Extra Soulslike Thoughts
When I wrote about Soulslikes I had a bunch of additional thoughts that didn't really fit into the piece and it really broke the flow to have them in the same post, so here they are in a convenient list!
The big thing I'd like to see soulslikes explore more is how to make the "running sections" that link boss-fights together... not running sections? I find it really frustrating that my favourite part of the genre, the tactical room-clearing resource management stuff, is pretty much entirely skipped in "normal" play once you've done it once before.
I don't think anyone plays these "soulslikes" as their first soulslike game - the vast majority started on a mainline FromSoft game and went from there. Maybe they bounced off those core titles, but they got the idea.
It's basically impossible to judge (say) Lies of P without that context - and indeed, I suspect in a world without soulslikes Lies of P would not have the success it has. "Dark Souls" is required reading in a way.
I often feel that the people discussing/reviewing these games aren't fully cognisant of this - like bringing in their understanding of FromSoft games will cheapen the conversation, make it too "subjective" or something. That may be presumptuous, but it's the vibe I get.
These games tend tighten the scope and change some fundamental aspect of "feel" from how FromSoft did it, and that's the often thing that stands out to me as "wrong" somehow - again, I think we underestimate how extremely well executed most of From's work is and just assume it's a collection of pieces anyone could figure out with enough time.
I find it interesting how often these games revolve around parrying, a mechanic that FromSoft use very sparingly in most games, and in the exception (Sekiro) it basically redefined parries, making them far less powerful. This comes up in the Gino video too, but I thought it worth bringing up here.
I like the rhythm of combat and risk-reward mechanics, but I do think the over-reliance on parries over positioning is a real weakness in a lot of these games. I think it added a lot to Clair Obscur, but that game doesn't have positioning and it felt very reminiscent of the Paper Mario / SMRPG style of turn-based combat.