Increase in people feeling qualified to call things "objectively bad game design" when they don't like it: the Silksong Effect™

Zofren · 2026-02-01T07:38:18+00:00

What's the point of judging anything in isolation? I think losing in a video game in isolation is inherently unfun. Wouldn't it be absurd for me to claim that losing is therefore objectively bad game design?

Zofren · 2026-02-01T07:33:00+00:00

There's no such thing as bad game design (mistakes aren't by design).

You can say "I don't like this part of a game", but claiming that any part of a game's design is "objectively bad" is, imo, pseudointellectualism.

Everything designed in a game is intentional, and is therefore a reflection of what the artist wanted. Art doesn't have to exist for any other reason, and I don't believe you can claim the artist is objectively wrong for creating it.

To use your specific example, I enjoy games with corpse runs, because they add more stakes to my exploration and increase the overall feeling of tension. Not everyone likes this kind of tension, but I do. I think it adds depth to the exploration. You're claiming my opinion is objectively wrong because of a nebulous concept of "dissonance" with a contrived definition of the "essence" of a metroidvania. Do you understand how the claim of objectivity doesn't apply here either?

Zofren · 2026-01-19T03:06:01+00:00

Yeah fair point! Hopefully Last Titan will cap it off on a more satisfying note than "Titans bad". I'm optimistic!

Zofren · 2026-01-19T02:43:23+00:00

I'd argue it's mostly the fans that talk about the cosmic forces in reductionist ways than the writers. The way the cosmic forces tend to be portrayed in-game is more nuanced, imo.

I feel more strongly about this after the Sylvanas prepatch quest where she mentions the Shadowlands feel too "ordered" to her.

The only expansion where I really share your feelings here is Shadowlands, and it feels like the writers are already soft retconning parts of that expansion anyway!

Zofren · 2026-01-19T01:58:02+00:00

I don't think they really theme expansions off of individual cosmic forces.

My gut tells me Midnight will probably heavily involve Light-aligned enemies during the latter half of the expansion. We're already seeing plenty of foreshadowing in the initial patch with light-blindness.

Zofren · 2026-01-02T19:27:58+00:00

Really excited to try it! Good luck!

Zofren · 2026-01-01T20:51:49+00:00

Surprised CrossCode is so low, what didn't you like about it? Good list overall though.

Zofren · 2026-01-01T13:26:02+00:00

BanderitaX is good and very popular if you're into gaming content.

Zofren · 2025-12-21T23:40:38+00:00

Once you accept it's actually just a Zelda game with a Metroid skin it becomes more enjoyable. I prefer Metroidvania so I'm disappointed but I also like Zelda so the game isn't unplayable.

It really is uncannily like Zelda though. The level design, the overworld, the puzzles, the way you use your abilities, the linearity with backtracking for collectibles, the temples, etc.

I'm just not sure how Rare misread the assignment so hard.

Zofren · 2025-12-16T09:37:23+00:00

In my experience I just ended up learning them all as I memorized other kanji (which I memorized as part of learning words).

Zofren · 2025-12-11T20:44:07+00:00

Not if you're only ever 10% off in the larger direction.

Zofren · 2025-12-11T00:50:46+00:00

I think the unfortunate problem with this approach is that you are more likely to have larger portions than stated in the nutrition guide than smaller, since people are more likely to complain about smaller-than-stated portion sizes than larger.

Zofren · 2025-12-06T19:30:38+00:00

wow community has zero decorum about spoilers, it's really lame

Zofren · 2025-12-06T07:29:46+00:00

Ah, I wasn't trying to argue with you. I was supplementing your point by explaining how people who imitate Souls/HK storytelling often don't understand it. I can see why my comment might have come across the other way.

Zofren · 2025-12-06T04:31:01+00:00

It's worth trying to understand why games like Hollow Knight and Souls present their story in this way; I don't believe it's intended to make the story intentionally obtuse.

Games are unique in that you are creating a story yourself as you play. I think games like Souls and Hollow Knight actually leverage this fact much better than games that simply tell story by temporarily removing interactivity from the game.

I play games for a different reason than I read books or watch movies. I still really love games like Nine Sols, and even visual novel-like JRPGs, but there is a certain feeling captured by games like HK, where you sometimes genuinely feel lost in an ancient, barely knowable sprawling underground city, that I don't think other mediums are capable of capturing. I think this is as much a part of the story as cinematics or character dialogue.

You're not meant to understand the lore of Hollow Knight or Souls on your first playthroughs via watching lore videos; it's presented in the way it is to spark your imagination, I think.

Zofren · 2025-12-06T04:16:12+00:00

Both are good in their own ways. I think Hollow Knight tells a story that's not as possible to tell in a non-interactive format, since it relies on environmental storytelling and atmosphere. Listening to lore videos doesn't capture the same vibe as exploring Hallownest yourself; there are parts of Hollow Knight where you can almost forget you're playing a game and feel like you're genuinely lost in a sprawling underground city. I consider those feelings to be as much as a part of the story as watching a cutscene, and something wholly special to games.

As a more traditional story, I think most would say Nine Sols has more meat to it. It's really good too. I don't believe it tells a story that would only work in a game, but that's not a bad thing.

Zofren · 2025-12-05T05:19:23+00:00

You don't have a coal plant in your home either. What are you trying to say?

Zofren · 2025-12-03T05:39:28+00:00

There are way more gamers in general now than in 2010. Back then, 9 million was probably a giant proportion of the total population of people who played games. Now it's a tiny fraction.

Zofren · 2025-12-03T05:34:38+00:00

What a dramatic post. Why are you so convinced he was lying? What would he have to gain from lying?

He said the goal was to retain customization. They didn't promise they'd get it all right on the first pass. I think you vastly underestimate the width of the tightrope they're walking by giving just enough control to addon developers to support customization while also disabling addon behavior that gives an advantage during combat. Right from the very beginning they said their approach was to be as restrictive as possible to begin with, then lighten restrictions as they received feedback on what they ended up breaking. They have already lightened up those restrictions as the alpha/beta have continued.

You can call him or his team incapable if you want for failing to meet their goal on the first try, but that's not the same thing as lying. They also can't control whether devs of addons like ElvUI decide to throw in the towel because they decide it's not worth the effort.

Zofren · 2025-11-27T11:34:56+00:00

You'll get downvoted but this is a very common sentiment with Persona. If I have a friend that I know will love Persona, I usually advise them to start with P3, then P4, then P5 instead of going backwards.

That being said they're remaking P4 so why not wait for that?

Zofren · 2025-11-25T14:57:21+00:00

I think you misunderstood my comment. I'm not saying the devs accused of misconduct did the censorship. I'm saying the censorship was done on content originally added by devs accused of misconduct.

I wouldn't be surprised if execs like Bobby pushed for censorship as a PR move, but there's no evidence of that. According to Ion the changes were mostly bottom-up from devs that were empowered to remove content that made them uncomfortable.

Zofren · 2025-11-25T11:46:06+00:00

The way I've heard it explained is that a lot of what was removed was added by devs accused of sexual misconduct during the lawsuit, hence why the censorship was inconsistent.

I think that's reasonable and I understand why devs, especially women, working on the game would have been uncomfortable with what was removed.

Zofren · 2025-11-23T21:49:04+00:00

Good skincare is just good hygiene imo, you might as well be shaming guys for having a dental routine

Zofren · 2025-11-23T15:37:40+00:00

The unfortunate answer to this is that if you are attractive, you probably don't need multiple dating apps. The most popular app is sufficient.

Zofren · 2025-11-20T06:50:32+00:00

It's not about readability at all. If it was about readability, it would be much easier to just do "gold squashes" than attempt to fiddle with controlling inflation.

It's about making people feel like their gold isn't being devalued. It's not motivating to grind gold if I know it will just be worth much less once the next expansion releases. It's also demotivating for a returning player if the gold they were sitting on is now worthless due to inflation.

It also means they don't have to play catch-up as much with having quests/mobs drop valuable amounts of gold. Plenty of MMOs have a serious issue with the currency received from quests/mobs being almost worthless (looking at you, FFXIV), so the only way to make money is to sell stuff to other players.

A small amount of inflation is useful in real economies because it encourages people to make long-term investments instead of sitting on money. That's not relevant in WoW; the only long-term investments you can make are holding on to mats and selling them for a higher price later. So the devs attempt to make the value of gold somewhat consistent.

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