Your video game hot take(s) thread

[Worgen]

That's a scripted action, it doesn't have anything to do with pathing or AI.

It means they had to put in the effort of scripting it, they had to animate it, they had to program it, would have been easier to take out the hop back or the break in the wall.

Having said that, there's plenty of places where enemies take themselves out in Dark Souls that are clearly unintended. I've seen serpent men run themselves off bridges in Sen's Fortress without any player input. I've seen drakes in the valley of the drakes fall into the ravine, and I've seen lightening demons in Anor Londo just back themselves off ledges despite the fact that they both have wings and can fly (which makes it extra silly). Painting guardians pretty routinely fall off the rafters trying to path to the player. Those are just the ones I can think of off the top of my head, and just in DS1. There's soo many more examples I could think of in the rest of the Souls series.

How about the rune farm in Elden Ring where you can shoot one of the demon bird things and just farm it for runes? Fromsoft is well aware of it and does not care about removing it. These are games that Fromsoft is perfectly willing to let you break. If not then they would have removed magic.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

How about the rune farm in Elden Ring where you can shoot one of the demon bird things and just farm it for runes? Fromsoft is well aware of it and does not care about removing it. These are games that Fromsoft is perfectly willing to let you break. If not then they would have removed magic.

Yes, that's another example of something unintentional being left in the game. I'm not sure why you think that somehow helps support your argument.

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

You're just wrong about this.

With the Taurus Demon fight the intention to having that break in the wall is for the boss to be able to knock you off the arena. It's meant to punish your bad positioning and teach you not to stand near ledges when fighting something bigger than you because taking a big hit with your shield up still knocks you backward.

The Taurus demon wasn't even originally supposed to be the boss fight on that bridge in DS1, he was repurposed to that area, and they just never bothered to fix his movement to not fall off the map because the development of DS1 was rushed and the game was never finished. (I can't find the source for this information. I remember it from an old Zullie The Witch video, but given that she has hundreds of videos about the various technical changes in all of the Souls games I don't really have time to look for it at the moment, so just "trust me bro.")

The clip for the Dark Souls 2 boss that I posted, the Dragon Rider is even worse. If you ever play it, it is very clear from the arena and boss design that it's all designed for the boss to knock YOU off. There's levers you can find and pull in the area leading up to the boss fight that cause the arena to get larger so that you have less of a chance of getting knocked off. The intention is that taking the time to explore the area would help alleviate a disadvantage later in the boss fight. It actually ends up doing the opposite because the bad boss pathing means that having the smaller arena makes it easy for him to accidentally kill himself.

There's a bunch of other places in all of the souls games where enemies just ledge themselves and die because their pathing is bad.

In a way though it’s kinda like the game is saying, what’s possible to happen to the player could be possible happen to enemies. Like the Maneaters in Demon’s Souls can’t easily knock the player off but also the player can cheese them off in a couple ways. There’s a Future Press guide (or maybe it was the You Just Died compendium, idk) where a FROM dev makes a point of stating anything is fair game, including cheese. So they’re surely aware of and have no problem with people exploiting any lingering design flaws.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

In a way though it’s kinda like the game is saying, what’s possible to happen to the player could be possible happen to enemies. Like the Maneaters in Demon’s Souls can’t easily knock the player off but also the player can cheese them off in a couple ways. There’s a Future Press guide (or maybe it was the You Just Died compendium, idk) where a FROM dev makes a point of stating anything is fair game, including cheese. So they’re surely aware of and have no problem with people exploiting any lingering design flaws.

Oh absolutely. I think they're impressed when people find unintended ways to beat certain challenges, and they value player creativity. That's not what's under contention here. Many of us are saying that Souls AI is generally pretty bad or at least rudimentary, and Worgen is claiming the opposite...and being wrong.

 

[Worgen]

Yes, that's another example of something unintentional being left in the game. I'm not sure why you think that somehow helps support your argument.

Cause you are full of it.

Oh absolutely. I think they're impressed when people find unintended ways to beat certain challenges, and they value player creativity. That's not what's under contention here. Many of us are saying that Souls AI is generally pretty bad or at least rudimentary, and Worgen is claiming the opposite...and being wrong.

No, I'm not saying its an amazing ai, you want a good ai then look at the bots in unreal or the enemies in Halo. But you are being overly harsh on the ai in the souls games when most games just use run at you or stand and shoot as their ai.

 

[BrawlMan]

But you are being overly harsh on the ai in the souls games when most games just use run at you or stand and shoot as their ai.

Not really. The Souls games are big budget mainstream games, so anything is fair game.

I'll give credit where credit is due with how some of the AI works, mainly bosses, but yeah, the AI for most of the rank files and mooks are pretty meh/average/mediocre. Streets of Rage 3/Bare Knuckle III, God Hand, Mad World and Ninja Gaiden Black have better AI than a majority of the Souls games. Almost all of these games are over 20 years old. Three of the former games were made on a low budget. God Hand especially; being made within the budget of two weekends.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Cause you are full of it.


No, I'm not saying its an amazing ai, you want a good ai then look at the bots in unreal or the enemies in Halo. But you are being overly harsh on the ai in the souls games when most games just use run at you or stand and shoot as their ai.

You've come full circle to saying the same thing I said a couple of posts ago. I literally don't know what you're arguing at this point.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Even when dead and sticking to you like shopping bags highlights the very rudimentary design behind Souls enemies.

I'll never understand why developers make enemies ragdoll like this. Just make them intangible when they're dead so the player can't move them. It seems like such an easy solution.

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Oh absolutely. I think they're impressed when people find unintended ways to beat certain challenges, and they value player creativity. That's not what's under contention here. Many of us are saying that Souls AI is generally pretty bad or at least rudimentary, and Worgen is claiming the opposite...and being wrong.

On one hand it’s good in the way that stuff can quickly fuck the player up if they aren’t paying attention, while still largely providing a fair fight. But there’s a lot of room in the code for whoopsies. Oddly enough though the criticism I find somewhat contestable is where a lot of people say the AI has trouble fighting more than one opponent, because I think that’s often true of multitasking in general. IE it’s rarely effective trying to do two separate things at once. They’d basically have to default to a “fuck it” AoE attack or something whenever the player and a summon team up, which would risk feeling really unfair. Drawing aggro is a perfectly tactical option in these games, and I think that’s part of why it looks like the AI is just plain stupid when in fact it’s largely intended.

*As an aside to my previous post, I meant to say the Maneaters can easily knock the player off (the biggest thing I miss about my legacy account is not having a stupid one hour edit limit on posts).*

 

[Worgen]

Not really. The Souls games are big budget mainstream games, so anything is fair game.

I'll give credit where credit is due with how some of the AI works, mainly bosses, but yeah, the AI for most of the rank files and mooks are pretty meh/average/mediocre. Streets of Rage 3/Bare Knuckle III, God Hand, Mad World and Ninja Gaiden Black have better AI than a majority of the Souls games. Almost all of these games are over 20 years old. Three of the former games were made on a low budget. God Hand especially; being made within the budget of two weekends.

Ehh, compared to most big budget games? Like the cod series where enemies tend to just be shooting galleries? Or what about RTS games where the ai tends to be pretty brain dead and has to cheat to have any kind of a chance? Very few games have any kind of advanced enemy AI, it tends to be just good enough to get the job done and the devs rely on numbers to add difficulty. Right now I'm playing the Spiderman remaster and the enemies are very dumb, but make up for it with numbers. Numbers can disguise a bad ai as long as the player doesn't look closely. But its much harder to do that with just a few enemies. The ai in the souls game for the most part might be rather simple, but its better then a lot of games still.

 

[BrawlMan]

but its better then a lot of games still.

Not really, and most of the statements you've been making are full of copium. Also, you just outed yourself as a blind Souls fan with little effort on your part. So congrats, have fun with that, and believe whatever helps you sleep at night easier.

 

[Casual Shinji]

I'll never understand why developers make enemies ragdoll like this. Just make them intangible when they're dead so the player can't move them. It seems like such an easy solution.

Well, only Fromsoft really does this to this extent. But then I don't know what goes into making an enemy go from alive to dead developement wise. Maybe Fromsoft leaves certain parameters on when an enemy drops that causes the ragdolling, or maybe they put too much effort into it in Demon's Souls and Dark Souls and now it's become part of their calling card so they have to put in every game now.

 

[Worgen]

Not really, and most of the statements you've been making are full of copium. Also, you just outed yourself as a blind Souls fan with little effort on your part. So congrats, have fun with that, and believe whatever helps you sleep at night easier.

Oh fuck off, you are full of shit and you know it, you are just being a hater. For some dumb reason you have it set in your heart, that the ai in the souls series is bad, when it has to be better then in a lot of games that have much simpler ai.

 

[BrawlMan]

Oh fuck off, you are full of shit and you know it, you are just being a hater.

Not really. I have no hatred for Dark Souls. You, on the other hand having going way overboard on the defensive and contradicting yourself with how the AI works. As both @Casual Shinji and @Dirty Hipsters have pointed out.

that the ai in the souls series is bad,

Nope. All you're doing is pointing false accusations. I didn't say bad or terrible. Mainly mediocre or average. Sometimes simple words, but it shows the problems with the AI.

So how about you take a chill pill and cool off for a minute?

 

[Worgen]

Nope. All you're doing is pointing false accusations. I didn't say bad or terrible. Mainly mediocre or average. Sometimes simple words, but it shows the problems with the AI.

So how about you take a chill pill and cool off for a minute?

I'm not saying the ai is amazing or anything. I didn't even say its good, I said Halo or unreal has good ai. But the ai in the souls games is above average, the average ai is pretty meh and usually just stands there and shoots or runs towards you. They are making the points that because the ai can fall off the side of clearly designed arenas that it means the ai is crap.

 

[BrawlMan]

I'm not saying the ai is amazing or anything.

You mentioned it the first time already. With the way you've been acting, you could have fooled me, but sure, let's go with that.

They are making the points that because the ai can fall off the side of clearly designed arenas that it means the ai is crap.

Well, that's their opinion. I can understand why they feel that way. I'm sure they are not alone on that. I at least gave credit to most of the boss AI in these games.

the average ai is pretty meh and usually just stands there and shoots or runs towards you.

Most games have better ai than the standard pop and stop shooters. Souls games do, but there plenty of non-shooter games that have better AI than a majority of tge Souls franchise. That's all I had to say on the matter, because i'm not dragging this out.

 

[Worgen]

You mentioned it the first time already. With the way you've been acting, you could have fooled me, but sure, let's go with that.

I literally did not. You love to imagine what I said.

Most games have better ai than the standard pop and stop shooters. Souls games do, but there plenty of non-shooter games that have better AI than a majority of tge Souls franchise. That's all I had to say on the matter, because i'm not dragging this out.

You mentioned big budget games, most of those are shooters. But you also have big budget games like Spiderman Remastered that has a pretty pathetic ai, which will just kinda stand around in the middle of combat and also get caught on terrain a lot. But it relies on numbers to mask that.

 

[BrawlMan]

literally did not. You love to imagine what I said.

Actually you did.

I'm not saying its an amazing ai,

This you?

Spiderman Remastered

Ok and? I believe you, but I know Miles Morales barely had the same AI issues. Invisibility broke the game on that one though. Nearly every game has ai exploits/faulty ai exploits of some kind. So the seoul games had better ai than some other games. Still doesn't change the fact that you have older and lower budget games that have better ai than it or the entire franchise. I'm done here or not taking us any further. You can go on about it, if you wish. I am finnito and done.

 

[Worgen]

This you?

That is literally me saying its not an amazing ai and that the ai in games like halo and unreal is better. But I stand by it still being above average.

Still doesn't change the fact that you haven't lower budget games to have better ai than it or the entire franchise.

I have no idea what you mean by this.

 

[BrawlMan]

That is literally me saying its not an amazing ai and that the ai in games like halo and unreal is better. But I stand by it still being above average.

That's what I was pointing out. You mentioned twice beforehand. Read your posts.

have no idea what you mean by this.

Grammatical error. I fixed it. Stupid Google speak.

On to better takes.