Challenging areas right near newbie areas

[StaceyPowers]

Generally, I expect really hard areas to be well away from newbie areas in open world games, but sometimes surprisingly tough areas are right nearby. As an example, I was surprised to find a Centurion in Shimmermist Cave in Skyrim given its proximity to Whiterun. Also, there is that notorious deathclaw area right near Goodsprings in Fallout: NV. What are some other examples?

[Kane99]

Or like when you go off into an area that isn't allowed to be accessed yet. Like in some of the GTA games where if you get too far out, or jump past a barrier somehow, it will give you a 6 star or 5 star rating. I know some games like Dark Souls start off tough, even with the first enemies you fight. 

[Clasher]

14 hours ago, Kane99 said:

Or like when you go off into an area that isn't allowed to be accessed yet. Like in some of the GTA games where if you get too far out, or jump past a barrier somehow, it will give you a 6 star or 5 star rating. I know some games like Dark Souls start off tough, even with the first enemies you fight. 

That is something that I was always prone to in GTA, you get stuck on a mission that is initially meant to be easy (the newbie kind of easy) and you just have to find a way to maneuver out of it.

Soul games are usually not easy even from the beginning and you need to go over it again and again to get a hint of what you are meant to accomplish.

[Empire]

On games like Fallout 3 or The Elder Scrolls where exploration is a large aspect of the gameplay and you have to go out  to locations that you ahve not unlocked before, I enjoy looking at the map and say if my objective is to the east, just heading east for a bit. Maybe checking the objective marker on the compass every so often, and then get pooped as a newbie 😛 

[Withywarlock]

My pick for a game that features this would be The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. It's so easy to off the beaten path only to find yourself being chased by cliff racers. Given the game's combat system with percentage-based hit chance you really ought to train up before straying from what your journal tells you. Or just install Morrowblivion. 😅

16 hours ago, StaceyPowers said:

Also, there is that notorious deathclaw area right near Goodsprings in Fallout: NV.

You've also got 'the shortcut' to New Vegas wherein there's loads of Cazadors to the North... that's fun to figure out. "They'll be just like bloatflies" are some common last words.

15 hours ago, Kane99 said:

I know some games like Dark Souls start off tough, even with the first enemies you fight. 

The first game especially. The first encounter with the first boss, the Asylum Demon, is meant to be run from before facing him a few minutes later with an advantage of an aerial attack. Then in the central hub the skeletons are tricky even with blunt instruments. If you go down the elevator you'll fight ghosts, or attempt to, because you need a certain weapon or status effect to fight them. So the only way is up, as they say.

Edited August 3, 2022 by Withywarlock

[Heatman]

19 hours ago, Kane99 said:

Or like when you go off into an area that isn't allowed to be accessed yet. Like in some of the GTA games where if you get too far out, or jump past a barrier somehow, it will give you a 6 star or 5 star rating. I know some games like Dark Souls start off tough, even with the first enemies you fight. 

It's just like what I experienced when I started playing Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, there would get some stages where I would be completely lost at what to do in order to survive. The level of ferocity the bosses I had to face, gets me killed in an instant. 

[Kane99]

8 hours ago, Clasher said:

That is something that I was always prone to in GTA, you get stuck on a mission that is initially meant to be easy (the newbie kind of easy) and you just have to find a way to maneuver out of it.

Soul games are usually not easy even from the beginning and you need to go over it again and again to get a hint of what you are meant to accomplish.

Idk, I always felt like the first missions in GTA were relatively easy to kind of get you used to the controls. I'd say maybe GTA IV was where it was the toughest opening wise, but I don't recall having much issue with any games in the series at the start. 

6 hours ago, Withywarlock said:

My pick for a game that features this would be The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. It's so easy to off the beaten path only to find yourself being chased by cliff racers. Given the game's combat system with percentage-based hit chance you really ought to train up before straying from what your journal tells you. Or just install Morrowblivion. 😅

You've also got 'the shortcut' to New Vegas wherein there's loads of Cazadors to the North... that's fun to figure out. "They'll be just like bloatflies" are some common last words.

The first game especially. The first encounter with the first boss, the Asylum Demon, is meant to be run from before facing him a few minutes later with an advantage of an aerial attack. Then in the central hub the skeletons are tricky even with blunt instruments. If you go down the elevator you'll fight ghosts, or attempt to, because you need a certain weapon or status effect to fight them. So the only way is up, as they say.

The first game for sure. But it may have been Bloodborne, from what I saw there's this dude with samurai sword who's crazy tough near the beginning. You can ignore him, but if you beat him, you get his OP samurai sword. But the dude is crazy tough and kills you in like a couple strikes. I watched people trying to beat him, and they had to trick him by making him fall off the ledge lol. But it worked. 😄 

[killamch89]

8 hours ago, Withywarlock said:

My pick for a game that features this would be The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. It's so easy to off the beaten path only to find yourself being chased by cliff racers. Given the game's combat system with percentage-based hit chance you really ought to train up before straying from what your journal tells you. Or just install Morrowblivion. 😅

You've also got 'the shortcut' to New Vegas wherein there's loads of Cazadors to the North... that's fun to figure out. "They'll be just like bloatflies" are some common last words.

The first game especially. The first encounter with the first boss, the Asylum Demon, is meant to be run from before facing him a few minutes later with an advantage of an aerial attack. Then in the central hub the skeletons are tricky even with blunt instruments. If you go down the elevator you'll fight ghosts, or attempt to, because you need a certain weapon or status effect to fight them. So the only way is up, as they say.

I was literally just about to bring up the first Dark Souls game - the scaling is so extreme that you'll run into super powerful monsters going into the Catacombs that you have no hope of winning against.

[Clasher]

5 hours ago, Kane99 said:

Idk, I always felt like the first missions in GTA were relatively easy to kind of get you used to the controls. I'd say maybe GTA IV was where it was the toughest opening wise, but I don't recall having much issue with any games in the series at the start. 

I experience this with my first play of GTA- SA and that was the first GTA game I played, I found it some what difficult to drive cars around the city without crashing it or running Into something and exploding the car.

After about a week I got In touch with it I started to play quite well but there are still times when you still get stuck even though you are not so much of a newbie.

[Kane99]

One other thing is when you get a scripted death or a death that happens on purpose. I think that kinda counts right? 

16 hours ago, Clasher said:

I experience this with my first play of GTA- SA and that was the first GTA game I played, I found it some what difficult to drive cars around the city without crashing it or running Into something and exploding the car.

After about a week I got In touch with it I started to play quite well but there are still times when you still get stuck even though you are not so much of a newbie.

That's fair. I remember in GTA IV the driving being kind of crap at first. But once you got it down, it became so much easier. 

[Heatman]

21 hours ago, killamch89 said:

I was literally just about to bring up the first Dark Souls game - the scaling is so extreme that you'll run into super powerful monsters going into the Catacombs that you have no hope of winning against.

I kept dying in that same situation over and over again, to the extent that I had to quit playing the game for a while and even went as far as watching other gamers playthrough in order to figure out how to get around it. 

[Kane99]

11 minutes ago, Heatman said:

I kept dying in that same situation over and over again, to the extent that I had to quit playing the game for a while and even went as far as watching other gamers playthrough in order to figure out how to get around it. 

Yeah Dark Souls likes to torment you like that, they force you to get good fast. I know with the first Dark Souls the beginning is just a test, and like someone said in this topic, you're meant to flee until taking him on shortly after. But for me, when I played I got killed by him right away. I know some people even defeat him right from the start. But those players tend to be pros. 😄 

But yeah, many gamers make the same mistake, going in and getting sweeped in the process. I got through that first bit, but didn't stick with the game for unfortunately. 

[The Blackangel]

Definitely the beginning of Zelda BOTW. Finding the temples and avoiding those laser shooting bastards is a massive pain, and an even bigger challenge. I get that it's probably a mostly training area so you can figure out the controls and whatnot. But it's still a lot of bullshit that's almost impossible in the beginning, especially for a n00b.

[Kane99]

Also, I'd include Shadow of the Colossus in this discussion. I felt like things got real pretty fast in that game, especially with the first colossi or whatever you call them. The first boss is so cool though. I wouldn't say it's hard, but grasping the controls can be a pain in the ass. I imagine the PS3 and PS4 remasters play better in the control department. 

Also, this may not count since it's not the beginning, but there was a mission where you had to shoot an arrow off the back of your horse into a sand monsters eye as it's chasing you down. The controls for the PS2 version were awful at the time and it took me a while to get it. The key thing was, that you had to shoot the monster in the eye, and it was a tight shot each time. 

Anyway, I later heard that you can grow your stamina bar by killing and eating lizards throughout the game. This was years later that I found out too, after I beat like 8 colossi. If I only knew about that before, I probably would have had a much easier time slaying the other colossi. 😄

[Heatman]

On 8/4/2022 at 7:04 PM, Kane99 said:

Yeah Dark Souls likes to torment you like that, they force you to get good fast. I know with the first Dark Souls the beginning is just a test, and like someone said in this topic, you're meant to flee until taking him on shortly after. But for me, when I played I got killed by him right away. I know some people even defeat him right from the start. But those players tend to be pros. 😄 

But yeah, many gamers make the same mistake, going in and getting sweeped in the process. I got through that first bit, but didn't stick with the game for unfortunately. 

I couldn't even remember how many times that I died. It got to a point where it became very embarrassing for me to keep playing but for the time I have already invested in the game, quitting playing it completely would be a big loss on my part. I'm not sure if I had played any game as difficult as Dark Souls before I got to it.