Are you still finding the combat clunky? It's funny, how much I care that combat is clunky is directly proportional to how vulnerable I am.

I just easily cleared New Londo, in DS1, and killed The 4 Kings. I was pretty much waiting a good 5-10 seconds between each king being spawned, whereas I think the idea is to clear them as fast as possible so that they don't stack up on you. The only annoying thing about the area was that I had to use a lesser but cursed weapon, since I didn't want to be rushed into exploring as fast as possible with the ticking time bomb of the transient curse instead of the cursed weapon. But even that was a piece of cake after upgrading the cursed weapon to +5.

Anyway, I'm feeling the whole game is pretty much busted for me in terms of difficulty. I'm way too overpowered. It's still very fun to explore and see the interconnectedness, but otherwise in terms of difficulty I'm way too relaxed for a DS game.
 
danutz_plusplus said:
Are you still finding the combat clunky? It's funny, how much I care that combat is clunky is directly proportional to how vulnerable I am.
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Now that I got used to it, I find the combat mechanic in DS3 quite fluid and logical. Even the kick-problem doesn't bug me any more though it still happens from from time to time.
 
Do you think the combat in DS1 is really that clunky, or do you think perhaps it might just feel that way because it's slower? DS3 and Elden Ring are quite a bit faster than DS1 & 2.
 
Combat is mostly good, when you get used to its ways and quirks. But anything involving environment traversal or platforming, you can never be sure what will happen. Especially in combat or in moments of stress.

Of course, I'm saying this now when I'm overpowered to hell and back, and could basically play this with my eyes closed. As I said, the more risky the situation, the less margin of error you have to work with, the more you notice the quirks. And frankly, the game sometimes does not feel very balanced. Shields are just unbelievably overpowered, if you have the stamina to take the hits. It's just so much easier to just hold up a shield, let it go in-between hits to recharge stamina faster, and then hold it back up again. On the other hand, with rolling, you're gambling the farm. So much more has to go right for your roll to be a successful one.

Currently I'm working towards using, what seems to be, the strongest shield in the game. Besides 100% physical damage reduction, if I have the stamina and I do, it's also got just very high numbers for all other types of damage (magic, fire and lightning). Basically I'll be almost unbeatable, aside from environmental deaths which can easily take me out. It's very volatile that way.

But yeah, also, it is definitely very slow compared to their later games. They obviously made chose to go with that faster and more reactive combat design. In DS1 if you do more than 1 tap for rolls or attacks, you constantly find yourself doing that roll or attack even 3 seconds later, after for ex getting off the floor out of a fat-roll. Most recent key strokes seem to be queued and will execute later when they can be. You do not cancel out. And especially with a fat-roll as I'm playing, I'd have to be extra careful. If I weren't overpowered and could easily take the hits.
 
danutz_plusplus said:
In DS1 if you do more than 1 tap for rolls or attacks, you constantly find yourself doing that roll or attack even 3 seconds later, after for ex getting off the floor out of a fat-roll. Most recent key strokes seem to be queued and will execute later when they can be.
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I don't remember it being that bad, but it's been awhile since I've played DS1. I can see how that would be frustrating especially after playing much faster games like Bloodbourne.

It almost sounds like a framerate issue, but I doubt that's the case with the system you have.
 
I've cleared everything in the Dark Souls base game, aside from the final fight which ends the game. But I still have the Artorius expansion content, which I just started.

Accessing the expansion's content was absolutely insane. This is basically what you have to do:
1. Find a particular very secluded area, that I completely and easily missed the first time I was there. It's pretty well hidden in the back of that area, where you would least expect something to be.
2. There you fight a golden golem and free an NPC who tells you of her world, out of a different time
3. You then have to either go back, or go there for the first time, and fight/refight a, what seems to be, a random ice golem. There's been loads of these across this whole game, but apparently that's the one you need to kill, but only after having freed that NPC. I cannot see any reason what that golem is the one, but whatever. More madness the better :D
4. Go back to that same area to initially found that NPC and you'll find a portal to access the expansion area.

It's insane the amount of loopholes and how hidden this is. And just to access the expansion you bought.

I've been wondering this for a lot of the obtuse and obscure stuff in this game, how is it that they are discovered, since a lot of them are so "random". But this one in particular, I'm really curious. Do the game guides come out around the same time the game is out? But even so, do the people writing those get help from the developers?

Anyway, I just find the thought funny, of I-don't-know-how-many people buying the expansion, at its first release when information isn't readily available, and just spending a lot of time just finding out where the hell the entrance to the expansion is.
 
Yep, that's typical Fromsoftware. Even in their earlier games, things were always quite vague and there were tons of hidden areas.

For the DLC though, it's probably one of those things that was posted online almost immediately by someone, and other players just Googled it.
 
JDR13 said:
Yep, that's typical Fromsoftware. Even in their earlier games, things were always quite vague and there were tons of hidden areas.

For the DLC though, it's probably one of those things that was posted online almost immediately by someone, and other players just Googled it.
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Yeah, but that first one though. I cannot imagine that was done very fast, unless someone had the unbelievable good luck to stumble onto the right path. Even so, that luck would need to strike twice, one to find that area, or go back to it if they have found it initially. And then to find that random ice golem.

I like imagine hundreds of players just scouring the game, losing hope, and then someone probably finds it. But I'd be curious how that all went. I wonder if there's been any youtube short documentaries about something like that.

EDIT: Yeah, it seems they kind of gave it away in the release trailer of the expansion. And that ice golem isn't there initially. Yeah, that eases the burden quite a bit. Yeah, it would've been completely insane to not give any hints or help. But it would have also been so FromSoft.

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danutz_plusplus said:
Yeah, but that first one though. I cannot imagine that was done very fast, unless someone had the unbelievable good luck to stumble onto the right path. Even so, that luck would need to strike twice, one to find that area, or go back to it if they have found it initially. And then to find that random ice golem.

I like imagine hundreds of players just scouring the game, losing hope, and then someone probably finds it. But I'd be curious how that all went. I wonder if there's been any youtube short documentaries about something like that.
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I think you're underestimating how popular Dark Souls was. It wouldn't have been hundreds of players, it would have been thousands. I'm pretty sure the entrance to the DLC would have been found and discussed on Day 1 even if it hadn't been in that trailer.
 
I like secret stuff that's a bit hard (though not impossible) to find, but it's funny to imagine an entire add-on that nobody can figure out how to start.

The worst hard to unlock thing that I've ever encountered in gaming, and I don't think it will ever be beaten, is all the shit you have to do to get the good and proper ending for the original Valkyrie Profile. It involves, among other things, failing at one of the main activities of the game, an act that is one of the central goals and the raison d'etre of your character. There is no way to anticpate that you should randomly fail in your task a couple of times.

I remember reading the various requirements in a hint book as I was nearing the end of the game, long after I would have been able to fulfill them. Never finished that game. Which was a bummer because it was very enjoyable in general.

Btw, this isn't a matter of a few minutes or different cutscenes at the end... the good ending of Valkyrie Profile is several hours long. Missing it means missing a huge chunk of the game.
 
The only time I struck not being able to access a DLC was when there was glitch to an encounter in Skyrim that meant I couldn't start the Dawnguard DLC. I had already killed a bear before owning the DLC, and that screwed things up. Tried all suggestions to fix it, ended up using some console commands. This was a long time after the bug was known about too...

Re: Dark Souls
Had a bit of a go at DS2 over the last couple of days. Your character definitely feels more mobile than in the first one. Enough so that I fell off cliffs a couple of times, doh. :)
If you want to play on PC with mouse and k/b you're going to have to do some serious reconfiguring, though. It doesn't have the relatively sensible default controls of DS1, e.g. "Use" defaults to shift plus left mouse click, normal attack with RH weapon defaults to right click, and many others that are not the "norm".
 
And I beat Dark Souls. As expected, all bosses in the expansion, which even the guide I'm following for anything I might have missed says are among the toughest in the game. Kalameet, Artorias, Manus. Gwyn gave me a scare here and there since he kept grabbing me. But again, I seem to be so overpowered that I can just brainlessly push forward and take punishment.

Overall it was nice, but even as annoying as it was to keep dying I have to admit that those tension-filled moments were the best. I also enjoyed being overpowered, as catharsis after taking so much abuse. But it was way more exciting working my way towards being overpowered.
 
Shagnak said:
The only time I struck not being able to access a DLC was when there was glitch to an encounter in Skyrim that meant I couldn't start the Dawnguard DLC. I had already killed a bear before owning the DLC, and that screwed things up. Tried all suggestions to fix it, ended up using some console commands. This was a long time after the bug was known about too...
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Why did killing a bear prevent you from starting Dawnguard? That perplexes me.
 
JFarrell71 said:
Why did killing a bear prevent you from starting Dawnguard? That perplexes me.
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The intro quest for the DLC requires a bear to be in a certain cave so you can help some dude kill it. You can't get past the intro quest and into the DLC proper unless the quest is progressed, and the quest can't be progressed if the bear is not there.

Better explanation here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrim/comments/74sgsn
View: https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrim/comments/74sgsn/dawnguard_quest_glitch_gunmar_and_his_bear_are/


From what I understand, the bug still exists.

EDIT: it's close to the beginning, but theoretically, you've already started the DLC at this point, so... bad example.
 
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In order not to be too negative about Dark Souls 2, I'd like to at mention one good positive. They seem to be have done away with the action queuing in the first one. Now if you click when your character is not ready to swing, he will just ignore the command. So this forces you even more to only click when he obviously seems ready to, or most likely you'll find a cadence and rhythm to the swinging, that works. That I like quite a bit.

The combat does also feel slightly different, and I'm not sure why exactly. I'm also feeling some differences in how your control your character relative to the camera movement. They seem to be more decoupled from each other. Which is not really something I like, but I'll live with it.

Another weird thing is now they've apparently introduced another stat, vigor for health. And now vitality is how much equipment load you can bear? That is really weird. Maybe it's a mis-translation.

Overall, aside from the negatives, I'm quite enjoying this. Even though I said I liked that teleporting was disabled in DS1, I think I'm coming around to liking it more that it's available from the start. I think there's enough stress in this game to not add more. And also nicely done on the fact that now you don't have to actively rest at a bonfire to make it your current bonfire. Just lighting it up seems to do that. Love that. It might be exploitable, since theoretically you could run to a bonfire with a pack of enemies on your trail, and light the bonfire just to start from that point upon dying. But, we'll see.
 
I think I got the hang of Dark Souls 2 now, even though it's still kicking my ass sometimes. It's definitely a different flow to the combat especially. In DS1 I would constantly panic spam click, and most of the time I would get away with it. But in DS2 if you spam click the character does absolutely nothing until you stop your spamming. And only then take into account your latest click. So it's forcing me to learn not to click.

It's also a lot more sensitive when it comes to blocking. In DS1 I feel I would constantly and easily raise my shield at the very last moment, and successfully block. Not so much over here. If you're caught in an enemy's animation, you have to back away to have a chance to block. At least that's how I felt it. It's also probable that my character's poise stat also has an effect on this.

Anyhow, so far I've been really enjoying DS2. I don't really see where the negativity comes from so far, but then again I'm too early. The one thing which I am mindful of, and thus setting my expectations accordingly, is the fact that the world will not be as interconnected. But that's fine. As long as exploration is still decent. I can roll with that.
 
I'm making very little and slow progress in Dark Souls 2, but it's still enjoyable. Getting my ass kicked left and right. And had my first encounter with a Pursuer, apparently this big ass knight is gonna keep harassing me throughout the whole game? It's gonna be a pain. I had to run away from him.

The combat system is so much more finicky than DS1, and requires even more patience and rhythm in how you attack. Or maybe I'm just too early on. And even the lowly enemies feel that much more aggressive, and tend to attempt to break you out of your swing and slash routines.

Blocking with a shield feels nowhere near as overpowered as it did in DS1. I can no longer just raise the shield at the last moment and stop the incoming swings. And more often than not I panic and start spamming. It's quite a significant challenge.

Plus, I know next to nothing about particular locations, layouts or where to go in DS2, compared to DS1. I had started and stopped DS1 so many times, plus watched so much footage of it that I was already familiar with a lot of the context. In DS2 it actually feels like an almost virgin experience. And as painful as that is, I also want to treasure that, since I never got that in DS1, having watched plenty of streamers best that game a long time ago, and also being much more familiar with it also due to the impact it had on the gaming community, compared to DS2 which not discussed nowhere near as much.
 
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