Aw, AJ, that's a shame to hear you didn't have a great deal of fun with Shenmue 2, but I totally get it. I'd recommended the first Shenmue to one of my best friends because she's a huge fan of open-world settings, environments where all characters have schedules and interior lives, and games that allow you to open drawers and closets and other such minute details. I watched her play through it, and although she enjoyed it as an experience and absolutely CRUSHED the QTEs (I was frequently speechless by this superpower; "I mean, I played a lot of Heavy Rain," she modestly responded), there was a lot that frustrated her and felt poorly-designed.
Her perspective was very interesting to me, because the first open-world game that blew her mind as a child was one of the later Ultimas (possibly VII), which from her descriptions sounds far more complex in the "characters have schedules and you can open drawers" department despite having been published in the early 90s. Shenmue felt like a bit of a step backwards from that vantage point, even though we realize the PC-to-console comparison stacks things in Ultima's favor.
She got very attached to the characters, though, and is currently making her way through Shenmue 2. Due to an oversight with the way the game is coded, however, I'm not able to watch her remotely through PS4's Share Play feature.
She's keeping me updated, though.
Regarding Zelda II, I've been thinking a lot about the game's reputation for difficulty and wanted to pick all your brains. When folks say "Zelda II is a difficult game," what aspect are they usually thinking of? If it's "the game is not always clear on what to do," I would agree, but I wouldn't chalk that up as deliberate difficulty. I think that's a design issue. I have been told by a lot of players that they didn't strategize their battle approaches and instead attempted to bludgeon their way through enemies, which would definitely account for a feeling of crushing difficulty.
I suppose what I'm trying to figure out is... is this game's reputation resting on the fact that most players tried it when they were kids, when we weren't always knowledgeable enough to tease out what a game was demanding of us? As an example, when I was little, it never occurred to me to map where I was going in a video game because I just expected the programming to provide me with all the tools I needed to succeed in-game. "If I needed a map, they would have given me one on the options screen!" was my thinking. Had I played this as a child, I am almost positive I wouldn't have been able to realize things like, "Oh, this random mook only has a vulnerable spot on their head when their shield is in the lower block position" and similar such.
Oh, P.S., pierrot: No, the clue that messed me up was not from the old lady of which you speak.
