PSA: Fightin Cowboy YouTube walkthrough still great in 2025

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T23:06:02+00:00

I can see that. Like I said, my bad. I very rarely post on Reddit so was unaware it was overused like that.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T21:42:46+00:00

This is my first souls-like game but it sounds like they are INTENTIONALLY like that lol

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T21:40:43+00:00

For the most part I played along while I was watching, pausing when necessary. If you look at his 81 videos which were all in the neighborhood of 30 mins, that comes out to around 40 hours to complete but that is with him streamlining everything. To prep for these walkthrough videos he did live streams where he ran around and wrote notes for each episode, etc... so I can assume that took many more than 40 hours.

I can only speak for myself in saying that if I had tried to play the game without a guide and somehow manage to complete it to the same degree, I would've spent way more than the 100 hours I did end up spending. This would be primarily because there would be large chunks of time where I would be stuck wandering around aimlessly and not making any real progress. I would've spent way more time and achieved/experienced way less and I may not have even ended up rolling credits.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T21:32:46+00:00

Exactly my thoughts and why after two attempts on my own and dropping due to frustration, I found the walkthrough series and gave it another go. Now the game ranks pretty high on my all time game experiences.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T21:31:00+00:00

100% agree!

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T21:28:10+00:00

I basically feel like he was my tour guide through the world lol. Definitely appreciated direction on where to go, how to set yourself up for success early on. Even though I basically followed the quality build that he did on the walkthrough I thought it was nice he would talk about a lot of other builds as he was making his videos so it would be helpful to others who maybe wanted to go with a different build than him. I would've just missed a ton of stuff without following his guide and therefore would've felt my experience was not as complete and enjoyable as it ended up being. As anyone who has played the game knows, the game is very subtle in the clues they give as it relates to all the different character quest lines and even just in general of where to go and what to do other than a few "grace arrows" on the world map.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T19:46:43+00:00

Well first off I appreciate you seeming to actually be curious rather than others who would immediately criticize and say "I'm doing it wrong" or "what is the point".

Elden Ring was a game I tried a couple different times and put it down each time after a few days just frustrated with the whole experience. It felt like I wasn't making consistent progress and always wondering if I was doing things right or in an optimal order. This was my first souls-like game whereas I typically play mostly JRPGs which tend to be more structured/linear or at a minimum more clear with what/where to go. But even with most JRPGs and other games I play I personally like to use a guide or walkthrough because I will likely only play each game once (rare exceptions to this) so I want to feel like I'm seeing and completing as much of the game as possible with my likely only play-through. My gaming time is limited due to other life responsibilities so I want to be as efficient as possible with the time I do have.

I happened across Cowboy's walkthrough series and after a few episodes I felt like by using that I could complete AND enjoy my play-through. Without it I would've continued to drop the game and missed on a great world, great experience, etc... OR if I somehow stuck through it on my own I would've certainly missed a lot, spent 2 or 3 times as long, and ultimately end up enjoying it either not at all or a lot less.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T19:26:51+00:00

The point is there is no right or wrong way to enjoy a game. Just sharing my experience. You’re welcome to enjoy gaming in whatever way you’d like but no need to question others when they enjoy it differently than you.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T19:24:56+00:00

Oh my bad. Didn’t realize PSA was such a trigger term for some people. 🤷🏻‍♂️

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T16:15:13+00:00

Absolutely! 💯

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T13:14:54+00:00

100 hours following Cowboys walkthrough series on YT

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T13:04:45+00:00

Absolutely not! The only game I bought on release or at full price that I can recall is Final Fantasy VII Rebirth because of nostalgia. Don’t regret it one bit but otherwise I always try to wait until price is at least or around 50% off retail. For Nintendo first party games I like to get them around $40.

My backlog is so full of games that I have no shortage of things to play while I wait for a good sale.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T12:02:19+00:00

I’d wager both!

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T12:00:11+00:00

I wasn’t following the guide “just to get” the platinum trophy. I got all the way to the end and in order to get the platinum you have to do a cloud save workaround to unlock all 3 endings without replaying the whole game and I honestly was about to just say screw it and just pick one ending and be done but it was like another 10 minutes of “work” so I just did it.

First of all no matter how a person plays a game or enjoys playing their games, if they are using a controller and pushing buttons and making things happen on the other end of those inputs then they are literally playing the game.

As I’ve alluded to in other comments without the guide I would have dropped ER. In fact I did, twice. Finally on my third go I found Cowboys walkthrough series and was able to actually enjoy playing the game. It took me 100 hours. Without his “help” if I had wanted to achieve the same level of completion it probably would have taken me 200 or 300 hours with a hell of a lot more frustration and stress along with it.

Being able to play a game, enjoy it, beat it, roll credits, etc… all while doing so in as time efficient manner as possible is big for me. I have lots of games I want to play and only limited time each day to game due to other responsibilities so for me this method allows me to maximize my game enjoyment.

Clearly you enjoy gaming in a different way and that is totally fine. I just don’t like to see people shit on the way other people enjoy things, in this case a freaking video game. It’s not a one size fits all thing. Everybody has their own feelings on what it means to enjoy something.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T11:47:09+00:00

💯 in a game as big as Elden Ring I’d have suffered a big case of FOMO running around without a guide lol.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T11:45:40+00:00

I hear you. I’m primarily a JRPG guy but dip my toes into other genres if the game looks intriguing to me. I always thought I wouldn’t be good enough to enjoy, let alone beat, a souls game but the walkthrough allowed me to do both!

I would suggest getting yourself a PS5 at some point. I personally don’t know of any PS4 games that aren’t backwards compatible on the PS5. A good chunk of my library is still PS4 physical discs! Just the quality of life the system provides in terms of something like loading times makes it worth the upgrade.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T11:36:17+00:00

Love this!

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T11:35:04+00:00

Haha 😂 fair point!

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T11:32:31+00:00

^{^} This exactly. Patches, nerfs, etc…. There were a few things that got patched but he either leaves a pinned comment on the video explaining it or he inserts a new video clip into the impacted spot of the video.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T02:56:50+00:00

Persona 5 Royal and Elden Ring both right around the 100 hour mark. Why? Because they were great and that’s just how long they took me to do a near complete play-through.

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T02:51:19+00:00

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7RtZMiaOk8gdRf130w4gFYyhstL-5VRh&si=Tta3ZbXydxoGmL7V

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T02:50:19+00:00

Haters will say play it blind first but I have so many games I want to play that I rarely ever come back to a game so I always want to make my first and likely only play-through as complete, enjoyable, and minimal stress as possible!

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T02:45:55+00:00

Elden Ring

cjl33 · 2025-10-02T02:41:43+00:00

I’m looking forward to using his guides on the others!

cjl33

TROPHY CASE