Last weekend, I played a little Elden Ring seamless co-op which was a lot fun! This week, I’ve been playing around with the PS5 I borrowed from a friend of mine. After jailbreaking it, I installed a couple games among which was Mortal Shell 2 and Wuchang. I’ve played both of them for a little while and enjoyed MS2 and didn’t find Wuchang enjoyable at all thus far, sadly. Might play both of them for a little longer this weekend.

All soulslikes have specific distances you need to travel from one bonfire to the next. In Demon’s Souls, you’d only get a single one throughout an entire level. In Dark Souls, there are a couple more distributed in an area and most are in walking distance. Sometimes there can be quite long stretches between them which can hinder the flow you get into when attempting to beat a boss. Elden Ring solved that issue through Stakes of Marika in addition to having a lot more graces in an area and shorter distances between the individual graces.

What’s your preferred bonfire distribution in soulslikes? Do you like the Stake system from ER? Would you prefer them to be a little more rare?

  • M.int ( MissingInteger@lemmy.zip ) 
    7·
    5 days ago

    I like a bit more distance between bonfires. So that it feels like an important occasion when you reach one. None of this seeing the next bonfire immediately nonsense – looking at you, Dragonslayer Armour bonfire.
    BUT I really like Stakes of Marika. One of the best things From has ever introduced. I hate run backs and love experimentation. Thinking about it more, I also like a Bonfire directly before a mayor Boss. Malenia and Consorts Graces are probably the Graces where I changed my build the most out of all places in Elden Ring.

    I am finally going to play some DS3 again this weekend. It’s been 2 weeks since I’ve played any video games at all, but now I’ve got the time. Well, where did I have my SL1 character parked… Oh, right before Friede – this should be easy, right?

    • imadethis ( imadethis@fedinsfw.app ) English
      4·
      4 days ago

      DS3 was laughable with some, but Elden Ring was downright farcical. Almost every boss that wasn’t a cul-de-sac had two sites of grace right on top of each other.

      Margit->front gate; godfrey->antechamber thing (and the site of grace immediately before that after the courtyard… ludicrous) etc., etc.

      Then there were the incredibly strange placements with the divine towers. Why did some have one at the top, others at the bottom, others in the top AND bottom, and others midway? It felt like they were going to do something with them, and just cancelled it at some point. Looking at caelid’s as an example of what they might have done with others.

      • M.int ( MissingInteger@lemmy.zip ) 
        3·
        3 days ago

        Most of the time I forget that Margit even has a Grace; I’m immediately off to speak to Gostoc while he has his exit speech. Same with Fire Giant; I’ve got stuff to do!

        The Graces at the Divine Towers are really strange. You can only open the door when you have the Rune to activate, and then there is really no reason to return to it. Even the Divine Tower of Liurnia has a Grace, and what’s that for to stare at Ranni’s corpse some more? Okay, the Grace at the Divine Tower of East Altus makes a minuscule amount of sense, since if you haven’t defeated Mogh when you get there, you might want to come back and don’t take the elevator again.
        But what offends my sensibilities the most is the Divine Tower of Caelid; it’s for some reason the only one who doesn’t have a Grace after the elevator (at least make it consistent!).
        Maybe you are right, and all the Towers were supposed to be some kind of mini-dungeons? And these Graces are the last vestiges of that plan?



        The more I think about it, Bloodborne + Stake of Marika would probably be my favorite theoretical “bonfire” placement.