Yeah but only some people can actually experience the story this way. Imagine being a disabled person who can’t beat the game at all because you’re just not quite able to have the manual dexterity to manage your weapons and time dodging. If it’s dozens of times more difficult to persevere, even the most stalwart spirits would just give up and do something more fun eventually, and if the game itself refuses to give any aid, it shows an entirely different message to that player. Without proper accessibility options this messaging and story becomes sour rather than beautiful towards those who are disabled. It says they should be able to continue going without anyone helping them at all, that their extraneous suffering is necessary or inevitable. Rather than being shown a trek against adversity with constant adversity and triumph over that adversity, they’re just spat on by the game and told they’re weak and… by extension, with the rest of the philosophical overtone of the game, specifically combined with the individualistic perspective of refusing to have difficulty choices, shouldn’t even exist because they can’t handle the suffering of it. It’s just the same blank wall of indifference and outright malice disabled people experience all the time everywhere else.
Thank you for pushing me on this. I’ve been wrestling with it all night, and I think in the last analysis I’m just afraid of change. Dark Souls has been one of the most important works of art in my life. The grim, determined, brutal optimism of the series kept me alive in the throes of utmost depression, gave me an experience of struggling with adversity that translated to the worst parts of my struggle to survive severe mental illness. I’m afraid that there’s something delicate about it, and if it changes too much it’ll break. But you’re right - That’s inside me, and my inflexibility. I should find more compassion for others, as well as more faith in the Fromsoft team to be better than they are and strive to overcome their own limits and setbacks. f
thank you so much for listening. And I really dont want to take away from what you took away from the story- I think perseverance is a virtue and there is a lot of meaning in holding onto hope despite it being . Stubbornness can be based asf. I think the main difference in my thinking is that my perspective is that perseverance is a collective thing; It’s about finding resources and options available to you, and a lot of the time the most effective ones are other people. Like you’ve pointed out this is rather explicit in the game. You can summon others to help you and stuff. I think the only issue is that this help might not be enough alone for some players, and while it might seem cheap or devaluing to the hostility of the world to give them the option to make it easier, I think it fits into the theme of perserverance well. For perseverance as a message to be portrayed to the player, they have to have a chance of succeeding, and giving accessibility and easier options enables that for disabled people. From that perspective I think it would only take away from the hostility of the world if players enabled accessibility options needlessly on purpose. Which while I understand the concern about it, I feel like if someone is choosing to play a famously challenging game, them turning around making it trivial for themselves on purpose is a huge Skill Issue and means they probably wouldn’t properly internalize the themes anyways.
Or in other words, perseverance is a communal effort and giving accessibility options could help players without access to the community for whatever reason to still receive that message
Yeah but only some people can actually experience the story this way. Imagine being a disabled person who can’t beat the game at all because you’re just not quite able to have the manual dexterity to manage your weapons and time dodging. If it’s dozens of times more difficult to persevere, even the most stalwart spirits would just give up and do something more fun eventually, and if the game itself refuses to give any aid, it shows an entirely different message to that player. Without proper accessibility options this messaging and story becomes sour rather than beautiful towards those who are disabled. It says they should be able to continue going without anyone helping them at all, that their extraneous suffering is necessary or inevitable. Rather than being shown a trek against adversity with constant adversity and triumph over that adversity, they’re just spat on by the game and told they’re weak and… by extension, with the rest of the philosophical overtone of the game, specifically combined with the individualistic perspective of refusing to have difficulty choices, shouldn’t even exist because they can’t handle the suffering of it. It’s just the same blank wall of indifference and outright malice disabled people experience all the time everywhere else.
Thank you for pushing me on this. I’ve been wrestling with it all night, and I think in the last analysis I’m just afraid of change. Dark Souls has been one of the most important works of art in my life. The grim, determined, brutal optimism of the series kept me alive in the throes of utmost depression, gave me an experience of struggling with adversity that translated to the worst parts of my struggle to survive severe mental illness. I’m afraid that there’s something delicate about it, and if it changes too much it’ll break. But you’re right - That’s inside me, and my inflexibility. I should find more compassion for others, as well as more faith in the Fromsoft team to be better than they are and strive to overcome their own limits and setbacks. f
thank you so much for listening. And I really dont want to take away from what you took away from the story- I think perseverance is a virtue and there is a lot of meaning in holding onto hope despite it being . Stubbornness can be based asf. I think the main difference in my thinking is that my perspective is that perseverance is a collective thing; It’s about finding resources and options available to you, and a lot of the time the most effective ones are other people. Like you’ve pointed out this is rather explicit in the game. You can summon others to help you and stuff. I think the only issue is that this help might not be enough alone for some players, and while it might seem cheap or devaluing to the hostility of the world to give them the option to make it easier, I think it fits into the theme of perserverance well. For perseverance as a message to be portrayed to the player, they have to have a chance of succeeding, and giving accessibility and easier options enables that for disabled people. From that perspective I think it would only take away from the hostility of the world if players enabled accessibility options needlessly on purpose. Which while I understand the concern about it, I feel like if someone is choosing to play a famously challenging game, them turning around making it trivial for themselves on purpose is a huge Skill Issue and means they probably wouldn’t properly internalize the themes anyways.
Or in other words, perseverance is a communal effort and giving accessibility options could help players without access to the community for whatever reason to still receive that message