Zero Punctuation: Hollow Knight / Dead Cells

Erttheking

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Got both of these games during the summer sale, though I've only played Dead Cells so far. Personally I'm liking it a lot, but I'm also looking forward to getting around to Hollow Knight.
 

Igor-Rowan

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I have to say, this year's line-up of Zero Punctuation has been way more solid than last year's, maybe that's a consequence of this year's games compared to last year's, but last year still had a "let's all laugh at an industry, that never learns anything tee hee hee".
 

Darth_Payn

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The echo effects were excellent. I too know the pain of building a LEGO set before my younger brother comes in to smash it. Not only that, but also lose pieces I need, so thanks for dredging up those memories. Beating him up for it helped cheer me up a little.
 

Marik Bentusi

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I actually think the time-locked doors in Dead Cells are a really smart design choice. They, along with shortcuts unlocked with abilities you gain in the later levels, are what make rushing levels viable.

You can play the game very slowly and stock up on all the helpful goodies you can get, which is the safe option. But if you're a veteran you can just load up on the money from time-locked doors or squeeze through high-level shortcuts with banked money from your last run, then use that money to buy equipment as you approach the levels that are high enough for your skill level. Equipment level scales with the level you're currently in, so everything you acquire in low levels is likely gonna be of temporary help anyway.

If you couldn't rush levels, starting from square one every time would get really tedious.

Only problem I personally have with time-locked doors is that randomly generated levels make them and exits a pain in the arse to find. At least the plentiful teleporters are set up in a smart way to minimize time lost through backtracking.
 

sageoftruth

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Is... playing Dead Cells really about being a piece of snot or was that just a metaphor? I was going to play it but it's possible I might not have the stomach for such a game
 

HK_01

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Noyemi-K said:
Cracked up at "support my patreon"
You can never go wrong with mocking e-beggars
I get that it's annoying, but Patreon's a good way for independent content creators to get by. If the Escapist ever goes under, I imagine Yahtzee would get one too.
 

sXeth

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sageoftruth said:
Is... playing Dead Cells really about being a piece of snot or was that just a metaphor? I was going to play it but it's possible I might not have the stomach for such a game
You play as the not-quite-Anime dude on the cover art. The enemies and levels kind of flit between fantasy and steampunk (and zombies are the basic mook)

I never really paid attention to the half-second in-between dying and respawning to take much note of what your corpse consists of when it gets dumped back in the prison cells to start again.
 

Johnny Novgorod

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It's always a bit disappointing when Yahtzee does these indie double features after disparaging the practice in I forget what review.
 

theproductofboredom

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I think it was a bit reductive to frame a review of Hollow Knight as a comparison to Dark Souls when the only thing it directly apes from that game is the death retrieval system.

There are some other similarities, but the emphasis on platforming and entire combat system are so wholly removed from Souls that it doesn't seem fairly comparable.

EDIT: It is explained why the player-character comes back from the dead if you explore and discover that you are, in fact, a hollow knight: an undying creature of the void created by Hallownest's King to contain the Radiance's plague (the orange goop/gas/etc).
 

sageoftruth

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Seth Carter said:
sageoftruth said:
Is... playing Dead Cells really about being a piece of snot or was that just a metaphor? I was going to play it but it's possible I might not have the stomach for such a game
You play as the not-quite-Anime dude on the cover art. The enemies and levels kind of flit between fantasy and steampunk (and zombies are the basic mook)

I never really paid attention to the half-second in-between dying and respawning to take much note of what your corpse consists of when it gets dumped back in the prison cells to start again.
Ah I see. Thanks.
 

Headdrivehardscrew

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Hm. Can't say I'm too interested in either of these.

When I want something different, I play Dark Souls 3 with a new character. Just this week, I made a joke character for a dare. She's only getting points in VIT and INT. I thought I'd prove some point or other, but thing is that she's the perfect glass cannon if there ever was one. She looks all meek and weak and innocent until that magic blade carves my initials into your face and your intestines plop out, making you feel all cold and empty inside.
 

normalguycap

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Getting sick of "Dark Souls is hard". It isn't. Just punishing rather than balanced. All one has to do is play slower and they've unlocked the secret. Trial and error and high burst damage is not difficult, just annoying and a cheat for real difficulty like a Devil May Cry.
 

shrekfan246

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normalguycap said:
All one has to do is play slower and they've unlocked the secret.
That's kinda funny, considering how many people have only gotten into the Souls games thanks to Bloodborne showing them that they don't need to play slowly.

Trial and error and high burst damage is not difficult, just annoying and a cheat for real difficulty like a Devil May Cry.
Buh... what? I'm trying to parse this sentence and I really hope you mean that Devil May Cry is an example of "cheating" difficulty. Devil May Cry, the game where the difficulty is almost entirely based on how much damage you deal versus how much damage the enemies deal? Where in half of the games, "higher difficulty" just means slapping late game enemies into levels earlier and earlier, or copy-pasting more enemies into battle arenas? Where the highest difficulty is literally one where you can't take a hit because you'll die from any damage?

Like, hey, I really like the Devil May Cry games, but if you're saying that Devil May Cry is a good example of "real" difficulty, then I think we've played entirely different games.
 

iller3

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Ever since the whole Call-of-Duty / World-of-Warcraft generation took over, I haven't considered most games being published as real games specifically because they're all aimed at this more casual audience who simply won't make time for the 100+ hours it takes to reach the upper Skill Ceiling needed to win at genuinely "difficult" games this these 2 (and to a degree, darksouls which was about 25% real difficulty and 75% artificial difficulty once you got Backstabs & Parry timing down).

...ironically, no I don't have time myself to buy&play these steam games but that's because I'm already balls deep in an MMORPG with too much complexity as it is and is even more difficult than Souls-Like games because it's a Logistical Nightmare Accounting sim.