cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/45674424
Hello, all!
I have recently gotten into playing FromSoftware's older titles, namely King's Field and Shadow Tower: Abyss.
It's all thanks to a Youtuber called Majuular. I had no idea at all about these games, since at best I'm just a light and casual fan of Dark Souls 2/3, and Elden Ring. What I mainly enjoy about Dark Souls/Elden Ring is the exploration aspect, hence the casual.
I've got to say, if you haven't played King's Field IV: The Ancient City, or Shadow Tower: Abyss (Shadow Tower: Abyss is a Japan exclusive, but a fan translation patch is available!), and you enjoy romping through retro games with that certain something that only FromSoftware provides, please give these games a try!
To add context, after watching Majuular's video on King's Field, and his video on Shadow Tower's series, I started to look into more of From's older games, and found a game that is heavily inspired by King's Field called Lunacid. Well, I played the HELL out of Lunacid, and loved it so much, I started digging into finding other games like it! While this led me to find out that not a lot of games are in this niche of gaming, I did find a few! I can provide those to you if you so wish, just let me know!
I am happy to report that there is also a toolkit that can make similar games to King's Field, provided by FromSoftware all the way back in 2000, and lastly updated in 2001! This caused me to start looking for games that were made in this toolkit, and again, I did find some, but not a lot! I was also able to find a Remade demo for King's Field 2 by someone going by Rotmilldev, who did a wonderful job, and the only thing I'm disappointed by is that the demo is only the first part of the game!
Anyway, the real reason I am posting this is to get some discussions going on similar games, getting King's Field/Shadow Tower on people's radars that might incite some inspiration or interest, and to give any info I can to anyone interested in trying these forgotten gems!
As I am currently in King's Field IV right now, I can help anyone else who wants to spin it up for a try, and give some hints on settings or insights into why I'm falling in love with these games. If you are interested in it, I can also give you a .pnach file that will introduce better feeling controls for this game, at the cost of making it easier to fight any enemies due to the game being developed for a slower player character, which in turn means slower enemies to match.
Thanks for reading all this. I'm sorry to geek over it, but I would love to discuss it with anyone else interested! :)
This is a great King's Field game in terms of accessibility, but King's Field 2 and 3 (JP) are where the real DNA is at. KF3 Pilot Style is kinda cool but ultimately just feels like a romhack of the 3rd game. Which I guess it kinda is, it is a demo that a really small number of fans got, and it has differences from King's Field 3.
King's Field is a slow game. It is designed to be played slow and to progress slow, not so dissimilar to the best games in the Survival Horror genre like Resident Evil 1, Silent Hill 1-4, Kuon, Haunting Ground, etc. Making any part of it faster detracts from the overall experience. My biggest recommendation for people playing King's Field is to play it the way it was designed. Use the original controls, don't use speed hacks to make the game faster or run with a higher framerate (doing this easily makes the game uncontrollable), and get out a trusty pen and notepad. The reward from completing the game in this way is not even remotely comparable to looking everything up online or using cheats to make it easier, plus you get a fun souvenir for your time with the game at the end. If you aren't going to enjoy the game like this, then King's Field just isn't for you, as it will have other inconveniences you will absolutely find annoying enough to drop the game for. And that's okay, not every game is designed for every person on the planet to enjoy.
As far as games similar to King's Field, many claim to be similar but are actually not. The only game that looks truly similar is Monomyth, but that has some significant deviances from the KF formula as well.
Lunacid is not realy much like King's Field IMO, it is Shadow Tower, but not Shadow Tower Abyss (which was way better IMO than the original in basically every way). Personally, I did not really like Lunacid that much. I was sold on the game by the idea that it was a faithful successor to King's Field, but it just isn't. Too much of the game is different, to the point that I would say the only similarity is that the game is a first person RPG and that it features a bubble compass. The theme, setting, gameplay pacing, and characters are more fittingly Shadow Tower. Also, the anime style characters stick out compared to the rest of the game's art style. I love anime, but felt that the game should have featured more realistic/stylized-realistic characters like in King's Field. The music was also very much Shadow Tower and did not sound like King's Field.
Also, I am fairly sure Sword of Moonlight has received fan updates in order to keep it running on modern operating systems.
Thank you so much for taking the time to comment!
I haven't gotten to the first or second game just yet, as I will be backtracking from the more refined, and as you said, more accessible games to the older titles as those will play more similar to the games I've found that used the toolkit for their creation! As you said, the website I linked to for the toolkit is the website hosted by the gracious person who took their time and love of the King's Field series and used it to improve the engine!
I understand what you mean by the game being purposefully built for the slow gameplay, but that just isn't how I want to spend my time as someone who doesn't have a lot of free time. That means that if I can, I will increase the walking speed, the combat speed, or whatever else I need to do to make the game more enjoyable for me, such as being able to use the right analog stick to move the camera. I'm not in it for the slow pacedness of it, I am in it for the exploration, level design, and over feel the games provide. I think it is awesome that people choose to play these games as there were meant to be played, and as you said, would even recommend it for those that want that challenge! I know there are others like me though, and that means that if it can help them enjoy the game for themselves, why try to invalidate their enjoyment? We can both play the same game, and talk about the level design, the secrets, and the atmosphere, while still being able to enjoy the game in our own preferred way. That's part of the fun of gaming after all! Some play on easy, others play on the hardest difficulty, and that's just fine!
I am sorry to hear you didn't like Lunacid that much, and while I agree the anime characters are pretty out there (and definitely not something I enjoyed seeing for the first time), you don't see them often enough, or at least I didn't through my entire 30 hour playthrough, where it became such an issue as to quit playing. Lunacid's developer only mentioned it being inspired by King's Field, and I think it took that inspiration very well. Maybe they changed the wording by the time it was fully released, but I never saw anything that said it was supposed to be a successor, only that it was heavily inspired. With that said, I understand what you were wanting, and I am sorry you did not get it. For a casual like myself, however, it was an absolute blast that made me go on to start playing King's Field and Shadow Tower, mainly because there aren't enough games like them!
As for the music, I am enjoying the music on King's Field IV, I enjoyed the music on Lunacid, and I hope that when I get done with King's Field IV, I'll enjoy the music in Shadow Tower!
All in all, the limitations of the past are gone. I understand they were working with the technology of the time, and I love what they were able to accomplish. No loading screens on a PS2 game, let alone PS1, was such an amazing feat that I don't think they get enough credit for! But, these limitations do not have to exist any longer, and I think people should be able to play any game, no matter if the developers are targeting a hardcore market or not, because I think limiting people from playing games is kind of sad. Video games are supposed to be an outlet, a hobby, something you can do to take your mind off of things or have a little escapism. If that means allowing them to play a game with more modern controls, as I have done for King's Field IV, why should that bother anyone else? You can still play the game the way it was intended to, while I play it in a way that is more satisfying for me.
Again, thank you for the time and effort you put into your comment. I just want others to try these gems out too. :)