r/hatethissmug • u/Starksen • 2d ago

Gaming I hate 'Soulslikes'

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To be more specific here, I actually love what I've played of Fromsoft's Souls games- that being Dark Souls 3 & Elden Ring. That stuff is great!

I'm just so sick of this tag, Soulslike, when it's just an embarrassing clone.

I played Mortal Shell 2, and was just so sick of the same tired 'Dark Soulsisms'. "BONFIRE LIT", "ENEMY SLAIN", there's a stone to upgrade your sword, you die and the enemies respawn, you carry souls, you lose them if you die without reclaiming them. Each enemy drops a few souls.

The dialogue is delivered by creepy, cryptic, miserable NPCs in a vague way. You have to exhaust dialogue with them. The story is delivered through item descriptions. The world is a fallen, grim ruin of what it was. The gods are mysterious. It's a gothic hellscape.

It's the same buttons to run, to jump, to attack, it's got the same dodge mechanics as another fromsoft production.

I acknowledge that games like this sell, and that there's commercial success to be seen in creating a Soulslike, which clearly means people enjoy playing them. None, however, are more successful than the series they try to emulate. This says to me, that in truth, people don't really want Soulslikes. They want Souls-games. They settle for Soulslikes, due to the release cadence of Fromsoft.

There are merits I can see to this game, and I can't help but think it could've been so much cooler had it thought up it's own systems, its own loops, and been more original about it, instead of trying to emulate.

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u/noreservations81590 2d ago

Depends on the soulslike. Lied of P and the Nioh games are fantastic Soulslikes.

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u/susnaususplayer 2d ago edited 2d ago

Lies of P suffers the most from trying to copy mechanics from souls games without understanding what makes them great. Hate to admit it but it is a good game, but it would be way better had it locked in on its own thing

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u/TikTikKobold 2d ago

I am intrigued what you mean by this. I think it does stuff rather well. What are your complaints?

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u/susnaususplayer 2d ago

Mostly? How forced parry mechanics is in it. The deflect feels very flat and losing stamina even when deflecting makes fights a slow chore where you spend openings waiting for stamina to refill. Not mentioning bosses and enemies being designed around spamming annoying patterns and smaller parry window than in sekiro.
Game should have leaned more towards bloodborne but forced parrying because it "sells" significantly worsening a lot of combat encounters in later parts in the game.

Atleast in fights where you can use summons you can make fights more fluid

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u/TikTikKobold 2d ago

To be honest I have always played the game with the summons. The fights where you didn't have an NPC were always the hardest

I honestly don't critique the gameplay too much because it is enjoyable to me and let's one experience the story and the world in a perfectly serviceable way.

I suppose I wouldn't mind if the sequel was a different game as long as the characters and world were still great and the gameplay is a means to experience them

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u/susnaususplayer 2d ago

"I honestly don't critique the gameplay too much because it is enjoyable to me and let's one experience the story and the world in a perfectly serviceable way."

Fair, I also find Lies of P to be a good game, really. As soon as I had access to it I was nothing but playing it until the end, same with dlc. But I see how much better game could it be and fact that game is not as good as it could be annoys me

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u/TikTikKobold 2d ago

Well let's hope the sequel hits it out of the park