LeoLeWolferoux
Wielder of Emptiness
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Post by LeoLeWolferoux on Jun 25, 2016 19:18:34 GMT -6
Ok, so one thing that I have noticed about any of the IGAvania games is the unique nature of enemy drops. Most RPG's in todays day and age have some form of enemy drop, from a battle reward, to a storyline event that you acquire a new item letting you proceed further into the game. Well one signature thing in any IGAvania is sorta this "double drop' mechanic, and what I mean by this is that enemies may drop equipment, or they may drop abilities. Starting with Circle of the moon, and ending with Order of Eclessia, enemy drops have played a fundamental part in upgrading your character, and generally buffing them up, examples being Nathan's DSS cards, Soma's Soul Dominance, Shanoa's glyphs, ETC. Well one thing that I noticed while playing the e3 demo of Bloodstained, is the overwhelming familiarity that it share with both titles of Dawn/Aria of Sorrow, and Symphony of the Night. Like Dawn/Aria, you acquire 'something' from the enemies, and it essentially gives you their power to some degree. (DoS/AoS being Souls, RotN being Shards) Like Symphony of the Night, you can acquire 'Familiars' who will follow you and help you in combat. (whether the 'familiar' feature will be a toggled/sustained mode is still unknown of course) And there are other similarities in these titles, as well. Alucard's backdash is often compared to Miriam's on the kickstarter, or the wide array of weapons that she can wield, being similar to Soma.
In all honesty, I think that these are great features, and I can humbly say that Dawn of Sorrow is my favorite Castlevania game. Though I'm not so sure that everyone else is convinced that these are great features, and I've even seen some youtube comments about 'repetition' or '...shoulda tried something new'. What do you guys think? I'm totally stoked because it just looks like an IGAvania to me. Do you think that the shard system is too like DoS/AoS? Do you think that Miriam's backdash should be nerfed?
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Post by stoltzy92 on Jun 25, 2016 20:21:20 GMT -6
Personally I like the shard system as is. Aria of Sorrow was big fav of mine because of all the crazy abilities and weapons you can get (Dawn of Sorrow gets knocked out by the gimmicky magic circle mechanic). More of those elements brought to the modern day the better. As for the back dash I don't really have an opinion on it since I never used it in this demo or in Symphony of The Night.
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Hyrist
Builder of Castles
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[TI2] A lie of light, to preserve the darkness.
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Post by Hyrist on Jun 25, 2016 20:28:42 GMT -6
I prefer to think if it as a distilled Igavania. There are multiple elements and feelings from each of the games that I am seeing in the Demo and other points, all of which thus far have been boon for my confidence in the game. This could potentially be very well the best Iga game made, and I don't say that lightly.
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Pure Miriam
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Post by Pure Miriam on Jun 26, 2016 1:41:37 GMT -6
When IGA got aboard on the Castlevania Franchise, one of the first things he and his team did was create how the gameplay would work on Symphony of the Night.
I read a lot of interviews from him and, although Symphony of the Night had a director, (IGA was an assistant) he helped on forging the game's general gameplay. From there on, he tried to do lots of different systems.
From what i read, IGA said that, when he was at Konami, the first thing he thought when he was going for a new IGAvania game, was the battle/magic/power system. And then, he built the plot around that. This helped him to shape each game with his own "thing", to depart from the classic Belmonts = Subweapons and whip system to new things.
Back then, when he made Dawn of Sorrow, he was asked why he was repeating the Soul Dominance (the magic system form Aria of Sorrow). He specifically said that, for him, on his own opinion, the Soul Dominance was the best magic/power system he and his team ever created. They where at the peak of creativity. And they was even forced to be really creative on some of those powers (what kind of power you made up for a blue crow that flies around?). So, for me, the Shard System is a great idea. I totally agree with IGA when he said himself that the Soul Dominance system was the best thing they ever did. And great things can be recreated and renewed for eternity!
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ChucklesTheJester
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Post by ChucklesTheJester on Jun 26, 2016 3:35:41 GMT -6
I'd like to think of it as the latest iteration that contains the best parts of previous games and removes the flaws thanks to the experience gained during the production of these previous titles, while also bringing in new ideas without destroying the spirit of the originals. We already have signs of innovation while staying true to the roots. The idea of an entire class of abilities that you can aim in any direction is pretty awesome, don't you think? Can you imagine one of those spells/sub weapons that ricochets off walls, but you can aim it in ANY direction, and the angle of bounce gets calculated in real time?
And the funniest part is, I realize where they got the idea. They got the idea from the Magnes glyph from Order of Ecclesia. From one utility glyph into an entire class of abilities. I'd call that good progress.
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Post by Saint Germain on Jun 26, 2016 3:58:51 GMT -6
Since crafting is in the game it reminds me of "Curse of darkness" plus the alchemist make me think of devil forge masters. The system I miss the most is the card system from "Circle of the moon" it had so much potential.
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Post by crocodile on Jun 26, 2016 5:10:29 GMT -6
I think a strong argument can be made for the strength of the Glyph system - I really liked how that tied into your main form of offense, left + right cancels, etc. However that works at odds with a robust equipment based weapon system and I know that was a large appeal of SOTN for a lot of people and something IGA wanted to recreate here. Given his aims and what the backers were likely looking for, the robust equipment system of SOTN and the Souls system of the Sorrow games was the best choice. I'm already imagining how broken things are going to get though and I'm already laughing. There are going to be some dumb weapon + shard combinations  LOL |
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Post by CastleDan on Jun 26, 2016 10:14:22 GMT -6
It honestly takes a strong balance of all the best IGAVANIA'S biggest strengths.
Sotn- Familiar System, visual changes in items, visual/audio, vaguely similar story idea ( half cursed, returning to what should be your home)
Aria/Dawn- Soul system
Curse Of Darkness- Crafting system
Order- Chests, and female protag
I'm sure there's more you can list for each game but these jump out at me.
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xCROOKEDx
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Post by xCROOKEDx on Jun 26, 2016 11:26:47 GMT -6
I think it's an entirely valid complaint that it feels too much like it's spiritual predecessors; Bloodstained FEELS like SOTN. There are definitely tweaks that could be made to give the game it's own identity and make it more of it's own entity than "Castlevania 3.0". That said, the game does play pretty great for the most part.
IDK, the biggest complaint I have, system-wise, is that shards seem to be a random drop. Personally, I'd change it to be psuedo-random instead, where each time an enemy's shard isn't dropped it increases the likeliness of the drop on next kill. Really easy system to implement, and helps against wasting the player's time. IMO, as much as I like the card system in Circle of the Moon, one of the worst aspects were that they were entirely random drops; I spent more time farming cards than I did actually playing the game.
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Post by CastleDan on Jun 26, 2016 11:50:04 GMT -6
I think it's an entirely valid complaint that it feels too much like it's spiritual predecessors; Bloodstained FEELS like SOTN. There are definitely tweaks that could be made to give the game it's own identity and make it more of it's own entity than "Castlevania 3.0". That said, the game does play pretty great for the most part. IDK, the biggest complaint I have, system-wise, is that shards seem to be a random drop. Personally, I'd change it to be psuedo-random instead, where each time an enemy's shard isn't dropped it increases the likeliness of the drop on next kill. Really easy system to implement, and helps against wasting the player's time. IMO, as much as I like the card system in Circle of the Moon, one of the worst aspects were that they were entirely random drops; I spent more time farming cards than I did actually playing the game. The game will feel like it's own identity by not being a castlevania story. I honestly LOVE that it feels like SOTN and it feels like the one game that gets the feeling the most right. Most people I feel have been waiting for a return to IGA's style and that fueled this games success. I'm sure it'll have moments of its own identity but I'm in it for that SOTN/Aria type gameplay, and IGA said as much in interviews that he knows his market and he feels people want THAT type of feeling again. |
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Rixuel
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Post by Rixuel on Jun 26, 2016 11:52:49 GMT -6
I think it's an entirely valid complaint that it feels too much like it's spiritual predecessors; Bloodstained FEELS like SOTN. There are definitely tweaks that could be made to give the game it's own identity and make it more of it's own entity than "Castlevania 3.0". That said, the game does play pretty great for the most part. IDK, the biggest complaint I have, system-wise, is that shards seem to be a random drop. Personally, I'd change it to be psuedo-random instead, where each time an enemy's shard isn't dropped it increases the likeliness of the drop on next kill. Really easy system to implement, and helps against wasting the player's time. IMO, as much as I like the card system in Circle of the Moon, one of the worst aspects were that they were entirely random drops; I spent more time farming cards than I did actually playing the game. No need for that, in most iga games, there is always an item that raise the chance of the drop. |
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Shax
Great Marquis of Hell
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Post by Shax on Jun 26, 2016 12:02:48 GMT -6
They should use whatever works for them. It is nearly impossible to think of system that is completely "new" so I piecing together some of the best parts of the Castlevanias is actually a pretty good idea. It's familiar, it works, and even in a new IP it should be both unique and familiar to players. Some people may not like that but the end result is a different unique game even if it draws on elements from other games.
Also,allow me to say...never trust Youtube comments, they're messed up. Youtube comments are on the same level as Twitch chat most of the time. Definitely not a place I would take "criticisms" of anything.
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Yän
Herald of the Moon
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Post by Yän on Jun 26, 2016 12:12:36 GMT -6
IDK, the biggest complaint I have, system-wise, is that shards seem to be a random drop. Personally, I'd change it to be psuedo-random instead, where each time an enemy's shard isn't dropped it increases the likeliness of the drop on next kill. Really easy system to implement, and helps against wasting the player's time. IMO, as much as I like the card system in Circle of the Moon, one of the worst aspects were that they were entirely random drops; I spent more time farming cards than I did actually playing the game. I think this is a good idea as it still keeps different drop chances but avoids the problem of overleveling due to excessive item farming. And to demonstrate how simple the implementation is I'm going to come up with a quick coding system even with my very limited experience in this field: Let's take Amy's shard drop as an example which has a chance of 1:100 All we need is to give it that starting variable "startDroprate" = 100 and a variable "currentDroprate" at the beginning we set currentDroprate = startDroprate Now whenever Amy is killed we generate a random number within the range of 1 to currentDroprate (100) asking if the random number = 1. If it is not 1 we'll say something like currentDroprate = currentDroprate - 1 (I'm going for a simple linear function here though other curves might also be useful) so that the next time Amy is killed we get a smaller range, thus a higher chance that the number will be 1. If the random number is 1 we'd get a shard drop and we set currentDroprate back to startDroprate. So yeah, very easy to do and a cool solution for some of the balancing and frustration issues with droprates in previous games. This system could work for any type of pseudo-random drop and any number as a starting chance. However, do we know if such a system is not already in place? Idk, to my knowledge they might have thought of something like this already. |
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LeoLeWolferoux
Wielder of Emptiness
Fifty Storms
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Post by LeoLeWolferoux on Jun 26, 2016 12:19:33 GMT -6
I think it's an entirely valid complaint that it feels too much like it's spiritual predecessors; Bloodstained FEELS like SOTN. There are definitely tweaks that could be made to give the game it's own identity and make it more of it's own entity than "Castlevania 3.0". That said, the game does play pretty great for the most part. IDK, the biggest complaint I have, system-wise, is that shards seem to be a random drop. Personally, I'd change it to be psuedo-random instead, where each time an enemy's shard isn't dropped it increases the likeliness of the drop on next kill. Really easy system to implement, and helps against wasting the player's time. IMO, as much as I like the card system in Circle of the Moon, one of the worst aspects were that they were entirely random drops; I spent more time farming cards than I did actually playing the game. No need for that, in most iga games, there is always an item that raise the chance of the drop. Soul Eater Ring. (Also somewhat but not totally related the master ring for Jonathan on PoR...?) :p |
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Post by Yarott on Jun 26, 2016 12:45:15 GMT -6
I wanna say that the game does need to find a way to make everything collected useful throughout the game. Because everything since SotN eventually made a lot of things into "trash loot", that's either there for flavor, to sell, and/or for collectors/hoarders. On top of that, all shards should be as good as they can be since the moment they are collected all the way till the end. Allowing for many viable combinations. I understand that the Soul System from A/DoS made an impact to many who played those games, or to those who played as Soma in Harmony of Despair. But having that one skill that trumps the rest would just reduce the overall depth by the end of the game. Finding a way to make the skills have an use for many situations would be great. I like that the game has something like an "Equipment Set 1" that implies that we could make certain builds and change between them on the fly. So, I expect that to have an use than for us to just stick to "Equipment Set 1".
I also expect the Alchemy Crafting System that's yet to be introduced in practice to be able to use all old and obsolete gear to make better versions. Either via classic RPG forging (Long Sword+9), Enchantment (Adding special effects to unremarkably normal gear), something like pulling a MacGyver with your stuff (2 Swords + Nunchucks + Duct Tape = Sword Chucks!), or all of the above. Of course, that would depend on how materials are used, and if they will keep being useful throughout. I guess this is another challenge for the devs. But I wanna see how they'll go at it.
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Rixuel
Loyal Familiar
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Post by Rixuel on Jun 26, 2016 12:55:48 GMT -6
No need for that, in most iga games, there is always an item that raise the chance of the drop. Soul Eater Ring. (Also somewhat but not totally related the master ring for Jonathan on PoR...?) yeah these items xD |
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Pure Miriam
Legendary Comrade
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Post by Pure Miriam on Jun 26, 2016 14:01:38 GMT -6
My opinions on some opinions shared here
About the random drop
Normally, most games that use random numbers, don't use random numbers. They use pseud0random numbers, that is exatly like what you guys said. It is strange to say that, but, the truth is that pseudorandom feels more random than true random for the perspective of who is playing the game.
When you are trying to obtain something from an enemy that has 1% chance to drop, you naturally expect it to drop after at least 100 or 120 tries. If the number is fully random, you may spent 1000 tries with no score or score it at the third time, because that is what real randomness is. It doesn't feel really random, it feels cheap or unfair.
So, in reality, most games do use pseudorandom generation of sorts. From what i read before, if something has a very low chance to drop (let's say 1%) some games simply LOCK that drop (put it at 0%) for the first tries, than goes to the real drop chance (at 1%) and after a set number of tries it goes to 2% and such. So, you do need a lot of tries to score, but you WILL score eventually, so, it feels MORE random than REAL random...Yeah...it's weird.
About Shards usefulness
I partially agree that the Shards should be useful but not for the whole game, that is almost impossible to achieve. Some powers will pale in comparision to others, because on a leveling-progressive game, to make a starting power useful for the whole game, that power will feel overpowered at start, OR the game must be smaller than what Bloodstained will be.
So, the solution to this is scale shards according to MP cost. Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow did that to MOST of souls. You simply had weak, poor range, hard-to-use souls with very low MP cost, and strong, good range, powerful souls with high MP cost. So, you could play on a conservative way, sacrificing usefulness for more usages, or the oposite.
Even so, there was some souls that are downright useless anyway. That is bound to happen with shards too. Expect some of then pale, and some of then BORN useless. I think it is just a adverse effect of any system with a huge selection of powers and spells.
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yey