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From Software The Dark Souls II Megathread™

cvv

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People on Codex actually defending DS2, the fuck happened to you guys?

Um, this is not the post-vanilla time, the tide has turned years ago. Three brilliant DLCs and a remaster came in the meantime if you haven't noticed. Now if you still play the DS2 hater edgelord YOU are the weird one.
 

Jarmaro

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Dark Souls 2 is good "relatively" to other games, but not to Souls series. I've finished my SotFS playtrough just yesterday, right after 2x Dark Souls 1 run, so I got fresh comparisions. Only early part of the game is really good, rest is a running circus.
Entire combat design is placing as many spamming mobs as possible, in every location. Only few bosses (DLCs bosses especially) are memorable and engaging, rest is easy, forgetable mess.
 

praetor

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Only early part of the game is really good, rest is a running circus. Entire combat design is placing as many spamming mobs as possible, in every location.

dude, at least try making it look like you played the game. because by statements like these you're either a bad liar or just plain stupid
 

Steezus

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Only early part of the game is really good, rest is a running circus. Entire combat design is placing as many spamming mobs as possible, in every location.

dude, at least try making it look like you played the game. because by statements like these you're either a bad liar or just plain stupid

What are you takling about? Especially Sotfs has just an unreasonable bunch of mobs in the weirdest and nonsensical places. DkS2 in general is a case study of weird ass enemy encounter and level design.
 
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Surf Solar

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Only early part of the game is really good, rest is a running circus. Entire combat design is placing as many spamming mobs as possible, in every location.

dude, at least try making it look like you played the game. because by statements like these you're either a bad liar or just plain stupid

What are you takling about? Especially Sotfs has just an unreasonable bunch of mobs in the weirdest and nonsensical places. DkS2 in general is a case study of weird ass enemy encounter and level design.

I replayed DS1 recently and currently am halfthrough DS3 and both of these games have lots of encounters where you are spammed with hordes or mobs. DS3 even more so.

I personally dont have anything against it, but dont pretend that only DS2 has that.
Where does the hate for that game come from anyway? Because muh holy Miyazaki didnt partake in it?
 

Perkel

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Most DS weapons in the same category are functionally the same while all the weapons in Bloodborne are different :rpgcodex:

Just because they hit similar that doesn't meat they function the same.

Take for example spears. You have normal spear, then you have something like pike. They are similar but they work differently.
And this doesn't come only for huge differences like spear and pike.

Bloodborne weapons are awesome but they are one trick pony, if you don't like reach on some weapon you think you would love to use then there is usually no alternative.
 

Steezus

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Both (all) Souls games have really shitty parts, but only one of them has you fighting against 5 gazillion Gargoyles because "muh difficulty" or make you unlock a shortcut only to find a bonfire 3 steps further. And it happens all the time. Replace Gargoyles with rats, Alonne Knights, Dragonriders, those horses in the winter DLC, the spiders at the Brightcove bonfire, the first half of Shrine of Amana, the way to the ancient dragon and much more.

Just compare Iron Keep and Anor Londo. Both areas have a boss that's considered difficulty by the majority of players. Ornstein & Smough and Smelter Demon. After unlocking the shortcut in Anor Londo, all you have to do is run past 3 Silver Knights and 1 Giant and that's it. There's a second giant and an archer, but they virtually pose no threat during the boss run.
After you unlock the "shortcut" in Iron Keep you have to run through like almost 10 Knights before you reach the bridge and then you have to deal with even more knights + archers. It's a complete shitshow of artificial difficulty.

And it's less because of muh Miyazaki. I'm sure there are people out there who can successfully replicate his formula. It's because Tanimura or whoever the director was, clearly misunderstood everything about the difficutly in earlier games.
 

Strange Fellow

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Both (all) Souls games have really shitty parts, but only one of them has you fighting against 5 gazillion Gargoyles because "muh difficulty" or make you unlock a shortcut only to find a bonfire 3 steps further.
I have mixed feelings about the DS2 gargoyles. On the one hand, they're a painfully blatant rehash of the boss from the first game. On the other hand, it's one of the most fun fights in either game, IMO. Just perfectly balanced.
 

Steezus

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Both (all) Souls games have really shitty parts, but only one of them has you fighting against 5 gazillion Gargoyles because "muh difficulty" or make you unlock a shortcut only to find a bonfire 3 steps further.
I have mixed feelings about the DS2 gargoyles. On the one hand, they're a painfully blatant rehash of the boss from the first game. On the other hand, it's one of the most fun fights in either game, IMO. Just perfectly balanced.

I'll give it that it's probably better balanced than Four Kings(which is the second DkS1 boss it rips off), since that's just a DPS race and DkS2 gargs stop spawning (I think) after there's three active ones, but there's zero reason for the fight to exist. There's not even a story justification why a bunch of DkS1 gargs have their club house next to the Bell Keeper PvP covenant. It's lazy and endemic to Dark Souls 2's problem of just shoving a bunch of unnecessary fights and mobs into the game.
 

ColonelTeacup

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Both (all) Souls games have really shitty parts, but only one of them has you fighting against 5 gazillion Gargoyles because "muh difficulty" or make you unlock a shortcut only to find a bonfire 3 steps further.
I have mixed feelings about the DS2 gargoyles. On the one hand, they're a painfully blatant rehash of the boss from the first game. On the other hand, it's one of the most fun fights in either game, IMO. Just perfectly balanced.

I'll give it that it's probably better balanced than Four Kings(which is the second DkS1 boss it rips off), since that's just a DPS race and DkS2 gargs stop spawning (I think) after there's three active ones, but there's zero reason for the fight to exist. There's not even a story justification why a bunch of DkS1 gargs have their club house next to the Bell Keeper PvP covenant. It's lazy and endemic to Dark Souls 2's problem of just shoving a bunch of unnecessary fights and mobs into the game.
Gargoyles are there to defend locations from intruders. Especially those of an evil nature. As an undead you are corrupted and they are defending the bell covenants headquarters from corrupted creatures or evil creatures like you.
 

Steezus

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Gargoyles are there to defend locations from intruders. Especially those of an evil nature. As an undead you are corrupted and they are defending the bell covenants headquarters from corrupted creatures or evil creatures like you.

I think the actual reason was that they were set up by Prince whoever to stop people from trolling him by ringing his GF's bell.
 

ColonelTeacup

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Gargoyles are there to defend locations from intruders. Especially those of an evil nature. As an undead you are corrupted and they are defending the bell covenants headquarters from corrupted creatures or evil creatures like you.

I think the actual reason was that they were set up by Prince whoever to stop people from trolling him by ringing his GF's bell.
I blame vaatividya for this idiotic theory.
 

Steezus

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Gargoyles are there to defend locations from intruders. Especially those of an evil nature. As an undead you are corrupted and they are defending the bell covenants headquarters from corrupted creatures or evil creatures like you.

I think the actual reason was that they were set up by Prince whoever to stop people from trolling him by ringing his GF's bell.
I blame vaatividya for this idiotic theory.

I kinda admire him for scamming people out of thousands of dollars by making up a bunch of shit. Dude still got more than a 1000 patreons but he hid the monetary value. Probably because people started to wonder why they pay him so much, lol.
 

ColonelTeacup

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Gargoyles are there to defend locations from intruders. Especially those of an evil nature. As an undead you are corrupted and they are defending the bell covenants headquarters from corrupted creatures or evil creatures like you.

I think the actual reason was that they were set up by Prince whoever to stop people from trolling him by ringing his GF's bell.
I blame vaatividya for this idiotic theory.

I kinda admire him for scamming people out of thousands of dollars by making up a bunch of shit. Dude still got more than a 1000 patreons but he hid the monetary value. Probably because people started to wonder why they pay him so much, lol.
At least it's over. With no more dark souls ever being released, it can finally rest.
 

Steezus

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Gargoyles are there to defend locations from intruders. Especially those of an evil nature. As an undead you are corrupted and they are defending the bell covenants headquarters from corrupted creatures or evil creatures like you.

I think the actual reason was that they were set up by Prince whoever to stop people from trolling him by ringing his GF's bell.
I blame vaatividya for this idiotic theory.

I kinda admire him for scamming people out of thousands of dollars by making up a bunch of shit. Dude still got more than a 1000 patreons but he hid the monetary value. Probably because people started to wonder why they pay him so much, lol.
At least it's over. With no more dark souls ever being released, it can finally rest.

Having 1217 patreons right now is far from over.

Sekiro's release is coming up and lmao @ no more Souls. Dude's set for the near future.
 

Surf Solar

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Dark Souls 3 is the biggest offender when it comes to bonfires right next to each other. Try harder.

Just off the top of my head you have the following 'hordes of mobs' in DS1:

Firebomb hollows after first bonfire in Undead Burg/room where three mobs at the same time attack you. Right after that outside again three enemies plus one archer from the small tower.

Undead parish, the part where you stab the boar in its ass, lots of the same enemies at once. Undead parish, a literal mob of hollows plus the channeller.
Torch wielding mob of hollows right before the butcher at the depths. Lots of rats or basilisks attacking you at once in the sewers. Blighttown is absolutely chockful of this trash from top all the way to the bottom. The skeleton wheels, actually the catacombs in general are full of this. Demon Ruins/Izalith, no words even needed. Anor Londo right in front of the painting, literally dozens of the same painting guardians. Once again lots of hollows, rats and particulary wheel skeletons in the painted world. Forest has two dozen samey treepeople. New Londo ganks you with ghost mobs. Want me to go on?

If you dont see any of the same encounters turned up to eleven in DS3 you might actually be retarded or have rose tinted glasses. It's at times much 'worse' than DS2.


I put it like 'worse' becauese none of these encounters are really difficult and the same goes for DS2. If you actually complain about alonne knight difficulty I don't know if you are joking or really bad.

Yes DS2 has bad levels or parts of them. But so do the other two. You're being a hypocrite if you only criticize 2 for it.
 

Villagkouras

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All three games never managed to communicate that locking to enemies is just a tool, especially for one on one encounters. Make the players understand that releasing the lock is useful in enemy hordes, boom, problem solved.
 

Steezus

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Dark Souls 3 is the biggest offender when it comes to bonfires right next to each other. Try harder.

I'm specifically comparing DkS1 and 2. Read harder. Also, I wasn't complaining about finding a bonfire one after another. I was complaining about making my way through a big ass area, unlocking a shortcut and finding a bonfire 3 steps next to the shortcut, thus fucking level design with a Dragon's Tooth sized dildo. Again, read harder.


Firebomb hollows after first bonfire in Undead Burg/room where three mobs at the same time attack you. Right after that outside again three enemies plus one archer from the small tower.

Undead parish, the part where you stab the boar in its ass, lots of the same enemies at once. Undead parish, a literal mob of hollows plus the channeller.
Torch wielding mob of hollows right before the butcher at the depths. Lots of rats or basilisks attacking you at once in the sewers. Blighttown is absolutely chockful of this trash from top all the way to the bottom. The skeleton wheels, actually the catacombs in general are full of this. Demon Ruins/Izalith, no words even needed. Anor Londo right in front of the painting, literally dozens of the same painting guardians. Once again lots of hollows, rats and particulary wheel skeletons in the painted world. Forest has two dozen samey treepeople. New Londo ganks you with ghost mobs. Want me to go on?

Have you noticed how those encounters are almost always comprised of super trash mobs that pose no danger individually and the ones I mentioned are all high tier enemies? Rats being the only exception, but I was talking more so about the two rat boss fights. There's almost always a tradeoff in Dark Souls 1 when it comes to encounter design. You're not gonna find a dozen Silver Knights attacking you at once when you try to run to the boss fog. Of course there are exceptions to the rule, but they're few and far between.

I agree with you 100% on the Skeleton Wheels and Izalith's Dragon Legs are obviously dumpster juice.

I also want to highlight that the bomb hollows in the Burg are great, since they only trap you if you're careless enough to fight the shield hollows on the narrow bridge. It's good design.


I put it like 'worse' becauese none of these encounters are really difficult and the same goes for DS2. If you actually complain about alonne knight difficulty I don't know if you are joking or really bad.

akshually drk soulzz is not dyffykult :cool:

Yes DS2 has bad levels or parts of them. But so do the other two. You're being a hypocrite if you only criticize 2 for it.

Literally my first sentence in the other post was "Both (all) Souls games have really shitty parts" you chucklefuck. All of them have bad levels. Non DLC Dark Souls 2 is the bottom of the barrel level design wise. The tree stump I had to kick over in Huntsman's copse gave the real world ass cancer. Coupled with the fact that DkS2 has the most individual problems, it's easily the worst game in the series.
 

Jarmaro

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And it's less because of muh Miyazaki. I'm sure there are people out there who can successfully replicate his formula. It's because Tanimura or whoever the director was, clearly misunderstood everything about the difficutly in earlier games.
Tanimura replaced previous director about year before release, and according to inteviews and talks he decided to scrap entire game and rebuild it. We cannot know for sure if game is better or worse for it, although it definitely hit it in some way, i.e locations continuity.
 

Jarmaro

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Firebomb hollows after first bonfire in Undead Burg/room where three mobs at the same time attack you.
Bullshit. Two trash hollows yhat you can kill in one, max two fast hits and one dude with shield that enters the room from other door oon the other side. Their attacks are also slow and obvious, I haven't heard of anyone that would have problem with place.
Bomb throwers are useless as they cant hit you once you enter. I think the only reason they are here is to interrupt player in trying to jump to lower balcon from hole in the wall. How can you compare this to DS2 mobs that most of the time go at you in 4-5 packs from both sides? I don't remember if that was the same in basic DS2, but in Forest of Giants you have location in which you are ambushed by 5 hard to kill Iron Turtles + invaded by NPC. All of that in tight spot.

Undead parish, the part where you stab the boar in its ass, lots of the same enemies at once. Undead parish, a literal mob of hollows plus the channeller.
You mean that place where you can just walk few steps right to be able to fight those 2 hollows and be safe from Boar as it can't reach you there? You are either trolling or delusional. Trash mobs that die in one hit, that you face in a corridor from the start, with free space behind so you can go back as far as you like. Also, the caster doesn't respawn. Without him there would be no challenge there.

Torch wielding mob of hollows right before the butcher at the depths. Lots of rats or basilisks attacking you at once in the sewers.
I actually played this moment few hours ago. You are on stairs and you deal with torches one after one, they also charge at blindly which leaves them open to attack. They die after one hit from 95% of weapons. Literally trash mob that's supposed to punish you fi you reckless. Bassiliks are a joke, they only difficulty is to not get baited into killing them while standing in death fog that casting takes them few seconds. Only with rats I can somehow agree, but they are in gropus beceause they are trash mobs and alone they are useless, mostly they come in groups 3-4. Back to you beceause they are eating some shit.

The skeleton wheels, actually the catacombs in general are full of this.
"Full"? By what definiton? They are only in two areas of the game, first on the road to pinweheel, 4-5 wheels that are difficult only if you ignore them and try to rush it to the boss, from my experience spawn is delayed so you have problem only if you didn't manage to kill them before others spawn and if fighting in open space. They actually require you to think and stand next to a wall so they stop after they miss you, they are memorable beceause they are unique and require diffrent approach. In DS2 you run around like clown 24/7 beceause enemies come from all directions. Second appearnce of wheels is in Painted world, but there they are used differently beceause instead of open space you fighting in tight corridors in mini labirynth, which feels more like playing bomberman and avoiding the bombs than fighting them. Just as if someone, you know, designed those encounters instead of spawning few of them in the same place and labeling it "difficult".

Demon Ruins/Izalith, no words even needed
Izalith is by most people considered the worst part of DS1 and it indeed is overcrowded with enemies. But still it's not on the level of DS2 spam.

Anor Londo right in front of the painting, literally dozens of the same painting guardians
You fight them one by one, max two beceause of their aggro range and how far way from themselves they are placed. This is also only such place in the game and guardians exist only to protect the painting, as is explained in lore. Walking above them is much more difficult. Ariamis is middle-endgame location and at that point in which you can access the painting they are trash. I think you don't even need to fight them, just skip them by going right or left, they stand at the center.

Once again lots of hollows, rats and particulary wheel skeletons in the painted world.
Nope, about wheel skeletons undergorund stronghold I wrote above, the only enemy that can be considered spammy is Phalanga ripped almost 1:1 from Demon's Souls and indeed it's shit enemy in my opinion. You encounter it only there.

Forest has two dozen samey treepeople.
What do you mean by that? You are having hard time only if you rush ahead and ignore everything around you (considering your arguments you must've done a lot of that), so you don't notice when pop out. You can also spot them if you look at the ground and kill them before they have time to react.

New Londo ganks you with ghost mobs.
Yes, and it's irrtaiting, but they are supposed to suprise you by going through walls. Only last room where you up with ladder may be considered spam beceause they placed too many of them there, but they die in one hit and have long attack animations so they aren't that challenging. In similiar situation in DS2 when you try to open the door leading to crossroads in a forest you are jumped by 6-7 shreks who need 2 or more hits to die, all that in small room.
Dark Souls 1 low points are DS2 ordinary.

Want me to go on?
Yes, beceause so far you are just making a fool of yourself. Try harder.

If you dont see any of the same encounters turned up to eleven in DS3 you might actually be retarded or have rose tinted glasses. It's at times much 'worse' than DS2.
I didn't play DS3 so I don't claim anything about it.

As I said previously, I don't consider DS2 a bad game, I think it could be great but was fucked up and is visibly inferior, even if it's still good in overall.
 
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Black Angel

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Just off the top of my head you have the following 'hordes of mobs' in DS1:

Firebomb hollows after first bonfire in Undead Burg/room where three mobs at the same time attack you. Right after that outside again three enemies plus one archer from the small tower.

Undead parish, the part where you stab the boar in its ass, lots of the same enemies at once. Undead parish, a literal mob of hollows plus the channeller.
Torch wielding mob of hollows right before the butcher at the depths. Lots of rats or basilisks attacking you at once in the sewers. Blighttown is absolutely chockful of this trash from top all the way to the bottom. The skeleton wheels, actually the catacombs in general are full of this. Demon Ruins/Izalith, no words even needed. Anor Londo right in front of the painting, literally dozens of the same painting guardians. Once again lots of hollows, rats and particulary wheel skeletons in the painted world. Forest has two dozen samey treepeople. New Londo ganks you with ghost mobs. Want me to go on?
Adding to Steezus points, do note that all these encounters (except for Demon Ruins, Izalith, and Painted World, and most of the game's post-Lordvessel) can be lured and dealt with one by one. Most, if not all of properly designed encounters in Dark Souls 1 was meant to keep players on their toe, so that they approach each and every unfamiliar areas slowly, and always looking up what's behind the corner, instead of blindly rushing forward.

Meanwhile, back at vanilla Dark Souls 2 at least, it was a fucking shitshow of a mess. I don't know how it is now in SotFS (though I remember seeing OnlyAfro's screenshot that it was still the case at release, if not actually much worse), but you can't lure enemies one by one, most of the time; try attacking one of them in the distance, and they ALL came rushing at you. The Forest of the Giants is the prime example off the top of my head, I had to abuse the ladder to deal with the mob near the Hedge Knight individually.
Also, it might be a plus for PvP, but the nerf to stamina in Dark Souls 2 is what made boss-rush much harder, if not outright impossible. Yes, you can wipe out encounter respawn after clearing them... what, 15 times? But I feel being able to boss-rush like in Dark Souls 1 is much, much more preferable.
 

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