Dark Souls

[DioShiba]

Remember when demon's souls rocked your dick by the time you played it in 2009?

well guess what, that is officially two years ago. It's time for a change,
and from software has your back with an epicly awesome follow-up. that's right, this ain't no sequel. It's an entirely new game.

So you maybe wondering, "why isn't this demons souls two?" I'll tell you why, it's because it's also going on the 360, that's right, dark souls isn't a PS3 exclusive like it's big ol' dad was. It's on both the PS3 and 360 because they know they can reach that big of a market.

How will it be different from demon's souls? Well if you played demon's souls there's some things you'll need to know about our new fresh prince before you creep your way into the game good droog:
-Dark Souls will have twice the ball-punching difficulty compared to how hard Demon's Souls was
-More weapons to kill ugly bitches with
-More awesome monsters waiting to rape you on every corner of the game.
-Now the game has Co-op and awesome PvP combat
AND MUCH MUCH MORE!

When's it coming out? Most likely by the end of the year. This game is still in development, but when it comes out I guarantee you will be screaming that it's the game of the fucking year.

peace out.

[SKELTON S. SKELETON]

still haven't played demons souls but this looks naise.

[TomGuycott]

I am so so so so so so so so so so so so so fucking pumped for this. Really I have been since Project Dark was announced, but this just throttles the awesomeness of the game up 700 times.

But now the debacle is which system to get it for. I know many more people with 360s, but all the people who I'd try to convince to get this have PS3's too.

[Woppet*]

If this is open world i will shit my britches.

[DioShiba]

If this is open world i will shit my britches.

It better be open world.

If it isn't I swear to god I will be disappointed in this game.

I haven't exactly played demon's souls but I heard nothing but good about it, I assume this will be the same.

[TomGuycott]

Oh my god this game is SO good. I want to do some sort of extensive review of it, but I don't have time and I just want to talk about it right now. Here's some highlights about the game that I really like, though (Tagged in case you don't want to know ANYTHING at all about the game, am spoiling some bosses, but most of them have appeared in trailers if you've been watching them):

Spoiler

-Open world, environments range from gritty to scary to beautiful, including dirty castles, fiery caverns, pitch black catacombs and sunlit cities.

-The humanity, estus flask and bonfire system makes the game simultaneously easier and harder at the same time, mainly due to the open world system and the inability to travel freely back to a hub world. (I spent 6 hours wandering around in what I found out was one of the last areas of the game trying to get back out, but could only respawn at the LAST bonfire in that section).

-Enemies are dangerous and attack very well in tandem, but at the same time are also capable of being tricked, like getting them close to en edge so you can bump them down into a pit, or getting drawn into traps meant for you. The more powerful enemies are much harder to trick like this.

-The world is riddled with minibosses that basically consist of incredibly powerful enemies that while not bosses in themselves ARE incredibly powerful and annoying if you don't know how to fight them. Unlike regular enemies, these enemies don't respawn after visiting Bonfires. Enemies like this include dragons, giant rats, that armored boar from the trailers, and a legion of Black Knights all wielding different types of weapons.

-Bosses, while each having exploitable weaknesses, are incredibly brutal, and even IF you exploit said weaknesses it will not always make the fight easy for you, and one missed step can kill you. Some of the concepts are rehashed (there's a necromancer that splits into copies like one of the bosses from Demons' Souls, but this one has a creepier design, atmosphere and was harder overall).

-NPCs scattered throughout the world provide surprisingly useful information when you know what to listen for. Like in Demons' Souls, some will come back and become real assholes later.

-More Miracles and Sorcery, and the addition of Pyromancy, my favorite of the three so far.

-Many more unique weapons (they even have a whip now!), a less confusing but not underwhelming smithy system, and a MUCH larger selection of cooler looking armors (so far every basic humanoid enemy in the game has had a collectible armor set, including the Black Knights). Naturally some are better than others because of stats, but sometimes you just want to look cool.

-Covenants can be joined giving the character allegiance to other factions. This gives you access to many more spells, some of the most powerful in the game in fact. You can even level up your faction rank by fulfilling certain tasks.

-Online Play is enhanced due to the inclusion of factions. Some factions REQUIRE you to go attack other players in order to level up, while other factions increase odds of joining others in your faction while warding away attacking players. Some of the faction requirements are more unique; for example, there is a faction where you set down messages on the ground with an item, and if another player who holds a Dragon Scale touches the message, you invade their world and take their scale if you defeat them.

[SKELTON S. SKELETON]

hey, now i've played demons souls (fantastic)
i really want this.

[DioShiba]

If I wasn't so poor I'd get this right now

fuck the economy for making it hard to find jobs, I just want to buy one decent game.

[TomGuycott]

In my opinion, everything great about Demons' Souls has been improved in Dark Souls. Basic commands have been improved a little bit (I don't remember whether you could sprint or jump in Demons' Souls, but in Dark Souls you definitely can). The environments are designed even better, lots of pits and traps and vicious enemies. I also like the boss designs even more in this one, but for some reason basic enemy designs in SOME areas aren't quite as cool. Basically those that carried over, the main case being the Skeletons. However, in Demons' Souls they were supposed to be some kind of weird tribal group that was possibly non-human. In Dark Souls they are clearly supposed to be human skeletons, hence the redesign down to basic human skeletons instead of cool silver and black ones.

[Tellis]

I'd check out this game, but I have Demon's Souls and I absolutely suck at it, irrevocably it seems. I've gotten past the Phalanx on two different characters/files (a Wanderer and a Temple Knight, the Temple Knight at the recommendation from a friend that they're easier?) and then really just can't make any more progress than that. I guess I'm just bad at video games.

(I don't remember whether you could sprint or jump in Demons' Souls, but in Dark Souls you definitely can).

You can JUMP now? Hm, that almost makes it a mandatory buy.

[DioShiba]

Nah, Dark souls is designed to be hard as balls.

if you're going to try and make it easy all you have to do is grind but what fun is that if you don't want to challenge yourself.

[Strasteo]

Dark Souls is amazing. I've been playing it whenever I get the chance and I've been having a blast. It's exactly what you expect. Demon Souls, but better. It's open world. No loading screens except for when you die, if I'm not mistaken.

There are glitches, some bad, some kind of fun to exploit/happen upon, but I'm sure they will be patched soon. There are a few camera issues but nothing severely bad, and sometimes you'll experience slow down but really these are nothing compared to the great things in this game.

You can jump, which I really like. It adds more dimension to the game/thrill in barely dodging an attack by doing so. The sense of dread/"oh shi- I'm screwed" is present as ever, and even more so. Common enemies pose much more of a threat than in Demon's Souls, and enemy placement is well thought out.

Example:

The frogs you encounter in the Depths (essentially a sewer) are easy to kill, but not to easy to avoid, especially when they swarm you and spray curse breath everywhere

What I really like is that they've kept the whole ambiguity of the world/story from Demon's Souls. You are expected to craft your own story out of what you're given and infer about details. The game doesn't spoon-feed you the story, which along with the dreariness of the world complements the feeling that you're alone (but of course, supported by other players) and expected to make the best of what you're given.

[TomGuycott]

I just fucking lost 2 hours of collected souls and Humanity (the souls wasn't really as important, I just happened to have a lot while farming humanity). I had 13 points of Humanity collected before I got totally robbed TWICE.

And despite that I can't wait to play more after work tomorrow. xD

Something I like about the game is that it doesn't give you all the perks that Demons' Souls gives you (a smith, a storage box, etc). Instead you have to DISCOVER them. If you know where they are or what the requirements to use them are they usually aren't THAT hard to do, but still, it's kinda thrilling to go searching for all those things. I also love how there is a much wider variety of armor and weapons. I have access to about six different boss armor sets... I just can't AFFORD them all.

[qman102]

Challenge is reward. The mantra of the Souls games. Brilliance

[Tellis]

This seems relevant.