For real, I love looking at my notes from playing the game. I have similar from Fez though, and I'd recommend playing that if you haven't. By the time I fully finished the game, that language I could straight up read without referencing my notes. xD

If you haven't already, you should give Chants of Sennaar a shot! The whole premise is trying to decipher languages to progress.

Damn you beat me to it.

it can be applied to chess openers where you punish the opponent if they don’t know it

Just like a stat check in other games. You have statistics that in a direct confrontation beat someone so they need to strategize. More unfair than knowledge check because you put a lot less effort into defending yourself than your opponent into attacking you.

That’s super interesting! I know next to nothing about fighting games, so that’s something I had never even considered as a strategy.

PvP KBU. Interesting...

That might just make fighting games click for me. I’ve long since given up on them, but the knowledge based games mentioned in this video are my favorites. Where do you recommend I start?

It's why I love chess

Yes it's similar but in Outer Wilds it's different. You don't get better as in fighting games, you simply learn the way, you don't train, don't grind, just learn.

@@Kmaaq personally I just play Tekken which is very hard to get into, it’s way more focussed on movement and defence than most fighting games. In terms of an “easy” fighting game to start with I’ve heard good things about dragonball if you’re into the anime vibe. Mortal kombat also is comparatively simple. Tekken is great to play, but you’ll probably be playing for a couple weeks before you’re executing a game plan vaguely competently, and it relies on a lot of knowledge of the cast that you build up over legit months/years. I love it because there’s so many different options in moveset compared to most fighting games but it is hard to get into.

@@Kmaaq Check out Cosmonaut Variety Hour's video on how to start with fighting games. I'd personally recommend Tekken. I feel there are a ton of tools to learn the game on KZfaq. You could also wait till Street Fighter 6 launches in June. There will be plenty more people to play with

Some bro. I felt the same. I can't sleep just thinking if I can find something that is similar to this game. But I hated the echo of the eye. Too much hassle going to that place. Felt like a chore. But through outer wilds, I start feeling the happiness of playing games again, and I have been wanting or chasing this feeling for so long.

Outer wilds is the type of game where I feel a kinship with both of you for also having experienced it.

It's so hard to convince someone to play outer wilds, because you cant explain to them why they should buy it, but when anyone plays it they say correctly it's the best gaming experience they've had in a long time

@@MrGoo189 spoilers for outer wilds dlc : Did you know you could highlight the position of The Stranger from you entry log (or any location for that matter). The game does explain it to you at some point after starting the dlc, but I can see hiw someone could miss that Since you're saying it was a hassle going there, I'm guessing you had to go and find its location every loop by going to the mapping satellite, in which case, I'm sorry for you haha that must have been quite annoying. I personally loved Echoes of the Eye, the atmosphere, the music and the new story were all amazing, although a bit scary at times, I'm not too good with horror games.

@@MrGoo189I think Echoes didn’t do a great job of emphasizing the shortcuts

Oh my god I couldn’t agree more. Outer wilds was one of my favorite games of all time.

​@@jacobbellet401 Outer wilds is my favourite game ever 💗💗💗💗

I'm so upset that I had watched someone play it before going into it! Thankfully I didn't get *too* much spoiled for me and I still had a great time playing it.

Couldn't get the hang of trying to fly and land the shuttle at all and just gave up. My brain just couldn't compute a fix for how awkward and unintuitive it felt to me

@@Dave_ja_vu I just wanted to say I've had the same experience as you and thought I would never finish the game because of it (I was also overwhelmed at first and not sure if I was making any progress). Once I pushed past the first couple of hours though, it became one of my favorite games of all time and I really love the controls now that I got the hang of it. I promise you getting used to it is worth it because it's easily the most unique game I've ever played!

This so much! I remember a buddy explaining to me how to craft an axe and I was absolutely ecstatic when I figured out how to make a pickaxe on my own! :) Good times.

Great example, IMO. Early Minecraft truly was a great time.

Nodecore might be what you're looking for, in that sense.

You just absolutely warped me to playing minecraft on my cousin's laptop and the complete wonder I felt when I discovered how to craft armor pieces. An unmatched feeling

I miss this ;-;

After I finished outer wilds, I remember just sitting there, struggling to internalize it all. It genuinely took days or weeks before I stopped thinking about it.

did you play the DLC? that is freaking terror. I love Outer Wilds exactly for the dread, but the DLC is too much like a horror game to me.

Fear of the sublime

Never played it, how does it make you feel dread?

@@redsoxfox Fear of the sublime (and fish). Have you ever stood on top of a roof, or near a cliff, or tried to understand the distance between yourself and the moon? Ever gone Swimming in the ocean past the continental shelf and thought about DOWN? Tried to reach for a cloud? Fear of the Vast. You are small, the universe is big. Things are more than you can understand. That sun/star is mighty awesome, and you are puny. Imagine falling into Jupiter. Or a black hole. Outer Wilds has you flying first person as a kerbal in a kerbal space ship around a solar system. There is no out of bounds.

I've thought on this before while watching my GF struggle to beat the first puzzle in the first new Tomb Raider. So much of gaming nowadays almost RELIES on the fact that you have done similar things before. If you don't have an understanding of what is and is not possible/typical for games, you can easily get absolutely confused and lost.

@@DanAnd190 May i recommend a series by a youtuber called "Razbuten", he has a series "what video games are like for people who dont play videogames". Basically he gets his wife to play a bunch of different games and this proves your point entirely. She does things that in reality make sense, like trying to jump over a low fence but the game has an invisible wall there, but anyone whos played games before wouldnt even think to try it. This isnt his first video but just so you dont have to search it yourself: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/jcedea91nL-WXWg.html

Once you learn the way you see the way in all things

@@DanAnd190 I'm pretty sure it's called game literacy and yes I think it's a fundamental part of video games and why the avarage age of gamers is going up. Newer games require more "knoweldge" to play than older games so a completelly game illiterate person would struggle way more to play a game like lets say Hollow Knight than Mario. Taking Outer Wilds as an example, the movement alone in the game would make a game illiterate person just run in circles in the starting area and probably not even realize that you have to interact with some things.

@@gjergjipocari8227 truth

Outerwilds is my favorite game and I’ve been looking for one like that. I downloaded tunic a while ago but haven’t played it yet. You’ve just convinced me 😁

I replayed with the tunic randomizer mod and it gave me a fresh sense of exploration. Even knowing most of the secrets I was forced to get creative because I was finding items out of order and couldn't take the more traditional route.@@stooglesgoogles7246

i played through the game and DLC but i have no idea what exactly is the thing being talked about! lol

@@quasiotter the thing that goes boom every 22 mins

@@yoyoibo oh, lol. sadly i found out about that before i played the game. i thought that was too obvious to be what you were talking about! :OP

It's too disrespectful of the player's time to not be talked about, I think. Anyone contemplating buying this game should know about it.

@@isodoubIet I’m not talking about the time loop… which yeah, definitely should be mentioned. I was only referring to the supernova. I bought this game knowing only that it was a space exploration mystery game in a solar system stuck in a time loop. The sun going boom on me was a surprise.

Sekiro was the hardest from software game on 1st try for me. Now I can play through the entire game unscathed. Meanwhile, dark souls was much easier on first try, but I still get my ass handed in it sometimes sekiro is simpler and more focused, but demands mastery of the smaller set of skills and is very satisfying

Isshin Ashina was correct, Hesitation is defeat, after losing, and losing, and memorizing the enemy's patterns it's not until you stop being afraid of them, but get loose and exploit all your chances, that you win effortlessly, in short, when you stop hesitating and start winning

Yes i really felt that when i replayed the game a while ago. I spent a whole day on isshin alone on my first playthrough, when i played the game the second time i was not afraid and did not ‚hesitate‘ when fighting him, he almost felt easy and i beat him on the second try. Such an amazing game, has easily become my favorite fromsoft game

That's so interesting, Sekrio is the only FS game that I had no desire to replay once I finished it. It's the only one that I didn't get all of the endings for, didn't platinum it, didn't even fight all of the bosses on the the other routes. Once I was done with it, I was done. Playing that, and then Elden Ring really taught me what it is that I love about those games (discovery/ exploration), and what I don't actually like as much as I thought that I did (combat/ challenge).

@@kode-man23 thats understandable. They’re both amazing games but Sekiro definitely has a more rigorous and less cheeseable combat system. I loved exploring Elden Ring and went out of my way to find everything I could, sekiro was beautiful but it just didn’t feel as replayable. The boss gauntlets made me fall back in love with it but for the actual game I’d have to agree

I remember a solid 1 month period, when my outer wilds hyperixation was on its peak Lmao, My every walk to school was filled with Timber heart. I love outer wilds

@@nunu1368 Timber Hearth got me to pick up guitar. Absolutely beautiful song.

Literally makes me weep, lmao

The best game

Hitman is a perfect example that I think could have been better in this video than Sekiro. It's a good showing of how replaying over and over again and exploring unlocks all sorts of 'hidden' gems. Your skill in that game is heavily tied to your knowledge of it.

Hitman is such a good example. Go from clumsily inching your way around a map to gracefully gliding around it. Gaining mastery over a map is one of my favorite things in gaming and Hitman nails it.

Hitman is such a great example of getting better at the game through learning map layouts etc.

I agree! Hitman is a perfect example of kbu. Though one can just play it in a scripted manner. There are like numerous possibilities in that game which makes it much more interesting. Combing your meticulous planning and presence of mind, you could make the best out of that games.

How did you misspell 'items' three times?

Tunic has always been on my peripherals. But seeing it discussed in the same breath as outer wilds, it has rocketed to the top of my To Be Played list

@@derek-rogers as it should be, they both share this key element of player exploration, albeit with different implementation based on core gameplay.

Tunic does what I wish classic Zelda games always did. There mystery and level of satisfaction at new discoveries, etc. I wish I hadn't looked up what the magic cross was and figured it out on my own, even if it had taken me 8 months lol

I think talking about Outer Wilds and similar games are just such difficult things to do. Any deeper dives would inherently involve spoilers, and it's one of the reasons why it's difficult to build hype around them. Even for friends I find it sometimes hard to convince them other than "trust me it's good", but the more you try to describe it the more you are risking revealing too much.

Ok you talked me into it

@@warriorfire8103 Yes, go play it, please.

I tell my brother you can beat the game right away if you know how

@@warriorfire8103 It's also my favorite my favorite game ever by a large margin. I will say that for the first 4 hours I was thinking "what is even going on, what am I supposed to do?" but if you can push through that feeling, it evolves into something truly magical.

@@Bulbbley I have wanted to love that game so much but I just couldnt. I spent like an hour on the tutorial place and finally got able to fly into space. I wanted to explore the backside of the planet only to crash and die. Then the game starter over from the beginning again. I was not aware it was a roguelike, I thought it was like a chill exploration puzzle game. Never touched it since because I got so mad the game wasted my time with that bs, it was frankly insulting.

As someone who is also always like 5 years behind on all games and dislikes spoilers I agree. This made me go from having very little interest in Sekiro to being really interested without feeling especially ruined by any knowledge I gained about it.

It truly is perfect, and he did it on probably the most important genre to be able to experience first hand. Really a great video, was surprised it was his first one, it was so well done!

Nothing nothing has resonated so much in me as outer wilds did,I cried so much when I learnt about what drove the nomai and what happened to them. When I finished outer wilds, I am a hundred percent certain outer wilds and blasphemous are two games who’ve shaped me into what I am today. You are right, I attend a lot of film and design festivals in my country and explore every kind of shapes storytelling may have, NOTHING compares to experiencing outer wilds. I purchased the owl dlc the day it released but haven’t played it yet as I’m saving this treasure for when I need it , if you know what I mean.

I know exactly what you mean

The Witness was my obsession for a good week or so. I filled out an entire notebook with just puzzles from that game

Absolutely. Trying not to spoil anyone on this game, but the first time I 'thought outside the box', I immediately was brimming with thoughts of things I looked at but didn't *see*.

This was the first game I thought of when he described KBUs! The Witness is an incredible game

Literally couldn't stand playing The Witness because I'm so dumb I was genuinely stuck on the first puzzle (the wire one) for TWO HOURS

​@@thebluebookworm3383 Git Gud (is that how this works?)

Except you have to play it a second time before you even you know the goal, then a 3rd time to 100% achievements... This is a great great game I keep hoping I forget so I can replay

The Case of the Golden Idol is a game similar to Obra Din if maybe a bit easier, I can recommend

I’ve been wanting to erase that game from my head so I can replay😢 truly excellent (also soundtrack slaps)

The way I managed to "replay" this game was to watch a friend play a couple years later. It was still fun to rediscover the mysteries together.

I have little brain memory, so I replayed the game every 6 month, if I'm lucky, I'll forgot 60% of that game content

It also has replayability because of the dynamic ecosystem. You know what other creatures you're likely going to encounter in different regions and how to evade/fight them but their behaviour is not set. One time that persistent lizard won't stop chasing you, the next time it's distracted by the other lizard, the next it basically saves you by being vulture food and yet another time there are no lizards there at all.

Probably one of the reasons it might be my favorite game. The video is interesting because calling this kind of design 'knowledge based unlocks' is an accurate description in a game'y sense, but really this is just another way to describe 'teaching'. Rain World might be the purest form of this old school game design because the entire game, even down to movement itself, is like one constant learning experience.

Swap the a and u, Kusabimaru!

The "ku" is still pronounced, but the "u" is devoiced (don't use your vocal cords).

Though to be fair, you're right that there's no "ka" in kusabimaru, lol

@@BarnabyFWNightingale and a on o and u have Kuso-bimaru!

@@q00u this is the problem. I misread it like 3 weeks ago and never looked back. Also, never heard of the devoicing concept before. That's cool!

Me too! Tbh I love playing wacky dating sims set in historical times and although they are partly fantasy I learned a lot about feudal japan lol. Games should be utilized a lot more in teaching! Imagine learning skills like horseback riding or real sword figthing in future VR games

I used to play a math game. When I was 8 years old or around that age my father gave me a game to play and in it you had to beat orcs by doing math. Honestly nice idea and looking back at it it could be really helpful, but as a child I found it very scary... Not only was I under time pressure but also in a new environment. Beeing new to math and then calculating under time pressure or you wouldnt defeat orcs hunts my dreams still to this day

Sethian and The Textorcist come to mind

This would go hard in a game where you are a spy and have to convincingly communicate in a foreign language to succeed.

​@@minniethriver Military uses VR to train their soilders

I agree

Yeah when I had the choice to remove Kuro's charm I though "how much harder can it be?", well it turns out, a lot.

Exactly, people think they know sekiro but they don’t until they played without kuro’s charm and without leveling health.

How much this game cost

Obra Dinn is still on my list. Some day I'm going to play it. Outer Wilds kind of isn't, since whenever I think about it, I start thinking it's overhyped and I'm just going to get disappointed by my own expectations.

@@AnotherDuck if you love exploration it is a must play

@@AnotherDuck It's not overhyped, IMO. It truly is great. It inspires so many emotions during your playthrough, especially if you love exploration. I legitimately almost panicked the first time I accidently got lost out in space without my ship. Truly terrifying at times, yet also intriguing, very pretty, and just overall interesting. Take the time to play it.

​@@AnotherDuck Outer Wilds is a phenomenal game. Go in as BLIND as possible. The biggest problem people have with this game is that they can't play it for the first time ever again.

​@@AnotherDuck I'm going to assure you because I know how expectation can suck normally good experiences. Even if your expectations is on the ceiling with Outer Wilds and that counters balance almost anything good the game has to offer, it's gonna be at least *worth the time* spent playing. Go at it

Haha yea I know. I knew I was stretching, but it's more than the concept of the first playthrough making the second playthrough a distinct experience that I was trying to get across, which is exactly what TUNIC does (so it's a bridging topic). Also, if I'm being honest, I love Sekiro and I just wanted to talk about Sekiro.

@@superdude10000 I actually thought you would mention the eavesdropping mechanic for a KBU on Sekiro, I think it really fits the theme

@@superdude10000 I totally respect that haha! I love the topic. Playing these kind of games gives you a new perspective on Game design.

@@superdude10000 You should add some additional games in this genre to the video description or a pinned comment. I have ALWAYS been looking for more games in this style, but it's so difficult sometimes. Love the video, keep up the great work!

I'd argue that muscle memory and repetition is important in Outer Wilds as well, though obviously to a lesser degree. It may just be that I suck at flying, but there's more than a few bits of Outer Wilds (eg lakebed cave, southern observatory) that I only completed after a dozen tries despite knowing what to do.

It's a much harder balance to strike now, I think. If you push it TOO far, the game feels tedious to play, especially as an adult with limited time. Majora's Mask would be a good example of this. Collecting all the masks without a guide is a HUGE time sink and really just a pain in the ass. The 3DS remake makes it much more manageable by giving you the little tracker that at least keeps track of what you know in a manner similar to OuterWilds.

Signalis has fantastic puzzles

@@DanAnd190 Agreed. Not to mention puzzles are just difficult to develop in general. It requires a different kind of creativity from open worlds and general questing to make the game interesting. It was usually combined pushing the limits of game development that was limited to the engine they were working with. And this was perfect in the era where development took a speedrun with better engines that allowed more and more every year, allowing new puzzles you couldn't do the year prior. So many games have pushed their players to think outside of the box because the players didn't think it was possible. But now we kind of come to a halt. It's now mostly 'look how pretty this looks, it's so realistic, we now have sunrays'! Puzzle games and platforms are garbage without the creativity as the whole game leans on it, so developers cannot avoid the challenge to make it interesting. With walking sims you can for a large part avoid that challenge. Most of it will work out if the game looks pretty and people have something to do (walk and watch the world pass by), and do an occasional quest or story. Write a bizarre story and have them walk from NPC to NPC and put in some cutscenes. Eventually they'll get bored and do need something to spark their interest and this is where so many games fail. But they have earned their money so it's the better model most companies choose.

@@DanAnd190 " the game feels tedious to play, especially as an adult with limited time" And this (along with powerful internet search engines) is why modern video games tend to suck. Developers are not interested in packaging and shipping a piece of art that can be enjoyed, they're interested in making something that can be sold as a throwaway time-suck to adults with money to spend. Instead of a game that is sold with a ton of secret things to discover through repeated exploration, we get games that ship unfinished, with extra features available through microtransactions and DLC, where the game includes features and modes that allow people to just follow the arrows through the whole game without having to think about or remember anything.

@@mylesleggette7520 i'd rather play a walking sim with a genuinely immersive world than a puzzle game borefest. If I wanted a puzzle game or a game with actual interesting mechanics, I'd play an indie or an action roguelike. Walking sims, as much as even I hate them, have their place in open world AAA games. However, I wouldnt want puzzles or difficult mechanics in an open world game because I simply dont want that from this kind of game (easy puzzles are fine tho). Think about it. The fun is in exploring the world and chilling, whether its in GTA5 or Spiderman. Having extra hard/long puzzles just stops the player from having fun. I like too many game genres but have too little time. Why play an open world AAA game for the gameplay? I'm there for the world. Why play an indie game for the realistic graphics? I'm there for the gameplay. "Jack of all trades, master of none."

Indeed, a fantastic game. Although i did prefer the first one for some reason.. hmm 🧐

I got stumped. I looked up on axiom verge till I got stumped again. I didn't look up on toki tori 2. Also stumped on toki tori

I'm glad someone else brought this up. TT2 is one of the best showcases of this kind of game design.

I'm also here to say that this was the first and best example that came to mind. :)

Came here looking for this comment.

Wo long borrows pretty heavily from Sekiro especially since it uses posture and deflect as a major mechanic. While being a solid game its not quite as rewarding or satisfying as Sekiro and lacks a lot of polish in a lot of areas. I also recommend going back and trying Ninja Gaiden Black or Ninja Gaiden 2. While not quite the same in mechanics as Sekiro the combat mechanics are very rewarding in both games.

I can also recommended sifu, it's way shorter and more action packed but it also has sekiro elements and flowy combat

@@ATLien51 It's been on my radar since it was announced. I'm glad I waited for it to come to Steam, the updates post launch would have been a bummer missing out on. Especially the theater mode, now I can make a Sifu short film!

It’s very much a rythm game, best combat in any game ever in my opinion. That feeling of mastery is just so satisfying

love how theres so much you can do once you have learned the game

I mean that’s half the reason these games are called metroidvania

I forgave myself for not figuring everything out. And not being able to handle some of the horrors. I'd rather have the experience of the game, than get so frustrated and never see the ending.

Same :(, I searched up most of the endings and the coords and well.. most of end game (there is no real end-game I suppose) discoverments. Bought the dlc and because I was so scared I also searched most of it so I could know what I’m running into..

i suppose troll levels are kind of knowledge based, you're gaining the knowledge on how to dodge the trolls lol

Rain World? Sounds like a pretty lame game, if you ask me.

@@chrispharmd2077 Dicey of you to comment that

I was thinking that I knew of a game that used your knowledge for the entire video but couldn't remember what game it was until I read Rain world And it wasn't that long that I stopped playing it, so it must be that my brain is too smooth

@@chrispharmd2077 yeah, like what does one do in that game? watch the rain fall?

@@duis9972 Glad to have helped, I am curious: have you played Downpour?

I've gotten down to the third level, maybe 4th? But I've had a hard time getting into it. I don't really play rogue likes that often, so I get kind of lost as to how I'm "meant" to play the game.

@@Crazy_Diamond_75 You are meant to maximise: either go as fast as possible, or instead of down - move horisontally, or spend a bit of time trying to understand what things do. That they added the cast spell log in the holy mountain is extremely useful for understanding things, like spell wrap (but don't help to understand the magical properties of chainsaw). And then there is also knowledge of map, which can assist you greatly in e.g. reusing resources.

That's until some Jälkotaluttohissi picks up a wand with "summon Giant Blackhole" spell and decimates the surroundings. Noita is only really bearable with mods

@@littlehorn0063 Massive skill issue. The only mod i play with is niko player character.

@@overloader7900 Yeah yeah and you get all the chicks and have a million billion dollars and other such brags that nobody cares about because this is the internet and you're just some random person whose opinion doesn't matter.