Scuzz
3321
Kind of. For some reason there is a lot of hate for DS2 in the general community, which I don’t understand. But I think on the whole people tend to love the one they started with best. DS2 gets some of it’s dislike probably from FROM’s re-issuing of the game and requiring you to pay twice for it. But the DLC that SOTFS comes with makes it worthwhile.
DS3 is different because of the quickness of the fighting. It has so many call backs to the previous games but the fighting is more stylized and just plain faster. But it is still a great game on it’s own. They all are.
I can only speak for myself. The reason I hated my DS2 experience is complex.
DS1 makes you feel really elated when you butt up against something hard, and you keep trying over and over until you overcome it and you feel great.
DS2 SOTFS made me feel like I’d been defeated because it stops spawning the enemies that were giving me trouble. So I didn’t have to learn to beat them, I can just outlast them.
This even carried over to some bosses. It was a terrible thing to go up against the Pursuer, and almost beat him, only to die, but then to go back to that spot and find out he’s gone. He beat me, and then he left. Once again, making me feel defeated.
So for me, DS1 was about overcoming difficulty and feeling like you accomplished something great. DS2 SOTFS (can’t speak to the original DS2) is about beating me down and making me realize I’m not that great after all.
Scuzz
3323
The re-spawning I think was a bad idea. Although it took something like 12 or 15 times before they quit respawning. And the game did give you the bonfire aestetics (sp) so you could replay an area.
As for the Pursuer, he does return to every area except the opening one. At all his other spawn points he returns if you die. Fighting him becomes almost a rite of passage as you die to his first visit (who doesn’t) and then eventually find him to be not much of a challenge.
I do think there are changes made to the original DS2 in SOTFS that are not for the better however.
Spect
3324
I love DS2. Still play it quite a bit. The only thing I really hate about it is the DLC. Iron Passage and the boss it leads to can fuck right off.
The place where the Pursuer first shows up isn’t meant to be the “boss room” for him. I believe From placed him there to fuck with people, and once he kicked your ass, he disappears back to his proper room. This initial fight used to be completely skip-able (still is if you want to wait for the items on that platform). He’s also totally cheese-able in his proper boss room, so there’s that. Now that I’ve played so many times, I don’t die to Pursuer anymore, and even take him out in his first preview appearance area now, without cheese. That’s what is awesome about Souls games, is that you can really master the boss fights with practice.
I also love souls 2. Of the three it is the only one I finished and even went halfway into new game+. It takes the grittiness of souls 1 and expands upon that. 3 is more polished seeming, which is good and bad.
Add me to the list of people who prefer DS2 over DS1 (and DS3). It was my first real exposure to the series, which is undeniably a huge part of that, but I also really like the mood and story, and the combination of despawning enemies and increased availability of NPC summons made it feel much more accessible.
There were a lot of thinkpieces back in the day but we don’t need to bring it back up. Suffice it to say that most of the unwashed Souls fans really liked Dark Souls, which was a new and exciting experience for them, and they were annoyed Dark Souls 2 was different.
That position held up until the genre expanded and the same people kept complaining about the same things with other games, not just DS2.
What they’ve failed to realize is they’ll never get that same experience again. They have changed as players just as the games have changed as well. The only solution is to embrace it.
(I’m basically ranting at dirty redditors so don’t be offended if any of this sounds like you.)
DS2 is a solid effort from the B team to fill a hole in the schedule between two Miyazaki masterpieces.
Interesting take. Was it a totally different studio, with different artists, programmers and what not, or just a few different folks at the helm? Not trying to be snarky, honestly don’t know.
ShivaX
3330
I didn’t care for DS2 mostly because “dude in armor” gets a bit old for a boss idea.
The DLC helped a lot with that, but almost all the original bosses are just big knights of some variation.
It also made some weapons kind of crap and others really good. Everything is some dude in heavy armor so a Lightning Mace is like the king of weapons pretty much the whole game. If you wanted to go with spears most bosses were kind of annoying.
Giant dragon-things, spider ladies and demons offer more interesting enemy variety than dude in armor, lots of dudes in armor, really big dude in armor. And most of the non-dude-in-armor bosses were kind of gimmicky ones.
Mostly just joking. I like DS2 but not as much as Demons, Dark or BB. But they are different teams, Bloodborne development started after Dark Souls was finished. DS2 had already started.
Sekiro is all dudes in armor and it’s amazing for it. The worst bosses are the Dark Souls ones!
ShivaX
3333
Most of Sekiro is humanoids, but a lot of them aren’t in armor. It’s a completely different game anyway.
Man that Artorias fight…I thought I had it down, but it took me quite a few attempts before I beat him last night. Those dodge rolls have to be precise boy. Very much enjoying this whole area. Descending into the abyssal ruins of Oolacile is quite the thing. I’m assuming they dug too deep, so to speak, and uncovered some dark shit.
These many-eyed beehive-headed enemies are amazing. Maybe my favorite so far. The creepy laughter just echoing off the ruined landscape, golden. I can do without the void hadoukens though. They are owning me hard. Got to the room with the ghosts and then stopped for the night.
Lotsa love for DS2 in here, very cool.
I can feel the end of DS1 quickly approaching, which I’m of mixed minds about. Very eager to move onto the next game, but also a bit sad, because this was an experience I’ll never have again.
Playing Sekiro was amazing, especially since I was able to experience it in real time with the rest of the forum/community, and I absolutely love that game, but it didn’t give me the same feeling I’ve had playing DS1.
There’s something quite unique about how austere the whole game is. Like you’re a peon dropped into a world of giants. The discovery, story, mystery, and progression is something I’ll never forget.
Yeah, there’s something special here. I think Dark Souls 3 (I’ve only played the beginning) also tries to capture that feeling and gets there too. My first Souls game was Demon’s Souls. I know someone half-jokingly presented the theory above that your first Souls game is your favorite because you never capture that feeling again. And I really clung to my experience in Demon’s Souls being the best for a while. I was reluctant to embrace the changes in Dark Souls.
But the game won me over. Demon’s Souls was special because it was my first Soulsborne game, but Dark Souls is special because it’s the best Souls experience. They do things with atmosphere and level design and enemy design and a combination of all of the above that adds up to more than what the other games do, in my opinion, of course.
Now I really do need to finish Bloodborne’s DLC and get back to Dark Souls 3 again. From what I played in the beginning of that game, they once again do things with the atmosphere and sound design and enemy design that I think was missing in Dark Souls 2. Something that makes it special again, not just from the perspective of pure game mechanics.
Spect
3337
The Souls franchise must be still doing really well. The 3 Souls games have been removed from Gamepass and PSNow and are all selling for full price on PC and consoles.
DS3 Delux - $85
DS3 - $60
DS2 SotFS - $40
DS1 Remastered - $40
Scuzz
3338
In all three games I think as a whole you can argue that the worst bosses were the 4 required boss souls in each game. It was the bosses you fight to get to them that are the best, with exceptions. But DS2 does have some great bosses, the Pursuer, the Twin Sentinels, the Sinner, the Mirror Knight etc.
Scuzz
3339
The Dark Souls games do go on sale from time to time but when you consider how old some of them are it is surprising that the prices haven’t dropped. Remastered was recently $20 on Steam and a few other services, and I know DS3 with the DLC was recently at a pretty good discount.
Remastered killed Prepare to Die Edition, and with it, the multiplayer community! Irredeemable sin.
