Very loosely ordered based solely on combat (& by extension how the game's length and pacing and level/enemy design affects the combat & my desire to keep playing). just wanted a place to type out my thoughts about this genre. 3D games only. not sure if I should include Souls type stuff... Gonna avoid listing things I haven't played recently
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It just nails everything lol. The mob combat & bosses are always engaging & the combat system feels complete in a way that very few of these do. Like this could be a respectable 3D fighter (& I guess the souls games already almost are)
First one where the Jump to Dodge thing clicked & I enjoyed the weapon variety, even though there was rarely a reason not to use the sword (& weapon switching mid combo was annoying cuz of the few weapons I didn't want to use). Goes on for a few hours too long tho, imo
I just really like how simple it is but still feels grounded & gives you a sense of space. You just helm breaker shit until you build Devil Trigger and then you shoot lighting from the sky until everything dies and it kinda rules for a 4 hr experience.
Incredible core combat, but the repetitive mission design & maximalist loot is overwhelming & drags things down. Eventually gave up cuz I heard the sequel is better about those shortcomings so I'll play that one.
Color coding & assist system are bad but the game feel with rhythm matching feels real good and the moveset gives a lot of opportunities to style on ppl. Fundamentally very similar to DMC4&5 but mostly pulls it off & feels great. Levels are a bit too long tho & it takes too many of them to get your base moveset.
insanely fun mob fights - better than anything else on this list except maybe Nioh & sekiro - but boss fights are kinda dull and level progression/"puzzles" are such a slog that I gave up on it about half way through. I really like the middle ground this achieves with it's control. there's a level of commitment to animations like the roll & jump not letting you have aftertouch, but the animations themselves are so fast and have just the right amount of heft so it gives the whole thing this flow of committing to something and then getting control back to make another decision and then giving that back & it just feels incredible, stands out even among the rest of these
The rhythm of punching and dodging to is so fricking satisfying dude. The low, close, over the shoulder perspective makes it really stand out from the rest of these and building your own combo strings allows for a lot of fun expressivity and a level of engagement with the core mechanics i love. Unfortunately, the dynamic difficulty and later stage boss design really drains the fun out of it for me, the constant stress is just too much for me to handle, Id much prefer a more fluctuating ebb and flow.
The fundamentals are strong and everything feels good on a base level but its so focused on spectacle boss fights that kinda end up playing out the same because of the dodge mechanic that it feels very repetitive. The mobs are less interesting/challenging than the first game too.
Lack of poise makes heavy builds very annoying. Game in general is much more unforgiving early on than future soulsbourne games. Specific to the remake - adding an item burden fucking sucks so much. I didn't think it would matter too much & I get the thinking that it'll help limit healing items, but it makes comparing items & especially armor an absolute nightmare if you're not just going off of a build guide you found online.
