Topic: anyone else just suck at games?

@Sunsy @Snatcher i use to enjoy fighting games back around SNES and PS1 days. The first three Tekken games were probably my favorite. There was so much to do: extra modes, unlockable characters, ending cinematics. I feel like fighting games back then accommodated the single player. So, even though my fighting style could be described as "dumpster fire", I had fun playing them just to see the next thing. With the exception of Smash Bros. I feel like fighting games are all about the online play now.

@theJGG the Souls games are an interesting bunch. I've been playing through them throughout the year and I think one of the reasons I enjoy them is because it makes me feel like I'm just barely scraping by. I really like the feeling that I'm just narrowly surviving most encounters.

This reminds me of a bit it Futurama I'm going to paraphrase:

"A casino where I win? That's great! This must be Heaven!" Pulls slot machine lever and wins again. "A casino where I always win? That's boring! This must be Hell!".

The taste of victory is sweeter when we've long been taking the bitter pill of defeat.

@Snatcher Yeah, usually I try and learn through failure but I sometimes use guides. With Smash I never looked anything up or even used the manuals for months, I just went in and mashed buttons. I learned how to play naturally through experimentation.

@Losermagnet Exactly. The feeling of just barely triumphing is stronger than the feeling of dominating a fight. I do that in racing games; in Gran Turismo I deliberately slam on the handbrake and spin off a few times (losing 20-ish seconds) just so I can have additional pressure and challenge. I feel like the Souls games have controversial balance (as @CactusMan says) that can be fixed easily with customisable difficulty.

While I praise Hidetaka Miyazaki's team for not compromising their vision, this is one thing I feel needs to be implemented.

Couldn't have said it better myself, you put it perfectly.

@TheJGG I mean some body had to learn it first right?

Depends on the genre and even on those I feal I am better it is still more a case of perseverance than other thing. For example I love platformers and I 100% completed any 3d Mario, donkey Kong, Rayman and finished all b-sides on celeste, etc. But I have died hundreds of times (thousands in Celeste until my fingers hurt but I just kept going because I was enjoying the challenge).
There are other genres however that I enjoy but I quite suck at like RTS (I am unable to finish StarCraft or WarCraft 2 without cheats as the games do not have a difficulty options).
And there are games that I simply do not play as I couldn't to save my life like fighting, FPS, horror or rhythm

I like to think I am somewhat competent at games, but there are definitely genres where I suck. At the forefront would be fighting games. I love Street Fighter, I enjoyed what I played of Tekken Tag Tournament 2, and P4 Arena is great. That said, I have no doubt I would get my butt kicked pretty quickly playing these as I can only just scrap by. Also not particularly great at shooters, but to be fair, I don't play these that much anyway, so... shrug

Turn-based strategy games like Fire Emblem, I enjoy, but I almost always play on casual/normal, because I do not have the skill/patience to properly plan my turns to destroy the enemy without losing my units. Not to mention, I much interacting with all the characters through out the game for little story bits that, whilst not needed for comprehension, are little nuggets of information which I like paying attention to. I did play through Awakening as my first Fire Emblem, and in that first playthrough, I played on classic, and by the time I got to the final chapter, I only had Chrom, Main Unit, and Flavia left. Given two of those that you cannot lose ever because of "Game Over", that is messed up.

Otherwise though, most games I typically play at normal or higher. I don't generally tend to struggle in games although there are some moments where I do hit road bumps and take a while to get pass. Like MorningRain, I also got stuck in Xenoblade Chronicles whilst I was playing on New 3DS (not the final boss though, but Lorithia, **** that fight). I ended up not continuing the game beyond that point until the definitive edition came out. Because I understood the game better as I had played once before, I actually did more of the side-quests and mindful grinding when playing DE so when I faced the boss again, I cheesed it

@MS7000 that is considered by nearly everybody as the most challenging fight in the game (mostly because the AI is stupid and likes to fight on the poison...)

@Balta666 The AI paid for their insolence in that particular battle. I know better than to be underlevelled in that fight!

In my youth I was probably better at games because I had more time to play them - and I usually only got games for birthdays or Christmas so I probably spent more time on an individual game than I do now.

Nowadays with sales and more disposable income I sometimes buy more games in a week than I would've in a whole year back in the day; coupled with less time to play due to work etc I don't really have the motivation to sink 100s of hours into a relatively simple game like I might've done in the past.

I still enjoy the challenge of beating a game, but I've definitely got a lower threshold for either dropping the difficulty down a notch or just picking something else to play rather than just keep plugging away until I beat it. I guess I didn't have that luxury back then; it was either keep trying or you'd have nothing else to play til next birthday/christmas!

@CactusMan @TheJGG I'm conflicted about the idea of making Souls games easier. Accessibility is always a good thing, but I can't help but think it would change the experience. Like a movie edited for tv or something. Hmmmm....I'll have to ruminate on this, because my initial reaction is it would make the experience less compelling if the world within the game wasn't so opressive. But I'm also the kind of nut that prefers one (and only one) difficulty option because of there's anything around that might make the experience easier/faster/whatever I'll be tempted to use it. It's a problem I have with the Final Fantasy VII, VIII, and IX remakes actually. They made it too easy to avoid their own content.

@TheJGG I did the same on my second playtrough (on switch). First time around I leveled a bit and in the end changed to Riki as he is so OP that it was no longer a problem (same thing for final boss)

@Balta666 I had heard after looking it up, and I would definitely be inclined to agree. The poison was a pest as you said because of dumb AI, but I also had the problem that I never seemed to damage the nebulae enough to get rid of them and damage the boss themselves.

I think phrasing's the most important part. If you position an easy mode as a "wimp mode" or "cheater mode" it'll deter some people from using it for fear of being shamed. Celeste is the complete opposite, it calls it "assist mode". The game tells you that while the game's intended to be enjoyable through challenge, those who don't enjoy it can play the game how they want to play it. The Souls games can do this, without altering the game. All you have to do is double player damage and half enemy damage. That's it. Or maybe add optional save points or something. I could probably beat a Souls game if these options were presented.

I acknowledge that I am thoroughly a core-casual gamer. The first thing I do when I fire a game up for the first time is tune the difficulty to "easy". I game to tune out the challenge that is life itself, so I prefer the absence of challenge in my leisure time. If a game invokes my ire or raises my blood pressure, then I'll tap out and switch to a different game immediately.

Life is short and I have zero tolerance for frustration.

@TheJGG after a few days of thought, I still feel the same way. With the amendment that it comes down to authorship. If a creator or group of creators designs their product with accessibility in mind then that's fine. But the opposite should also be true - when a challenging game is designed that way then it's the intent of the creator and to deviate from that would be to alter the experience. In this case its the trial and error nature of the games. That's what makes them an auteur gaming experience - modify that and how different are they from most other action/rpg games? I feel like if we were talking about a complex novel or movie we wouldn't be having a discussion like this. I'm not suggesting that everyone should like this stuff - simply that there are things that exist that are designed to challenge us.

To change subjects slightly - I doubt very many people are "good" at Dark Souls (especially when they first start). You're supposed to get your stuff kicked in, repeatedly and throughout the whole game. The loss you feel when you risked trying to find that next bonfire, but something kills you and now you have to decide whether you should try to reclaim your lost souls or carry on elsewhere. I guess that's why I feel the way I do - it's not about some "git gud" elitism, it's about being okay with dieing and saying to yourself "what can I do differently?". You're only gonna do that if, y'know, get killed repeatedly lol. There's also a large community aspect to the games. I'm pretty sure they were made in a way to entice players to go online and say "what the heck do I have to do to beat this guy!?!" And, again, if you can just decrease the difficulty then your less likely to seek out advice. I'm rambling - but I felt it necessary to elaborate on why Dark Souls specifically may be a poor fit for some kind of player calibration.

I like to think I'm good at games but then again I did give up on the final boss in FF6 and I do have like 10000 deaths in Celeste as of me starting Chapter 9 yesterday, but I still love those games.
I do think I am good at Smash Bros though (just not tournament level good).

@Losermagnet I have to admit that when I played Demon's Souls on PS5 I tried and persisted and little came out of it. When you get killed by the base enemies multiple times you know you're a terrible player. But this doesn't mean the game's poorly designed, nor does it suggest it's a masterpiece. I read that Bluepoint wanted to add an easy mode, but didn't want to change the game's balance. I can see both sides of the argument; one is that you'd want to preserve the feel of the game, but you'd also want to introduce the series to a more picky audience.

I'm not a fan of the whole "git güd" shebang, it's too played out and it doesn't prove anything in the end. The game's fun for some people and it's not for others. The learning curve from my experience, is very satisfying up until a certain point, after which it borderlines unfair. Funnily I didn't know about the bonfires, I had to look it up to realise you were talking about Dark Souls and not Demon's Souls! If you can save your game at bonfires, I may be convinced to get that on Switch or something. Because in Demon's Souls you're required to go at least an hour without a save point!

Personally, I've grown more to dislike easy being called stuff like this. More and more I find myself playing on easier difficulties to avoid frustration, and to simply enjoy the game and have some fun. Also from playing on easier difficulties, I find games really don't just give you a win and there is still some deal of challenge involved.

Games should be fun and enjoyable, if playing on an easier difficulty allows that for someone, I really don't see that as a bad thing honestly.

@Sunsy Its kinda annoying when a game does it I agree, but just don't take it to heart, its just a little trolling, a little joke, and as long as they don't mean it I don't have a problem and I don't bc I can't really tell if its a joke or they meant it.

@TheJGG ha! I had no idea you were talking about Demon's Souls. Ironically, that's the one Soulsborne I haven't played (well, that and Sekiro). I'll be getting a PS5 soon though, and hope to remedy that. In any case - while I'm unsure how Dark Souls compares to Demon's Souls, Dark Souls saves automatically while you play (and constantly). Bonfires do save, but they also restore your health and allow you to spend your souls to level up. Die once and you'll be booted to the last bonfire you were at losing all the souls you're holding, die again before you can recover them and they're gone for good.

Soulsborne games really should have demos available. I'm sure tons of people buy them and are unhappy with how inflexible they are. A bit of trivia about Bloodborne: the trophy for beating the first boss in Bloodborne had only been earned by about 50% of players. Thats insane. The relative popularity of these games really surprises me.

Mentioning Bloodborne has me thinking too that if you found Demon's Souls not too your liking you may enjoy one of the other games. Personally, I don't like Bloodborne that much. When I play Dark Souls I go for a beefy tank build. High HP, heavy armor, and a big shield (I need all the help I can get lol). This playstyle doesn't really translate to Bloodborne. There aren't any (useful) shields and armor is not nearly as important. Being aggressive is more beneficial and, well...I'm not. For this reason I'd say Bloodborne is the hardest Souls game for me, but conversely I've seen others rank it as their easiest.

If you do try Dark Souls let me know 😁 I enjoy the thought of offering advice instead of always requesting it. I've played DS Remastered, DS II, Bloodborne, and currently on DS III (which I started not too long ago after a break from the series). I still get smooshed into wallpaper paste but every new area or shortcut I find feels like a revelation.