I dropped off there, but not because they explode, which I didn’t know. For me it felt like I got an idea of what the game was going to be like, not really going somewhere new compared to Hollow Knight and being a slog with long annoying runbacks.
Not sure if that feeling is accurate for what it would have been like to continue, but importantly for the analysis it was a culmination of everything that came before.
The fake bench before him that forces you to get diseased
was so offensive I almost quit, but I kept going on, determined to reach the end. I was nearly at the end of the game when I reached Crust King Khann.
Tap for spoiler
I miraculously cleared the first three gauntlet rooms on the way to him before dying in the fourth. When I went back in and realized it was going to make me start from the beginning each time, and that it may take me ten or so times after I finally reach the boss to finish, I immediately uninstalled.
People who love the runbacks will say things like “Once you’re good enough, the runbacks aren’t a slog they are just time consuming.” That’s exactly what a slog is. If the game made you put in the first 100 digits of pi every time you died, no one would play it because it was wasting your time. Punishing you for dying by burning a significant chunk of your real world life span is not something I want to encourage.
My disdain for games that have no respect for the player’s time seems to be uncommon. I criticized Blue Prince for the same reason, and people strongly disagreed.
it was going to make me start from the beginning each time
that’s actually not the case, after the third gauntlet room there’s one of those giant drill spikes you have to hit that falls and breaks through the floors below, letting you skip all 3 major gauntlets, only leaving the short 4th one
regarding runbacks, imo they’re fun, so sure, they take time, but anything in a game takes time to do. And all but one of the runbacks are less than like 40s long, I see them as a phase 0 of boss fights, and greatly enjoy them. They also change things up so it’s not just permanently fighting the boss itself the entire time. My caveat here is that the movement system being fun adds to that a lot, so in things like the 3rd person Souls games, if it’s just a long sprint, it’s not as interesting, whereas Silksong has one of my favorite movement systems in gaming, so I even looked forward to the runback when I died against Last Judge.
It’s a matter of taste. The runback is as exercise in speedrunning which allows you to sharpen the core skills until you can pass everything fast without losing HP. At the point where you pass everything with full HP it’s not a slog anymore, just going through the motions.
I dropped off there, but not because they explode, which I didn’t know. For me it felt like I got an idea of what the game was going to be like, not really going somewhere new compared to Hollow Knight and being a slog with long annoying runbacks.
Not sure if that feeling is accurate for what it would have been like to continue, but importantly for the analysis it was a culmination of everything that came before.
The runback for the Last Judge wasn’t even that terrible, just annoying and time consuming. There’s another one called Groal The Great which is:
spoiler
not great at all
Especially if you don’t know about
Tap for spoiler
the secret bench, and even than it’s still not great. Fuck Groal
Tap for spoiler
The fake bench before him that forces you to get diseased
was so offensive I almost quit, but I kept going on, determined to reach the end. I was nearly at the end of the game when I reached Crust King Khann.
Tap for spoiler
I miraculously cleared the first three gauntlet rooms on the way to him before dying in the fourth. When I went back in and realized it was going to make me start from the beginning each time, and that it may take me ten or so times after I finally reach the boss to finish, I immediately uninstalled.
People who love the runbacks will say things like “Once you’re good enough, the runbacks aren’t a slog they are just time consuming.” That’s exactly what a slog is. If the game made you put in the first 100 digits of pi every time you died, no one would play it because it was wasting your time. Punishing you for dying by burning a significant chunk of your real world life span is not something I want to encourage.
My disdain for games that have no respect for the player’s time seems to be uncommon. I criticized Blue Prince for the same reason, and people strongly disagreed.
that’s actually not the case, after the third gauntlet room there’s one of those giant drill spikes you have to hit that falls and breaks through the floors below, letting you skip all 3 major gauntlets, only leaving the short 4th one
regarding runbacks, imo they’re fun, so sure, they take time, but anything in a game takes time to do. And all but one of the runbacks are less than like 40s long, I see them as a phase 0 of boss fights, and greatly enjoy them. They also change things up so it’s not just permanently fighting the boss itself the entire time. My caveat here is that the movement system being fun adds to that a lot, so in things like the 3rd person Souls games, if it’s just a long sprint, it’s not as interesting, whereas Silksong has one of my favorite movement systems in gaming, so I even looked forward to the runback when I died against Last Judge.
It’s a matter of taste. The runback is as exercise in speedrunning which allows you to sharpen the core skills until you can pass everything fast without losing HP. At the point where you pass everything with full HP it’s not a slog anymore, just going through the motions.