From Software Dark Souls 3

[Murk]

Reading the last 5 or so pages, I do have a serious question.

For those who thought DS 3 was the best in the series so far -- do you still think so, and if not, what made you change your mind?

I have about 50 hours logged in (nearly all of which was during the first two weeks of its release) and I just can't be bothered to replay it.

I can't help but feel the beginning is super linear, and as soon as I get to the road of sacrifices -> swamp area I just lose all interest.

 

[sullynathan]

pvp is better than DS1 and I enjoyed certain locations and put a lot of hours into it. That's about all I can say since I haven't played it in a couple of months because my laptop is shit.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Does anyone honestly believe it to be best in the series? Most of the things it does well, Bloodborne does better.

 

[Kutulu]

For me DS 3 fails just as much as Bloodborne, might be controversial but i would put those two behind ds1&2&des....

 

[sullynathan]

Does anyone honestly believe it to be best in the series? Most of the things it does well, Bloodborne does better.

I believe it does things better than the rest of the series and that's coming from someone who never played Bloodborne past Gascogne or played SOTFS multiplayer.

 

[Haplo]

For me it's DS1 >> DS3 >> DS2.

Mainly due to the level and world design. Also I really like the Weapon Arts and was rather indifferent about dual-wielding/power stancing. PvP sucks in all.

 

[ghostdog]

Yeah maybe PvP is the only aspect that DS3 is better. I had some fun PvP and co-op sessions. Aside from that, I found it worse than DS2+exp. If the DS3 expansions are great maybe I'll change my mind. Right now I have zero desire to touch it again though. I think BB is better. DS1 is still my favorite FROM game by far.

 

[Perkel]

Reading the last 5 or so pages, I do have a serious question.

For those who thought DS 3 was the best in the series so far -- do you still think so, and if not, what made you change your mind?

I don't think anyone said DS3 is best in series.
General feeling about it is that it is better than DS2 but worse a bit than DS1.
But this isn't straight 1+1 = 2

All 3 games have their own aspects they excel at.
While DS3 isn't best DS at the same time it has best level, monster and boss design.

At the same time it is more linear than all other DS games from start so replaying game again is a bit worse than rest.

Though i don't personally count above (lack of replayability) as malus because i prefer better one time experience than 6 times doing mediacore game. So despite that i won't play DS3 multiple times like DS1 i would rather have this rather than doing DS2 multiple times which do have more non linearity but content in vanilla is just bleh.

my pers. fa. is Deamon's Souls though.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

You can only consider level design to be "good" in DS3 if you only care about the architectural layout. And even in that sense, none of the DS3 levels are better than Blighttown, Catacombs, Painted World or Latria 1. DS3 levels are nice to walk around, but they generally lack any kind of gameplay-related identity (aside from Irithyll Dungeon and maybe Grand Archive), so in that sense they're worse than even Tomb of the Giants, New Londo, Shrine of Amana, and so forth.

One of the things DS3 has over the rest of the series is its excellent endgame, however.

 

[praetor]

my personal order of preference would be DaS1 > DaS2SotFS=BB >>>>>>>>>> DaS3 > DeS, and unless the 2 DLCs are something mind-boggingly spectacular, which i highly doubt, and/or the combat is completely overhauled (there's a higher chance DeS gets a PC release than that), i don't see that changing

 

[Murk]

Does anyone honestly believe it to be best in the series? Most of the things it does well, Bloodborne does better.

Pages ago, in this thread, I recall at least 2 people saying it was their favorite/the best. This was during the peak of the hype on week 1.

So I ask, and maybe there are those who never said so, or maybe there are those who loved it early on, but grew tired of it quickly. I am just curious if it aged well.

 

[Leechmonger]

Going by single-player:

DeS > DS1 > DS3 > DS2

Demon's Souls is one of the best games I've ever played, and a fairly unique experience to boot
DS1 is a flawed gem, it added a cohesive world that can be navigated in several ways, estus flasks, etc. but also has some really terrible areas and shitty input lag
DS2 is bland as fuck (feels like a mod), the DLC saves it from being a complete disappointment. The graphics bait-and-switch was shameful.
DS3 has more memorable environments than DS2 but is let down by lack of enemy poise in the mid- and late-game

And if you care primarily about multiplayer you're looking at the wrong franchise.

 

[Ivan]

Bloodborne is great all the way through.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Bloodborne is exactly the same as DS1 - great beginning and midgame, then mediocre endgame. It starts going to shit about the time you reach the snake area in Forbidden Woods.

 

[toro]

Combat ranking: DaS2 + SOTFS combat > DaS1 combat > DaS3 combat (the same ranking for PvP).

Game world design: DaS1 world > DaS2 + SOTFS world > DaS3 world.

And the bosses: DaS1 bosses > DaS3 bosses > DaS2:SOTFS bosses (debatable: DaS2 has Lost Sinner, Darklurker, Sir Alonne and Fume Knight - the problem is most DaS2 bosses were mere pushovers instead of proper bosses)

DaS3 is the newest one and it looks the prettiest. Compared to DaS2 besides combat mechanics, I really miss Bonfire Ascetics and DaS2 matchmaking.

As for PvP, it's pretty much a mess but at least parry works in multiplayer sessions. Everybody is using the same weapons (Washing Pole, Onikiri, Yhrom Machete) cause there are a few viable builds.

Some weapon arts are OP but the vast majority are retarded cause you cannot use them in PvP - you are asking for punishment every-time you breakdance.

To be honest, I don't know who is the best DaS game. I just feel that DaS3 is the most soul-less game from the series. It's mechanically sound but there is not a lot of heart put into it. Maybe the DLCs will prove me wrong.

 

[AdinsxBejoty]

Bloodborne is exactly the same as DS1 - great beginning and midgame, then mediocre endgame. It starts going to shit about the time you reach the snake area in Forbidden Woods.

Are you including the DLC in there anywhere, for either game? Just curious. Old Hunters was effectively my "endgame" for Bloodborne since I'd beaten everything up to the very last boss in the main game in preparation for the launch, and it was such a fucking fantastic ending to the game for me.

I mostly agree, though, though I'd say Byrgenwerth specifically is where the pacing takes a nosedive and never picks up again. Now that I know the game like the back of my hand, Forbidden Woods seems pretty pointless, but the actual area is so big and there are so many enemies that it at least felt stressful my first time through. At least it has the Suspicious Beggar and your first experience with an Abhorrent Beast.

When I beat Rom, I had to back to Byrgenwerth to see what I missed, because I couldn't believe it was such a tiny area with basically nothing in it. Everything afterwards is too straightforward and too easy, felt like the game was tired of slapping you around and just wanted to drag you to the end by cutting every area in half and giving all the bosses 10 second attack animations where you can just walk behind them and go wild.

 

[toro]

Edit: Bonus

 

[sullynathan]

You can only consider level design to be "good" in DS3 if you only care about the architectural layout. And even in that sense, none of the DS3 levels are better than Blighttown, Catacombs, Painted World or Latria 1. DS3 levels are nice to walk around, but they generally lack any kind of gameplay-related identity (aside from Irithyll Dungeon and maybe Grand Archive), so in that sense they're worse than even Tomb of the Giants, New Londo, Shrine of Amana, and so forth.

One of the things DS3 has over the rest of the series is its excellent endgame, however.

if you count Lothric Castle and the grand archives as end game, then yeah, DS3's end game is better than DS2 & DS1. Also, Lord of Cinder was a better final boss than Nashandra and Gwyn. New Londo is arguably one of the worst areas in DS1 with one of the worst bosses in the game. The grand archives and Lothric Castle are just as good if not better than the catacombs or the Painted world.

 

[Damned Registrations]

I don't know why everyone seems to get all doe eyed over blight town. It was basically a bunch of shitty platforming in an area full of what amounted to invisible silent snipers. It was tedious and annoying and better off being skipped. It's one of the few areas in the entire game that had no real reward to speak of. DS2 levels had a lot of gameplay gimmicks like the monsters averse to light or the traps in various places, but the layout was pretty dull, basically 4 different linear paths out from the hub, and then an endgame that dragged out way way too long. It felt like you started out with a lot of options and whittled them away to nothing very quickly. And the levels themselves were generally pretty straightforward.

DS3's overall layout was like a long main route with frequent side branches. If you were interested in finding alternate routes at any given point there were some to be had. It also had multiple paths within the levels, and shortcuts to unlock. I'd say it's probably the best of the three games, with DS1 making a close second and DS2 a distant third. DS1 wins for lore and atmosphere, while the other 2 games stumble around with a bunch of nonsense that was clearly thrown together carelessly. The one thing DS2 did properly was it at least made what few characters it had relatively easy to interact with. 1 and 3 both royally fuck that up and require a bunch of obscure bullshit to ever see half the conversations in the game.

 

[sullynathan]

I've replayed Blighttown a hole bunch of times and while I don't really like Swamp areas, Blighttown has a lot of shortcuts that allow the player to get through the place very easily. Its pretty fun in co-op too and Quelaag is one of the better bosses in DS1. The catacombs on the other hand isn't a very interesting level with really low level enemies until the annoying wheel enemies and it ends with the easiest boss in the entire series.

 

[Ivan]

Bloodborne is exactly the same as DS1 - great beginning and midgame, then mediocre endgame. It starts going to shit about the time you reach the snake area in Forbidden Woods.

DA FUCK?

the best encounter is AFTER, and the Shadows of Yarnham are great. But, to each his own. I was talking about the 3 npc battle.


also, as far as Dark Souls 3 is concerned, it's the end of a trilogy. it tries to replicate moments we loved from previous titles. it's Metroid Prime 3. it's good for what it is, hell it may even have a great moment or two, but it's swallowed in the shadow cast by its forebears.

 

[Metatron]

There's a case to be made for the DS2 DLCs being better than DS3 (especially Ivory and Old Iron King ones) but the base game of 2 with its mediocre world design (falls in the typical trap of dragging you from one zone to another whitout ever giving you the impression of being in an actual believable world), filler content, pushover bosses and not-100%-there melee combat is obviously inferior to 3. Anyone who says otherwise is a tryhard. Hopefully the upcoming DS3 DLCs will do the same for the latest one as the King DLCs did for 2.

 

[sullynathan]

going by how good all the DLC for the souls games have been, I expect this one to be good also but I'm not buying.

 

[Ivan]

i didn't care for Dark Souls 1's DLC. 2's was game saving.

 

[AdinsxBejoty]

DS1's DLC felt like more of the same, which is as good or as bad as you liked the core game, I guess. I think it was just a solid addition.

DS2's DLC were so insanely better than the core game that they shine for it, but I don't think that's necessarily a good thing. Obviously good for playing it, but it just highlights how much they'd fallen out of form in the initial DS2 release. Other than gameplay, the souls games' architecture is one of my favorite parts of the games. Every other souls game looks like they ripped da Vinci out of the past and made him draft entire kingdoms. DS2 has so many flat, featureless walls, and the features they bothered adding looked pretty fuckin terrible. That throne room in Drangleic Castle...