I feel that Souls-Like is incorrectly and overly used for every new action game.

[Nuriyokan]

Disclaimer: I'm not making a huge deal about it and i understand that it's nothing more than a label.

Before Dark Souls ever released I played games like :
Ninja Gaiden
God of war
Onimusha
Dante's Inferno
NinjaBlade
Darksiders
Kingdom Hearts
Devil May Cry

I never once thought to myself that dark souls was just like any of these ^ . DarkSouls stood out and was very unique . I'll save you all the details because this is not a dark souls review , and I'd end up typing way too much.

These games used to have a genre called " HACK n Slash " or " Hack and Slash " . A game where you use a melee weapon of some sort and fight many enemies as well as a big boss . You'd take down said boss using melee attacks or a few different weapons. The genre just slowly got renamed to " Souls - Like " .

Some games I honestly don't think classifies as a " Souls-Like " .
Dark souls has the theme of dungeons and dragons , however not all dungeon and dragon games are like dark souls . The theme of medieval , or D&D isn't enough to say that a game is like Dark souls . You wouldn't call skyrim a souls like just because its medieval even if the game would have been 3rd person.

The main thing for me at least is if a game has some sort of rest area that resets the enemies and allows you to dump points into 10+ stats as well as having 100's of weapons / spells to mess with. Locking on and doing the back stab is also a feature . We can tell what games were heavily inspired by Dark Souls like :

The surge 1
The surge 2
Thymesia
steel rising
Lies of P
Mortal shell
Nioh
Nioh 2
blasphemous 1 and 2
Hollow Knight ( 2d darks souls )


These ^ all make sense because of how they are designed. they copy dark souls formula just like the new star wars game with the whole rest area and stuff. Now , games like this :

Lords of the fallen 2013
The lords of the fallen 2022
Phantom blade 0
Black myth wukong
Crimson desert
Dragons Dogma ( that's not like dark souls at all )
Dragons Dogma 2
Final Fantasy 16 ( yes people are actually saying its a souls like )
Kingdom hearts 3 ( umm no..... )
Wanted: Dead ( HOW BRO HOW ?????? )
Lost soul aside ( no )
wo long fallen dynasty ?
Rise of the Ronin ? ( feels like ninja gaiden )
nier series ? ( looks like a hack n slash game ) not souls .

Are not...

Games have had hard bosses in them before dark souls and we used to call them hack n slash games . Souls-Like means its almost 100% identical to dark souls in its design . Most games that get labeled as souls like are nothing like dark souls.

Elden Ring , Bloodbourne , and Sekiro are made by Hidetaka Miyazaki ( creator of dark souls ) so yes those are TRUE SOULS - LIKE games . Their design is 100% identical , meaning that they could have built those games and then just said it was dark souls and you'd never notice the difference outside of sekiro.

These other games aren't even like a souls game but they get labeled as one. I'm not really making a big deal about it . I understand that people can change terms and do as they please . My over all thing is that " Souls-Like " is really misleading . Now you may ask why not Lords of the fallen . I'm sorry but Lords of the fallen 2013 is not like dark souls . if anything it feels similar to darksiders in terms of combat . The only thing even close is the parry mechanic that's it.

Please explain to me how Ghost of Tsushima is like Dark souls ..... I don't get that one but I haven't played it yet either .

[Fistraiser]

Onimusha was released more than 10 years before demon souls.
Anybody who calls onimusha souls like is simply put a moron
If anything the combo parry system probably had some influence on the counter riposte system.

[Nuriyokan]

Originally posted by Fistraiser:

Onimusha was released more than 10 years before demon souls.
Anybody who calls onimusha souls like is simply put a moron
If anything the combo parry system probably had some influence on the counter riposte system.

I just view Onimusha as a hack n slash game and i would never compare the two other than saying both games have weapons and bosses but that's it.

[Fistraiser]

Originally posted by Nuriyokan:

Originally posted by Fistraiser:

Onimusha was released more than 10 years before demon souls.
Anybody who calls onimusha souls like is simply put a moron
If anything the combo parry system probably had some influence on the counter riposte system.

I just view Onimusha as a hack n slash game and i would never compare the two other than saying both games have weapons and bosses but that's it.

Oh it is.i would never relate them to each other either.
The whole souls like genre thing is something that newer gamers like to use as a term because they werent around when difficult games was the norm so they just like to slap the souls like tag on things.
Its stupid and annoying but thats how the younger generation are.

[Boralf]

You forgot Salt & Sanctuary.

[Fineous🔥]

I agree with you OP, i dont care about the labels at all not even to consider it a thing to discusss (still im extremly thankful for your contribution).

As Fistraiser said

Originally posted by Fistraiser:

The whole souls like genre thing is something that newer gamers like to use as a term because they werent around when difficult games was the norm so they just like to slap the souls like tag on things.
Its stupid and annoying but thats how the younger generation are.

Back in the days everything was a Doom clone.....now a Souls game....meh just meh.

[AstinDextor]

Your dividing what does and does not count as a souls-like is pretty arbitrary. Wo Long fits all the criteria listed, more so than Nioh, and you have Nioh as a soul-like and Wo Long not. Also I haven't played the new Lords of the Fallen but the original one was 1000 percent a souls like and even the developers said so. I don't know what your point is, but I think we have that in common.

In short: terrible, take a lap.

[EF_Neo1st]

Lords of the Falllen is souls-like:
It resets enemies on death or resting
You lose your stuff if you die
You are animation-locked (you need to wait your current action to be fully performed before being able to perform another action)
These things by themselves would be enough to make it a souls-like in terms of gameplay (amount of weapons or variety is not what makes it a souls-like gameplay)

[Sabaithal]

Disagree on Lords of the Fallen (the first one anyway). Its exactly Dark Souls I, but a bit slower and with a warhammer skin.'

You can also add Code Vein to the soulslikes list, as it is pretty much Ds3 but anime.

[B O R G]

The dragon dogma 2 case rly made me lose hope in this community

[mpcgannon]

First, I'll argue Dark Souls had the theme of Berserk, not DnD. Even if Berserk is base off DnD, we're talking about a copy of a copy not a direct inspiration.

Hollow Knight is not a souls like not even by the definition you provided before the list.

Your missing Sekiro on the list of games that are not souls likes.

In conclusion, I agree with the spirit of the thread but I believe your talking points need a bit of polish. With the reputation of difficulty for Demons and then Dark Souls, souls-like became a bit of an elitist title that everyone decided they needed to emulate. The term is so overused it means little for those looking for games like Dark Souls. It's almost as bad as roguelike.

[zab]

this guy says Elden Ring, Bloodborne and Sekiro are identical in design
insane stuff, wish I didn't read any of this

[Nuriyokan]

Originally posted by B O R G:

The dragon dogma 2 case rly made me lose hope in this community

lol

[Nuriyokan]

Originally posted by zab:

this guy says Elden Ring, Bloodborne and Sekiro are identical in design
insane stuff, wish I didn't read any of this

stop trolling .

[zab]

Originally posted by Nuriyokan:

Originally posted by zab:

this guy says Elden Ring, Bloodborne and Sekiro are identical in design
insane stuff, wish I didn't read any of this

stop trolling .

sorry that no one will give you clown awards, you tried

[Sabaithal]

Originally posted by Nuriyokan:

Originally posted by zab:

this guy says Elden Ring, Bloodborne and Sekiro are identical in design
insane stuff, wish I didn't read any of this

stop trolling .

Not a good response.