Please don't stop making these. Even if you need to change what type of games you cover, it's just fun watching you try out obscure steam games. I always get excited when another of these is in my subscriptions
WOAH MY GAME DREAM OF A SUNFLOWER GOT ON SOULS-LIKE DUMPSTER DIVING I made it with fellow developer rakasaac in 2 weeks for a game jam, as a learning experience, as well as just to have "Touhou Dark Souls" exist in the world! I specifically worked on the online message system as well as most of the animations and audio Unfortunately, we've since moved on to other projects, but we may revisit the bullet-hell souls-like idea again in the future. Thanks for making my day Iron Pineapple!
Honestly I really like idea as whole. Maybe we'll see it fully fleshed out in the future? Either way pretty cool game and wish you good luck in your future endeavors.
Please don't feel like this kind of content is unwanted or lesser. This souls-like review series of yours continues to be some of my all-time favorite content on TH-cam that will always get an immediate excited watch from me. Your genuine interactions and fair assessments, along with the way you speak in general make your content a joy to watch. Keep it up!
Coming back from binging almost the entire series of these: You should consider doing a sister series that revisits the ones you thought had potential after a year or two and see where they are now.
Bizarre Souls dev here: It feels weird to see my meme game featured in the same video as Tunic, Nine Sols and other top quality games. I'm glad it made you chuckle haha
For a meme game seemed pretty cool and in-depth, didn't seem lazily made, also officially the only JoJo game where dio can use his stand and actual vampire powers so congrats on that.
You know what I always like most about these is the respect you show for these games, even ones you didn't like or were clearly unfinished or very rough. Devs put a lot of work into them and its hard to produce a really strong game. We're very spoiled by the indie market because we pay the most attention to the best games, but there's literally millions of indie devs out there trying to make something. Some don't succeed, and that's okay. We don't often start from a place of success.
Making interactive content is extremely challenging and everyone should be applauded for even trying, but alas, most of these small projects are going to be awful because of either a lack of money or talent. It's the rare diamond in the rough like Tunic that shows there really is great talent out there in the masses, you just have to keep trying.
overexaggerated youtubers remind me of those dystopian game shows you see on shows like black mirror where its just like brightly coloured slapstick mildly violent nonsense occuring
“Soothing”, “relaxed”, or “calm”, if you’re worried about what it sounds like you’re saying. And I agree. It’s great to hear someone down-to-earth have so much to go through and talk about. Great vibes on this channel
stoic, soothing, relaxing, tempered, calm, comforting, appeasing, lulling, smooth... so many words to use.. and you go with "bland" and "low energy" to describe haha. But yes, youre not wrong either lol
The commentary is actually pretty insightful. Bro occasionally goes from personal opinion to giving an actual review (wolong at the end of a recent episode comes to mind, I bought it on that recommendation)
Steam dumpster diving is one of the only series I instantly click and watch full episode of as soon as I see a new episode. I would not even mind it expanded to some other genre of games that you enjoy. I found many games I tried and loved through this series and I had a good laugh with many others. One of the best and most unique youtube series. Keep up the great work ^^
That's one of the reasons I love this series; is great to give visibility to small developers that have nice ideas that would otherwise fly under the radar, as well as to give constructive feedback for people that are starting in game developing and still need some polishing before getting there.
@@breakthecode4047 maybe because of him giving his feedback on each game so the devs would understand what people would like/dislike more, especially the ones who've had their games featured
I had a great time playing Hobo Cat by not playing it the intended way. I skipped most of the game by constantly sequence breaking and glitching behind the locked gates xD
Of course everybody has their own preferences, but, i would say Iron did "downplay" Hobo Cat quite a bit. Yes, i did not see his entire gameplay of it, but still, from what he has shown us: The game is creative/ somewhat unique, animations are fine, combat variety (ground pound, peeing from above, throwable objects can be used for parrying & have unique uses), new weapon like banjo is not just a skin it has custom sound & animations, decent voice acting, fun well made cutscences. I believe Iron did not enjoy the humor, so it probably effected his judgment to some extend. That is not my usual preference either, but i think people see Soulslike genre as "serious", maybe too serious. So i actually appreciate this fresh new take of a Soulslike. Def underrated review. Its just the humor, the game otherwise seems to work. I did not hear Iron say its unplayable cuz of bad performance.
I'm absolutely in love with the aesthetic and designs in Guilt: The Deathless. It's a shame the gameplay isn't a little more polished, but the art team killed it. Will definitely keep an eye on that one.
Always strange how games inspired by russian/slav folklore gain this much love in the comments. I mean, yeah, the art is badass, for likho for example, but nobody really says so about tunic kind of games and other stuff. And iron pineapple also says something on these folklore people designs, like with domovoi in this video. It isn't strange, but just seems like it, maybe that's the witcher influence on the world.
@@ethan2670 Yeah I liked the idea of "punishing" looting, or rather creating a risk/reward system around it. It could infuse some fun mechanics familiar to the survival genre but through the violent lens of Soulslike violence. But it would definitely make balancing a whole lot harder for the devs
So. Because of this video i did end up buying thymesia on my switch. I will say the game has definitely improved from what you saw and played. Im liking it so far
Anything that has good deflect mechanics goes immediately on my watchlist! And it's really nice to see these devs try something different, I am sure the story will be just as dark as their other games.
25:20 Btw sunflower totally make sense in the context of Touhou. This girl is Yuuka Kazami "Flower Master" whose main place of activity is a field completely covered in sunflowers.
Upon finding him years ago via For Honor and Dark Souls trolling, I would not have necessarily expected to consider the real Iron Pineapple eventually amongst the most wholesome video-makers I follow--which I definitely mean as a compliment. He's doing God's work with this series.
Thymesia actually looks like it has the bones to be a really great game. The death animation for losing to a boss is a really cool idea that adds to the impact of dying.
Recommendation: "LOST TO TIME" Can be found on steam 2D Dark Souls but with time manipulation powers. Its pretty souls-like, lil bit janky and has reviews in the single digits.
Guilt actually had pretty stellar looking character and creature designs, like a mix of D&D and Berserk. Environments didn't look bad either, especially given the obvious asset limitation. If they fixed the bog-standard movesets of the common enemies and touch everything up just a little bit there's a lot of potential there!
There was a clear divide in the attention to aesthetic versus mechanics. They put a lot of effort into the art, which is REALLY well done, so they really just need to iron out the gameplay.
I like that it's also inspired by actual folklore. Koschei the Deathless, the ghost looking guy, is a character from Russian mythology, a sorcerer who turned himself into a lich to gain immortality. I don't know much else about it either but it may be that the other creatures are also from that particular story, which would give them a bit more personality other than just being enemies for the sake of being enemies. In terms of art style, it definitely reminded me of the Berserk games as well.
I love how IP usually tries to include student projects in most episodes. They're always rough but you can see the creativity and passion put into them and including them gives exposure to people who are trying to carve their own place in an already over saturated market. Kudos, love these vids, keep em coming bro.
Next time you do another episode of this series, I highly recommend checking out The Tarnishing of Juxtia. It's got a demo on Steam right now with a release date of "Summer 2022." I was really surprised and impressed by the demo. The game doesn't have a super unique "hook" or anything, but the devs really nailed the fundamentals. Character actions feel great, and enemy movesets are hard but fair. Environments and character designs aren't anything unique as far as Souls-likes go, but they're well rendered in an appealing pixel-art style.
I'm here one year later just to say... I was looking towards Nine Sols to fill in the gap waiting for Silksong. *It exceeded all my expectations and more, and is among the best games I've ever played.*
Would unironically try most of the games in this video. This might have been the best “Soul-like” video he has done yet. At least when looking at the quality of the games. Not because any of the games were the best but because none of them were the absolute worst, almost none of the games felt like filler to extend the video… that Jojo one doesn’t count because Jojo is perfect by simply existing.
Tunic is unironically an absolute GotY, even with Elden Ring contending. Didn't really expect to see it in a video about obscure souls-likes, Tunic is fairly well known.
This vid is trending hard right now. I'll bet you're really making some devs' weeks when you give optimistic reviews―I think it's safe to say that your opinion is easy to understand and your expertise in the area well-respected. I really like this series, and I hope it continues to be this successful for you to incentivize the honestly consumer- _and_ indie developer-friendly work that you're doing here. I'd even say that what you're doing is _important_ for this corner of the industry, where art still trumps profit. Thank you
I agree and honestly I’d argue it’s very important because any type of feedback whether negative or positive will help these indie devs in the long run. The more people that give them opinions on what is or isn’t done right the better. Plus he’s very respectful with his critiques even to the worst games
"Red Candle is the studio that made Detention and Devotion. Two well rated horror games" I'll admit I'm not sure if that makes me more or less confident in their work. I mean... going from a narrative centric horror game to a 2d platformer soulslike is quite the leap.
Judging from the gameplay footage in the video, I'm optimistic, I really dig the aesthetic and the deflection-based combat with the explosive charms, seems to work way better than Thymesia, which was going for something similar.
You would be surprised by the catalogue of many indie devs, Edmund Mcmillen has a lot of games and the Castle Crashers devs never make the same game twice.
Consider that 98% of the self-tagged Souls games on Steam are so bad and broken that they aren't even fun to hate-watch, being from people who have proven they can actually finish a game and have it be good takes them straight to the top percentile - even if the game is bad, it will at least be a sincere attempt to make a game from people who know how game design works.
I recommend revisiting Thymesia. I got it when it was released as a full game and had a blast playing it. There is more mechanics including breaking barrels.
The Sunflower one, with some refinement and high production quality, that could almost be a good game, it tried to be bullet hell but the 3d and full range of motion didn't make it so much as hell as slightly wiggle between. Nah it needs massive cleaving attacks and zones of damage coming, so you have to maneuver around to avoid them. Sort of like Souls boss where sometimes you see an animation and you know to run away asap, or to run towards the boss to get under his attack.
Yeah, with some proper telegraphing, bullet clusters, and a dodge mechanic with i frames, it would be a seriously fun souls-em-up. Probably good enough to get popular and maybe warrant a sequel to help the dev team grow, get more funding, and gain more experienced with new, different mechanics.
I didn't notice him use any of the elemental weapon modes in Dolmen video. I found that was what made it fun. You basically had two stamina bar's worth of dodging and attacks.
It never ceases to amaze me how different games within the rough genre of "Souls-like" manage to be. Nine Sols looks absolutely gorgeous. Hope it does well.
@@A_Black_Sheep94 ah ye, in arcades you had lives and you could try again and again. You are right, they said it's like i am selling my soul, one piece at a time.
this is one of my favorite series on youtube. its a very chill and unbiased look at souls likes. I've added quite a few of the games you've reviewed on this show and just added at least Tunic to my wishlist.
@@MolnarSPeter Not really? That was around the time I got into the medium, and I'm fairly certain it wasn't particularly common back then either (the only example that springs to mind was Dead Space and its sequels).
@@MolnarSPeter no it wasn't... actually, that comment deserves more. because seriously, there is a few games over a long time that had death animations. It is nothing to do with a specific time, it's just generally a waste of resources. Dead space was indeed about a decade ago, 2011 to 2013, and tomb raider reboot would count from there. But so would the rest of the tomb raider series from 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2003...you get the idea. Let alone things like kings quest or space quest from 1986 to 1995, the elvira game from 1990, fade to black 1995, heart of darkness in 1998, limbo was 2010... Most players will only see a fraction of the deaths, and only while simultaneously getting annoyed. Even moreso if the animation is too long, and they die multiple times.
the steam dumpster diving series is honestly the series that introduced me to your channel, and sometimes I put old episodes that I've seen a million times on as comfortable noise to fall asleep to. it's always a good day when a new episode drops!
Touhou fangames are usually a lot more high-effort than the average, so I'm not surprised this one was too. I do think 3d may not be the best environment for bullet hell gameplay though, Nier had to shift to 2D perspective to make it work, because 3D just leaves too many openings. Though it didn't help that none of these patterns were particularly hard. Look up some of the stuff stage 6 bosses in the mainline touhou games have, that's some real shit right there.
I think the 3D is fine, but the patterns need to work WITH the system, as opposed to AGAINST it. There needs to be more angles of approach, & more rotational attacks. The fact that pineapple never left the ground, despite a pretty fluid flight system, shows that they could've done SO much more with it. Having attacks that need you to fly in order to avoid them would make boss fights MUCH more satisfying.
If you haven't already, I'd recommend taking another look at Thymesia. I've played through it and it's one of my favorite souls-likes. From what it looks like, I think they fixed the feather system because it works really well now. It is still pretty similar to sekiero in terms of combat, but I really enjoyed some of the more advanced combos, and the fast past combat is incredible! Thank you for making such great content, I love your videos!
I was actually surprised how little he commented on it when I was playing the demo and was like: WTF HOLY SHIT the whole time. Even though it was just a demo I was really captivated by basically everything from the gameplay, setting, story, art, music! I especially loved that they also did a good bit of environmental storytelling!
I've been following Thymesia for a while and am really excited for the full release. They did also tweak some things based off demo feedback, so they are listening to what people are saying.
I had a lot of the same criticisms that pineapple did some hopefully they worked on the mechanics a lot because that demo was really disappointing to me.
Thank god, It was a janky mess when I played it a few weeks ago. I loved the setting and general vibes but it was a tough slog through that demo they released.
are there a lot of soul calibur characters ported as bosses? the first boss demonstrated nightmare and there appeared to be ivy as well in the ending clip
"I know some people probably just want Elden Ring stuff" I certainly can't speak for everyone, but me personally, I'm a bit tired of Elden Ring stuff. I'm glad to see this variety series again
I'm quite intrigued by the Touhou game : the main strength of the series is its ability to create equally beautiful and difficult patterns on a 2D field. I hope that Dream of a Sunflower will try to use its 3rd movement axis to its advantage and create something interesting (I also hope they use better art for the bosses, Doremy is a hella cool character not benefiting from being a cardboard cutout)
From the gameplay in the video it didn't seem the flying or dodge roll were utilized much in the bosses, but those could make for very interesting attacks
That game was just a 2-week one-off project that isn't getting any further development, but the dev (noeticnightjar on itch) is a touhou game jam regular so I'd definitely recommend checkin' out some of their other work too
If not for this video I would have never in my life found the masterpiece that is hobo cat adventures big thanks for exposing this 10/10 literal game of the year
Nine Sols definitely looks fantastic and well made, I'm going to keep an eye on it, It already has a page on steam so I'll be getting it when it comes out (oh and try the demo on steam guys if you are interested)
Hobo Cat walked so Elden Ring could run. It's not easy being such a cornerstone, and there will always be some who don't appreciate it. Hobo Cat truly is the game of our generation.
I love that FromSoftware has transformed a generation of indie devs into fucked up, body-horror sculpting, Gustave Dore/Zdzislaw Beksinski/H.R. Giger protégés. The amount of goat demons, spider abominations, and anthropomorphic hybrids floating about this generation of game design is unprecedented. Thanks Miyazaki 😂
I love horror. I wish that it doesn't need to get attached to 'Soulslike' game play to become popular. I'm not a fan of the mechanics, but I'm glad that the fans are having their golden age.
Letting you know, I still have fun watching these. As crazy as our world is, it’s know it’s not completely hopeless when I see “I tried another souls-like” pop up on my feed lol Your awesome, your bring a lot of joy to a lot of people that need it, your doing great!
Thymesia would have gained so much credibility if it had done its system like Shinobi on the PS2 and had enemies stay stunned as long as you can combo them, then use a button to execute them all at the same time with a stylish dash between them all.
Honestly pine, the reason why I subbed to you and continue to come back and watch is because of these style of videos... I enjoy your Darksouls/Elden ring videos too of course, but I don't think your content should be limited by just one game/type of game... I greatly enjoy you exploring the "souls-verse" , and even when the "games/worlds aren't too great", its definitely a nice change of pace that feels organic. Please continue to make more videos like this, and don't be afraid to "color outside the lines". Looking forward to the next one!
“I know some people want Elden Ring stuff” NO, all your content is amazing and I thoroughly enjoy when you delve into obscure games! The old FromSoft games were great to look at since even I never looked into it and Steam dumpster diving is a great way to both critique obscure games and find some great ones too! Keep at it!!!
I'm glad to see Red Candle still being alive! All I know about them is the Winnie the Pooh texture in Devotion and the whole controversy about it, with GoG pulling the game from their store, due to "the request of gamers"...
It's ya boy, Dolmen Gaming. And today we gonna attempt the Bed of Chaos thing in ya'll most favorite game. without further a do. It's dolmen time." "But first a message from our sponsor: Random Ass VPN..."
Dream of a Sunflower really caught my interest, both Touhou and Dark Souls series of games have a reputation for being hard so as far as I'm concerned it's a match made in Gensokyo (even though the game seems pretty easy, but the idea is still cool). Thanks for the showcase!
Hey wow, gosh, I participated in the same game jam that the 9th game was made for, so nice to see our little community gettin' some recognition. My own entry to that jam was heavily inspired by a game I played 'cus it was in this very video series (Lucah: Born of a Dream), but the end result wasn't very souls-like-y, so Dream of a Sunflower was truly the better fit here. Still a fun little coincidence though, small world huh?
To be totally honest this is the content I come to the channel for - I love weird and experimental games, and these videos are such a digestible way to find out about things I might've missed. This series has introduced me to a lot of smaller titles that I've played and loved.
I’d describe Tunic as a B- Souls-like with an A+ puzzle game hidden within. The question is whether the combat is good enough to hold your interest long enough to start discovering the game’s true secrets. If you enjoy both Souls and puzzle games, you owe it to yourself to push through to the game’s back half.
Y E Im going to tell you right here: I love this series to the bone. It teaches so much about video games, what goes right, what goes E wrong. There are many valuable lessons to take about player engagement and polish. A lot of the time seeing some aspiring EE gamedevs do something wrong can be an extremely valuable lesson, and these videos help to expose people to the such. E E and when the games do it right, a new game on my radar! S
Regarding Thymesia, there's two things that do make it feel kinda off, especially when looked at as a Sekiro-Like; 1) The Deflect is not also a Block. In Sekiro, you can pretty reliably wiggle-dance your way to victory over most foes, and if you slightly mistime your Deflect you can hold the button to transition into a block. You'll take some chip damage and a bunch of posture damage, but it will still give you what is effectively a partial success on your block. Combined with Sekiro's Restore-Health-on-Deathblow abilities that you'll pick up as you go through the game, and this means that missing a deflect is punishing, but something you can recover from. In Thymesia the Deflect is a Dagger Slash. It is an attack. You cannot hold down the button to block, and there's so few active frames and such a long recovery that you can't wiggle-dance at all. If you miss a Deflect you take full damage, and there doesn't appear to be, at least in the demo, any life-steal on deathblow. This means that the Deflect is an extremely high risk high punishment mechanic that honestly doesn't even seem to provide much benefit when you pull it off. I think when I beat the Feather Tutorial Knight I did it mostly by just dodging and swiping. 2) The Feather Parry mechanic works like Bloodborne's Gun Parries, but everything visually about the mechanic seems like it's trying to intentionally push you to the wrong timings. Basically, you don't time the feather based on the green line, you time it so that your feather hits the enemy during the active motion of their swing, same as Bloodborne's Gun Parries. This is simply a problem of the visuals being bad. Currently, again based on Feather Tutorial Knight, the Knight begins the wind-up of their attack, and then the line fills up, and then they begin the actual swing. The problem is that the line filling up, because it happens after the wind-up starts, that suggests it is there to help with timing, but it isn't. If you time your feather to the line it will hit the enemy before their swing beings, and the recovery is too long to throw a second feather. They should look more like the Burst Attacks in Nioh 2, as they are a very similar mechanic, where the enemy just gets an aura the second they enter the windup phase, or just go full Sekiro Like and have the visual warning coincide with when you should throw the feather. I think those two problems are the biggest problems for Thymesia's Combat right now.
yeap exactly my complain, the dodge seems way better than doing other things, and the feather parry is so fking weird, sometime I pull it off when the knight is not even charging, but then I can failed it when he is in the middle of attacking, which unlike bloodborne (and worse than bloodborne) another thing that I don't like with this game is, it introduce so much mechanic in such a short demo, and most of them feels quite optional, like the prosthetic thingy is powerful-ish but so hard to get, I still better off just spam light attack and dodging
For what they have in the demo so far, the game felt pretty solid to me. They've been spending the last few months taking feedback, especially after they had delayed the game from their original release date (October 2021). The demo is good, but further polish will make the game stand out come launch day, I'm willing to bet.
Dolmen is the most game ever made. Still sends shivers down my spine when the protagonist says "It's dolmin time". Truly a masterpiece. I give it 100/100 dolmen
Hobo Cat Adventures had a weird charm to it. Felt like someone played Banjo Kazooie high on bath salts and then just *communicated that experience to the audience*.
thats kinda what conkers bad furday on the n64 is, thats why one of the reviews said its a nice mix of it with soulslike elements. for example, you fight a giant pile of shit in conkers bad furday by throwing toilet paper at it if i recall correctly
I fell in love with Tunic a while ago. It's super cute and mysterious and actually pretty hard. I like it a lot, I think it's worth playing for sure. Dolmen though, that game fucking blows hard lol
I highly recommend Barony. It's more Kingsfield than Souls to be honest, but I feel like it has a place in this series. I personally really enjoyed it a lot, it's a lot more fun with friends tho.
eyo i forgot to say on the actual video, but your coverage on "going under" a couple souls-like back actually got me to go grab a copy lol love this series! looking forward to you playing all 1269 results!
I feel like Guilt has some cool and interesting stuff, like moving on an overworld map in a For The King style, and the combat is like half Souls half Diablo 3, which is pretty cool for me as a fan of both (as an end product, both were kinda crap on launch, D3 being... Different...)
I have a game for you: FIRE IN THE BEASTLANDS . Its a souls like similar to salt and santuary, but in an pré historic setup, it pretty good and nobody knows about this game
Don’t stop making these videos, I’m so glad you enjoy making them, your content is so creative and fun to watch and you have a nice voice and personality which is huge for these review videos, so please do keep it up!:)
Always happy to see more of these! A recommendation I'd have for another one of these (and for anyone looking for similarly obscure titles!) is EPΘCH - I had some fun with it back when it released, and while I wouldn't call it particularly noteworthy, it is _highly_ obscure because you can only find it on Steam's search if you use that Greek character. Using a normal O will return an identically named game that is entirely unrelated. It's extremely cheap now, so I think it's worth giving a look!
you should try draken: the ancient gates. It was made for the PS2 but a good emulator can run it pretty well. It has a souls like combat but before demon souls came out. It also has fun dragon combat. Highly recommend
@@TouchDirt there are decent emulators out there if you wish to revisit it. I play the game once a year and it never gets old. It was so ahead of it's time
For context for that Touhou game: You're playing as Kazami Yuuka, one of the oldest character's in the series. She is a sadist who enjoys bullying others, especially humans. She's implied to be very old for youkai standards. Essentially she controls nature and her signature thing is sunflowers as she hangs out in the Garden of the Sun (sunflower field). Depending on which timeline it is, she can also create dimensions. That laser you used is called the Master Spark, though the game didn't give it justice. In reality it'd cover the entire screen.
Please don't stop making these. Even if you need to change what type of games you cover, it's just fun watching you try out obscure steam games. I always get excited when another of these is in my subscriptions
I second that. I don't care about the genre. Soulslike, rogue like, like like.
Yeah same here, love the theme, but absolutely adore the format!
Hear hear!
I second this notion. although at this point it's more a case of, "I fourth this notion."
fr
WOAH MY GAME DREAM OF A SUNFLOWER GOT ON SOULS-LIKE DUMPSTER DIVING
I made it with fellow developer rakasaac in 2 weeks for a game jam, as a learning experience, as well as just to have "Touhou Dark Souls" exist in the world! I specifically worked on the online message system as well as most of the animations and audio
Unfortunately, we've since moved on to other projects, but we may revisit the bullet-hell souls-like idea again in the future.
Thanks for making my day Iron Pineapple!
YOOO DUDE I LOVED THAT GAME THANK YOU FOR MAKING SUCH A BEAUTIFUL THING!
I really liked how closely the bullet patterns mimicked the Original games, it was a nice touch!
Love the little animations you gave Yuuka
You did an awesome job!
Honestly I really like idea as whole. Maybe we'll see it fully fleshed out in the future? Either way pretty cool game and wish you good luck in your future endeavors.
Please don't feel like this kind of content is unwanted or lesser. This souls-like review series of yours continues to be some of my all-time favorite content on TH-cam that will always get an immediate excited watch from me. Your genuine interactions and fair assessments, along with the way you speak in general make your content a joy to watch. Keep it up!
I second this, It's always such a great surprise when one of these videos shows up in my sub feed!
^this
Coming back from binging almost the entire series of these:
You should consider doing a sister series that revisits the ones you thought had potential after a year or two and see where they are now.
This is an awesome idea
heck yeah!!! < 3
I'm here for this!
Yes!!!
Speeeecially student proyects.
Bizarre Souls dev here: It feels weird to see my meme game featured in the same video as Tunic, Nine Sols and other top quality games. I'm glad it made you chuckle haha
- You are by far the worst pirate I've ever heard of.
- But you have heard of me.
It is the most appealing one from all of these, to be honest. Will definitely give it a try
it stuck out as more likeable than 90% of the games in this series, will also give it a try!
For a meme game seemed pretty cool and in-depth, didn't seem lazily made, also officially the only JoJo game where dio can use his stand and actual vampire powers so congrats on that.
jotaro being called dolphin enjoyer made me laugh pretty hard
You know what I always like most about these is the respect you show for these games, even ones you didn't like or were clearly unfinished or very rough. Devs put a lot of work into them and its hard to produce a really strong game. We're very spoiled by the indie market because we pay the most attention to the best games, but there's literally millions of indie devs out there trying to make something. Some don't succeed, and that's okay. We don't often start from a place of success.
Especially solodevs or student groups yes
This is a beautiful message that every Dev should read, never give up people
Making interactive content is extremely challenging and everyone should be applauded for even trying, but alas, most of these small projects are going to be awful because of either a lack of money or talent. It's the rare diamond in the rough like Tunic that shows there really is great talent out there in the masses, you just have to keep trying.
There's a very real chance I've played more Souls-likes than literally anyone else.
deeznuts
Did u ever played mods on dark souls
RATIOOOOOOOOO
I'd believe it
still no fishing though
I honestly love how “bland” or “low energy “ his commentary is like
No annoying yelling or being overly dramatic it’s refreshing
overexaggerated youtubers remind me of those dystopian game shows you see on shows like black mirror where its just like brightly coloured slapstick mildly violent nonsense occuring
“Soothing”, “relaxed”, or “calm”, if you’re worried about what it sounds like you’re saying.
And I agree. It’s great to hear someone down-to-earth have so much to go through and talk about. Great vibes on this channel
Fr the way he does it is like just reacting to everything, but its like im with a friend just joking around trying a game. Feelsgoodman
stoic, soothing, relaxing, tempered, calm, comforting, appeasing, lulling, smooth... so many words to use.. and you go with "bland" and "low energy" to describe haha. But yes, youre not wrong either lol
The commentary is actually pretty insightful.
Bro occasionally goes from personal opinion to giving an actual review (wolong at the end of a recent episode comes to mind, I bought it on that recommendation)
Steam dumpster diving is one of the only series I instantly click and watch full episode of as soon as I see a new episode. I would not even mind it expanded to some other genre of games that you enjoy. I found many games I tried and loved through this series and I had a good laugh with many others. One of the best and most unique youtube series. Keep up the great work ^^
That's one of the reasons I love this series; is great to give visibility to small developers that have nice ideas that would otherwise fly under the radar, as well as to give constructive feedback for people that are starting in game developing and still need some polishing before getting there.
Lol same as me every time i see it i get a pizza or sth and watch it
This.
So glad this series is back, it's one of my favorites
Hobo Cat adventures is winning game of the year for sure, did you see those bloodborne parries and mid-air pissing?
Honestly, the humor was right up my alley!
@@misterx2133 isnt it past your bedtime?
Literally better mid-air pissing mechanics than most triple A games!
It's also got... MILK
@@noahleach7690 My bedtime is with your mom.
That nine sols game actually looks pretty damn solid, looking forward to that one.
Never stop with Steam Dumpster diving, I think it directly makes games better and gives us a window into more games we might like.
It’s also encouraging for fledgling developers!
Explain how it directly makes games better.
@@breakthecode4047 maybe because of him giving his feedback on each game so the devs would understand what people would like/dislike more, especially the ones who've had their games featured
@@maxbreaker that's an incorrect statement though. Because what he likes isnt always going to be what others enjoy. It's not a good metric
I had a great time playing Hobo Cat by not playing it the intended way. I skipped most of the game by constantly sequence breaking and glitching behind the locked gates xD
Of course everybody has their own preferences, but, i would say Iron did "downplay" Hobo Cat quite a bit.
Yes, i did not see his entire gameplay of it, but still, from what he has shown us: The game is creative/ somewhat unique, animations are fine, combat variety (ground pound, peeing from above, throwable objects can be used for parrying & have unique uses), new weapon like banjo is not just a skin it has custom sound & animations, decent voice acting, fun well made cutscences.
I believe Iron did not enjoy the humor, so it probably effected his judgment to some extend. That is not my usual preference either, but i think people see Soulslike genre as "serious", maybe too serious. So i actually appreciate this fresh new take of a Soulslike. Def underrated review.
Its just the humor, the game otherwise seems to work. I did not hear Iron say its unplayable cuz of bad performance.
I gotta job for you to do 😆
I'm absolutely in love with the aesthetic and designs in Guilt: The Deathless. It's a shame the gameplay isn't a little more polished, but the art team killed it. Will definitely keep an eye on that one.
Has a lot of potential
I'm intrigued by the guilt system. Balancing loot vs revive strength is unique. Might be good, might be awful.
Always strange how games inspired by russian/slav folklore gain this much love in the comments. I mean, yeah, the art is badass, for likho for example, but nobody really says so about tunic kind of games and other stuff. And iron pineapple also says something on these folklore people designs, like with domovoi in this video. It isn't strange, but just seems like it, maybe that's the witcher influence on the world.
My thoughts exactly
@@ethan2670 Yeah I liked the idea of "punishing" looting, or rather creating a risk/reward system around it. It could infuse some fun mechanics familiar to the survival genre but through the violent lens of Soulslike violence. But it would definitely make balancing a whole lot harder for the devs
So. Because of this video i did end up buying thymesia on my switch. I will say the game has definitely improved from what you saw and played. Im liking it so far
"So everything in this game, even looting a body, costs guilt. Like, I'm constantly increasing my guilt meter."
Finally, a mechanic I can relate to
You have to break your cycles of guilt my brother in Brozouf
We love loot
Gain guilt by feeling guilt
Whole game is just a ripoff of Trauma Center, smh
Always been interested in Nine Sols. But now I'm even more interested knowing it's the developers of "Detention" and "Devotion" XD
Definitely the best game of this list, looks great
Same, those games are great
Anything that has good deflect mechanics goes immediately on my watchlist! And it's really nice to see these devs try something different, I am sure the story will be just as dark as their other games.
I loved the Nine Sols demo but wait yo it was them???
You look familiar.
Maybe KK in the wheelchair.
Also rip steam asia region banned devotion because of Winnie the pooh joke.
25:20 Btw sunflower totally make sense in the context of Touhou. This girl is Yuuka Kazami "Flower Master" whose main place of activity is a field completely covered in sunflowers.
Upon finding him years ago via For Honor and Dark Souls trolling, I would not have necessarily expected to consider the real Iron Pineapple eventually amongst the most wholesome video-makers I follow--which I definitely mean as a compliment. He's doing God's work with this series.
Off to a great start with the Hobo Cat
Hobo cat is gold
Humour seemed pretty tedious to me. Ha-ha, pee pee. Epic.
might actually buy it honestly lol don’t game much after work. this looks right up my stoner loner time
@@Prawnsly I 100% believe you only are saying this because of his reaction to it.
@@Prawnsly average soylord
Thymesia actually looks like it has the bones to be a really great game. The death animation for losing to a boss is a really cool idea that adds to the impact of dying.
No seriously that game looks like it has such potential but is bogged down by a lack of polish.
@@loathbringer kinda reminds me of how sonic frontiers looked
looks kinda shoddy to me
The animation and effects look really good
Souls games don't really benefit from a long death animation. You'll die a lot, and after the 5th time or so, just wastes time between attempts
Recommendation:
"LOST TO TIME"
Can be found on steam
2D Dark Souls but with time manipulation powers. Its pretty souls-like, lil bit janky and has reviews in the single digits.
хз почему, но на первый взгляд напоминает deaths gambit)
Nine Sols is out, I repeat, Nine Sols is out
That aside, thanks you for the many games you've helped me discovered, please never stop this series
Dream of a Sunflower unironically captures the goofier aspects of souls really well, especially how multiplayer interaction feels.
and the kind of bizarre/esoteric touhou feel - pouring and drinking tea to restore heath, saving by contemplating the beauty of a sunflower, etc
Guilt actually had pretty stellar looking character and creature designs, like a mix of D&D and Berserk. Environments didn't look bad either, especially given the obvious asset limitation. If they fixed the bog-standard movesets of the common enemies and touch everything up just a little bit there's a lot of potential there!
There was a clear divide in the attention to aesthetic versus mechanics. They put a lot of effort into the art, which is REALLY well done, so they really just need to iron out the gameplay.
I like that it's also inspired by actual folklore. Koschei the Deathless, the ghost looking guy, is a character from Russian mythology, a sorcerer who turned himself into a lich to gain immortality. I don't know much else about it either but it may be that the other creatures are also from that particular story, which would give them a bit more personality other than just being enemies for the sake of being enemies.
In terms of art style, it definitely reminded me of the Berserk games as well.
@@vermillion6159 false dmitry is straight up from russian history (upd: polish too, i guess)
Elden Ring: * ages four months *
Iron Pineapple: I've given thee courtesy enough.
Except for Elden Ring, he hasn't done a From game video for 3 years lol
@@arcanefire7511 huh you forgot about demon souls
@@arcanefire7511 and ninja blade, and shadow tower and kingsfield
@@gottdashochstewesen4902 Yup, fair enough
Can`t blame him, I got bored after 60 hours of gameplay focused around aimless horse riding to find flowers.
Thymesia did get better and became one of my favorite souls-likes ive beaten
Liteeally my fav souls like
Yeah, that demo did the game dirty. It's pretty awesome nowadays.
It's still short. But the demo looks so much worse than the game
He didn't use the wounds system correctly either, barely saw him claw
Same thymesia was actually such a great game
the never ending supply of souls likes amazes me
Hobo cat copycats*
or Metroidvanias
that sounded like something satan would say
I love how IP usually tries to include student projects in most episodes. They're always rough but you can see the creativity and passion put into them and including them gives exposure to people who are trying to carve their own place in an already over saturated market. Kudos, love these vids, keep em coming bro.
Next time you do another episode of this series, I highly recommend checking out The Tarnishing of Juxtia. It's got a demo on Steam right now with a release date of "Summer 2022." I was really surprised and impressed by the demo. The game doesn't have a super unique "hook" or anything, but the devs really nailed the fundamentals. Character actions feel great, and enemy movesets are hard but fair. Environments and character designs aren't anything unique as far as Souls-likes go, but they're well rendered in an appealing pixel-art style.
just played it off of your recommendation, this game is awesome!
definitely picking it up on release
I've been following ToJ for a while and the demo was so much fun. Can't lie, very hyped.
That game looks amazing
Juxtia is a pretty good
I played the demo a few days ago and it's really good! Another one in a similar style is Moonscars, well worth checking out too.
I'm here one year later just to say...
I was looking towards Nine Sols to fill in the gap waiting for Silksong. *It exceeded all my expectations and more, and is among the best games I've ever played.*
Fun fact: Silksong has been in dev for longer then Daikatana.
Would unironically try most of the games in this video. This might have been the best “Soul-like” video he has done yet. At least when looking at the quality of the games.
Not because any of the games were the best but because none of them were the absolute worst, almost none of the games felt like filler to extend the video… that Jojo one doesn’t count because Jojo is perfect by simply existing.
tunic was such a pleasure to play - im so glad you covered it here too :D more dumpster diving pls
Lol even Girl_DM wants him to do more.
I mean, who wouldn’t!
It's one of my other favorite TH-camrs! Hi :)
I totally agree, Tunic is amazing.
Tunic is unironically an absolute GotY, even with Elden Ring contending. Didn't really expect to see it in a video about obscure souls-likes, Tunic is fairly well known.
My favorite part is when Dolmen from the game Dolmen goes "It's Dolmin' time!"
and then he Dolms all those spiders
The meme died when Jared Leto tweeted about it
@@GreebusBleeb I loved when Jared Leted all over them guys while saying "it's letin' time" letiest shit i ever heard
@@GreebusBleeb dude couldn't even realise we weren't having fun with him we were mocking him
@@GreebusBleeb oh shit are you talking about the world famous actor Jared leto who portrayed morbius is the smash hit film morbius?
Touhou one is sooo cute. The green haired lady is Yuuka. She tends to large sunflower fields. So sunflowers are usually associated with her character.
I kind of love how “Admire Sunflower” just sounds like it could be a poorly translated “Praise the Sun.”
Real "I ran Dark Souls through google translate 100 times and made it a new game" vibes
This vid is trending hard right now. I'll bet you're really making some devs' weeks when you give optimistic reviews―I think it's safe to say that your opinion is easy to understand and your expertise in the area well-respected. I really like this series, and I hope it continues to be this successful for you to incentivize the honestly consumer- _and_ indie developer-friendly work that you're doing here. I'd even say that what you're doing is _important_ for this corner of the industry, where art still trumps profit. Thank you
I agree and honestly I’d argue it’s very important because any type of feedback whether negative or positive will help these indie devs in the long run. The more people that give them opinions on what is or isn’t done right the better. Plus he’s very respectful with his critiques even to the worst games
The combo of the review juxtaposed to the gameplay makes it perfect
The art in question: Butts pulls a carrot out of his ass to a fart sound
"Red Candle is the studio that made Detention and Devotion. Two well rated horror games"
I'll admit I'm not sure if that makes me more or less confident in their work. I mean... going from a narrative centric horror game to a 2d platformer soulslike is quite the leap.
Judging from the gameplay footage in the video, I'm optimistic, I really dig the aesthetic and the deflection-based combat with the explosive charms, seems to work way better than Thymesia, which was going for something similar.
I highly recommend playing it. The gameplay is pretty smooth and fun.
You would be surprised by the catalogue of many indie devs, Edmund Mcmillen has a lot of games and the Castle Crashers devs never make the same game twice.
Consider that 98% of the self-tagged Souls games on Steam are so bad and broken that they aren't even fun to hate-watch, being from people who have proven they can actually finish a game and have it be good takes them straight to the top percentile - even if the game is bad, it will at least be a sincere attempt to make a game from people who know how game design works.
@@massgunner4152 That's fair... also god don't remind me of Castle Crashers... I still want more of that.
I recommend revisiting Thymesia. I got it when it was released as a full game and had a blast playing it. There is more mechanics including breaking barrels.
I like to believe the devs watched Iron's video on the game and thought "Damn it, we didn't add breakable barrels!" Lol
@@theoneandonly2441
Not only that but they made breaking barrels an achievement
Dude I really felt the “I WANT to love this game.” Comment on the Thymesia game. It looks so awesome and clearly there’s passion behind it..
He got clapped and said the game is bad when he probably played an old demon lol
@@jenzu4229 he never said the game is bad though?
@@jenzu4229 You should never play an old demon.
@@Aidz1212 he said its 'pretty bad'
22:10 That "Ok. Yeah. That's fun." is probably the most genuine reaction I've heard towards a game in a while.
This game art is so beautiful
The Sunflower one, with some refinement and high production quality, that could almost be a good game, it tried to be bullet hell but the 3d and full range of motion didn't make it so much as hell as slightly wiggle between. Nah it needs massive cleaving attacks and zones of damage coming, so you have to maneuver around to avoid them. Sort of like Souls boss where sometimes you see an animation and you know to run away asap, or to run towards the boss to get under his attack.
Yeah, with some proper telegraphing, bullet clusters, and a dodge mechanic with i frames, it would be a seriously fun souls-em-up. Probably good enough to get popular and maybe warrant a sequel to help the dev team grow, get more funding, and gain more experienced with new, different mechanics.
I feel like no one of you has ever seen or played any of the NIER games lol
@@MaBuster exactlyyyyy it's driving me nuts
I didn't notice him use any of the elemental weapon modes in Dolmen video. I found that was what made it fun. You basically had two stamina bar's worth of dodging and attacks.
I loved Detention and Devotion and did not know they were making Nine Sols, very glad you highlighted them.
These video's are always a treat to watch.
That's the one game I glanced at and was immediately like, "Oh hello there sexy."
Please keep making these. Steam Dumpster Diving is one of my favorite series on TH-cam. Like your other videos too, but these are always 10/10
It never ceases to amaze me how different games within the rough genre of "Souls-like" manage to be. Nine Sols looks absolutely gorgeous. Hope it does well.
Because it's not "souls-like". Action RPG has been here forever.
It's not a genre, it's a game play mechanic
@@A_Black_Sheep94 ah ye, in arcades you had lives and you could try again and again. You are right, they said it's like i am selling my soul, one piece at a time.
@@marceelino wut
Nine sols is cringe furry trash game
this is one of my favorite series on youtube. its a very chill and unbiased look at souls likes. I've added quite a few of the games you've reviewed on this show and just added at least Tunic to my wishlist.
OK, having a custom animation for the boss killing you actually seems like a really cool idea.
That used to be a thing in games slightly over a decade ago, too bad studios dont want to put that much effort in nowadays
@@MolnarSPeter Not really? That was around the time I got into the medium, and I'm fairly certain it wasn't particularly common back then either (the only example that springs to mind was Dead Space and its sequels).
@@MolnarSPeter no it wasn't...
actually, that comment deserves more.
because seriously, there is a few games over a long time that had death animations. It is nothing to do with a specific time, it's just generally a waste of resources. Dead space was indeed about a decade ago, 2011 to 2013, and tomb raider reboot would count from there. But so would the rest of the tomb raider series from 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2003...you get the idea. Let alone things like kings quest or space quest from 1986 to 1995, the elvira game from 1990, fade to black 1995, heart of darkness in 1998, limbo was 2010...
Most players will only see a fraction of the deaths, and only while simultaneously getting annoyed. Even moreso if the animation is too long, and they die multiple times.
the steam dumpster diving series is honestly the series that introduced me to your channel, and sometimes I put old episodes that I've seen a million times on as comfortable noise to fall asleep to. it's always a good day when a new episode drops!
Touhou fangames are usually a lot more high-effort than the average, so I'm not surprised this one was too. I do think 3d may not be the best environment for bullet hell gameplay though, Nier had to shift to 2D perspective to make it work, because 3D just leaves too many openings.
Though it didn't help that none of these patterns were particularly hard. Look up some of the stuff stage 6 bosses in the mainline touhou games have, that's some real shit right there.
NieR had 3D bullet hell too. One example is the Opera Boss
Returnals did a very good job.
@@NephTheGremlin nier one had a few 3d bullet hell bosses too
I think the 3D is fine, but the patterns need to work WITH the system, as opposed to AGAINST it. There needs to be more angles of approach, & more rotational attacks.
The fact that pineapple never left the ground, despite a pretty fluid flight system, shows that they could've done SO much more with it. Having attacks that need you to fly in order to avoid them would make boss fights MUCH more satisfying.
If you haven't already, I'd recommend taking another look at Thymesia. I've played through it and it's one of my favorite souls-likes. From what it looks like, I think they fixed the feather system because it works really well now. It is still pretty similar to sekiero in terms of combat, but I really enjoyed some of the more advanced combos, and the fast past combat is incredible! Thank you for making such great content, I love your videos!
Nine sols was one of the most fun games I've played in a while can't wait for the full game to come out next year
I was actually surprised how little he commented on it when I was playing the demo and was like: WTF HOLY SHIT the whole time. Even though it was just a demo I was really captivated by basically everything from the gameplay, setting, story, art, music! I especially loved that they also did a good bit of environmental storytelling!
I've been following Thymesia for a while and am really excited for the full release. They did also tweak some things based off demo feedback, so they are listening to what people are saying.
One of the few that looks like it has potential
I had a lot of the same criticisms that pineapple did some hopefully they worked on the mechanics a lot because that demo was really disappointing to me.
Thank god, It was a janky mess when I played it a few weeks ago. I loved the setting and general vibes but it was a tough slog through that demo they released.
are there a lot of soul calibur characters ported as bosses? the first boss demonstrated nightmare and there appeared to be ivy as well in the ending clip
i love when John Dolmen says "it's dolmen time" and dolms all over the bad guys
#dolmensweep
Dolmen made a dolmillion dolmars on release night. Truely one of the games ever.
cant wait for the sequel "Dolmen 2: Revengeance of the Doll Men"
@@theapexsurvivor9538 truly one of the games of all time!
Could you IMAGINE if you got that Thymesia execution every time before you heard, "I am Malenia, Blade of Miquella"?
"I know some people probably just want Elden Ring stuff"
I certainly can't speak for everyone, but me personally, I'm a bit tired of Elden Ring stuff. I'm glad to see this variety series again
I'm quite intrigued by the Touhou game : the main strength of the series is its ability to create equally beautiful and difficult patterns on a 2D field. I hope that Dream of a Sunflower will try to use its 3rd movement axis to its advantage and create something interesting (I also hope they use better art for the bosses, Doremy is a hella cool character not benefiting from being a cardboard cutout)
From the gameplay in the video it didn't seem the flying or dodge roll were utilized much in the bosses, but those could make for very interesting attacks
Reminded me of Nier Automata a little when I first saw it.
That game was just a 2-week one-off project that isn't getting any further development, but the dev (noeticnightjar on itch) is a touhou game jam regular so I'd definitely recommend checkin' out some of their other work too
If not for this video I would have never in my life found the masterpiece that is hobo cat adventures
big thanks for exposing this 10/10 literal game of the year
Dude thymesia is so good, I bought it the min it came out and loved it. I would totally recommend it!
Nine Sols definitely looks fantastic and well made, I'm going to keep an eye on it, It already has a page on steam so I'll be getting it when it comes out (oh and try the demo on steam guys if you are interested)
Every installation of this series makes me happy and is fun to watch. I'd still probably watch even if it wasn't tied to soulslikes
Scary to think that Iron Pineapple has played more Souls-likes than anyone ever
There's a very real chance
More than anyone else
Literally
Just started playing Tunic and I'm loving it so far ^^
Oh what an honor to be featured 🙌🌞 thanks a lot ❤ sorry you didnt like it though 😅
It looks very funny!
was conker an inspiration ? cause the humor felt conker like
Hobo Cat walked so Elden Ring could run. It's not easy being such a cornerstone, and there will always be some who don't appreciate it. Hobo Cat truly is the game of our generation.
@@athomicritics yes! The squirrel King is actually conker a few years later. I modeled his throne to look like the one in Conkers bad fur day
@@HoboCatGames thats neat , ill give it a try now
Gonna be honest, I miss these steam dumpster diving videos, I'd love to see more sooner rather than later.
I love that FromSoftware has transformed a generation of indie devs into fucked up, body-horror sculpting, Gustave Dore/Zdzislaw Beksinski/H.R. Giger protégés.
The amount of goat demons, spider abominations, and anthropomorphic hybrids floating about this generation of game design is unprecedented. Thanks Miyazaki 😂
I love horror. I wish that it doesn't need to get attached to 'Soulslike' game play to become popular. I'm not a fan of the mechanics, but I'm glad that the fans are having their golden age.
Letting you know, I still have fun watching these. As crazy as our world is, it’s know it’s not completely hopeless when I see “I tried another souls-like” pop up on my feed lol Your awesome, your bring a lot of joy to a lot of people that need it, your doing great!
Hang in there ♥️
@@TwintailsLover Will do! 😊
Nine Sols is an indie I'm super interested in for the comic style and the art/gameplay. Love these videos, thanks for keeping the series going!
Glad you talked about Tunic, as someone who really likes exploring in games playing through it blind was a treasure.
Thymesia would have gained so much credibility if it had done its system like Shinobi on the PS2 and had enemies stay stunned as long as you can combo them, then use a button to execute them all at the same time with a stylish dash between them all.
Idk that sounds like DmC kind of gameplay
Shinobi/Nightshade was awesome, shame no games really have that mechanic
Honestly pine, the reason why I subbed to you and continue to come back and watch is because of these style of videos... I enjoy your Darksouls/Elden ring videos too of course, but I don't think your content should be limited by just one game/type of game... I greatly enjoy you exploring the "souls-verse" , and even when the "games/worlds aren't too great", its definitely a nice change of pace that feels organic. Please continue to make more videos like this, and don't be afraid to "color outside the lines". Looking forward to the next one!
“I know some people want Elden Ring stuff”
NO, all your content is amazing and I thoroughly enjoy when you delve into obscure games!
The old FromSoft games were great to look at since even I never looked into it and Steam dumpster diving is a great way to both critique obscure games and find some great ones too! Keep at it!!!
I'm glad to see Red Candle still being alive! All I know about them is the Winnie the Pooh texture in Devotion and the whole controversy about it, with GoG pulling the game from their store, due to "the request of gamers"...
I mean to be fair to gog, a massive number of Chinese nationalist idiots did request it
God I hate antis. They cant even legally have access to steam and gog but they still get on VPNs and review bomb and spam.
19:06 that death animation was excessively brutal and I like it
It's only for that boss unfortunately
25:23 How did they not make this Praise The Sunflower?!
Petition to rename Souls-like to Dolmen-Like.
I second this
@@H3rry118 me 3
Petition to rename this series "Steam Dolmen Diving"
It's ya boy, Dolmen Gaming. And today we gonna attempt the Bed of Chaos thing in ya'll most favorite game. without further a do. It's dolmen time."
"But first a message from our sponsor: Random Ass VPN..."
oboeshoes!
Dream of a Sunflower really caught my interest, both Touhou and Dark Souls series of games have a reputation for being hard so as far as I'm concerned it's a match made in Gensokyo (even though the game seems pretty easy, but the idea is still cool).
Thanks for the showcase!
Hey wow, gosh, I participated in the same game jam that the 9th game was made for, so nice to see our little community gettin' some recognition. My own entry to that jam was heavily inspired by a game I played 'cus it was in this very video series (Lucah: Born of a Dream), but the end result wasn't very souls-like-y, so Dream of a Sunflower was truly the better fit here.
Still a fun little coincidence though, small world huh?
I dont even like Souls-like games but I'm always really glad when I see one of those videos pop up where you play niche games. Keep it up please!
To be totally honest this is the content I come to the channel for - I love weird and experimental games, and these videos are such a digestible way to find out about things I might've missed. This series has introduced me to a lot of smaller titles that I've played and loved.
I’d describe Tunic as a B- Souls-like with an A+ puzzle game hidden within. The question is whether the combat is good enough to hold your interest long enough to start discovering the game’s true secrets. If you enjoy both Souls and puzzle games, you owe it to yourself to push through to the game’s back half.
Y E Im going to tell you right here: I love this series to the bone. It teaches so much about video games, what goes right, what goes
E wrong. There are many valuable lessons to take about player engagement and polish. A lot of the time seeing some aspiring
EE gamedevs do something wrong can be an extremely valuable lesson, and these videos help to expose people to the such.
E E and when the games do it right, a new game on my radar!
S
Nine Sols animations look so smooth, I'm definitely wishlisting that one
Regarding Thymesia, there's two things that do make it feel kinda off, especially when looked at as a Sekiro-Like;
1) The Deflect is not also a Block. In Sekiro, you can pretty reliably wiggle-dance your way to victory over most foes, and if you slightly mistime your Deflect you can hold the button to transition into a block. You'll take some chip damage and a bunch of posture damage, but it will still give you what is effectively a partial success on your block. Combined with Sekiro's Restore-Health-on-Deathblow abilities that you'll pick up as you go through the game, and this means that missing a deflect is punishing, but something you can recover from.
In Thymesia the Deflect is a Dagger Slash. It is an attack. You cannot hold down the button to block, and there's so few active frames and such a long recovery that you can't wiggle-dance at all. If you miss a Deflect you take full damage, and there doesn't appear to be, at least in the demo, any life-steal on deathblow. This means that the Deflect is an extremely high risk high punishment mechanic that honestly doesn't even seem to provide much benefit when you pull it off. I think when I beat the Feather Tutorial Knight I did it mostly by just dodging and swiping.
2) The Feather Parry mechanic works like Bloodborne's Gun Parries, but everything visually about the mechanic seems like it's trying to intentionally push you to the wrong timings. Basically, you don't time the feather based on the green line, you time it so that your feather hits the enemy during the active motion of their swing, same as Bloodborne's Gun Parries.
This is simply a problem of the visuals being bad. Currently, again based on Feather Tutorial Knight, the Knight begins the wind-up of their attack, and then the line fills up, and then they begin the actual swing. The problem is that the line filling up, because it happens after the wind-up starts, that suggests it is there to help with timing, but it isn't. If you time your feather to the line it will hit the enemy before their swing beings, and the recovery is too long to throw a second feather. They should look more like the Burst Attacks in Nioh 2, as they are a very similar mechanic, where the enemy just gets an aura the second they enter the windup phase, or just go full Sekiro Like and have the visual warning coincide with when you should throw the feather.
I think those two problems are the biggest problems for Thymesia's Combat right now.
yeap exactly my complain, the dodge seems way better than doing other things, and the feather parry is so fking weird, sometime I pull it off when the knight is not even charging, but then I can failed it when he is in the middle of attacking, which unlike bloodborne (and worse than bloodborne)
another thing that I don't like with this game is, it introduce so much mechanic in such a short demo, and most of them feels quite optional, like the prosthetic thingy is powerful-ish but so hard to get, I still better off just spam light attack and dodging
Good analysis
For what they have in the demo so far, the game felt pretty solid to me. They've been spending the last few months taking feedback, especially after they had delayed the game from their original release date (October 2021). The demo is good, but further polish will make the game stand out come launch day, I'm willing to bet.
Dolmen is the most game ever made. Still sends shivers down my spine when the protagonist says "It's dolmin time". Truly a masterpiece. I give it 100/100 dolmen
Highest grossing game of all time with 500 dolmillion dollars
Hobo Cat Adventures had a weird charm to it. Felt like someone played Banjo Kazooie high on bath salts and then just *communicated that experience to the audience*.
thats kinda what conkers bad furday on the n64 is, thats why one of the reviews said its a nice mix of it with soulslike elements. for example, you fight a giant pile of shit in conkers bad furday by throwing toilet paper at it if i recall correctly
@@DomTheSub24 and its a giant Poo opera singer
Completing the manual in Tunic pretty much felt like being the cat in the cat transcendence meme, one page at a time.
very pleased to report that the dream of a sunflower dev is working on another souls-inspired 3d bullet hell game and it's dope
Man your disposition to play so many games and give your honest thoughts is quite amazing. Love this series
I fell in love with Tunic a while ago. It's super cute and mysterious and actually pretty hard. I like it a lot, I think it's worth playing for sure. Dolmen though, that game fucking blows hard lol
I've been loving Tunic so far. Can you recommend me any other games this good? (beside Death's door I definitely try it later)
nah bro bizzare souls is peak
I highly recommend Barony. It's more Kingsfield than Souls to be honest, but I feel like it has a place in this series. I personally really enjoyed it a lot, it's a lot more fun with friends tho.
eyo i forgot to say on the actual video, but your coverage on "going under" a couple souls-like back actually got me to go grab a copy lol
love this series! looking forward to you playing all 1269 results!
love that game! the writing was so funny
I feel like Guilt has some cool and interesting stuff, like moving on an overworld map in a For The King style, and the combat is like half Souls half Diablo 3, which is pretty cool for me as a fan of both (as an end product, both were kinda crap on launch, D3 being... Different...)
I have a game for you: FIRE IN THE BEASTLANDS . Its a souls like similar to salt and santuary, but in an pré historic setup, it pretty good and nobody knows about this game
Don’t stop making these videos, I’m so glad you enjoy making them, your content is so creative and fun to watch and you have a nice voice and personality which is huge for these review videos, so please do keep it up!:)
Always happy to see more of these!
A recommendation I'd have for another one of these (and for anyone looking for similarly obscure titles!) is EPΘCH - I had some fun with it back when it released, and while I wouldn't call it particularly noteworthy, it is _highly_ obscure because you can only find it on Steam's search if you use that Greek character. Using a normal O will return an identically named game that is entirely unrelated. It's extremely cheap now, so I think it's worth giving a look!
you should try draken: the ancient gates. It was made for the PS2 but a good emulator can run it pretty well. It has a souls like combat but before demon souls came out. It also has fun dragon combat. Highly recommend
I always think about that game, I only ever had the demo disc version but I played the fuck out of it.
@@TouchDirt there are decent emulators out there if you wish to revisit it. I play the game once a year and it never gets old. It was so ahead of it's time
For context for that Touhou game: You're playing as Kazami Yuuka, one of the oldest character's in the series. She is a sadist who enjoys bullying others, especially humans. She's implied to be very old for youkai standards. Essentially she controls nature and her signature thing is sunflowers as she hangs out in the Garden of the Sun (sunflower field). Depending on which timeline it is, she can also create dimensions. That laser you used is called the Master Spark, though the game didn't give it justice. In reality it'd cover the entire screen.
Dolmen actually looks like a fun idea. I now want a sci-fi souls game.
FromSoft next game is Armored Core. So closest we will get to sci fi for them. If you’re a fan of mechs.
Warframe but the attacks are slower you have to dodge block or parry instead of just facetanking sounds great.
Give Miyazaki 2 years max
This is 3 months late but the character is a copy and paste of the main character in deadspace
T he Surge 2 is great