Alexander’s Been Playing- Dark Souls 3 and Rocket League
So if you couldn’t tell from my long-winded review, I’ve been enjoying “Dark Souls 3.” After banging my head against the wall of boss monsters, I’m now putting myself through the ordeals of challenging every other player I can in order to max out the rewards for engaging in PVP. Those Pale Tongues and Vertebrae Shackles don’t come easy.
But in between my Dark Sword R1-spamming, I’ve been putting a lot of hours back into “Rocket League” because of the new Hoops update. It turns out rocket-boosting cars don’t just mix nicely with soccer, they work wonders with basketball as well. I always loved “Rocket League” for being such a simple, elegant concept that’s easy to pick up and relax with, yet complex to fully master. That challenge of mastery is then given a new layer when you have to transition into playing an entirely different sport with the same mechanics. Sure, the game is mostly one of managing your boost and jumps to control the ball, making passes, and making shots on the goal. But with soccer, you just have to move the ball horizontally, whereas in basketball, you need to think vertically as well, shooting the ball up as much as forward to get it in the basket.
I don’t know if it will replace the default soccer mode for me, though. Don’t get me wrong, there are things I prefer about the basketball mode, like the valid strategies of bouncing the ball off the walls to bounce into the hoop. However, it’s exasperating that a team can keep getting quick points by just boosting into the air, singing “I Believe I Can Fly” with reckless abandon, and tapping the ball during its mid-air drop at the start of each round. Or maybe I just need to master the particular technique myself. After all, if all the “Dark Souls” has taught me anything, it’s that frustration of something is the first step at mastering and enjoying that thing.
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