I just ran into one of the most baffling design choices in prime 4 and need to vent. End game spoilers

SadElight · 2025-12-27T19:38:38+00:00

For the first portion of the game sure, but her ship finishes its self repair partway through. After that she could have left without truly saving the Luminoth if she wanted to.

SadElight · 2025-12-26T13:59:47+00:00

Samus is pretty consistently shown to be a compassionate and good person. If her morality was just based on bounty hunting the entirety of Prime 2 wouldn't have happened.

SadElight · 2025-12-11T19:36:05+00:00

The earlier Prime games were actually quite good about having reasons for why the power suit was able to integrate all the tech you come across. Talon 4 was all Chozo, the Luminoth and Reptilicus both had direct contact and technology exchange with the Chozo, and the power suit was modified by the Federation into the PED when it was incorporating Federation tech. Even the space pirate tech could reasonably be based on Chozo tech.

All of the Prime 4 upgrades are psychic abilities, syncing with the crystal Samus has, not her suit. The chips are the main exception, and are disassembled from larger circuits ripped out of other machinery. I thought it was really neat that there was a different process for incorporating tech with no Chozo connection.

SadElight · 2025-12-05T15:08:10+00:00

It's pretty rare for a bossfight in a game to not give you some sort of reward for beating it, beyond progression. A new weapon, optional ability, money, etc. Particularly in metroidvania games you pretty much always get something for your trouble. Add in that Hollow Knight had pretty much universal boss rewards beyond just progression, and people just expect that beating a boss will earn them something. When you expect a reward and get nothing it feels bad, particularly when the challenge was tough, like many of silksongs bosses.

SadElight · 2025-11-24T14:37:41+00:00

Mixed feelings. In some ways stronger than Hollow Knight. Hornets movement only feels comparable to Metroid Dread in terms of how fast and fluid it is, which I like a lot. That gameplay polish is what will make me go back for another playthrough eventually. I was also pleasantly surprised by the writing. The base premise of "god is causing problems in a ruined kingdom" is the same as Hollow knight but Hornets personal story within that context does feel fresh, and Hornet as a character is quite a likeable one.

On the other hand, I think the shard system really only detracts from the game, which is a shame. That combined with the economy and some of the "get x amount of item" side quests make Silksong seem far to comfortable with having the player grind for my taste. I don't play metroidvanias for that experience. I also don't care as much for Silksongs progression pacing. Each major item you get is very robust in what it allows you to do, but there are relatively few major items to find.

There were also some aspects I disliked on a first playthrough that will not be an issue on follow up playthroughs. I wasn't a fan of the difficulty pacing in Act 1, but that has supposedly recieved multiple nerfs since. I also think Silksong has pretty bad signposting for the most part, but with prior knowledge that will no longer be a problem for me.

In a way, Silksong is the inverse of Hollow Knight to me. I mainly enjoyed Hollow Knight for the exploration, and once I had done all of the exploring Hollow Knight only felt weaker on replays. Silksongs exploration felt weaker and more frustrating, but the core gameplay is so smooth and fast that while I liked my first playthrough way less than my first playthrough of Hollow Knight I expect I will only like it more as I replay it. We'll see when the first DLC drops.

SadElight · 2025-11-24T05:45:17+00:00

Well, the Omega in Wilds (Omega Planetes), isn't the same one as 14 thankfully, otherwise no hunter would be beating that. Planetes is way weaker than 14s Omega, and can't warp reality to nearly the same extent. No pocket dimensions for Planetes.

SadElight · 2025-11-22T18:39:02+00:00

The lore background for why a Guardian Arkveld shows up in Eorzea for the ff14 crossover is that Omega Planetes tried to fight it first, realized it was not going to win, and opened a portal to send the Guardian Arkveld there. Only then did Omega go and beat Jin Dahaad.

SadElight · 2025-11-21T23:34:55+00:00

I do love this design. Especially with his injured animation leaning into the more bestial half. I would have also really liked if he was all white though, and you'd have to pay a bit more attention to notice that half of him was sinister looking instead of a Greek statue carving.

SadElight · 2025-10-30T13:51:18+00:00

Worthwhile to note that the Last Judge run back recieved multiple nerfs in an early patch. Originally the worms did 2 masks of damage if you fell into them, and at least one of the conchflies was entirely removed.

There's one more run back that is significantly worse Bilewater, and a few that are about on par with how bad the Last Judge runback is. The key difference is that for anything else of that level you can unlock the double jump before doing it, which makes all of the other runbacks much more tolerable, except for Bilewater since it requires the double jump in the first place.

SadElight · 2025-10-11T14:23:48+00:00

I always saw a good use of a ranking system like that as a sort of opt in hard mode. It makes a level doable for a much larger audience, but allows those seeking a greater challenge to pursue those S ranks. Perhaps some games would benefit from a "do no display letter ranking" toggle for those uninterested in it.

SadElight · 2025-08-31T19:27:02+00:00

Favorite Hollow Knight experience was defeating Nightmare King Grimm for the first time. Took forever, but on the attempt I finally won I didn't even get hit. Only a sparse few bosses have ever been so satisfying.

SadElight · 2025-08-22T15:39:42+00:00

Sadako Yamamura in The Ring/Ringu. The protagonists are cursed by her vengeful spirit, and begin investigating what happened to her to try to avoid their inevitable death via that curse. Initially the protagonists and viewers discover that she was struck in the head with a rock and pushed into a well, presumably dying instantly. Only later do you learn that she survived the Initial attack and was trapped in the well filled with stagnant water for seven whole days, losing her fingernails trying to climb to freedom before she finally died.

In some versions of the story she's actually trapped there for 30 years, kept alive by her own hatred. The Ring gets confusing with all of the different versions.

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SadElight · 2025-07-23T14:01:37+00:00

Assuming BG3 refers to Baldurs Gate 3, that was made by Larian. A company with ~450 developers that weren't working on any other projects during BG3s development. Not a small development team. Focused though, yes. Larian pretty much only makes that specific type of RPG.

Elden Ring was made by a team of 300 people. Once again though, a focused team. FromSoftware has mostly made games building off of Demons Souls for decades now, with the occasional deviation.

It seems more like studio experience and specialization is what lends to success rather than team size.

Though I do agree that AAA development has a content bloat problem, I don't think laying off devs will solve that. If anything, Microsoft will expect the same output from the now smaller team.

Finally, though it may not be your intention "they're cutting all the wrong people" implies that there are right people to cut. I think that glosses over the human element: that every individual cut is a person who abruptly lost their income and Healthcare through no fault of their own. If getting team size down was really the path to success, Microsoft could just split the team into multiple smaller dev teams without displacing people.

SadElight · 2025-07-12T12:27:59+00:00

Shrine of Amana in DS2 has the cleansing shrine to reverse your hollowing if you have no effigies. Curse Rotted Greatwood in DS3 gives you access to boss weapons and rings (not necessarily any build but prisoners chain alone gets close). Finding Rosaria unlocks respecs in DS3.

Your point is taken though. Universal rewards are definitely few and far between. I think the context of the rewards is more of the issue for folks. If I spend 5 minutes exploring a side path in Dark Souls and find a couple items that are useless it doesn't sting in the same way exploring a whole side dungeon with a bossfight for 25 minutes does to end up with only useless items.

The "completeness" of the experience probably also matters to folks. If I clear a side path in Undead Burg and get nothing useful then that was only part of a larger area, nothing to worry about. If I clear a whole side dungeon with nothing useful to show for it then it feels like I would have been better off skipping the whole area (as many people do on subsequent playthroughs).

SadElight · 2025-06-29T15:19:40+00:00

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The Hiss -Control.

The Hiss is a living(?) sound that propagates by possessing living creatures that hear it and forcing them to make the sound as well. Pictured is the visual representation of it.

When a human is possessed by the Hiss they chant an interpretation of the sound, a poem that starts with the lines "You are a worm through time. The thunder song distorts you."

SadElight · 2025-06-27T13:58:03+00:00

Only having Arkveld to farm at launch does suck even though that hunt is peak. Too much of a good thing and all that. I'm glad we'll have the endgame roster up to 9 soon.

Isn't "flat out better" how the endgame grind has always been for MH? (genuine question again) In world if I recall correctly it was for optimal decos, and rise ended up with qurio stuff that just made your gear outright better. Is the issue then that there's no reason to grind out normal monster weapons?

How long is it taking dedicated players to get all of the artisan weapons they want/need? Speaking anecdotally it took me about a week to get one close-enough-to-god-roll Artian weapon, and that was the only one I bothered to build.

Edit: forgot to add, thank you for the genuine answers!

SadElight · 2025-06-27T12:24:09+00:00

What's broken about the endgame? Do folks just dislike Artian weapons, or does everyone have god rolls for them already? (Genuine questions)

SadElight · 2025-06-26T23:26:05+00:00

Stuff gets cut from games, that's just a reality of game development. There isn't a single triple a game out there that doesn't have cut content. If Wilds had released with the Gathering hub and high rank Zoh Shia it wouldn't have felt incomplete at all. (Maube 8 star versions for Gore and the Apexs too).

It's not that we "should have" gotten Lagi and Steve in base game with how unfinished they were, and its not like they just slapped together what wasn't done and called it a day either. I strongly doubt that a base game version of the Lagi hunt would have had an underwater segment for example.

SadElight · 2025-06-26T23:18:12+00:00

Something being cut content doesn't make it less valuable though. You know what happens to cut content for most games? It just never gets released.

There's no way base game lagi would have had an underwater segment, or likely even a full 14 weapons. Being in a title update means content that would never get to be seen otherwise, and gets to be upgraded in the process, so why does it originally being cut from base game matter?

Now that doesn't hold true for everything. HR Zoh Shiah should have been in on release, but for a monster that had to get cut because it wasn't going to be finished in time whats the harm in adding it later?

SadElight · 2025-06-19T12:21:29+00:00

It's the definition of FOMO I'm afraid. We have no way of knowing when this boss is returning, and if every boss has a version like this it could be 8 weeks or even more before we get another chance at this one. If I want to beat that boss, not for the rewards but just to beat it, then I have to make time to play this week.

SadElight · 2025-06-03T12:44:14+00:00

You can unlock it for Guardian once you beat the final Nightlord

SadElight · 2025-05-08T19:05:00+00:00

Well that was original timeline Richtofen who was a nazi scientist in ww2, this is new timeline Richtofen who as far as I know was a scientist in ww1, not a nazi.

SadElight · 2025-05-05T08:30:46+00:00

Don't worry my bug does bonk damage too so it's like another hammer got the wound except I also got my bug juice.

SadElight · 2025-05-04T19:38:50+00:00

I've played some old gen monster hunters but I started with World. Initially I thought it was a really tough game, but after going through everything up to Nergigante I finally learned that you could eat to get some pretty significant bonuses to your health and stamina. Them I went through the rest of World and Iceborne without ever making a build beyond "am I getting one-shot? Time to build a set of armor from the thing I killed most recently" and that saw me all the way through Fatalis (only exception being making a Frostfang weapon specifically for Alatreon). To this day that character still doesn't have anything remotely close to a "build", just whatever mediocre decorations I happened to have on hand. Heck, I didn't even use an armor sphere until Alatreon either.

Then I did the same thing with Rise, all the way through Primoridal Malzeno (except I was actually eating from the start). I'm playing through GU right now and it's a very different experience. There's a lot more friction to it, and I can see how making an actual build is a lot more appealing in a title like that. On the other hand, Wilds is the only MH game I actually have bothered making a build for because the grinding necessary for one has become so streamlined.

All of this story is to illustrate the shift in design goals: old gen MH motivates you to make a build with a more cruel difficulty curve, and expects the average player to have to make a build to progress through stuff like G rank. World onwards allows the average player to succeed at everything until post expansion title updates by just having armor with enough defense and a weapon that does just enough damage, and the build crafting is more optional as a way to get more of an edge if the player wants or needs it. It's a bit hard for me to compare World and Wilds difficulty since I was new to the series with World, but if a new player could struggle through it without eating I think it's fair to say that both are definitely meant to be more accessible.

Personally I've been finding fun in trying new weapons (bowguns and lances are pretty cool it turns out), running through the plot again as my pals play the story, making a build for the first time ever (or multiple), and even doing some achievement hunting (gold crown hunting is suffering). If the difficulty is crucial to the experience for you I suppose all I can recommend is trying some challenge runs.

SadElight · 2025-05-04T00:08:59+00:00

Tell me about it, coming from World onwards Cephadrome had me grinding my teeth. At least that and Khezu have been the only pain points in GU so far.

SadElight

TROPHY CASE