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No wrong answers here. Just personal opinions. But if you're going to label people as "brain dead", then I doubt you've even considered the prospect of someone "not getting it" even if the game spelt it out in neon lights.
After all, There's everyone's favourite example on gamers not thinking for themselves, DarkSydePhil. He can't even read in game tool tips and prompts. Who's going to save this poor man from himself?
Be extremely careful when using sweeping generalisations. They're very often not accurate. Besides, you already answered your own problem. If they didn't get it from the game's own hints and information, then it's easy enough to "Just google it" and get the answers that way. It's your copy of the title, why should you care about "someone else#s opinion" on the "right" way to play it? I agree that the best way to play a Soulsborne title is blind, but even I'm going to be throwing out wiki links, video guides and advice if people are looking for it. Same answer to anyone "demanding the game be played in this manner or not at all". You do whatever you feel you need to do to enjoy the title, Internet keyboard warriors be DAMNED!
Now that's out of the way, let's get back on topic.
The issue here is that you're assuming that since you didn't get the hint from the NPC's message, that no one else got it. It's a similar issue that's currently being shown from people not understanding the new Nier's save system, or most of the unclear or weirder aspects of the Soulsborne titles. Fun fact, I didn't know what hitting the lever did after defeating the Dung Defender did until a mate told me. I just thought that the area it drained was open already, and that I just kept missing the entrance to it before.
This is an issue that's usually blamed on too many games "hand holding" players, or outright telling or walking the player through the actions needed or indeed what they can do. Which then leads to people not actually trying to solve it themselves and just "giving up" if they can't find the answer. By leaving it vague and offering snippets here and there, it promotes the player to either experiment with the surrounding area, or indeed to "stumble" upon something they didn't know they had, or indeed to try out this new skill elsewhere. Indeed, the large majority of lore and information on the Soulsborne titles can be found and worked out from the item descriptions and objects in the world rather than directly from the NPCs or cut scenes.
It's pretty much down to the genre or the setting of the game. Most Metroidvanias offer a "show, don't tell" approach to world unlocking or technique teaching. As for "people not knowing about it means they're going to be put off from the title", it leads to the unfortunate question of "why did they buy the game in the first place?" being asked. Most people refer to the Souls series when talking about Hollow Knight, and the original "metroidvania", Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, also was very tight lipped about it's own mechanics. And yes, The Souls series of games are spin offs of Metroidvanias, if being more about boss killing and gear rather than learning new moves and unlocking zones. You had access to most of the games "spells" from the very start, only the player doesn't know the input required for the spell, and for some of the stronger effects, lacks the MP required to pull them off.
There are however clues and means to work out the answers under your nose. Symphony of the Night has spell scrolls telling the player what to hit to cast the spell, and the MP cost of it. Knowing these in advance allows the player to cast something "earlier" than normal otherwise. You just needed to find them...
To bring it back to the examples in the thread, the Hunter's Journal mentions that the shade is "an echo of a previous life.". Taking this, and what the NPC calls "regrets", you could put the two together from that. Or indeed thinking about what the character could of lost in the first place which the NPC could "find floating around" in the first place. Of course, they need to have found the Hunter as well as slain their shade in the first place, but there has to be a line here somewhere. "Explore your surroundings" shouldn't be a tutorial for ANY game in this genre, no matter how "dumb" we're going to assume the players are.
"Easy when you know how", I know, but there's not much else for the game to be referring to. Indeed the harder part to put together is the eggs, but the game does offer a small hint by referring to the egg as "generally not considered edible". Odd place to mention that, right? There's an NPC down in the waterways that sells the eggs as "food they've found", and there's your answer.
As for the downward attack effects on the player, that's the experimental part. After all, there's areas of the game that offer shielded foes hovering over spikes or acid. The bounce mushrooms offer a risk free practise area for the move, and then the player can either try and repeat the move on those targets to clear the hazard, get access to areas by using the mushrooms, or indeed on other foes in the game as a method to attacking them from another angle (RE: Shield users in the Crossroads) or as a means to pile on pain from "pogoing" them away from any counter attack or contact.
And...given the nature of the game not spelling things out directly, I'm spoiler tagging this. Childish, yes, but I think it's better to
There's also a mind blowing fact about this downward swinging pogo effect. You can use it on SPIKES AND BUZZSAWS DIRECTLY, and this is REQUIRED to clear some of the trickier areas of the White Palace climb, as well as a means to attempt to avoid damaging yourself if you happen to fall into them in the first place. Granted if the object or enemy is moving too fast upward then it's going to hurt you regardless, but the areas that require the move it's used to save your double jump to avoid landing groin first into the next saw, or for the height needed to progress. I knew about the attack "pogoing" on enemies, but I didn't know you could use it on spikes until the bounce mushrooms. Then it was a matter of trying it and seeing if it could work or not.
Last small point.
Consider what the other posters have said. Most of the time, the player's reaction to dying and the shade spawning would be to return to the zone in question to retrieve what they lost. So it's not that useful if the large amount of time people aren't going to risk travelling back to Dirtmouth. I'd consider working out how to use and where the fast travelling points are is a higher priority than a "Bloodstain retrieval service". And consider the cost and location of the shop. This isn't viable for early game usage, given that the key is expensive. And there's also the matter of not finding the fly salesman to begin with. There's a lot more than "I didn't know that this git did this!" here. d=P
Anyway, nobody is saying that it's impossible to figure out what "regrets" mean in this context. The initial poster merely claimed that at least 90% of people wouldn't figure it out, which i would say is probably a conservative estimate if anything. The thing is, even once you know what the eggs do, there's basically never any reason to use them. I think a potentially better use would be if spending an egg in town allowed you to purchase a blessing that protected you through your next death, keeping Geo and maybe even preventing Fragile charms from breaking.
2) This is probably the first place you can access with the simple key
3) I found her dialogue pretty obvious. "Leaving regrets around the world, like a dark stain" is quite clearly referring to the shade, especially if you've read the shade's hunter notes by this point. The eggs are the only "food" item in the game (and there's a person in the royal waterways also selling them as food)
I didn't know what Jiji actually did with the shades, so I went and died and came back to test it out. I think the only way you can miss this is if you never unlock her door in the first place, and use the key first in the city of tears
Again, this is the only thing I feel is really oddly designed in the game. The downstroke attack is just a small thing in comparison.
My day job is a computer game designer, and how I feel about a design is irrelevant when I watch an overwhelming number of players falling into the same problem spot. Part of my job is to see how people interact with elements of the game and if things can be learned organically. It's the old "make the player feel smart" part of designing.
I've done a few 100% run throughs and am working on speed runs at this point, so I definitely like this game, or I would not be doing so, but I can't deny the number of times I've seen people not having figured out this aspect, and I believe others would be hard pressed to ignore that evidence as well, as much as I've been condescendingly told "I am assuming" these things.
Like here's a random thread on the same page as this one where someone finished the game, and didn't know what rancid eggs did: https://steamcommunity.com/app/367520/discussions/0/135512133546067267/
You can find tons of youtube playthroughs where players are like "Another egg? What do these do? I better save 'em for later!" wayyyyy later in the game than their intended useage.
Again, I feel like the problem is that there is no opportunity to organically learn this, and that it only really benefits players who are just starting out, as later, you don't really have a use for geo or retrieving your shade anyhow, and are probably skilled enough to get your shade back in most circumstances without problem.
The other thing I see a lot of is the people who got it immediately dismiss the idea of clarifying in some way as "hand holding", and I get that. DS and such was an oasis from the excessive hand holding games like Zelda had foisted onto players, but, consider this:
What benefit does it give newer players who might need the service to have a bit more clearer signposting? What detraction does it make to have this signposting? Does it actively make the game worse?
I understand the "GIT GUD" sort of mentality many take when it comes to souls-like games, and that's just an aspect of the community, but I dunno, I mean, I've loved and played DS since release day, and have spent hundreds of hours discussing and dissecting the designs behind it, and I see where many of the parallels in the design philosophy are found in HK, but I do feel like the rancid eggs in particular a bit too cryptic for their own good, considering the player type they benefit.
(speaking of, it sorta feels like day 1 and 2 in DS, if you all remember that, where curse purging stones were a mechanic that was primarily spread through word of mouth, but where DS encourages player communication inside the game and out through its semi-multiplayer aspects, HK feels more like it reserves that for the late game puzzles like the void heart and such).
I'm an explorer. I always try to see everything I can before heading somewhere I might not be able to return from for a while, so I found the door before ever heading down the well.
After rescuing the merchant, it was obvious to me that the simple key would work with the simple lock, but the egg's purpose eluded me. Still, at 60 geo and with an obvious purpose, cause that's how games work, it wasn't an option not to buy it to find out.
After finally being able to afford the key I checked the door, and from Jiji's dialogue concluded that they somehow helped recover from death. I can see how this step might not be clear to people who never fought their shade before, but to me it was quite clear what Jiji said. So the next time I died I tested it, found out they wanted the egg and fought my shade there. Shame about the egg, but I was never confused about Jiji's purpose after talking to them.
Make an achievement about that like... Reunited: Embrace your regrets trough the rancid egg
Well something like that ?
I don't know if any of you have already started Steelmode and find out what live in this place. But if yes:
Did you get something after donating a lot of rancid egg? I have donate like 6 - 8 (don't remember exactly how) and he keep telling me the same without a gift :(
http://steamcommunity.com/app/367520/discussions/0/135511913389386955/
Given that, it seems to me that the only people that aren't going to find out what the eggs do, are the ones for whom the eggs wouldn't likely be useful (people that never abandon their shades). It is still frustrating to be collecting these things with no indication of what they're for.
Probably top 5 edgiest things I've ever read on the internet
You misspelled minuscule
Sounds like you haven't been on the internet that long then.
Either way, I don't think that it's an issue. It rewards paying attention with giving an alternate solution to an already solvable problem. I think you're overstating how much of an issue not figuring out what it does is.
Even if it were a near essential element of the game, I don't think that it's too convoluted anyway. There's an easily discoverable locked door in town and the shop sells a key. Easy. And once you get in, every single one of her lines of dialogue has a clue that leads toward using the egg.
She talks about a shade? Better come back and see what she has to say when you leave behind a shade. Don't have an egg at that point? She talks about wanting an egg. Simple, if you're taking the time to read.
You're saying that both you and LPers had trouble with it, right? Well other than yourself I'd say that LPers are inclined to miss things like this. Their "profession" is to multitask. They are talking and entertaining a crowd while playing, of course they'd be likely to miss something that requires reading closely.
As for what you lose if you add some sort of tooltip? That sense of discovery that comes from figuring it out. A rather nebulous answer, but I would say that it's a very important reward in a game like this.
Yes but I think it would be better design if she had specific line of dialogue if you go talk to her WITH rancid eggs in your inventory but WITHOUT having lost your shade.
Something along the lines of : "Oh that egg you've got... next time your soul is troubled, bring it to me, I'll make good use of it" or maybe slightly more subtle but you get the idea
The fact that she has no reaction to the player having rancid eggs is a bit deceiving. And the odds of going there randomly while your shade is gone are very very slim.
I tried to bring her the rancid eggs once, and since it didnt trigger anything, I just moved on. I wouldn't have found about her and the rancid eggs purpose if I didn't look it up in the Steam guides. And that was after finishing the game 100%.
I don't think Team Cherry intended for it to be so obscure, and I don't see how it being obscure services the game or the intended mechanic. There is no point in having the player find and carry those 15 rancids eggs without knowing why, and the players who struggle often could really benefit from knowing the mechanic.
Imo, a simple extra dialogue linked to having an egg in your inventory would solve it, what do you think of it?
Well there are two conditions to use the egg with her, right? You need to have left a shade behind and you need to have an egg. She already gives a rather obvious hint when one of those conditions is met (left behind a shade). I don't see how it would be bad for her to comment on the egg condition being met as well, as long as it wasn't too hamfisted.
On the other hand, figuring out what she means by "shade" is the real meat of the puzzle, so I don't think that it should give that away. So yeah, more of a cue that "yes, this is where the egg is used" would work well I think, and help people avoid the problem that you had.