Personal Finance PowerPoint Presentation. Bond Market versus Stock Market. Prepare to get financially fit by practicing personal finance. Most of this information comes from Investopedia Bond Market versus Stock Market. What's the difference which you can find online? Take a look at the references, resources, continue your research from there. This by Chisoba Mora, updated February 22, 2022. In prior presentations, we've been taking a look at investment goals, investment strategies, investment tools, keeping those in mind, comparing and contrasting now the bond market and the stock market. It's time to invest your money. So how exactly are you going to allocate that money? As we've seen in prior presentations, we often want to keep in mind that allocation method, that diversification, and the two key components or two of the major components we might want to be allocating between are equities or the stocks and the bonds fixed income. So after all, a well-diversified portfolio strategy is recommended before you start to buy assets such as stocks and bonds. Now notice you're going to hear this all the time every time you think about investments, allocation of your assets, diversification, and it's a good idea to be diversified, especially of course on the long run, keeping into consideration your total investment goals, your time horizon, and your risk tolerance levels. But even though we hear it all the time, it's kind of difficult to do in practice because oftentimes when we see stocks doing quite well, if the market's going quite well, then we feel like the bonds aren't really giving us that return, and we tend to want to then move to the stocks. And when the economy goes down, we start to feel like, oh well, the stocks are getting killed over here. I want to move my money straight into the checking account possibly, or into a savings account, CDs, or into bonds. So it's really important to kind of drill in our mind that this diversification goal, time horizon, and reiterate them because they're hard to do in practice. So indeed, stocks and bonds are two of the most traded types of assets, each available for sale on several different platforms or through a variety of markets or brokers, and there are important primary differences between stocks and bonds. The bond market, the bond market is where investors go to trade, buy and sell debt securities, prominently bonds, which may be issued by corporations or governments. So on the bond side of things, we're often thinking about first possibly the government bonds because those are the great measuring tools to be comparing to because they have a very low default risk related to them because the government bonds should be able to pay back their debts given the fact that they can tax and they can basically print money. So then you can use them as a baseline to compare other bonds. You can think of bonds as in essence for you loaning money to the issuer of the bond, the government or the corporation and they in return giving you the promise to pay back the bond at the end, that being the maturity and generally some kind of interest, interest being similar to say rent, if you were to say rent someone an apartment for example, you would expect the apartment back at the end of the rental period and rent for the use of the apartment. Interest is basically the rent for the use of the money. So the bond market is also known as debt or credit market. Securities sold on the bond market are all various forms of debt. By buying a bond, credit or debt security, you are lending money for a set period and charging interest the same way a bank does to its debtors. So the bond market provides investors with a steady, albeit nominal source of regular income. So the idea of the bond or what's good about the bond is typically you're going to have your income preset for the standard types of bonds because you've agreed to a set interest rate. However, that interest rate usually doesn't have a return that would be as potentially high as investing in stocks, but you also don't typically have the potential of it really going down a lot below the principle, for example, because of the setup of the bonds where on the stocks you have more risk of that. So in some cases, such as treasury bonds issued by the federal government, investors receive biannual interest payments.  When you do the bonds, a typical kind of payout would be on a bi-yearly basis, meaning every six months. Many investors choose to hold bonds in their portfolios as a way to save retirement for their children's education or other long-term needs. Investors have a wide range of research and analysis tools to get more information on bonds. Investopedia is one source breaking down the basics of the market and the different types of securities available. Other sources include Yahoo Finance Bond Center and Morningstar, so you can check them out to kind of look at ratings, for example. They provide up-to-date news analysis and research. Investors can also get more specific details about bond offerings through their brokerage accounts. So where bonds are traded, the bond market does not have a centralized location to trade, meaning bonds mainly sell over the counter, OTC. As such, individual investors do not typically participate in the bond market. Those who do include large institutional investors like pension funds, foundations and endowments, as well as investment banks, hedge funds and asset management firms. Individual investors, when we're thinking about the individual side of things, who wish to invest in bonds may do so through a bond fund managed by an asset manager. So oftentimes, we're going to be using the bonds and possibly not buying the bonds on an individual bond-by-bond basis, but possibly using some kind of asset manager, possibly using tools such as mutual funds, ETS. Many brokers now allow individual investors direct assets to corporate bond issues, treasuries, munis and CDs. New securities are put up for sale on the primary market, and any subsequent trading takes place on the secondary market. So this concept of primary market and secondary market can sound confusing, but the primary market just means with regards to bonds, buying the bonds directly from the issuer of the bonds, be that the government or the corporation typically. When you're thinking about the secondary market, now you have the bonds already issued and you're selling from one investor, say, to another investor, not buying them directly from the issuer. So the market where investors buy and sell securities they already own. So these fixed income securities range from bonds to bills to notes. By providing these securities to the bond market, issuers can get the funding they need to project for projects or other expenses needed. So who participates in the bond market? The three main groups involved in the bond market include the issuer. These are the entities that develop, register and sell instruments on the bond market, whether they're corporations or different levels of government. So typically the issuer, they're the ones that need the money, they're the one we're in essence loaning to if we are investing corporations and governments typically. For example, the U.S. Treasury issues, Treasury bonds, which are long term securities that provide biannual interest payments for investors and mature after 10 years, investing in certain securities of the bond market such as U.S. Treasury securities is said to be less risky than investing in stock markets, which are prone to greater volatility. So obviously, again, that government bonds are typically the baseline that we can compare to due to the less risk because you don't have the default risk as prevalent there because they can print money and tax to service debt. Underwriters usually evaluate risks in the financial world. In the bond market, an underwriter buys securities from the issuer and resells them for a profit. Participants, these entities buy and sell bonds in other related securities. By buying bonds, the participant issues a loan for the length of the security and receives interest in return. Once it matures, the face value of the bond is paid back to the participant. So bond ratings. Bonds are normally given an investment grade by a bond rating agency like Standard and Poor's and Moody's. These ratings expressed through a letter grade tell investors how much risk a bond has of defaulting. So they're not perfect, but these rating agencies can help us to determine the risk levels of the bonds, helping us to determine prices, helping us compare and contrast different types of investment opportunities of a similar nature. A bond with an AAA or A rating is high quality while an A or BBB rated bond is medium risk. Bonds with a BB rating or lower are considered to be high risk. So the stock market. The stock market is a place where investors go to trade equity securities such as common stock and derivatives including options and features. So typically when we think about the stock market, we're usually kind of thinking primarily the common stock is the baseline investing tool that most individual investors would be thinking about having an equity investment in the company. Meaning you actually if you actually own the stocks, you typically have a voting capacity and you're basically it's thought to have the claim to basically the assets minus the liabilities or in essence the equity of the company. Stocks are traded on stock exchanges. So typically when we're buying stocks as an individual investor, we're not buying private stocks, we're buying public stocks typically, which are typically larger stocks, larger stocks that want to have that outside investment from a larger pool to get more capital. So they can basically grow and therefore participate on exchanges, exchanges then requiring some more transparency and formalization and standardization on how these corporations represent or present their financial statements so that investors can do comparing and contrasting more easily between different types of investments and have a more transparent option for their investments, giving a higher level of trust to investors opening up markets beneficial both to the investors as well to the companies that can generate capital that way. So buying equity securities or stocks means you are buying a very small ownership stake in a company. So you can think of that similar as like a voting right that we have in a Democratic Republic, for example, in a Democratic Republic, we don't basically vote on every decision like whether to go to war or something like that. We vote instead for people to represent us who then you know kind of make the decisions similar things with the stocks. We have a kind of voting capacity. We can vote for things. For example, the board of directors, the board of directors should be repping representing us by trying to make money by hiring management that will be capable of making decisions in order to generate revenue for the stockholders. So while bondholders lend money with interest equity holders purchase small stakes in the companies on behalf of the company performs well and the value of the shares purchase will increase. So as a stockholder, we can get paid back in a couple of different ways. We're not just going to get fixed interest payments. We might get dividend payments, but the dividend payments are going to be dependent upon whether the company through management we can vote for the board of directors and stuff but they still once voted for half the decision making power to well that whether or not they give out dividends or not, which would be basically given back some of the earnings of the company or whether they don't give dividends or decrease the dividends and put the money back into the company. And if they do that, hopefully we we benefit from them adding value to the company increasing the stock price of the company, which we can then sell. So the primary function of the stock market is to bring buyers and sellers together into a fair regulated and controlled environment where they can exercise their trades. This gives those involved in the confidence that trading is done with transparency and that pricing is fair and honest. So the exchanges help us to basically do that. And that's one of the reasons that the United States, for example, exchanges typically can garner a lot of capital investment due to the fact that there's a pretty high level of security related to them. If you can generate the trust, then you can often generate you know the capital related. So this regulation not only helps investors but also the corporations whose securities are being traded. So obviously the company wants access to the capitals and we as investors want to be able to trust the system so that we're feel comfortable investing in them. So the economy thrives when the stock market maintains its robustness and overall health. So just like the bond market, there are two components to the stock market. The primary market is reserved for first run equities, initial public offerings, those of the IPOs will be issued on the market. So you're basically buying directly from the company as the company issues new stocks. Most of the time we're not buying IPOs when we're investing in the stock market. We're buying from other people that are investors that are reselling the stock. So this market is facilitated by underwriters who set the initial price for securities. Equities are then opened up on the secondary market. So secondary market, similar to as we saw with the bonds, instead of us buying the stocks directly from the issuing company, we're buying them from other investors. So which is where most trading activity happens. That's where we typically are at. So the prominent US stock exchanges in the United States, the prominent stock exchanges include the NASDAQ, a global electronic exchange that lists the securities of smaller capitalization companies from different parts of the world. Although technology and financial stock make up the bulk of the index, it also includes consumer goods and services, healthcare and utilities. This exchange also forms the basis of the US technology sector benchmark index. So indexes are great tools because they're kind of averages to try to get an idea of different components of the market or possibly the market as a whole, basically using kind of averaging techniques and using certain stocks that you think are hopefully this basket of stocks represents a certain component or segment or possibly the entire market. So then we got the New York Stock Exchange. The NYSE is the largest exchange in the world based on the total market cap of its listed securities. Most of the oldest and largest publicly traded companies are listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The New York Stock Exchange has gone through a series of mergers and was most recently purchased by the Intercontinental Exchange, the ICE in 2013. 30 of the largest companies in the New York Stock Exchange make up the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the DJIA, which is one of the oldest and most watched indexes in the world. So again, this is a type of index that's trying to give us, you know, a measure of a component basically of the market. These indexes can be quite useful.  American Stock Exchange, the AMEX, which was acquired by the New York Stock Exchange, Aaron X, and became the New York Stock Exchange American in 2017. It was first known for trading and introducing new products and asset classes. The exchange was also the first to introduce an EFT operating electronically. The exchange is home to most small cap stocks. Key differences. One major difference between the bond and stock markets is that the stock market has central places or exchanges where stocks are bought and sold. The other key difference between stock and bond market is the risk involved in investing in each. When it comes to stocks, investors may be exposed to risks such as country or geopolitical risk based on where the company does business or is based. Currency risk, liquidity risk, or even interest rate risk which can affect a company's debt, the cash it has on hand and its bottom line. Bonds, on the other hand, are more susceptible to risks such as inflation and interest risk. When interest rates rise, bond prices tend to fall. If interest rates are high and you need to sell your bond before it matures, you may end up getting less than the purchase price. So we've talked about some of these risk factors in a bit more detail in prior presentations. Obviously, when we think about different types of investments, there's always risk and reward that we have to basically balance out. And the idea of diversification is to get some areas where typically when one component such as stocks is possibly going to be doing well, then maybe the bonds are not going to be at the stocks go down because they have more volatility and are more likely to fluctuate up and down. Possibly then the bonds might be there to kind of hedge us out and not experience those deep dips on the bond side of things. But you can get into more detail on each of those risk factors individually as well. So if you buy a bond from a company that isn't financially sound, you're opening yourself up to credit risk. In a case like this, the bond issuer isn't able to make the interest payments leaving itself open to default. So if you buy bonds that are less secure, like if you buy government bonds, it's less likely or almost not likely at all, hopefully that the bonds are going to have a default risk because that would mean that the U.S. government couldn't service their debt even though they have taxation capacity as well as possibly basically printing money. But a lot of times when we're talking about individual investors, they'll go to the higher grade bonds and they'll go to the U.S. government bonds because those are going to be the bonds that you're trying to use to temper or mitigate the risk of the more volatile stocks. But it kind of depends on your overall investment strategy. So you could go to more risky bonds which might have a higher possible return but they also have more risk involved with them. So stock market or performance can broadly be gauged using indexes such as the S&P 500 or Dow Jones Industrial Average. These indexes are great because they're trying to give us an idea of sections of the market. And also if we use investment tools like ETFs or mutual funds, we can tie them to these indexes and that could possibly cost less in terms of management, could cost for the management of like a mutual fund. We've talked about mutual funds in prior presentation. Similarly, bond indexes like the Barclays Capital Aggregate Bond Index can help investors track the performance of bond portfolios.


On the women's side it was a similar script. The finals pitted 2016 champ Emily Israelson against Haley Toilette who lost in the finals in 2015 and lost in the semis in 2014. Things were headed all square into the ninth on the par five. Both players would get on and to Toilette's landing just short of the pin and rolling a little bit past. She would send her eagle putt long so the comeback her to save birdie is good. Israelson birdies as well.  On the tenth Israelson chipping for birdie. That's how you get it done. She'd pick up for par. After that she would win the next three holes. Still three up on the fifteenth Israelson with her third after Toilette gets on in two. She sticks it to ten feet with Toilette in tight for her birdie already made Israelson looking for the bird to keep it up three. Drains it. She moves three up and then on the sixteenth hole she just needs a two putt to win the match. Lags it up nicely and wins it all the closest match of her tournament. She cruised all week long in the other divisions. Jeff Wiltsey takes the senior title. Joe Burgess gets the win in the executive division and Brady McGarry is your junior champion. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland news, please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.


Everybody forced here ripping the sports car to Almanac multi-sport personal box edition volume 3 5 boxes of them for Joe L Joe's got I'm gonna go in order that I see them listed here 80 23 34 83 and 97 you go Joe. Good luck, man. I'm gonna rip them in that order to number 80 Troy Brown Patriots legend number Tim Brown to right Think 20 years and MJ in it. We got close box ever 18 had a Randy Moss So we got close to Jersey number match on the boxes What is that oh it's absolute baseball prime Jersey auto Mariano Rivera That is a sick-looking car number one of five What year oh for Don Russ playoff? Absolute baseball. Wow dude.  That's what it was Patch auto Mariano Rivera Gorgeous number one of five. Yep.  All right Next up for job. I'm gonna go in order here 23 is next That's he has such a nice auto man. He does it's everybody knows the Mariano Rivera auto It is like the class. It's like class of class man. It's so nice From goat to great prospect good time to get this one to 2020 bowman chrome Michael Harris prospect auto PSA gem in 10 Had a great debut this year. He's been very good for Atlanta Michael Harris a first bowman base auto PSA gem in 10 It wasn't Michael wasn't a Michael Jordan was a Michael Nice card there man. He might win rookie of the year. It's either hammer Strider the two teammates Number 34 now number 34, maybe a big poppy in this one Or a Shack a Lakers shack Nope, neither those guys 2019 tops archives Mike trout tops magazine auto. That's a really cool card PSA gem in 10 Number two of 20. It's a very unique trout Tops magazine auto car for 2019 archives two of 20 Mike trout. There he is man. There you go, Joe I like that number 83 is next Box 83 what do we got? Oh, that's gorgeous a pristine 10 1718 Don Russ optic the rookies hollow insert of Jason Tatum Pristine 10 10's all around outside of the centering the centering on a 9-5 That is awesome, man. Yeah, you can see it a bit insane grade hollow the rookies Don Russ optic Jason Tatum pristine 10 The optic was pretty I love to see the old optics from that year never got to rip any wood Sick year-end pristine 10 Tatum and box 97 Simi on rice number 97. Yeah, there's a PSA nine Fleer Jordan sticker earlier. Oh, dude. That's nasty. I love not got you nor is the best It's the best sneaker spotlight dirt in a vitsky auto 6 of 99 stunning cards just stunning Fantastic dirt on the back for you Joe L Man, these are filthy six of 99 dirt in a vitsky sneaker spotlight Definitely I think I think a fan favorite of like everybody that collects basketball cards a sneaker spotlight Thank You Joe. We appreciate you as always. We'll get him out to you shortly


The Bahrain School is a Department of Defense dependent school that serves an international community. The Bahrain School teaches more than 700 students including dependents from Naval Support Activity Bahrain, Kingdom of Bahrain and surrounding nations. Bahrain School is the only school in Dodia to offer this college preparatory program which by many estimates is the finest college prep program in the world. It is on par with the best private schools in the US. It well prepared students to easily get into Ivy League schools. I had kids in my class who went Stanford, went to Harvard, went to Yale, most are surgeons. Reporting from Naval Support Activity Bahrain, I'm petty officer Nicholas Lopez.


Hey friends today, we are hanging out at Disney's Hollywood Studios I've been noticing some super low wait times on the app So I wanted to come out and check it out and then also since Magic Kingdom is in full Halloween mode I thought maybe some Halloween things would be popping up here at Hollywood Studios like Minnie's Halloween Dine And we're just gonna hang out ride some rides eat some food and just have a beautiful Hollywood Studios kind of day Anyhoo, let's go do this I have to say it is a beautiful day today at Hollywood Studios. It's 85 degrees out It's very windy, but it also might be raining a little bit later on I think there's a good chance of rain in the area. So we're gonna make the most of the day no matter what I Can't be the only person that sits at home and just randomly pulls up the my Disney experience app and checks the wait times and sees what kind of dining reservations they can get even though They don't plan on going to a park I do it all the time like I just constantly look and like I said I've noticed like Tower of Terror has been super low and that's been really actually long the past couple of days So maybe they fixed the other side and yeah, I mean, I'm just kind of excited. I want to ride some rides today Wow, take a look at these wait times Tower of Terror 35 minutes rise of the resistance 85 minutes smugglers run 45 minutes And this is at like three o'clock in the afternoon or yeah, it's 3 p.m. Right now I know 85 minutes sounds a little bit long, but for rise of the resistance I'm used to seeing over a hundred minutes. These are really good wait times rock and roller coaster though 70 minutes seems a little bit high for me, but still 35 minutes for Tower of Terror. That's not too shabby. I Feel like Tower of Terror is a definite especially if it's only a 30 minute wait We have to ride it and then also Mickey and Minnie's runaway railway is only a 20 minute wait So like those are some pretty low wait times. I Had reservations actually come here to the Hollywood and Vine for a little dinner Because it switched over to Minnie's Halloween Dine, which is a Halloween themed character dining And I'm not too sure if I'm gonna actually go because in 10 days on August 28th It's actually converted back to the full buffet. So I kind of might want to wait, you know what I mean I mean right now they're doing family style, but the buffet is gonna have like Halloween themed treats Or maybe I might do them both. Maybe I'll do it today and then come back on the 28th The reason I'm torn between going now or waiting for the buffet I mean because the buffets gonna be a whole different menu and that's gonna be the permanent one This was just temporary. So if I show you guys this it's just gonna disappear in 10 days And the price hasn't changed. It's still gonna be the same amount now than it is with a full buffet It's still like $55 all character dining is so like it's kind of a big commitment While I ponder whether or not I'm gonna be going to Hollywood in Vine I ran into my friend Kristen right down Main Street, and she's actually gonna head down to Galaxy's edge I'm gonna join her because she's got some fancy ears there. Look at those wookie ears They are they're really nice Yeah, magic appears Yep, I'll put a link in the description for the ears though because they are really really nice But we're gonna head in the galaxy's edge Since we're actually over here in Galaxy's edge I was thinking about stopping in the docking base seven and grabbing a move juice which is basically like a non-alcoholic beverage It's a really good like special drink only to Galaxy's edge like it's in the Star Wars universe And I kind of like it's very refreshing Right here is a look at the move juice and it's simply fruit punch Simply orange with pineapple and Chipotle pineapple, and it is it's very refreshing But they also have some other really cool Cacochins down here. They have the gold squelch and longer, but I'm kind of in a cool-off mood I mean it is it is refreshing even though it's Chipotle pineapple This is something fun that I like to do especially with basically any Star Wars animal So I'm gonna show you what a move is in like the Star Wars universe And then I'm gonna show you move juice. So the juice is coming from the move And here it is here is a move right there in the picture shown and this is a move juice So we are drinking the juice of the move. I feel like it's a Dr. Seuss rhyme right now I'm with my friend Ryan for love of theme parks. Cheers to the move juice We're crushing Seriously though. This is actually a really refreshing beverage. I feel like you should ask for light ice though I don't like too much ice in my drinks Enough of the move juice business though. I want to actually start making our way over to sunset. Maybe ride Tower of Terror All right, it's time to make our way down and ride Tower of Terror Hopefully it's still a low wait time or actually hopefully it's a lower wait time I mean 30 minutes is low But you can't go wrong with a good 13 minute wait 13 minute wait means walk on but I think it's a little too early for that Also, I want to point out the awesome black panther Roosevelt shirt that I'm wearing look at this shirt I love it. I love all of the black panther line like I told you guys before There's a link in the description if you guys want to buy any of the shirts that I wear There's a promo code PMM 20 20 percent off your first order, but I love it We're gonna head right on in and I have a sneaky suspicion That it is close to a walk on because I feel like we should have been stopped already And I don't see anybody around the river been here There's no line moment of truth Look at that. Oh Look at that I'm so happy to see both sides back open again at the tower That's probably why the wait times were so low But it's still like a really awesome thing to have like a under 30 minute wait and by the way We only waited 10 minutes. I think about 10. I think it was a 10 minute wait 13 minutes. Oh 13 minutes means no wait though Uh-huh. I climbed up Exactly Now I'm scared So it was actually a 13 minute wait, which is kind of scary It is time It's been nice knowing you We're stuck You will begin moving again very soon hotel staff will be on hand to assist you as needed Please remain seated It's uh, yeah I Look you can actually see Caesar though look at him This is honestly definitely a first for me, but I love it I love being able to see all the details inside the Tower of Terror like this is kind of cool We're all just chilling. We're all just like kind of waiting. It's kind of nice actually. Oh, Nicky T. He's calling too Is that a coffee machine I've never noticed that before so it looks like right The coffee machine I hear the chains the man's coming he's coming to let us out Yeah Well, I'll be out in just a minute we have a little vehicle issue behind you so it just didn't want to cooperate So we're gonna move it where it needs to go so that this be a little Right Thank you, I like our view You know what would be cool is if it got broke in the elevator shaft We just keep going through sequences just up and down You would just keep going and going but so somebody is standing in the the special dimension right now most likely. Yeah There Does anybody need water For some reason the only thing I'm thinking about is the office and establishing the special corner We're stuck in an elevator I'll do it again with the lights on We're moving back now We've made it. Oh That was the troublemaker back there I was so excited it was the best thing ever actually Maybe It might be because of my bracelet It's gonna be a one-time lightning lane use for anything except rise resistance or slinky dog dash Hey, thank you. Oh, and we got some water too. Thank you I was the best I never I loved it How awesome was that I love it I mean I love getting evac on rides But I love it when they turn the lights on and the cast members and the whole crew at the tower of terror was so comforting And they were there we were stuck in there. I would say about 30 minutes We were stuck in the elevator shaft and there was one elevator behind us and in front of us and they just kept checking in on us They had waters for us and then also when we got off we got a free lightning lane Or we could have rode it again, but it was so cool just seeing everything with the lights on things like that I get excited about I'm like a big disney like fanatic when it comes to things like that So i'm happy that I got to share it with you guys I was worried maybe they would tell it to turn our cameras off But I mean since we were still on stage there was no behind like off stage like video being shown So it was perfectly fine, but yeah, I loved it. I'm very excited Now since we have our lightning lane, I think we're gonna make our way over to Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway I feel like that would be a good redemption spot. It's a 50 minute wait right now But all of the times went up because of the rain right now It's a little poury out and like Slinky Dog Dash is closed So I feel like this is a good redemption and we can use it anywhere except for Rise of the Resistance And Slinky Dog Dash It's nice to get out of the rain. I mean it's nice that it sometimes it rains and you get to like cool off a little bit But today it was only 85 degrees out. So it wasn't that hot and now I'm super wet So I feel like I got no benefit from it This way to the trains This guy always leaving you with all the work. I know It's gonna take days to repair this I'm very happy with our choice now wouldn't it be cool if we got evacuated from this ride? I would I would actually I'd be happy One two three that we just got done with Mickey's Runaway Railway I think it's time we go to dinner go for some din din at Hollywood and Vine seen some halloween characters and have fun Fun fact, this is also Jojo's first time actually coming here first time ever Yeah, I heard that the buffet is not back just yet not just yet, but we're gonna still see all the cool characters We're gonna see you know Mickey mini goofy. I love that. I'll dress up in their halloween best That's all I'm here for that's you that's yeah, that's you perfect Like I said in the beginning of the video this whole entire menu is gonna be changing It's gonna be going back to the buffet. So I'm not gonna focus so much on the food I am gonna show you the food But we really are just doing this to see the characters and we'll be back in a couple of days Thank you. All right time to head on in. Hi, how are you? Oh, yes Very fancy. Thank you Look at Mickey right here So Thank you I love the fact that as soon as we got to the table Mickey started waving at us So I can't wait for Mickey and mini to come back around for some reason every time I come to mini's Like halloween dine She's always like the star of the show me because she's it's mini halloween dine. That's why Oh, yes, oh my gosh, I love you. You look spectacular That is awesome So cool spider button The spider buttons is really that's a good touch You're the best Mickey We'll see you again soon Yeah, oh yeah, we'll be here. I'm excited for some dance moves Not only do we get to see all the characters dressed up in their halloween's best But they play halloween music as we're sitting in here And there's a couple different shows and Mickey is like I'm so Mickey keeps looking at me. So I'm gonna get excited Like I said, I'm not going to be focusing too much on the food because they are going to be switching back all the way to Uh a buffet which you see right here And the price is $55 for adults and I think it's $35 for children And I think I'm going to get the tenderloin the beef tenderloin It's what I always get when I come here But uh, yeah, it's still really good food, but I'm excited because when the buffet comes It's going to be halloween themed food and it's going to be completely different food Oh Oh mini's over here Oh, there she is. Oh, very excited to see you. I'm happy to be back Do you look very spooky the spiders the twirl a little bit of everything? This is amazing I'm so happy to be at your halloween dine It's a seasonal thing. I come every year come every every season Oh, you're the best. Thank you Wow I'm coming in for a selfie too No, we should actually take a selfie together Yes, definitely Oh my lord Oh, we're gonna go this way too. Yeah Oh That's too awesome, isn't it she is the best Yeah, that's the way I know makes me want to dance I love it you're making me jealous It's so funny because one thing I noticed when you dine here at hollywood and vine It's like you never want to stop like recording and taking photos because it's non-stop Like mickey and mini have just been like so amazing and we still have goofy the goo the goo's coming First things first they bring out a little salad a little dinner rolls And I always talk about how amazing these breadcrumbs are. I love these breadcrumbs. They're so good Oh, wait, why am I calling them breadcrumbs? Oh I don't know why I'm calling them breadcrumbs. Maybe I'm leaving a trail, but I do love them She's back again. There she is. Oh It's the best it's halloween tonight Oh The gang's all here the gang's all here. Oh, we love it Thank you. Oh, thank you guys That was amazing that was so special they're never together like that Wow All right, the food is here. I got the beef tenderloin jojo got the Spiced pork loin. It's good. I know it looks like you get some pineapple chutney on there and some galette Very very good. I know I've had it before it is good and you can swap out things too So I think I'm going to get broccolini as a next side instead of the green beans But I'm just excited to dive in and it is all you can enjoy so we can swap swap So if you want to try this then I can order one for you and you can order one for me Clever, right They're actually playing nightmare before christmas right now Oh and Pluto's here. Gotta eat my rib. I gotta eat my prime rib. I mean my tenderloin Oh There's bluto. Gracie sends her best regards. Yep Every time I see Pluto, I always ask him about his springy whiskers. Look at how springy there. Look at look at that The best you're you're so awesome Pluto. Thank you Yes, thank you See ya. Hi pal It's so funny because I'm afraid to take a bite of my meal because Like Goofy can show up or like bluto showed up. I know look at Goofy's right there He's coming. He's coming around the corner. Yes. He does Oh, no, he's going around the other corner like he does But I do have to say I really do love this beef tenderloin It is really really good and this and the meat's cooked perfectly I'm just very excited. So you guys are gonna have to tune in. You guys are gonna have to see What you think of the food. Let me know I'll be doing a video when the buffet opens again But you're gonna have to let me know what you think is better like this food right now Or when I do the buffet so soon just 10 days away actually Enough of the green bean business the Goof is here. Oh, yo Very spooky A little bit of everything That's the way We don't want some of the food I feel like I feel like my my green beans are here Yes, we'll bring you some treats. I'll find a picnic basket for you Yeah Goofy's waiting for his food Where's dinner I'll have what he's having I love it Hold on He's ready to eat Right now they're actually playing oogie boogie song and it's so awesome. Well, well, well, what have we here? I think Goofy dancing about it. I see a you're a little asakaya Oogie boogie Well, well, well, what have we here? Oh, oh, happy halloween He's done he's taking a break That is too good Oh Oh halloween spell Tis the season when the leaves fall when together it's fun for all May your tricks be sweet and your treats be sour May your tricks be sweet and your tricks be sour Happy halloween everyone Say the magic words with me Happy halloween measure happy halloween. Thank you. Oh, thank you. Yes Oh, it's time for dessert Got a little creme brulee. I got the lemon Shortcake this looks good. Let's do it. Let's do it. See you guys later. Okay. Bye mini. Thank you. Bye Mickey. Appreciate it guys Happy halloween And with that, I think we are done here today. What a fantastic day at halloween studios Honestly getting stuck on the tower terror riding Mickey and Minnie's runaway railway Having a little move juice and then the character interactions here are fantastic I love all of the people that work here at hollywood is fine. They are such Great like hosts. Maybe you were such a great host. I had so much fun Seriously, and I can't wait for the buffet to reopen. I'm definitely coming out to cover it But just being here and seeing the characters like I feel like that's worth the price alone Especially in the different seasonal like offerings. So I hope you guys enjoyed the video I enjoyed making it. We'll see you next time Bye


So it's been more than a couple of weeks since my last video because I've been busy playing games I'm gonna write about. I played the Division 2 right through to the end game and I'll have a long one up on that at some point I've got a video about how I think the move to micro transaction supported free DLC actually sucks and has only led to crappy little Updates being called DLC. I'll have a video about that and I'll have a video about value in indie games focusing on how we should judge a game's price But today I'm going to talk to you all about the newest game for my favorite developer from's new title Sekiro This is going to be a critique and I want to make clear I'll spend more time talking about the things I think went wrong than what I think went right Because much of what went right is what has always gone right moments of moment combat Lore art design mood and tone I don't think anyone needs to listen to me make the amazingly profound statement that combat is fun in Soulsborne games So my disclaimer is I sure do like Sekiro and at the same time there are things that could be improved Today I'll talk about what I think Sekiro does amazingly well What I think it does well, but not quite as good as the other games and the games problems and there are some it does have problems From hasn't made a perfect game before and Sekiro isn't there first after the logo performance So let's start with this Sekiro is an excellent game and many of its changes are positive There are a bunch of changes I don't like and I don't think it's from software is best game like seemingly everyone else in the world does But the game is already with Metro likely to be one of my favorites of the year It's new combat system is fresh enough to make the game feel different and the focus on mobility and stealth Bring something completely new to the formula I'm actually surprised at just how much fun I've been having with its stealth and traversal mechanics And I've really enjoyed the more standard storytelling that's on display in the game Still all of these changes also come with downsides and there are a bunch of other things that range from bad To neutral as well as some held-over mechanics that annoy me greatly looking at you terror None of this means Sekiro is a bad game It is an excellent game again, but I do think it means the game isn't quite as amazing as what I've been seeing and reading since its release Let's start with something the game seems to do well at first glance But which is actually a bit of a weakness when we look a little closer When you first boot up Sekiro at least on PC You'll notice that it runs in a nice stable 60 frames and that the world is quite beautiful But then you'll notice there are some problems as well When we consider that this is the same from software who brought us the original dark souls that was utterly unplayable without a moderated fix I'm not terribly surprised at its performance issues, but that doesn't make it okay Just because the souls born games are my favorite games ever doesn't mean I should just accept subpar performance And let's start with the PC here While the game generally runs quite well on max settings at 1440 on my i5 7700k GTX 1080 setup, it's not perfect and for some reason after playing for hours The game will begin having literally the very worst screen tearing I've ever seen in a video game Like it actually hurts my eyes it gets so bad. Well, I'm an experienced PC gamer That means I should go into the settings and turn on v-sync, right? So let's just hop over here Okay, and maybe we click over here in advanced then we'll Scroll down. Oh Yeah, there's no v-sync setting Presumably because the game has it on at default to provide a hard lock at 60 fps, which is kind of annoying Now that screen tearing will only go away if I completely shut the game down and reboot But the inability to use my snazzy 144 Hertz monitor isn't the only problem with the settings here The game simply doesn't offer the basic suite of options that PC players have come to expect Like for instance, there is no borderless windowed mode and Even advanced graphics options are the very bare minimum that's acceptable. There's no field of view no ultra wide support Very little control over graphic settings beyond on and off toggles Still it runs decently if not really well. I only had one crash. So that's good But there's another issue where if I play for many many hours The frame rate will suddenly tank to terrible levels requiring me Sometimes to completely close the game out and then restart my computer. I have never had this with any other game So I have no idea what it is, but that's my experience. You know your mileage may vary on PC I didn't buy in the consoles because I have zero trust with from softwares console ports But according to another awesome digital foundry video linked below that is the greatest channel ever It seems I was correct to buy on PC because the same frame-pacing issues that plague blood-borne and especially Dark Souls 3 are back again The Xbox one X apparently only hits 1440p at 30 FPS most times and even its unlocked frame rate mode is Actually poor jumping about and hovering around 37 FPS an Unstable 37 FPS is objectively shittier to play than a hardlock 30 making the unlocked mode basically useless Sony consoles fare better, but they aren't good and I want to be clear Securio is an often beautiful game and on PC. It looks great Generally, but with the quality of recent titles even on console. It's clear that from performance lags behind Even at 30 FPS locks from games can look extremely choppy when played on console Bloodborne on the base ps4 can be painful sometimes Fabric still looks kind of bad hair still looks weird NPCs lips move now But there is literally no sinking at all watch. I had to play a clip of this because it's so distracting It's actually works in their mouth not moving at all. So just watch here watch I Didn't even try to make the link sink to the words I know I should think it's cool that their mouths finally move and all but like Lip-syncing is kind of a thing in games now games have gotten insanely good at it actually and this is kind of unacceptable Frankly, it's time to get this shit right Hopefully this intermediate step from lips that don't move to lips that move but totally independently of the words being spoken means next time lips will move kind of generally at the same time as words and from 2023 title will finally have fully synced lips and words and that'll be sweet man But all in all playing on PC and aside from the inexplicable screen tearing and frame drop issues after playing for many hours The game ran well Still the lack of settings the locked 60 FPS and the continued core console performance and resolutions is a knock against an otherwise very good product and as always a work of art and speaking of art World and levels From software has always been lauded for its environmental storytelling and its world and level design Long-time fans of from's games will immediately notice some big changes when they first start playing a few of the biggest of these is the lack of a stamina bar a Dedicated jump button and a grappling hook all of which combined to make traversing the world much much faster and more fluid than any of the previous games And while the game still does have somewhat wonky movement while sprinting There's no doubt it feels better to move around than it used to although when you watch me play You should consider that the controller I'm using is actually broken now this movement is generally a good thing But these traversal tools also Mean that levels had to be longer and less cluttered to be fully utilized For as good as it feels to zip around the map Sliding into cover before grappling up onto a tree or swinging from grapple point to grapple point This speed of traversal also means that you spend much less time actually taking in the sights The slow lonely isolation of previous souls games is basically lost and perhaps realizing that players would no longer be slowly Pouring over the entire map much of the highly detailed and cluttered environmental storytelling is gone here Now the actual art design is different though still of a ridiculously high quality and there are certainly areas that feel like Self-contained rich little environmental stories But there's less of that in Sekiro than in any of the other games other than Dark Souls 2 Leaving aside that there are simply less and less diverse levels here Very few of the places you will traverse feel as real and lived in as the last two games Nothing here compares to Lothric Castle Central Yarnham the Cathedral or the Boreal Valley and we will get into the game's tendency to reuse areas and enemies later But aside from just feeling less detailed and real there's another issue that arrives from the somewhat less memorable areas You simply don't feel like you've traveled very far in Sekiro Part of this is also down to the way Sekiro breaks up its gameplay into much smaller almost tiny discrete bites The previous games all had one thing in common and that was long winding levels with fairly large distances between checkpoints Many if not most of the levels centered around careful thorough exploration Opening shortcuts finding hidden paths and items and memorizing the level to prepare yourself for boss fights Sekiro's bonfires, which are called idols are everywhere There are places where bonfires exist for one large courtyard or a corridor Sometimes there will only be five or six enemies between checkpoints Almost every single boss has an idol Directly outside its arena and one at the start of the gauntlet I'm not opposed to idols outside of arenas and I actually think it's a positive change Nobody ever enjoyed running past all the enemies for another shot at the boss But the presence of so many idols even along the levels critical path speaks to what I think is the game's Unnecessary early game and then also boss difficulty It's almost as if they made a bunch of their typical long levels and then realized the game was so ridiculously Stupidly hard early on that they need to drop idols every 60 feet to prevent rage quitting This feels like a kind of bad decision to me And we will go into this further during the section on difficulty because that's an important part of this game But for now, I think it's undeniable that the sheer amount of idols breaks the game up so severely That you never feel like you've journeyed anywhere You never feel stretched You feel less like you're on a long epic journey than on a series of five minutes trolls One of the stranger things is that the intricately designed levels aren't totally absent and a weird first for the series The later game levels are the best designs in the game by miles But for well over a dozen hours to start the game You will be passing nearly identical looking feudal era Japanese buildings and these are beautiful looking levels again But still Because you spend so much of the early game in identical looking levels the game lacks that same feeling of progress as the previous two Bloodborne was truly amazing and making the player feel like they were descending into an abyss as they slowly worked Their way across its blood-stained world and Dark Souls 3's Incredible diversity of environments makes that game feel like a truly epic voyage And even if the games levels did have the same rich details as the last two again You wouldn't really notice it because you move through these levels fairly quickly until you arrive at a stealth focused combat arena The intricate interconnected level design that from games are loved for simply is not present in Sekiro The games focus on movement and it's absolutely unnecessary level of early game difficulty Conspirer to create a very different world design than previous games I'm not saying that is good or bad. It just is for me I kind of missed the previous games level designs, but others might disagree the generally more open level design isn't necessarily good or bad It's just different and how much this bothers you or how much you like it will probably come down to a matter of taste You might prefer what Sekiro has done with the early levels. I was left feeling kind of disappointed Nothing in the world design stuck with me like the dead horse and overturned carriage at the beginning of Bloodborne Or the sky and bonfire when you arrive at the undead settlement in Dark Souls 3 or coming down the steps into Anor Londo There are still several amazing moments in Sekiro, but none of them came from just the level and world design And again, I want to be totally fair This is very possibly taste, but Sekiro Didn't worm its way into my memory in the same way And this could very well have less to do with the actual design work and more to do with just how quickly you're moving through the game itself And that's not something that could have been done differently considering Sekiro's combat systems The width and length of the areas are needed to make the stealth gameplay work, and it really does work But I also greatly missed the tight focused ambush laced levels of the previous games There are very very few enemy ambushes in the game because the levels are so wide open and because enemies are so powerful Early on that almost all of them are two hit kills and I honestly can't recall opening even one useful shortcut I of course found doors that said does not open from this side I wrote an elevator, but I never once used a shortcut Now this isn't some travesty, but it's kind of disappointing Sekiro has an interconnected world, but it simply doesn't feel like it's interconnected It feels like a hundred tiny micro levels to traverse from idle to idle being fair and rating against previous games I don't think that anyone could argue that the world on level design here is as intricate and detailed as the last two games the focus on stealth Difficulty and the combat system all combined to make the previous level design impractical for a variety of reasons from a design perspective and it's the thing I missed most I Love the way Sekiro's feudal Japan looks and I love the way it plays I just didn't love moving through it as much as I did yarn them The sense of exploration and being on a long journey is here occasionally, but only rarely and only in certain specific parts of the game It is much closer really to the level design of Dark Souls 2 not bad But not as good as Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3 of course Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3 have like the best level design ever So you know take that criticism for what it's worth Variety is the spice of life My other video about Sekiro was months ago when all the articles were about how much different this game is and how All of the RPG mechanics were gone My main concerns hearing that was a lack of variety in the gameplay No way to dynamically adjust difficulty and a lack of replay value So let's look at all of that but first I want to address something that's kind of annoying to me I make the mistake of being on reddit a lot.   They're just implemented kind of poorly in my opinion You still have vendors many of the same animations are taken directly over there is poison Slow movement swamps grab attacks Cheasing enemy AI is now fully implemented as stealth with a flashy animation But the reality is that we already did this from soft Brilliantly, I might add took the way we already played the game and implemented it as its own mechanic with a skill tree We used to throw pebbles and enemies to pull them toward us.  This always felt like exploiting the game and we called it cheesing But the simple fact is the game felt balanced around those things So from took those techniques added a crouch button and implemented actual stealth It is an amazing change to take something we were doing anyway and makes it Insanely more fun than it had been It is a total stroke of brilliance But that doesn't mean it's some utterly new thing You don't have stamina now, but you have posture You won't dodge very much anymore instead of pressing B to perfectly time your dodge through attacks Now you press LB to perfectly time your reflections to attacks these changes take getting used to but once they click You will find that playing this game feels almost exactly like playing any of the other games The mechanics are more shuffled and changed the encounters are more tweaked than Transforms and that is great because I happen to think that the from software combat system is literally perfect and only needs occasional tweaks But again, this isn't some totally new game in a whole new genre That'll be totally alien to souls players It is a souls game where you block instead of dodge and cheesing is now called stealth I love it, but this game can be compared to the others It keeps a shitload of mechanics items and systems and as such we can examine those things and see what's better than the other games What's worse than the other games and what's as good, but different than the other games Let's start off with one of the things. I was most nervous about Weapon and build diversity I didn't own a ps3. So my souls experience begins with Dark Souls Dark Souls had a shitload of weapons and an almost absurdly complex system for upgrading them With several blacksmiths different upgrade trees a stupid amount of crafting materials Dark Souls 2 had a ludicrous amount of weapons and an easier upgrade system, but the game also kind of sucks So we won't really talk about it here Dark Souls 3 has a lot of weapons a good amount of unique move sets It added weapon arts, which ended up being pretty useless outside of a few weapons and kind of annoying because they used your fucking mana So if you weren't a caster you could use them like twice, but it was there Bloodborne has the least weapons of any of the games But each one was totally unique and all of them were viable for a particular play style Added to these systems was sorcery Miracles hexes pyromancies in the souls games and that basically utterly pointless arcane tools and bloodborne Dark Souls has an absurd amount of ways to kill things many of which are bad Bloodborne has like a dozen ways to kill things all of which are good So what is Sekiro like well Sekiro falls in between Dark Souls 3 and bloodborne What this means in practice is a lack of weapon variety that leaves the combat somewhat limited The much advertised prosthetic arm weapons are rarely very useful as they all have Ridiculously long wind-ups that are more dangerous to use than it's worth outside of very very specific instances Although in those specific instances, they are super useful, but it's rare Later in the game when you can take a hit without instantly fucking dying and you've upgraded the tools You can finally start to play around with them and they are really really fun Which makes it all the more disappointing that you simply rarely use them and like never use them in boss fights outside A couple of very specific things Now this combat system is still super duper fun But I failed to see why other weapons couldn't have been made available to the players to mix things up more Enemies use spears and halberds and axes I'd have liked to use those and if they wanted to keep you with the sword for narrative purposes I would have very much preferred if from had figured out a way to allow the player to make much greater use of these kick-ass Prosthetics the games very very best combat animations are all tied to either the shinobi skills or the prosthetic tools They all have kick-ass blood-borne style animations and they all feature cool particle effects and unbelievably good sound design But the combat balance and speed and aggressiveness of enemies means it's almost never ever safe to use them Against regular enemies using your shinobi arts almost always means getting hit and you simply cannot get hit in Sekiro without everything going to shit the game demands near Perfection from the player and punishes you so hard for getting greedy The entire game is constantly slapping you in the face for even one missed deflection or trying to get one extra hit in It actively teaches you to never try anything crazy And then all of the tools feature huge long wind-ups that have no hyper armor at all Really, you can easily get repeatedly interrupted and killed as you try and get off any of these tools or skills Other than the firecracker which has a near instant cast Likewise enemies are ridiculously fucking good at blocking So you almost always end up spending ammo which is spirit emblems in Sekiro to start a huge long wind-up Only to have the enemy block the strike most of the tools don't do all that much more posture damage than your sword and Leave you unable to block so you're almost always always better off not Using the cool new skills and weapons that they designed. It's a serious issue I took risks and used them because I felt like it but anytime the game got harder I used the tools and skills less the only time I used them was on enemies I could have easily killed with my sword That sounds kind of like exactly backwards to me It seems like the tools should have been super powerful weapons with high risk high reward that you'd only use on the toughest enemies Instead they are high risk low reward So you only use them on the weakest enemies with only one sword Skills that are ridiculously situational can only be equipped one at a time and take forever To unlock and tools that cost ammo and are almost always either unnecessary or actively dangerous to use There is basically zero weapon and build diversity in Sekiro. This isn't open for discussion You can think that's a good thing or not a good thing But you can't think it's not true the combat is still awesome and timing your blocks perfectly before Showering blows down a cowering blocking opponent feels really really good, but it's a missed opportunity I hope there's a second row too and they realize they can greatly improve this system by making the coolest abilities Actually viable outside of niche boss fights and weak as fodder enemies in Dark Souls or Bloodborne When you get a bit bored you can really switch things up by changing your combat style I recently played Dark Souls 2 again as a caster for the first time I used hexes and a Zwee hander and I felt a lot different in playing using a straight sword and parrying shield in Bloodborne using the saw cleaver feels quite a bit different from using Ludwig's holy blade or the moonlight sword It's not a different game, but it's just enough variety to keep things interesting Sekiro has all the tools needed to have the same thing, but it just doesn't do it The long wind-ups and high risk is a leftover from the previous games They should have made all the tools totally uninterruptible Given the player total risk from the long wind-up at the very least you'd trade taking damage for doing big damage It'd be a different way to play Instead the game's best animations go basically to waste because you won't really be using them Okay, let's move on There was so much talk about how Sekiro had dropped the RPG mechanics totally I heard and read tons of stuff about how farming for souls was a thing of the past Imagine my surprise when I found that Sekiro still has RPG mechanics and that one particular design choice ended up meaning I farmed more in Sekiro than I ever did in Bloodborne of Dark Souls RPG mechanics For all of that talk about how much different Sekiro is it retains a remarkable number of progression mechanics from the previous games Death carries a harsh XP penalty The penalty is lower than the previous games But you also cannot go back to the place you died and reclaim the dropped XP if you die You lose progression permanently for the first time money and XP are separated out into separate currencies And you lose half of each on death There is a mechanic that gives you between a five and thirty percent chance to be spared the penalty But it is basically no literally totally random and for the most part death means you lose your progress With one odd exception that ends up causing more farming rather than less Let me explain Rather than simply getting XP and trading it for levels Sekiro leaves all of its build progression spread across several skill trees These trees include things like new attacks better versions of existing attacks and new movement techniques But also crucial things like better healing from items better stealth More Shinobi tool ammo and better item drop rates as such Some of these skill nodes are the kind of thing a player feels they need to unlock Sekiro doesn't eliminate its RPG mechanics. It just jumbles them up some Previous games increased the healing power of your flask by finding items out in the world now their skill tree unlocks Increasing health and stamina used to be acquired by spending XP now you find them in the world These changes seem kind of arbitrary to me and serve only to increase the difficulty of the early game for No real reason other than changing things for changes sake The one caveat here is that as you acquire XP you fill up a bar until you earn a skill point Once you get that point it is banked, but any more progress is lost on death Now do you see what's up here? There's an inbuilt incentive to farm for XP because the benefit of getting the bar to fill up is so huge Thank God it took me more than half the game to figure this out because once I figured it out I could not unlearn it if I was more than halfway to a point It seemed irresponsible and stupid to not simply keep killing the nearby enemies until I had unlocked that point and because XP accrues slowly and skills are both stupidly expensive and require you to unlock all the previous nodes Getting a skill you really want like I don't know your health flask restoring more than 15 percent of the bar takes a long-ass time This means that once you find a nice little group of easily killed enemies The temptation to keep killing them until you've banked enough points to get that skill You're looking at is nearly irresistible not needing to farm is something everyone was praising But I never once farmed in blood board for anything other than blood vials, and I fucking hate it having to do that I still think it's basically one of only a handful of problems with that game and I very very very rarely farmed and Dark Souls or Dark Souls 3 The only time I did it was if I was close to using an item I wanted to try if I had a level up two levels of strength to try a sword I was interested in I would farm up an area to quickly level that skill I did farm in Dark Souls 2 because they made the asinine decision to put the effectiveness of dodging Literally the core skill of the entire game behind an RPG stat, and I hated that But beyond those very specific instances I did not farm in Souls games because you lost all of your XP on death in those games There's really no incentive to farm By locking in these skill points someone like me will always be peeking at the bar to make sure he's not really close to a point And if I'm closer to a point than not I will just farm up the damn points And this is bad because in general the tree is basically superfluous So as you're farming you'll end up thinking to yourself Man, this is a lot of effort for really no practical benefit I've already gone over how rarely you end up using the combat arts But because those very few important things are way down the ladder you end up farming to unlock a bunch of skills You will literally never use once just to get to the one that lets your flask heal more Okay, so the game that supposedly eliminated farming Tripled the amount of farming I did in this game, and I don't think that's going to be a rare occurrence I can say here that I think this RPG system is objectively inferior to the previous games in every way XP comes slowly.  There are no builds You can choose a different combat move that you won't use and you can go crazy finding the materials for upgrades on your shinobi tools that you'll use But not very often and yet I did because that's how I play games And I'll bet lots of other people did too because this is basic player psychology If there's a skill tree, I unlock it. If there's an upgrade material, I go get it I've been playing games for nearly 40 years and this behavior is hard coded in me now I like RPGs. I love well done RPGs. Dark Souls is a brilliant RPG. Bloodborne is a really good one.    It's so good also because these fights play out as sword fights play out in my imagination You attack and test your opponent and back off and wait you circle each other eyeing and opening You continue to fight until you notice a pattern They're prone to or a particular attack that always leaves them vulnerable and you punish them not only by attacking and forcing them on the Defensive but by perfectly blocking and using their own attacks against them The game does a really good job of keeping things either one-on-one or in a manageable group of weak enemies and Anytime you arrive at a huge group of enemies You know you had to stealth kill almost all of them and the game's movement abilities mean that for the first time Running away is actively encouraged Eventually you will get enough health and damage that you can go to earlier levels and play bloodborne if you want But when you're along the main path the game is a very very well-paced mix of carefully surveying the area Finding all of the easy escape routes up into the trees Slowly stealth-killing enemies before mopping up by sword fighting one or two guys Trying to fight more than two dudes in Sekiro is nearly certain death Nearly every single enemy can stun lock you to death in two shots and seconds even with the lack of weapon variety and the inefficiency of the tools and combat skills What's actually here is so fucking tight and polished that you can easily do the same basic sword fight 1000 times and still enjoy it I mean that means it's good Would the game be even better if I could use my flaming spear more or if I had a few different types of swords Yeah, I think so. I mean, I know so but even so it is really damn good And that is so important because one area the game lacks Objectively is enemy and boss variety the first three areas you will go to in this game have almost nothing beyond samurai dudes And even amongst those dudes, there's like a few variations and those variations are very small There's the dude with the straw hat. There's a dude with an axe. There's a dude with a bow They throw a couple of big troll type enemies in there But the game may be an effort to familiarize yourself with the basic combat system doesn't change up its enemies for like 10 12 hours This isn't something that actively hurts the game But it's disappointing compared to the variety of enemies you encounter in the previous games when I started it I thought it was because the game was going to stay true to being feudal Japan But it comes clear later on that this isn't the case as you are fighting headless corpses and giant snakes and cricket shooting zombies and zombie villagers It feels more like a lack of design time like they couldn't have the same amount of enemies as in previous titles And the same goes double for bosses people were upset about the asylum demon being reused in Dark Souls They were kind of annoyed about turning regular enemies to bosses in the chalice dungeons They marked Dark Souls 2 reusing a particular boss in the DLC and changing the color of his blast attack to blue But Sekiro Reuses bosses and mini bosses to a shocking degree. There are two snake eyes about five generals Two centipede giraffe fights two ogre fights three of the drunken fat guy from the commercial at least five of the headless demons There are three of the shimuchen warriors. You fight two of the main story bosses twice with only slight changes There are two Guardian 8 fights with the second one featuring both of the phases at the same time These aren't slightly changed fights usually They're literally the exact same fight with a couple featuring maybe one different special attack This one has a grab and that one has a thrust and that's the exception for most of them They are exactly the same except with a different arena. This seems like a lack of development time to me And I don't think it's something anyone could really defend Again, I love the game and each of these fights is cool enough with some of them being fantastic But that is an insane amount of reused fights There are at least ten bosses that are reused sometimes as many as five times Including main epic story bosses, and I think that kind of sucks dude I Understand reusing one or two bosses and the Guardian 8 fight is an example of reusing a boss really really well And the headless fights are kind of extra content I guess the others are kind of just copy-paste jobs right down to having basically the same name And it does the same thing with areas where you will backtrack to reuse an entire level during the main story of the game twice As the game moves on the enemy variety increases But the sheer amount of reused enemies bosses and areas is a first for the series and it is not an improvement It's a step back. I can only hope it's because there was tremendous development time used on creating a new combat system and a traversal system If this happens again, I think Frumb will deserve to get a bunch of criticism for it This game would have been immensely improved by having a bit more level and enemy variety Replacing all the reused bosses other than the ape and the headless with totally new designs I kicked the living shit out of most of these guys the second time I fought them which nicely segues into our final section difficulty Why did I obliterate those bosses when I saw them the second time? Because the first time I fought them 15 or 20 times if not more that's not an exaggeration I think I might have fought the second boss lady butterfly and genichiro ishina like 30 times I must have fought the demon of hatred 35 times easily. It could have been more Sekiro's regular combat early in the game is Ridiculously hard Especially if you're like me and find yourself somewhere you shouldn't be but decide you're not gonna let the game tell you What to do and mash your head against the wall until you win and the bosses in this game are almost all painfully Unnecessarily difficult this ties in both with the changes to the RPG system and to the structure of the game and its combat system Let's wrap this up with the most controversial statement Sekiro doesn't do a good job with his difficulty curve Sometimes it is just way too frustratingly hard so hard I'm convinced huge swaths of people will never finish this game But other times it's almost too easy like when you're replaying the same boss with the exact same moves The reason is too easy is precisely because it's too hard Let me explain that The first time you fight a boss you will have to do it so many times and acquire So much mastery that when you fight that boss again, they can't even touch you From's games have always required players to learn what the game demands, but they haven't previously required perfection Several of these bosses I ended up beating without getting hit because the game literally demands that level of perfection to progress And this goes right up to the last boss. It was just ridiculous This undoubtedly makes you feel like Superman when you actually do it But it also makes you want to break things getting to that point Let's try and break this down from two perspectives, okay? For a veteran player of souls games learning the different tweaks to the system was punishing Almost every enemy after the tutorial area did like 80% damage to your health bar and adjusting to how quickly they chain attacks together Was hard if you're like me and have played all of these games five or six times each I'm sure it was a difficult learning curve Now I want to look at this as someone who has never played one of these games your average person who plays video games would have Almost zero frame of reference for this. Well, that's what we were like when Dark Souls first released you might say except Sekiro is objectively Insanely harder than Dark Souls one.  This is why idols are always directly outside of main bosses and almost always only two or three enemies from mini bosses There are no gauntlets to run here because boss fights end in seconds The first time I fought Genichiro I think I literally died in three seconds the first time I fought the last boss same thing bosses have ridiculously large move sets and more those moves are at insane speeds Their special attacks are almost all instant kills if you aren't at absolute full health And they're almost all impossible to react to until you've seen it many many times I ended up getting the second face of Genichiro only after beating his first phase without taking any damage because that's what the game basically demands of you Then I was instantly killed by phase two when lightning one shot me by the time I beat that phase I ended up beating both phases without healing because I'd fought him easily 20 times easily probably more man Bosses almost all heal punish. They attack almost constantly have tiny damage windows They are simply incredibly difficult and require more pattern recognition and better Reflexes than any boss in any of the previous games outside of maybe Medea I booted up Dark Souls after this just to see the bosses and in Dark Souls They look like they are moving in slow motion compared to Sekiro now I don't think bosses should be beaten on the first try One of the things I hate most about Dark Souls 2 is that the regular enemies are annoyingly hard to deal with But almost every single boss I beat the first time outside of a very few like fume knight and sin But I also think asking anyone but weirdos like me to fight a boss for two hours and 35 tries until you've got it down so much. They don't even hit you is way way way too far over the line Previous games had a built-in way to avoid this There was an inbuilt difficulty setting that allowed players to adjust the game to their own skill level it Naturally let the player adjust until it was just hard enough This was called RPG leveling if a boss was one-shotting you you could just spend some points on health Get it up to three shots and make the fight more manageable. It didn't make it easy mode Dark Souls 3 had very challenging boss fights even over leveled at endgame. Nameless king is kind of a nightmare But you can get that fight to where it doesn't require you to play absolutely perfectly to progress Likewise, you cannot level at all if that's what you're looking for and make it so every boss one shots you And there's a happy medium in here somewhere somewhere between me fighting the guardian ape So damn many times the next time I fought him I didn't die at all even though there was a second guardian ape in the fight Sekiro keeps many many systems. There's a swamp that slows you. There's poison.  You'll end up hoarding because you don't want to waste them I have like a billion fists full of ash But tying damage and health upgrades to defeating story bosses and clearing levels seems Pointlessly cruel to me for a good segment of players Eventually in Sekiro like in all of the games You'll reach a point where you finally feel properly leveled for regular enemies, but never for bosses The game gets significantly easier not only because you've mastered its systems But because by halfway through only a few enemies can kill you in one and two hits The boss fights only get easier as your skill increases though Tying leveling to boss wins means they've balanced these fights to be hard and given players No way to progress if they just aren't good enough at games or if they simply don't have the patience for the punishment This game meets out I have often heard the argument that souls games shouldn't have a difficulty slider because the developers have a certain vision for the Experience they want the player to have but that line of thinking completely misses an entire point Not all players are equally skilled. I have been playing games for 40 years I am a healthy guy who has good enough hand-to-eye coordination that I played baseball all the way into a division 1 junior college And I played a shitload of souls games My experience with Sekiro and even for me this game was frustratingly difficult and infuriating at times But my experience is fundamentally easier than someone with severe arthritis or Slower reflexes or someone who has never played a souls game. I Will play a different game than someone who's 63 I will have a much easier time than someone who has worse eyesight My game is easier than somebody who just isn't good at games The only way to actually ensure that the developer vision of the player experience is upheld is to allow players to match the difficulty to their skill level Previous souls games could have benefited from a direct difficulty setting like Celeste has They don't have that but they do have something almost as good. Maybe even better, frankly They've got a hidden dynamically adjusting difficulty slider that is in case deep within the game's systems and mechanics themselves a 53 year old woman with arthritis can play Dark Souls 3 and Struggle and then simply farm souls to level up her health and strength until it's high enough to overcome her mistakes She will stop leveling naturally as soon as the difficulty becomes more manageable for her because farming sucks And no one wants to do it more than is needed That system worked well and made the games far more accessible than they were given credit for between shields and magic and bows and leveling anyone of any skill could beat the Dark Souls games Whenever I saw people going on about how deliciously hard the games were I cringed a little both because I don't think that's actually true They weren't that hard and because they were systems in the games to allow anyone to overcome them And I cringed because there's something else about this discussion that I think is important Reducing these games down only to their raw Mechanical difficulty does them a great disservice The from software titles are more than just the basics of the combat systems They are more than just their difficulty if that's all they were we would be talking about the surge as the greatest game of all Time it is definitely harder than Dark Souls and it has the same combat system with a couple of cool little tweaks in there But the surge is better than Dark Souls 3 is something literally nobody ever said I sincerely doubt the people who made the surge think it is better than Dark Souls 3 Souls games aren't only about the difficulty that is definitely a part of it I won't deny that but it's more than just that it's just how snappy and Fluid and polished the combat is it's how it's how good they feel to play it is how Unbelievably good the animation work is the art direction is the sense of mystery It's the world and level and enemy design. It is the fantastic sound direction and the unbelievably good music It's the lore and the island descriptions.  We imagined Souls games are so good at everything they do. I don't understand why she shouldn't be able to complete the game also I am no designer But how about a dynamic system that adjusts enemy health and damage based on how many deaths you've had You can even have a lore reason call it fatigue Enemies or bosses get fatigued the more times they've killed you I don't think I would have enjoyed the game less if I had fought Lady Butterfly ten times instead of 20 In conclusion I'm gonna wrap it up here There's a lot to discuss and I am playing NG plus now so I might very well do another Sekiro video after I played the game again I also want to start a fresh game and see what the difficulties like after having already beaten it I rarely score things, but I'm going to do that here I consider Bloodborne and Dark Souls 3 to be 9.9 games as close to perfect as you can get I don't think Sekiro is as good as those two games and I'm almost positive It will be replayed less often, but it is still a fantastic game and those two games are so damn good I didn't expect Sekiro to be that good But the game is still one of the best of the generation and easy nine Sekiro does so much right and it's a game that could be as good as those others with a few more tweaks. I Still very much hope for a Bloodborne 2, but now I really want a Sekiro 2 I feel like this game is an excellent transition point It tries a bunch of new things and it absolutely nails the most important of those its combat its story It's movement and art are all top-notch, but I really feel like there is a better game in here somewhere There's a nearly perfect game in here somewhere and Sekiro 2 I would like to be able to use the Shinobi tools more. I would like the combat arts to be useful I would like greater diversity in world design and a return to at least some of the winding twisting shortcut filled levels I'd like longer levels with less bonfires Importantly, I want a Sekiro that goes back to the old leveling system allowing players to level health and damage and posture With XP and moves combat arts progressions to items that are found in the world or are rewarded from NPCs I'd like either settings or a progression system that ensures a wider audience of players can finish the game and see them from the works of art They are Performance needs to improve going forward, especially on console man NPCs need to have lip-syncing PC settings need to be expanded 60 FPS lock No borderless windowed seriously dude.  Sekiro is so good that I want another one that will be perfect The best from software game is in here somewhere They've got the foundation of it here and should be commended for some bold choices But they also understand that we made some choices that didn't work as well as the systems.  I am eagerly waiting DLC for this game I'm psyched to see what's next. All right.  Thanks for coming. See you next time Bye