So this marks my completion of the famed difficult juggernaut of a game- Dark Souls Remastered. The game was originally released on the Playstation 3 in September of 2011. It was developed by FromSoftware. This is a company famous for making very gritty and tough games such as their famous Armore Core series. I heard about the game when it came out all those years ago, but although I was becoming a fan of the genre, I didn't like the cover art that much and was a bit put off by the dark nature. I really fell in love with dungeon brawlers when I played Genji on the same system. After looking it over and researching it for quite a while, and completing Nioh in the process, I began to consider Dark Souls, as it has its own separate lore, and does make some effort to distinguish itself from the usual tasteless blood, gore, and deemo games, which I despise. It really focuses on being as hard as possible, and I will discuss the different types of hard.
What I've come to find in difficulty in video games, is that very few games have the ability to nail it just right. Monster Hunter might have come the closest of all games I know, besides a couple of obscure titles like The Red Star. I have always appreciated hard games, because to me, that's what video games were created for in truth. They were meant to push us physically and mentally to new levels. But you have some games, that are near insurmountable in challenge, where you wonder at times, if you will every overcome the difficulty, and then you have games that you know you can overcome, but wonder how you will weather the brutal challenge that requires patience. I liken to the power lifter versus the fitness expert. One man attempts to take on bench pressing 500 pounds for the first time, and sweats under the challenge, while another man takes on benching 200 pounds for 50 reps. These are different avenues, but both equally challenging. While Monster Hunter is the big weight game, where skill is all that can save you, Dark Souls is the rep challenge, where you are capable of becoming very powerful, but can always fall into cycles of dying for unknown reasons.
Dark Souls was the game that brought about Nioh and other titles. It is the basic dungeon brawler, that relies on equipment sets and weapon upgrades, as well as learning the patterns of enemies and layout of dungeons. No one nails challenges that push your skill level like Capcom. What I've come to find of FromSoftware, is that their games are more arduous than insurmountable. Even Armored Core, was extremely hard, until you found the right mech design and specs. In Dark Souls, unlike Monster Hunter, you do not rely so much on attributes and breaking down large bosses with skill. While that element does exist, the game is more reliant on leveling up and becoming stronger in various ways.
You are and undead warrior who starts out being released from a cell as you are tasked with travelling to the world of the great lords and saving the world. You gather intel and weapons along the way, such as spears, swords, great swords, axes, bows and short swords. In the character menu, there is a huge board of attributes to upgrade. Each time you level up, you can only upgrade one, making leveling up very daunting and critical. You can enhance strength, endurance, stamina, dexterity, faith, intelligence, and resistance. Each attribute effects different weapons and armors. The game has different types of magical attack attributes. There is fire, lightning, and poison. You can raise resistance to help slow and neutralize the effects of such attacks. Your dexterity will help your damage proficiency with some weapons like katanas, swords and spears. Your strength will help you wear heavy armor when the prerequisites are met, and will increase attack power with some large weapons like great swords. Endurance will increase you ability to carry a larger load in general and will make you able to even wield certain weapons or wear certain armors in the first place. Based on a percentage, your movement speed and stamina consumption are effected by the ration of capacity to carried weight. By increasing either your stamina or health, you can build the meter to sustain more damage and launch more attacks.
In the game, there are a few randomly placed black smiths who you meet that can upgrade your equipment and sell you components to do so. This is crucial to making your armor and weapons good enough to fight the enemies. I found that the game does a horrible job of explaining things. There is very little in the way of cutscenes and direction. I found that I had to refer to walkthroughs and videos, made by people who put the time in, dissecting and looking through books etc. to learn the lore and how to find things. To me, that is ridiculous. There were a lot of things I would have had a hard time finding out I had to do. One example is that in the end of the game, some areas like Anor Londo, which are labeled as optional, had many items and areas that I could not have beaten the game without finding and exploring. When I heard how big the world was, I was skeptical, but let me tell you, it is absolutely enormous. And it is connected as they say, but in a very convoluted way. I was so pleased when I achieved the teleporting ability near the end.
The bosses in this game were pretty good. What will hang you up, is adjusting to the new enemies in the area. They will be so strong, that you will be surviving the area for quite a while as you level up. It really is a good feeling to get so strong over time, that you can comfortably travel an area that you used to sweat walking through. In fact, now playing new game plus, I kind of smile, as I am obliterating enemies that used to give me fits. The game is specifically designed to turn up the intensity, and in my opinion, begin to break game mechanics to take you out, when you have a lot on the line. In this game, you acquire your currency from souls you pick up from downed foes. Like other games in the genre, if you die, you can make it back to where you died and collect the loot you dropped. However, if you get killed before that happens, all souls are lost. After a while you learn to spend your souls on leveling up you character and equipment as often as you can. Because some areas are so huge like the Catacombs and Anor Londo, you are constantly searching for bonfires to sleep at and save. These are the areas where you level up, change equipment and save. The game has a spell system, where you can build up slot capacity and equip spells from various schools such as Pyromancy. In your loadout, you can equip as many spells as you can contain. You can have 2 weapons for each hand that you cycle through, and several items, such as estus flasks, throwing knives, dung piles etc. Estus is the healing item of the game, as you find bonfires, you replenish them and increase capacity by kindling the bonfire further.
I think the most memorable boss fight in the game was the fight against the two lovers Ornstein and Smough. Ornstein was a lighting sword wielding knight, who moved very fast, and Smough was a giant hammer wielding beast who covered insane range. You had to fight them at the same time, and after beating one, fight the other after they powered up with their lover's remains. It was one of those fights that taught me how to tackle bosses in general. Many of the boss fights can seem very unfair, until you find a trick of sorts that stifles their offense. The enemies in Dark Souls all have the ability to modify their attacks to throw off your defense. You can block most attacks, and parry some melee attacks, but the timing has to be perfect. I mastered it of course, but when fighting later enemies, almost all of them have unblockables. It's so weird to play games where every single enemy has a move list.
I would be remissed to fail to mention the aesthetics. The graphics and lighting are superb. The scope of the draw distance, textures and level design really give it a grand scale look. This serves to show off the ability of the Switch console, as it seems unreal to play such a game on a handheld. You visit many different locations from old temples to forests, to mountains and catacombs. However, I feel there could have been a bit more sunlight in the game. And the camera angles were at times, atrocious. There are times when I walked to my death due to a sudden flip of the camera on a very narrow ledge. Once again, like Genji, this game likes to interweave intricate platforming into a game where the mechanics don't suit it at all. And when it comes to save points, many times you are stuck in a long chasm between them. I also feel the game could have done a much better job explaining what needs to be done. For a game that can and will kill you in an instant when entering a new area, it would be nice to know where I need to be generally before I run out of healing items.
I spent so much time trying to find my way in the huge world, that I became insanely powerful. I got a great sword that I used that was insanely strong. I used it, and pretty much began to become a boss myself. In the end, the last boss, Gwyn, who was the creator of all the turmoil that had happened, was an interesting, but not very crazy fight. He used a long flame sword, and the thing that threw me off, was that he was in such a small area. I was anticipating a long dungeon, with many hidden save points and mini bosses, but after fighting 7 knights in a wooded area, I found him in a tower. He rushed me, but was easy to time and hit. What made him dangerous, was the fact that he could vary his combos and rest very quickly, so if you got caught in his reset, you could end up trading with him and taking death damage. Unlike Monster Hunter, there is no chance to whittle away at the enemy. You usually die in 2 consecutive hits. Your healing items will quickly disappear. The key is to beat the boss as quickly as possible.
I appreciate the design, and I think I will enjoy the new game plus even more. While difficult, it was more of a strenuous ordeal than one that required insane skill. I'll keep playing it for a bit, but I must say, I wish it had more cinematics and explained lore. Still, it was amazing, and addictive for the last couple of months. So I give it a knightly 8.8/10
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