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Demon Souls / Dark Souls


AshVilla

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1 minute ago, Chindie said:

It's one of best games ever made. Absolutely not for everyone though.

Sounds very challenging. But a non-turn based RPG is right up my street.

Probably won't get round to it for a while. I've got Skyward Sword to get through first (I'm crap at having two games on the go at once)

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22 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

I've picked up Dark Souls Remastered on the Switch. Never played it before so looking forward to it

I'm always quite jealous when I read that someone is going to play it for the first time.

As mentioned a zillion times, easily my favourite series of games and I've finished DS1 countless times. But that first playthrough is amazing. I've still yet to find a game with such a uniquely bleak atmosphere,  and once you start exploring and find how superbly interconnected the whole world is, it's just wonderful.

It's not a game that clicks with everyone, but if you get into it, you're in for a treat.

Hit me up if you need any tips mate.

Edited by Designer1
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There's a couple of things about Dark Souls for me.

Firstly I don't think there's anything in gaming that touches the feeling of succeeding in a Souls game. Banging your head against a boss or a section, coming close and failing, then having a complete right off, and then finally doing it, is unparalleled. 

And then it's the lore. Or moreover the way the story and it's world is told. Dark Souls doesn't have lore dumps, or anything really that explicitly exists to tell you what is happening. An item description will give snippets of a wider story, but everything has to be interpreted, or derived from hints in the world. It's fantastic.

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29 minutes ago, Designer1 said:

100% physical shield = win.

I've passed them now (thanks to some manic dodging) but I'm not sure my shield choice would've made a difference. I'm still using the Grass Crest shield which is 95% I think, the issue was they just trapped me against a wall and smashed through my stamina.

I only ended up inside the painting in the first place because I coincidentally saw it in a Gameranx video a coupld of days before. Anor Londo looks nice. Iron Golem was.. a boss? Currently navigating a(nother) narrow walkway whilst being shot with giant arrows by two giant armoured knights. Genuinely feel like the environment has been my most challenging enemy thus far, even most of the enemies seem to fall off things just as often as I do.

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35 minutes ago, Delphouneso said:

Currently navigating a(nother) narrow walkway whilst being shot with giant arrows by two giant armoured knights.

Ah, you've met the...

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  • 2 weeks later...
20 minutes ago, Delphouneso said:

Bed of Chaos is an awful boss. Actually all 4 of the bosses I've fought down here in fire town have been pretty disappointing.

BoC is rightly regarded as the biggest pile of bullshit boss in the games series.

When I do my No Death runs, I have to use the firebomb tactic to avoid all the bollocks.

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There's a few issues with the combat in this game but I think my biggest problem is that you can only dodge in four directions whilst locked on. Took me a while to discover that's why the combat felt so clunky and I feel like it really hampers the game.

In Bloodborne choosing whether or not to lock on felt like a tactical choice, in this it seems unless you're using a shield and blocking your way through fights locking on is just a hindrance so I've basically played exclusively unlocked since about Capra Demon onwards, the problem with that is blocking, parrying, running attacks and jumping attacks are much harder to execute unlocked, which hasn't been a huge issue because none of the bosses have been too challenging anyway - or they're so big they're hard to miss - but it makes the combat feel quite unintuitive and it can be quite awkward constantly having to manually recenter the camera.

To balance this moan with a positive I just started the DLC and mechanically the DLC bosses are an instant upgrade on everything else I've fought so far, faster, more aggresive, more unpredictable and more challenging. Artorias is the first boss where I've had to actually learn his moveset and look out for his tells. Unfortunately these bosses just emphasise the above issue.

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Finished NG7 with my Giant Dad build the other night so I'm going to have a long break from it now.

Obviously having Elden Ring on the horizon will help when I need my Miyazaki fix 🙂

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Manus would be a much better fight if his combo was a grab. Maybe it's just cause I'm running a low vit build but I can avoid the first two hits and the rest will still kill me at full HP. It's annoying that he can start it whilst you're staggered too making it an unavoidable one shot. /rant

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Okay I'm done.

I feel like I've had a lot of issues with this game but overall I've enjoyed it. The combat is clunky and the environment is infuriating, but I did enjoy the world it was set in. Though I'm not sure why I spent four bosses worth of time in Izalith and only one in Anor Londo. The DLC is great too, I don't know how much time passed between its release and the main game but it feels way more polished, the bosses are a real step up in quality and difficulty too.

Worst bosses:

1. Bed of Chaos - doesn't need explaining.
2. Capra Demon - dogs are annoying anyway but two of them and a boss in the game's smallest boss arena, coupled with one of the most infuriating boss runs to even get to the arena in the first place - I didn't enjoy this one.
3. Ceaseless Discharge - its hitbox doesn't line up with its animations which makes it difficult to dodge and it can also hit you through walls. It seemingly only has two attacks and thus makes for a pretty uninteresting yet potentially frustrating encounter. Also has a name that sounds like an STI.

Best bosses:

1. Artorias - plays like Orphan of Kos lite. I'm generally more a fan of humanoid bosses anyway but he's everything you want from a good boss. Aggressive, fast, varied and unpredictable moveset, great arena, great music, great back story. I'm assuming he can't be parried (I'd given up trying to parry bosses by this point) but it would be great if he had a tiny parry window on of or two of his attacks too.
2. Ornstein and Smough - best boss in the main game by a distance, Anor Londo is one of the best areas of the game and this was a really fun boss with a minor puzzle element. (I killed Ornstein first btw)
3. Bell Gargoyles - I could've put Kalameet here but as frustrating as I intitially found the gargoyles they taught me a lot about the game's mechanics and I find myself looking forward to fighting them again.

Honourable mention to my favourite NPC: Hawkeye Gough. That guy should voice audiobooks.

Despite there being a tonne of weapons, armour, spells and play styles to explore I feel less enthused about subsequent playthroughs of this game. There are certain areas I just have no interest in going through again (Tomb of the Giants I'm looking at you) and I'm not sure the main game is challenging enough to tempt me into any challenge runs. That being said it's time to go watch some VaatiVidya lore vids and figure out what I need to platinum.

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Glad you still enjoyed it despite its flaws.

- I love Tomb of Giants! Atmospherics are superb, and when the giant skelly doggos attack its some serious heart racing stuff. The Maggot headpiece is a must though. First time I went there without it by mistake. Didn't end well.

- you'll kick yourself when you see how you're supposed to kill Ceaseless Discharge.

- if you do another playthrough I suggest going Sorc and using an int scaling weapon (the spear that you can create from the Moonlight Butterfly is my weapon of choice). It's really fun seeing how differently it plays from range.

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6 hours ago, Designer1 said:

Glad you still enjoyed it despite its flaws.

- I love Tomb of Giants! Atmospherics are superb, and when the giant skelly doggos attack its some serious heart racing stuff. The Maggot headpiece is a must though. First time I went there without it by mistake. Didn't end well.

Maybe this was why I hated it. I was using the skull lantern which meant permantly holding L1 the entire time I was in that place (which also prevents you from jumping), also meant I wasn't able to use a shield, and with low vit most of those enemies 1 or 2 shot me.

 

6 hours ago, Designer1 said:

- you'll kick yourself when you see how you're supposed to kill Ceaseless Discharge.

'ceaseless discharge cheese' is one of the more interesting phrases I've typed into Google.

 

6 hours ago, Designer1 said:

- if you do another playthrough I suggest going Sorc and using an int scaling weapon (the spear that you can create from the Moonlight Butterfly is my weapon of choice). It's really fun seeing how differently it plays from range.

Yeah this is definitely how I'd approach a subsequent playthrough, I really enjoyed a glass cannon playthrough of Bloodborne despite how clunky and limited the 'spells' are in that game, it'd be nice to have a go in a game with a more in depth magic system. Though I did find pyromancy largely useless in this run.

 

Also I have to say now that I've finished the game I'm massively impressed you managed to make it through the whole thing without falling off anything. Did you include the DLC in your no death run?

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  • 4 weeks later...

So I'm an idiot. Just got to the Giant Blacksmith on NG+2, bought the final weapons I needed, platinum didn't ping..

I bought the cursed Artorias sword twice. Because I'm an idiot, and because the game gave them both the same **** name.

What do I do? I really don't want to have to complete this playthrough and play NG+3 up to this point again, but starting a NG means getting the Very Large Ember again I think in order to get a +10 weapon? Are there any skips I can utilise?

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45 minutes ago, Delphouneso said:

So I'm an idiot. Just got to the Giant Blacksmith on NG+2, bought the final weapons I needed, platinum didn't ping..

I bought the cursed Artorias sword twice. Because I'm an idiot, and because the game gave them both the same **** name.

What do I do? I really don't want to have to complete this playthrough and play NG+3 up to this point again, but starting a NG means getting the Very Large Ember again I think in order to get a +10 weapon? Are there any skips I can utilise?

Ouch 🙁

There's no way around it iirc apart from asking someone to drop it for you online in a co op session.

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