Armenius
Extremely [H]
- Joined
- Jan 28, 2014
- Messages
- 41,731
Have not been able to play as much as I'd like recently, so I'm still on my NG playthrough. 44 hours in now, at the end of the last DLC (Crown of the Ivory King). I have to say, I disagree with a lot of people that praised the DLC as I believe that they are all worse than the main game. What in the world is with all the tight spaces?
Frozen Eleum Loyce in Crown of the Ivory King looks beautiful and massive from the outside, but that awe is immediately melted when you start traversing inside and are relegated to tunneling and linear corridors.
Crown of the Iron King was better with more branching paths and open areas, but all the fights again take place in tight areas that are contrary to the design of the rest of the game. The mechanic of needing to find and destroy the Ashen Idols was unique and interesting. It's probably my "favorite" of the three.
Crown of the Sunken King had an interesting premise. I did enjoy the descent through the pyramid to reach the boss at the end. Some of the trap puzzle rooms are ruined again by the tight spaces and enemy placement.
So many areas are designed to force you into a situation to use a certain playstyle, for which my character was not built for. It made the whole experience frustrating. I also dislike the optional ending areas where they made the trek to the boss exceptionally arduous to get through only to reward you with a fight that follows the trend of punishing players for using different playstyles. I am honestly fed up with the gameplay loop in this content that I am not going to finish the Frigid Outskirts and am just going to move on to my NG+ playthrough, and I'm likely going to skip the DLC altogether next time and on subsequent playthroughs.
By the way: I did experiment briefly with a build that maxed out agility with a Soul Vessel, but it didn't get rid of the input delay in this game. Actions are certainly faster and you get more iframes in rolls, but you still can't get a feel for where the iframes are and the input delay still ruins the combat in this game.
Frozen Eleum Loyce in Crown of the Ivory King looks beautiful and massive from the outside, but that awe is immediately melted when you start traversing inside and are relegated to tunneling and linear corridors.
Crown of the Iron King was better with more branching paths and open areas, but all the fights again take place in tight areas that are contrary to the design of the rest of the game. The mechanic of needing to find and destroy the Ashen Idols was unique and interesting. It's probably my "favorite" of the three.
Crown of the Sunken King had an interesting premise. I did enjoy the descent through the pyramid to reach the boss at the end. Some of the trap puzzle rooms are ruined again by the tight spaces and enemy placement.
So many areas are designed to force you into a situation to use a certain playstyle, for which my character was not built for. It made the whole experience frustrating. I also dislike the optional ending areas where they made the trek to the boss exceptionally arduous to get through only to reward you with a fight that follows the trend of punishing players for using different playstyles. I am honestly fed up with the gameplay loop in this content that I am not going to finish the Frigid Outskirts and am just going to move on to my NG+ playthrough, and I'm likely going to skip the DLC altogether next time and on subsequent playthroughs.
By the way: I did experiment briefly with a build that maxed out agility with a Soul Vessel, but it didn't get rid of the input delay in this game. Actions are certainly faster and you get more iframes in rolls, but you still can't get a feel for where the iframes are and the input delay still ruins the combat in this game.