this game is a lot to take in so in so apologies if this comes across a bit rambly. it is a truly fascinating gaming experience

shades of dragon's dogma intially. crafting, myriad items, long treks across vast wildlands, random encounters with giant and/or dangerous enemies, packs of roving humanoids, etc. it's great. combat feels and looks closer to bloodborne than dark souls 3. i miss the level design but i also got to play 3 fromsoft games with amazing level design so i'm not really complaining. also there are some bewilderingly vast areas in this game. in this way the scope kind of makes up for the seeming lack of intricately designed discrete levels of the souls series and bloodborne. this game hooked me after i spent maybe 2 hours completely enraptured exlporing a cavern i happened upon. it was a feeling i hadn't experienced in a very long time. completely boggled trying to wrap my head around the combination of scale and rich visuals. it started out as a minor dungeon but just kept going and going. absolutlely mind-bending stuff!

it's interesting to see this team stretch out a bit and embrace gameplay and narrative that is a little more explicit (as opposed to obtuse and implicit.) it's probably a better game for it. they seem to have done a bit of streamlining, consolidation, and repositioning of mechanics and systems:

• "bonfires" all over the place. in the early game you can't go 3 minutes without finding one. almost always you will find one just before a boss gate. this is good for this kind of game in particular and for the series in general. some of the bonfire-to-boss runs in ds1 and ds2 were truly dismal and spirit-breaking

• weapon arts and infusions are now bound to the same slot. you can't have a magic weapon with the kick weapon art for example. also the kick is now a weapon art. this does mean weapon arts are no longer bound to specific weapons. time to move that charged spear stab weapon art to your favorite greatsword!

• consumable weapons (throwing knives, grenades, holy waters, poison darts, etc.) now scale with stats (!!!) i assume they did this to make crafting/consumables play styles viable. (can't wait to see a consumables only speed run!) also you are meant to craft all this stuff instead of buying it

• only one "ring" slot but it seems like they moved those statuses to rare and limited consumables (i.e., paying a one time cost of *000 souls for another spell slot.) maybe you find a merchant later on to buy additional ring slots

• pyromancy got moved into the faith pool of spells, formerly "miracles." i think this is a smart change. makes faith/int builds more approachable for new players. faith needed something more than lighting spear/stab anyway

• you can charge some spells like charged weapon attacks in ds3 and bloodborne. rapid attacks have also been added to some spells, meaning you can cast them in a combo-like fasion like you would weapon swings. this is an amazing change and adds a timing element to what was previously a kind of static play style in previous games.

the fromsoft soulsborne core is still there: combat, character progression, and exploration are meant to be handled with consideration and care. the art design is still elite. boss fights are still wild tests of reflexes and learning tells and animation windups on the fly. the feeling of deslotation as you are exploring is somehow *enhanced* by the vast wilderness before you. in the souls series you meet other npcs all the time. in this game they seem to be somewhat of a rarity. it's almost always you vs the world

one "problem" i am having is that i cannot for the life of me find some decent gear. i know it's early hours but even in souls games you find a cool-looking and/or effective set of armor to wear until you can get your true fashion souls on in the mid-to-late game. i feel like i am exploring a lot but i just am not finding much in the way of weapons or armor. it's a little annoying but the few pieces of gear i have found i had to really work for via exploration or a minor boss encounter. this is a big change from being rewarded by diligently exploring a smaller space or simply progressing through the storyline in the soulsborne games

i think this game is really cool. i was a little hesitant at first because it felt too obvious and comparitively hand-holdy. but after understanding what it is doing it clicked and i fell deep into it