Lies of P is getting difficulty options to make the Soulslike more accessible

Nice, I loved the atmosphere and aesthetics of this game but I couldnt get the hang of parrying at all.

Would give it another go if the parrying window is more generous with these options.
 
I get it. Its an interesting option for people. Personally its not something I'd ever use. I'd keep the difficulty where its at.

I found the game pretty hard. Weird I see people saying Souls games are harder. I actually find Souls games EASIER than this game.
Rather, I had issues with the game after Puppet King. The second half of the game really just leaned heavily into the multi phased, endurance run bosses which get painfully tiring. Spend 5 minute poking a boss down to 0, for it to kick into phase 2 where its harder and tankier. Die during then? REDO WHOLE FIGHT.
And while I don't think having boss checkpoints is a solution, its more so I feel the boss health's needed to be balanced more to where I'm not wasting 5-10 minutes before I get to the part I'm stuck at. Where I can only practice 1-2 dodges/parries before I get killed. The whole second half of the game relied heavily on that design, as it felt as if almost every other, (it not EVERY) boss after puppet king was basically a 2 phased fight that tested my patience more than anything.
2 Phased fights can be awesome, in fact, Puppet King was absolutely amazing, but when your game becomes the same painful schtick over and over again, it gets pretty tiring.
 
rodrigolfp said:
Mods count because the intended way went nowhere if you don't use them. Just like a Normal (intended way) difficult changes nothing if devs adds a more easy difficult as option.
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how do you know normal is the intended way? which is the intended difficulty setting in Doom Eternal? what's the intended one in Halo 3? fans who play these games will tell you it's not the "normal" ones. most Halo players will tell you that Heroic the the most balanced and fun mode, most Doom player will tell you Ultra Violence is probably the way to go for a balanced experience. neither of them are the default/normal mode.

I'll tell you playing anything below the highest difficulty mode on Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart is a snooze fest. I know someone who played it on "Rebel Agent" (not even sure if thats the equivalent of Normal in this) and hated the game, I told him to switch to "Renegade Legend" and he loved it.

having multiple modes with different damage values basically gives the devs an easy way out to tell you to just try a different mode. it also incentivises them to dumb down the "normal" mode, so that noone has to feel bad if they can't keep up with the "intended" mode.
this then means that this type of normal mode isn't really designed for good players. but what if this "normal" mode that is deliberately dumbed down is the one that got all the attention during development? what if the harder modes are just lazy, barely playtested value tweaks with unbalanced encounters that are either way too frustrating or even straight up unfair?

Halo 2's Legendary mode comes to mind. an unfun, terribly designed and straight up unfair ordeal that has insta-death snipers you can't see coming. it clearly wasn't playtested or given any real attention, let alone purposeful design changes. meanwhile Normal is basically a cakewalk. so you have the Heroic setting sandwiched between a mode that is barely a challenge, and a mode that's insanely unfair and frustrating.
in Rift Apart you have a singular mode that you'd think is ridiculously hard, given that it's 2 mode above the default, while in reality it's the only one that actually encourages you to use the full array of gameplay mechanics the game offers, when on normal it's so dull that you can ignore anything and just spam attacks like a mindless zombie. and it's not like Renegade Legend is some hardcore mode that requires god like gameplay to beat... it's maybe describable as "kinda challenging" at most, yet it's 2 above normal and probably something most people won't even think about trying, let alone the first one they'd try.


so the main 2 issues are that 1: the player can not know which mode is the best to choose, which can lead to someone ruining their own first playthrough of the game or making it more frustrating as they change back and forth trying to find the correct one.
and 2: developers are encouraged to make a normal mode dumbed down enough as to not frustrate even the worst of players, while other modes often get far less attention in terms of balance and design, as they basically are just there as a way for the Devs to tell you they offer modes for everyone.

the worst restaurants are the ones with 10 pages full of different dishes. would you rather trust to get a good pizza at place that also serves hamburgers, burritos, tacos, spaghetti, kebabs, rice dishes and curry. or would you rather trust to get a good pizza at a place that only serves italian food, and has a menu that fits on a single page?
if you have something for everyone... chances are everyone will get served something mediocre.

you can't give every game mode the same attention... that's just a fact. especially in today's bloated ass AAA titles, or if you're a small team barely being able to deliver a AA title within your budget.
so I trust a game more if it only presents you a single mode. because if a game does that, you know the Devs made sure it's the best it can be. it can't be too dull, as there's no alibi "hard mode" you can point people towards... and it can't be unfairly hard as there's no way to just tell people to play on easy.

DMC3 has the best way to handle this. only 1 mode. if you get stuck somewhere it offers you an easy mode but warns you that you can't switch back later. and if you beat it it offers increasingly harder and weirder modes to give you some additional replayability.
but it has that Normal mode that it clearly presents as THE MODE to play.

FromSoft also does it right. offering a variety of strategies and tools to overcome hard challenges, but all are compiled into a singular mode. there's no questioning if this is the intended design.
Nintendo does the same in most of their games. 1 mode, easy ways to progress, harder challenges if you seek them out while playing the game as intended.


so no. mods are irrelevant in this. they aren't affecting the game's design. difficulty modes do, and usually in a bad way.
you could say "but Lies of P added the easy mode after the fact, so clearly the normal mode got the most attention!"... yeah, for the main game this is true. but what about the DLC? which mode got the most attention? did having to balance 2 modes negatively affect one of them? maybe both of them? will the easy mode be even any fun to play or will it have the opposite effect and make people who only tried it on easy drop the game because it's too dull, like my friend dropped Rift Apart because he didn't try the right and only fun mode?
 
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Listen boys, the game was pretty hard indeed and the Manus & Nameless one bosses made tear my hair out but, the game's biggest problem was the absolutely shitty and incredibly unforgiving parry system - JFC, I can't even imagine of playing this on an older LCD with 80-90ms of input lag, I played it on an OLED and the parrying was almost impossible to pull off...

If there is a way to adjust that in the DLC I'll be a happy camper - the main difficulty can stay the same for all I care, it's just that fookin' parry timing window that got on my tits
 
rofif said:
It is extremely hard and unfair later on. I was raging on last few bosses.
just because you don't have an issue, doesn't mean 98% of other players have to suffer through it.

The games nowadays are just difficulty difficulty and difficulty to some people.
Games ARE SO MUCH MORE than just a difficulty. This is amazing game for story, art, music, combat, exploration. Being balls out hard unfair difficulty is not enjoyable to everyone.

As I've said. Nameless % was at 2% when I beat him. ONLY 2% of gp pc players beat the dude week after release.
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It was a gamepass title, all gamepass titles have suppressed achievement stats, especially 30 hour games. Clair Obscur's final boss is at 2.83% and that's significantly easier than Lies of P. Nameless puppet is at 8.3% now.
 
Giallo Corsa said:
Listen boys, the game was pretty hard indeed and the Manus & Nameless one bosses made tear my hair out but, the game's biggest problem was the absolutely shitty and incredibly unforgiving parry system - JFC, I can't even imagine of playing this on an older LCD with 80-90ms of input lag, I played it on an OLED and the parrying was almost impossible to pull off...

If there is a way to adjust that in the DLC I'll be a happy camper - the main difficulty can stay the same for all I care, it's just that fookin' parry timing window that got on my tits
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For me the parrying felt super easy compared to Dark Souls or Elden Ring. Not as easy as Stellar Blade (for another recent comparison).
 
This might end up having the opposite effect on their intended outcome when it comes to their next game (and the DLC). Add difficulty options a while after release to allow "new players to experience our game" and lose a decent percentage of players for your next release (like me). It's a bold strategy. Maybe it will work out for em ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 
LordOcidax said:
3dTLf0n.png

The game is not even that hard…
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its what devs want and its for more sales.
 
There are bosses where I can imagine people meet a bit of a wall, I think most people will know the group I'm referring to, so I don't really see an issue.

Difficulty options don't take away from my own experience and enjoyment. There are a few games I've blasted through on EASY just because I didn't want to invest too much time.
 
Doom_master1122 said:
I get it. Its an interesting option for people. Personally its not something I'd ever use. I'd keep the difficulty where its at.

I found the game pretty hard. Weird I see people saying Souls games are harder. I actually find Souls games EASIER than this game.
Rather, I had issues with the game after Puppet King. The second half of the game really just leaned heavily into the multi phased, endurance run bosses which get painfully tiring. Spend 5 minute poking a boss down to 0, for it to kick into phase 2 where its harder and tankier. Die during then? REDO WHOLE FIGHT.
And while I don't think having boss checkpoints is a solution, its more so I feel the boss health's needed to be balanced more to where I'm not wasting 5-10 minutes before I get to the part I'm stuck at. Where I can only practice 1-2 dodges/parries before I get killed. The whole second half of the game relied heavily on that design, as it felt as if almost every other, (it not EVERY) boss after puppet king was basically a 2 phased fight that tested my patience more than anything.
2 Phased fights can be awesome, in fact, Puppet King was absolutely amazing, but when your game becomes the same painful schtick over and over again, it gets pretty tiring.
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I thought Lies of P was on the easier side, aside from a few bosses that had me banging my head.

But as soon as you have access to the consumables shop, everything just becomes a matter of resource management. They're super OP.
 
How would I brag about beating souls slop #147 then? How would I stroke my ego if even nintendo housewife can do the same? This is the only thing in my shallow life I can be proud of. Terrifying news.
 
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People who complain about this being added are losers who probably brag about beating dark souls all the time.
It's their biggest life accomplishment
 
I won't object to this one. I think it really depends on the game. Dark Souls for me needs to be difficult because it reinforces the entire narrative the game is aiming for: you are a weak, hopeless creature struggling through a dying world. The repetition of death and the inescapable loop of its doomed world is central to its narrative, so changing it would break the game.

Lies of P has much more narrative wiggle room, so this is less of a big deal to me. That said, it's one of the hardest soulslikes I've played (only really second to Sekiro), so this is probably a step in the right direction.
 
rkofan87 said:
its what devs want and its for more sales.
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more sales ?

Doubt Reaction GIF


who wanted to play this game already did and ppl that didnt wont buy the game now to play the DLC , also, they are pissing off the core audience that bought the game on release and made the game successful, imo a lot of these ppl ll boycott this DLC cause of this decision.

like lets see if the hundred more copies they ll sell cause this ll out weight the ammount of ppl that ll not buy the DLC, lets see what the sales ll be.
 
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Lokaum D+ said:
more sales ?

Doubt Reaction GIF


who wanted to play this game already did and ppl that didnt wont buy the game now to play the DLC , also, they are pissing off the core audience that bought the game on release and made the game successful, imo a lot of these ppl ll boycott this DLC cause of this decision.

like lets see if the hundred more copies they ll sell cause this ll out weight the ammount of ppl that ll not buy the DLC, lets see what the sales ll be.
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the fans who boycott the dlc over this are dumb.
 
Lokaum D+ said:
putting difficult slider on a souls like is dumb too, now we just wait to see who ll come out as a loser after this decision.
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everyone...

Before, you could say, "Oh, I completed Lies of P," and it wouldn't raise any questions.
Now you will have to answer an additional question "And on what difficulty?", and here there are already available options for the development of events, you passed on the standard difficulty and now you will have to answer an additional question that no one would have asked you before, which in principle can be perceived as doubt in your abilities as a player + now they may not believe you either. You can also say "I passed on easy difficulty" - this can cause a smile, or you will be embarrassed to admit it and lie that you passed the game on the standart game mode.

Let them do what they want, the main thing is that this infection does not spread to other games of the genre...
This removes that very important moment in Souls games, when all players are in the game in absolutely equal conditions.
 
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