I Quit Sekiro (Or It Broke Me)

The Explosion Network discusses Sekiro: Shadow's Die Twice and how it broke them after initially being excited to play it

[NarutoFox]

Good article. I respect the writer opinion

[vivaladil]

Thank you.

[Potnoodle999]

Each to his own. Although I think the opinion here is utter toss, no offence! Stop trying to shit all over one of the best games of the year people! Please! Pissing me off lately all these articles.... people need a battle to fight🙄

[TheGamez100]

Fromsoft's games arent for everyone. Loved bloodborne and enjoyed every minute of it. Stopped playing midway on ds1. Loved ds3 the first half but stopped halfway also. I do want to go back and finish them but man is it tough to want to go back. Havent gotten sekiro yet and heard its more about parrying and countering which is my most hated/weakest way to fight. Awaiting for bloodborne 2 lol, I love being aggressive and fast in combat.

[PowerOfTheCloud]

Haha i could have wrote your comment. Everything matches me almost to 100%.
I became addicted to bloodborne, while I lost any motivation to progress further through Ds2 and 3.
Also i am not good at parrying so I am aware that sekiro isn't the right game for me.

A Bloodborne 2 announcement would bring me tears of joy, i guess.

[nucky64]

i didn't have as big an issue with DS2 as i did the second half of DS3. #3 was great the first half but just became "not fun" the second half.

[sprinterboy]

I defeated 2 bosses on bloodborne and got stuck, 6mths later and another 20hrs of gameplay I finally managed a 3rd boss and just last month I beat my 4th boss lol, I'm tapping them mothers fuckers down haha.
These games are generally not my kinda games but my god I'm always been so dam competitive.

[Tapani]

Who are you people!? ;) Games used to be much harder in the 80s and 90s! Millions of young people participate in eSports and play like normal people played every game in the 80s. I guess there are casuals here and there, and being a casual gamer is not a bad or good thing, just a different kind of gamer. Respect to that! :)

[PowerOfTheCloud]

For me it is not about the difficulty itself. The setting, the atmosphere of the game has to completly suck me in in order to make me enjoy to struggle through the game and make me want to put time into learning patterns and reading enemy moves.
And for me, I find that medieval setting of the dark soul games extremly boring so at some point i lose the motivation to progress through the games.

With sekiro though, the settings seems fun, like nioh in which i sank hours and hours, but i suck at parrying, no matter how much i pratice it, so buying a game in which this is the main mechanic seems like a waste of money to me.

[Tapani]

Have you really practiced that hard, though? Because you can just hold L1 button while being locked to an enemy, and that's all the parrying you need most of the time. It's actually eventually much less about skill, and much more about being cool headed. I mean my wife beat first few bosses quite easily, and this is the third game where she is moving the camera with a controller's left stick (Zelda BOTW and MH:World were the first two.)

Sekiro is the most streamlined Soulsborne game there is, but still has a lot to offer for one good thorough runthrough. Replayability is questionable, though. I still prefer Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and Bloodborne over it, but it's up there with DS3 and DS2, albeit different. Sekiro is like Ninja Gaiden when it comes to difficulty, a bit different from the previous Soulsborne games.

[sprinterboy]

Those were the days, I remember missing a extra life and you'd be like shit I could of done with that

[rainslacker]

Games were simpler though, and it was usually obvious what needed to be done, and there was typically much less pattern recognition like younsee in modern games.

[nucky64]

yea, second half of dark souls 3 was a real slog. enjoyed it less and less as i played.]
edit: if you hate parrying/blocking and countering - avoid sekiro. that's what it is.

[Hungryalpaca]

If you love being aggressive and fast in combat...that’s Sekiro dude.

[VerminSC]

The game is damn hard. I thought I wasn’t going to be able to beat the last boss

[Tapani]

Once you figure out the move set, the last boss is one of the easiest bosses in the game. It's a long fight, but it's quite predictable.

[harmny]

Sounds like a chore

[mogwaii]

I'm another who took to bloodborne feverishly but could never get that way about the souls games and sekiro.....I stopped after the first boss, far too irritating.

[starchild]

Probably because Bloodborne is the easiest out of their similar games.

[antikbaka]

meh. Ds 2/3 were easier for me

[starchild]

I really should have said "for me" because it definitely comes down to what you're used to and what your strengths and weaknesses are as a player. But I have noticed that Bloodborne seems to have the most mainstream appeal and the fewest complaints about its difficulty which makes me suspect that many people found it easier and more approachable.

[Darkborn]

@starchild that's why I didn't like bloodborne as much, and when I mentioned that on here all the haters gathered up to bash. I loved all the dark souls games and demons souls, but could not bring myself to finish bloodborne because it just felt off to me.

[AspiringProGenji]

The Old Hunters DLC was very difficult. That I heard lots of complaints about it’s difficulty. The game overall was not that easy but it came after every sould fan, especially on PS, had fone through all the other games so they were veterans already. Also BB’s combat approach was more aggressive instead of passive so it eas easier to get into, but still not so mainstream

[ShinRon]

not if you play magic souls or shield souls, then its the hardest

[Veneno]

I hear that sentiment quite often. Interesting. I found Bourne and Souls to be the same game. Bourne being just a mod of Souls. Still just as amazing of course. It's like the sequel series to Souls set centuries further into the future in the dawning of the modern world.

[mezati99]

yep

i value my own mental health

[Stanjara]

Me too!

[cyber_daemonx]

And my hairline.

[LOGICWINS]

Yeah, games like this simply aren't for me. I stick to turn-based games: 100% strategy, no need to worry about muscle memory. If I die, I die knowing it was because I wasn't smart enough...not because I wasn't fast enough.

[Kocurstvo]

Oh my god. Another lame whiner... People should be ashamed they dont have enough skills to play Sekiro and not admit it and cry in front of public. If you are not capable to play Sekiro, then DONT!!! Play Firewatch and bullshts of that nature!!!!

[Cikatriz_ESP]

Did you read the article? He clearly and succinctly explains that he already did what you’re suggesting and stopped playing due to lack of patience. In the future, if you have nothing original to add to the conversation please consider keeping it to yourself.

[vivaladil]

Sorry you didn't appreciate my viewpoint. I have played Firewatch though and it is a great game.

[Harryvok]

You have AIDS, don’t you?

[The_Sage]

I think you should practice writing so that you are better at voicing your opinion, "in front of public".

[rainslacker]

I usually have more fun with those bullshit games than I do with souls games. But I'm not one that needs to act like I'm all let because I spent a stupid amount of time not having fun to congratulate myself for having finally gotten past that stupid amount of time not having fun

[LoveSpuds]

It's definitely a tough game, so I can see why people might be turned off it.

I am not a particularly skilled player of videogames but I managed to beat Sekiro. More than any other game I have ever played, Sekiro made me feel like I was getting better with each passing attempt of a boss or miniboss fight.

The last boss however, nearly drove me away, I reckon I died 40+ times but I could feel myself getting closer each time. I learned each attack and how to counter it and suddenly, boom, I beat the game; I literaly punched the air in jubilation when that arsehole died!

The greatest demonstration that the game educates and trains you is that I am blasting through areas in NG+ and making mincemeat of all the enemies without much trouble, whereas previously, I would get by butt kicked.

I loved Sekiro but personally, I loved Bloodborne and Souls more.

[Cikatriz_ESP]

Well said, and a lot of the views mirror my own. I love the game, but at some point you have to wonder if all the arbitrary speed bumps are actually adding anything to the experience that I couldn’t similarly achieve by simply pressing pause and punching myself in the balls for a few minutes.

[starchild]

That could be said about any amount of challenge in games. That it's a waste of time and amounts to artificial speedbumps. I don't agree though. If you take the challenge out of games they would essentially play themselves and would end up being not much different than movies.

I love Sekiro and a lot of the reason why is because it actually forces you to learn how to play it. Once you get good in Sekiro you can pull off simply amazing things.

[The_Sage]

I think he may be referring more to the fact that you can't just start at the boss again when you die. You have b.s. to wade through first. I don't dig that either.

[The_Sage]

Lol! That literally made me laugh out loud, Cikatriz. Thanks for that. I feel the same way.

[william_cade]

Another Celeste article.

[vivaladil]

I think I was ahead of the curve for this particular one.

[Matrix6]

上達します

[Tapani]

御意。

[Angelin]

Hah, nice one :)

[Angelin]

遊ぶために

[Youngindy21]

Is Sekiro really that hard? It can't be harder than Nioh.

[vivaladil]

I didn't play enough of Nioh to compare, but they're definitely both hard games.

[starchild]

Definitely both really challenging. It's going to come down to your own playstyle and what you're good and bad at.

[salmonade]

Nioh was easy af. Sekiro is 4 times as hard, when you start. But Sekiro does get easier... until you reach the last boss :P

[Cobra951]

"Yes, I know #gitgud and all that fun stuff, but I have boiled down my feelings for Sekiro and decided I didn’t have time for its shit anymore.
. . .
"I’m not trying to say it’s a broken system, it’s simply one I don’t care for anymore. I don’t have the time for, and I had to realize this and -- well, I uninstalled the game for my own mental sanity. Because I know I’ll keep wanting to come back, keep trying again, keep getting frustrated. . . . the question that’s most important when choosing to play a game like this is: is winning worth it? And for me, I have (for now at least) said no it's not."

It's not a difficult concept to understand. Playing a game to suffer hours of frustration in exchange for an eventual moment of gratification gets old. Been there; done that. I gamed my way through the early consoles, when technical limitations meant high difficulty and repetition were needed to give games enough longevity. I don't want to do that anymore. There is no need for that anymore.

[Hungryalpaca]

Good thing Sekiro doesn’t do that.

[vivaladil]

Thanks to whoever shared this on here!
Glad to see a lot of conversation spurred by my piece.
:)

[cfc83]

At least you made the effort. I don't even try games that have these reported levels of difficulty. I'd like to try some of them, but maybe sometime.

[Vanfernal]

You know, mad respect for the writer of this article. This game isn't for everyone. Heck, I hated it it until it finally *clicked "and now I'm enjoying it. But instead of crying about an easy mode, he admitted that the game was not for him.

[SegaSaturn669]

I remember when Mario Maker came out, I really enjoyed it, then the troll, extreme difficulty levels emerged and I lost interest. I didn't have the talent or motivation to beat them so I stopped playing. This game doesn't troll you -- the difficulty isn't that high, you can different tactics for a drastically different outcome. In this game, failing was a joy for me.

[salmonade]

You're just not good enough to finish it. No harm in that

[rainslacker]

That's a pretty flawed assumption. Being good isn't the same as being willing to spend the time to learn what needs to be done to progress is in the game. I can be good at a lot of games, but I'm not willing to put the time in to be good at them if I'm not having fun with it.

[salmonade]

No it's not. A girl I know who never played any Souls game ever and she beat the first boss in 3 tries. I'm a Souls vet and I beat the first boss in 4 tries. My point is that certain people are more adept at reacting and using varied controls more than others. Some people are more adept at adapting what they're used to. Like hack, hack, hack, hack or in my case, dodge, dodge, dodge, attack attack, dodge, dodge.

I was like the author, but I was able to change my way of doing things. It DID NOT take me hours and hours of time. I just adapted to a new style. This author just is not good enough to finish the game. He's not good enough to change what he's learned in a timely fashion.

If you spend your whole life, you could learn Rocket Science. But people who are more adept can do it quite easily. Obviously, I'm no Rocket Scientist, but what I can do is learn a game like Sekiro, and it doesn't take that much time at all.

*Theres a point in there somewhere. Sorry im hungover and just woke up*

[rainslacker]

One can learn to be good at anything they put their mind to for the most part. Not always, but I'll get to that later.

There are games that have very complex mechanics, which many may never take the time to really learn, but there are those that will take that time. It's not because they aren't capable of doing so, it's because they don't wish to do so. Fighting games for instance. Most of them have basic moves, or complex chain type moves, often requiring rather rigid timing on button pressed during the proper frame. Some will just play them button mashing, and not do well on harder modes, or against good players. Others will take the time to perfect those moves and be able to execute them without fail most of the time. The former, just has no desire, but may take time to learn a few of the moves over time. The latter, takes the time because they have the desire to.

All games are about learning the game play, and you are just making an assumption that the author is not good enough to finish. By his own admission, he just didn't care to take the time.

As far as learning Rocket Science if you spent enough time. That's not true. There are things in that which are fairly abstract that have to be used to perform precise and complex calculations. Not everyone is capable of doing that mentally. There are those who may not be capable of playing harder games due to their disposition and level of patience, or they'd have to change their disposition to make it possible, which can happen as they grow older in life. I wasn't saying everyone can learn to play a particular game, just that your assumption was flawed that the author wasn't good enough to finish the game.

[AnnaDea]

Git Gud

[MoshA]

I dont think i can finish it myself but I am happy Miyazaki has full creative control. All these co-op Souls casuals are devastated lmao. Let's hope Armored Core 6 and Bloodborne 2 are even harder :)

[Harryvok]

I enjoyed beating dark souls 3, but I just don’t have the patience for these games anymore. 3 deaths in the one area or to the same boss and I’m bored.

[Pancit_Canton]

God of war is harder than Sekiro, yet nobody's complaining about it.

[Kabaneri]

The only enemies in that game that are Sekiro level difficult are the Valkyries.

[Elda]

A definite disagree.

[masterfox]

probably broke you , no doubt.

Really sucks to see lots of this new generation of gamers forgot how to time their attacks , very poor reflexes, and don't even know how to properly evade, block or counterattack. oh well.

[nommers]

It's always been this way. There weren't that many hardcore gamers even back then in the early arcade days. It's just that back then those were the only games in town so of course you might hear about a biased perspective of "gamers were better players back then".

[metalgod88]

First off, excellent article with very valid points.

I like to put these types of games in a category I like to call "Practice to Perfect". As it implies, you practice over and over until you overcome a challenge.When it comes to Sekiro, a lot of people I know in the real world wouldn't have the patience fail over and over and over until they finally, FINALLY beat that challenge, only to run into the the next one 20 minutes later.

I wish a category like that would catch on, so people would have something to call these types of games (aside from soulsborn) to warn others that "hey, this game takes a lot of time, patience, and practice to beat".

[Elda]

Agreed! That's my method.

[rainslacker]

I think it's one of those things that the people asking for it yo be easier, aren't as invested in taking the time to learn how to play on that level. Which is fine, as not everyone has the same motivations for playing any particular game.

There are several non souls type games whose hard modes can be challenging, and there are those who will endeavour to overcome it. Some do it well, others have easy outs with moments of luck or moments of pure controller through the TV frustration. The ones that do those modes right are the ones that balance them well, and account for moments in the game where itd be impossible to get through if they didn't change things like damage. TLOU grounded mode did it well in my opinion, although a few spots were still challenging.

I think most people are capable of learning how to be good at any given game. Any game is really about muscle memory and learning when to react or pattern recognition. The thing about games like this though is they dont give much in the way of getting you to the point of learning those things. The learning curve starts high, and doesn't let up.

[SCW1982]

I respect your opinion but one of the things I love about Sekiro is even if you are stuck at a part there is usually always another branching area you can work at as far as progressing the game and your skills. You don’t run into a Father Gascoine situation where it’s beat him or progress no further. And that’s something I really think From should be applauded in with this game.

[hiawa23]

Games like Sekiro are generally not for me, but I loved the NG games, and this seems to be the closest to it. I stopped playing BB but I thought there was an easier mode added to that game or some change that made it more appealing, I just did not like the atmosphere or the character, but I love ninja samurai games, and Japan culture, so I am slugging it out in Sekiro, and when I get stuck I just pull out the phone or tablet and look at the IGN or You Tube guide, so I am fine with that. One of these days I will go back to BB, but like I said the setting, look, feel of the game has to suck me in to really get into. There is just too little time, and too many games to play to be enjoyed than wasting time with one you may not enjoy so much.

[carcarias]

Wow. It just goes to show how gameplay experiences can differ.

I found that the amount of time between idols was pretty short compared to other souls games and fairly straightforward. The souls games made me think really carefully about what direction to take, when to use potions and when to call it quits and go back to the previous bonfire to save XP. Sekiro has so many opportunities to just run through, stealth past or bypass enemies that i rarely had a problem finding the next idol.

Strangely my experience about bosses and checkpoints is vastly different too. I was really pleased to find that bosses were close to idols, with the exception of Juzou the Drunk, which pissed me right off. Needing to keep killing enemies or running through them to get to a boss is my biggest criticism of Souls games, but for me Sekiro doesn't have that problem.

I wonder if it's Juzou that made the writer quit? Because if it is, I'd urge them to re-install it. I can't think of a boss that's not near an idol after Juzou, although I still have 2-3 bosses left.

The only wall I hit was when there was nothing to do except beat one of these three bosses *SPOILERS*

Bowguy at the top of the temple, one armed ninja in Ashina Reservoir, spear guy at top of Ashina Reservoir steps. They were all rock hard and seemed way OP. However, by finding all possible prayer beads and gourd seeds, getting a new skill tree from an NPC and improving my posture damage, my character was good enough to beat Spear guy and then one armed ninja. I then had enough prayer beads to upgrade again and so I went and beat Bowguy.

After that, you're kinda set for the rest of the game, though it's still a great challenge. I urge the writer to take up the controller again; if you can beat Souls, you can beat Sekiro :)

[vivaladil]

I beat Juzou. It was more the random big spear guy mini-boss that was the tipping point of "I hate having to run here every time."

[Aaroncls7]

haha goodbye skeleton

[Suzyp]

if you give it more time and learn the mechanics of the game, it's actually easier than BB and DS3...

[Potnoodle999]

Jesus what a dreadful article. This game is 10/10

[vivaladil]

I didn't rate the game, but if I was had to I would chuck it in the 8-10 area.

[v3nny]

fucking plebs I swear

[UnHoly_One]

Controversial opinion:

These games are only popular because people want something to brag about.

[Ashunderfire86]

That Lady Butterfly 🦋 break me lol! Very hard fight wow 😮