Dark Souls II - What they can do to make it better @ Kotaku

You know, I liked Skyrim, but I thought the exploration and discovery elements were a little much. After all, they were basically a marketing ploy. -Any- game can have exploration and discovery.

They should create a whole new Skyrim mode where I don't have to travel outside of towns or major dungeons at all. I don't even want to find them originally. Just zip me from story point to story point. Maybe even skip the battles. I don't really like battles.

Maybe they could add a multiplayer Kart-racer mode? I like those games.
 
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It will be interesting to see what the Dark Souls people think is best for their franchise.

Either they are going to try to be more accessible to reach a broader audience like Skyrim, get more sales, more notoriety, more open sharing of ideas, etc. Or they are going to stay with their niche audience and just try to please those core gamers, and in essence isolate themselves from the broad audience they could have captured if only they had made some changes.

I for one, hope they become more accessible. An easy mode, a very easy mode, more tutorials, etc. Give the casual gamers a fun experience with your game as well.

I look at Skyrim. There are what, 4 or 5 difficulty modes? And Master is challenging, for those who want it, and Novice or whatever is easy for those who want that. It's not hurting anybody to have those options.
 
It will be interesting to see what the Dark Souls people think is best for their franchise.

Either they are going to try to be more accessible to reach a broader audience like Skyrim, get more sales, more notoriety, more open sharing of ideas, etc. Or they are going to stay with their niche audience and just try to please those core gamers
No, it's not "interesting", it's worrying.
Beside, the whole premise is stupid. The game isn't a niche product because it's too hard; if anything, being rumored as very challenging dragged it out of the niche their developers lived in for years.
From Software is developing games since the early '90s and Dark Souls it's the first game that made them famous worldwide.
But I can imagine these corporate managers babbling of this kind of bullshit in their offices already:
"Hey, our game was successful exactly because of how unique it was.
But I'm going to tell you: what it needs now? To be exactly like any other fucking game around".


It worked so well with other franchises, after all.

I for one, hope they become more accessible. An easy mode, a very easy mode, more tutorials, etc. Give the casual gamers a fun experience with your game as well.
I genuinely can't understand this kind of mindset. Is this some sort of stealth trolling?
If you like simple, piss easy, idiot-proof games, there is so much on the shelves already. Most of what's on the market today, actually.
Why exactly would you enjoy to *ruin* even this franchise for everyone who loves it?
And YES, I'm saying "ruin" because that's what a easy and straight -forward Dark Souls 2 would be for me: a ruined franchise. A game that would lose all the appeal of the previous one.

There aren't too many games these days that don't insult our intelligence, so one would think their existence should be celebrated (and to some degree it is) but apparently someone feel treated by them.
"Oh my god,to play this I would actually need to learn something, instead of mashing the green A(wesome) button until my thumb hurts. That's a scary thought".

I look at Skyrim. There are what, 4 or 5 difficulty modes?
Aaaand funnily enough, not a single one is good.

And Master is challenging, for those who want it
No, it's not. Neither challenging or fun or even rewarding, for all that matters.
Plus, the game lacks any sort of balance, with pretty much every single kill easily becoming "game-breaker" if adequately exploited (and I actually mean every single one, from combat to crafting).
 
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Tuco, your attitude is garbage, and I hope game developers don't listen to self-righteous gamers like yourself who put yourself on a pedestal for playing your super cool niche game.

Once you get off your high horse we can have a discussion. Until then you can buzz off with your garbage attitude.

You're just afraid that someone else is going to have fun with your precious game.
 
That's what I like about Dark Souls. That's not to say the balance is perfect or that the game is anywhere close to perfect.
It is actually. Somewhere quite close to perfect, that is.
Like every game in existence, it has some issues, of course.
I think it's an archaic practice that needs to go
I think there´s nothing really archaic about
a) filling a game world with opponents of different strengths and other characteristics
b) putting in some challenges one has to overcome to proceed further
and I especially despise "puzzly" boss fights that have nothing to do with an actual tactical battle or common sense.
In the whole game there´s a single boss fight (a certain Bed) that I´d put into this "puzzly" category of yours.
Then there´s one (a certain demon with dogs) that, at least according to my experience, is set up in such a way that luck plays bigger role in it than it in my opinion should.
Overcoming the other ones is all about tactics, common sense and good eye :).
 
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Tuco, your attitude is garbage
And your opinion is uneducated and worthless, as you clearly don't understand the first thing of game design, system design or anything related.

and I hope game developers don't listen to self-righteous gamers like yourself who put yourself on a pedestal for playing your super cool niche game.
I don't give a single damn about your hopes.
Beside, what's up with this "super cool pedestal" bullshit once again? What's that? Some sort of inferiority complex you are secretly harboring?

You actually don't get it, do you? People don't praise this game because it makes them "feel cool", for Christ's sake.
People praise the game because they enjoy it a big time.
So please, go to sell this "elitist on the pedestal" bullshit to someone who buys it, someone as clueless as you.
 
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I'm sure I understand more about game design then you.

Your idea of game design is isolation. Keep all the cookies for yourself. I know your type.

My idea is inclusive. I like many to share the experience and have fun. All types of people - young, old, disabled, etc.

I'm sure the first time you saw a young child playing your precious Dark Souls, you would be the first one to say how the company sold out, they're garbage now because *gasp*, even KIDS can play the game now!

You're like the fan of some obscure indie band that you don't want anyone else to find out about and listen to. You're selfish. So are the others in this thread who can't concede the simple OPTION of giving casual gamers an easy or very easy mode.

But hey, the Dark Souls people will ultimately make their choice. Let's hope they make the right one (and don't listen to people like you).
 
Because that stupid "easy mode" would have a huge influence over the game's design, no matter how blindly people like you will keep claiming otherwise.

It's like with the fast travel argument in RPGs like Oblivion/Skyrim: "You can just ignore it!!!1!".
No I can't, because when the game is designed around the idea that the player will be able to warp distances at any time, that affects the design of everything: quests, landscape, content distribution and so on.

Fast travel is an in game mechanic people are expected to use. And Morrowind also had tons of traveling all over the place (I think it was worse than Oblivion) during quest and people did not like which is one of the reasons fast travel was added to Oblivion(though I used fast travel in MW via the console). Beth made an error and ignored the fact that some people like in game travel fast travel methods, while I don't use in game fast travel or normal fast travel until I have play for a long time(at least 100 hours, in Oblivion, Fallout 3/NV,etc I do like in game fast travel because it makes the game world more believable. Skyrim did much better as it had in game fast travel, faster travel(horse) and fast travel. But that is besides the point(and besides the modding).

If Dark Soul had a difficulty setting changer via console I would have no problem. Its a simply stat adjustment I am looking for, deal x% more dmg or take x% less, no adjustments of anything else. No altering of game, it would not make sense to alter the game. Unlike Morrowind where there were a lot of complaints from the community about the lack of fast travel and other things(and the change did not affect the basic TES game play, after all, every TES but MW has fast travel), here it seems that only a small portion of people compare to the masses are interested in difficulty settings. And that part of the key appeal in Dark Souls is the challenge unlike fast travel in which only made the open world design even more accessible to those who like open world games.

Also it had no fundamental effect on the game(as I said Morrowind had you going all over the place and it was even more annoying to many, not to me as I just used the console, but still). And a simply easy mode with stat adjustments would have not mean any design difference. How would added a easy mode patch to a game already made affect the design of the game anyway? Not that I think this simple method of adding a easy mod, adding it almost as an afterthought would make a difference to a new Dark game anyway.

I did a quick check and it does appear that cheat engine already has a bunch of things it can mess with in Dark Soul's, how I love pc gaming. Though every game should have better mod support, I mean TES games are amazing as you can craft them into whatever you want, but at least something is better than nothing. And with mod support the players can just add in whatever they feel like.
 
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I'm sure I understand more about game design then you.

Your idea of game design is isolation. Keep all the cookies for yourself. I know your type.
no, it's not.
My idea of game design is "Be true to your vision, don't try to please everyone, make the game you want to make and it will find its audience naturally".
And that's because if you "fail" to reach success doing what you were trying to do, you will at least have a genuine product, while if you fail to cater to a broader audience, you will be both a failure and a whore in terms of artistic integrity.

My idea is inclusive. I like many to share the experience and have fun. All types of people - young, old, disabled, etc.
Well, your idea is silly. The whole idea that everything should be for everyone is intrinsically silly.
No wait, it's not just silly, because something silly is usually something pointless but harmless. Your idea is genuinely TOXIC. It actively hurts this industry, flooding the market with tasteless, colorless stuff. RPGs made to cater those who can't stand RPGs, action games made for those who aren't good to play action games, strategic games without too much strategic depth because it could be intimidating and so on.

I'm not saying that there shouldn't be easy or simpler games but I'm very, very hostile to the idea that everything should be for everyone.
Is that game too hard for you? Don't fucking buy it. Don't pretend it's your right to play the easier version of it.
Or if you really don't like to actually learn and master games and you enjoy just pushing on big colored buttons, then active a cheat, download a trainer.

I'm sure the first time you saw a young child playing your precious Dark Souls, you would be the first one to say how the company sold out, they're garbage now because *gasp*, even KIDS can play the game now!
I don't care what others play, actually.

You're like the fan of some obscure indie band that you don't want anyone else to find out about and listen to.
No, I'm not, not even remotely, and you are making shit up.
Actually, I would like to see every single person on this planet playing and enjoying the game, I would like to see the developers successful.
But I would like to see them successful for what they are.

The difference between you and me is that I understand that if that success must come at the price of compromising their products, then it would be a disgrace more than a bless.

You're selfish.
And you are full of crap. And I mean it. It's not just me trying to piss you off. i'm actually baffled by how full of crap you are.
 
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Fast travel is an in game mechanic people are expected to use. And Morrowind also tons of traveling all over the place during quest and people did not like which is one of the reasons fast travel was added to Oblivion(though I used fast travel in MW via the console). Beth made an error and ignore the fact that some people like in game travel fast travel methods, while I don't use in game fast travel or normal fast travel untill I have play for a long time(at least 100 hours, in Oblivion, Fallout 3/NV,etc I do like in game fast travel because it makes the game world more believable. Skyrim did much better as it had in game fast travel, faster travel(horse) and fast travel. But that is besides the point(and besides the modding).
This is completely beyond the point, even ignoring how fast travel didn't see its birth with TES but existed long before.
Other games handled fast travels far better, anyway, nailing down that sweet spot between making movements convenient and not making the world building feeling pointless (i.e. Ultima, Gothic, Risen, etc).


the problem when fast travel is taken fro granted, like it was in those Bethesda games, is how it actively affects design.

Did you even try to play Skyrim without making any use of fast travel?
It's an awful, dreadful experience (even more than just playing the game as it is, I mean) because even for the most stupid, trivial quest like "deliver this wood spoon to my granny so she can eat her soup" you have to travel across half continent. Everyone has a task for you that implies miles and miles of travel to the most worthless shit.
Now, when you have a well designed open world game like Gothic 2 or Risen, on the other hand, world and quest designers make an active effort to keep everything at a good pacing, making you travel little distances for trivial tasks and bigger ones for "big deals".

If you make an attempt, you will easily realize that Skyrim, a mediocre game by itself, becomes literally *unbearable* if played without fast travel, at least for everyone who isn't into LARPing.

This is the subtle effect that a single feature, apparently completely unrelated to the core design, can have on the whole game, even when it's supposed to be "optional".
 
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Great, another person who acts like they have the moral high ground just because they want to take a niche product adored by a specific audience and turn it into McDonald's.

*rollseyes*

Seriously, this kind of thinking is why we have 10 million Call of Duty clones. Not all games should chase the same audience.
 
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This is completely beyond the point, even ignoring how fast travel didn't see its birth with TES but existed long before.
Other games handled fast travels far better, anyway, nailing down that sweet spot between making movements convenient and not making the world building feeling pointless (i.e. Ultima, Gothic, Risen, etc).


the problem when fast travel is taken fro granted, like it was in those Bethesda games, is how it actively affects design.

Did you even try to play Skyrim without making any use of fast travel?
It's an awful, dreadful experience (even more than just playing the game as it is, I mean) because even for the most stupid, trivial quest like "deliver this wood spoon to my granny so she can eat her soup" you have to travel across half continent. Everyone has a task for you that implies miles and miles of travel to the most worthless shit.
Now, when you have a well designed open world game like Gothic 2 or Risen, on the other hand, world and quest designers make an active effort to keep everything at a good pacing, making you travel little distances for trivial tasks and bigger ones for "big deals".

If you make an attempt, you will easily realize that Skyrim, a mediocre game by itself, becomes literally *unbearable* if played without fast travel, at least for everyone who isn't into LARPing.

This is the subtle effect that a single feature, apparently completely unrelated to the core design, can have on the whole game, even when it's supposed to be "optional".

I think I made it clear I played Oblivion, Fallout 3 and New Vegas without Fast travel for over 100 hours each. That is beside the fact that Skyrim has ingame fast travel, and beside the fact that all the TES games(well not sure about arena only played it a little) do the same thing(send you all over the place), if you don't like it then its not for you.

Many people like the endless wandering, that is why I don't like fast travel and many people don't play quest by quest, I just pick up quest and do them as able. And for those that don't like that there is fast travel, both ingame and on the map and faster travel via horses, it gets even more fantastic because Skyrim like OB and MW beforehand are basically the most customize games ever, because of all the mods. Want better travel options, mod, want to not even bother with Skyrim(i.e the province) mod, want to change this or that, mod. Want basically unlimited gameplay, mod mod mod mod. Its absurd the how much value Beth's games have.

And you may not like Skyrim but it reach the highest levels of achievement, massive games sales and popularity and extremely well received by the critics. That is a damn good game right there, when both the critics and fans line up behind you. Bethesda is masterful game maker. I don't like most non rpg's, but I do think that say a game like that new Batman game from last year which also got great metacritic scores and great sales is clearly a good game, even though I did not like it when I tried playing it.

Skyrim was just not your style of game.
 
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I actually enjoyed Skyrim for what it was. But, like you said, it's not for everybody. Neither is Souls.

That's not a negative thing for either game. A game should try to be the best embodiment of its own essence. It shouldn't be all things to all people.
 
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I actually enjoyed Skyrim for what it was. But, like you said, it's not for everybody. Neither is Souls.

That's not a negative thing for either game. A game should try to be the best embodiment of its own essence. It shouldn't be all things to all people.

If only modding support was more common then games could come closer to being all things for all people without have to "sacrifice" any core game design features. For example me using cheat engine on Dark Soul to make it easier and thus make it a fun game for me, hurts no one else. But I guess people will just say wasting time on making the game more moddable, when the core game is fine as it is.

I wish I was not so picky, but I have never played any game I would not want to change numerous things about that game, some games like the TES games come closer(and keep coming closer) but still not close enough for me to not want to change a bunch of stuff to suit my taste.
 
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I think I made it clear I played Oblivion, Fallout 3 and New Vegas without Fast travel for over 100 hours each.
Well, I'm glad for you but I'm not that much into masochism and self-punishment.
The game is already bad by itself, playing it without FT makes it unbearable for me.

That is beside the fact that Skyrim has ingame fast travel, and beside the fact that all the TES games(well not sure about arena only played it a little) do the same thing
Uh... yeah... And whoever claimed otherwise, exactly? How is that relevant to what I was saying, exactly?

And you may not like Skyrim but it reach the highest levels of achievement, massive games sales and popularity and extremely well received by the critics.
I'ts simply a bad game that fools people into thinking "that's the virtual world i ever wanted" because it has most of its fans in an audience of clueless customers without any reference to compare it.
People without knowledge of the genre or any decent standard about solid game mechanics.
If you go on any gaming forum you will easily notice that if on one hand it's true that for every 100 people playing Skyrim you will hardly find one playing Gothic/ultima/Risen, on the other hand almost everyone who played those prefer them to Skyrim.

That is a damn good game right there
I strongly disagree, and on a side note I don't know a single respectable gaming critic -with a decent knowledge of the RPG genre- who praised Skyrim beyond its obvious merits (presentation, size, production value, etc).
Then again, i'm apparently talking with someone who thinks that commercial success and press exposure must mean quality, so I should probably give up on this side argument.

I don't like most non rpg's, but I do think that say a game like that new Batman game from last year which also got great metacritic scores and great sales is clearly a good game
Arkham Asylum and Arkham City were more than good. They were instant classics.
Same goes for Mark of the Ninja this year. In fact those are games miles ahead of Skyrim in terms of tight design.

Let's be clear, because things are becoming a bit confusing here, especially with Fluent and his bullshit accusations based on the imaginary crap in his head.
I'm not one of those "posers" who like to pretend there aren't good games anymore.
I could easily point a few good-to-excellent games for every single one of the past years. Still, I'm not exactly happy with this trend for more and more idiot-proof games from bid budget studios/publishers.

Oh, and just to be even more clear about the main issue: no, i wouldn't have a problem with a "super easy mode" for Dark Souls 2, if that would not affect the core design in any way.
My problem is: I don't think it's possible. A "super easy mode" would most likely have a fallout effect on the overall design.
How can they make, for instance, a new Sen's Fortress if they have to worry about how easy it must be played in easy mode? It's not like doubling HPs would work, in that place.

Plus, let's face it, the super-easy-mode would be likely shitty to play, because as someone else put it "Dark Souls is a learning experience, if you take away the need to learn from it you are left with nothing".
Then again as I already said... that's probably ok for those who don't actually like to play games, just to breeze through them mindlessly.
 
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I just got out of Blighttown.

When on my way there, I missed the Spider shield. I didn't have any anti-toxin herbs with me either. The damn poison Blowdart Snipers shot dart after dart into me until I became green from the plague. I tried to push on and get to the bonfire at the bottom, alas my healing items ran out and I died.

Having re-spawned in the Depths, I went and got my spider shield - the best protection against those pesky Snipers. Shield in hand I started tracking them down and murdering them as painfully as I could. They were all put on high, hard to reach places. The platforms on which they stood were narrow. The Blowdart Snipers are the incarnation of trolls. They fire rapidly and it is difficult to take a swing with a slow weapon without eating a poison dart to the face, and getting intoxicated. When you get close, they push and shove, trying to make you fall or simply interrupting your attack, as if to annoy you more. I finally dealt with the ones on the way down and reached the Great Hollow.

The Great Hollow is a hollow tree, through which branches form a path to its base. To reach the base, you need to walk the spiraling maze of narrow branches. In this spiderweb of branches, various glowing items can be found on adventurers who have tried to climb down. Those are usually stones that are used to upgrade your equipment. Needless to say, they are hard to reach - you need to jump from branch to branch to get to them. My death count rose dramatically as I tried to land on those great rewards. I also chased some crystal lizards for their goodies and in the pursuit, my weapon broke.

Oh my. I've been in this situation before - no repair box, no(upgraded) backup weapon, and not a blacksmith in sight. I decided to push on with the highest damage weapon I hard - a 2H Axe with short range. On my way down, I encountered a room with basilisks, the frogs that spit out a curse cloud. Stay in it for too long and you get a curse that halves your HP. I killed them once, yet died a bit later while trying to reach a piece of treasure. The 2nd time I fought them, I did little damage and missed a few attacks and ended up being cursed. Having taken what I could from the Great Hollow, I decided that I should at least ring the second bell of Awakening before going all the way up to the Cathedral to lift my curse.

Unupgraded sword in hand, my character limping with half of his(little to begin with) HP, I went to take on Queelag. Needless to say, I got poisoned from the swamp on my way to her domain. With some pyromancy clothing I could survive one hit from some of her attacks. With damage around a hundred and slow swing speed, the fights were dragging out quite a bit more than I was used to. I died about a dozen times due to poison taking away a good part of my HP and getting one-shotted, stepping into lava puddles(that huge room becomes a mine field when the fight drags on!) and lack of experience in dodging all of her attacks. I finally managed to kill her, ring the bell and go to the Cathedral, but it was one hell of a trip.

I will NEVER forget to buy a repair box again.

From the above story, what do we need to do to have *easy mode*. I can tell you for certain that enemy health and damage divided by 2 won't cut it. You need to:
*Add invisible walls so players don't fall so much. Make everything a corridor so players don't get lost.
*Ops, we can't jump to secret places with those walls anymore. Who need secrets anyway, away with them as well.
*Poison dart dudes? They will be annoying no matter how little damage they do. They put too much pressure on the player => removed.
*Half HP curse - YOU MEAN YOU HAVE TO GO ALL THE WAY UP TO THE CATHEDRAL TO GET RID OF IT?? IT COSTS 3K SOULS?! => Curse gone.
*Weapon = worthless when it breaks? What if it does at a bad time and you can't repair it, like, right now? => Indestructible weapons.

How would this be the same game after these changes? How do you think it won't affect the core of the game for the rest of us who like the way it is designed?

If you don't understand what Souls games are about, why do you want to play them at all?
If you don't kill the Channeler before fighting the Gaping Dragon, he will buff him and shoot magic arrows at you until you cry.
If you don't kill the Firebomb Giant, he will keep throwing firebombs at you throughout the fight with the Iron Golem.
In Anor Londo, the Silver Knights will push you off the narrow path that leads to the castle with their big ass Dragonslayer Greatbows.
Ornstein will draw your attention while Smough turns you into a pancake with his car-sized hammer.
The boobs are also a fucking lie!

There are no ponies and there are DEFINITELY no rainbows here. Look elsewhere.
 
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@Tuco

Skyrim was an awesome game, I never played Gothic 2, but I did play Risen and like the vast majority of game critic thought it was much better than Risen(simply check metacritic for that, though to be fair the games did come out a few years apart), including all the people I have talk to on forum that played both, of course the Risen forum was comically small compared to Beth forums and of course going by one own experience in these matters I tend to think is faulty reasoning.

Your personal taste our your own. But I don't see how one can denie the overwhelm commercial and critical success of Skyrim. How else can a company look at game success? If I am Todd Howard here is how I think I would see my games: The critics love it, we have sold millions of copies, our games have life times far greater than any almost any other rpg's because of the mod kits, I.e the mod forums for Oblivion, Fallout 3 and Morrowind are still very active, that is how much people love our games. I don't see any other rational metric to use.

You don't like it that is fine, you have your own taste. I love them, I love the exploring,etc. I don't like Batman, CoD or so many other games that have gotten high critical praise and big sales. That is my taste, but I would not call those games bad. That seems silly to me in light of the reviews and game sales they have achieved.

When looking at such subjective things, I think the most objective way to separate your own personal taste and trying to judge something as good, bad or great or otherwise is to look at popularity and critical success. I personally like a number of games that never got great sales or great reviews, I think there great for me. But I would never list them as all time greats, or tell people that they are. Simply because it so subjective and I am just one person. On the other hand if a lot of other people like/loved the game, if it one dozen of awards from major game review outlets, etc then I would say that game is a top game and if you like that style of game you should give it a try.

I personally tend to find the critics to be very accurate, both for movie, tv shows and games. But I know its quite common for the advrage person to dismiss critic views as silly and just go see the big blockbuster. This is not science there is no right answer. Nor is there a right one to play, the people on the cheat engine forum seem quite please with the Dark Soul modding, with making it easier for them, why begrudge them that?

I think Bethesda makes amazing open world rpg's, that come far closer out of the box to being my perfect game than any other, and then with the mods I can further mold the game to be even closer to that ideal. You don't like the games, ok fair enough people have there taste. Again there is no right answer.
 
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Again: An easy mode would not "destroy" or even alter the game for anybody who wants a challenge. It would not prevent you from playing the hard mode. (No, really, it wouldn't.) It would let players decide how much time they wish to spend completing the game.

There is only an easy mode. They need to add a hard mode. You're just bad. :p

Oh, "QQ I don't have the time or interest to learn how to play I just want to be instantly good" - classic mindset of a cheater in games. Why don't you go download some hacks. So many games ruined by hackers who want their fucking easy mode.

No offense, Noting personal… It's just "make darksouls easy" is really not something you can say and expect any respect. You obviously just don't get it. Dark Souls difficulty isn't your real issue; nerdrage is.

Anyway, to add something nice… Dukes Archives is pretty near the end. It really sucks to hear you got 70 extra hours entertainment from your RPG but you should have it won in another 3. Besides you'll find you do it a LOT faster your 2nd playthrough.

So here's a mini game guide you can use to give you powerful knowledge you can then use to tailor the experience and make it easier.

☺You gotta kill Seath in the crystal area outside dukes.
☺You gotta kill Nito in the Tomb of Giants (catacomb)
☺You gotta kill 4 kings in new londo ruins. (need Sif grey wolfs ring)
☺You gotta kill some tree thing in that fire area past queelag.

Put the 4 souls in the pot then go kill the final boss.

If you have trouble there's an amazingly detailed wiki and youtube videos for every single weapon, bossfight, secret, etc who will hold your hand all the way to victory. No cheats, developer included or not, required.
 
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@Tuco

Skyrim was an awesome game
no, not really. Not a single one of its subsystems works.
From a design standpoint Skyrim is not awesome, not good, not even average. It's actually terrible.

I never played Gothic 2, but I did play Risen and like the vast majority of game critic thought it was much better than Risen
Skyrim? Better than Risen? Hell no, it wasn't.
More big, more impressive, more shiny? Sure. A better game? Not really, it couldn't even dream to compete on even ground, as Risen has a world that actually feels worthy of exploration, a combat with a resemblance of strategy and balance, quests that aren't carbon copies randomply generated, actual interaction with NPCs and so on.
Who would be this "vast majority of game critics" exactly? A bunch of clueless fratboys from some console-centric magazine?

(simply check metacritic for that, though to be fair the games did come out a few years apart)
OR you would find that most of the complaints are about how awful the console port it is or how the graphics aren't cinematic and polished enough, just to prove my previous point about clueless critics.
On the other hand, try to ask around here or visit some specialized community like RPG Codex or NMA and go to ask to RPG lovers what they prefer between Risen and Skyrim.
You will learn it's not even a contest for many of them.

Your personal taste our your own. But I don't see how one can denie the overwhelm commercial and critical success of Skyrim.
I don't deny it, I find it irrelevant to the Nth degree.

You don't like it that is fine, you have your own taste.
Yeah, I do, but I'm not talking about tastes here, I'm talking about objective mechanical flaws.
Then again I'm probably arguing with someone who actually prefer Skyrim to Dark Souls, which I find frankly comical.

And I don't care if you don't like Batman or not, that's not the point (apparently making big display bad taste for you is almost a faith); Batman is a mechanically solid game. Skyrim isn't.

I personally tend to find the critics to be very accurate, both for movie, tv shows and games
For movies, books and music I would generally agree, because usually critics are people of vast, deep competence in the field they work on, even if not necessarily of good taste.
Too bad that's not the case with game journalism, so you have people reviewing roleplay games without even knowing what's Ultima VII, the yet unmatched king of the genre. Larian Studios talked about this in one of their blogs: about how they compared their next game (Divinity OS) to Ultima and then they had to explain what Ultima was to most of these teenager "critics" from several game magazines.
It would be like having a movie critic who doesn't know what Citizen Kane is. He would laughed out of the door.

Anyway, you talk a lot to say very little of useful. But I can tell you how all your monologue about the general praise for Skyrim sounds to me: "I don't have any personal standards, I think I will let others decide what's good and what not for me".
I'm not even sure why arguing about Skyrim's metascores should be of any relevance here and now, by the way.
You are dragging this OT which is of very little interest to me (I had plenty of occasions to shit on Skyrim in other topics and in other forums) and of very little relevance with this thread.
 
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