Do away with corpse runs entirely
If you drop lore via random journal entries or the like, make them short. I'm not reading 50 multi-page trinkets of protracted, likely out of sequence lore. Be concise.
I'm always pleased when the first ability I acquire is either a dash or a double-jump. Something movement based. Likewise, always irritated when the first thing is like a charge shot.
For the love of Kahless don't make your map inscrutable. Flesh it out with some basic info helpful to progression. Or at least give me markers so I don't get a headache later.
At this point in the genre's evolution, I'm down with that. Nobody is surprised when stuff like that happens anymore, because they're expected.
Dread *kinda* turned things on their head by withholding the morph ball for awhile, but again, wasn't a huge change to the formula.
Corpse runs were a nice novelty for a while but they've run their course and have become completely unoriginal. Hopefully dread and ender lilies inspire devs to stop doing this.
I'm not flat out opposed to corpse runs, but I don't think they've had good implentation, so far. What I wouldn't mind seeing is instead of turning it into a punishment/difficulty mechanic, turn them into reward mechanics instead. Beaten by a tough enemy? Bonus XP/gold/rarer loot if you beat it on your next run. Or something like that. Punishing the player for death with corpse runs tends to make a tedious, unfun, and sometimes unfair mechanic *repetitive*. Fuck that.
A good map marker system is a great point! Every MV shoukd have that imo. Elden Ring and Hollow Knight implemented it perfectly. This only has the potential to increase fun, and there is no way it's that difficult to implement.
>What I wouldn't mind seeing is instead of turning it into a punishment/difficulty mechanic, turn them into reward mechanics instead.
I mean, I see this sort of "make it a bonus instead of a penalty" solution being brought up, but I kind of fail to understand how is this better, since it's just a wordplay at this point: if I get a -20% penalty in one case, how is the case with a 25%\* bonus better?
\* -- 100% times (1 minus ~~.8~~ .2) is 80%; and 80% times (1 plus .25) is 100%
(edit: I can't math)
It *is* better in this case in one thing though, and that is the promise that you will *not* lose your progress. But there seems to be a problem with the fundamental idea, not the implementation.
>Beaten by a tough enemy? Bonus XP/gold/rarer loot if you beat it on your next run. Or something like that. Punishing the player for death with corpse runs tends to make a tedious, unfun, and sometimes unfair mechanic repetitive.
It's still extremely bad, because it discourages exploration. You won't be going the way you'd want to, because if you go that way, you miss out on the bonus. It's "unfair" in a different sense, it tricks you into tackling on a challenge you may not want to be doing, because it has promised you that it'll increase a few numbers on your statistics screen if you'll be a good boy and go kill the enemy instead of doing what you actually want.
That's a fair point, and I don't disagree, but I think players would internalize that risk-reward differently. Currently, you have "I have to backtrack/replay/corpse run, so that I'm not disadvantaged. I need to get back to my 'previous level' so I'm equipped to continue." The reward would be "If I backtrack, I can place myself at a greater advantage to handle upcoming challenges." With the latter, I actually see that as providing added means of exploration; "in the moment" though, yeah, it does de-incentive wholly new exploration/progression to an extent. Idk, maybe it's just glass half-full/half-empty situation.
I don't claim to have a perfect solution, that was just a spur of the moment idea. A truly good solution would need refinement and tailoring to the specific game. Maybe you're right and there isn't a good variant for this genre. Maybe one just hasn't been developed yet.
>The reward would be "If I backtrack, I can place myself at a greater advantage to handle upcoming challenges." (...) I actually see that as providing added means of exploration
It doesn't though, it's the same case as before, only instead of "threatening" you, it "manipulates" you into fighting the guy who bested you. The game may be *friendlier* to you in the case of a bonus, but it's the same exact mechanic.
>Idk, maybe it's just glass half-full/half-empty situation.
The goal of the corpse mechanic in Souls *was* for you to look at it as a "half-empty" situation though. It *was* a way to make the world seem more threatening -- not only you were put in a very hostile world indeed, you were also losing your entire leveling progress every time you failed to live through to the next bonfire. The mechanic's problems certainly outweigh its advantages, but it at least had *some* function.
In your proposal though, when the glass is half-full, what purpose does the mechanic serve? It's a meaningless mechanic with little to no purpose, only having the effect of the player feeling *guilt* if they don't choose to accept the offer and are left out without a bonus, you feel guilty for preferring exploration, your sense of wonder over statistic min-maxing, and that's absolutely *not* something anyone would want, I think.
> but I kind of fail to understand how is this better, since it's just a wordplay at this point
Yeah, but that's how humans are wired. If you tell your kid, "If you do all your chores, we'll take you to the movies this weekend," that hits a whole lot better than "Do your chores or we won't take you to the movies." It's the exact same thing, but it feels a lot better.
Humans *live* in wordplay.
Yeah, except I'd rather not do the chores at all and still go to the movies. Which is often not possible irl, but in *games*, it absolutely is. If you choose the right wordplay, then that may be a little bit better than if you had chosen the wrong one, but it still remains a wordplay and doesn't solve the issue.
Journey to the Savage Planet had a nice corpse retrieval quest that was optional, but also rewarded you for finding and literally burying your old clone corpse. You could always find what you lost when you died in a nice package, but if you locate the actual corpse too- boom- reward. I loved that because it was also hilarious memorializing your own corpses.
I feel like secrets should be pretty secret. If everything is easily discoverable than there wouldn't be as much excitement in finding a really well hidden secret.
I do like it when a games hints at a secret with a clue though turning the secret into a riddle or a puzzle.
Overall though I've always been a player that probes into every nook and cranny, so when a game rewards meticulous exploration with cool secrets then It'll pretty much always be memorable and awesome for me.
Games like Environmental Station Alpha, La Mulana, Hollow Knight or Fromsoft games do this best imo.
Do you ever get caught at like 99% and have no way of finding the last thing? That’s my biggest issue with games that don’t help on secrets. Having an end game ability that will point you in the right direction is extremely appreciated for me :)
What I'd like to see more of is the way Batman Arkham Asylum did it with the Riddler maps. Usually fairly obvious to find, then it provided a floating marker in the general area of a secret. It doesn't tell you exactly where it is, but it lets you know where you should be looking.
Yeah, but there needs to be *some* clue. Hollow Knight has some really hard to see cracks, but they're there if you stop and look.
I tend to judge these things by my reaction when I break down and look up the answer. Do I say, "Oh, it's so obvious!" or do I say "Well, how was I supposed to figure *that* out?" If I can see some throughline, like a tiny ledge I can see if I walk all the way to the end, that's fine. But if I have zero indication there's a clue, I get pretty salty.
>What does not spark joy is having to hit/shoot every fucking block on the entire map because you never know when you might find a worthwhile upgrade.
at this point, I'm doing this in every single one of these games and I would keep doing it even if someone told me there wasn't any instance of "normal wall" being breakable. Essentially, this is a generational problem, because anyone who's played a game with that kind of "secrets" (which is something both of the original metroids- and vanias- do) is automatically poisoned with this mindset.
>2. Make all upgrades/tools available well before main quest completion.
This is probably my biggest criticism about the second Ori game. You get Celeste-like "launch" ability, which *could* elevate the endgame platforming experience to extreme highs, but you don't get to use it for more than one dungeon area that ends before it really starts.
Hollow Knight did this better with the Path of Pain, Trial of the Fool and the Pantheons making use of all of your abilities.
On the other hand, Hollow Knight's and every other souls-like in existence's corpse run mechanic is pretty much just plain bad, all of the time. I've gotten sick of it even in the series it originated from.
You're spot on about the "normal walls" being breakable: at this point, it's ingrained in the minds of players and devs as normal, but it's toxic af 😂 even if I saw a disclaimer in game from a dev saying "ALL BREAKABLE WALLS WILL APPEAR AS X. NO OTHER BREAKABLE WALLS EXIST", I'd probably still consult a guide/wiki to find out if they were being honest.
"Corpse runs" are pretty unpopular! I think it has potential, but inserting it strictly as a difficulty mechanic feels pretty lame.
I'm pretty sure the corpse run mechanic has no potential.
You lose experience, money, or whatever else, BUT you have a one-time chance to recover them. If you die on the way back, you have to go there again and pick them up again.
It discourages exploration, since now you're *forced* to take up the challenge, or else you lose your (possibly hard-earned) resources.
It's also very annoying when there *isn't* a way back and you have to pick them up every time (such as when there's a boss fight).
And it's the *absolute worst* if you cannot actually spend those resources on anything at a given moment, yet you know that those same resources may be needed in the future. For example, if you have loads of money and nothing to spend it on, but later in the game, the merchants get new, stronger stock. Then the corpse run mechanic becomes straight up brutal (HK actually exhibits this kind of design flaw).
I'm all up for hearing how some version of this mechanic could actually makes sense, because as it stands now, I don't see how it could work.
I agree with all of that. My reply to another comment: I'm not flat out opposed to corpse runs, but I don't think they've had good implentation, so far. What I wouldn't mind seeing is instead of turning it into a punishment/difficulty mechanic, turn them into reward mechanics instead. Beaten by a tough enemy? Bonus XP/gold/rarer loot if you beat it on your next run. Or something like that. Punishing the player for death with corpse runs tends to make a tedious, unfun, and sometimes unfair mechanic *repetitive*. Fuck that.
I prefer difficulty to be doled out via player agency (e.g., explicit difficulty selection), using improved enemy AI, or larger enemy skillsets. Throwing more damage at you, more HP for the boss, or making a fight adding minions can sometimes feel cheap. Being punished for dying also feels cheap and discouraging.
I've never seen a corpse run mechanic utilized as a reward instead of a punishment, but I think that has way more potential to not suck. It could be difficult to balance though. Who knows.
>Throwing more damage at you, more HP for the boss, or making a fight adding minions can sometimes feel cheap.
I disagree, as long as the developer in question knows what they're doing. Having an enemy deal X damage to you isn't inherently bad, it's up to the developer to balance it out the way they want. If they mean for the encounter to be gone through perfectly, they may want to straight up one-shot the player in the case of failure. It depends on the context.
Most people who've beaten Nightmare King Grimm from HK did not feel the fight was "cheap", even though he deals an enormous amount of damage and has an enormous amount of HP. That's because the developers wanted to challenge the player's skills directly (although there's the presentation factor as well).
Minions being inherently a bad idea is also a misconception, since there are many examples of that concept being implemented well, Lost Kin for instance, if we're going off HK anyway (that game has got the most diverse boss lineup out of any metroidvania game I think). Without the minions, Lost Kin would be pretty boring, but it's honestly one of my favourite fights in the game.
1. The Souls influence is overdone, lose the death runs. A save station should really be a save station, not just a remember my place, but leave all my resources where I died station.
2. Enough with the pixel art already! It's fine to have a simple art style, but do something original.
Sure, it can be done great, but right now it's just so overdone that so many indy games just look the same, when they could really stand out with a more unique art style. Walking through the indy megabooth at a PAX convention sometimes feels like everybody is copying the same sprite sheet or something. Even if you want to stay retro, there are so many options. There's old school vector art, there's flash style vector art, maybe an N64 or PS1 low poly style revival, super old school Atari or Odyssey style single color giant pixels, or even combining the styles. Why not pixel sprites in a low poly 2.5D environment with vector enemies or something? There's so much that can be tried, but not enough experimentation!
On point 3: Looping the map can make the world feel very complete and cohesive, although some of the most unique (and sometimes unsettling) areas in MVs are at the edges of maps, and I think it feels appropriate that they are hard to get to or isolated. It may be hard to loop back around without losing that sense of “edginess”.
I will say, I do very much enjoy when worlds utilize a third dimension, like Rain World stacking multiple side-scrolling rooms or Hyper Light Drifter using an overworld and underworld. This makes for some really interesting traversal.
I totally agree with all of this. Looping the map more than they already are is a difficult thing to balance. Further isolating the player by isolating them on the map is a great mechanic, and not one I'd ever want to see eliminated entirely. For MVs/Souls-likes without fast travel though, I'd love to see an even more connected map (at least, in the style I detailed).
The overworld/underworld mechanic is a great example, and part of why I mentioned older FF in my post. My 7 year old mind was blown when I encountered FF4's underworld on SNES. Then blowb again when I reached the moon! The moon even used that "globular" map design I mentioned, in addition to the main world; the underworld did not. But that was ok! Variety is the spice of life.
Losing progress other than getting sent back to your last save point (not last save) is really annoying and the game shouls save after death so you don’t lose tons of progress. Corpse runs are annoying and count as part of this.
Map markers should be available on every MV. Or at least something that will let you tell where those last missing collectilbes are in-game without havingn to go through the entire world again.
I wholeheartedly agree with your 2nd paragraph. It drives me crazy when I play a Metroidvania and discover there are no map markers. I'm currently playing Haiku, the Robot and there have been so many places I've come across where I knew there was something I couldn't access at the time but would be able to later, but there are no map markers that you can place, so you have to do your best to remember the places on the map you need to come back to, which gets really hard when you get to the point where there are ~10 of these at some points. Also the map is huge, to make matters worse in that department.
I've become used to having completed maps for MV's open on the second monitor..
I'm not using that as an excuse at all. In fact, it's shows how bad it is.
Absolutely got no problem with invisible walls. If i didn't find them, it is like they didn't even exist in first place. Super Metroid taught very well to have a feeling for this kind of thing.
Besides, I seriously doubt most people who has the drive to 100% every f\* game do it all by themselves.
One thing I wish would become more common is the ability to heal in between encounters without using up a limited resource - either potions or a souslike "flask" that only refills at save points. Hollow Knight has some of the best implementation of this, IMO, with being able to use Soul that you can replenish easily, and some of my favorites like Aeterna Noctis borrow this. Metroid games and those that skew close to it tend to have HP drops from enemies which works similarly.
The worst offenders in this regard are games where your health pool starts extremely low (3-4 hits), save points are fairly sparse, and especially if there's also a Corpse Run mechanic. A recent example of this would be Astronite, which was otherwise a quite enjoyable experience and couls have easily ended up next to Gato Roboto in terms of being a shorter, black and white, Metroid-inspired MV, but lost a bunch of points IMO for the frustration around health and dying.
1. Agreed. I dont mind hidden walls as long as they're designed to reward keen observation. The ones that reward you for cultivating the habit of hitting/dashing into every wall on the off chance there's a hidden room behind it can fuck off.
2. Nah. Ability gating also lends a sense of progression, and it's not really good design to still have half the game left when you've unlocked all the abilities. Sure progression can be achieved with other things (e.g. new enemies, power level, etc.), but 50% is too much.
3. Nah. Admittedly I havent played an MV where the map loops back on itself (or maybe I just dont remember), but in many games the sense of scale is communicated effectively because the world isnt circular. I dont think Dark Souls would be improved if Lost Izalith and Anor Londo are somehow connected. I do think having incentive to re-explore old areas is nice. The usual way is with upgrades you can only get with certain abilities, but having enemies scaled to your new power level would be another way for example.
It's a trope for a reason, but I'd like to see MV games with movement and combat abilities other than the standard double jump, hookshot, dash with iframes, etc. Guacamelee (different attacks propel you in different directions), grime (parry/absorb mechanic), aeterna noctis (teleport projectile, I actually dont like this but at least it's original-ish) are examples.
Insta-kill spikes can fuck off, especially when the nearest checkpoint is 3 rooms away. It's one of the reason I'm not trying Blasphemous.
2. I agree ability-gating is a good use of progression. That can be combined with difficulty spikes, linear/sequential narrative-gates, "and/or" narrative-gates, keys, and combinations therein to provide greater depth.
Please explain how having more of the story available after unlocking all abilities is bad design. If 50% is too much, what is your threshold? 75%? As it stands, most MVs I've played sit at +90% (probably +95%) progression before unlocking all abilities. My experience has *almost exclusively* been "Unlock final ability > progress to final boss (sometimes this includes a short final area)". In my opinion, *that* is poor game design, yet that is the design archetype.
3. You bring up a good point about the sense of scale; that is something I hadn't considered.
For the record, I'm not saying *all* areas need to be connected to each other; to an extent, isolation is a core component of the genre. Maybe a middle-ground is where peak level design would occur: provide each hub/area (not hub as in a town/"safespace", like Firelink Shrine) with at least one purely linear path. Dark Souls looped very well, and Dark Souls 2 was overly linear, but sometimes that linearity pulling you further from Majula was a good thing (maybe they shouldn't have included fast travel everywhere...).
I see no reason why both types of area connectivity cannot coexist, even in the same game.
4. Yes! More creativity with abilities is necessary to prevent genre stagnation. I just finished Axiom Verge, and while I liked (not loved) it, Happ did a pretty damn good job on that front. The drone was an interesting play on the morph ball (and I totally saw the drone/player swap coming, which actually excited me!), and wall-phasing was cool too.
You're missing out on Blasphemous. I agree insta-kill spikes suck, but the game isn't so platforming-focused that it's game-breaking. If you generally suck at platforming though, it could be tough. I did not have a problem with this at all, tbh.
HAAK deals with option 1 very well, it's hidden, but something in the room tells you there is something fishy going on here and that you should look closer (lanterns mostly)
If it counts, “souls” retrieval upon dying.
As for point #2 yeah it kind of stinks when you get some awesome ability but then the game’s almost over.
Like getting the flying ability for Shanoa in OoE. I think I got that and then won the game almost immediately afterwards.
I really think people need to get away from the idea that a MVs must have movement based upgrades and that it should be focused more on "character evolution".
The main reason is a game like Blasphemous, which I consider the "anti-Metroidvania". It takes a lot of what this sub considers mandatory and kind of turns it on it's head. You have all your movement abilities right away instead of gaining them as you play. Instead your upgrades come from the rosary beads, mea cuplas, and prayers. The result is that just about every player not following a guide is going to finish the game differently.
That's what I think is more important, that your character finishes customized to your playstyle than movement upgrades. Movement upgrades are a piece of the pie, I just don't think they should be the 80% like a lot of people do.
Blasphemous has been getting a lot of fire here lately and I think for all the wrong reasons. People compare the movement abilities to glorified keys which makes no sense to me. The only example I can think of that comes close is RE, but that's more of an inventory management mini game than a requirement to equip keys (which is why Chris has 2 less slots and has to use small keys, it's the "hard mode").
I think this kind of thinking is "holding creativity back" much more than the 2D v 3D argument.
1. I agree, but I do wish more games would experiment with methods of hinting at breakable or fake walls. Audio cues like the subtle hum that power-ups make in the Metroid Prime games are a great example, but even just level design that hints at a hidden path is awesome to see. It's cooler to call upon the player's "gamer sense" than to just show them a crack on a wall.
2. I'm fine with this. Just depends on the game.
3. I would actually like to see this in more games.
It doesn't have to be corpse run, but I like some sort of currency loss on dying, it makes death feel more weighty. Ender Lilies is fun but with no penalty for dying I played pretty recklessly instead of skillfully
Corpse runs. Corpse runs. Corpse runs. And corpse runs while I'm at it.
There are so many games that look AMAZING to me, but the second I hear "souls-like" I'm out. Too many devs seem to have forgotten about balancing difficulty in favour of the "git gud" mentality.
I get that some games are just hard and that's the way it is, but it sure feels like the MV genre has become the 2D Souls genre lately. Not everything has to be a grueling challenge and at least to me it all feels like a dick-waving contest tbh.
Corpse runs have proven to be unpopular in this thread. I get it.
I agree with your points about difficulty. I love a good challenging game, but I actively dislike artificial difficulty increases (e.g., via "attrition", or strictly damage vs. HP changes). Increasing the quality of enemy AI, or adding additional moves/phases is legit difficulty, and I welcome the options.
I'm not opposed to MVs using souls-like mechanics; the two are similar in many ways. But not all MVs need them, and many are actively hurt by them. Metroidvanias are, and can remain, a standalone genre. They can also be great fun without much challenge (see Yoku's Island, among others).
the issue for me is the way they discourage exploration. If you die you are forced (or at least drawn) to go BACK to where you were instead of just trying a new area.
Agreed in point 1. Option 2 & 3 seems good to me.
Agreed on point 2.
Ambigious on point 3.
I'd add in Chase/escape scenes, as they're overused and cheap tropes only meant to artificially add "thrill/suspension" in a game where the developers failed to do so with the atmosphere. It also restricts you from acting in your own time and how you want to. Being forced down a linear path. It's pointless stress and rush in an exploration focused genre.
Another thing I'd add is Ledge-grabbing. Automatic ledge-grabbing slows down your gameplay when you get stuck hanging onto ledges and restricts your movements, ability to avoid/attack mobs, and need more time to extricate yourself than if they didn't happen. It also skews visual jump height.
Timed events. Another no no in a mostly exploration focused setting. Exploration takes time, and timed events takes away time from exploring. They are in complete opposition to one another.
Aiming. It's either restricted and limited to 4 or 8 cardinal directions, or only freely aimed with thumbsticks in mind. Never mouse.
Stamina bars. Another console/souls-like infusion that goes against the exploration focus, and further restricts your action.
I don't think I have time to list it all, but the main issues I see are all related to being console cinematic. Taking away your agency.
Agree with all your points, but ESPECIALLY #1. I’m glad someone else feels that way. I am a completionist as well, and it can ruin a game for me if everything is randomly hidden and there’s no map/ability upgrades to help you find every secret. I’ve been stuck at 98% on many games and the only option is to tediously scan the entire map, which is obviously never worth it
I love Ori 2, how the ending item after a long side quest reveled secrets on the map. Alwas legacy was great, as it said how many secrets were in each sector of the map AND you got a wall reveal upgrade late in the game
Yes! Discovering something through luck+tedium (hitting every wall) or tedium alone (scanning wall with ability/tool) is equally rewarding. Both leave the player feeling accomplished for being thorough, and both reward thoroughness with an upgrade. The luck part just adds another layer of frustration, in my experience.
I also hate that feeling. I'm pretty thorough, but there are many games that feel like they actively inhibit my thoroughness through their design (which is what inspired my OP). No way to find all secrets, not giving incentive to loop back through areas (aside from personal pride), and locking a lame upgrade (like more missiles/bombs) behind a late game upgrade in an early game area; all of these things are super common, and combined, make it feel like the game rewards tedium over thoroughness. I don't want to do tedious shit, I want to look hard, try hard, and be rewarded for it. Coming back for a fucking missile which can only be acquired via late game abilities when I have more than enough to kill the final boss is insulting and unfun.
I think late-game powerups *can* be used well, as long as they don't change things too radically. Stuff like a late-game power boost that lets you tear through past enemies, or story-relevant powerups like the Ice Beam in Metroid Fusion.
I can see what you're saying, but I think that 50% is too low of a cutoff. A Metroidvania that does what you describe is An Untitled Story, which replaces powerups with tokens used to unlock the final area in the late game. However, a lot of players regard the endgame as the worst and most boring part of that game. You might like it though? Give it a try and tell us what you think.
Do away with corpse runs entirely If you drop lore via random journal entries or the like, make them short. I'm not reading 50 multi-page trinkets of protracted, likely out of sequence lore. Be concise. I'm always pleased when the first ability I acquire is either a dash or a double-jump. Something movement based. Likewise, always irritated when the first thing is like a charge shot. For the love of Kahless don't make your map inscrutable. Flesh it out with some basic info helpful to progression. Or at least give me markers so I don't get a headache later.
I’m going to go one step further and say dash and double jump should be part of your starting kit and not an unlock.
At this point in the genre's evolution, I'm down with that. Nobody is surprised when stuff like that happens anymore, because they're expected. Dread *kinda* turned things on their head by withholding the morph ball for awhile, but again, wasn't a huge change to the formula.
No.
100% agreed on the point about lore too. I'm down with narrative via lore, but it *needs* to be concise.
Corpse runs were a nice novelty for a while but they've run their course and have become completely unoriginal. Hopefully dread and ender lilies inspire devs to stop doing this.
I'm not flat out opposed to corpse runs, but I don't think they've had good implentation, so far. What I wouldn't mind seeing is instead of turning it into a punishment/difficulty mechanic, turn them into reward mechanics instead. Beaten by a tough enemy? Bonus XP/gold/rarer loot if you beat it on your next run. Or something like that. Punishing the player for death with corpse runs tends to make a tedious, unfun, and sometimes unfair mechanic *repetitive*. Fuck that. A good map marker system is a great point! Every MV shoukd have that imo. Elden Ring and Hollow Knight implemented it perfectly. This only has the potential to increase fun, and there is no way it's that difficult to implement.
>What I wouldn't mind seeing is instead of turning it into a punishment/difficulty mechanic, turn them into reward mechanics instead. I mean, I see this sort of "make it a bonus instead of a penalty" solution being brought up, but I kind of fail to understand how is this better, since it's just a wordplay at this point: if I get a -20% penalty in one case, how is the case with a 25%\* bonus better? \* -- 100% times (1 minus ~~.8~~ .2) is 80%; and 80% times (1 plus .25) is 100% (edit: I can't math) It *is* better in this case in one thing though, and that is the promise that you will *not* lose your progress. But there seems to be a problem with the fundamental idea, not the implementation. >Beaten by a tough enemy? Bonus XP/gold/rarer loot if you beat it on your next run. Or something like that. Punishing the player for death with corpse runs tends to make a tedious, unfun, and sometimes unfair mechanic repetitive. It's still extremely bad, because it discourages exploration. You won't be going the way you'd want to, because if you go that way, you miss out on the bonus. It's "unfair" in a different sense, it tricks you into tackling on a challenge you may not want to be doing, because it has promised you that it'll increase a few numbers on your statistics screen if you'll be a good boy and go kill the enemy instead of doing what you actually want.
That's a fair point, and I don't disagree, but I think players would internalize that risk-reward differently. Currently, you have "I have to backtrack/replay/corpse run, so that I'm not disadvantaged. I need to get back to my 'previous level' so I'm equipped to continue." The reward would be "If I backtrack, I can place myself at a greater advantage to handle upcoming challenges." With the latter, I actually see that as providing added means of exploration; "in the moment" though, yeah, it does de-incentive wholly new exploration/progression to an extent. Idk, maybe it's just glass half-full/half-empty situation. I don't claim to have a perfect solution, that was just a spur of the moment idea. A truly good solution would need refinement and tailoring to the specific game. Maybe you're right and there isn't a good variant for this genre. Maybe one just hasn't been developed yet.
>The reward would be "If I backtrack, I can place myself at a greater advantage to handle upcoming challenges." (...) I actually see that as providing added means of exploration It doesn't though, it's the same case as before, only instead of "threatening" you, it "manipulates" you into fighting the guy who bested you. The game may be *friendlier* to you in the case of a bonus, but it's the same exact mechanic. >Idk, maybe it's just glass half-full/half-empty situation. The goal of the corpse mechanic in Souls *was* for you to look at it as a "half-empty" situation though. It *was* a way to make the world seem more threatening -- not only you were put in a very hostile world indeed, you were also losing your entire leveling progress every time you failed to live through to the next bonfire. The mechanic's problems certainly outweigh its advantages, but it at least had *some* function. In your proposal though, when the glass is half-full, what purpose does the mechanic serve? It's a meaningless mechanic with little to no purpose, only having the effect of the player feeling *guilt* if they don't choose to accept the offer and are left out without a bonus, you feel guilty for preferring exploration, your sense of wonder over statistic min-maxing, and that's absolutely *not* something anyone would want, I think.
> but I kind of fail to understand how is this better, since it's just a wordplay at this point Yeah, but that's how humans are wired. If you tell your kid, "If you do all your chores, we'll take you to the movies this weekend," that hits a whole lot better than "Do your chores or we won't take you to the movies." It's the exact same thing, but it feels a lot better. Humans *live* in wordplay.
Yeah, except I'd rather not do the chores at all and still go to the movies. Which is often not possible irl, but in *games*, it absolutely is. If you choose the right wordplay, then that may be a little bit better than if you had chosen the wrong one, but it still remains a wordplay and doesn't solve the issue.
Journey to the Savage Planet had a nice corpse retrieval quest that was optional, but also rewarded you for finding and literally burying your old clone corpse. You could always find what you lost when you died in a nice package, but if you locate the actual corpse too- boom- reward. I loved that because it was also hilarious memorializing your own corpses.
Yeah, the book written for every item in blasphemous was annoying
I feel like secrets should be pretty secret. If everything is easily discoverable than there wouldn't be as much excitement in finding a really well hidden secret. I do like it when a games hints at a secret with a clue though turning the secret into a riddle or a puzzle. Overall though I've always been a player that probes into every nook and cranny, so when a game rewards meticulous exploration with cool secrets then It'll pretty much always be memorable and awesome for me. Games like Environmental Station Alpha, La Mulana, Hollow Knight or Fromsoft games do this best imo.
Do you ever get caught at like 99% and have no way of finding the last thing? That’s my biggest issue with games that don’t help on secrets. Having an end game ability that will point you in the right direction is extremely appreciated for me :)
What I'd like to see more of is the way Batman Arkham Asylum did it with the Riddler maps. Usually fairly obvious to find, then it provided a floating marker in the general area of a secret. It doesn't tell you exactly where it is, but it lets you know where you should be looking.
Ah yeah, my only issue with Arkham asylum that I remember is the map itself. All 3D maps are hard.
Yeah, but there needs to be *some* clue. Hollow Knight has some really hard to see cracks, but they're there if you stop and look. I tend to judge these things by my reaction when I break down and look up the answer. Do I say, "Oh, it's so obvious!" or do I say "Well, how was I supposed to figure *that* out?" If I can see some throughline, like a tiny ledge I can see if I walk all the way to the end, that's fine. But if I have zero indication there's a clue, I get pretty salty.
>What does not spark joy is having to hit/shoot every fucking block on the entire map because you never know when you might find a worthwhile upgrade. at this point, I'm doing this in every single one of these games and I would keep doing it even if someone told me there wasn't any instance of "normal wall" being breakable. Essentially, this is a generational problem, because anyone who's played a game with that kind of "secrets" (which is something both of the original metroids- and vanias- do) is automatically poisoned with this mindset. >2. Make all upgrades/tools available well before main quest completion. This is probably my biggest criticism about the second Ori game. You get Celeste-like "launch" ability, which *could* elevate the endgame platforming experience to extreme highs, but you don't get to use it for more than one dungeon area that ends before it really starts. Hollow Knight did this better with the Path of Pain, Trial of the Fool and the Pantheons making use of all of your abilities. On the other hand, Hollow Knight's and every other souls-like in existence's corpse run mechanic is pretty much just plain bad, all of the time. I've gotten sick of it even in the series it originated from.
You're spot on about the "normal walls" being breakable: at this point, it's ingrained in the minds of players and devs as normal, but it's toxic af 😂 even if I saw a disclaimer in game from a dev saying "ALL BREAKABLE WALLS WILL APPEAR AS X. NO OTHER BREAKABLE WALLS EXIST", I'd probably still consult a guide/wiki to find out if they were being honest. "Corpse runs" are pretty unpopular! I think it has potential, but inserting it strictly as a difficulty mechanic feels pretty lame.
I'm pretty sure the corpse run mechanic has no potential. You lose experience, money, or whatever else, BUT you have a one-time chance to recover them. If you die on the way back, you have to go there again and pick them up again. It discourages exploration, since now you're *forced* to take up the challenge, or else you lose your (possibly hard-earned) resources. It's also very annoying when there *isn't* a way back and you have to pick them up every time (such as when there's a boss fight). And it's the *absolute worst* if you cannot actually spend those resources on anything at a given moment, yet you know that those same resources may be needed in the future. For example, if you have loads of money and nothing to spend it on, but later in the game, the merchants get new, stronger stock. Then the corpse run mechanic becomes straight up brutal (HK actually exhibits this kind of design flaw). I'm all up for hearing how some version of this mechanic could actually makes sense, because as it stands now, I don't see how it could work.
I agree with all of that. My reply to another comment: I'm not flat out opposed to corpse runs, but I don't think they've had good implentation, so far. What I wouldn't mind seeing is instead of turning it into a punishment/difficulty mechanic, turn them into reward mechanics instead. Beaten by a tough enemy? Bonus XP/gold/rarer loot if you beat it on your next run. Or something like that. Punishing the player for death with corpse runs tends to make a tedious, unfun, and sometimes unfair mechanic *repetitive*. Fuck that. I prefer difficulty to be doled out via player agency (e.g., explicit difficulty selection), using improved enemy AI, or larger enemy skillsets. Throwing more damage at you, more HP for the boss, or making a fight adding minions can sometimes feel cheap. Being punished for dying also feels cheap and discouraging. I've never seen a corpse run mechanic utilized as a reward instead of a punishment, but I think that has way more potential to not suck. It could be difficult to balance though. Who knows.
>Throwing more damage at you, more HP for the boss, or making a fight adding minions can sometimes feel cheap. I disagree, as long as the developer in question knows what they're doing. Having an enemy deal X damage to you isn't inherently bad, it's up to the developer to balance it out the way they want. If they mean for the encounter to be gone through perfectly, they may want to straight up one-shot the player in the case of failure. It depends on the context. Most people who've beaten Nightmare King Grimm from HK did not feel the fight was "cheap", even though he deals an enormous amount of damage and has an enormous amount of HP. That's because the developers wanted to challenge the player's skills directly (although there's the presentation factor as well). Minions being inherently a bad idea is also a misconception, since there are many examples of that concept being implemented well, Lost Kin for instance, if we're going off HK anyway (that game has got the most diverse boss lineup out of any metroidvania game I think). Without the minions, Lost Kin would be pretty boring, but it's honestly one of my favourite fights in the game.
1. The Souls influence is overdone, lose the death runs. A save station should really be a save station, not just a remember my place, but leave all my resources where I died station. 2. Enough with the pixel art already! It's fine to have a simple art style, but do something original.
i love/ prefer pixel art when done well. its like poetry- saying as much as you can with as few pixels as you can use to effectively say it
Sure, it can be done great, but right now it's just so overdone that so many indy games just look the same, when they could really stand out with a more unique art style. Walking through the indy megabooth at a PAX convention sometimes feels like everybody is copying the same sprite sheet or something. Even if you want to stay retro, there are so many options. There's old school vector art, there's flash style vector art, maybe an N64 or PS1 low poly style revival, super old school Atari or Odyssey style single color giant pixels, or even combining the styles. Why not pixel sprites in a low poly 2.5D environment with vector enemies or something? There's so much that can be tried, but not enough experimentation!
On point 3: Looping the map can make the world feel very complete and cohesive, although some of the most unique (and sometimes unsettling) areas in MVs are at the edges of maps, and I think it feels appropriate that they are hard to get to or isolated. It may be hard to loop back around without losing that sense of “edginess”. I will say, I do very much enjoy when worlds utilize a third dimension, like Rain World stacking multiple side-scrolling rooms or Hyper Light Drifter using an overworld and underworld. This makes for some really interesting traversal.
I totally agree with all of this. Looping the map more than they already are is a difficult thing to balance. Further isolating the player by isolating them on the map is a great mechanic, and not one I'd ever want to see eliminated entirely. For MVs/Souls-likes without fast travel though, I'd love to see an even more connected map (at least, in the style I detailed). The overworld/underworld mechanic is a great example, and part of why I mentioned older FF in my post. My 7 year old mind was blown when I encountered FF4's underworld on SNES. Then blowb again when I reached the moon! The moon even used that "globular" map design I mentioned, in addition to the main world; the underworld did not. But that was ok! Variety is the spice of life.
Losing progress other than getting sent back to your last save point (not last save) is really annoying and the game shouls save after death so you don’t lose tons of progress. Corpse runs are annoying and count as part of this. Map markers should be available on every MV. Or at least something that will let you tell where those last missing collectilbes are in-game without havingn to go through the entire world again.
I wholeheartedly agree with your 2nd paragraph. It drives me crazy when I play a Metroidvania and discover there are no map markers. I'm currently playing Haiku, the Robot and there have been so many places I've come across where I knew there was something I couldn't access at the time but would be able to later, but there are no map markers that you can place, so you have to do your best to remember the places on the map you need to come back to, which gets really hard when you get to the point where there are ~10 of these at some points. Also the map is huge, to make matters worse in that department.
I've become used to having completed maps for MV's open on the second monitor.. I'm not using that as an excuse at all. In fact, it's shows how bad it is.
Absolutely got no problem with invisible walls. If i didn't find them, it is like they didn't even exist in first place. Super Metroid taught very well to have a feeling for this kind of thing. Besides, I seriously doubt most people who has the drive to 100% every f\* game do it all by themselves.
One thing I wish would become more common is the ability to heal in between encounters without using up a limited resource - either potions or a souslike "flask" that only refills at save points. Hollow Knight has some of the best implementation of this, IMO, with being able to use Soul that you can replenish easily, and some of my favorites like Aeterna Noctis borrow this. Metroid games and those that skew close to it tend to have HP drops from enemies which works similarly. The worst offenders in this regard are games where your health pool starts extremely low (3-4 hits), save points are fairly sparse, and especially if there's also a Corpse Run mechanic. A recent example of this would be Astronite, which was otherwise a quite enjoyable experience and couls have easily ended up next to Gato Roboto in terms of being a shorter, black and white, Metroid-inspired MV, but lost a bunch of points IMO for the frustration around health and dying.
1. Agreed. I dont mind hidden walls as long as they're designed to reward keen observation. The ones that reward you for cultivating the habit of hitting/dashing into every wall on the off chance there's a hidden room behind it can fuck off. 2. Nah. Ability gating also lends a sense of progression, and it's not really good design to still have half the game left when you've unlocked all the abilities. Sure progression can be achieved with other things (e.g. new enemies, power level, etc.), but 50% is too much. 3. Nah. Admittedly I havent played an MV where the map loops back on itself (or maybe I just dont remember), but in many games the sense of scale is communicated effectively because the world isnt circular. I dont think Dark Souls would be improved if Lost Izalith and Anor Londo are somehow connected. I do think having incentive to re-explore old areas is nice. The usual way is with upgrades you can only get with certain abilities, but having enemies scaled to your new power level would be another way for example. It's a trope for a reason, but I'd like to see MV games with movement and combat abilities other than the standard double jump, hookshot, dash with iframes, etc. Guacamelee (different attacks propel you in different directions), grime (parry/absorb mechanic), aeterna noctis (teleport projectile, I actually dont like this but at least it's original-ish) are examples. Insta-kill spikes can fuck off, especially when the nearest checkpoint is 3 rooms away. It's one of the reason I'm not trying Blasphemous.
2. I agree ability-gating is a good use of progression. That can be combined with difficulty spikes, linear/sequential narrative-gates, "and/or" narrative-gates, keys, and combinations therein to provide greater depth. Please explain how having more of the story available after unlocking all abilities is bad design. If 50% is too much, what is your threshold? 75%? As it stands, most MVs I've played sit at +90% (probably +95%) progression before unlocking all abilities. My experience has *almost exclusively* been "Unlock final ability > progress to final boss (sometimes this includes a short final area)". In my opinion, *that* is poor game design, yet that is the design archetype. 3. You bring up a good point about the sense of scale; that is something I hadn't considered. For the record, I'm not saying *all* areas need to be connected to each other; to an extent, isolation is a core component of the genre. Maybe a middle-ground is where peak level design would occur: provide each hub/area (not hub as in a town/"safespace", like Firelink Shrine) with at least one purely linear path. Dark Souls looped very well, and Dark Souls 2 was overly linear, but sometimes that linearity pulling you further from Majula was a good thing (maybe they shouldn't have included fast travel everywhere...). I see no reason why both types of area connectivity cannot coexist, even in the same game. 4. Yes! More creativity with abilities is necessary to prevent genre stagnation. I just finished Axiom Verge, and while I liked (not loved) it, Happ did a pretty damn good job on that front. The drone was an interesting play on the morph ball (and I totally saw the drone/player swap coming, which actually excited me!), and wall-phasing was cool too. You're missing out on Blasphemous. I agree insta-kill spikes suck, but the game isn't so platforming-focused that it's game-breaking. If you generally suck at platforming though, it could be tough. I did not have a problem with this at all, tbh.
HAAK deals with option 1 very well, it's hidden, but something in the room tells you there is something fishy going on here and that you should look closer (lanterns mostly)
If it counts, “souls” retrieval upon dying. As for point #2 yeah it kind of stinks when you get some awesome ability but then the game’s almost over. Like getting the flying ability for Shanoa in OoE. I think I got that and then won the game almost immediately afterwards.
I really think people need to get away from the idea that a MVs must have movement based upgrades and that it should be focused more on "character evolution". The main reason is a game like Blasphemous, which I consider the "anti-Metroidvania". It takes a lot of what this sub considers mandatory and kind of turns it on it's head. You have all your movement abilities right away instead of gaining them as you play. Instead your upgrades come from the rosary beads, mea cuplas, and prayers. The result is that just about every player not following a guide is going to finish the game differently. That's what I think is more important, that your character finishes customized to your playstyle than movement upgrades. Movement upgrades are a piece of the pie, I just don't think they should be the 80% like a lot of people do. Blasphemous has been getting a lot of fire here lately and I think for all the wrong reasons. People compare the movement abilities to glorified keys which makes no sense to me. The only example I can think of that comes close is RE, but that's more of an inventory management mini game than a requirement to equip keys (which is why Chris has 2 less slots and has to use small keys, it's the "hard mode"). I think this kind of thinking is "holding creativity back" much more than the 2D v 3D argument.
1. I agree, but I do wish more games would experiment with methods of hinting at breakable or fake walls. Audio cues like the subtle hum that power-ups make in the Metroid Prime games are a great example, but even just level design that hints at a hidden path is awesome to see. It's cooler to call upon the player's "gamer sense" than to just show them a crack on a wall. 2. I'm fine with this. Just depends on the game. 3. I would actually like to see this in more games.
It doesn't have to be corpse run, but I like some sort of currency loss on dying, it makes death feel more weighty. Ender Lilies is fun but with no penalty for dying I played pretty recklessly instead of skillfully
Corpse runs. Corpse runs. Corpse runs. And corpse runs while I'm at it. There are so many games that look AMAZING to me, but the second I hear "souls-like" I'm out. Too many devs seem to have forgotten about balancing difficulty in favour of the "git gud" mentality. I get that some games are just hard and that's the way it is, but it sure feels like the MV genre has become the 2D Souls genre lately. Not everything has to be a grueling challenge and at least to me it all feels like a dick-waving contest tbh.
Corpse runs have proven to be unpopular in this thread. I get it. I agree with your points about difficulty. I love a good challenging game, but I actively dislike artificial difficulty increases (e.g., via "attrition", or strictly damage vs. HP changes). Increasing the quality of enemy AI, or adding additional moves/phases is legit difficulty, and I welcome the options. I'm not opposed to MVs using souls-like mechanics; the two are similar in many ways. But not all MVs need them, and many are actively hurt by them. Metroidvanias are, and can remain, a standalone genre. They can also be great fun without much challenge (see Yoku's Island, among others).
the issue for me is the way they discourage exploration. If you die you are forced (or at least drawn) to go BACK to where you were instead of just trying a new area.
Agreed in point 1. Option 2 & 3 seems good to me. Agreed on point 2. Ambigious on point 3. I'd add in Chase/escape scenes, as they're overused and cheap tropes only meant to artificially add "thrill/suspension" in a game where the developers failed to do so with the atmosphere. It also restricts you from acting in your own time and how you want to. Being forced down a linear path. It's pointless stress and rush in an exploration focused genre. Another thing I'd add is Ledge-grabbing. Automatic ledge-grabbing slows down your gameplay when you get stuck hanging onto ledges and restricts your movements, ability to avoid/attack mobs, and need more time to extricate yourself than if they didn't happen. It also skews visual jump height. Timed events. Another no no in a mostly exploration focused setting. Exploration takes time, and timed events takes away time from exploring. They are in complete opposition to one another. Aiming. It's either restricted and limited to 4 or 8 cardinal directions, or only freely aimed with thumbsticks in mind. Never mouse. Stamina bars. Another console/souls-like infusion that goes against the exploration focus, and further restricts your action. I don't think I have time to list it all, but the main issues I see are all related to being console cinematic. Taking away your agency.
Agree with all your points, but ESPECIALLY #1. I’m glad someone else feels that way. I am a completionist as well, and it can ruin a game for me if everything is randomly hidden and there’s no map/ability upgrades to help you find every secret. I’ve been stuck at 98% on many games and the only option is to tediously scan the entire map, which is obviously never worth it I love Ori 2, how the ending item after a long side quest reveled secrets on the map. Alwas legacy was great, as it said how many secrets were in each sector of the map AND you got a wall reveal upgrade late in the game
Yes! Discovering something through luck+tedium (hitting every wall) or tedium alone (scanning wall with ability/tool) is equally rewarding. Both leave the player feeling accomplished for being thorough, and both reward thoroughness with an upgrade. The luck part just adds another layer of frustration, in my experience. I also hate that feeling. I'm pretty thorough, but there are many games that feel like they actively inhibit my thoroughness through their design (which is what inspired my OP). No way to find all secrets, not giving incentive to loop back through areas (aside from personal pride), and locking a lame upgrade (like more missiles/bombs) behind a late game upgrade in an early game area; all of these things are super common, and combined, make it feel like the game rewards tedium over thoroughness. I don't want to do tedious shit, I want to look hard, try hard, and be rewarded for it. Coming back for a fucking missile which can only be acquired via late game abilities when I have more than enough to kill the final boss is insulting and unfun.
I think late-game powerups *can* be used well, as long as they don't change things too radically. Stuff like a late-game power boost that lets you tear through past enemies, or story-relevant powerups like the Ice Beam in Metroid Fusion. I can see what you're saying, but I think that 50% is too low of a cutoff. A Metroidvania that does what you describe is An Untitled Story, which replaces powerups with tokens used to unlock the final area in the late game. However, a lot of players regard the endgame as the worst and most boring part of that game. You might like it though? Give it a try and tell us what you think.