#Dark Souls is an ARPG

[raspberrykraken]

I’m finally in the endgame of Diablo 4, by endgame I mean Act 6 to finally finish this campaign out. I did play Diablo:Hellfire on gog, Diablo2: Resurected, and the last season of Diablo 3 plus indie games while waiting for Diablo 4 to come out. Perhaps this will be a personal retrospective of the games and being a little upset because of how the campaign panned out for D4. Spoilers below.

In the opening scenes of Diablo 4 we are already having influences from Hell on two sides. Mephisto and Lilith. The first is more secondary than the second. Oh, why you ask? Because although you were “given” her petals she isn’t able to directly influence your character at all. You find signs of her throughout the game with more petals and visions. But the core gameplay is you being distracted by shiny things across the world while pursuing her.

Yes she has cut a path of cults and killed lots of people across the world. So has her former lover Inarius with his church. Both share extreme ideals, both are sides of the same coin. Lilith has more self awareness and understanding of her status, her mission. Inarius is a pompous jerk who wants to go back to Heaven and regrets ever being with her, doing any of this of creating humans, Sanctuary, the controversial Nephalem that are wrote out from Diablo 3. They get regulated to a group solving that problem as Diablo 4 takes hundreds of years into the future.

Diablo Immortal takes place in between Diablo 2 and Diablo 3. It’s gameplay is refined Diablo 3. It’s okay.

On the side Mephisto gets to directly influence your character. Offering advice, help, guide you through certain areas. Prime Evil of Hatred who had the foresight that if he was helpful to random strangers then maybe they will help him. In previous games he was trapped but managed to influence people before being freed by his brother Diablo in Diablo 2. So definitely a mysterious character that hasn’t been explored throughly from a story perspective but this isn’t his story. Yes he can intervene as the Father, which he is as Lilith is his daughter, but he completely railroads the narrative to his side.

It boggles me that Lilith only directly talks to your character on the second time you use the Sightless Eye, an ancient magical artifact, and tries to influence you to joining her. Not whispering to you, taking to you, trying to justify her actions, how people who see her get it wrong. But no, the story is written as if its all been pre decided, which it has. I get it, can’t take any kind of risks of an ARPG game by adding the RPG elements of choices in it. Your player character has already made up their mind on the whole thing and accept her Father over her.

I know on one hand she is the villain of the game. On the other Mephisto has been too and wised up unlike his brothers. She helped create Sanctuary giving everyone something new to fight over as the Eternal Conflict will never end, she was looking for a safe place with Inarius. In the lore all this has happened before, it will happened again. Humans are just pawns in their game. And thats where the narrative is being left. Very Battlestar Galactica of it.

Exhausting is definitely the word for it. I’m not trying to justify her actions. Her and Inarius do. I just feel like there could’ve been more. And I am hoping the seasonal updates will help.

I guess I am spoiled by other ARPGs like Dark Souls series. Arguably they do give you some kind of choices, especially in Elden Ring, and I guess I wanted that.

And if you made it this far thanks. Thanks for reading. <3

[a-space-opera]

[manstoolit]

I almost lost my sanity playing Lies of P

[rikventures-art]

Looming Shadow

Commission for Parasitic-King on deviantArt, of their character Al and AveryFish's character Chester Lawrence.

Hiya all, I realise I've been putting a lot of psa posts and the like here and not much of my own art, so here's something I finished recently to help make this an art blog again c:

You may not use, copy, repost or in any way alter my art.

[brutalgamer]

Action-RPG Achilles: Legends Untold quests to consoles and PC next week

A “souls-like” aRPG? That’s the promise of Achilles: Legends Untold, which takes the Greek hero on a mythical quest.

[shuttershocky]

With regards to making iframes fit into your game, what do you think of DS2's system of having a stat that directly affects iframes? Most players think it's a poor fit for Souls at least, since they're all based on having a usable dodge so adp is functionally mandatory for at least a few levels. Do you think there's a game/series that it could work well for?

I'm not going to lie I think the idea is pretty rad actually, it was maybe just not a good fit to do it to rolls, for Dark Souls 2 specifically.

To this day, I STILL see posts from people who claim that rolling simply doesn't work in DS2, not realizing it's actually stat-reliant (even more so than it already is in DS with weight). While Dark Souls is the game about discovering things for yourself, Being Dark Souls 2 meant players (and apparently, the level and combat designers lol) were coming in with expectations molded by Dark Souls 1 where rolls were critical for defense.

But I don't think the idea itself is bad. One problem I have with many Action-RPGs is that stats are mostly damage/HP number go up without much (if any) changes to the action, leaving both halves feeling disconnected. Soulslikes having player agility (usually rolls) be affected by their weight is pretty cool, but stats affecting more things related to the action like overall movement speed, the number of iframes to a dodge, maybe even something that affects parry timings could be really cool. I'm sure there's an ARPG out there that toys with this that I'm just not remembering.

[saltminerising]

I’m getting the impression that a lot of people comparing achievements from other games to the ones in flight rising are doing so in bad faith.

It’s fine to have harder achievements in games like dark souls, bloodborne, assassin’s creed, god of war, etc. You know, games that naturally lend themselves to these kinds of level difficulties.

But if you’re going to tell me that flight rising, an online pet sim geared towards teenagers with an average player base of 3k users, should have achievements for the same level of difficulty as a boss in an action rpg, then I’m just going to have to call that bait.

This game and the expectations that come with it do not compare to the expectations of game genres like moba, arpg, and others. If you want achievements for gaming skills, then try those.

[kunosoura]

yes dark souls 2 has the worst game feel of every fromsoft arpg and yes its writing has serious flaws and yes its the black sheep of the series but I really do just love hexes so much they’re so cool and such a fun way to play shrugs

[bearersofthecurse]

These are actually such evil categories.

RPGs: Okay, this is a fine spread, of games called RPGs, ignoring that none of the games are actually about RPing, but that's fine it's what the genre is called

ARPGs: This is truly evil.... FF7R and DS in the same genre.... That is truly an evil thing you've done. That's like asking people what their favorite movie+tv genre is and one of the options has The Office and 2001 A Space Odyssey in it. Boy oh boy. Woof.

RPG Shooters: Okay. Kind of. Fallout isn't a shooter. I get the connection between the other two despite my strong hatred of one of them lol

Action Adventure: You don't think Dark Souls shares a category with LoZ??? I'm turning into the joker. They are fucking brothers.

Roguelikes: I don't play these so I have no take

FPS: Okay. FPS and Team Shooter are not the same genre. I'm sorry to do this to you Halo but Halo and CoD are in the same genre, with Apex, but Valorant, TF2, Overwatch. those are not FPSs. I love Overwatch and TF2 but I HATE CoD it's not even a game and it IS a genre difference. This one is more hair splitty though, admittedly

MOBA: Okay that's fair. I'll refrain from saying league sucks though. Oh. Fuck. sorry.

Simulation: I'm gonna cry. No Banished, no Surviving Mars, no Euro Truck Simulator, no Elite Dangerous, no Kerbal Space Program. Fucking Stardew Valley. How could you do this to me.

Metroidvania: I only know these exist because of one of my polatoms.

Horror: Most "horror" genre stuff is really just scary and not horror. This spread is pretty okay but come on where's Puppetcombo and Closing Shift. ... and go on, put Subnautica on the list too, the world won't change until the brave speak up.

Other: I can't believe you didn't give Disco Elysium a category that only has Disco Elysium in it.

Other 2: Wait where's racing games.

[montyterrible]

“How do I love thee, Lords of the Fallen 2? Let me count the ways…”

Having somewhat recently finished my first playthrough of the 2023 Lords of the Fallen, and after immediately starting a second playthrough, I wanted to put together some thoughts on the game; however, I also wanted to avoid writing another Mortal Shell - sized epic, so I am going with an internet staple: a clearly delineated list, with five entries just because. There are issues I could talk about at great length—like the enemy variety or how the “rune” system of passive bonuses equipable on weapons feels kind of boring or limited—but I want to focus on the things that I feel led to me ultimately loving Lords of the Fallen 2 overall since that feels more fun and better suited to this intentionally limiting frame than trying to say something comprehensive.

I LOVE THE LEVEL/WORLD DESIGN…

“I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight”

While I enjoyed Elden Ring and Lies of P for the most part, one area where both of those games kind of disappointed me was in their individual approaches to the recursive and generally labyrinthine level and world design people associate with the Souls­-like sub-genre of ARPGs. I thought Elden Ring was too much of an open world game on the whole, with too much empty space and checklist-style design, while Lies of P was pushing in the opposite direction, with conventional linear levels so focused that they lacked a strong element of exploration. Both of those games do have some brilliant bits, but Lords of the Fallen 2023 was just a lot more satisfying to me in this regard.

It doesn’t reach the level of flexibility that the first half of the original Dark Souls has, but it often surprised me with just how consistently good it was at sending me out from a checkpoint, spinning me around five or so times, and then leading me back to that checkpoint again (to my surprise). It’s obviously more focused than Elden Ring since it has the more traditional Souls-y structure, but it’s also frequently willing to indulge in nonessential loops or significant dead-ends, in contrast with Lies of P. Furthermore, if you don’t engage with its system of optional checkpoint creation, that requires a consumable item, then some of these loops feel especially brutal, at least on a first playthrough, given the maze-like levels and the enemy numbers and aggression being quite intense.

“World design” factors in here because A) levels do loop back to one another at times in ways that I did not initially anticipate and B) the total space you explore is so dense. It’s not all incredibly interconnected via traversable paths, but as you explore and gain an appreciation for where each area is in relation to the others, you start to notice just how layered everything is. It’s possible to look up from the bottom of the world and place things at the top (or vice versa) in a really satisfying manner. In the end, you make your way all over, down, around, and under this particular mass of land that the game’s explorable world is situated upon. The effect reminded me most of Dark Souls 3, maybe especially because that is another game of this type where there isn’t an abundance of interconnectivity but where you can see the whole world from very early on and then get to spend the rest of the game traveling through it and visiting all the locations you were shown, while also looking back (often up) at the places you already traveled through.

I LOVE UMBRAL…

“. . . [I]f God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.”

In still images, Lords of the Fallen 2 can look quite impressive visually, albeit in a sometimes “default” Unreal Engine sort of (Maximum Polygons) way, but there is a certain amount of crustiness to it when you dig in and get up close and personal. I’m not some kind of graphics obsessive or someone who really cares about console power and whatnot, but the most distinctive “current gen” aspect of Lords of the Fallen 2023 is probably the element of “Umbral,” which represents both a technical showcase and an intensification of an idea that’s been developing across other, similar games.

In Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, you can die (at least) twice thanks to the resurrection mechanic that lets you revive on the spot where you were killed to continue fighting. In Mortal Shell, losing all of your health causes the “Foundling” to be ejected from whatever “shell” it’s inhabiting, where you could keep fighting in that extremely fragile state or could scramble to get back into your body before a single hit kills you. Lords of the Fallen 2 intensifies and expands on this concept by instantly (without a loading screen) sending you to what amounts to the realm of the dead when you’re killed initially, with true death coming only if you also die in this Umbral zone. It’s actually possible to technically die again and again without resetting an area as long as you can escape from Umbral at one of the designated exit points, which crumble upon use.

Probably the most succinct way to explain Umbral is that it’s the Otherworld from the Silent Hill franchise, but entering and exiting it is completely seamless and freeform. Being in Umbral changes the game world into something more Fucked Up. Some of the changes are just visual, but Umbral does also come with new landmasses, interactable objects, and enemies as well that sit naturally beside, around, and amidst what you could see before, effectively creating the impression of a ghostly land that’s always just out of sight all around you.

One cool concept here is the Umbral Lamp, which has various active functions (like yanking the soul out of your enemies temporarily) but which will passively let you see into Umbral if you just hold it up. Doing this reveals the hidden environment and also allows a limited interaction between the planes. I tested this very early in my first playthrough when I noticed that a wall in Umbral had this grotesque protrusion that I assumed would have collision tied to it. Walking along that wall without the lamp raised was perfectly smooth, but if I held the lamp up, I’d collide with the obstacle. Keep in mind that you can pull out the lamp whenever you want and swing it over whatever part of the environment you like. I’m not technically in the know enough to evaluate exactly how impressive this is, but it’s a neat trick that feels like it might show off the hardware.

Umbral adds so much to the exploration of the game because of how any given area is essentially doubled, though not all spaces have anything meaningful to see or find in the other realm. It’s often used as a puzzle-solving mechanic, where you have to willingly enter Umbral (risking true death) to bypass an obstacle, possibly via a path that only exists in the world of the dead. A fun horror visual you encounter a few times in the game is moving, in Umbral, along the bottom of a body of water, with plant life waving and debris and corpses floating around you like the water was still present. Even when Umbral isn’t used for anything meaningful, looking into it still reveals these extra macabre environmental details, like saintly statues that appear demonic if you shine your lamp on them. I accidentally jump-scared myself at times because I’d hold up the lamp, only to find an enemy from Umbral staring me in the face, or shrieking and taking a swipe at me as I yelped and dropped the lantern, narrowly avoiding being dragged into Umbral from the ghostly contact.

I LOVE THE “DREAD” METER (AND OTHER DISPLAY STUFF)…

“I love thee to the level of everyday’s

Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.”

I’m cheating a bit with this item, but, at least initially, this is an extension of what I was talking about before. When you are in Umbral, you have a limited amount of time to explore, as the number and type of enemies that continuously spawn around you from these little statues/frozen figures intensifies with time, ultimately culminating in the appearance of a very powerful reaper-like creature that starts hunting you down. I had some narrow escapes during my first playthrough of Lords of the Fallen 2, where I entered Umbral (willingly or not) and then only just managed to reach an exit point or checkpoint to escape before triggering the reaper’s appearance, or sometimes even as it was actively chasing me.

The meter that tells you how close you are to doom is a wonderful visual, though: It’s primarily this giant eye icon in the upper right part of the screen that periodically blinks (and that shuts when you’re in a safe zone). This was honestly a huge contributing factor to me getting the game after I saw it in pre-release coverage. Rather than go with some innocuous meter or minimalist bit of design, you have this very lively, large eyeball. It’s both goofy and kind of genuinely unsettling.

Other elements of the UI/HUD have a similar level of stylization, most notably the displays associated with the Umbral Lamp and ranged weapon/magic actions. Every character has the lamp, but then the other depends on whether you’re casting magic or are using a bow or various thrown objects. You toggle between these two options with the up and down directional buttons, and holding the left trigger “opens” the selected one, surrounding the larger icon with a bunch of smaller ones indicating actions and button inputs. These are all very colorful, and the arrangement (where the smaller icons sort of ring and overlap with the larger ones) just struck me as some level of idiosyncratic. Initially, the icons are even kind of mysterious or “confusing” in a way that I liked. When you hold up the lamp, for example, you see all these little options, one of which is a skull and another of which looks like a weird fetus.

Also kind of idiosyncratic is the choice to pull the camera into an over-the-shoulder position when the player holds the left trigger to either ready their aim or raise the lamp. I like this flourish because it seems kind of unnecessarily awkward. It helps with manually aiming, I guess, but the shift also makes transitioning from melee to ranged (or lamp) options a little disorienting. In combat, it obscures your view of the battlefield, for example, and while you can still evade, it feels like exposing yourself to take on this perspective. And maybe vulnerability was one consideration here, as this is the perspective from which you use your lamp, so holding it up and peering into the dark, in a sense, is meant to create this appropriate feeling of tension or horror, which is further enhanced by your slowed movement and more limited view.

Or maybe it’s just willfully different to avoid mirroring FromSoftware’s work too directly? There’s part of me that likes that option just as much (if not more) than the marginally more profound one I described above. In either case, seeing this awkward view change in the pre-release footage also charmed me.

I LOVE THAT IT IS LORDS OF THE FALLEN 2…

“I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints. . . .”

While I was initially intrigued at the prospect of a sequel to the 2014 Lords of the Fallen, I kind of… fell out of interest with it when I started thinking about what the massive time jump and the title (“THE Lords of the Fallen,” at the time of announcement) suggested about the relationship between the sequel and its predecessor. I did finish that first game and did continue playing it afterward, and probably would have stuck with it even longer if I hadn’t been constantly stressing about backing up my save to a USB flash drive to avoid losing my data to frequent crashes, so this framing of the sequel felt kind of like a snub to me.

What got me back on board and did push me to get it was watching a little of someone’s stream around the release date. When they spoke to a particular character at the hub and he directly referenced the events of the first game, including outright using the name “Antanas,” that was the point I decided to buy Lords of the Fallen 2023. To someone who hasn’t played the first game, I don’t think any of this stuff is too obviously being carried over and will just feel like the usual Souls-like vagueness around names and events and such being dropped casually, sans context. There is part of me that wishes it was more prominent, but I’m fairly content with what I got: Aside from the antagonist Adyr technically “returning” from Lords of the Fallen 1, there are two other characters carried over and one who has a connection via his ancestry.

Having these little footholds of pre-existing investment is ultimately what helped me get interested in the new stuff, I feel. I started out not really connecting with the new characters in a hard-to-describe sort of way. The writing and characterization were fine, I thought, but there was just something “off,” like they were a touch too generic maybe (but maybe that feeling only comes from having played so many of these games now that I recognize the archetypes). Eventually, though, those feelings changed and I did care when characters started meeting their, predictably, tragic ends. Some of these “quests” were more underwhelming than others, but I started caring at some point I can’t exactly identify. I think I also missed the more conventionally RPG-like dialogue system of the first Lords of the Fallen, which is replaced here with the more distant-feeling Soulsian approach of just having other characters as good as monologue at you.

This sequel’s aesthetic ended up being more consistent with the first title than I originally thought. Some shift in the visuals that I find hard to pin down had me thinking, pre-release, that the game was going in a more grounded direction, where the 2014 Lords of the Fallen had this colorful, kind of goofy, comic-book-like look to it. Having now examined the enemy models in particular up close, I think the perceived shift is just a result of more subtle changes that I’m again not qualified to identify specifically; however, the “Rhogar” (read: demon) designs here definitely look like they belong in the same universe from the first game, so it was just some change in… lighting(?) that threw me at first. The one thing I was hoping for that never happened was for the old enemies or areas to somehow return as well as a surprise finale or something. That would have really delighted me. 

I LOVE THAT PARRYING (AND THE GAME) IS A BIT EASY…

“I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.”

Don’t get it twisted—I died a lot in this game, sometimes in ways that felt fair and other times in ways that seemed like BS, though that’s an element of even the “official,” FromSoftware-made, Souls games. I felt tension while exploring in a way that I believe enhances that exploration, and I certainly didn’t go into any fights just assuming I’d win. The threat was there. And yet, I’d say this game is probably easier than any of the other titles I’ve mentioned above, and even that the exploration and moment-to-moment fights might feel tougher than the big bosses in a way that seems awkward or even unintentional. And yet, the game still feels like a true sequel to Lords of the Fallen 2014 in this way, as my impression of some of the post-release discussion around that game was how it was in some ways a more approachable take on this style of RPG. I think Lords of the Fallen 2 carries on that tradition.

One way it does this is through making grinding an incredibly accessible process. Since enemies spawn infinitely in Umbral, it’s easy to do a little grinding without even necessarily meaning to as you simply cut down the weaker demons because they’re either in your way or just on your way (somewhere). You don’t have to constantly visit a checkpoint and reset the level to get more sources of EXP to appear and can instead just go into Umbral and let the EXP come to you.

Bosses and enemies also have simpler move sets than in the more recent other big-name Souls-ish titles, and since enemies repeat so much throughout the game, you can get pretty comfortable with them individually. Parrying, as previously noted, also feels easier. That’s partly to do with the enemy repetition giving you so many opportunities to learn their attack patterns and timings, but they also tend to attack in simple and more easily readable ways. Most of them are humanoids, so how they hold and swing their weapons (or limbs) just makes a lot of sense even the first time you encounter them. Parrying is a matter of timing a block with the enemy’s attack, rather than performing any additional inputs, which means that you can also accidentally get parries even as you simply raise your shield or weapon to defend yourself.

I thought I’d try parrying out against the first proper boss—a heavy metal angel with her feet out—just to see how it went and found it so satisfying and reasonable to pull off that it became a staple of my first playthrough. I even went with a lighter, very small shield to maximize the risk of mistiming a parry since I felt so confident doing it (and since it’s possible to regain health in this game through certain mechanics I won’t get into here). The sounds and visuals associated with parrying just felt rewarding, as were the effects associated with breaking an enemy’s stance and delivering a “Grievous Strike,” up to and including the perhaps overly chunky wind-up and splattery noises that are meant to sell the power of the attack.

I reached a point years ago, when I still hadn’t played that many Souls-esque games, where I was no longer interested in punishing duels and was more invested in novelty and mechanics (“gimmick fights,” even). I can still buckle down and learn fights if I have to—and I certainly had to when I played Lies of P—but getting to bypass that process of dying over and over and having to come to terms with the fact that you might have an hour or more of learning ahead of you before you make meaningful progress in the game again seems just fine to me. Re-playing some Elden Ring in preparation for its upcoming expansion, I just found myself kind of tired of the Margits of the gaming world. Lords of the Fallen 2 was arguably too easy at points, even for me with this mindset, but I generally just found it fun. The exploration was the thing that really drew me in—that and sometimes feeling like I was trundling through the cover art of a heavy metal album—and the fights were more so the seasoning than the meal itself.

IN CONCLUSION…

“I love thee freely, as men might strive for Right;

I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.”

This game was essentially a gift when I bought it, and if dollars and hours are equivalent, I nearly got my money’s worth with my first playthrough alone. However, I think Lords of the Fallen 2023 had the misfortune of being priced into the same associative tier as titles like God of War: Ragnarök or The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom when it lacks a lot of that polish, scale, and detail and would probably feel more at home at 50 dollars instead. It carries on a bit of its predecessor’s jank, and however massive of an undertaking it actually was to create, it has this scrappy quality to it at times when the seams really show. It was very unfortunate for it to release a month after Lies of P as well—a similar game that was both cheaper and more polished and that also had the more audacious and novel premise.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that Lords of the Fallen 2 will receive a critical/popular reappraisal in the future. That’s probably just a safe bet at this point for literally any piece of media, but I genuinely think that the stuff with Umbral and the level and world layouts are going to catch people’s attention in a wider sort of way in time, probably after a price drop or steep sale.

(Title based on and quotes above taken from Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnet 43, “How Do I Love Thee?”)

[legiongamerrd]

#Gamefemerides

Hace 10 años se lanzó Dark Souls II. Es un RPG de acción desarrollado por FromSoftware y publicado por Bandai Namco. Es el 3ro de la serie Souls. Fue lanzado para Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, y Xbox 360.

Aunque sucede en el mismo universo, no hay una conexión directa de la historia entre el primer Dark Souls y la secuela. El juego usa servidores multijugador dedicados.

#LegionGamerRD #ElGamingnosune #Videojuegos #Gaming #RetroGaming #RetroGamer #CulturaGaming #CulturaGamer #GamingHistory #HistoriaGaming #GamerDominicano #Podcast #GamingPodcast #FromSoftware #BandaiNamco #DarkSouls #Souls #DarkSoulsII #PlayStation #PS3 #PS4 #Microsoft #Windows #Xbox #Xbox360 #XboxOne #RPG #ARPG #JRPG

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[jcmarchi]

Cover Reveal – No Rest For The Wicked

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/cover-reveal-no-rest-for-the-wicked/

Cover Reveal – No Rest For The Wicked

Moon Studios cemented itself as a premier upstart studio thanks to its stellar work on Ori and the Blind Forest and Ori and the Will of the Wisps. The team is parlaying that success and experience to craft a dramatically different project it’s been dreaming about for years: No Rest for the Wicked. This dark fantasy action RPG combines influences from a variety of genres, from ARPGs like Diablo to the difficulty and thoughtful combat of Dark Souls, to the town-building of Animal Crossing, and more.

We traveled to Vienna, Austria, to visit the home (and Moon’s de facto headquarters) of co-founder Thomas Mahler. Joined by Moon’s other co-founder and CEO, Gennadiy Korol, we went hands-on with No Rest for the Wicked and filled 12 pages with our impressions and exclusive details about the game’s town-building and social features, endgame content, and early access roadmap. We also picked the brains of the two figureheads to learn how the project game to be, what to expect, as well as background on Moon’s history. 

Here’s a closer look at this month’s cover. 

Issue 364 also includes other great features, such as an eight-page deep-dive on the video game history of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. 2024 marks the 50th anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons, so we have a retrospective of the role-playing game’s colossal influence on the game industry as told by developers. With the well-received launch of Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, we caught up with Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio head Masayoshi Yokoyama to discuss the game’s themes, the growing international success of the Like a Dragon franchise, and what comes next. The issue also includes previews for upcoming titles like Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Silent Hill 2, Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, and more. 

You can also try to nab a Game Informer Gold version of the issue. Limited to a numbered print run per issue, this premium version of Game Informer isn’t available for sale. To learn about places where you might be able to get a copy, check out our official Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, BlueSky, and Threads accounts and stay tuned for more details in the coming weeks. Click here to read more about Game Informer Gold.

Print subscribers can expect their issues to arrive in the coming weeks. The digital edition launches on March 5 for PC/Mac, iOS, and Google Play. Print copies will be available for purchase in the coming weeks at GameStop.

[gertlushgaming]

The Last Oricru Final Cut Review (Steam)

 Our The Last Oricru Review takes us to an action RPG with a strong emphasis on storytelling and player choices. The player is awakening in a sci-fi medieval world at a time of war and starts influencing the destiny of the whole nation. The game is designed as both – a single-player and a coop experience.

The Last Oricru Final Cut Review Pros:

- Decent graphics. - 25.57GB download size. - Steam achievements - ARPG gameplay. - Full controller support. - Steam Deck optimization. - Graphics settings - display mode, resolution, v-sync, fps cap, DLSS, motion blur, depth of field, render scale, gamma, auto set quality, view distance, anti-aliasing, post-processing, shadows, textures, effects, and foliage quality. - Controller settings - Invert axis, camera sensitivity slider, toggle sprint, and auto Centre camera. You can rebind controls with the custom preset. - Mouse and keyboard settings - Invert axis and sensitivity sliders, camera auto center, and you can rebind the keys. - Opening combat tutorial and all-new hint system including short tutorials. - Stamina is used for attacks, rolling, dodging, and attacks. - In-game cutscenes. - Combat is sols like blocking and attacking, learning enemy patterns, and countering. - Can skip cutscenes and fast-forward interactions. - Fully Voiced characters. - Your character can have an undercut or bald head hairstyle. (in the game menu) - Inventory system to easily equip and unequip gear. - Two game difficulties - story and dark. - Auto equips gear in empty slots. - Multiple choice encounters. - Talk with characters to get more lore and have the opportunity to unlock new mission options. - Relations with factions and characters are affected by your decisions. You can also go and see what previous choices did. - Breakable objects with hidden loot. - Loot chests can be found. - Weapons have a secondary attack or a magic spell attached to them. - Three schools of magic - Fire, Void, and lightning. - Earn EXP and get points to put into your stats - life, will, vigor, strength, dexterity, and intellect. - Essence is collected from enemies and in the game, you can turn it into gold. - Split screen support and you can use a combination of the controller and mouse and keyboard. - Online Co-op with friends and randoms mode. - 3rd person perspective. - The game uses Dark Souls-like mechanics such as dropping all essence upon death and leveling up causes enemies to respawn. - Possible to just farm essence and level up and power level. - The Mana drainer allows you to steal life force from enemies and turn it into mana for yourself. - Your loadout can house two sets of weapons allowing quick swaps. - The gear will have green and red numbers for comparison. - Dismantle and upgrade equipment when leveling up. - Has the storytelling and interactions of an Elder Scrolls game but the exploration and combat of a Souls game. - The world is a huge multi-connected affair with many many shortcuts to unlock. The Last Oricru Final Cut Review Cons: - The mouse cursor keeps coming back onto the screen during cutscenes even when the controller is connected. - The slow starter then continues with a slow pace. - Icons in-game like not having the stats for a weapon are not explained. - Mission markers are not always used. - Fell through the floor a lot, especially on elevators. - Drops in the game are all just yellow orbs. - Despite the combat looking good, it soon turns into just button-mashing and is kind of boring. - Doesn't do a good job of directing you or telling you the current task. - You don't have a dedicated compare menu/button. - Minimal settings. - The game difficulty default is the harder one and to change it, it's hidden in a menu and not spoken of. - There is no mention of dropping essence or how enemies respawn. - The mission tracking is terrible. - You have to be so precise with getting pickups. - The camera goes crazy a lot of the time. - Local co-op players can only level up until they match the host and never go past them. - Local players cannot interact with characters or influence the story. - The text is small, especially in the equipment menus. - Performance hitches as you move around. Related Post: Heavy Duty Challenge Video Review (PlayStation 5) The Last Oricru: Official website. Developer: Gold Knights Publisher: Prime Matter Store Links - Steam Read the full article

[rikventures-art]

Sword Dance

"All great dragons, at one point or another, have a grand display of their magic where they are at top form." - Trial of Aether, High Class prompt

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[guywithbeer]

If you enjoy challenging souls-like games and dark fairy tales you will probably enjoy LIES OF P.

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[redd2d]

Wait, a world that interconnects on itself? Changes in one location affecting other areas? Wacky characters that move around as you progress the game?

Dark Souls is the Banjo Tooie of stamina-based ARPGs