still, the same things that you could criticize dark souls bosses for could also be applied to games like Metal Gear Rising

Enemy design generally

Lords of the Fall was legit what i said though, and due to its similarities to dark souls i generalise any such games the same,

Its about just dodging around until you understand the boss's standard pattern and then just attack during that 1 build in flaw

Most enemies are always designed with deliberate spaces for them to be vulnerable to the player

You can also do the inverse

Attack until it's dangerous

thats the premise of Serious Sam 😄

or Duke Nukem

what's wrong with that design doctrine?

should fighting a boss be a random chance of success, or a challenge that can be learned and overcome?

dark souls is very much like a dance

theres a difference between a challenge to overcome, and
"Oh he's about to be vulnerable"

dark souls doesn't have hyper armor for bosses

they're always vulnerable to damage

yes but you'll get punished for recklessness

if you maneuver out of the way during their attack you can hit them whenever you want

DS2 even gave you extra damage for this

so you shouldn't be punished for recklessness?

You should be, but thats not the point

Blitzcrieging the boss trying to deal more damage to it than it can do to you in the same timeframe should be punished

but it shouldn't be a waiting game

which was my experience with it atleast

that makes no sense

should you be able to attack the boss while it's attacking or something?

I don't understand how you would do bosses differently

i'd give the bosses more abilities, and methods/chances to surprise/counter you

And make them feel like you're on an even footing, but can't properly learn their method of attack

such a thing would be impossible to program

you need to make animations, line up hit detection, and pre-program AI

sooner or later, people are going to learn the pattern, and it will become a dance that can be learned

what you've just described is what only PvP can do

and even then, with a limit

because there IS a limit to the tools that can be used by the player

Nah it wouldn't be impossible to program,

It would require a lot more work yes,

But you can easily design such systems where an enemy can switch its attack half-way and have a selection of attack choices or so

but there would ofc be flaws to it

Dark Souls 3 kinda does that

enemies will slow down or speed up their attacks seemingly randomly to throw off players

stuff liek that yeah

have you played dark souls 3?

I haven't, i didn't enjoy Dark souls 1 enough to buy the followups

I only seen some lets plays of it

maybe they've changed things in the followups, that i'm not aware of

well then it'd kinda unfair to judge an old game by such high standards

true

DS3 solves the issues you have with DS1, seemingly

it does have the best bosses imho

Slave Knight Gael 👌

I admit i'm basing my knowledge off of 2 things
flaws i found in DS1
And the idea that sequels generally stick to the same systems

Hence i'm assuming DS2 and 3 are generally the same quality

so you're right i am judging them unfairly

anyhow its getting late for me, i gotta head off to bed

such a game in VR would be awesome though 🤔