The Hollow Children Thread

[AlexSwingle]

Been meaning to talk about the different puzzle games known as Dark Souls. Hopefully this will be a safe space to share misery. Any game that has stilted combat animations, requires hindsight, and gives you the option to make bad choices are good for Dark Soul discussion.

[AlexSwingle]

Mars: War Logs [PS3+360 Download Only, PC]

A clean-shaven Wolverine is stuck on Mars. He teams-up with a lady-boy to kill a prison warden and some governor. The game takes about 10-15 hours to complete and has a little clunky, but satisfying combat. You use a modified nail gun as your range weapon and can make small changes to your melee weapons. It's routinely on sale for about $3 on the PC with controller support.

I like the dialogue quite a bit. Wolverine goes full asshole, often belittling anybody who talks to him. The game has almost no SJW propaganda, which is a major plus for me. The warden is mentioned as being a habitual rapist and you can get it on with one of his victims after swooning them. Glorious.

For the negatives: The side quests are buggy. About two of the side quests can fail to continue in their progression. It prevents an achievement, but the rewards for those two quests aren't special.
Little variety in combat styles. It's practically a beat-em-up, but has a heavy emphasis on counter-attacks and dodging, like most Dark Soul variants. There are 4 weapon types based on threat range and attack speed. I often wailed on fools with a club because who doesn't like to beat enemies with a car muffler?

[Death Adder]

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[AlexSwingle]

I understand Autism is a pandemic, but these people need to be silenced or at the very least, ignored. You have 1-2 allies at all times, but mostly 1. Mass Effect requires no skill and you have full control over your two team mates. In this one, you don't. I recommend you watch a few minutes of a playthrough, otherwise you might get tricked into thinking towards or away from the game.

The molerats are god damn retarded strong, especially on the higher difficulties.

[AlexSwingle]

Nioh: Not-Geralt, The Highlander [PS4/5, PC]

A high-fantasy, Japan-themed Dark Souls game that is built around stamina management and quick deaths. The bulk of enemies attack in 2-3 hit combos. If all their hits land, you'll usually be dead or out of stamina, paralyzing you long enough to die from a finishing blow. What makes the game fair is the fact you have the same moves the enemies have and you'll typically kill them in the same manner. Enemy A.I. is decent for a Dark Souls game, meaning it'll be hard to cheap your way through the game.

You also fight demons. They typically hit harder, attack more often, and leave aura bubbles that prevent you from regaining stamina. To balance it out, once you make them run out of stamina, you can stun-lock them for 5-6 seconds, which is usually enough time to kill them.

The bosses are insanely hard. It took a friend of mine about 8 hours of grinding the first island to get the proper stats and gear to compensate for his timing problems. The first boss tends to stun-lock players for up to 1800 damage. When I beat that boss, I had 1200 HP. It was rough.

Equipment have modifiers on them and the bulk of your strength comes from randomly getting better equipment. You can forge+enhance your current gear if you want to remove some of the RNG out of the loot drops.

It has online co-op. Not sure if it is cross-platform, but it is a ton of fun to wallop on monsters. They almost never get a break to counter-attack. It's practically cheating, but it doesn't ruin boss fights like other Dark Soul style games do. The A.I. tends to target the most vulnerable instead of always picking the nearest target, so you have to be on your toes, regardless of the role you assigned yourself in the team. (range vs melee, .etc)

I almost forgot to mention this: Each weapon has three fighting stances for speed vs damage strikes. Makes a huge difference in the approach against each enemy. You can also summon a spirit guardian that makes you invulnerable while it is still alive. The spirit enhances your damage and lasts for a limited amount of time. The timer is shortened if you are hit while using the spirit.