The weird thing about scaling up the Dark Souls model of "everything wants you dead" to a larger continent is it produces this weird uncanny valley in which absolutely nothing else is happening in the setting until you arrive.

No one is knitting, or writing, or just generally thinking about what to do with their long existence; they're just shambling along until you somehow happen to arrive, and their only response beyond brief snatches of dialog is to choose carefully practiced violence.

And I mean, that made sense when we're talking about a cursed undead kingdom in which everyone, including the castle guard, is slowly losing their sapience to carnal instincts subservient to a primal power. But in this setting, it... really does not make much sense, and it feels off in a significant way.

It's like going to Disney World, except all of the attractions specifically want to kill you, and your only agency in the experience is Y to talk or any other face button to violence. And even with playing most of the other games in the series to date, I find myself having trouble relating to this experience.

I mean, the game is good, I think? But this specific thing feels so completely alien to me somehow.

@Goldkin
" “I do feel apologetic toward anyone who feels there’s just too much to overcome in my games,” Miyazaki told me. He held his head in his hands, then smiled. “I just want as many players as possible to experience the joy that comes from overcoming hardship.”"

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/hidetaka-miyazaki-sees-death-as-a-feature-not-a-bug

@Goldkin And his story behind the reason for anonymous co-op is inspiring too:

""The origin of that idea is actually due to a personal experience where a car suddenly stopped on a hillside after some heavy snow and started to slip," says Miyazaki. "The car following me also got stuck, and then the one behind it spontaneously bumped into it and started pushing it up the hill... That's it! That's how everyone can get home! Then it was my turn and everyone started pushing my car up the hill, and I managed to get home safely.

"But I couldn't stop the car to say thanks to the people who gave me a shove. I'd have just got stuck again if I'd stopped. On the way back home I wondered whether the last person in the line had made it home, and thought that I would probably never meet the people who had helped me. I thought that maybe if we'd met in another place we'd become friends, or maybe we'd just fight...

"You could probably call it a connection of mutual assistance between transient people. Oddly, that incident will probably linger in my heart for a long time. Simply because it's fleeting, I think it stays with you a lot longer... like the cherry blossoms we Japanese love so much.""

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/souls-survivor?page=3

@Aradia I guess it makes sense that it's specifically constructed challenges without much appeal to the plot, and the mechanics of combat and jolly coop are very polished. It's just weird to me to go through the motions of constructing an entire world, but to have it serve primarily as a funnel between encounters. Hence the Disney World analogy.

But I can't really argue against that being the intended experience or delivering well on it.