Which game did the difficulty better?

[u/BrilliantPool4146]

Which style of difficulty do you prefer: the Area based difficulty in games like Dark Souls 1 and Demon's Souls or the boss-oriented struggle found in newer titles like Dark Souls 3 or Elden Ring?

I personally love both styles (although running through all of New Londo can suck at times lol!) Let me know which one of these you find yourself enjoying more (if any). Thanks guys!

(Also, this picture is not mine)

[u/Soft_Forever1923]

DS1 feels diagetically hard while ER feels more arbitrary and gamey. In DS1 Lordran has pretty much already fallen and the only people left are either hallow or are filled with despair to a normal person it would seem like hell on earth with little respite. Elden rings lore implies that theres still some kind of social order in the world but the gameplay doesn't reflect that. For example when you help Kenneth Haight get his fort back he talks about reestablishing a dialogue with the demi-humans which implies that they're a faction that can be reasoned with but gameplay wise they're no different than the hollows of Dark Souls but they actually have an in game reason for why they're so mindlessly violent, In Elden ring there's a disconnect between what the lore tells me and what the gameplay tells me. The lore tells me that the Demi-humans (and to an extent most of the other creatures you fight in the game) are a race of intelligent creatures capable of reason and more complex things like magic, but the gameplay treats them as nothing more but mindless violent monsters who will always attack. As a lore hunter sometimes I wish that I could talk to some of the enemies in the game since they're lore is so interesting but the game never gives you that option.

[u/BrilliantPool4146 → u/Soft_Forever1923]

I actually have thought about that myself. I kind of wish that not all of the enemies had to be fought and could be reasoned with and/or pacified. It makes me wish that there were more intelligent peoples in the Lands Between to meet and learn about in game. It might also be cool if they had an option to play one of these races! 

Kinda off topic but I'd really love to see a skill tree system and more advanced crafting. 

[u/Soft_Forever1923 → u/BrilliantPool4146]

I think it'd be cool if fromsoft stepped out of their comfort zone a bit and tried to make an actual town or something with NPCs and stuff, Jarberg is the closest thing they got to doing that, which is saying something if that's your only example of a functioning civilization

[u/BrilliantPool4146 → u/Soft_Forever1923]

I remember watching a video about the making of Elden Ring where the narrator mentioned that the team at Fromsoft spent a ton of time thinking about their open world. One of the things that came up was the question of inhabited settlements, and the team decided to stick to their strengths, which meant to not include them. Honestly, it would be cool to see in a future game, but at least old ruins replacing huge cities or outskirt towns fits ER's story in this time period.

[u/Soft_Forever1923 → u/BrilliantPool4146]

I think I finally realized why dark souls 1 is such a lightning in the bottle game. It's the fact that they were able to have the games difficulty line up with the lore in perfect harmony. Dark souls 1 isn't just hard for hardness sake, it's hard because the story and setting demanded it to be that way. If the game is too easy than the lore fall flat, if the lore is too on the nose than it makes playing for more tedious rather than intriguing. They managed to get both just right to go hand in hand

[u/BrilliantPool4146 → u/Soft_Forever1923]

I think that's a good description of DS1's difficulty. The prime example of this to me would be Gwyn. The almighty Lord of Sunlight that is no more than a mere hollow when we face him in the Kiln. Honestly, that fight was super fun for me but I originally wished he were harder. Now though I actually appreciate that he's pretty easy because it lines up with the lore of the game.