Dark Souls: Flee! Run Away! No Country for Old Men!

The Game Room
1

I blame my son, the Err Apparent. This game is munching my brain. It is fiendish, evil incarnate, it sucks the life right out of you and leaves only a shambling, un-showered, unshaved husk of what was a mature and intelligent man. Or might have been, at some point. I don’t remember…

Japanese, of course. Their program of revenge continues…

Not that he plays the damned thing, oh, no! Being one of those ironic hipster metrosexual lame-o kids these days, he prefers something more wussified, like Skyrim.

Get off my X-box! Its a beautiful Minnesota day, barely below freezing, go outside and play! Take a Greyhound to Iowa and back, its a kicky experience. Better still, walk! Its good for you, it builds character! (I swore I would never say that…)

Flee! Run away! If you see the box in your presence, pick up with tongs and carry it to Gamestop for resale, buy a bottle of rotgut vodka with the money, you’ll be better off!

I have only one note of approval: the controller is built to endure being flung across the room with great force. It bounces, drops, settles and gloats. This monstrosity has already consumed thirty hours of my time! OK, forty. Fifty, tops. Its got a counter that, presumably, measures time spent on the game, but it lies! It LIES!

I need a titanite slab? There are no titanite slabs! The titanite cake is a lie! Dung pie is real, of course.

This is the thanks I get. His Mom wanted to name him Sunshine Rainbow, but I wouldn’t let her. Years of wisdom and sagacity in abundance. And he does this to me!

Remember: youth and skill is no match for age and treachery. Soon. Soon.

2

So, um, a summary of the gameplay mechanic?

3

I’m intrigued by your ideas and wish to subscribe to your newsletter!

4

/me quickly runs the post through his elucidator-ese translator program:

He’s saying he liked the game!

5

Let’s hang out at the quarry and throw things down there!

This game, Dark Souls. I’m intrigued. Tell me more, please, OP.

6

Kinda hard to aim with this. Everything depends on your degree of previous infection. Do the words “Penny Arcade” invoke Coney Island to you? When you hear words like Zelda, Doom, Metroids, Halo…do you feel a reminiscence of sensation, like remembering really spicy sex? If not, it is unlikely that you will grasp the crux of the biscuit, here.

One prevailing theme of video games you might call the quest meme. Usually a sort of sword and sorcery theme, enemies to be conquered, spells to be applied, strategic decisions regarding the deployment of unicorn. There’s a buttload of them, frequently a series of puzzles and mazes that get increasingly difficult, the difficulty balanced against advantages gained by experience. Typically, each separate episode climaxes with a “boss fight”, some exceptionally difficult enemy who must be overcome to get the Diamond Dragon Ninja Sword and ten thousand hit points, and the option to ravish a maiden. Or be ravished by one, depending on preference.

There is a fine balance to be struck with difficulty, how to make the puzzle/fight difficult enough to be interesting. Most game makers were sensitive to this problem. Make the game too simple and short, the customer feels like he didn’t get much for his money. Make it too hard, you got grown men calling your customer service line pretending to be calling on behalf of their kids.

Dark Souls (and, to a large degree, its predecessor, Demon Souls) broke the mold. They deliberately made a complex, rich, and visually satisfying game that is intentionally hard. Tricks and traps abound, you are waltzing with a radioactive porcupine in a minefield. One minor mistake can send you on a three hour quest to get back to where you were. Fuckin’ love it.

7

That still doesn’t tell me anything about what it is. Is it a puzzle game? A strategy game? An explore-the-map-looking-for-hidden-treasures game? Real time or turn-based, or a hybrid of the two? Do you control a single character, a small group, a large group? How does your character or characters interact with the world: Do they pick up and put down objects, hit things with weapons (and if so, what kind of weapons), get things to chase them into traps? Is there an ultimate goal, or is it just survive-as-long-as-possible?

8

I gather that it’s a particularly brutal real-time action RPG. Sort of like Skyrim, only designed by a dungeon full of sadistic emos.

9

May the Google be yours. Serially, if you’re into this kind of shit, odds are real good you already had heard. I have no idea how much education you want on this subject, but it is freely available, there’s a considerable amount of intertube real estate devoted to it. A portion of that consists of weeping and gnashing of teeth. A considerable portion.

And there’s more than the usual amount of collectivity about it as well, lots of info threads of people asking other people for info.

“Well, did you trying ramming the 9-foot Crystal Razor Spear up his ass? Lot of damage.”

“No, I was trying to complete the Spell of Forlorn Encystment, but my necro points are too low…”

“Bummer, dude”

10

Let me take a stab at this. Dark Soul is a console action RPG game with your standard character development mechanics and dungeon crawling. It reminds me of Nethack, but real time.

In Dark Souls, you die. A lot. You could fail to notice a death trap and just step into the way of a slicing blade. Or while you were dodging an enemy attack and fall off a cliff. A ghost may suddenly come through the wall and attack you from behind. Or you are in an area with foes too strong for you.

Despite it being an action game, Dark Souls is not a button masher. You have time each strike, each block and each dodge. You have to consider the terrain, who you are fighting and what sort of weapons you are using (for example, using a two handed sword in a narrow corridor is a bad idea as you may end up hitting the wall instead. Much better to use a spear). You even have to time when you drink a healing potion (you can’t cancel the animation - it takes about 5 seconds. I’ll imagine Skyrim would be much harder if you actually have to physically drink the potion). The game never pauses, even when in the inventory screen.

You don’t have 99 potions. At the start of the game, you only have 5 and you can slowly increase the limit by getting certain key items. Spells are D&D-ish - you don’t have mana, but each time you rest, you regain usage in a spells. For example, every 1 slot you give to a Heal spell, you get 5 uses between rest.

Each time you die, you lose souls, which is your XP and currency for getting new items. You will respawn at the last bonfire you rest at (which also replenish your healing potions and spells). However, when you rest, all the enemies in the current area respawn.

The game is difficult, but apart for one boss (so far) it’s not cheating. You will see hints around you where’s a trap, be it a blood stain or a corpse. It requires you to be on alert when you are exploring a new environment.

This game has a fixed storyline, but offer infinite replay with New Game+.

Here’s a really great article on Dark Souls - What Dark Souls is Really All About

11

I’m going to go ahead and guess which boss you’re referring to:

Capra Demon?

I’ll agree, that one is hit or miss, and very little has to do with you…it’s just how the “environment”, for lack of a better word, spawns when you face him.

12

There is also a sense of community with its slight multiplayer nods. For example in the first game you would see bloodstains on the ground where players that were playing the game at the same time had recently died, and clicking on them showed you a ghostly image of their last few seconds of life. Kind of an early warning system that actually worked incredibly well. The game is hard but it makes you better as you play it, you know when and how you fucked up and the next time through you will have an idea of what not to do.

13

Reflects poorly on Christianity, I fear. I mean, c’mon, Jesus, three days to re-spawn?

14

Indeed. I did that over 20 times before saving up to get Magic Shield. And now they nerf that too.

15

I think I’m missing the gene that allows me to get enjoyment out of frustration. So it’s not for me, thanks.

16

There is one cardinal rule in Dark Souls, as there was in Demon Souls: Pay Attention.

I’m currently on NG+++. For those unfamiliar with the system, the reward for beating the game is being able to start it again with your current level and most of your equipment, but the game is significantly harder each time. Each time you beat the game, you add a plus sign - so I’m on the fourth playthrough.

And yes, it’s hard. But I really don’t like that term; I prefer to think of it as demanding. It demands that you pay attention at all times. That embossed pavestone? Pressure trigger. Those swinging axes? Will drop you into a pit filled with really, really hard enemies if they don’t outright kill you. That rumbling noise you just heard combined with the apparently worn tracks you’re standing in? Enormous boulder coming your way.

But the game makes this level of difficulty feasible by having a very, very exact control system and a completely logical battle mechanic. What I mean is, if you have a rapier and a buckler, poking the enormous skeleton clad in titanic armour and a huge shield isn’t going to do a lot of damage - unless you can get behind him or stagger him to find the flaw in his armour. And if he connects with one of his - slow, telegraphed - blows from that enormous hammer, you’re not going to be able to block that with a 1’x1’ piece of wood. Get out of the way, instead.

In fact, I can only really think of one instance in the game which struct me as unbalanced/unfair aside from the boss fight mentioned above. It involves a very narrow catwalk over a long abyss which you have to cross while being shot at. Unfortunately, the people shooting you are using three metre tall bows and their arrows are the size of javelins.

17

Why do I get the feeling you’re in Sen’s Fortress right now? :stuck_out_tongue:

Also: I’ll add the only thing I found bullshit in this game: The Great Hollow. Platforming should NOT EXIST in a game with the wonkiest platforming controls ever conceived.

18

So, you’re standing on that …patio?..where the three lightning demons were most recently dispatched. There is a narrow ass walkway that leads down to another where two more are waiting and the javelin snipers are taking potshots.

However, just to the “north” of this walkway there is another, except this one doesn’t seem to lead anywhere worth going. BUT! if you inch along and keep careful watch, you will find there are a couple of spots where, with a good bow, plenty much arrows (esp. poison), and the Hawk Ring, you can find a narrow vantage to stick them. Done right, they don’t seem to know you’re there, if they catch on, back up two steps and they can’t hit you. Wait a tic, rinse, repeat.

Gotta have the Hawk Ring, won’t work without it. But stick those guys with a half-dozen poison arrows each, and watch them die! Die! Die! Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!

19

“Platforming”? My people do not know of this thing.

20

Elucidator, I’m sorry, but your posting style in this thread is getting serious flashbacks to Instructions for a Help. :slight_smile: