I never said that Elden Ring’s success could lead to “gamers want all accessibility options removed” & I never claimed that “every game should be enjoyable for everyone”.
I said that I hope Elden Ring’s success doesn’t inspire the widespread creation of more games designed in a similarly unwelcoming style, because I think there should be more accessibility options in games in general so more people are able to play.
Arbitrarily excluding people is not actually a good thing.
Crazy numbers, wonder how many people bought into the hype and have buyers remorse though
Souls isn’t for everyone and this is absolutely a souls game no matter how some people want to pretend otherwise
BOTW2 and Starfield will eclipse Elden Ring.
It is indeed going to be interesting as to what the ratio is going to be between people who were hesitant to play a Souls game and actually like it to the people who, as you say, bought into the hype and find out the game is not for them.
Nintendo fans are a different breed so I wouldnt be surprised but Starfield sales will be heavily held back by GamePass
Not that they care as they will be getting an absurd amount of players and subs which is their goal but in pure sales, no PS and GP Day 1 will definitely make it very hard
In terms of just players though, FH5 was able to do what? 18m in just 2 months?
I wonder what numbers they expect Starfield to have
Yeah, nobody complained. Strange that, isn’t it.
Could it possibly be because the developers of Celeste hadn’t previously built a brand off of the concept of “difficulty” & cultivated an obnoxiously elitist fanbase which would throw the most almighty shit & snot-flinging tantrum the gaming world has ever seen, due to the optional availability of easy mode accessibility they wouldn’t ever need to use?
The point of the games inspired by Elden Ring is that to produce games that encourage exploration rather than completing the icons on the map (Ubisoft ruined a lot of open world games due to that). Some time in the past developers decided that the mass market does not want to play games that do not tell what to do. Elden Ring proved that it is not the case.
Elden Ring does essentially what BGS games do (and specifically Morrowind) and BOTW - where you create your own journey without the guide, directions and icons.
Well if Starfiled gets the marketing campaing of Cyberpunk 2077 level, then it is a possibility. Of course they won’t reach the same amount of sales due to Game Pass (and probably number of concurrent players in Steam too), but they should reach high numbers.
Been an OG hardcore gamer since before it was cool. Since the NES. From games ain’t even blowing my skirt up. Pfft…
I’m pretty damn supportive of that. I love that. Even though I still like checklist open worlds (bc they’re very comfortable), I would prefer if more open world games were driven by exploration like ER and BotW. That is fine. However, I’m not into the difficulty/grinding aspect of Elden Ring as the only way to play the game with no difficulty scalability options.
I reckon it won’t appear until after the ID@Xbox showcase later today, seems like the review embargo and OST (which is downright incredible) sales are due to go up later today too, probably to coincide.
We’ve waited years for this GOTY, a few more hours is fine
I believe a boss that’s about 20-30 hours into the game has a 50% completion rate on the PC side of things so that’s pretty damn good imo.
It’s definitely not for me. I will say though even though I already stopped playing it after a dozen hours and am now in the group of that people could personally be getting a little fatigued by all the posts, tweets, youtube videos etc. about how amazing the game is and how well it’s selling, I would’t even think about making a thing out of that. Or trying to say it’s overrated
Because even though it’s not for me, personally, I was still incredibly impressed by the game. And fully understood what about it was so addictive and captivating to fans of that style of game
I would never dare try and shit on someone elses parade. I get why it’s so loved and I think it deserves the massive success it’s having
You know you can turn off the icons on the screen, right? Even in Ubisoft games?
But there is a guide though, the light at each grace area points you where to go(don’t know if it changes later on), as for icon completion, that’s still there in the form of fast travel points from the map I saw some one post.
Oh I figure it would but then i realized the game releases on steam an hour before the id xbox show… which confused me.
Had no idea. All I remember those dreadful towers, enemy bases (oil refinery etc) and unlocking the areas on the map 
Ubisoft style open world consists of a bunch of icons that you can “resolve” (towers, enemy bases, villages, question marks, unlockable map areas) and static world (time freeze as soon as the player leaves the area - nothing is gonna change without player interference or when player don’t see it).
Essentially it boils down to a situation where you can’t create a unique journey as the world is designed to be a theme park, rather than world that is telling a story and can exist without player. Great graphics, physics might be present, but it does not contribute anything to the gameplay or does not create interesting situations (like till this day in BOTW or even Skyrim people can tell you some fascinating things about how the played the game).
Well, I happen to like how “unwelcoming” Elden Ring is. That level design I posted is very “unwelcoming” and that made it memorable for me. The only worry I can see from your post is that “easy mode” might not be a thing anymore? That’s not gonna happen. Or is the worry that developers might start doing less “guided” experiences now? I don’t think ER’s success will be changing much if anything in terms of accessibility for other developers.
And can’t you just not play these unwelcoming games?
I’m also getting the feeling you are annoyed at this game’s success because you don’t like the fanbase. Every fanbase is full of toxic morons… Shouldn’t be a factor in a game’s success at all.
The game world in Ubisoft games is not built in mind with having them off though. It’s just not designed that way. Turning them off is an “afterthought”. In ER the world is intricately designed so that you would not need icons.
This is what I mean. Ubisoft’s worlds are not designed like this
Elden Ring’s success won’t bring any wide ranging change to games. Most publishers want accessible games because they appeal. I’m pretty sure there’ll be alot of people buying into the hype and will drop the game when they realise they can’t play it without dying constantly.
I’m interested in this game but I can also see that there is an arrogance when it comes to more hardcore-focused games like this. People will champion all the accessibility from first party games like Gears or The Last of Us but when it’s an apparent niche Japanese title, they don’t want it so they can have some e-bragging. The term ‘git gud’ is used by people who lack achievement in real life after all.
The “marketing” of Cyberpunk was mostly hype from E3 showcases. So in that regard Starfield is already behind Cyberpunk since Starfields teaser didn’t generate the same buzz as Cyberpunk. YouTube ads are fine and all but free press like podcasts and news media are key, not to mention a killer memeable E3 moment to kick things off, then into overdrive when Keanu Reeves gives a breathtaking moment.
