Great breakdown. I think another part of it that I don't see mentioned here is how long attacks animations lock you in before you are allowed to dodge. It's a matter of frames, but Lies of P attacks take a little longer compared to Soulsborne games.
I think this interacts with the strange dodge buffering quite poorly. I found I often queued up a dodge too early during an attack, which led to the game doing something I wasn't expecting. I also found that especially with bosses, I could recognize that I needed to dodge far before an attack hit me, but I often couldn't break out of the attack animation quickly enough.
Mixed in with the character's slower movement speed, that led me to be super cautious during fights and only trying to go for big openings, because I felt like I couldn't rely on the dodge system. Maybe that's intentional, but seeing as the game seems to take a decent amount from Bloodborne, I would guess not.
Though I didn't really check if the animation lock-in was longer it felt that way.
The end result of the various issues is that to dodge it feels like you should just mash dodge and hope for the best, and then because you were just mashing and due to the quirky controls what happens as a result feels too unpredictable.
There's also an animation that plays when you take a big hit that kind of looks like a dodge. (Your sort of skid) I'm not sure if that's an animation that plays after you take any big hit or if it *is* actually a dodge.
Great breakdown. I think another part of it that I don't see mentioned here is how long attacks animations lock you in before you are allowed to dodge. It's a matter of frames, but Lies of P attacks take a little longer compared to Soulsborne games.
I think this interacts with the strange dodge buffering quite poorly. I found I often queued up a dodge too early during an attack, which led to the game doing something I wasn't expecting. I also found that especially with bosses, I could recognize that I needed to dodge far before an attack hit me, but I often couldn't break out of the attack animation quickly enough.
Mixed in with the character's slower movement speed, that led me to be super cautious during fights and only trying to go for big openings, because I felt like I couldn't rely on the dodge system. Maybe that's intentional, but seeing as the game seems to take a decent amount from Bloodborne, I would guess not.
Though I didn't really check if the animation lock-in was longer it felt that way.
The end result of the various issues is that to dodge it feels like you should just mash dodge and hope for the best, and then because you were just mashing and due to the quirky controls what happens as a result feels too unpredictable.
There's also an animation that plays when you take a big hit that kind of looks like a dodge. (Your sort of skid) I'm not sure if that's an animation that plays after you take any big hit or if it *is* actually a dodge.