, Smouldering Lake in DS3, Mountaintops in Elden Ring, and The entire second half of the alchemist’s island in Lies Of P. Even on subsequent NG runs I just don’t bother as even once I’m leveled up, the area is just not fun to traverse.
As you pointed out many new things suffer from their predecessor. Plenty of great sequels at their that were "not as good" as the original because the original was new and exciting and this is "more of the same." I try to take things by their own merit and not compare to much. I just want to enjoy fun games, appreciate their deviations and bonk some bosses.
I did a lot of random coop low level. I got summoned for the Sundered Monarch very low level. On the other hand when I encountered him in my own game I was fairly high level. There was a stark difference in difficulty between fighting him low, or high level. I think it's possible the bosses were tuned to a certain level that many players are surpassing. That makes the bosses too easy. This is a problem with a lot of RPGs without time limits. I wouldn't want a time limit though. Some people are going to overlevel, and we just have to accept it.
I am mixed on the bosses in this game personally. When it comes to the Miniboss enemies, that are reused in levels, It does remind of DS1 having bosses like say the Capra Demon or Taurus Demon that become common enemies late game. But Lords of Fallen will sometimes have boss enemy introduced then immediately proceed to use them as enemies (Like Kinranger, the Crimson Rector or the Ruiner), now it's not the worst thing ever but it makes those bosses feel more forgettable cause they just seem like an enemy with a named hp bar (like Dark Souls 2 did sometimes, like the Royal Rat Vanguard). Going into NG+1 does increase their hp but ultimately it's still the same enemy, just lasts longer. Not all of them are bad (besides maybe the Flame Enchantress) but I would've liked a gimmick or some unique attacks to help them stick out. As for the main bosses, I did enjoy most of them, but when it comes to The Hallowed Crow and Adyr (Two bosses with incredible designs but incredibly mediocre fights, feels dissapointing), and thankfully the Umbral Ending has a more unique fight but it is just a harder variant of the tutorial boss. NG+1 does help make these guys feel more challenging, but the Sundered Monarch having almost a Monster Hunter boss hp bar is not fun, like who thought giving that boss like 50,000 HP was okay, especially if you run an inferno build 😅 Tl;dr I hope they make some of the bosses more challenging but in more meaningful ways and not just giving them more health.
I think that if we combined lies of p bosses and enemies with LOTF level design. We would get an incredible masterpiece. As a souls veteran. I liked aspects of both games and have nothing but confidence in the future of soul style games. What a great time to be alive.
Two things. Firs, i wanna say, that back in 2012, it took me about an hour or more to beat Ornstein and Smough, and 2 years later, i remember banging my head against the wall at the Ruin Sentinels, and Fume Knight etc. (those playthroughs were blind). By comparison in 2022, Malenia took about 15 minutes and it was the hardest boss to beat for me in the game. So i cannot judge Lords of the Fallen bosses,as 10 years ago self (or an newcomer), when i was starting the series, but NOW, these bosses definitely seemed too easy. Second, there is a definite change of approach in From Soft regarding levels/bosses. In Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2, the areas were considerably harder to just run past everything. Especially in DS2 they went the extra mile to make sure you actually PLAY the areas instead of running past them. The bosses were much simpler, but also the run backs to the bosses were much harder as well. In DS3, the areas seemed to be just "noise". Something unimportant, until you get to the boss (with a bonfire just outside most times). But the bosses were much more complicated. Elden Ring is sort of the same. Sure the areas are much better than DS3, but its still very easy to just ignore and run past everything, and still there is a bonfire right out the boss door. Lords of the Fallen is clearly taking the approach of the first games, which in itself, is not a bad thing. But the actual areas in these early Souls titles were FAR superior than Lords of the Fallen.
I think this video needed more discussion about how boss difficulty is affected by the tools available to the player. Player mechanics and resources have a huge influence on the difficulty especially since this game has made big improvements to ranged options.
It's pretty easy to tell where it's going. 1 shot moves that cover the entire arena, or attacks so fast you don't have time to react, imput reading, and insane amounts of health/health regen You saw this with Gale and Midir they were the precursor to eldenring, and guess what. Damn near every boss in elden ring take something from those 2.
And I think gale and Midir were the most overrated shit boss fights ever lol. So then leading into that was a bummer in elden ring. I LOVE input reading!
There are no one shot move that cover entire arena in Elden Ring, there are no attacks so fast you don't have time to react, there is no input reading (only animation reading, and this is present since DS1) and most bosses in ER don't have any health regen Gale and Midir are very fair.
@@GrimDim There is no input reading in Elden Ring and DS3, only animation reading, and how it's a problem that the boss can react differently depending on the action you take ? Since DS1 bosses had the capacity to animation read, Artorias can detect when you use an Estus and respond with an attack.
Godskin apostles wave hello, also the fat one starts rolling over everything with hitbox so big it is only dodge-able from a certain angle... oh you wanted to heal, too bad i read your input here is the fireball from the skinny one. Honestly Elden Ring is my favorite game i ever played, but after playing Lies of P i resent a bit that it does not have blocking mechanic always present and capable of perfect block like in Lies of P. If it is going towards that kind of bosses you need a mechanic to deal with it at any time with any build and not only specific builds.
@@DreamskyDance they patched the Godskins' heal punish; it no longer happens robotically often and it's slower, so you can dodge and punish back and it doesn't feel like they're reading your mind to tell that you've decided to heal.
I finally platinum it yesterday. I can definitely say it was an emotional ride. I like a few innovative mechanics they brought to the genre but there were alot of annoyingly frustrating parts throughout the game. But I will say the developer's have been listening to the community and making updates nonstop to the game. That should definitely be recognized in this day an age, when so many game's release in a bad state and stay that way. They definitely did so much better than 99% of other soul's-like game's. Lies of P releasing at the same time didn't do the game any favors either.
As a souls-vet, I stopped half way through on a level 70 and decided to make a corrupted toon and have maxed my level to 25 with weapon upgrades to 5. In that, I have had the best souls experience I’ve had since DS3. Some bosses and areas are bs, while others are a cake walk. If people weren’t so used to afk farms and being op early on (thanks to ER), then I feel like people could truly enjoy this game (graphical issues aside). It’s a souls exploration game that requires you to memorize locations and patterns more than any other game in its “genre”. Some old Souls bosses, even some new in ER were pretty bland and easy, but this game takes everything a step forward. It just should’ve gotten a bit more polish before release.
Stuck on Malekith on my third Elden Ring playthrough with dual spear frenzied flame character that rushed through the game, will try Lords of The Fallen afterwards, send help.. !! XD In seriousness...partly this is my comment on the difficulty arms race, Malekith is almost the other end of the spectrum especially for my build. Although i didnt tried LOTF yet, i have it installed and am amazed by the amounts of updates and fixes this game got, looking forward to playing it ( when i beat the other end of the spectrum of difficulty arms race ) and personally i think that it will suit me well some change of pace in a souls game and that ill like it.
I want a game where enemies also consider us as a boss. Sekiro is probably the closest but a game where say it takes 20 hits to kill a boss, it would also take 20 hits to kill us. Make it difficult to land hits maybe but I would love a game where you don't always need to be perfect at all times.
The only thing that matters is whether bosses are fun and if you leave the room wanting to fight them again because something in them was captivating to you. I think a game that handles this very well is Remnant (and the sequel), where bosses cycle through rather simple movesets while still maintaining that heightened sense of a deadly boss battle. The balance between adrenaline, spectacle and resource management has been rounded out nicely in those two games, with practically no bosses demanding multiple hours-long repeated attempts. The fact co-op is also nicely integrated and players can synergize with different builds is a massive plus as well.
I think once you figure out the trick, or have the right build then bosses are easy...in any souls/souls like game. So I just put more emphases on fashion and don't care about how strong my armor is and just have fun with it. I loved this game. I had issues with performance the first day, but never after. Such a good game.
I still have to say, the challenging exploration was my favorite part of this game. And I know most people are annoyed by the enemy density, and some of their worries are warranted, but I’m not sure how much you could reduce it without making the levels feel too sparse, which is a problem I had with Lies Of P. Where the levels felt pretty empty and mostly uninteresting as enemy encounters. I want more Souls-likes that capture that DS1 feeling of hatred towards the player in terms of its environment, like Blighttown and Sens Fortress. Which LOTF gave me a good bit of, and I’m thankful for that.
you can say lies of p had uninteresting enemy design but They have more enemy variety that they always introduce new enemies in every single location instead of making mini bosses turn into Generic mobs instead of try to introduce which is something that lies of p didn't even do,, so you can see that lies of p enemies & bosses are quality over quantity ahahaha i rather enjoying the level design that has very few mobs but still gives me good challenges & fair,, rather than dealing with spam mobs, spam range mobs & spam mini bosses that turn into generic enemies,, whats even worse they not even try introduce new enemies variety in new location i mean why mobs from the first area is literally in olmost every single area?? Again there's nothing fun dealing with spam mobs which is also why ds2 hated by many peeps
I can think of a couple solutions to the difficulty arms race. A simple one would be to add a difficulty setting to make the game more challenging (not an easy mode), but that’s probably not gonna fly since it clashes with the whole souls design philosophy. I think other devs should do something like what Hexworks did and make new game plus especially challenging for veterans while giving the option to do a regular new game 0.
If you want an easy run through just go ranged. +10 assassin bow is S scaling in AGIL, use the princess sting, 2 blank feather ranger rings, 2 +10 jefferys dagger socketing them with AELSTRIX runes and you can just nuke every enemy from a distance oh and if you want to make it even easier use the HARROWER DERVLA'S CROSSBOW at +10 and you can kill anything with one trigger pull but its an ammo hungry crossbow since each shot uses 3 ammo. With the crossbow every shot hits for roughly 1500 each hit and with a charged shot from the assassin bow ive hit nearly 4k
I enjoyed this video a good bit. Here’s my opinion, The problem with the “this is meant to mirror Souls 1” thing is that the devs specifically meant for it to be akin to a “Dark Souls 4” This means to me, on some level, we should be getting something that builds on Dark Souls 3 on some level. (Thematically, design wise) By all estimations, the only thing I can say in this game that even partially does that is the fact that it mishmashes mechanics in from every souls game. Thematically, and design wise, it feels like a step behind Dark Souls 1 or even Demons’ Souls. For example, things like having boss fights that are more thematic /cinematic than interactive is fine. But here’s my challenge how Lords of The Fallen *actually* executes it: Gwyn’s boss was fight was meant to portray a somber, pathetic atmosphere, which is did, and which why people love it to this day. You could say the same for DES’ final boss. These fights both had bosses directly before them that were sufficiently interactive and thematically significant in their own right. Lords of The Fallen’s final boss *tries* to portray spectacle, and instead we get something laughable and pathetic. You couple that with the flaccid boss fights shortly before it, and you’re left with a really underwhelming final segment of the game. I still think Lords of The Fallen is a good game all that being said, but in terms of it being a good Souls or Soulslike game? I would put it about on par with Demons’ Souls; but only because of certain modern mechanics being added to the combat. In terms of lore, attention to detail, and everything else that makes a good souls game, the dev team has some work ahead of them before I can say that Lords of the Fallen matches up to my expectations as far as that. It’s a solid step back in terms of everything that makes a souls game good outside of gameplay imo
For me, I was never really into Souls games. I played the very first DS back on PS3. That had me wanting to rip my hair out but that's because I had little patience back then haha. The only "souls-like" game(s) I have ever come to love was Remnant From the Ashes and Remnant 2 (if you consider them souls-like). For someone like me, I thoroughly enjoyed Lords of the Fallen. It felt like the perfect difficulty for someone who isn't a vet of DS games. But I understand how it can be disappointing to those who are. It would be cool if New Game + for LotF made things harder by making the bosses engage much more frequently along with higher health pools for those that seek the challenge. I was fortunate enough to not have any issues with the game on PS5 and I started my second play through on NG+1 to see if I can get better. The devs are looking at feedback constantly, I'm sure the community can persuade them to add some kind of challenge for the vets but also keeping the non-vets happy. :)
I think the primary thing that could be improved on is the bosses should simply have a bit more health. I had to nerf myself and not use a single spell (I played as an Umbral Death Knight with Umbral sorceries and Rosamund's Sword) on bosses because it would just melt them. I'm not even saying this to brag, but I don't think a single boss took me more than 5 tries and several of the rememberance bosses I beat first try. That's frustrating simply because I wanted the fights to go on longer. I was actually sitting there in the fight, watching the health bar of the boss diminish and I'd let myself die simply because the music, the moveset, the art direction were all just god-tier, but the fight itself was just too easy, and I think it's because the attacks are VERY telegraphed and give you a ton of reaction time. If I had to change the bosses I'd increase their health a bit, and then I'd make their attacks quicker/longer attack combos. If new players are struggling, they can summon a friend or an NPC to help with the fight, but I'd just like bosses I don't beat first try, or even in the first 2-3 tries. 7-15 tries is the butter zone I think for main bosses and none of these even got close for me.
Haven't played LotF. i think the big issue a lot have is it's too much like Dark Souls 2 Scholar otFS in general area design of having a lot of gank mobs in linear corridors with no place to maneuver
It's unreasonable to balance every encounter around every build, some situations might be more demanding depending on your build, that's the nature of RPGs. What really pushes Soulsborne to its heights is the complexity of the enemy's movement, patterns and reaction to the player; when you master all of that, you can low level most bosses and beat them with little trouble. The problem, in my opinion, is not only the quality of the individual bosses, is that many in LoTF either don't have the visual quality of a Fromsoft game, so they're not a great spectacle, nor they evolve the enemy's movesets to push you further like even DS1 did with Ooacile and some of the 2nd half. LoTF has a decent gimmick for the exploration aspect, yet didn't provide much for the combat and boss design. Again, even DS1 evolved it's enemies and boss design with Artorias, Manus and Kalameeth.
I got the regular ending in lotf, and I felt the bosses overall were perfectly fine. Especially the last one was disappointing, but in general they felt challenging but fair. Reminds me of DeS and DS1 moreso than of DS3 and ER.
I really tried to enjoy the bosses in this game, and in NG, you can even say that they're a passable experience (not even comparable to Lies of P or Remnant II's quality in my opinion, but passable) but NG+ simply rips all enjoyment of any of them away by basically just adding zeroes to every stat. After multiple playthroughs, I had weapons of every damage type and enough items to pretty easily switch between builds (I even mained an umbral build which made it pretty easy to switch between radiance and inferno for bosses) yet without fail, every single boss fight took so little damage from any of the weapons, even if they were weak to those damage types, yet standing there and pumping spells would deal 3-5x the dps even against resistant enemies, as if the game wanted you to basically be the Azur Comet build from Elden Ring just to clear a boss before you die of boredom. I've done NG+ DS3, Elden Ring, Code Vein and Remnant II on Apocalypse, which were all stellar experiences because the bosses actually kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time, but there are so few bosses in Lords that actually made me want to be there (which is what made me finally call it quits 3/4 the way through my last run). It's not even necessarily the difficulty, because if they wanted to make the bosses more difficult, they could have just put the NG+ bosses as the NG boss stats and added more zeroes to NG+. It's mainly that the bosses feel completely uninspired and the metaphorical "tango" between player and boss feels almost hollow. I think something that goes pretty unrecognized in a lot of these games is the creativity that goes into making bosses that you can love even if you aren't a fan of their move set or other aspects of the action-to-action experience of fighting them. It's a combination of artistic aesthetic, narrative themes, and design mechanics that produce the experience a person associates with the boss, not just its individual moves and stat points. I don't think the game needed to produce some Apoc Annihilation, Solo Bladebearer/Cannoneer or Malenia-tier challenge for me to be impressed, but just something that felt inspiring, unique, and impactful to the game's narrative and world.
Thanks Ziostorm for this great collab. Was a lot of fun working on this video together.
Also big thanks to your community for watching in. Greetings
Your insight was really helpful, great content man😊
Thank you, Sir! 😀@@a5hen
Hiiiii Manni (:(:(:
Yo! Manni, awesome to see you here
@@TheRealManni Hi Manni!
All I know is I don't want LotF to fail. I like it enough that I want to see them continue to patch it and eventually come out with a DLC and new ending.
They released big ass content roadmap. So content will keep pileing up for sure. I hope they will work on enemy variety and make them difficult, not just reusing them and multiplying them by 3
Loved the boss fights. Some of them could’ve been more difficult, but they were all enjoyable for me.
I've faced 4 and they kicked my ass 😂😂
@@nippy3126after the first 4-5 the rest were so incredibly easy as my character got more powerful, but the bosses seemed to not get that much stronger
@@tehCostHDonly hushed saint kicked my ass but others was mega easy
Man, try the bosses in NG+, that is where true pain resides.
After noticing several similarities to DS1, I tried the old "exit the game during a boss fight" method and wouldn't you know it, when I came back, I'm standing right outside the boss room wall, lol. Awesome!
Love the video, so awesome that you made a collab with Manni! we all in the WR community absolutely love him!
Despite it's many flaws, I adore Lords of the Fallen. Makes me wonder what story elements I am missing from the original that'd give me additional context to what's going on in the setting.
What really sparks this curiousity is with Judge Cleric, my favorite boss in the game so far. Her first phase had me fighting this warrior priestess in her prime and it makes me wonder just what led to such a hard fall from grace. By most accounts, the Hallowed Sentinels and Judge Cleric were noble... Though madness crept into them long before their corruption. Years upon years of watching over a dreadful enemy that could resurface at any time and lay waste to the world would not doubt take their toll even on an immortal.
The best bosses of any action RPG are the ones that give me the Tears of Awe: so beautiful in the emotion and spectacle of the fight that each rematch brings tears to my eyes and a smile on my face. The only other bosses to do that are the Successors of Code Vein and Lu Bu in Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty. Makes me wish every soulslike/action RPG had a boss rematch mechanic: I could fight first phase Judge Cleric all day.
I don't ask for perfect games. Maybe this is just me coming from Skyrim and Fallout, kept alive solely by their wonderful modding communities, but I don't keep my standards too high: if it can pull me into the setting, I'm satisfied.
I like your point of view!
I stoped playing lotf in NG+ the moment I failed against cleric the hmm 40th time because Ive had terrible graphical bugs on her first fase (she looked like a texture flickering fan) + problems with the camera locking system and some of her mechanics had some absolute terrible hitbox on my runs. I gues if everything of those mentioned things gets fixed/changed somehow I might replay this again to finally beat her on ng+
@@XandersFlavor I've never encountered those bugs, though I haven't even finished the game with any of my characters yet either. I'm willing to bet those issues are very likely patched now, though I can't say anything to help with camera troubles.
My advice is to always be on the move, especially when she does either of her ultimates: though be careful just sprinting for it or may get caught in follow up attacks. Phase two is especially tricky, as she gains her flying spear charge attack: though the Infernal spikes don't have as big of a radius as the heat distortion may have you believe.
@@Cosmic-Sorceress-17 Ive had more problems with fase one were she has already empowered herself and then after attacking multiple times steping forward with a stab + burst.. and this burst has the worst hitbox in the entire game. you can def dodge it but not like me xD
You should complete your game once and try out ng+ now it has tp points again.
All bosses (except cleric) feel so much better in ng+ this really spices things up.
this was my personal favorite if seen so far.
"LOTF BOSS FIGHT - Rapturous Huntress of the Dusk [NG+ 1]"
Same camera issues like me in this video.. want to relock it and it snaps in some random direction... this triggers a lot if you fight a boss like her and she keeps on jumping away making you lose the lock on her... am glad I managed to clear the huntress of dusk on ng+ atleast xD
@@XandersFlavor Will do: almost finished as both my Holy and Inferno characters, anyway.
Rapturous Huntresses are always a tough fight for me: they have a lot of scary moves and can easily close distance and strike from range when I try to cast. May try and get more practice in at the Empyrean.
Bruh I first tried Judge Cleic bich lmao😂 bosses are too easy in this game after you master your bloodborne type dodge😢
Manni gang: 👇
BOOM ;-D
We are approaching the point where there needs to be a difficulty for newbies and one for veterans in these games. I want that feeling of an insurmountable challenge, but the barrier to entry is getting ridiculous for new players. Lies of P for mamy veterans felt very reasonable, but for new players it was insane.
I really liked the bosses in LOTF. Just because they did a mix of lore/skill bosses just as you get in DS2. You don't always need a forehead-to-the-wall extremely hard boss every single time. There is a beauty to story telling, boss design, and overall fun to games that is missing and not appreciated by so many newcomers to the genre.
Well, most of the bosses in ds2 are poor or mediocre, so that isn't helping this game's case. You're correct that bosses don't always have to be super hard, but it also seems like your standards are pretty low.
@@loubloom1941hahaha this is why things will never get better. Just pre order your game and hop online to say whatever dumb jumbled thoughts that you're thinking at the moment
It has nothing to do with standards, they made a completely valid point. People also fail to realize that FS has done this repeatedly with boss design and does gimmick bosses and silly mechanics all the time. The original demons souls had some very, very simple boss design. But everyone gives them a pass because it’s FS and everything they touch is gold. I would argue that while lords is easy I’m the realm of bosses by comparison I think the story element is there like they said, and I think it’s also meant to be played more than once. Once you get into NG+1, or 2 etc I think you will see some difficult times. Same mechanics, but much harder. I don’t want to face Elianne on any NG+, and several other bosses.
On the contrary. Your standards are being the low one here, and your arrogance is embarrassing. DS2 bosses are mostly fantastic. They all have unique mechanics and quirks like: Flexile Sentry having 2 different sides and therefore movesets, Pursuer can be defeated with ballistas or fought normally. It also has a hidden "second phase" if you get stabbed by his cursed blade, his moveset changes. Even the very first boss, The Last Giant is very interesting with its lore implications, it being angered of seeing you, as it met you in the past before, falling at your hands. Executioner's Chariot is also very interesting, it requires you to quickly explore and judge your surroundings, find cover and find a way to defeat it, it is not sraightforward. Do I need to go on? Because I can. These bosses offer different challenges, unique spectacles, and more often than not, they reward you for formulating different strategies, and thinking on your feet quickly to figure out a way to overcome them.
But for people with extremely low standards like yourself, you only need bosses that require ONE STRATEGY, and are ENTIRELY ONE NOTE: press the roll button at the right time, NO USAGE OF ACTIVE BRAINPOWER NECESSARY. You want bosses that require absolutely ZERO strategy other than avoiding attacks with the circle button. YOU are the one with EXTREMELY low standards for bosses. You must have never in your life played any other video games with bosses than Dark Souls 3, Bloodborne and Elden Ring, because sure as hell you have no clue about interesting boss design.@@loubloom1941
@@loubloom1941 what would you say is a good standard then?
Interesting topic and well done video as always. Cool to bring in another guest for the video. Cheers from Germany
I still haven’t bought the game, I’ll give it a year before I do. Since the first gameplay showcase I knew the game would have plenty of issues and I guess I was right… Hopefully Lies of P or Elden Ring DLC are not too far away.
from mannis vid, glad i found you... amazing vidsss
Literally the updates went to better to worst. I finally couldn’t deal with it and uninstalled.
The silly decision to change an upgrade path of the boss weapons was the final straw.
The lock on still sucking after so many other updates is inexcusable.
Picking up your vigor is a troll. The soul flay and vacuum for parasites is way too slow.
Hi Ziostorm. I'm one of Manni's subs. This game looks great. I played Raid for quite a while and got mega bored with it. This game looks a lot more exciting. Thanks for the game intro.
Thanks for hoping over friend 🤙
I appreciate how every single boss didn't have a second phase.
Yea in lies of P every boss having a forgettable ost and second phase healthbar just got old
Lords of the fallen stole our 60 bucks
Not worth it for the constant gank across the level. You cleared the level once and that's it. Next you are going to run through everything. The enemies are so bland to even engage with.
@@martk647 completely agree
Most of the challenge in the boss fights are the massive frame rate drops.
Don't forget the stuttering
@@glowie5811 Ha, also terrible for sure.
@@glowie5811i dont have the stuttering issue even tho I'm playing on not optimal 3060ti, but more hours you play the more your fps drops. You need to constantly reload your game after 2 hours of playing😢
You make a fantastic comparison between this game and DS1 that I think is a huge part of the divisive reception of the game. Players coming strictly from ER that may not have played Ds (1,2, or 3) could feel let down that there is no Malenia tier difficulty to overcome. I actually really enjoyed the environment and direction of this game. It wasn’t particularly difficult, but it definitely wasn’t easy and it certainly didn’t hold my hand. I felt like I was immersed into a world where I needed every tool on my belt to survive and needed to actually search for where to go next. I loved it, for me it’s a masterpiece that I will absolutely be playing again
This game compares to DS2 which is usually viewed negatively by many Souls fans. DS2 was a game tying to replicate the DS1 formula but be different.
Instead of trying to remain like a souls game I would have liked more care with Umbrel and the lamp.
This is disingenuous. We didn’t expect the game to have Malenia tier fights. But something comparable to Margit would have been perfectly fine. The bosses in LoTF are extremely janky.
You're right, I definitely noticed this with many people who came straight from Elden Ring. LOTF is much more comparable to ds1 and 2 imo. The interconnected environments, enemy mobs, the difficult areas, that feeling of just trying to survive, and I even tried the "exit the boss fight" method to see where I would appear after coming back and, of course, I was right outside the boss room wall, lol. I loved LOTF and I'm still playing it in ng+. I'm interested to see how ng+ 3 feels without the vestiges and with more enemy mobs. Let's go!
@@ELDENLORD89bruhhhh
Mate, Margit is what Fromsoft has come to after developing these types of games for 10 years. What are you smoking. The animation, the combat design, the voice acting, the voice directing, the sound design... Fromsoft has a company has largely gotten better and better at that, and Margit is one of the more complex fights when looking at souls bosses overall.
Calling this a Master piece is a bit much...
Good thing I'm not good at Souls games "like that", and I found all the bosses super difficult, so it became a lil overwhelming that the progression of each area in the game could be so oppressive with the sheer amount of enemy density (made worse if you're sent to Umbral). Overall, the beautiful level design and art direction made the stress easier to overcome. I loooved the enemy designs.
Dont worry it’s like one of the two most unbalanced souls likes out of all of them
@@tomasdelcampo2 tbh I don't even know what "balanced" vs "unabalanced" looks like because I'm ass at any Soulslike, but I have fun struggle bus anyway lmao
Bruh the bloodborne style dodging made the game super easy for me after I figured my build😂 I just first tried half of the bosses in the game and other half never took me more than 3 tries😢
@@muramasa870 that's so cool
Here from mannis channel. Subbed.
I am a big fan of humanoid bosses that you can actually fence with and parry their attacks, it is super satisfying when you parry each hit of a 4-5 hit combo. One thing that I could do without were parts of the boss fights where you were waiting for the boss to do their thing without much to do: Lightreaper dragonrides and hushed saint dicking around on his horse come to mind. Even if you use that time to heal up or buff your weapon, they are way too long and break the pace of the fight.
w collab love to see manni
Yeah was an awesome collab. Thx man!
Greetings from Manni's community!
came from manni gaming
The hollow crow boss has an amazing design. I was so excited to fight it when I saw it only for it to be a gimmick boss and my heart sank.
That's how we do in the Manni Town😼
I genuinely hope more souls like games go for more spectacle and fun bosses instead of brickwall difficult bosses. I love difficult fights but the things that I love the most about the souls genre has always and will always be the lore and atmosphere, not the fights. I liked Gwyn's fight, for example, despite being one of the easiest, because he was supposed to be easy. That was the lore, that was the reason for the depressing music. I liked the Adyr fight because it was about the lore, having him talk to us, explain his pov, and then being possibly proven right when Orius kills everyone. A custom boss that wasn't a mob fight would have been neat but it genuinely wasn't a dealbreaker for me, I loved the setting and the lore we got.
It's genuinely getting boring that souls is known for difficulty now instead of lore and setting, it really is. I want bosses and music and characters and settings that make me give a shit about it, not min max a build and go "okay, what moves will deplete 75% of my max level hp in one hit" or "time to wait out another 20 hit combo because that's the norm now".
Lords of the Fallen isn't perfect and I doubt it ever will be, but I will happily slot it as one of my favorite games ever because it gave me reasons to actually enjoy the setting and the atmosphere. I liked that the bosses weren't impossible, I liked that they were built for spectacle and atmosphere, I liked that I can blend whatever I wanted into the game, which was carrying a giant ass sword while playing around with actually good magic while having the ability to dodge properly or parry my way through.
How are the bosses in Elden Ring not interesting charachters with interesting lore ? You can have difficulty, lore and atmosphere at the same time.
Also it's more about the depth of the boss than the difficulty, if there isn't any depth to the bosses it can kill replayability
I hope not. Also, why am I not surprised that you complain about "a 20 hit combo." In ER you don't even have to wait out combos in their entirety. The correct dodge or correct positioning will work as well.
@@loubloom1941 because they're fucking boring, I never said it wasn't doable. Elden Rings 20 hit combos you just have to wait out or run around, there's no reaction to anything else you do.
Since we're on elden ring now, for some reason, fine I'll talk about it: a boss that has no reaction to the player until their magical poise bar is broken is boring, and long combos, while doable, is just there to fill in the gap that should have been reaction. Outside of npc bosses, normal enemies turned into bosses and Malenia, who already has shit poise to begin with, most every boss just takes a hit and keeps going until their invisible bar is broken and you can go in for a critical. This is a feature that persists outside of Elden Ring, but you decided to bring this specific one up.
Now I'm going to compare it to another game: Sekiro, which Lies of P, for example, draws a lot of combat inspiration from. Only the absolute largest and most unique enemies in Sekiro chug through your attacks and moves, every fight feels like they react to you as a character and a player instead of taking hits and then cooling down while you punish. You can dodge or counter them, or you can force them on the defensive by being aggressive. Lords of the Fallen isn't a perfect game but I love it because it gives you tools to take advantage of enemy regardless of what build you run and throws you in this weighty world that feels like it reacts to your hits. Again, not perfectly, but that's what I feel. Whether it's against an Enchantress, a Rector sword dude, a normal mob, a higher tier mob, or more humanoid bosses, I felt like there was a clear reaction, to me at least, when they got hit and when they were gonna react. Only the truly giant ones felt like they didn't, but at least their combos didn't drag on. The bosses weren't overtly difficult but it felt like their presence was felt more in how they moved and what they did. "But Elden Ring did that!" To an extent, yes. However they had no reaction to what you did beyond the bare minimum. Elden ring bosses stagger *eventually* . Their invisible poise bars drain *eventually* . Until then, you're dealing with a nonstop attacking entity that only pauses after a long combo is forcefully gone through or you get good enough with a parry shield to tank it and go for that parry. There was no reason at all for them to react to you beyond the bare basics, unless you spec into jump attacks, master parrying or learn how to run behind them and spam r1 or r2, you get no real fight. I would have liked a Lords of the Fallen/Sekiro parry style put into elden ring to actually force the enemies to react to you, but there isn't one. You just have to run in circles and wait for the combo to end if you can't get behind them. You have no presence in that game, at all, not unless you're fighting a basic mob or a somewhat high tier mob that was turned into a mini boss. Lightreaper felt like it gave me more reaction to what I did than Morgott. The only bosses I can think of that had good reactions to the player was Malenia, since she can do random parries and jumps away, and the respec lady fight since she's a mage who runs away at every opportunity.
@@ni9274 "it's genuinely boring that souls is known for difficulty now instead of lore and setting". I never said souls games didn't have it, I said that's all they're known for, and everyone that tries to mimic the games or fall into the souls genre is increasingly focusing more on "difficulty" over depth and interest. Lies of P for example. A wonderful game with extremely fun combat and wonderful bosses, yet the world was boring af. I genuinely couldn't find it in me to care about the setting at all, ever. The bosses and npcs? Sure. The setting? Nah.
@@Pie_Smackersounds like a you problem, cus I felt the exact same about lords of the fallen, couldn’t give a SHIT about the lore, god did I not care, I tried, I platinumed the game for Christ sakes, and I still hate the game, yes, I played through because I spent $70 on the piece of broken easy ugly trash. Lies of P actually left me with a full belly and still wanted seconds. Lords of the fallen my god I couldn’t wait for the credits to roll so I could put it on OfferUp up and get as much of my money back as possible.
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Ah yes, alternative perspective being the same perspective but discussed in greater and more stilted detail.
Here from the manni town
lol nice one!
@@ManniGaming thx mam
Here from the Manni town. 👍.
I'm playing this with my brother so every boss we do is co-op and it kind of shows that the game was not balanced with this in mind. We'll often beat a boss first try.
As far as boss design I think theming will be a bigger part of bosses. Fast bosses should be fast and nimble, tanky bosses will be tanky, magic bosses will tricky and flashy. I think the lore bosses are a good example of what a boss should be. Not every boss should be able to counter every style of play but should instead be made with showing what that boss is about. So yes a fast player should run rings around a slow boss but a tanky player should face tank a quick but weak boss. These can also help sell the fantasy of what the player is trying to be. A quick ninja that out skills the brute or the brute that gets hit looks at the boss and says I pity the fool. (slight exaggeration in these examples but just trying to sell what the experience should feel like)
I found the game extremely enjoyable and fun. My only complaints are with the Hollowed Crow and Adyr fights. Both bosses have stunning design that is underutilized and would've been amazing for an actual boss fight. Due to lore implications I understand the design choices and they are very fitting but they're not enjoyable. As for difficulty, I found the game to be more challenging than DS titles, excluding Nameless King. The game becomes much easier once you start parrying. The parry system in LotF definitely seems much more generous or easier than in the souls titles.
Onw thing is for certain, the devs are putting a lot of work into the game and deeply care about it.
I honestly hope this "arms race" continues until it reaches levels only a few can overcome. Maybe even none. Imagine a boss that is just outside of human capability... the community would flip it's lid! (Shouldn't be mandatory to beat the game though)
manni is great in explaining
I am here from mannis channel great video
I didn't mind it. It's main boss only for one ending out of three and it is set right after the king. Not like you are having whole set-up location just for him.
Tbh Radiance ending is akin to Shura ending in Sekiro, other ending have just way more into it
I thought this game has some of the best bosses in soulslikes. Pieta, hushed saint, lightreaper, spurned progeny, dervla, sundered monarch, elianne, tancred, judge cleric, and the iron wayfarer.
Bosses were such a hit or miss in this game. The main bosses like the Pieta, Dervla, Hushed Saint, Lightreaper, Tancred and Judge Cleric were amazing and memorable for all the good reasons, meanwhile many others were just "meh", and some others like The Iron Wayfarer were among the most egregious examples of bad game design I've ever seen. Like seriously I'm still so livid about how garbage that boss fight was because that's supposed to be a cool callback to their first game. Lords of the Fallen had tons of potential, and still has in my opinion, it has excellent level design, build options, unique game mechanics, cool story and characters, but it all feels so wasted because even with all the updates and patches, it's clear that the game needed to be refined and some aspects of it needed to be modernized, and it's still way, way too much rough around the edges. There are no perfect games, even Elden Ring has a lot of problems despite being arguably the peak in this genre, but I think videogame devs need to understand that in order to make the best possible product you have to work like you WANT and CAN achieve perfection. Look at Elden Ring DLC, I ain't mad at them taking 2 years to make it because I just know that whenever we get it, it will be the most unforgettable experience in videogame history. So I really hope that the devs learn from this experience and consider their mistakes with this title for their next IP, or even an ipothetic sequel, and work with this objective in mind, to reach as close as they can to perfection BEFORE releasing the game. Patches should not be included in the game develoment process, they are a form of customer support. A good game shouldn't really need many patches tbh. I really appreciate how receptive they were to criticism and how fast are they working to fix the issues, it gives me hope. It's definitely a step in the right direction, for sure. Let's hope this is a turning point for videogames development.
I just hope ER DLC is darker themed and not that bright and grand bs that the main game was.
Hard agree with this. It's also worth notice that some Masterpieces from other genres stubble in some areas but don't detract much, which it isn't the case for this gsme.
I disagree with the notion that great game don't need patches when even DS3 received 14 of them, and Bloodborne also received a couple, but it's true that some design choices aren't fixed just by patching things up (AC Unity is a perfect example of this).
lmao wayfarer fight pisses me off so much every time it's just a cum simulator with a bunch of unnecessary staggers especially when he locks me in the corner and starts blasting that jizz i feel raped hello it's lotf hotline? i was gangbanged by a single guy
@@johnhuddleston1986lol ah, yes, the super duper kid friendly themes of genocide, torture, dismemberment, and existentialism were surely much too bright and happy 🤡
Might wanna do another playthrough and/or get new eyes there champ 👍
Dark souls 3, to me, is the pinnacle even after elden ring. ER was good but very safe, whereas DS3 still feels like the culmination of several From games combined.
I got here for Manni
I stayed for the game, it's kinda fire tho
Honestly the main bosses were great, they had great ideas, variety and music etc...
However Adyr was simply a giant disappointment, which is sad cuz the he could've had an amazing fight since his music, spectacle, setting and sense of finality was really there.
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Thanks for coming over^^
You know you can kick enemies to break their posture, right?
I really do agree that the bosses did feel a bit easy comparatively speaking. However the jump to ng+ is a significant jump and I had no idea they were gonna go from squishy to spongey in one ng+! I was like wait wtf?
Try Lies of P and talk about "souls veterans can beat any bosses easily"))
In my opinion the bosses in the first PT were way too easy. I first tried almost all of them. NG+ did make up for it partially though. The later bosses are a lot more challenging in NG+ and especially the umbral ending boss is insane in NG+. Elianne is one of the most difficult (and coolest) bosses I have ever fought. Because of her massive healthbar in NG+, you really have to learn every move she does and because her attacks are telegraphed well, it was a lot of fun to learn.
dude I'm on tancred rn in NG+ and holy shit I've died like 15times or maybe more the ramping of difficulty went soooo much higher I love it. Cant wait to see if NG++ makes the earlier bosses even crazier haha
@@trippy4150 NG+2 is not that much of a difference but the jump from NG to NG+ is massive. Especially lategame.
@@EldenLord.Sadly tough she is copy paste of pieta fight...
@@garciasth217 The basic attacks are but there are new mechanics like the phantom or the eyeballs etc.
@@garciasth217 Bro what are you waffling about. She has probably 6-8 new mechanics with all new magic types
Lmao the sacred resonance of Tennessee made me laugh out loud
The secret Bad ending Boss is 10 / 10 ✌
Manni is 404 in that link
Man the twin brothers of sin boss fight is one of my favorite bosses of all time. So cool and unique.
Great perspective/way to look at the game, good video!
Lords of the fallen really really feels like a drag to get trough. It was fun on the beginning but the bosses just where so gimmicky and bad that i didnt really care about the story anymore. Some of the areas are also WAY to long I just run through it because there is no way i am beating 5 elite enemies at ones.
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I am struggling to finish the late game area, the level of enemies and gank squads just makes it not fun, and the boss fights very often fall in to cheap artificial difficulty
Man, The Bramis Castle was such a pain to explore. It gave me flashbacks to DS2's road to reach blue smelter demon.
@@AvdimaxMaybe I was just lucky, but I absolutely did not have that experience when exploring that level. I liked it a lot.
The enemy repetition just makes the game tiring. You can say that the enemy ganks are worse in DS2 but at least it's not the same enemies over and over repeated throughout the game.
Edit: Yeah, I didn't get the irony 🤦♂️
"It almost seems like hexworks is lacking the decades of experience..."
It's literally the studios first game 🤨
Yes, that was the point I was making in a humorous form, bud 🙂
What it means is: People need to cut Hexworks some slack and allow them some time to perfect things, too
as an experienced souls player I really only struggled with the Hushed Saint, and this was because my weapon and catalyst were only +2. I blame myself cause I could have left and upgraded more. Several of the bosses I cheesed with poison. the boss of the game I was waiting for another phase and wished they had made it a bit more challenging. Lies of P's Nameless Puppet fight was one of the most challenging bosses I've faced in a long time, so it is possible to challenge players like myself but I enjoyed Lords of the Fallen bosses overall, hopefully we'll get some actually challenging bosses through DLC.
broo what im saltiest about is the co op . I wish i could just leave my summon sign down for newer players but instead im put in a random que where i might get to help a level 20 one moment and then a level 200 the next.
Really wish we could decide what bosses or portions of the game we co op in .
Bought it due to people praising it within the souls community, played it till the first boss and dropped it. Coming from Lies of Pi this was a flop I still don't know how people can recommend this at 70$
Man, you're entitled to your opinion and I respect that. I'm not sure why, but it feels like you're schilling a bit. I think you're view on a different perspective is fair, now that I consider it. That said, we can't accept Super Mario Bros 3 levels of gameplay because 'noobs'. Bottom line (imo), LOTF has some cool stuff and I'm looking forward to their next iteration. That said, I feel like some S Koreans (I know. I hate to keep beating that drum but.....) took a better first shot
Manni made me do it 👍🏻
And I am proud of it!
Souls games may need difficulty settings. But I don’t want more health or damage for bosses. That can be apart of it but I think difficulty in souls should change how bosses move and maybe add add attacks. This means on first play through you can get a feel for the bosses but on second and third you can up the difficulty and see new moves and attacks that you were not prepared for. That does mean this puts a even heavier load on a studio where half the players are never going to see the content you made but it might just set a new souls like standard that we can all get behind
Now for me the problem are not the bosses but more the difference between the level and the bosses, you can fall casually in one big room against 2 Raiders, 1 Pyromancer, a fuck ton of dogs with a Skeleton warrior where you are lucky to run through without being hit because everyone knows how to 360 noscope in this game and then you end up against a boss you 3-5 try...(I died more like 30 times in that room) It just feels frustrating...Elden Ring also used bosses in early game as normal enemies later BUT at that point they feel like normal enemies here they still feel like mini bosses everytime I met them.
100% felt like the combat was the main reason for the divisiveness and easy bosses. It feels more hack and slash than souls like and I wish attacks required more commitment like in lies of p
I love Lords of the Fallen, being playing a lot of coop and it's been a blast.
I did see a roadmap in their discord server. there's a decent amount balance changes, including a separate scaling between PvE and PvP
This is a massive problem I have with souls games in general that Matti brought out, where the stage is filled too much with just annoying and difficult enemies that it’s just frustrating so you just run through it.
Each game I’ve ever played had that area, it was Blighttown in DS1, Smouldering Lake in DS3, Mountaintops in Elden Ring, and The entire second half of the alchemist’s island in Lies Of P.
Even on subsequent NG runs I just don’t bother as even once I’m leveled up, the area is just not fun to traverse.
As you pointed out many new things suffer from their predecessor. Plenty of great sequels at their that were "not as good" as the original because the original was new and exciting and this is "more of the same." I try to take things by their own merit and not compare to much. I just want to enjoy fun games, appreciate their deviations and bonk some bosses.
I did a lot of random coop low level. I got summoned for the Sundered Monarch very low level. On the other hand when I encountered him in my own game I was fairly high level. There was a stark difference in difficulty between fighting him low, or high level. I think it's possible the bosses were tuned to a certain level that many players are surpassing. That makes the bosses too easy. This is a problem with a lot of RPGs without time limits. I wouldn't want a time limit though. Some people are going to overlevel, and we just have to accept it.
This game is fire I don’t care what the critics say.. I’ve played most Soulslike games and this is one of the best imo
You kinda miss nothing. The lamp bearer. The one with skely hand its the main character of the first game
I had the same feeling but still liked it way more than Lies of P.
Hi Manni
MANNI 🔥🔥
I am mixed on the bosses in this game personally.
When it comes to the Miniboss enemies, that are reused in levels, It does remind of DS1 having bosses like say the Capra Demon or Taurus Demon that become common enemies late game. But Lords of Fallen will sometimes have boss enemy introduced then immediately proceed to use them as enemies (Like Kinranger, the Crimson Rector or the Ruiner), now it's not the worst thing ever but it makes those bosses feel more forgettable cause they just seem like an enemy with a named hp bar (like Dark Souls 2 did sometimes, like the Royal Rat Vanguard). Going into NG+1 does increase their hp but ultimately it's still the same enemy, just lasts longer. Not all of them are bad (besides maybe the Flame Enchantress) but I would've liked a gimmick or some unique attacks to help them stick out.
As for the main bosses, I did enjoy most of them, but when it comes to The Hallowed Crow and Adyr (Two bosses with incredible designs but incredibly mediocre fights, feels dissapointing), and thankfully the Umbral Ending has a more unique fight but it is just a harder variant of the tutorial boss. NG+1 does help make these guys feel more challenging, but the Sundered Monarch having almost a Monster Hunter boss hp bar is not fun, like who thought giving that boss like 50,000 HP was okay, especially if you run an inferno build 😅
Tl;dr I hope they make some of the bosses more challenging but in more meaningful ways and not just giving them more health.
I think that if we combined lies of p bosses and enemies with LOTF level design. We would get an incredible masterpiece. As a souls veteran. I liked aspects of both games and have nothing but confidence in the future of soul style games. What a great time to be alive.
The level design of LOTF is pretty bad. It's a confusing mess. The aesthetics are good, though.
I'd rather just have Lies of P as it is thanks. Pilgrim's Perch and Fen were half the areas I actually completed in LotF and they suck.
No just give me more lies of p lies of p levels may be linear af but that isn't a bad thing
Two things. Firs, i wanna say, that back in 2012, it took me about an hour or more to beat Ornstein and Smough, and 2 years later, i remember banging my head against the wall at the Ruin Sentinels, and Fume Knight etc. (those playthroughs were blind). By comparison in 2022, Malenia took about 15 minutes and it was the hardest boss to beat for me in the game. So i cannot judge Lords of the Fallen bosses,as 10 years ago self (or an newcomer), when i was starting the series, but NOW, these bosses definitely seemed too easy.
Second, there is a definite change of approach in From Soft regarding levels/bosses. In Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2, the areas were considerably harder to just run past everything. Especially in DS2 they went the extra mile to make sure you actually PLAY the areas instead of running past them. The bosses were much simpler, but also the run backs to the bosses were much harder as well. In DS3, the areas seemed to be just "noise". Something unimportant, until you get to the boss (with a bonfire just outside most times). But the bosses were much more complicated. Elden Ring is sort of the same. Sure the areas are much better than DS3, but its still very easy to just ignore and run past everything, and still there is a bonfire right out the boss door. Lords of the Fallen is clearly taking the approach of the first games, which in itself, is not a bad thing. But the actual areas in these early Souls titles were FAR superior than Lords of the Fallen.
it was a okay game 7.5/10 - just the price was way too high - $49.99 at best - 80$ no way
It would've been very decent for 50 bucks, but i paid 80 FOR THIS SHIT?!?
I got it for 40 usd on eneba
I think this video needed more discussion about how boss difficulty is affected by the tools available to the player. Player mechanics and resources have a huge influence on the difficulty especially since this game has made big improvements to ranged options.
Pietas blood animation took me tf out right at the beginning of the game also judge cleric has weird cutscene animations.
Love from Manni and for war robot community
It's pretty easy to tell where it's going.
1 shot moves that cover the entire arena, or attacks so fast you don't have time to react, imput reading, and insane amounts of health/health regen
You saw this with Gale and Midir they were the precursor to eldenring, and guess what. Damn near every boss in elden ring take something from those 2.
And I think gale and Midir were the most overrated shit boss fights ever lol. So then leading into that was a bummer in elden ring. I LOVE input reading!
There are no one shot move that cover entire arena in Elden Ring, there are no attacks so fast you don't have time to react, there is no input reading (only animation reading, and this is present since DS1) and most bosses in ER don't have any health regen
Gale and Midir are very fair.
@@GrimDim There is no input reading in Elden Ring and DS3, only animation reading, and how it's a problem that the boss can react differently depending on the action you take ?
Since DS1 bosses had the capacity to animation read, Artorias can detect when you use an Estus and respond with an attack.
Godskin apostles wave hello, also the fat one starts rolling over everything with hitbox so big it is only dodge-able from a certain angle... oh you wanted to heal, too bad i read your input here is the fireball from the skinny one.
Honestly Elden Ring is my favorite game i ever played, but after playing Lies of P i resent a bit that it does not have blocking mechanic always present and capable of perfect block like in Lies of P. If it is going towards that kind of bosses you need a mechanic to deal with it at any time with any build and not only specific builds.
@@DreamskyDance they patched the Godskins' heal punish; it no longer happens robotically often and it's slower, so you can dodge and punish back and it doesn't feel like they're reading your mind to tell that you've decided to heal.
I finally platinum it yesterday. I can definitely say it was an emotional ride. I like a few innovative mechanics they brought to the genre but there were alot of annoyingly frustrating parts throughout the game. But I will say the developer's have been listening to the community and making updates nonstop to the game. That should definitely be recognized in this day an age, when so many game's release in a bad state and stay that way. They definitely did so much better than 99% of other soul's-like game's. Lies of P releasing at the same time didn't do the game any favors either.
As a souls-vet, I stopped half way through on a level 70 and decided to make a corrupted toon and have maxed my level to 25 with weapon upgrades to 5.
In that, I have had the best souls experience I’ve had since DS3. Some bosses and areas are bs, while others are a cake walk.
If people weren’t so used to afk farms and being op early on (thanks to ER), then I feel like people could truly enjoy this game (graphical issues aside).
It’s a souls exploration game that requires you to memorize locations and patterns more than any other game in its “genre”.
Some old Souls bosses, even some new in ER were pretty bland and easy, but this game takes everything a step forward. It just should’ve gotten a bit more polish before release.
Stuck on Malekith on my third Elden Ring playthrough with dual spear frenzied flame character that rushed through the game, will try Lords of The Fallen afterwards, send help.. !! XD
In seriousness...partly this is my comment on the difficulty arms race, Malekith is almost the other end of the spectrum especially for my build.
Although i didnt tried LOTF yet, i have it installed and am amazed by the amounts of updates and fixes this game got, looking forward to playing it ( when i beat the other end of the spectrum of difficulty arms race ) and personally i think that it will suit me well some change of pace in a souls game and that ill like it.
Manni Pog
LOL Hehe hey ho
I want a game where enemies also consider us as a boss. Sekiro is probably the closest but a game where say it takes 20 hits to kill a boss, it would also take 20 hits to kill us. Make it difficult to land hits maybe but I would love a game where you don't always need to be perfect at all times.
The only thing that matters is whether bosses are fun and if you leave the room wanting to fight them again because something in them was captivating to you. I think a game that handles this very well is Remnant (and the sequel), where bosses cycle through rather simple movesets while still maintaining that heightened sense of a deadly boss battle. The balance between adrenaline, spectacle and resource management has been rounded out nicely in those two games, with practically no bosses demanding multiple hours-long repeated attempts. The fact co-op is also nicely integrated and players can synergize with different builds is a massive plus as well.
I love the Remnant games!
@@Brynloch First DLC Nov 14. And then 2 more to go. It's gonna be great.
I think once you figure out the trick, or have the right build then bosses are easy...in any souls/souls like game. So I just put more emphases on fashion and don't care about how strong my armor is and just have fun with it. I loved this game. I had issues with performance the first day, but never after. Such a good game.
I still have to say, the challenging exploration was my favorite part of this game. And I know most people are annoyed by the enemy density, and some of their worries are warranted, but I’m not sure how much you could reduce it without making the levels feel too sparse, which is a problem I had with Lies Of P. Where the levels felt pretty empty and mostly uninteresting as enemy encounters. I want more Souls-likes that capture that DS1 feeling of hatred towards the player in terms of its environment, like Blighttown and Sens Fortress. Which LOTF gave me a good bit of, and I’m thankful for that.
you can say lies of p had uninteresting enemy design but They have more enemy variety that they always introduce new enemies in every single location instead of making mini bosses turn into Generic mobs instead of try to introduce which is something that lies of p didn't even do,, so you can see that lies of p enemies & bosses are quality over quantity ahahaha i rather enjoying the level design that has very few mobs but still gives me good challenges & fair,, rather than dealing with spam mobs, spam range mobs & spam mini bosses that turn into generic enemies,,
whats even worse they not even try introduce new enemies variety in new location i mean why mobs from the first area is literally in olmost every single area?? Again there's nothing fun dealing with spam mobs which is also why ds2 hated by many peeps
I can think of a couple solutions to the difficulty arms race. A simple one would be to add a difficulty setting to make the game more challenging (not an easy mode), but that’s probably not gonna fly since it clashes with the whole souls design philosophy. I think other devs should do something like what Hexworks did and make new game plus especially challenging for veterans while giving the option to do a regular new game 0.
If you want an easy run through just go ranged. +10 assassin bow is S scaling in AGIL, use the princess sting, 2 blank feather ranger rings, 2 +10 jefferys dagger socketing them with AELSTRIX runes and you can just nuke every enemy from a distance oh and if you want to make it even easier use the HARROWER DERVLA'S CROSSBOW at +10 and you can kill anything with one trigger pull but its an ammo hungry crossbow since each shot uses 3 ammo. With the crossbow every shot hits for roughly 1500 each hit and with a charged shot from the assassin bow ive hit nearly 4k
I mean I did like the game overall, a good 6 or 7 out of 10 but if you think this is a masterpiece, you gotta get checked man
I enjoyed this video a good bit. Here’s my opinion, The problem with the “this is meant to mirror Souls 1” thing is that the devs specifically meant for it to be akin to a “Dark Souls 4”
This means to me, on some level, we should be getting something that builds on Dark Souls 3 on some level. (Thematically, design wise)
By all estimations, the only thing I can say in this game that even partially does that is the fact that it mishmashes mechanics in from every souls game.
Thematically, and design wise, it feels like a step behind Dark Souls 1 or even Demons’ Souls.
For example, things like having boss fights that are more thematic /cinematic than interactive is fine. But here’s my challenge how Lords of The Fallen *actually* executes it:
Gwyn’s boss was fight was meant to portray a somber, pathetic atmosphere, which is did, and which why people love it to this day. You could say the same for DES’ final boss. These fights both had bosses directly before them that were sufficiently interactive and thematically significant in their own right.
Lords of The Fallen’s final boss *tries* to portray spectacle, and instead we get something laughable and pathetic. You couple that with the flaccid boss fights shortly before it, and you’re left with a really underwhelming final segment of the game.
I still think Lords of The Fallen is a good game all that being said, but in terms of it being a good Souls or Soulslike game? I would put it about on par with Demons’ Souls; but only because of certain modern mechanics being added to the combat.
In terms of lore, attention to detail, and everything else that makes a good souls game, the dev team has some work ahead of them before I can say that Lords of the Fallen matches up to my expectations as far as that. It’s a solid step back in terms of everything that makes a souls game good outside of gameplay imo
I clicked on your link from manni I'm happy I did I've never played this game but it looks awesome
For me, I was never really into Souls games. I played the very first DS back on PS3. That had me wanting to rip my hair out but that's because I had little patience back then haha. The only "souls-like" game(s) I have ever come to love was Remnant From the Ashes and Remnant 2 (if you consider them souls-like). For someone like me, I thoroughly enjoyed Lords of the Fallen. It felt like the perfect difficulty for someone who isn't a vet of DS games. But I understand how it can be disappointing to those who are. It would be cool if New Game + for LotF made things harder by making the bosses engage much more frequently along with higher health pools for those that seek the challenge. I was fortunate enough to not have any issues with the game on PS5 and I started my second play through on NG+1 to see if I can get better. The devs are looking at feedback constantly, I'm sure the community can persuade them to add some kind of challenge for the vets but also keeping the non-vets happy. :)
I think the primary thing that could be improved on is the bosses should simply have a bit more health. I had to nerf myself and not use a single spell (I played as an Umbral Death Knight with Umbral sorceries and Rosamund's Sword) on bosses because it would just melt them.
I'm not even saying this to brag, but I don't think a single boss took me more than 5 tries and several of the rememberance bosses I beat first try.
That's frustrating simply because I wanted the fights to go on longer. I was actually sitting there in the fight, watching the health bar of the boss diminish and I'd let myself die simply because the music, the moveset, the art direction were all just god-tier, but the fight itself was just too easy, and I think it's because the attacks are VERY telegraphed and give you a ton of reaction time.
If I had to change the bosses I'd increase their health a bit, and then I'd make their attacks quicker/longer attack combos. If new players are struggling, they can summon a friend or an NPC to help with the fight, but I'd just like bosses I don't beat first try, or even in the first 2-3 tries. 7-15 tries is the butter zone I think for main bosses and none of these even got close for me.
Haven't played LotF. i think the big issue a lot have is it's too much like Dark Souls 2 Scholar otFS in general area design of having a lot of gank mobs in linear corridors with no place to maneuver
It's unreasonable to balance every encounter around every build, some situations might be more demanding depending on your build, that's the nature of RPGs. What really pushes Soulsborne to its heights is the complexity of the enemy's movement, patterns and reaction to the player; when you master all of that, you can low level most bosses and beat them with little trouble.
The problem, in my opinion, is not only the quality of the individual bosses, is that many in LoTF either don't have the visual quality of a Fromsoft game, so they're not a great spectacle, nor they evolve the enemy's movesets to push you further like even DS1 did with Ooacile and some of the 2nd half. LoTF has a decent gimmick for the exploration aspect, yet didn't provide much for the combat and boss design. Again, even DS1 evolved it's enemies and boss design with Artorias, Manus and Kalameeth.
I got the regular ending in lotf, and I felt the bosses overall were perfectly fine. Especially the last one was disappointing, but in general they felt challenging but fair. Reminds me of DeS and DS1 moreso than of DS3 and ER.
I really tried to enjoy the bosses in this game, and in NG, you can even say that they're a passable experience (not even comparable to Lies of P or Remnant II's quality in my opinion, but passable) but NG+ simply rips all enjoyment of any of them away by basically just adding zeroes to every stat. After multiple playthroughs, I had weapons of every damage type and enough items to pretty easily switch between builds (I even mained an umbral build which made it pretty easy to switch between radiance and inferno for bosses) yet without fail, every single boss fight took so little damage from any of the weapons, even if they were weak to those damage types, yet standing there and pumping spells would deal 3-5x the dps even against resistant enemies, as if the game wanted you to basically be the Azur Comet build from Elden Ring just to clear a boss before you die of boredom. I've done NG+ DS3, Elden Ring, Code Vein and Remnant II on Apocalypse, which were all stellar experiences because the bosses actually kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time, but there are so few bosses in Lords that actually made me want to be there (which is what made me finally call it quits 3/4 the way through my last run). It's not even necessarily the difficulty, because if they wanted to make the bosses more difficult, they could have just put the NG+ bosses as the NG boss stats and added more zeroes to NG+. It's mainly that the bosses feel completely uninspired and the metaphorical "tango" between player and boss feels almost hollow. I think something that goes pretty unrecognized in a lot of these games is the creativity that goes into making bosses that you can love even if you aren't a fan of their move set or other aspects of the action-to-action experience of fighting them. It's a combination of artistic aesthetic, narrative themes, and design mechanics that produce the experience a person associates with the boss, not just its individual moves and stat points. I don't think the game needed to produce some Apoc Annihilation, Solo Bladebearer/Cannoneer or Malenia-tier challenge for me to be impressed, but just something that felt inspiring, unique, and impactful to the game's narrative and world.