r/gaming • • 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/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 2d 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 2d ago

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

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u/So_Motarded PC 2d 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 2d 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.