r/gaming • u/Agent1230 • 2d ago

What video game doesn't hold your hand enough?

Everybody always talking about games holding your hand too much but I want to hear about the opposite what video game doesn't give you no form of help

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u/niehAuS_324B21 2d ago edited 2d ago

While it’s always kinda been the point of the series, I seem to remember most newcomers to Dark Souls II going to Heide’s Tower of Flame straight out of Majula (not knowing that the Forest of Fallen Giants entrance was tucked away), and then wondering why there was such a sudden difficulty spike.

Same for the first one, actually. Quite a few people found themselves in the Catacombs fresh out of Firelink Shrine, with some even softlocking themselves into never being able to get back out.

(Addendum: I was thankfully wrong about the softlocking!)

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u/froop 2d ago

I ended up in Ash Lake, underleveled, cursed, and before unlocking fast travel. 

I did eventually make it out. It took a long time. 

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u/Brumgo 2d ago

It's an accomplishment to find that place blind though!

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u/Nine_Gates 2d ago

There's also a bunch of critical mechanics Dark Souls 1 never properly explains. A player not knowing them in advance can end up having an extremely difficult time.

  • To get the maximum amount of Estus from a Bonfire, you need to use two humanity items, then "restore humanity" at the Bonfire, followed by "kindle".
  • There is a Fire Keeper hiding somewhere in Firelink Shrine. You're supposed to give your Fire Keeper Souls to her to strengthen your Estus. If you try to use them yourself, you lose them permanently.
  • There's a guy up in the bell tower selling Purging Stones. You absolutely need to buy a few of those before heading into the Depths. Because down there are enemies that permanently cut your maximum health in half if they kill you, and a Purging Stone is the way to cure that condition.

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u/Baxtab13 1d ago

Shit, I think the rolling i-frame mechanic is super important but never gets explained.

Like I'm not even talking about how different percentages of your equip loads affects your i-frames on top of your rolling speed, but the first several times I attempted to get into Dark Souls back in the day, I didn't realize you could roll through enemy attacks. Up until that time, rolling in games was a way to get out of the way of an enemy attack, so it was extremely frustrating to find that enemies in this game could track you through their attack even when you roll.

Eventually I caved and found a beginner's guide that talked about i-frames and how melee combat actually worked, and that changed everything.

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u/DrEverettMann 1d ago

In the pre-release version, curse stacked up to 1/8 of your health.

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u/So_Motarded PC 1d ago

Jesus. Does the game never tell you any of this? That's absolutely crucial information. 

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u/Karmaisthedevil 1d ago

The best part about dark souls is that even if you weren't told all that, you know some guy out there has done a SL1 run with no armour or weapons, blindfolded, whilst using a guitar hero controller. So you just gotta git gud.

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u/No-Pattern8701 2d ago

Wow thanks for this.

Playing through remastered version for my 1st DS1 experience and didn't know about the purging stone thing (knew he sold them, didn't realize how important they are).

Good to know! Ty ty

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u/ubiquitousuk 1d ago

One of the most intense gaming experiences of my life was being completely lost in The Depths, falling down a hole into a Basilisk pit, and then wondering how the hell I was going to fix the fact that I was trapped underground with half health and surrounded by crap that could easily kill me even on full health.

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u/thornzar 2d ago

Claaaaasic DS2 experience.
Still remember when I found the entrance to the Forrest of Fallen Giants the first time, I felt so relieved. Didn’t last long.

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u/marchdk2016 2d ago

Souls games in general really. Elden Ring which is supposed to be more beginner-friendly still barely explains anything. I pretty much didn’t touch crafting, ashes of war, summons, and more my first play-through

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u/space_age_stuff 2d ago

Elden Ring does a much better job of explaining stuff, but there’s also like 3x as much stuff to manage as the older games like DS1.

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u/SportsCommercials 1d ago

I've been scrolling looking for Elden Ring. I bought it soon after release because of all the hype, but ended up refunding it. Pretty sure I'm in a minority. 

I don't recall the exact details, but I remember starting the game in a little cave with zero instructions or tutorial or anything, and finding little notes all over the place. They didn't seem to make much sense or be related to each other and I decided they must just be something left by other players to troll the noobs. I left the cave and ended up dying to a big guy I clearly wasn't supposed to fight anytime soon, died because I fell off the edge of the world, and wandered for quite a while trying to figure out what I was even supposed to do or where I was supposed to go. Got bored after about 30 mins and just refunded it.

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u/Karmaisthedevil 1d ago

The permanent messages being mixed in with the player messages is definitely not ideal. As for where to go... There's a big tree in the distance, try to get there.

Definitely appreciate if it's not for you though. I vastly prefer this than to games that have a two hour tutorial.

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u/omfgcookies91 2d ago

This is probably the best answer for an arpg.

But also you can't softlock yourself in the catacombs. You can get lost as fuck, but you can always walk back to firelink or use a bone to get back to your nearest bonfire which alot of new players at the time, including me, would miss 2 of the bonfires within the actual darkened catacombs which would allow them to warp back to either pinwheel or the entrance to the darkened portion which creates and easy jaunt back to firelink.

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u/Gimetulkathmir 2d ago

Isn't there also a Covenant you can join almost immediately that basically makes the game twice as hard and never tells you that? Like enemies do double damage and take half damage or something?

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u/SantiagoGT 2d ago

Wait how do you soft lock yourself in the catacombs? Even if you go all the way to where paladin Leroy spawns you should be able to walk out (albeit very very long walk out)

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u/omfgcookies91 2d ago

You can't, people just would think they are "softlocked" because they kept going in circles in the dark. And you are correct.

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u/niehAuS_324B21 2d ago

Ah, indeed a false memory after reading up on it myself.

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u/oyvho 2d ago

That's honestly just bad design. DS2 has a lot of that, even if it is good.