Topic: Dark Souls Remastered \[т]/

@NEStalgia I had to google what a Nopon is... Never played Xenoblade .

I've tried magic in Dark Souls... I had some fun with a pyromancer, but I've always gone back to playing either an utter tank slamming about the most giganting slab of metal I could find or an agile warrior type dashing about with nary a plate on them, parrying and stabbing anything and everything.

If I do incorporate some magic into my toons it'll usually be miracles, as is the case with my current guy. Which works out dandy because the Dragonslayer Spear scales well with faith as well. And, of course, Sunbro forever with the lighting spear; which I've upgraded to the Greater version the other day.

It's actually one of the cheapest, easiest ways of playing Dark Souls; turtling up behind a greatshield and just poking with a spear untill whatever's desperately desperately trying to claw your face off keels over from 47 stab wounds to the face.

But it's still just as fun as my very first playthrough. And I don't think this'll be the last.

Be careful there are ways to break shields especially bosses that hit so hard that it usually breaks your guard

I never trust blocking with shields since if they break your form, you're going to be toast. So dodgerolls are my way to go.

@Bart_T Found the Iaito. Worst comes to worse I can upgrade that.

@NEStalgia Magic is great in this game. I am with @brainofgrimlock . I don't know why people dont like it.

Oh, I think I need to play something else for a while... It feels like I’ve sold my soul to Dark Souls!

Gaping Dragon is down, took for the first time some help from other players (it’s cool that you can summon others) which made it easier. But I went back to Firelink Shrine instead of going to Blighttown. Need to farm some moss first!

@zionich It's powerful... and I also find it boring. I don't find that much joy in hanging back throwing fireballs or destroying everything with just a few attacks like tempest and Dark Bead.

Melee combat is a lot more dangerous, and while there are also really powerful weapons like the Black Knight halberd (which is disgusting), in general the higher danger just makes it more fun for me.

@EvilLucario Understandable. I lean more Paladin/Tank as well.

@EvilLucario I'll give you that the melee in DS is definitely a much more unique experience than other ARPGs, and that makes it interesting to play, but all that said, it's still not exactly Monster Hunter, and even MonHun has ranged options.

Heck the discovery of magic gives me a reason to give Bloodborne a second chance, one last time before I just delete that monstrosity once and for all (I got it for free and feel like I overpaid.) Dark Souls, at least 1 and 3, I find very addictive in a weird way. Bloodborne I just can't stand playing at all.

It's kind of like two games. As a knight it's an action combat game with RPG elements. As a mage it's a proper RPG But I do perceive the whole game, world, and systems of the game very differently playing each, kind of like switching from third person to first person cockpit in flying or racing game. But I always play mages going back to the old D&D games, TES, Diablo, etc. Only weird thing about Souls is usually mage classes make the beginning of the game extremely hard, only to become OP by the end. With Souls, the infamously hard game is made easier in the beginning with a mage starter.

IMO I'm starting to think that souls isn't as "hard" as the legends say so much that the terrible translation makes it more obtuse than the things you found perfectly fine with Xenoblade It suffers from Fal'Cie syndrome. They had to come up with their own words for common things so you don't know what they're talking about. You start as a mage and have no idea how to use magic and the first thing they give you as a broken sword, then shield, then dagger. Then you finally get a "catalyst" after you played the beginning as a melee fighter, with nothing explaining that a "catalyst" is just the Pulse L'Cie version of a magic staff. Then you can "kindle a bonfire" and "attune magic" (equip spells), and of course there are "covenants" which I still don't know what they are.

I can't help but think if the game actually used recognizable names for anything it would instantly be easier. Once you navigate the proper nouns hurdle it starts feeling a lot more like a traditional game.

At least there's no RNG blades....

@zionich Well EvilLucario's the kind of player that makes RPGs as hard as possible with self imposed restrictions to make it "more fun" "No healers, max DPS only!"

@NEStalgia I believe what you get in the Undead Asylum changes depending on what class you picked. I picked a thief as my second character and got completely different gear from the knight. Instead of a longsword and a more broad shield, I got a knife and a circular buckler. So I think mages get different gear if you picked mage classes at the start of the game.

That said Dark Souls was intentionally designed as like a sort of mistranslation of medieval books the creator read in his youth. He didn't fully understand what the stories exactly was, but he got the general gist of it. That translated to Dark Souls' obscure storytelling, and with inspiration from Zelda 1 and how secrety and cryptic that game was, that's how we got Dark Souls 1.

There's so many missable things in this game it's not funny. On my first playthrough, I completely missed an optional boss, two areas (which apparently make up 10% of the game world), almost missed the DLC, and barely did NPC sidequests. Lots of obscurity in this game, and it goes beyond the terminology.

And yeah I like to push myself lol, which is probably why I didn't find Dark Souls 1 to be terribly challenging. It took me 30 hours on my first playthrough to beat it and only one boss really got me over and over.

The clases at the start only change your initial gear and the initial stats. But you can start a mage and end up a warrior

@EvilLucario Yeah, it does. The mage gets the leather buckler and dagger where the knight gets the sword and shield, but also gets the "catalyst" (please just call it a staff, FROM!) instead of a soul from the floor near the zombie where ball rolls down the stairs opening the key giver, so the mage actually gets two weapons in the asylum. But it's confusing because you start with spells on your menu but no idea how to use them. It's times like that I miss printed manuals.

Cool origin story for the game. I hadn't known that. Still, mistranslation aside, important gameplay mechanics are probably better off with understandable names rather than 80's obscurity that was based mostly on bad Japlish translation. I wonder what words are used in the JP versions. Probably something more sensible. But yeah the obscurity ....I get, and like the obscurity in things that make you explore to understand. I'm not keen on the obscurity where you don't actually know what you're looking at while you're actually looking at it (NPCs, etc.) I know there's that huge monster stomping under the boss arena in the asylum....it's the first thing you see in the game. No idea how you access that. Nor the locked door on the top floor before you jump down into the asylum demon. And that's the obvious stuff.

What is a covenant though? (And don't say Master Chief's enemies.)

I think these games are generally challenging enough without "pushing yourself" to make it worse. Then again, that run to undead burg is now easy. The fire throwers suck though. It's a little bit, accidentally, like Mega Man. once you memorize the level and know enemy placement much of the challenge evaporates. The game relies a little on memorization and momentum, outside bosses.

@leoes12 Well yeah, ya don't wanna tank every single hit, and you'll wanna move around and lower your guard to recover your stamina at the right time. But generally, with a good stability shield (like a great shield) and some clever manouvering you can make most bosses look like absolute punts. I took down O'nS half a dozen times over the weekend in co-op, mostly acting as a tank while everyone else got their spank on.

@NEStalgia Covenants are basically "guilds" that give you some benefits. Not very important benefits and they aren't all too beneficial and I believe most of them are for PvP, but otherwise I don't think they're too important.

As for the second demon in the asylum, it's actually a secret of the game. You can actually head back to the Undead Asylum by making your way to the giant bird's nest, curling up, letting it carry you back, then you can access the boss by a breakable floor you fall through from the Asylum Demon fight. The key to that door you mentioned is also on top of the church-like building in the Firelink Shrine.

Yeah, this game is obscure as hell. At times it works for it like with the vast amount of secret cool stuff, and other times it's... meh with hollowing and kindling.

@EvilLucario I had the Crestfallen Knight talk about seeing someone curled up in the birds nest and whisked away. I wouldn't say it was a big secret. Just have to actually listen to the NPC's. ( Unless this was a Remastred addition)

Woohoo! Took down the Gaping Dragon on my second try! Off to Blight Town.

@EvilLucario Wow, that's a pretty obtuse way of finding the very first monster you see in the game

And yeah, hollowing and kindling make such little sense without reading.

@Bart_T true but that's coop on my current playthrough I'm soloing all bosses so I can't really hide behind a shield

@NEStalgia i could give you a guide for covenants but I don't want to spoil it to anyone else
@EvilLucario covenants do more than you think and can be pretty fun

@leoes12 Sure you can! Just make sure to only do it when they're swinging at you, and to poke them with a sharpy when they're not.

@EvilLucario Well, yes, most are for PvP. But not all, and most actually give you access to certain spells and equipment that you otherwise wouldn't get.

And remember, when in doubt, go Sunbro.

@EvilLucario

And don't forget to mention that you need to return to the Asylum in order to get the 'key' that lets you enter the Painted World too. My favourite area in the game.