Someone made a great little retrospective about the history of From Software and how Dark Souls came to be. If you haven't played Dark Souls you should definitely buy a copy as it was easily the best game of 2011. It's coming to PC soon for anyone who's not into console gaming.
It probably appeals to the same kind of players who liked stuff like Megaman in the sense that the levels are probably difficult so that the player must re-do them until he/she gets a sense of memorization and skill from studying the level design
which is likely a niche that SAx falls into and seems to not go over as well with the ADD generation
the levels are probably difficult so that the player must re-do them until he/she gets a sense of memorization and skill from studying the level design
Not quite, in Dark Souls you're given the tools to overcome any obstacle as soon as you leave the starting area. Any time you die after that is your own fault for either not being patient, underestimating an enemy, or simply not bothering to learn the controls. Though Dark Souls is known for being difficult, there are no cheap deaths. Everything is on you.
I don't mind difficulty as long as it isn't rage inducing. Like Super Meat Boy. That game will make you throw your computer out the window. Its sole purpose is to get you mad.
I played through Super Meat Boy, and while it's quite frustrating, it's the good kind of frustrating. When you die, it's because you aren't skilled enough, unlike other games whose sole purpose is truly to just get you mad(such as IWBTG). Every time I got mad at SMB, I was mad at myself for making a stupid jump or not dodging something properly, I never felt anger towards the game because the game wasn't cheating me, it was just hard.
These games definitely aren't for everyone, and if you can't stand admitting that your skills are what's at fault, they're definitely not for you. They're for people who like to challenge themselves on a more rewarding level than getting your numbers higher than someone else's numbers.
I've never played Dark Souls or any of its predecessors, but I definitely intend to get it for PC when it's released.
I don't really consider it skill unless you're able to beat the stage in one or two tries. Otherwise it's just you learning the stage and recognizing when and how everything happens. Most people beat each stage after playing it 50 or 60 times. It's not really skill, it's "I know this stage like the back of my hand at this point so now I can breeze through it." Which is why as soon as they beat it, they repeat the process all over again: lose tons of times, then once they've memorized when the rockets shoot out, or how long they need to jump, they beat it.
Anyone can beat something once they've memorized all the patterns and can easily anticipate when everything will happen. Which is why I don't really like it. I can't beat it early enough for it to count as "skill" and when I win it isn't satisfying because once you've played the stage enough times, it sort of becomes easy mode and is no longer a challenge.
Similar to how you have videos of people walking all over Megaman bosses.
They're only able to do that because they've done it several times. I dare you to find someone that beat every Megaman boss on their very first try, and not after they played it so much they memorized the boss attack patterns and knew exactly when to dodge, when to attack, etc.
