That reminds me of the Primal Dialga fight in Explorers of Time, Darkness, and Sky. It's a super difficult fight, and every time you die, you lose half(?) of your items, which makes it even more difficult. It took me forever, and by the end of it, I had no good items left in the storage system.

[–] ThefuzzyFurryComrade@pawb.social 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It’s a super difficult fight, and every time you die, you lose half(?) of your items, which makes it even more difficult. It took me forever, and by the end of it, I had no good items left in the storage system.

That just seems like a negative feedback loop if you cannot leave and return when you are stronger? That could be a soft-lock. I have not played the games so I am not certain what the design philosophy was there.

[–] LordAmplifier@pawb.social 2 points 2 days ago

It was a huge feedback loop, but it looks like I was a little wrong. I looked it up and it turns out that you can go back to Treasure Town (where your home base is) to do other dungeons and stock up on items again, but then you need to clear all the dungeons on the way to Dialga again. I didn't know that back then, though, so I just kept trying until I got lucky and found the right items in Temporal Spire, the dungeon that you have to go through before fighting Primal Dialga (because a checkpoint right before the final boss would be too easy). The design philosophy probably was "This is the final boss of the main story, make it difficult." Dialga has Roar of Time, for example. That move can hit you anywhere on the floor and deals a ton of damage.