i just bought this and its DLCs. what am i for?

>>715000145 (OP)
amazing base game, do your first playthrough without any dlcs. don't enable anything, don't touch any accessability options, don't spoil yourself on mechanics, story and regions.
expansions are middling at best to bad

>>715000145 (OP)
Pain, frustration, and suffering. But at the same time, an incredible and fun experience.

>>715000448
i haven’t spoiled anything for myself.all i know is that the enemies have some kind of unique AI. why should I disable the DLCs? do they affect the base game?

Recommend playing base game 100% vanilla. If it clicks it's a pretty amazing experience, very unique game and has lived rent free in my head for years
Also don't be afraid of dying. It doesn't affect your progress as much as you might think

>>715001721
Downpour adds things to vanilla even if you are playing base campaigns. There's a whole region and its one of the worst ones in game. Some things are alright, but if you will accidentally wander into pipeyard on your first playthrough - my condolences.
Worth noting that all DLCs are basically official mods not made by original developers.

>>715002060
>>715002068
ookay i promise i will deactivate them

>>715002068
To elaborate on the region:
It's FUCKOFF HUGE compared to modestly sized vanilla regions (although Downpour's gigantism makes it pretty averagely sized).
It lacks any kind of visual identity and looks like pallete-swapped mishmash of 3 other regions. Some rooms are so similar that it's easy to confuse them.
Centipede hell. Vanilla game usually puts centipedes in labyrinthine, confined rooms, here though, have fun jumping over long ass centipedes on flat floors. And there are a lot of them, probably more than in any other vanilla region.
Very poor shelter placement. Some shelters are 3-4 rooms away from eachother, while some subregions have 1(!) for the entire thing. Sump tunnel is a travesty against mapmaking.
It's just plainly unfun. Its like they've copied other regions, but actually forgot to include their fun geometry gimmicks and creature placement.
It's just useless. There's no reason to ever go there. There's a single cool room (large underground lake) and otherwise there's literally nothing of value. It was supposed to become a shortcut between distanced regions (i.e. sky islands to shoreline), but ended up being so fucking huge and annoying that taking it is actually slower than going the old way.

>>715002060
I wish it clicked with me

>>715004254
It didn't get it on my first try either. Dropped it after 2 hours.
But then i gave it another try a year later, and now its one of my all time favorites. I think you need a specific kind of mindset going into it, especially if life's rough you might get repulsed by it's uncompromised, distilled misery.

>>715004520
I eventually gave it another try on easy mode and still couldn’t get into it. Got farther than the first attempt, but still didn’t really enjoy it