Elden SoulsBorne: Felyne Village - the FROM thread

Jim's tactic there has gotten me through the entirety of DS1, 2, 3 and ER without a single summon, so I'd say its valid.

I thin BB I was more dexy but that's kind of how the game is designed.

I ended up playing as a magic katana build in Elden Ring, so dexterity plus intelligence. Chop 'em up with the katana and some spells to pepper them at range. I eventually got a katana with a magic shockwave special attack that I used for the rest of the game.

Magic Katana sounds cool

There's a class that starts with a katana and a bow if I remember rightly. The katana I found was really tough to get - locked behind a nasty boss that I definitely fought too early - but carried me through the rest of the game after getting it.

I'll have a look when XVI is done and bunch of other games but July* is meh that it good look in then.

*Be interesting what games Andy use for his July Quiz.

I've started on Elden Ring. Really looking forward to it, given its sitting in the centre of the Venn Diagram of 2 games series I love*. Although so far there's been an unbeatable enemy which is: the PS5 Wi-Fi connection. I've been chucked out 3 times in an hour (although the PS5 itself never registers that it's been disconnected, implying that it's only going off for a fraction of a second). So I'm probably going to have to play offline, this denying me such helpful messages as "try finger ahead, but hole"

*Of course I'm talking about Ape Escape and Bubsy the Bobcat

I think my copy is mega-cursed in fact. Not just the online thing, but, feeling not so inspired, I just hit the "similar face" things several times.
Which resulted in:

Uh... isn't that?

Now Luke has to grow that beard

I'd normally chalk it up to "curse of the bald white man", but that genuinely could be Luke with different facial hair.

Yeah that actually is bang on.

I'm now at the point where I think my screenshot looks more like you than you do

Double posting: I'm terrified of playing a Souls-y game with a lot of freedom, and have followed the first piss lines up to the tower where there's what I remember from previews to be the first proper boss. I've also chosen to make I-don't-think-it-looks-like-Buska-anymore a magic lad, and I've never played any Souls game without either being a big-stick-smasher or a whizzy-fencer. I presume there's nowhere I was supposed to "find" on the way that'd give me some mega-helpful item?

Er... if not obvious, perhaps don't suggest things - I should probably do this properly!

Buska, I did click that, if only to see whether I was just doing something dumb! I should point out that, before I wrote that, I hadn't even been given access to the Firelink Shrine equivalent! And I've been scared to deviate from the main path, at least to start with, for that reason. Which I may do a bit, if only to find someone who can help out with my (for me in a Souls-y game at least) experimental build.

And I beat that first big lad. And I found the map I was supposed to find beforehand.

Really this has been embarrassing so far.

It wouldn't be a Souls game without some embarrassing failures, plus it could always be worse, back when ER launched one streamer I watched got stuck in the far east of the map for like 2+ weeks because he's so stubborn about exploration & wouldn't give up an area he clearly wasn't ready for yet.

I’ve played something like 5 to 10 hours of Shadow of the Erdtree now. I paid basically the same as a full-price game for it because I had to use my European account and pay in pounds sterling, which the yen is abysmal against right now.

I don’t feel remotely short-changed. This is a huge expansion, I saw the Bonfireside Chat boys say its basically Elden Ring 2 and I don’t think they’re that wrong to say it. I’ve had a couple of those incredible moments where a mindless wander down a side path unlocks a part of the map as big as everything I’ve seen so far.

It also hasn’t been taking the piss in terms of difficulty so far. Regular enemies can get me if I don’t pay attention, but if I’m on my game they go down in one or two swipes. Of the named, health-bar bosses I’ve fought, one was tough but essentially just because it was my reintroduction to this game’s combat. Another was a visual spectacle and a cool battle, but went down in two or three attempts. And one more was an absolute breeze.

The new DLC-exclusive pseudo levelling encourages exploration nicely and evens the playing field for characters. The game looks stunning, though I’ve had one moment which made me really feel that I was playing a game made for PS5 players on a PS4.

Spoiler:

I’m really digging this. Its almost on the scale of what TotK would have been if they’d actually released it as a BotW DLC instead of a standalone game.

I did think from what I saw and how people talking, SotE basically be it's own game why a expansion not dlc in same way CDPR talk about it or the old days of PC Gaming.

Aye it's something else, though I haven't played for like 2 & a half days now due to being a wee bit overwhelmed by the exploration side of it. Just need to pick a route and stick it out & I'll be back into the rhythm.

Buska's spoiler chat: