This game is to frustrating

[Vazeyo]

Important information first: I don´t have good hand-eye coordination and my reflexes are also not the best.
This being said, this game is to frustrating. At least for me.

If you look at similiar games like Celeste or Super Meat Boy: They are both very hard and very fast paced games. But they both have something in common which Katana ZERO doesn´t succeed in:
A static map and enemy positions. In Celeste or Super Meat Boy I didn´t need to have the best reflexes because I could learn by my mistakes. Every time I respawned I made one more step to the finish line simply because I´ve learned the patterns slowly. This just isn´t possible in the current state of Katana ZERO. Enemies go on patrol, so it isn´t possible to learn a stage properly to its full extend. Thus it´s Trial & Error. Which is rather sad. I actually thought that Katana ZERO wouldn´t play out like that. But it does. Unfortunately.

Furthermore, enemies with ranged weapons can shoot me, while they are out of my own screen thus I didn´t even know about their existence... and can kill me. Which is also very frustrating.

Its also very frustrating that there were 2 enemies (so far, I´m just 2 hours in) which came out of nowhere (1 came out of the elevator, or knocked a door to find me) and they were both the last enemy of their stages. Which means if you get surprised by them and die you need to play the whole stage all over again! How is this meant to be fun?

Its also very intimidating that the devs seem to care more about their hardcore playerbase, adding a new brutal hard mode, but not an easier mode for bad players like me. (I´m not a bad player in general, I mean I beated Cuphead, Celeste and Hollow Knight, all of these are very hard games imo, but I´m certainly bad in Katana ZERO.)

So please, I beg you devs, please add an easy mode for players like me. Add something like that I can rewind time myself, so I can choose my own respawnpoint, a bit like the puzzleplatformer Braid, or make the enemies more static so I can learn their patterns more easily. I don´t know. I don´t want to tell you how do you could do your jobs. I´m not a gamedesigner after all.

If someone has read it that far: I´m really impressed. Thanks for reading and I hope that my voice matters, at least a little bit! Have a nice day!

[Chickenb00]

you have 1.9 hours on record for this game, yet you managed to beat Hollow Knight, a game I find frustrating and challenging myself. maybe you just need to play a bit more to learn the ins and outs. i only learned around the 5-hour mark that i can change direction mid-air using the timestop feature to completely bullet dodge.

[Vazeyo]

Originally posted by Chickenb00:

you have 1.9 hours on record for this game, yet you managed to beat Hollow Knight, a game I find frustrating and challenging myself. maybe you just need to play a bit more to learn the ins and outs. i only learned around the 5-hour mark that i can change direction mid-air using the timestop feature to completely bullet dodge.

Maybe you are right and I will give this game definetly more time to succeed for me. And I will of course play this game to the end. But right now I don´t feel comfortable with the game at all. Which is very unpleasant.

[Vazeyo]

Originally posted by Gamer1214:

Also the game will load the last save file if you continue and choose yes. If it doesn’t say continue where you left off you accidentally hit no at some point.

Very interesting... I pressed the "Continue"-button 4 times so far. This message NEVER showed up before. Maybe its a bug, because I´ve seen this message NOW for the first time. I also never pressed something, because, why should I? There was no reason for that. But good to know that this issue of mine isn´t there for me anymore! ;)

[aaaaa]

Just got through the default campaign and I also want to share some thoughts.

I agree, overall the game mechanics feel a little less polished compared to something like hotline miami. Don't get me wrong; gameplay itself is stellar!



Mechanics

Enemies behaviour is hard to reliably predict. For example, when you hit a shield carrier they jump away and shoot right? I noticed that the timing of their shot is different every time. Rng?

Hitboxes felt a bit strange too. When two enemies do a simultaneous melee attack from one side, you die. The game lets you parry one and get slashed by the second one.

Still not entirely sure how bullet deflection works. It gets kinda wonky when you do it without slowmo and unpredicatble shoot timings don't help. Which is shame because it would have been fun to be able finish the game without it.


Story

I'm confused but I like it. Did I mention hotline miami?

[Leoscar]

Hollow knight isn't terribly difficult, aside from the obvious challenging areas. It's a long metroidvania in which death equals backtracking for a while, making the game difficult everywhere would be frustrating. I don't think you can compare the two games.

Katana zero is a short die and retry, not that you need to die a lot to progress in normal mode, the ennemy placement is more often than not quite forgiving and the slow mode can be used a while before it runs out. The game doesn't need to be fair, because you can finish the levels under a minute and if you die you can restart instantly, it's hardly frustrating. Come on, choosing you own spawn point? Why would you ever need that in a game where the levels are so short?

[Vazeyo]

Originally posted by Leoscar:

Hollow knight isn't terribly difficult, aside from the obvious challenging areas. It's a long metroidvania in which death equals backtracking for a while, making the game difficult everywhere would be frustrating. I don't think you can compare the two games.

Gaming is something very personal. Someone will say that Hollow Knight might even be easy while others will say it was the hardest game in their life. Every human is different and so is every game for every human.
I didn´t compare these two games I just mentioned Hollow Knight to impress that I´m not the most bad player in the world ^^

Originally posted by Leoscar:

Katana zero is a short die and retry, not that you need to die a lot to progress in normal mode, the ennemy placement is more often than not quite forgiving and the slow mode can be used a while before it runs out.

If someone dies a lot in normal mode or not is, again, something personal. I died, per stage, on average more about 10 times to finally proceed, maybe even more (didn´t count). In my opinion the enemy placement is not forgiving. Especially those of the enemies with ranged weapons. I often even see myself that I wait that enemies walk into a better position to kill them more easily. And again: Every human is different and so is every playstyle of every human.
Slow mode can be used a while, sure. But I can´t handle it properly. Maybe its because this action is located on a button which takes more time to press down (L2 Button on Xbox 360 controller) while other buttons, like the A-button, are capable of instantly pressing down, fulfilling an instant action. (I will change the controls because of this soon)
There is also a little delay between pressing the slow mode button and the happening slow mode. Its short, but I could really feel the annoyance while this delay killed me multiple times, even though I pressed the button in the right time.

Originally posted by Leoscar:

The game doesn't need to be fair, because you can finish the levels under a minute and if you die you can restart instantly, it's hardly frustrating. Come on, choosing you own spawn point? Why would you ever need that in a game where the levels are so short?

A short game doesn´t mean that its easy. And if it isn´t easy, it may take more time to actually beat it. Thus it isn´t a short game anymore, for some players.
Its not like that you would be forced to play this easy mode or something. It would be purely optional. Thats why I´m always a friend of devs who provide as much game options as possible regarding everything. Because *sigh* again: Every human being is different and thats why every videogame should have options for literally everything. Not just options for inclusion but I literally mean for everything. Enable/disable the entire HUD in parts, changing the difficutly in every detail (which made Celeste´s assisst mode so awesome, or the blessings and burdens in "City of Brass"). I literally die inside everytime if I see developers who don´t provide as much game options as they should. (btw. its awesome that I can change the text speed in this game!)
Sure, in the end its their game and they have a vision how its meant to be played but these little decisions who might be small at first may be huge problems for others which might not even be forseen by a dev at all.

[Vazeyo]

Just wanted to point out that I will deinstall this game now, after giving it a fair chance. Its just not made for me, I guess. I will return to it if there is an easy mode or something but right now the game is unplayable for me.

[Vazeyo]

Originally posted by Gamer1214:

You only gave it two hours though. You have to get used to how the game plays overall. I felt similar to you at first, but it gets easier as you practice and get comfortable with the controls.

Well, I´m sorry, but if 2 hours are not enough. How much time would be enough to get near as good in this game? How much time did you need personally to get good?
Its also the fault of the game because there is no training facility or something like this. Sure, I could replay previous chapters but thats basically it.
This game just frustrates me. And if something frustrates me, I don´t continue playing it. That sounds harsh but thats how it is. Unfortunately, for this game.

[aaaaa]

Originally posted by Gamer1214:

You only gave it two hours though. You have to get used to how the game plays overall. I felt similar to you at first, but it gets easier as you practice and get comfortable with the controls.

The game is 4 hours long tho. Or is there more content in hardmode?

[Gem of Temporarity]

If you managed to wrsp your head around the hell that HK's movement and other hard games' difficulties are then it's just a matter of time you get used to this. Rolling proactively instead of reactively helped me a lot.
Also, if you're not fine with the controls you can change them and, unlike in the aforementioned game(HK), they aren't hugging reset after death/game restart and don't f UIs up.

Originally posted by NO ITS CALCIUM:

The game is 4 hours long tho. Or is there more content in hardmode?

If packing new things into places you've been in before counts, yes there is.

Also, replayability exists.

Originally posted by NO ITS CALCIUM:

Hitboxes felt a bit strange too. When two enemies do a simultaneous melee attack from one side, you die. The game lets you parry one and get slashed by the second one.

Still not entirely sure how bullet deflection works. It gets kinda wonky when you do it without slowmo and unpredicatble shoot timings don't help. Which is shame because it would have been fun to be able finish the game without it.

There is a sword that parries/deflects EVERYTHING in it's bigger-than-normal range at once, even kills despite enemies parrying if you're close enough, but is slower, all sword but it only parry/deflect one thing per slash(but slash fast af). Speedrun mode(unlocked after beating the game for the first time) has a setting that disables RNG.

[TwiceBites]

nah hes playing on controller, honestly i had a super easy time on MKB, im a super cautious player, and dont really like to speed through things, and this let me aim up shots for thrown objects from far away.

other than that, in response to the main dude;

the enemy spawn randomization isnt too large, and i found myself abusing it more often than not.

the levels are incredibly short so if you are having trouble with a specific enemy or 2, its not as big of a deal as it might be otherwise.

If you need to practice to get through an area, just use the area that you need to practice for as the training ground, worst case scenario is that you accidentally pull off a good run on it when you didnt mean to. i really dont get the issue here......i cant think of any games that DO have a "training area"

2 hours is really not gonna be mastery unless you're already geared for this kinda game. i cannot think of a good game that was unique and i wasnt geared towards being good at already that i mastered in less than 2 hours. And, lets face it; the mechanics and playstyle of this game are unique enough that you're just not used to it, its a new feeling of game and its gonna take some time to get used to, if you got pissed off the first time it took you more than 2 hours to beat a game you wouldnt be here right now

[Jay K]

Get Gud

[Pausen]

Its all just about pattern learning. I had to repeat some stages at leas 30 times util i got them. But this game makes it really easy since after you die you basicly instanly back.

[FlavorfulHades]

This game more then deserves a second chance, 2 hours wont cut it. It took me around 6-7 hours to beat the supposedly '4 hour' game the first time, because a few levels were frustrating, but last night I did a replay with the knife (you can unlock 5 different weapons by finding keys on different levels, that alone adds fun replayability) and beat the whole thing again in about 2. It takes a bit of time to master, one tip that might help you is if you're stuck in a room, theres a chance you can go up or down a floor, some lvls the floor change area is more hidden then others, there are few stages that must be completed in a specific way

[lain lunchbox mashcore]

Ranged enemies have less range than your screen, and have predictable shooting patterns.
You also complained about Trial and Error being bad, yet you praise Super Meat Boy for letting you (and I quote) "LEARN FROM YOUR MISTAKES", which is a gentleman's version of T and ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ E. Only difference being between the two is that here it's way cooler, cause it's explained in the lore. The enemy patrols are also on a set path and not random. Not by a longshot. The game is hard, no doubt. But if you don't have the best reflexes, then don't play this damn game. ALSO, super meat boy can also ♥♥♥♥ you up at he last second.

OK I'm actually reading the stuff you write here on the go and gotta say, you sound like a game journalist. Not all games have an easy mode. After just 2 playthroughs of a stage, all split apart by hours, I can beat the stage in a minute and without a single death, it's genuinely simple after a while. I hate to be that guy, but think of Dark Souls. When's the last time the "hardest game of all time" had a difficulty setting? Your comment is actually more frustrating than the game itself on hard mode without slow motion.

Git gud scrub