Current Events > Lowering Elden Ring's difficulty would break the game itself says Miyazaki

(+) Yeah! (+)

You will need to be a lot more specific than that my good man, there are a lot of giant dudes in this game. You mean these goobers?
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/1/1bbb5a28.jpg
Level 9 seems pretty low to be around that area if I remember correctly, try exploring elsewhere in Limgrave, I believe you're in the northwest or so if this is the guy? There's another couple of these guys dragging a caravan around in Limgrave, but they're easier to take out since they're tied to the caravan so they can't really move well.

That's where we disagree, though, and where I disagree with the developer sentiment expressed in the OP. I do think the game could have been made more approachable in a very simple way that could have been easily ignored by anyone who did not want an easier or less challenging experience. To me, it reads like a cop-out, like a flimsy excuse.

Like I said, if he had just said instead "you know, we could have done this, but we just didn't feel like it", all I could really do in response to that would be to shrug and say OK. I might still not personally like that sort of take, but I couldn't exactly say it was wrong.

Sure, but I'm sure you know that isn't really a satisfying substitute for immersing yourself into a game/world you wanted to try experiencing firsthand. If it were, you would never buy/play any video games and just hop on twitch/YT/whatever to watch other people play them for free.

Pot, kettle, etc.

I love how people throw around the word gatekeeping

The community welcomes people with open arms to enjoy the games as they are.

Thats not an invitation to wine and complain one of the core tenets of the games isnt for you and needs to be changed.

hey I see a lot of people eating this thing and it looks really good, can I try that?
sure but its spicy
oh I dont really like spice
okay.
yeah thats too spicy change it.

I love how people throw around the word gatekeeping

The community welcomes people with open arms to enjoy the games as they are.

Thats not an invitation to wine and complain one of the core tenets of the games isnt for you and needs to be changed.

hey I see a lot of people eating this thing and it looks really good, can I try that?
sure but its spicy
oh I dont really like spice
okay.

"Does it come in mild?"

"Does it come in mild?"
"The restaurant has no obligation to sell it in mild why don't you respect their vision stop trying to change this food that's in my hand also I lied it's not actually spicy at all you just have to use the shield/dodge roll"

If youre using restaurant analogies, Id say its like asking a place called Death Tacos to change their recipes just for you, when you can just open the taco and take out anything you dislike, though you cannot completely remove everything.

Internet People refusing to understand the point of the analogy:

your analogy is bad.

"Does it come in mild?"
"The restaurant has no obligation to sell it in mild why don't you respect their vision stop trying to change this food that's in my hand also I lied it's not actually spicy at all you just have to use the shield/dodge roll"

no. Its spiciness is what has attracted people to enjoy it in the first place. But its not an insurmountable level of spice. Anyone can enjoy it, some may need to work up to it more than others though.

no I just dont like spice, change it.

I like how you just paraphrased back to me the part where you backpedaled on it being spicy.

interestingly im actually seeing a lot of players unhappy with how difficult the dlc is, and considering who you have to beat to even access the DLC, I dont think these are the people who beg for an easy mode.

Some of the posts on the elden ring subreddit are like war zones lol.

If we're talking bosses I'm out. I can't be spoiled by anything

@ssb_yunglink2

I find that interesting. Are there particular bosses they are complaining about? Feel free to hide in spoilers if it would upset others. I don't care about boss names.

I have beaten a total of 11 bosses (out of like 40 I think?), with 2 major. A couple have been a big pain in the ass, but nothing worse than Mohg for sure.

If we're talking bosses I'm out. I can't be spoiled by anything

so a lot of complaints are about the frame rate in general taking some huge hits, especially during some of the boss fights.

Some of the bosses ive seen mentioned repeatedly are The lion and Rellana.

The camera was a little crazy, but that first boss you mentioned is cake. The second, yeah, pain in the ass. But still, not as hard as Mohg.

also the golden hippo has been brought up a lot. Apparently theres a massive difference between NG and NG+ in terms of difficulty of the dlc

I like how you just paraphrased back to me the part where you backpedaled on it being spicy.

And he was never seen again.

Apparently theres a massive difference between NG and NG+ in terms of difficulty of the dlc

also the golden hippo has been brought up a lot. Apparently theres a massive difference between NG and NG+ in terms of difficulty of the dlc

interestingly im actually seeing a lot of players unhappy with how difficult the dlc is

Those complaints will swiftly go away, once you get your Scadutree Blessing levels up it becomes much more manageable as people are finding out. Don't even have to keep leveling normally, I got mine up to level 6 and it made a world of difference with my 150 character. I think you can get 10 or so levels without ever fighting a single boss.

Judging by your feedback, Pathologic 2 is actually balanced in a way that achieves all that.

However, we have received clear feedback that the game is too hardand we dont think that everyone who says that misses the point of the experience. People are different and have different attention spans and patterns. So were fine with allowing the players to tweak the game a bit to account for this fact.

Our games have always been in a curious spot. Some people only finished the original Pathologic and The Void using cheat codes. So while in theory these players agreed with our stance on games as a medium for creating compelling experiences, in actuality they didnt reallywellexperience what we had in store for them. Which is, of course, understandable. Not everyone wants a life-changing experience every time they launch a game. Sometimes people only want a cursory glance.

Well, wed rather give people a tweaked experience than none at all.

So, in the coming 2-3 weeks well introduce a difficulty slider to Pathologic 2. Youll be able to tweak the game mildly, within the limits of what we consider intended difficulty, and also set it the way you want, if you want.

But we hope that you dont. Pathologic 2 is supposed to be almost unbearable, otherwise the effect is lost. We concede that everyone has their own limits to push. But we strongly advise against making the game easy for yourself.

However, we do like the notion of giving you this freedomand this responsibility. This way, the achievement of resisting the temptation and finishing the game on intended difficulty becomes even more true and vivid. And thats the kind of effect we deeply appreciate.

Pathologic 2 (A much harder game than any From game) obliterated this ass logic years ago:
https://youtu.be/q00T0xxj2o0?t=2417
https://steamcommunity.com/app/505230/discussions/0/1653297026046920037/

They released a game.
It was really hard. It was intended to be hard. The Devs wanted it to be hard and the intended purpose of the game was that you died over and over. Part of the art/story and emotion was built on that rockbed. You actually suffer permanent negative effects from dying that you can't save scum out of.

People complained the game is too hard.
Devs added in optional difficulty settings and openly said "We don't like these and don't want you to use them since it's not the experience we intended but since you wanted them here they are as an option."

Then everyone got to enjoy the game and absolutely nobody suffered in any way whatsoever. The fanbase is fantastic and there is no toxicity at all of any note.

The devs even noted that a ton of people who played their games just used cheats and mods anyway so why not just make it easier for them if that's the experience they wanted even if the devs didn't.

Just immediately inadvertantly proves that the Dark Souls nonsense is purely because their fans are largely toxic and the devs know that, so they play to them. Not for any actual benefit beyond feeling superior to others. The reality is difficulty settings would be easy as pie.

But the fanbase is so toxic, the devs know they make more money by feeding the toxicity that they are "better" than the "plebs" who need to "git gud"

The "You cheated not only the game, but yourself. You didn't grow. You didn't improve. You took a shortcut and gained nothing. You experienced a hollow victory. Nothing was risked and nothing was gained. It's sad that you don't know the difference" fan grift

Edit: You can also make the game even harder than the devs intended if you're into that too. Literally everyone won.

i'm several bosses deep into the DLC and so far i've found them all to be more difficult than malenia. they are definitely designed with purposely taking advantage of players' expectations and reaction times

one of them thus far has managed to feel like an actual dance though, and it might be my new favorite in elden ring

overall im disappointed with the bosses aside from OSTs tho

also i havent found any easy yet, and im pretty damn good at the game

Ah yes, the widely acclaimed Pathologic 2 with a peak concurrent player count of *checks steam charts* 1,400 players.

Are you NG+? Because I have fought 11 bosses (2 major) and nothing even close to Melania. Apparently my not being NG+ makes it easier.

Also the Emoji Movie is better made than Schindler's List since it made more money and more people watched it.

baseball sells more tickets per year than football so that means it's a better game. i can make terrible comparisons too lol.

i'm guessing you saw a bunch of attention being thrown around and wanted in on that. you should be embarrassed. fucking sheesh.

stop trying to get attention from me dude. shoo.

You're literally supporting the guy youre responding to if you think the popularity equals better argument is stupid

UR said pathologic 2 was able to provide difficulty modes and the fanbase accepted it and still enjoyed not using it if they didnt need to. That was then responded to with nobody played it tho as if popularity means anything.

So youre now agreeing with arguments made to support difficulty modes.

he was accidentally proving me right

that's not what happened at all, but you're just here to shitpost and nobody on the forum takes you seriously and i'm not going to be the first.

Yup

Guy was so eager to argue wuthout thinking that he didn't even realize he was accidentally proving me right

Those complaints will swiftly go away, once you get your Scadutree Blessing levels up it becomes much more manageable as people are finding out. Don't even have to keep leveling normally, I got mine up to level 6 and it made a world of difference with my 150 character. I think you can get 10 or so levels without ever fighting a single boss.

Elden Ring has made a tiny fraction of what Dungeon Fighter Online makes in money and playerbase. So by your logic Dungeon Fighter Online is an infinitly better game with better design and Elden Ring should be more like Dungeon Fighter Online?

Also the Emoji Movie is better made than Schindler's List since it made more money and more people watched it.

Look how quickly the goalposts were moved. AND on top of that, the new moved goalpost logic of "Well your example is a smaller game and therefore I can ignore all the raised ironclad facts" boils down to "It makes money so that's why they do it."

Which is exactly what I said. This is the toxicity I'm talking about. There's no artistic justification whatsoever, it's just that the fans feel good about putting other people down and gatekeeping. So there's a grift to be made there.

Edit: On a petty note, Patholigic 2 actually has a higher very positive rating than Elden Ring on Steam so the "acclaimed" part doesn't even work for the elitism.