Too much artificial difficulty

[Lahoo Eckbert]

Way too many locked rooms where you have to go through a gauntlet of enemies. Combat ain't this games forte, I think they overdid those encounters this time around.

[Lahoo Eckbert]

Originally posted by gungadin22000:

You don't seem to be enjoying the game. Maybe you should play something else?

Yeah I just alt f4'd after 5th wave of the gauntlet popping up an enemy I haven't seen before throwing energy balls that take chunks of your hp even with elemental resistance rosary bead. I'll try a refund we'll see.

[gungadin22000]

I recommend using the large AoE prayers, they tend to clear chaff quite well. Additionally, the parry of the sword and rapier is very powerful and can allow you to stand in front of quite a few enemies completely unharmed, such as the very dangerous candlestick skeletons. Parry, retaliate, victory.

[HighLanderPony]

Bleeding Miracle makes most trash mobs trivial.

[Kaarel]

Originally posted by Lahoo Eckbert:

Originally posted by Kaarel:

There's a lot more kill rooms in this game than B1 i agree. I didn't have any problem since the combat for me is very enjoyable but people have different tastes. I fully sympathise.

I'm trying to figure out a way to clear the one in elevated temples where a big enemy spawns at the end, the dude on a bed carried by others and keeps shooting energy balls and each take 1/3 of my hp with 2 health upgrades.

I think those forced gauntlets are the worst feature of the game. They are too difficult and not fun.

Resistances are key for you to get out of these scenarios. Dashing also has full invul frames through the whole thing until the end, also try to jump right before the electrical spheres pop out, they follow the last position they track right before they fire. Time your dashes to go through them too, but my reocmmendation is that you equip your Rosary with elemental resistances, you will find items around in the same area usually that will hint you what kind of damages are there.

Do not give up just yet, the worst is still to come lel. Jokes aside, if you need to take a break just do, and come back later to the game.

[The_Chariot]

Originally posted by HighLanderPony:

Bleeding Miracle makes most trash mobs trivial.

This.

Blood boomerang and blood wheel are very strong and with added mystical and elemental damage resonances you can burn through most off the bosses like nothing.

[Belphegor]

blasp 2 def felt ez'r than blasp 1

[kevintheradioguy]

I feel like it's one of the biggest points of the genre, no?

[SMJSMOK]

Originally posted by Lahoo Eckbert:

Combat ain't this games forte

That's a...surprising take. Isn't the gameplay mostly combat + some light platforming?

[fakename]

Thank god there's still some difficulty in this game! In my opinion it doesn't go hard enough. In the original, the developers had to patch it to make certain spike pitfalls less dangerous, and in this game you don't even die from spikes!

If anything I wish the combat got more difficult sooner. It's hands down less difficult than the first game, which is fine, that game still exists and I expect any DLC they make to get a little crazier. But jeez, stop encouraging devs to baby us.

[BastardSword]

Originally posted by Lahoo Eckbert:

I'm trying to figure out a way to clear the one in elevated temples where a big enemy spawns at the end, the dude on a bed carried by others and keeps shooting energy balls and each take 1/3 of my hp with 2 health upgrades.

These guys can be annoying but I find the best thing to do is dash through them because they only shoot their balls in one direction. So if they are shooting to the left and you dash through bed bro to the right, you won't be hit at all and you'll be able to get in several hits. You don't even need air dash, you can just ground dash.

There's another really annoying enemy that has a sword that can shoot out a bunch of red homing balls, again best thing to do is when he starts casting dash behind him so he is facing away from you while shooting his balls, they will just fly off screen and you'll be able to get in a bunch of hits.

As for gauntlet rooms I find them fun now but they were annoying at first. The quick prayer that shoots out a red wave along the ground is REALLY effective, jump and use it and it will get in a bunch of hits as it falls through the enemy, then sit on the ground for a bit and cause more damage before it starts rolling. The skeleton candelabra guys are the worst gauntlet enemies for me because they stunlock me to death if they gang up on me and I can't parry them, but they die pretty easily to this prayer.

[Lahoo Eckbert]

Sadly my refund didn't go through because my playtime exceeded 2 hours so I'll have to wait for a nerf patch.

Originally posted by SMJSMOK:

Originally posted by Lahoo Eckbert:

Combat ain't this games forte

That's a...surprising take. Isn't the gameplay mostly combat + some light platforming?

No, not really. First game was mostly platforming and very little mandatory combat(most enemies you can run past).
I think the devs mistakenly thought being able to avoid enemies was a bad thing and they littered the place with those gauntlet rooms, added more weapons and upgrades and shifted the focus towards more combat. It's a game where you get staggered and take damage when enemies touch you, there is no way the combat can be "good." It can at best be alright.

[Lahoo Eckbert]

Originally posted by BastardSword:

Originally posted by Lahoo Eckbert:

I'm trying to figure out a way to clear the one in elevated temples where a big enemy spawns at the end, the dude on a bed carried by others and keeps shooting energy balls and each take 1/3 of my hp with 2 health upgrades.

These guys can be annoying but I find the best thing to do is dash through them because they only shoot their balls in one direction. So if they are shooting to the left and you dash through bed bro to the right, you won't be hit at all and you'll be able to get in several hits. You don't even need air dash, you can just ground dash.

There's another really annoying enemy that has a sword that can shoot out a bunch of red homing balls, again best thing to do is when he starts casting dash behind him so he is facing away from you while shooting his balls, they will just fly off screen and you'll be able to get in a bunch of hits.

As for gauntlet rooms I find them fun now but they were annoying at first. The quick prayer that shoots out a red wave along the ground is REALLY effective, jump and use it and it will get in a bunch of hits as it falls through the enemy, then sit on the ground for a bit and cause more damage before it starts rolling. The skeleton candelabra guys are the worst gauntlet enemies for me because they stunlock me to death if they gang up on me and I can't parry them, but they die pretty easily to this prayer.

Yeah I figured those guys out. You can't dash through most big enemies(which is a terrible terrible feature) so I didn't try dashing through them at first but then I did and owned em.
The new problem I face is the sword dude with the red energy balls, he is fast and very tanky and he spawns after two big hammer dudes which are also pretty hard to defeat unless you position your self correctly.

[fakename]

Originally posted by SMJSMOK:

Originally posted by Lahoo Eckbert:

Combat ain't this games forte

That's a...surprising take. Isn't the gameplay mostly combat + some light platforming?

Yeah, I mean it has boss fights, but it's a little bit of everything: combat, platforming, exploration, and puzzles (mostly in the form of secrets) in that order.

The games have their own approach to combat which is very deliberate. Enemies are extremely simple, they only do 1-2 or 3 different actions at most. But if you don't take advantage of their pattern, and try to force your own way which isn't the right way, you will get pushed around and take damage which feels frustrating.

There's 3 different weapons in this game and many different spells, you're supposed to use what's best for each situation. For example the small dagger wielding enemies can't be hit by the rapier's standing attack, and if you try to use it on them while ducking then the damage and stun is just not enough to stop their movement and you will get hit over and over. Most spells (the fast prayers) melt individual enemies when aimed correctly.

Keep in mind you can easily run past enemies while traveling from place to place, it's not until very late in the game that a screen is so dangerous you will take stray hits from trying to do this. There's only a couple of large enemy types that can't be dodged through, and the dodge is completely invincible for its duration. The giants with the maces have ONE attack with a very obvious startup, which you simply have to dash away from and jump over (or dash through, in the case of the lightning ones).

Blasphemous 2 is hands down easier than the first game because you have so much less delay between actions, especially with the dodge. Combat is definitely a greater focus in the sequel for this reason. I'm sure, given how long the game's been out, most players haven't yet gotten really good at doing advanced stuff like rapidly using the different weapons' unique moves while swapping between them. The ceiling for doing that stuff is much higher in this game than in the first one, where moves like the charge attack and the falling attack were almost impossible to use effectively in fights.

You will definitely die in this game's more difficult rooms, where you have 3-4 enemies on the screen at once. But it's not as frustrating as a lot of games, and dying in video games is normal and it should be expected.

[domuinor2]

Originally posted by fakename:

This...but I must say the "choke points" with enemies spawning are waaay to much in this one, not that hard(until the final stage) but they are boring and a little lazy.
In the first one there were like 3 or 4 of them in the all game(without counting the arena) and they give you some good stuff...here most of them give you only ability points(and you can farm them anyway by fighting), Idk I would prefer a mini boss with different patterns than 10 enemies with the same pattern, maybe more variety on the enemies.

[Crusta]

skill issue

seriously the difficulty curve in this sequel is just on point