Saturday Morning Gaming: Advice for Elden Ring

Jaybird

Jaybird is Birdmojo on Xbox Live and Jaybirdmojo on Playstation's network. He's been playing consoles since the Atari 2600 and it was Zork that taught him how to touch-type. If you've got a song for Wednesday, a commercial for Saturday, a recommendation for Tuesday, an essay for Monday, or, heck, just a handful a questions, fire off an email to AskJaybird-at-gmail.com

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10 Responses

  1. Fish says:

    Got it on my wish list. Normally I’d wait for it to go on sale but I might pull the trigger anyway.Report

  2. Jaybird says:

    okay
    Started with The Spear Dude.
    That was a mistake.
    Excellent distance striking, everything else felt like I was walking through molasses.
    Tried the second dude over. Much quicker, much more responsive.
    Sighed, tried the first dude.
    This guy moves like I’d expect. My first interaction in the real world was with the giant guy who is keep going straight and down to the left.
    And I actually got rid of half of his HP before he killed me!
    Got the horse, switched to the halberd.
    Using the halberd on the horse is significantly different than using the halberd on the ground. The halberd on the ground? Might as well be standing still. On the horse? You can time it to hit right as you pass. Do massive damage and then, a second later, be 20 feet away.
    This is not helping me against Margit the Fell something something.
    Resorted to googling. Going to wander around and find the spectral jellyfish.Report

  3. Reformed Republican says:

    I started playing ER a while back, but I got distracted some time after beating Margit, and I haven’t gotten back. I plan to play more, but I don’t know when. I use walkthroughs, and I don’t feel bad about it.

    I’m playing a few different games at the moment, but today I will focus on Vampire Survivors (normally $4.99 on Steam but $3.99 for their Halloween sale). Jeff Vogel of Spiderweb Software described is as a Twin Stick shooter that plays with one stick. Between that and the price, I gave it a try.
    You start out with your survivor, wandering around with bats coming at you and automatically firing your weapon at regular intervals. Kill a few things, pick up a few crystals, Bam! you level up and get to choose from random upgrade. Maybe you can level your weapon, buy a different weapon, or buy a power up. As time goes own, enemies increase in power. You have to kill quickly enough to level up enough to stay ahead of the enemies. After a little while, you die. Then you get to start again.

    As you play, you get coins, which you can use to buy “permanent” upgrades between playthroughs. Permanent is in quotes because you can always refund them and respec.

    As you find objects, level up weapons enough, and meet other achievements, you will unlock other weapons, power ups, and characters. Between that and the permanent upgrades, eventually you will stumble on a build that is essentially unctouchable. You will beat the stages boss monster and maybe even last all 30 minutes. For me, I went from getting stuck around level 15-16 and around 10 minutes to suddenly surviving to the end. It was very satisfying.

    All in all, it has been an addictive game, and I still have a lot to discover. I easily got my $4.00 of value out of it, and I have been largely neglecting games that I paid a lot more money for.Report

  4. Marchmaine says:

    Heh. Nope. Twitchy and punishing and dickish? That’s what work is for.

    Played some Total Warhammer III – meh. Is it weird that the game makes me hate resolving combat using the engine that is the studio’s entire raison d’etre? I play it like a terrible 4X game.

    Updated Lost Arc (Ark?) but didn’t actually play… can’t get past the aesthetic.

    Played some Undecember(?)… it was ok; but not convinced that the complex systems are cool or dumb.
    Played some Grim Dawn (again)… it is very nearly a good game.
    Played some Last Epoch … I *want* to believe, but it’s just meh.

    Guess I’m just waiting for POE 2 and will probably have to try Diablo IV to discover how they misunderstood their game and player-base. I saw their mobile game on Google Play and could only muster a wry chuckle… not even a curiosity download for $0.Report

  5. Fish says:

    I got oldest boy to share his Steam liberry with me today so I started Elden Ring. I created a character who looks like he’d be at home in an 80’s rock band or on Metalocalypse (and received a touch of criticism from said boy for not digging more deeply into the characterization options.

    I also chose to start as a Wretch. I figured why not maximize my suffering by building this guy from the ground up? So it’s my 80’s rock god and his loin cloth and trusty club.

    It took me 8-10 tries to beat the Soldier of Godrick, and when I did I managed to perfectly execute a jump strike, which knocked him off his axis, after which I just pummeled him to death with my loin cloth…er…club.

    I don’t normally play games like this, and never with a controller, so I’m struggling with all the buttons and sticks and triggers and pulling/pushing/toggling everything at the right time, but so far it’s been fun.Report

  6. Bevedog says:

    Your buddy is a fricken genius. Seriously though, the game was everything I wanted it to be when I heard “open world Dark Souls.” I just love those games, though I’m not any good at them. Glad you gave it a try.Report

  7. jason says:

    Nice. I’m currently level 160 or so. I’m mostly a faith build (incantations are the bomb, yo) and I use the blasphemous blade. I’m near the final levels, but I take my time with open world games. A good early spirit ash is Banished Knight Engvall, but eventually Mimic Tear or Banished Knight Oleg will be better choices (or Black Knife Tiche, but I don’t have her yet).

    Once you accept death (and more death) as a reality and manage your runes, the game works better. You have to be prepared to change tactics when you’re strategy isn’t working as many of the dungeon areas are puzzle-like when it comes to deciphering how to best kill the enemies and avoid death yourself. Also: YOU DON’T HAVE TO FIGHT EVERYTHING. In the early game, you can grab many weapons/upgrades/etc by running and avoiding enemies.

    Also, stay the eff away from rune bears. Seriously.Report