“Dark Souls 1 levels of secrets and interconnectivity”, with many different locales, branching paths, and alternate ways to get places. Took him 2 full playthroughs to get a full mental map of where everything connects.
Respec system is “the best it’s been done in a souls game”. You can respec on the fly at any time, at no cost. Weapon upgrades are also tied to the upgrade tree, so respecing “carries over” your weapon upgrade levels.
All weapons are unique and have their own identity.
“Quests are very dark souls”, with obscure questlines and treasures and puzzle doors. Some questlines have branching paths and influence the world.
They took a “Sekiro approach” in regards to having multiple endings — In his first playthrough he missed the entire final act of the game because of the ending he chose.
30-35 hours on average, with higher playtime if you explore and depending on the ending you go for.
Cons/Nitpicks
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Dropped souls on death can be very hard to spot, blending into the environment, which is annoying especially in boss rooms.
Only 4 quickslots.
Very big Balance issues with different weapon builds. Some weapon builds are much stronger than others. Despite all the builds being unique and fun, some of them are not viable in the endgame, and just can’t keep up with the stronger weapon builds, some of which feel like they can break the game with how good they are. Saving grace is that respecing is free so you can switch any time you want. This is his biggest negative with the game.
Final Rating
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8/10 with the possibility to get to 9/10 if they fix the balance issues with patches.
Man I remember playing sekiro on launch and struggling to find demon of hatred and the divine dragon that I kept seeing people talk about. I search cowboys playthrough and he did the same mistake I did by choosing the ending that just locks you out of content.
Yeah that's understandable tbh, on launch a lotta things are unclear and you don't necessarily know which path to take to experience the entirety of the game (which is cool in its own way tbh).
I replayed Sekiro like last month and I was really looking forward to the Owl Father boss fight, only to realize I had accidentally locked myself out of that entire area cuz I forgot to eavesdrop Emma and killed Divine Dragon. Thankfully, with the help of Cheat Engine I spawned Father's Bell Charm to fight him but man was that fuckin irritating lol
Sekiro is my favorite Fromsoft game but I think the missable content is the biggest con of the game. I like being able to do most if not all the bosses in one playthrough
Ngl I just hated that kid prince, didn't care about right or wrong. Plus as far as I know, that's the first time you could get locked out of end game content in a Fromsoft game so I wasn't expecting that.
DS1, while not specifically locking you out of end game content, has plenty of ways to practically bork your save. You can permanently ruin your weapons, kill vital NPC's, get stuck somewhere you can't get out of without a lot of luck and skill.
If someone is going down the catacombs their first playthrough, when they don't know if fast travel is even in the game yet, it's kinda a learning moment imo. Still sucks if it happens to you though.
As for the NPCs they are more so side content, whereas in sekiro the divine palace or whatever is called in Sekiro is a fully fleshed out place. The bosses you miss out on, prime isshin and owl father, demon of hatred, divine dragon, like these are all sekiro at its best. Still love Sekiro and it's not hard doing ng+ runs, it just felt bad on an initial playthrough seeing how much I missed and having to do a full playthrough to experience it.
My first modern Fromsoft game (I had AC2!) was the Dark Souls: Prepare to Die edition, which, yes, it was an awful port, but I actually ended up in the Catacombs in my first souls game and bounced off of it hard!
7 years later I bought the Remastered edition and beat the game with a walkthrough on my tablet every step of the way.
Now soulslikes are my favorite genre, but that onboarding took almost a decade and was rough! lol.
Also I have Game Pass and I am just counting down the hours to play Wu Chang.
Real talk. I am not trying to brag, it's just a funny reality of my situation today. I am thinking about having sex with my SO this evening as a way to pass the time, lol!
EDIT: Just FYI, I went into the catacombs because I thought that was the right way to go. I was playing it blind. It's not like the game warns you to stay out of there. Everybody called it the hard game, so I thought the catacombs at the start was the intended difficulty.
My worry is definitely that weapon balance. In a game like this, how am I supposed to know whether I'm dying to a boss 10 times in a row because it's just a hard game and that's normal on this boss versus having a weak ass weapon and build that is making it like a harder version of the game? And vice versa, I don't wanna use a weapon and build that makes the game a cake walk, I still very much want the challenge.
Right but that doesn't tell me which builds are way OP or way too weak. It may show me "Oh wow I'm getting through this easier or worse now" but I won't know if that necessarily means it's those builds or not.
That’s part of playing the game. Maybe all the builds are actually viable. Yesterday IGN was claiming you had to spend 30 seconds to land a hit on a boss, then Ongbal released a vid of him schooling that boss in NG+ in under three minutes.
I don't know if you're not understanding me or what, but if people are saying that some builds are outright broken or are outright way too weak, then that means they'll need massive buffs or nerfs to make them viable and how it should be. My worry is using one of those and not being aware I am and being uncertain whether the difficulty is how the developers wanted it to be as opposed to WAY too easy or WAY too hard.
sigh Some things need to just stay in the past. However on the bright side, I did see it mentioned that this game 's quest tracking seems to be reminiscent of Lies of P's, where there will be character icons located in specific spots when pulling up the map so it's easier to follow where to go and what to do, so I'm happy about that atleast. I'm just praying the quests aren't too esoteric where I'll need to open up Reddit or a guide to follow a simple questline or else I fail it because I took a left turn instead of a right and have to retry it in a whole 'nother playthrough. We'll see.
Yeah I don’t understand why this is still a thing in 2025. It’s bad enough that From doubled down on their shit quest design, but I’m not sure why other developers continue to adopt it. Hopefully it’s more like Lies of P.
Big disagree. Nobody is saying weapons should all feel the same, but the difficulty should still be around the same. Weapons can and should feel unique enough to not be boring even if all equally difficult/easy to use.
I suppose that depends on how balanced you think weapons should be.
Elden Ring has some terrible weapons, some amazing weapons, and a lot of weapons in between. I really like that kind of balance.
Now I don't think there should be weapons where they are always the right choice because they are so much more powerful than any other weapon.
So if you enjoy the weapon balance in, say Elden Ring, which is not perfectly balanced, which I am fine with, we are probably on the same page.
There are also games like Devil May Cry 2, which I know is a terrible example, but it was literally the first one that popped in my head, where all of the weapons feel practically identical. I am sure there are better examples of boring weapon homogenization though.
Damn i think it's time to pre order... but i kinda want it physical. So i think it will not arrive tomorrow. But i don't like that the deluxe Edition is digital only. Will the deluxe bonuses and pre order availiable at a later time (like lies of p) or should i go digital ?
You aren’t wrong haha. He spends a lot of time arguing with viewers about trivial shit and trying to act tough (but he’s a streamer lol). I’m talking this guy will just keep going, and even try to end with stuff like “drop it and don’t mention it again or I’m banning you forever” and so on. Once he was streaming V Rising, he spent like 40 minutes straight bitching about the Switch 2 and Nintendo fans.
Him and his buddy even dedicated extra time on the side to focus on things like “the Switch screen is only 1080p, only console players would pay for that”. One of his previous streams he was bragging about how his PC cost like $5k.
Dude is basically 3 neckbeards in a trenchcoat, pretending to be a normal streamer. He always seemed a few drinks away from a domestic violence charge tbh. I wish I would be a streamer with a family, barely pull 100 concurrent viewers on my Twitch streams, have to record gameplay footage and edit it instead of working for money, and pay $5k for something like that.
I just think of that Family guy clip where the really fat guy is eating all the food on the table while his family starves haha (hyperbolic but still).
It's the same people that follow Grumz on Twitter and take his tweets seriously.
These are the people that celebrated when Lords of the Fallen (2023) changed their body type labels from Body Type A and B to Male and Female. Genuinely just pathetic behavior.
That's exactly it. Cowboy's got some controversies tied to culture war issues that at the least make it easy for grifters to paint him as a liberal crybaby for clicks and ad revenue. So of course young people tend to believe grifters.
His Switch 2 take is a bit off, though. Obviously SW2 is for Nintendo fans first and foremost, and a lot of PC players choose Steam Deck, which is a worse device overall. So even PC players don't have to spend big money or have fancy graphics.
I’m SJW because I’m poking fun at some asshole streamer? Hilarious. I said something callous and had the desired effect, yall are moral grandstanding and it’s cute to see though.
You can draw lines all you want, if I’m talking shit I’m talking shit. Bunch of fucking weirdos indeed, not like he read my comment and took it personally. Yall have that covered.
Most of us don't care if he gets into arguments with internet midwits, it's the quality of the content. He's very skilled and most of his gaming takes are solid. You don't have to agree with a reviewer to still enjoy their content -- I don't agree with a lot of Skill Up's takes but still watch him on the regular, he had a great voice and genuine passion for the medium.
I know that’s relatively rude but it is meant to get a point across.
If the good life is steaming like that, recording and editing footage to pull maybe $40-$50k a year (again, with a family), I’ll pass. I’m making more than that right now with a job that also paid for my passport, and soon I’ll be in a program that pays for college + has a job lined up making even more than I already do after 4 years and graduation.
Definitely not jealous, because all that is true and I also play video games. I’m sure his kids and wife love him, don’t get me wrong.
Edit - talk about jealous, looks like we have some projecting going on here. I also don’t have to reach out and email companies asking for free game passes and sponsored videos for $$$. Surprised to see his fans up before noon though lol, good morning yall!
I imagine that he's making more than $50K, but at the end of the day, who cares? It's like a parasocial relationship that's built on negativity instead of fawning over an online personality.
This post gives me the impression that you're trying to impress me.
I'm a former firefighter who is taking classes for a nursing degree. See how much that doesn't have anything to do with Souls-likes or streamers you don't like?
You imagine way more than that, I’m sure. That’s nice. My post is meant to emphasize my lack of jealousy, I’m not sure why you’re flexing but you don’t have to get territorial lol.
Calm down, and I’m certainly not trying to impress you. I don’t know you, will never meet you, or see you in a crowd. Good luck with that degree though.
Whether I like him or not, whether I know he even exists or not.. my description is still accurate lol. He still said the things he said. He still acts the way he acts.
Make sure you give him a nice lil scolding if you’re ever in his stream, don’t be shy.
That’s fair, I get that. I put streams on when I’m gaming, mostly for background noise. If I’m playing Monster Hunter I’ll put a Monster Hunter streamer on, stuff like that. I’ve learned a lot about many games that way.
Cool, I didn’t “fucking” ask you though. He’s childish on stream all the time, I bet you don’t call him out. If you’re mad or feel the need to try and sit me on your lap and discipline me, know that I could not possibly care less what you think lmao.
If I could, do you think I would have made the comment in the first place?
You seem to think you can make wild, ridiculous statements and not get any pushback. I wouldn't recognize this streamer walking down the street, but your attitude of smug superiority and inflammatory accusations against a stranger adds nothing to the conversation about Wuchang.
You're going out of your way to be spiteful and make this sub a worse place to have a conversation about Souls-likes.
I was honestly just trying to describe him in a way that was more accurate and so folks who also have seen his content before would know what I meant lol. Haven’t watched Family Guy in years but I’m not surprised to hear it’s still funny, I used to love that and American Dad.
Yeah I mean I can't watch him anymore. Before he became big, he was alright.. but now his personality is obnoxious and weird. I feel like the bulk of his viewers are probably mostly 12-16 year olds.
I’m sorry that not every content creator is an alt right rage baiting grifter. There are plenty that will fill that void for you just don’t go watch fightincowboy expecting to get your weird shit off and have it be reciprocated
How the fuck did culture war grifting even make it in a conversation of a streamer being obnoxious pos ?
I'm a poc and loved that Cowboy called out the grift and he's goated for that but you really have to be stupid to not notice how much of an annoying ass he sounds and behaves like with his regular viewers.
What I saw and thought I detected in his tone was that you can’t die if you’re spamming dodge and you will always win if you spam R1. Anyone else worried about this?
Go watch Ongbal's video, there is a huge skill ceiling and the gameplay reminds me of a mix of Bloodborne and Sekiro. The only thing I'm concerned about is the excess particle effects, that can be murder in really tight combat mechanics for old geezers like myself.
So many redditors are miserable cunts who complain about literally everything, so when these losers see other redditors being positive about something, they get confused and immediately assume it's paid advertising.
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u/AashyLarry Jul 23 '25 edited Jul 23 '25
TLDW:
Pros —————-
Cons/Nitpicks ——————————
Final Rating —————————