Poll: Will you ACTUALLY be playing Dark Souls 2 easy mode? (if there is one)

[mew4ever23]

No, because I'm probably not going to play dark souls 2.

 

[lechat]

i refused to play dark souls because i have no interest in a game that will heavily punish me for failure which may or may not be my fault without the option to make the game what i consider fun

here's a question: if i was to use say cheat engine or some sort of hack would there be a way to allocate souls (thats skill points right?) in a way that could slightly lower the difficulty in dark souls without making it god mode?
i really do want to check out dark souls but only if i can tweak the difficulty myself
BTW thats not a question on how to use cheat engine or w/e since im well capable of hacking games. i just need to know if if the xp/lvl system is such that i can make it slightly easier without turning myself into a god

 

[chadachada123]

It would be hilarious if Dark Souls 2 came with two difficulty modes: hilariously easy and brutally, brutally hard. I want easy to be so easy that it takes the fun out of playing on easy.

I want thm to pull a dick move like old games did and not let you get morew than halfway in on Easy.

OT: Nah, probably not, I play standard/normal as default anyway on everything.

Oooh. OOOOooohhh. Oh I like this idea. This would be fucking awesome in multiple ways. It would both ACTUALLY be useful to people learning the game (Good enough to play it on Easy? Great! Now you get to start over and play it how it is meant to be played!), AND would be a freaking hilarious way to address the whole "accessibility" crowd.

OT: I don't really like the poll question and its lack of options. I would *try* an easy mode if Dark Souls 2 has one, but it would not be my main account and I wouldn't be "seriously" playing it, just playing it to check out differences and seeing if I could, say, speed-run it or something.

 

[chadachada123]

i refused to play dark souls because i have no interest in a game that will heavily punish me for failure which may or may not be my fault without the option to make the game what i consider fun

here's a question: if i was to use say cheat engine or some sort of hack would there be a way to allocate souls (thats skill points right?) in a way that could slightly lower the difficulty in dark souls without making it god mode?
i really do want to check out dark souls but only if i can tweak the difficulty myself
BTW thats not a question on how to use cheat engine or w/e since im well capable of hacking games. i just need to know if if the xp/lvl system is such that i can make it slightly easier without turning myself into a god

There are multiple glitches that can give you infinite souls or infinite items (that can be redeemed for souls and aren't lost upon death), both in Dark Souls and its predecessor, Demon's Souls.

Using one of these glitches, you can level up your character as much as you like, and, as long as you take it slowly, you can level up your character until they reach a level you feel "comfortable" playing with that also isn't God Mode. In that sense, you can absolutely tweak your difficulty through glitches, in addition to tweaking the starting difficulty by just choosing a character better-suited to your play style. This does mean that you have to watch your levels yourself to make sure you don't accidentally make it too easy, or make it too easy because you got greedy.

Many veteran players will use the soul glitches to make their characters max level (which is INSANELY over-powered because the standard player will never come within even ten percent of maxing out every stat), just to see what will happen, or to play PVP with other maxed players so there is no advantage to either player, pure skill.

 

[lucky_sharm]

If Dark Souls had an easy mode...that wouldn't make an average game easier to stand. As much as the difficulty made me rage in Dark Souls, I ended up telling the game to fuck off after I'd spent nearly seven hours on the game, and still had no real idea where I was, who I was, and what I was supposed to be doing. There was some mention of Bells during the opening scene, and an Eagle picking me up after I escaped from some prison. So...unless Dark Souls 2 is just generally better, Easy Mode it will be for me (Because fuck grinding through one area over and over again, using all my health potions against three enemies, refilling my health potion, and then having the enemies respawn. That's not difficult, that's fucking bad game design).

It's not bad game design if you yourself are too impatient or too inept to overcome the challenges presented in the game. You won't even need to heal yourself or grind at all if you actually take your time and kill the enemies one by one. Eventually you become strong enough to tear right through them anyway.

There's also no reason given for why the knight in the beginning saves you, and he's basically just been told to ring a church bell somewhere, because it will "reveal the fate of the undead" (which the very first character you meet post-tutorial says is likely bullshit[footnote]

Spoiler

And he's right.

[/footnote]). Ultimately, all ringing those bells does is summon a plesiosaur. And then you wait until the very end of the game to understand anything he's saying, beyond "go here and do this."

The actual story/goal is actually something that you yourself have to discover. The final choice in the game is actually quite morally ambiguious when you understand what it means to link the fire, and what it means to leave it be. Here's a hint: what do you lose in order to kindle a bonfire? The lore and story is all in the background, gameplay mechanics, and in what the NPCs tell you. You have to draw your own conclusions based on the information that you discover. Think of Half Life in this regard, another game that is light on narrative.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

I probably won't be getting the game unless I am in the market for another ugly mediocre game. Of course, there's a chance it could be a lot better than Dark Souls.

 

[skywolfblue]

I would.

I've heard good things about Dark Souls combat and bosses.
But from what I've heard if you die you have to do the whole section over again. That's a deal-breaker for me.

 

[DeltaEdge]

Yeah, I probably would play the easy mode if I ever actually decided to pick up Dark Souls 2, although I've never been a Souls player, and I'm guessing there are spider monsters somewhere in the game, and I am too much of a pussy to play a game with spiders that I find scary enough(I unplugged my Wii, exited the room, and didn't go near it for 3 days after seeing a Skulltula in Twilight Princess, and it took all of my courage to beat that dungeon. Will not touch Limbo!). But yeah, anyways, I sometimes like to build my way up to the harder difficulties. I usually like to start out on normal mode, sometimes slightly higher if it were say, a Tales game (played through Graces f on moderate mode my first time, and plan to do hard mode next), and then challenge the higher and higher difficulties. I gradually get better and better at the game per mode and eventually beat it on the hardest difficulty. That being said, I usually would start on normal mode, but Dark Souls wouldn't have one, so Easy would probably be the normal mode, just titled differently.

 

[Random Argument Man]

I won't play dark soul 2 because I don't like to be frustrated over a game. If I did, I'd play normal though. I wouldn't ***** over the people who would rather play easy mode. A.They can enjoy the game. B. It can be a stepping stone for them before they can get into deeper gaming stuff.

I never understood why people see it as a problem.

 

[Reyold]

I love difficult games, so no, probably not.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

I think I've made it fairly clear that I'm against an easy mode and wouldn't play it on principle, let alone for any other reason, but it's not going to have one anyway. The whole thing was a mistranslation and I suspect something worse is actually happening - the core game is going to be more straightforward. But I haven't played it and I'm pretty sure no-one else has either, so I'm not going to make a decision about what it is or is not. I can however say that simplification of the combat or story would be a terrible thing for the series as far as I'm concerned, and quest logs, non-in-game explanations of quests or goals, forced motivations, restriction of options, increase of linearity, symbols above enemies for when you can parry, obvious enemy layouts, any of that, I would not like to see. The one exception is better and more thorough tutorials (woven into the story of course) which explain obscure stats. But honestly, I'm most annoyed at the point in a recent interview ehre it was stated there will be less choice at the beginning of the game, and that could mean less character classes (and while there are quite a few, I like quite a few because there are a lot of stat combinations to cover) or I think more likely less routes to go along (meaning there may not be a graveyard or New Londo or something to go to first), but whatever it means I can't see it being a good thing.

tl;dr: No, I'm pretty sure there isn't going to be one and I wouldn't consider playing it if there was.

 

[Darth Rahu]

I won't play on Easy mode for one simple reason: it isn't meant for me. I've beaten Dark Souls before, played Demon's Souls, I am familiar with the games and their difficulty curves. I've also been playing games since I was four years old. I don't need it, but that doesn't mean I'm against its very existence. Simple as that.

 

[NeutralDrow]

There's also no reason given for why the knight in the beginning saves you, and he's basically just been told to ring a church bell somewhere, because it will "reveal the fate of the undead" (which the very first character you meet post-tutorial says is likely bullshit[footnote]

Spoiler

And he's right.

[/footnote]). Ultimately, all ringing those bells does is summon a plesiosaur. And then you wait until the very end of the game to understand anything he's saying, beyond "go here and do this."

The actual story/goal is actually something that you yourself have to discover. The final choice in the game is actually quite morally ambiguious when you understand what it means to link the fire, and what it means to leave it be. Here's a hint: what do you lose in order to kindle a bonfire? The lore and story is all in the background, gameplay mechanics, and in what the NPCs tell you. You have to draw your own conclusions based on the information that you discover. Think of Half Life in this regard, another game that is light on narrative.

It's morally ambiguous? Coulda fooled me.

Spoiler

I didn't link the fire. Screw all those self-serving pricks who told me it was a good idea, it my turn to be self-serving. The new Age of Humanity is upon us, the primordial serpents bow to me, and I already killed any remaining gods who could have mattered.

I haven't played Half-Life yet, but I doubt it's a similar thing. Gordon Freeman, for all that he's a silent protagonist, sounds very much a part of the world he inhabits. The Dark Souls character is just an out-of-nowhere spanner in the works who either fulfills a master conspiracy and ensures the status quo for the next thousand years (while simultaneously <color=aliceblue>burning that entire time until they go as nuts as Gwyn), or says "screw it" to everything and decides to make everything move on. There's ambiguity involved, but I wouldn't call any of it "moral." More ambiguous in the sense of "I have no idea what will ultimately result from this, only educated guesses."

Honestly, the game I kept recalling while playing Dark Souls was Soulbringer. Both games have extensive backstory lore, told through objects you find and people you talk to as the game progresses. The main difference in approach is that Soulbringer's discovered lore nearly always is or is revealed as relevant to what you're actually doing ("there's something odd about this addendum to the Treaty of Three Empires Elric is selling..."), and that it's possible to tell because you actually know what you're doing.

 

[barbzilla]

No, I will not be engaging in an Easy mode. Not because I feel like it ruins the game or anything like that, but because I've played the previous games and had very few problems on the default difficulty. Since I could do it on those two, I'm going to go into DS2 assuming I will be fully capable of doing so here as well.

 

[LiberalSquirrel]

Yes and no. Having an easy mode might convince me to buy it.

Let me explain.

From everything I've heard about the Demon's/Dark Souls series, it sounds interesting, but annoyingly hard. I enjoy a challenge, but I don't enjoy frustration. Having the option to knock down the difficulty in case the feeling of "yes, awesome, my skills are being challenged!" turns into "well, this is just knee-knockingly unfair and annoying... and rather frustrating" might well convince me to finally make a purchase of a game in the series.

No, I haven't played Demon's Souls or Dark Souls. Yes, I plan to. Eventually. The fact that I look towards gaming as a relaxing recreational activity, and thus don't want to get uber-frustrated with it, has pushed the games considerably further back on my "to-buy" list than they might otherwise be.

 

[viranimus]

Ok thats understandable. If you want to understand, then stop ignoring the fact that It most certainly DOES detract from all modes as if it does not exist. Your hypothetical is based on that incorrect assumption. If you chose to ignore the facts of a case, picking and choosing what you will consider as valid, how can you possibly come to an informed decision?

Im sorry, the problem isnt elitism here. The problem is detrimental tolerance

I ment [b/]on a technical level[/b] in terms of the actual game mechanics...that is (which I had to go back and edit because it wasnt clear in the context of this argument)

with that in mind YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO PHYSICSLLY CHANGE SETTINGS so there is NO confusion as to who is "leet" and who isn't

this bullshit is all in your head, I mean its not [i/]enough[/i] for you to have the satisisfaction of you beating it on hard/normal...oh no, as far as your concerned those other kids can;t play with your toys because you don;t get to feel as special

boo-fucking-hoo

No, the bullshit is in your head. You throw in an edit of "a technical level" specifically so you can ignore and dismiss the opposing argument as if it doesnt even exist and should not be mentioned. I get thats par for the forum course when it comes to dissenting positions, But if you demand a technical level, so be it.

Where is the precedent of a game with scaling difficulty that withheld content based on selecting a lower difficulty? Certain fighting games perhaps? Last one I can recall was a dead or alive I think. None the less its uncommon if not rare and practically unprecedented in an RPG.

The whole counter of this argument is "These people should be able to enjoy the content, even if they arent skilled enough to do it now" So this faux enlightenment position WANTS to give people access to the content of the game. Ok. So what incentive is there for someone to play the game on normal, when everything the game has to offer can be accomplished in easy? That is the technical level. The difficulty of a game invariably is scaled by the path of least resistance to experience the content delivered. By adding that easy mode and there being no incentive to suffer through hard or NG+ modes, the difficulty of the game is reduced to that lowest common denominator. Remember, choice goes both ways, and just like you have to proactively go down, you also have to proactively make the choice to remain up when there is no logical reason to do so. In doing that... you remove the validity of the one most prominent feature the IP is known for, and do so across ALL modes. You might want to ignore the validity of it, but the only thing accomplished by easy mode is taking a franchise known for being difficult and leaves it as nothing more than just another action RPG franchise.

Simply by giving players a choice diminishes all modes by eroding the point. It is a desolate, evil, malevolent world bent on your destruction leaving you hopeless against seemingly insurmountable odds. Asking you to decide if you want that hopeless situation to be gentle or aggressive obliterates the hopelessness the world is intended to provide.

Now, You can drop this "elitism" tripe, because that is a construct that has NO basis in reality. My position is being spun as this big mean alpha übermensch trying to lord its spoils over all the other unworthy and unwashed masses. That is not even remotely true. What this is about is defending one IP out of respect for servicing a niche that the LCD had long since abandoned and their ability to continue to fully service that niche because no one else did. To maintain the IP and not having to compromise what made it a cult hit, simply because it was made into a cult hit and that popularity has resulted in nothing more than massive butthurt over feeling left out because it was never intended for them in the first place.

So you know what I say? Its long past time for gamers to stop the utterly useless and self centered boo hoo`ing It accomplishes nothing. Toughen up and make your choice. If you dont like it, either work to find a way to be better and rise to the challenge, Or accept you cannot and pick something else. There is no shame in that. But dont make others have to suffer your issues. I would hope more people would chose the former rather than just giving up at the first sign of resistance.

Edit: And just to clarify... my idea for a perfect souls game... is one that even I cannot beat
"May all your desires be fulfilled except for one, so you'll always have something to strive for."- 7of9

Now its after midnight ET. Going to bed so please understand there wont be responses for a few hours, if I see anything that merits responding to, ill post when I check in the AM

 

[Reaper195]

If Dark Souls had an easy mode...that wouldn't make an average game easier to stand. As much as the difficulty made me rage in Dark Souls, I ended up telling the game to fuck off after I'd spent nearly seven hours on the game, and still had no real idea where I was, who I was, and what I was supposed to be doing. There was some mention of Bells during the opening scene, and an Eagle picking me up after I escaped from some prison. So...unless Dark Souls 2 is just generally better, Easy Mode it will be for me (Because fuck grinding through one area over and over again, using all my health potions against three enemies, refilling my health potion, and then having the enemies respawn. That's not difficult, that's fucking bad game design).

It's not bad game design if you yourself are too impatient or too inept to overcome the challenges presented in the game. You won't even need to heal yourself or grind at all if you actually take your time and kill the enemies one by one. Eventually you become strong enough to tear right through them anyway.

This was rather early on in the game. And it was down a single, thin corridor. Patience doesn't come into it when you have your shield up as you go after the closest guy, take a swing before quickly hiding behind your shield. But before your shield comes out, the other two have already peppered you with fucking arrows while you were hitting that one skeleton. Once. So for every attack I did against one skeleton who was two feet away, I was hit by two arrows from two more skeletons, fifteen feet away. That;s not being impatient, or being inept. That's fucking bullshit.

Also, a game where the player has to figure out a majority of the story in such a large game is a mix of both bad story, and bad writing. It's fine for an indie game that's only two and a half hours in. But after seven hours of not knowing where I was going, or why, or who I was aside from "Yo, you're a zombie in this zombie prison. Ring a bell. Fuckin'...do shit." at the beginning...objectively, the writing is bad and the story is bad.

 

[Vault101]

No, the bullshit is in your head.

HAHAH...yeah...sure

[quote/]You throw in an edit of "a technical level" specifically so you can ignore and dismiss the opposing argument as if it doesnt even exist and should not be mentioned. I get thats par for the forum course when it comes to dissenting positions, But if you demand a technical level, so be it.[/quote]
because IT WAS WHAT I ORIGINALLY MENT but upon second reading I realised it wasn't clear, as for the "oposing argument" I'm still not getting it I'm afraid

[quote/]
The whole counter of this argument is "These people should be able to enjoy the content, even if they arent skilled enough to do it now" So this faux enlightenment position WANTS to give people access to the content of the game. Ok. So what incentive is there for someone to play the game on normal, when everything the game has to offer can be accomplished in easy?[/quote]
wait...now your upset that less people will play the game "your" way? anyway, I guess the answer to the question is so they can get a great big hard-on with their E-peen....case in point

[quote/]That is the technical level. The difficulty of a game invariably is scaled by the path of least resistance to experience the content delivered. By adding that easy mode and there being no incentive to suffer through hard or NG+ modes, the difficulty of the game is reduced to that lowest common denominator.Remember, choice goes both ways, and just like you have to proactively go down, you also have to proactively make the choice to remain up when there is no logical reason to do so.[/quote]
its NOT technical in terms of game design or mechanics because it all comes down to the PLAYER..its the player who changes the settings..I would assume "hard" would be the default for dark souls 2

by that logic I would play EVERY game on easy because "well derp I win the game that way right?" if a game is too easy then there is no challenge..no challenge it gets boring

if there was an easy mode would you play it? of coarse you wouldn't you said you enjoy the challenge, and I'm sure people will be plenty impressed when you tell them you beat dark souls without resorting to easy

[quote/]In doing that... you remove the validity of the one most prominent feature the IP is known for, and do so across ALL modes. You might want to ignore the validity of it, but the only thing accomplished by easy mode is taking a franchise known for being difficult and leaves it as nothing more than just another action RPG franchise.[/quote]
story is a huge aspect of the Mass Effect games, you can skip through the story alot of the time, but it doesnt change the fact that story is important in mass effect. Just like the fact that you have the OPTION of an easyer mode does not change the fact dark souls 2 would be a challenging game


[quote/]Simply by giving players a choice diminishes all modes by eroding the point. It is a desolate, evil, malevolent world bent on your destruction leaving you hopeless against seemingly insurmountable odds. Asking you to decide if you want that hopeless situation to be gentle or aggressive obliterates the hopelessness the world is intended to provide.[/quote]
did it ever occur to you that some people might still find "easy" mode challenging in its own right? again your upset people *gasp* might not play the "right" way,like I said before I think somones stupid if they go into mass effect and ignore thr story but hey if they want to play that way I don;t care

[quote/]Now, You can drop this "elitism" tripe, because that is a construct that has NO basis in reality. My position is being spun as this big mean alpha übermensch trying to lord its spoils over all the other unworthy and unwashed masses. That is not even remotely true.[/quote]
I don't know...seems like that to me

[quote/]What this is about is defending one IP out of respect for servicing a niche that the LCD had long since abandoned[/quote]
case in point

[quote/] because it was made into a cult hit and that popularity has resulted in nothing more than massive butthurt over feeling left out because it was never intended for them in the first place.[/quote]
somone here is buthurt....and its not the masses of flithy casuals...

[quote/]So you know what I say? Its long past time for gamers to stop the utterly useless and self centered boo hoo`ing It accomplishes nothing.[/quote]
yeah we should totally do that...oh wait

[quote/]Toughen up [/quote]
the fucking fuck?..ITS....A....GAME!

[quote/]and make your choice. If you dont like it, either work to find a way to be better and rise to the challenge, Or accept you cannot and pick something else. There is no shame in that. But dont make others have to suffer your issues. I would hope more people would chose the former rather than just giving up at the first sign of resistance.[/quote]
no one is upset they can't play darksouls
I actually don't really care that dark souls was too hard for me...whatever and I don;t care if the next darksouls comes out being the same...however if there was an easy mode I might actually be interested,

[quote/]Edit: And just to clarify... my idea for a perfect souls game... is one that even I cannot beat
"May all your desires be fulfilled except for one, so you'll always have something to strive for."- 7of9[/quote]
well then what's the point of that? do you also like to drive nails into your hands for fun?