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"Just grind" is, in my opinion, the argument that proves all of this gatekeeping is garbage. Grinding achieves the same thing as an easy mode except it takes ho

"Just grind" is, in my opinion, the argument that proves all of this gatekeeping is garbage. Grinding achieves the same thing as an easy mode except it takes hours of mindless low-engagement gameplay to complete. Grinding has widely been considered bad gameplay for more than two decades at this point. If the game didn't have RPG mechanics and there was no mechanism to just make the enemies deal a smaller percentage of your health pool or to make your attacks deal more damage then I'd be much more amenable to the "the game is flawlessly tuned according to the developer's vision and that should not be touched" but it obviously isn't since every single player will arrive at each encounter with different character and weapon stats.

saiya-jin 5y ago
There is another point by people like me - I really would love to experience this game, but I don't have life to waste in yet another largely meaningless grinding. I have 2 kids to raise, wife to attend, work to work, real hobbies like sports to do. I've definitely grown out of putting insane hours of my life into gaming, and not going back, ever. This one-fits-all-or-goodbye approach means I'll miss this game, forever. And just as you say - only damage/defense stats would need to be tuned a bit and I could approach it. Why would that hurt anybody wanting to play it on harder level is beyond me...
- Jensson 5y ago
  > Why would that hurt anybody wanting to play it on harder level is beyond me... Two reasons, first people can't control themselves. Just like people have a hard time not eating a cake sitting in front of them they also have a hard time not using easier difficulty modes, even when they would enjoy the harder ones more. You can't just tell these people to control themselves, to them this is a really important part of the game and adding difficulty options hurts their ability to enjoy the game. Not using easy mode is as easy as not eating so much and get fat, if you could solve the issue that easily then 50% of the population wouldn't be obese. Secondly is development, if you add easy modes most testers will run the game through on easy, and the game will mostly be designed around easy. Hard mode gets run to see that it is possible, but not to see that it is enjoyable, meaning that in basically every game with multiple difficulty modes the hard mode is a boring slogfest. Fromsoft games is a breath of fresh air here, they are hard without being boring, that is its major selling point.
- darkteflon 5y ago
  It’s disappointing to read takes like this because you’re talking yourself out of what is a really special gaming experience - unique, in fact. When you use the word “grind”, it connotes that you feel the game is extracting an unreasonable price from you in order to allow you to progress: making you play the “bad parts” in order to see the “good parts”. Lesser games are certainly guilty of this! But that’s not at all what these games do. People don’t put “insane hours” into these games because of the grind - they do it because they love it. All one can ask is that you forget what you think you know, and take another look. There’s something really special here. I’ve got kids too man, I don’t have time for bullshit, but Miyazaki’s given us something really special here. I’m just thankful that in the few hours left to me each week, I can sit down and play something like this.
  - UncleMeat 5y ago
    > People don’t put “insane hours” into these games because of the grind - they do it because they love it. But I was just told to grind to level up to make the game easier. That isn't putting in insane hours for fun. That is saying "if you want to beat O&S, go spend a bunch of hours killing knights in Anor Londo for hours."
    - psyc 5y ago
      I love a lot of grindy games. What I always tell people is it’s all about whether you enjoy the core combat loop or not. The swinging and ducking and dodging and shooting and running around. If the moment to moment action isn’t fun for you the game can’t be even if it offers “goals” that you feel like you want to see.
    - darkteflon 5y ago
      I didn’t tell you that. The whole point of my comment was that you should take another look at what you’re calling “grind”, because there’s more to it. Look, you complained about gatekeeping, and about the community. This is a bona fide attempt from someone in the community to ask you to set aside your preconceptions and take another look at what the game is trying to say. If it doesn’t gel with you, well then maybe it really just isn’t for you - and that’s fine. Not every game is for every person. But changing a bunch of difficulty sliders isn’t going to fix that.

saiya-jin 5y ago

There is another point by people like me - I really would love to experience this game, but I don't have life to waste in yet another largely meaningless grinding. I have 2 kids to raise, wife to attend, work to work, real hobbies like sports to do. I've definitely grown out of putting insane hours of my life into gaming, and not going back, ever. This one-fits-all-or-goodbye approach means I'll miss this game, forever. And just as you say - only damage/defense stats would need to be tuned a bit and I could approach it. Why would that hurt anybody wanting to play it on harder level is beyond me...

Jensson 5y ago
> Why would that hurt anybody wanting to play it on harder level is beyond me... Two reasons, first people can't control themselves. Just like people have a hard time not eating a cake sitting in front of them they also have a hard time not using easier difficulty modes, even when they would enjoy the harder ones more. You can't just tell these people to control themselves, to them this is a really important part of the game and adding difficulty options hurts their ability to enjoy the game. Not using easy mode is as easy as not eating so much and get fat, if you could solve the issue that easily then 50% of the population wouldn't be obese. Secondly is development, if you add easy modes most testers will run the game through on easy, and the game will mostly be designed around easy. Hard mode gets run to see that it is possible, but not to see that it is enjoyable, meaning that in basically every game with multiple difficulty modes the hard mode is a boring slogfest. Fromsoft games is a breath of fresh air here, they are hard without being boring, that is its major selling point.
darkteflon 5y ago
It’s disappointing to read takes like this because you’re talking yourself out of what is a really special gaming experience - unique, in fact. When you use the word “grind”, it connotes that you feel the game is extracting an unreasonable price from you in order to allow you to progress: making you play the “bad parts” in order to see the “good parts”. Lesser games are certainly guilty of this! But that’s not at all what these games do. People don’t put “insane hours” into these games because of the grind - they do it because they love it. All one can ask is that you forget what you think you know, and take another look. There’s something really special here. I’ve got kids too man, I don’t have time for bullshit, but Miyazaki’s given us something really special here. I’m just thankful that in the few hours left to me each week, I can sit down and play something like this.
- UncleMeat 5y ago
  > People don’t put “insane hours” into these games because of the grind - they do it because they love it. But I was just told to grind to level up to make the game easier. That isn't putting in insane hours for fun. That is saying "if you want to beat O&S, go spend a bunch of hours killing knights in Anor Londo for hours."
  - psyc 5y ago
    I love a lot of grindy games. What I always tell people is it’s all about whether you enjoy the core combat loop or not. The swinging and ducking and dodging and shooting and running around. If the moment to moment action isn’t fun for you the game can’t be even if it offers “goals” that you feel like you want to see.
  - darkteflon 5y ago
    I didn’t tell you that. The whole point of my comment was that you should take another look at what you’re calling “grind”, because there’s more to it. Look, you complained about gatekeeping, and about the community. This is a bona fide attempt from someone in the community to ask you to set aside your preconceptions and take another look at what the game is trying to say. If it doesn’t gel with you, well then maybe it really just isn’t for you - and that’s fine. Not every game is for every person. But changing a bunch of difficulty sliders isn’t going to fix that.