This is my first time playing a souls-like and I love it.

[Oatmeal God]

I don't know why but almost every person I've ever met advised against me starting to play souls-likes. They act like it's an evil game genre not for the faint of heart. Like bro it's a game, I played this game for the first time and I love it. I love the combat especially, instead of just swinging wildly like in most RPGs, you have to actually use skill to fight most enemies. The combat feels like I am fighting an actual person that has survived long enough to know their way around a sword. Every single fight I'm in puts me of the edge of my seat and I love it, no matter how low level the enemy might be. Why did most people I've met who play souls-like games act like its some sort of cursed game genre that only superior, skilled players can play? Like why gate keep such an amazing experience? 10/10, really good game.

[Apocalypse]

Originally posted by justfaded:

Originally posted by Apocalypse:

Yeah exactly, while it has some elements it''s only a soulslike unless we are going to use a very loose definition of the genre that could fit a very wide range of games no one would ever consider soulslike.

Besides the fact that you can for instance beat almost the entirety of Outward with just the free fire spell for your lantern because you are faster than the entire game, just set them afire and run around them and repeat if needed, (okay with some ranged attacks you need the occassional dodge). And so can you bypass almost all difficulty with just placing enough traps each combat. Outward only is difficult with certain playstyles, which also doesnt sound like a soulslike experience to me.

You can use magic to cheese every souls game from fromsoft.

That said, the term soulslike is so stupid. Just making subgenres for everything because everything is expected to be specialized now.

You could be right, dont play dark souls myself. But from their reputation I assume it is based around way smaller windows in which you can find the spots to use it and the difficulty is kept up to a decent degree. In Outward you have a very comfortable timeframe to win that way and it becomes a cakewalk for most of the game.
But yeah, definitions are subject to perspective anyway. But I wanted to be surprised by a narrow definiton that would fit both games, mainly because Dark Souls is not my type of game and have enjoyed Outward for some time

[Cadeyrn Dragheim]

Depends. I played most ds titles. They're not that hard depending on your build. Plenty of facetank ones too.

[Kalephax]

This game isn't accurately described as a soulslike because it's got a very different focus and gameplay loop from Souls games but it definitely is a survival rpg with soulslike elements. Dark Souls is definitely one of the biggest inspirations for it. If you like the combat in this game you'll like soulslike games.
The Pillar Greathammer is a direct Dark Souls reference, the elemental rags are borrowed from the series, dodge rolling and stamina management are important, etc.

[Oatmeal God]

Originally posted by TФEY:

This game isn't accurately described as a soulslike because it's got a very different focus and gameplay loop from Souls games but it definitely is a survival rpg with soulslike elements. Dark Souls is definitely one of the biggest inspirations for it. If you like the combat in this game you'll like soulslike games.
The Pillar Greathammer is a direct Dark Souls reference, the elemental rags are borrowed from the series, dodge rolling and stamina management are important, etc.

I appreciate you informing me cordially without insulting me passive aggressively like the other people in this thread. Here's some points.

[Talbrys]

Originally posted by Oatmeal God:

Why did most people I've met who play souls-like games act like its some sort of cursed game genre that only superior, skilled players can play? Like why gate keep such an amazing experience? 10/10, really good game.

Because the younger generations have no self esteem on account of being indoctrinated to hate themselves because they were born in the West. So instead they derive self worth from beating fights that many give up on or at least cause immense frustration. This is why Souls fans are so toxic, because anybody threatening their game is also threatening the player's sense of self worth. But souls games are less difficult and more just unbalanced and based on luck. A guys goldfish was able to beat Malenia's first phase in Elden Ring. I won't link one of the articles because I think it's against the rules in the Steam forums but essentially a streamer divided the fish tank into a grid, with each cell representing a button for him to press if the goldfish swam into it. You can find the stories and the video with a simple search though. Apparently another guy defeated Malenia in Elden Ring with a rubber band trick. The catch was that the “trick” didn’t help the gamer at all but instead was used to keep the camera spinning at all times during the fight, which added more complexity to the already challenging battle. So you don't even have to be able to keep track of the boss to beat it, it just takes a bunch of tries before you get lucky with the move sets the boss chooses during the fight.

That being said, I did enjoy Elden Ring and AC6 (even if I was disappointed they continued with Souls style combat instead of using that of the old AC games but I digress). So I'm sure there are others like me that either enjoy that CBT or at least are willing to look past it to find the parts they do like. It's just a certain demographic with an inferiority complex is VERY vocal about any criticism of their game and like to try to convince people they are some kind of god for beating it.

[Midas]

Originally posted by Apocalypse:

Originally posted by justfaded:

You can use magic to cheese every souls game from fromsoft.

That said, the term soulslike is so stupid. Just making subgenres for everything because everything is expected to be specialized now.

You could be right, dont play dark souls myself. But from their reputation I assume it is based around way smaller windows in which you can find the spots to use it and the difficulty is kept up to a decent degree. In Outward you have a very comfortable timeframe to win that way and it becomes a cakewalk for most of the game.
But yeah, definitions are subject to perspective anyway. But I wanted to be surprised by a narrow definiton that would fit both games, mainly because Dark Souls is not my type of game and have enjoyed Outward for some time

You're trying to argue a game isn't a souls-like when you don't even play souls-likes?

[Apocalypse]

Originally posted by Midas:

Originally posted by Apocalypse:

You could be right, dont play dark souls myself. But from their reputation I assume it is based around way smaller windows in which you can find the spots to use it and the difficulty is kept up to a decent degree. In Outward you have a very comfortable timeframe to win that way and it becomes a cakewalk for most of the game.
But yeah, definitions are subject to perspective anyway. But I wanted to be surprised by a narrow definiton that would fit both games, mainly because Dark Souls is not my type of game and have enjoyed Outward for some time

You're trying to argue a game isn't a souls-like when you don't even play souls-likes?

Unless you call Outward a soulslike, than I am.
Joking aside, I have watched a lot of Dark Souls, mainly the boss battles and did try them a few times years back and have some friend playing them who talk about them a lot so have some general idea of them but it never appealed to me. Hence my interest in why the games could ever be considered similar since it didnt seem so to me

[Shortpower]

Originally posted by Apocalypse:

I agree that the souls-like lable has no business being there. If someone thinks so I would be interested in hearing a definition of souls-like that fits both dark souls and outward

Souls-like appears to mean any RPG with stamina and I-Frame rolls making up the core systems of combat.

So while I'd say it's "souls-like" I wouldn't actually compare it to Dark Souls since it's a fundamentally different game.

[Midas]

Originally posted by Shortpower:

Originally posted by Apocalypse:

I agree that the souls-like lable has no business being there. If someone thinks so I would be interested in hearing a definition of souls-like that fits both dark souls and outward

Souls-like appears to mean any RPG with stamina and I-Frame rolls making up the core systems of combat.

So while I'd say it's "souls-like" I wouldn't actually compare it to Dark Souls since it's a fundamentally different game.

There are a bunch of specific gameplay elements that make up a "soulslike" and basically any of them in isolation are things you'll find in non-soulslikes too, but it's the very specific combination of those specific elements in specific amounts that makes a soulslike.

Overall, I would not call Outward a soulslike, but it definitely has soulslike combat, because soulslike combat is generally defined by the following characteristics:

-Resource-focused combat, where a 'stamina' resource is used for basically everything. Offense, defense, running, dodging, etc. You're always weighing the cost of resources with every action you take.

-Slower-paced more deliberate combat, where the specific behavior and animations of individual attacks are important, and there is a lot of nuance to the weapons or weapon classes. Weapon choice matters for more than stats and cosmetics, and most weapons have their own niches/roles/playstyles/builds to focus on.

-A lot of action variety, and by that I mean the number and types of actions you can use. It's not just 'attack' and 'jump', or something. You'll have several ways to attack, several ways to modify those attacks, several ways to defend at any given moment, and good mastery of combat typically involves all of these elements.

-There is a higher skill ceiling than just button mashing and timing, it includes strategy and adaptability as well. This typically includes stuff like timed dodges, timed blocks, parry mechanics, and counter mechanics as well. Sometimes positional mechanics like flanking damage, or backstabs, too. Usually in any given situation you have a half-dozen or more different ways to engage with the target, and there will almost always be a theme of some more powerful abilities being higher-risk or higher-cost and taking more skill to execute safely.

All of these things exist in Outward. The overall scope isn't as high, because it's not as heavily a combat game as Dark Souls, but it's all there in some form.

[Talbrys]

Originally posted by Midas:

Originally posted by Shortpower:

Souls-like appears to mean any RPG with stamina and I-Frame rolls making up the core systems of combat.

So while I'd say it's "souls-like" I wouldn't actually compare it to Dark Souls since it's a fundamentally different game.

There are a bunch of specific gameplay elements that make up a "soulslike" and basically any of them in isolation are things you'll find in non-soulslikes too, but it's the very specific combination of those specific elements in specific amounts that makes a soulslike.

Overall, I would not call Outward a soulslike, but it definitely has soulslike combat, because soulslike combat is generally defined by the following characteristics:

-Resource-focused combat, where a 'stamina' resource is used for basically everything. Offense, defense, running, dodging, etc. You're always weighing the cost of resources with every action you take.

-Slower-paced more deliberate combat, where the specific behavior and animations of individual attacks are important, and there is a lot of nuance to the weapons or weapon classes. Weapon choice matters for more than stats and cosmetics, and most weapons have their own niches/roles/playstyles/builds to focus on.

-A lot of action variety, and by that I mean the number and types of actions you can use. It's not just 'attack' and 'jump', or something. You'll have several ways to attack, several ways to modify those attacks, several ways to defend at any given moment, and good mastery of combat typically involves all of these elements.

Are you touched? Souls games are known as one of the faster combat systems out there. Hell Dark Souls 3 uses "faster gameplay and amplified combat intensity" as a selling point.

-There is a higher skill ceiling than just button mashing and timing, it includes strategy and adaptability as well. This typically includes stuff like timed dodges, timed blocks, parry mechanics, and counter mechanics as well. Sometimes positional mechanics like flanking damage, or backstabs, too. Usually in any given situation you have a half-dozen or more different ways to engage with the target, and there will almost always be a theme of some more powerful abilities being higher-risk or higher-cost and taking more skill to execute safely.

Please, elaborate on that skill ceiling when a goldfish beats soulbosses and a guy uses a rubberband to spin his character around uncontrollably and still wins. And I found another, one guy beat the game in two hours blindfolded. Anyone can win at souls games, it's just a question of trying the same fights 10-20 times until you get lucky. But please, keep telling yourself succeeding in souls games makes you some kind of ninja strategic genius. In this new dystopian world of ours everyone needs some copium.

[Midas]

Originally posted by Talbrys:

Originally posted by Midas:

There are a bunch of specific gameplay elements that make up a "soulslike" and basically any of them in isolation are things you'll find in non-soulslikes too, but it's the very specific combination of those specific elements in specific amounts that makes a soulslike.

Overall, I would not call Outward a soulslike, but it definitely has soulslike combat, because soulslike combat is generally defined by the following characteristics:

-Resource-focused combat, where a 'stamina' resource is used for basically everything. Offense, defense, running, dodging, etc. You're always weighing the cost of resources with every action you take.

-Slower-paced more deliberate combat, where the specific behavior and animations of individual attacks are important, and there is a lot of nuance to the weapons or weapon classes. Weapon choice matters for more than stats and cosmetics, and most weapons have their own niches/roles/playstyles/builds to focus on.

-A lot of action variety, and by that I mean the number and types of actions you can use. It's not just 'attack' and 'jump', or something. You'll have several ways to attack, several ways to modify those attacks, several ways to defend at any given moment, and good mastery of combat typically involves all of these elements.

Are you touched? Souls games are known as one of the faster combat systems out there. Hell Dark Souls 3 uses "faster gameplay and amplified combat intensity" as a selling point.

You must not play many third person action games if you think dark souls has 'faster' combat. Nearly any third person action hack-'n-slash game that isn't trying to be a souls-like is going to have way faster combat. DMC, God of War, Nier, Darksiders, etc, etc.

Dark Souls 3 was 'faster' than previous Dark souls, sure, but that's still slower than nearly any other kind of third person action combat game.

Originally posted by Talbrys:

Please, elaborate on that skill ceiling when a goldfish beats soulbosses and a guy uses a rubberband to spin his character around uncontrollably and still wins. And I found another, one guy beat the game in two hours blindfolded. Anyone can win at souls games, it's just a question of trying the same fights 10-20 times until you get lucky. But please, keep telling yourself succeeding in souls games makes you some kind of ninja strategic genius. In this new dystopian world of ours everyone needs some copium.

You seem to be desperately mad at something, and I have no idea what it is. I never said the game was impossible or that some people can't beat it easily. You'll find people like that for literally every game that exists, so if that's your metric for difficulty, than congratulations, no game in existence is actually hard.

[Talbrys]

Originally posted by Midas:

You must not play many third person action games if you think dark souls has 'faster' combat. Nearly any third person action hack-'n-slash game that isn't trying to be a souls-like is going to have way faster combat. DMC, God of War, Nier, Darksiders, etc, etc. Dark Souls 3 was 'faster' than previous Dark souls, sure, but that's still slower than nearly any other kind of third person action combat game.

I've played plenty enough to recognize fast combat and slow combat. This game is fairly slow, souls style is fast. Maybe it wasn't with the first game, but this is tyool 2023, not 2011 and the term has changed with the times. Maybe you should too.

You seem to be desperately mad at something, and I have no idea what it is. I never said the game was impossible or that some people can't beat it easily. You'll find people like that for literally every game that exists, so if that's your metric for difficulty, than congratulations, no game in existence is actually hard.

There's the projection I expected from a souls champion. Please, keep telling me what I'm feeling.

[Midas]

Originally posted by Talbrys:

There's the projection I expected from a souls champion. Please, keep telling me what I'm feeling.

I never claimed to be any kind of champion. I just gave a breakdown of the traits commonly associated with souls-like combat. Not specifically Dark Souls, all souls-likes, because I've played a whole bunch of them. You decided that apparently is something that you need to take personally, since you've only been rude in response to something that wasn't even directed at you and had no hostility in it at all. I don't know what your problem is, but you've obviously got a chip on your shoulder with how upset you've been despite no provocation from anyone.

[Talbrys]

A souls fan accusing someone of having a chip on their shoulder. That's rich.

[Midas]

Originally posted by Your Friend Hana:

Originally posted by Midas:

There are a bunch of specific gameplay elements that make up a "soulslike" and basically any of them in isolation are things you'll find in non-soulslikes too, but it's the very specific combination of those specific elements in specific amounts that makes a soulslike.

Overall, I would not call Outward a soulslike, but it definitely has soulslike combat, because soulslike combat is generally defined by the following characteristics:

-Resource-focused combat, where a 'stamina' resource is used for basically everything. Offense, defense, running, dodging, etc. You're always weighing the cost of resources with every action you take.

-Slower-paced more deliberate combat, where the specific behavior and animations of individual attacks are important, and there is a lot of nuance to the weapons or weapon classes. Weapon choice matters for more than stats and cosmetics, and most weapons have their own niches/roles/playstyles/builds to focus on.

-A lot of action variety, and by that I mean the number and types of actions you can use. It's not just 'attack' and 'jump', or something. You'll have several ways to attack, several ways to modify those attacks, several ways to defend at any given moment, and good mastery of combat typically involves all of these elements.

-There is a higher skill ceiling than just button mashing and timing, it includes strategy and adaptability as well. This typically includes stuff like timed dodges, timed blocks, parry mechanics, and counter mechanics as well. Sometimes positional mechanics like flanking damage, or backstabs, too. Usually in any given situation you have a half-dozen or more different ways to engage with the target, and there will almost always be a theme of some more powerful abilities being higher-risk or higher-cost and taking more skill to execute safely.

All of these things exist in Outward. The overall scope isn't as high, because it's not as heavily a combat game as Dark Souls, but it's all there in some form.

Souls games are defined by the, "go and pick up your souls" mechanic. Outward has very few instances where you have to recover your backpack. Otherwise the melee combat is similar to dark souls, but magic and item combat are different(for the better.)

That's why I said the combat specifically. The defining traits of the overall genre are a lot longer. Outward doesn't have a bonfire mechanic, or leveling exp that you can lose on death, either.