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#soulslike

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January 26, 2024 - Day 391 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 427

Game: Elderborn

Platform: Steam
Released: Jan 31, 2020
Installed: Jan 26, 2024
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 22m

Rating: 1 - Nope

Elderborn is a first-person Soulslike slasher melee-combat game.

The game opens with a bombastic monologue from the lead character (at least you can choose their gender), who lays out a brief history of how you got to the point of entering the locked-down city of doom, but there was nothing unique about it that grabbed me. It was just... filler.

(Sidenote: If your game supports 3440x1440 ultrawide, you need a FOV slider. Playing a first-person game through a fisheye lens is not fun.)

The graphics and design feel average. It feels like they forgot the narrative part of a Soulslike that gives you a reason to press on.

Ultimately, the biggest problem with the game is that it's just boring. Run to room. Cut down undead. Run to next room that looks like previous room. Cut down undead. Rinse and repeat.

Elderborn is:

1: Nope

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November 14, 2023 - Day 318 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 337

Game: SCP: Secret Files

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jun 2, 2022
Installation Date: Nov 14, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 20m

Souldiers is a 2D pixel-art Metroidvania Soulslike platformer, and the last of this months unplayed Humble Choice bundle games.

It has a fantasy setting, which involves being saved from death due to machinations within the kingdom by a Valkyrie only to have to fight in the land that you're taken to, and I didn't get much further than that in 20 minutes.

The devs have put a lot of thought and effort into the backstory, but it's not one that grabs me.

Once again, I'm staring at a fairly average Metroidvania in a year when I've played such excellent Metroidvanias and Soulslike platformers, that a game really needs to bring something different to the table to grab me.

Unfortunately, Souldiers didn't, and it's just kind of:

2: Meh

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September 19, 2023 - Day 262 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 283

Game: Lies of P

Platform: Xbox Game Pass PC
Release Date: Sep 19, 2023
Installation Date: Sep 19, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 32m

Something a little different today. A review of Jodie Whittaker's Australian accent.

OK, not really (although it's passable, and justifiable with her backstory of having been living in the UK and returned to Australia).

As far as I remember, this is the first time I've reviewed an Xbox Game Pass game, which means I get to play Lies of P without dropping A$100 or more on it.

Lies of P is a third-person soulslike set within a retelling of the Pinocchio story. You play as P (ie. Pinocchio), who's suddenly awakened, seated in a train, in what very much appears to be mostly-human form, with the exception of a mechanical arm.

A voice calls to you to meet her at a hotel, but to get there, you first need to escape the train station, which is full of mechanical people determined to kill you.

You're presented with one of three initial playstyles, and I chose the one with the (seemingly) most straight-forward attack style (and the most HP).

Lies of P is set in the Belle Époque era. I had no idea what that was, but it's basically late 19th Century Europe through to WWII. The environment is beautiful.

One of the most lessons I learned the hard way, is don't make the mistake of skimming each of the tutorial pop-ups. Turns out they're kind of important.

Even so, by the time I hit the 32 minute mark, I'd traversed the same set of mobs five or six times, and died on the first boss repeatedly.

Blocking is incredibly important, both for restoring energy, and for staggering the mobs. Unfortunately, it requires very good timing, and I don't quite seem to be able to pull it off yet.

This is where XGPU is most useful to me. If I put in another couple of hours, and it's not a game I'm going to improve at (some of them aren't, thanks hand-eye coordination!), then nothing lost.

Not quite sure what I'll do when I have to start paying full price for XGPU, but that's a problem for 2027 Allie.

For now, Lies of P is:

4: Good

#LiesOfP #ThirdPerson #Soulslike #MastodonGaming #Gaming
#Project365ONG #Project365 #NewPlay

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July 9, 2023 - Day 190 - NewPlay Bonus Review
Total NewPlays: 210

Game: The Surge 2

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Sep 24, 2019
Library Date: Apr 30, 2023
Unplayed: 70d (2m9d)
Playtime: 79m

The Surge was one of the earliest reviews I did in this project, and the game that gave me an understanding of the mechanics of Soulslike gameplay.

In April I found that I had a Steam Key for The Surge 2, from the Humble Choice July 2021 bundle, and so I loaded it up.

For the last few days, it's been bugging me that the gap between play days and new plays was 19 days. It feels... unordered. Threw in a bonus newplay to round it up to 20.

The Surge 2, like its predecessor, is a sci-fi themed third-person Soulslike action-RPG.

It's also the game I've sworn more at than any other since January 1.

I've gotten frustrated with some games, but my frustration with The Surge 2 was on a whole different level.

After a cut-scene intro, followed by a character creator, you wake up on a hospital table in a prison.

Unlike the first game, you don't have an exo-suit, just a couple of defibrillator gauntlets. Yeah, I have no idea why.

The game does the same thing as the first one, too. Throws you up against larger enemies to teach you the movesets, and then suddenly throws you up against an armored boss.

Clad only in a hospital gownsuit (no bare bums here), and a pair of defibrillator gauntlets.

I died.
And died.
And died, and died, and died some more.

For the first 45 minutes I couldn't even land a single hit on him before he took me out.

The swearing became increasingly copious, eventually quitting out in frustration, and looking up a Google video on how to kill the boss.

It didn't help.

I went back in, and locked on, targeting the one exposed part of his body (his head).

Died.

Died some more.

Eventually I got a single hit in.

Died a few more times, ragequit and went grocery shopping.

Came back from the shopping, sat down at the PC and tried again.

I died.

I honestly don't understand what people see in Soulslikes. The sheer frustration of dying over and over again.

Eventually, I was managing to avoid him, so I was still dying, just slower.

Then I noticed he was telegraphing his attacks, and there were... gaps. I might be able to land a punch and retreat.

I did.

Then two attacks in a row.

I started to feel the pattern. I still died, but I was doing increasing damage.

Then suddenly... I didn't die. He did.

I won the fight.

It was then, that I understood what it is that people see in Soulslikes. Breaking through that frustration to clarity.

The satisfaction of taking down a boss that seemed impossible to kill, or even hit. Not by coming back with bigger guns, but by recognising the patterns, and countering them.

The Surge 2 is the Soulslike that gave me an understanding of the satisfaction to be found in Soulslikes, and is:

4: Good

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July 5, 2023 - Day 186 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 205

Game: Hollow Knight

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Feb 25, 2017
Library Date: Dec 4, 2018
Unplayed: 1674d (4y7m1d)
Playtime: 32m

Hollow Knight is a 2D Soulslike Metroidvania. I find it wryly amusing that six months ago, that was word salad to me.

Now I know I'm dealing with a 2D platformer that will have me traveling backwards and forwards through different zones, with parts of levels inaccessible to me until I find MacGuffins or character upgrades that will allow me to access those areas.

It's also going to be hard, and I'm going to die a lot; I'm going to be faced with the option of trying to get back to a save point to redeem the stuff I've picked up and upgrade, or risk it all to collect more stuff. If I do go back to the save point, all of the stuff I killed will have respawned.

That's the game play; the relevance of all of that to this review is that this isn't a game I could have appreciated six months ago.

It's one of the unexpected discoveries of this project, that in pushing myself to play all of these games has given me a new appreciation for the mechanics underlying many of them, that were opaque to me before.

Hollow Knight has a melancholy feel to it, both with the soundtrack, but also with a muted, stark palette that reinforces the Soulslike feeling.

There's not a lot of explaining what's going on, so when an NPC does have something to say, it's slowly opening up the world around me.

I still feel like there's a lot to put together to make sense of what's happening, but Hollow Knight seems:

4: Good

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July 2, 2023 - Day 183 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 202

Game: Elden Ring

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Feb 25, 2022
Library Date: Jul 2, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 33m

Here we are, at the half-way mark. There are 182 days ahead, and 182 days behind. For today, I decided on something special

Turns out, in return for my upgrading my son's computer last night, he bought me the game of my choice today... which was Elden Ring. Again.

Technically, this is not an "unplayed" game. My kids bought me Elden Ring for my birthday last year, and I attempted to play it, got intensely frustrated with it, and quit out after 80 minutes and got a refund.

I simply didn't understand that death is part of a soulslike.

However, in the process of playing through this project, I grasped the play style of a soulslike, which brings me back to Elden Ring.

In case you've been living under all of the rocks, Elden Ring is a third-person open-world soulslike action-RPG.

It's dark, and brooding, almost devoid of colour. As with other soulslikes, there are points within the game that you can return to either when resurrecting, or to (effectively) save your progress.

However, do that, and it resurrects all the mobs you just killed, doesn't it? (Yes. It does.)

There's a constant trade-off between returning to these points to restore your energy, and effective save your inventory, and upgrade, or to keep moving forward, in the hope of finding what Elden Ring calls a "Site of Grace".

Starting over from the beginning on a fresh save, I learned something that I missed first time around... when I quit out after 80 minutes in March 2022, I hadn't even completed the tutorial. The final tutorial boss frustrated me so badly, I gave up.

Probably should have gone in with a character base far less squishy too.

This time, as a Vagabond, I died twice, and I enjoyed myself.

It's still not "I MUST PLAY THIS UNTIL I AM FINISHED!", but it's definitely "I'm going to willingly spend some time in this game."

Thus, at the halfway point of #Project365ONG, I'm happy to say, having given it another shot, Elden Ring is:

4: Good

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June 9, 2023 - Day 160 - NewPlay Bonus Review
Total NewPlays: 178

Game: Remnant: From the Ashes

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Aug 20, 2019
Library Date: Jun 7, 2023
Unplayed: 2d (2d)
Playtime: 40m

Remnant: From the Ashes is a third-person souls-like ARPG, & game #5 from the June Humble Choice bundle.

The game opens with an avatar designer; while not overly complex, it was enough to be able to create a female character & make her feel like "me".

You then find yourself in a boat for a cinematic intro, while a voiceover sets the scene; after a final shipwreck, you're washed up on a post-apocalyptic shore, with a palette of mostly dark muted colours, armed only with a sword.

So... souls-like.

There's an integrated training section of the game where you're introduced to the main bads, "the Root". Creepy AF spike-shooting black & red trees can spawn out of nowhere, or drop from platforms above you where they're ...rooted... in defiance of gravity, hanging there in exactly the way bricks don't.

Once you're rescued by the inhabitants of "Ward 13", you get a couple of guns (less souls-like), and start exploring this horrifying world in which you're part of the titular remnant of humanity.

The atmosphere is incredibly creepy, and I'll probably spend some more time killing evil trees.

Remnant: From the Ashes is:

3: OK

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Jan 10, 2023 - Day 10 - NewPlay Bonus Review
Total NewPlays: 14

Game: The Surge

Platform: Steam PC
Release Date: May 16, 2017
Library Date: Aug 27, 2018
Unplayed: 1597 days (4y4m14d)
Playtime: 2h20m

I'm picking through games at random that I haven't played. Again, with no idea what I'm getting myself into.

"OK, sci-fi. Cool... WHOA!"

The whole vibe of the intro was that things were going to go sideways, I just didn't expect it to happen in quite such a visual way.

Apparently, this is a "soulslike" sci-fi game. My last "soulslike" was Elden Ring. That went so badly, I got a refund.

It could be that I didn't really grasp the gameplay loop. I did here, though, because it was making me quite cross at first.

I think I've got enough of a handle on it that I might even given Elden Ring another shot, at some stage.

Anyway, the plan was to play for 15-30 minutes, and almost 2.5 hours later, The Surge is good.

For bonus points, I was looking in my email to see when I got it, and discovered I also got The Surge 2 in a bundle that I haven't even activated. Yet.

My initial rating for The Surge is:

4: Good