(Demo abandoned)

What the fuck are we doing? How the hell did Dark Souls 3 become the template for action games?

"Oh, it's the potential for good levels!" But what would good level design even look like in this context? Dark Souls 1 has a simple combat system that doesn't rely on large open spaces without obstacles. This way the player can be trusted to defend themselves in most terrain, which in turn enables designs like Blighttown, Sen's Fortress, New Londo Ruins, etc. where enemies can meaningfully interact with the level geometry. One can argue how consistently applied or successful this was in practice, but there is a solid design goal there that's still visible even up to Elden Ring (as scattershot as that game is).

As you make combat systems and enemy AI more complex though, generally you'll have to start making the simplifying assumptions of plenty of open space and no blocking terrain, which in turn restricts your level design capabilities. This is fine if you build the game accordingly, i.e. most of the classic linear action games. But Dark Souls 3 likes do not actually seem to be aware of this and so have dragged along huge amounts of bloat sections (Stellar Blade: swimming, keypads, climbing) so they can continue to pretend that the spaces between fights have any relation to the actual mechanics.

Similarly constructed arguments can also be made for the following Souls systems, which I will leave as an exercise to the reader: items, camera, pacing, leveling.

So I guess the whole point of these games is to grit your teeth so that you can experience the combat system? But is the combat really all that interesting? The camera limits how many aggressive enemies you can reasonably handle at once, and not being able to hitstun enemies with normal attacks pushes you into hit and run defensive play, which in turn pushes you to abuse the simplistic, timing-based parrying and iframe systems that all these games are cursed with. Why bother when you can just play Nioh 2, which commits all the soulslike sins above but at least has actually interesting resource management, accessible hitstun, deep weapon movesets, and so on. Why play any of these games at all when you can play Monster Hunter where the defensive, commitment driven style that soulslikes are known for is a hundred times better executed?

This whole subgenre is a complete dead-end design wise and doesn't look to be getting better anytime soon. What a mess.

One of the best action puzzle RPG with simple mechanics I have ever played. What hooked me initially is how good the combat feel is specially how smooth and responsive it is. The combat really shines with elemental swapping to use different skills or to exploit weaknesses which feels really good. The skill, level and equipment progressions are refreshingly simple and not obtrusive. Rather, the game still values mechanical skill over stats.

The other hook is the mute main character herself who is quite expressive and endearing despite her limited vocabulary. Her story is quite nice as well as how the game uses its MMORPG setting wisely which is thankfully not too meta and more sincere. Side quests are strangely non-trivial which is a nice surprise. Overall, the game is well rounded exceeding my expectation for an indie game.

While I can shower this with more praise, I do have some gripes. This game has SO MANY PUZZLES that can turnoff players, but the quantity and quality kinda make this special in this genre although it is a valid pacing concern at times. The only puzzles I do not like are timed and precision based since analog aiming may not be the most accurate specially with the added pressure of enemies or bosses. Still, it is impressive the game choose its mechanics wisely and crafted so much synergy from it.

The camera with the art style can be quite unclear in terms of the Z-axis or vertical plane where it is hard to determine if a two edges are on the same level. I do wish for an accessibility option to display walkable edges and their height (perhaps with color) to mitigate this. Without some hint, platforming jumps can feel like trial-and-error and unnecessary knowledge checks.

I do like the aspect of trading instead of merely buying outright; however, it kinda feels artificial in the late game where many merchants are bundled together each with only 4 trading item limit. It does add some flavor and intentionality, I do think it can be better streamlined if the interface allowed for more. Some trades as well require an unusual large amount of craftable items bordering on unnecessary which can be an issue.

I do have some other gripes such as aim sensitivity, but overall this delivers such a great amount of value and content as well as heart which I really appreciate. Very much recommend this game and is a new personal favorite.

Finally, a game that actually lets the player play around with freedom.

Kenshi is a very unique and I don't even know.. I'm very bad at the game I have pretty much just been running around exploring and mildly "roleplaying" for myself. But I've also had very fun even though i don't know what I'm doing.

The game is kind of hard to understand though.