Dark Souls

In general. I had friends who tried to sell me on Skyrim because it had a mod that turned dragons into rock bands, complete with rainbow spotlights shining in the background. I just don't understand how they thought something so stupid would either be interesting and/or add to the game, or how they could assume that a mod would sell me on a game. I'll enjoy a great mod (RP, anyone?) but I won't bother with it if the game itself isn't worth bothering with. But when I like a game, I hate it when mods just contradict its themes, tone, mood, setting. I went on a mission for years seeking "the best" mods for FONV- ultimately stifled by my PC not being able to handle all of them at once, so I put my pursuit on hold till after the new computer was finished -and I was very particular that the mods were canonical or lore neutral. None of those Mary Sue mods, none of those mods that make super model glossy characters without a hint of smudge on em, none of those FO3 implant mods, none of those series crossover mods, etc. This is what mods need to be, for me.

So, like I said, while that mod looks funny, it still breaks the setting wide open, so I would never bother with it. I'd stick to seeing that in a humorous youtube video having been edited into the shot.
 
SnapSlav said:
In general. I had friends who tried to sell me on Skyrim because it had a mod that turned dragons into rock bands, complete with rainbow spotlights shining in the background. I just don't understand how they thought something so stupid would either be interesting and/or add to the game, or how they could assume that a mod would sell me on a game. I'll enjoy a great mod (RP, anyone?) but I won't bother with it if the game itself isn't worth bothering with. But when I like a game, I hate it when mods just contradict its themes, tone, mood, setting. I went on a mission for years seeking "the best" mods for FONV- ultimately stifled by my PC not being able to handle all of them at once, so I put my pursuit on hold till after the new computer was finished -and I was very particular that the mods were canonical or lore neutral. None of those Mary Sue mods, none of those mods that make super model glossy characters without a hint of smudge on em, none of those FO3 implant mods, none of those series crossover mods, etc. This is what mods need to be, for me.

So, like I said, while that mod looks funny, it still breaks the setting wide open, so I would never bother with it. I'd stick to seeing that in a humorous youtube video having been edited into the shot.
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Makes two of us. Relieved to see I'm not the only one. I've always been put off by mods in general, even with the Elder Scrolls games (once every 3rd year that I do bother playing them) and New Vegas I stick with minimal mods that don't break the setting. Only exception is FO3, where that huge overhaul mod (forgot the name) makes the game somewhat enjoyable for a few hours in comparison to the bland and utterly boring vanilla game. UI mods, mods that fix bugs and sloppy design, or that restore cut content with adding as little of the modders touch as possible are really what I usually bother with.

As for Dark Souls, if you feel the need to mod the shit out of it on your first playthrough, maybe it's simply not the game for you.
 
SnapSlav said:
In general. I had friends who tried to sell me on Skyrim because it had a mod that turned dragons into rock bands, complete with rainbow spotlights shining in the background. I just don't understand how they thought something so stupid would either be interesting and/or add to the game, or how they could assume that a mod would sell me on a game. I'll enjoy a great mod (RP, anyone?) but I won't bother with it if the game itself isn't worth bothering with. But when I like a game, I hate it when mods just contradict its themes, tone, mood, setting. I went on a mission for years seeking "the best" mods for FONV- ultimately stifled by my PC not being able to handle all of them at once, so I put my pursuit on hold till after the new computer was finished -and I was very particular that the mods were canonical or lore neutral. None of those Mary Sue mods, none of those mods that make super model glossy characters without a hint of smudge on em, none of those FO3 implant mods, none of those series crossover mods, etc. This is what mods need to be, for me.

So, like I said, while that mod looks funny, it still breaks the setting wide open, so I would never bother with it. I'd stick to seeing that in a humorous youtube video having been edited into the shot.
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I agree and disagree with you.

I agree that if a game needs the shit modded out of it, it's a bad game.

I also agree with your method of selecting very canon/lore friendly mods. On my current playthrough of New Vegas I have bug fixes, UI improvements, expanded functionality of gameplay elements that were never truly fixed (i.e the weapon mods in FNV can not be dequipped with ease.), texture improvements and finally the J.Sawyer mod (Joshua Saywer's own personal changes to New Vegas that he wanted to implement during Development but couldn't,it makes the game a more challenging and fair RPG experience.)

I do disagree with you somewhat about Skyrim, vanilla Skyrim is about as boring and shallow as you get, but extremely heavily modded Skyrim has genuinely provided one of the most immersive gaming experiences of my life. I'm not defending the game at all, but I am disagreeing with the "polished turd" sentiment somewhat.
 
For Dark Souls I am only installing Graphic improvement mods and that one Obama Joke mod, I was just browsing through the ones I needed and stumbled upon it, couldn¿t resist, and makes dying a little less stressing (It only delays the daily rage quit by 20 minutes really).

New Vegas is a great game on itself, and moded it becomes simply amazing, with the multiple gameplay overhauls, texture packs, enbs, additional quests (altho not all of them are great), companions and uncut content. I just can't conceive to go back to a segmented up Freeside or Strip anymore.
 
Man, you made me install Dark Souls again. But it's alright, I'm having a blast. Doing a good ol' Dex/Faith build, same as my first character ever pretty much. But better, since I now kinda know what I'm doing.

It makes me want to play Dark Souls 2 as well, I haven't touched it since the middle of summer. But I have to say, playing the first game again makes it even more obvious how much better it is than the second.
 
So do you have (or are aiming for) a Standard Uchigatana +10 with Darkmoon Blade buff, or a Divine/Occult Uchigatana +5?
 
The advice is simple: disregard class. Class determines 3 things (and only 1 of them has any lasting impact): Starting equipment (won't matter when you get better stuff), Starting spells (won't matter when you start customizing your character) and Starting stats (matters the most, because minimum stats need to be at or below what you ideally want them to be when you "complete" your character). Everything else about your character is your own skill and item acquisition. Which shields you use is up to you, and there is an abundance very readily available early on. A Kite Shield in the Undead Parish, the Crest Shield back at the Asylum once you unlock the elevators and revisit the crow, and plenty of others strewn around the entire game. Which weapons you use is slightly more selective, but there are many options to get you by until you acquire your "preferred" weapon type, most notably the Drake Sword. Same with Spells.

All that really matters is figuring out how you want to play your character. If you want to be a heavy spellcaster, start pumping points into INT so you can do some nice damage with the spells you'll EVENTUALLY get, and at least 20 VIT so you don't fall over at the slightest breeze. If you want to be a tank that can just absorb any punishment, then invest in VIT and END so you can wear really heavy armors and upgrade your HP as much as possible. If you want to be an evasive attacker, then you'll want a decent amount of END (for the stamina to dodge with) and either STR or DEX, depending on your preferred weapon. The biggest thing, however, is practicing. Nothing matters half as much as simply understanding the combat of the game and begin good at the manner in which you intend to approach combat. It doesn't matter if your Stamina is maxed out if you can't dodge for shit.
 
SnapSlav said:
So do you have (or are aiming for) a Standard Uchigatana +10 with Darkmoon Blade buff, or a Divine/Occult Uchigatana +5?
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Uchigatana +14 actually (goes up to 15) ;) But I've mainly used a Divine Balder Side Sword, and for Anor Londo I got Quelaag's Furysword. I'm considering getting a spear. Never played around with spears much in DkS1, but it was my favorite weapon for my Dex/Faith build in DkS2. Any advice on a good spear?
 
It's been so long since I played Dark Souls that I forgot the max levels of upgrade paths. I guess, now that I think about it again, the elemental upgrade paths go to +10, and the alternate elemental upgrade paths go to +5, so the Standard would go all the way to +15 since elemental is an alternate to Standard...

Best spear is of course the Winged Spear with an upgrade that reflects your attributes. Divine/Occult if it's to go with your Dex/Fth build. The Ornstein and Gargoyle spears are nifty if you just wanna abuse them for their gimmicky properties, but that's about it. They both scale something awful. Most DkS players think of the Lightning Spear found in Sen's Fortress when they think of spears in the game, since it's typically the first spear anyone acquires and EVER uses, but it's not as strong as a Lightning Winged Spear could be, as well as simply short-term of a weapon in general. Unlike polearms, spears just have a limited capacity in DkS, since they're the "longer range weapon you can use while blocking", so their damage is never going to be particularly remarkable in the long run.
 
Yup, that's right about the upgrades. It's a shame really that so many of the upgrade paths are pretty meh. Or maybe it's just that I never play the type of character that could benefit from them.

Hm, I will give the Winged Spear a twirl. Looking at the scaling, I'll be better of making it Divine it seems. I'm aware that spears are pretty sub-par damage wise, but I like the reach of them. And the looks, basically. I don't bother too much with pvp this time, and I put as much emphasis on having a cool-looking character as a powerful one. I was gonna get Ornstein's spear, but I don't remember it being particularly useful, might be a waste of souls. My preference would be a spear/polearm hybrid. I used the Scythe a lot on my first character. I loved the reach and the moveset, even if it was a bit too slow. I'd love to have something to both poke and sweep with.
 
Well the gimmick of Ornstein's spear is that it has a ranged attack. But that costs durability EVERY time you use it, so it's just not feasible to make common use out of it. Plus the damage is nothing spectacular at all.

I remember I made a character modeled after "Artorias" BEFORE the DLC came out, so I just made him how I assumed he might appear, and I used the True Artorias Greatsword as a weapon. That is one of THE best scaling weapons in the game, not necessarily early on, but in the long, long, LONG-run, SL200 and beyond. Not a very stellar moveset, as unlike long swords it was somewhat slow, and unlike the biggest swords it didn't have staggering effects. But it was a pretty cool weapon, and I enjoyed using that character when I still played.

My experience with the different upgrade paths is that they were just a consequence of trying to "address" some of the complaints about Demon's Souls (as well as other changes) that didn't really seem all that thought out. Lightning was the biggest culprit in that sense. Nice that there's a new elemental upgrade path, but it costs an extremely common ore to be able to craft, AND its resistance is extremely rare AND it boasts the most damage? Just not well thought out, clearly. Any scaling weapon SHOULD outperform a static, non-scaling elemental weapon if your stats get high enough, but that simply was never the case with Dark Souls, which disappointed me greatly.
 
Just finished Demon's Souls all the way through for the first time.

Really don't get what the whole hype was about, especially from SnapSlav.

It was really underwhelming.

I found the setting and plot to be totally inferior to Dark Souls, and was far too vague in it's background lore, which worked well in Dark Souls as there was just enough to form ideas and several items interlinked stories in their descriptions, whereas Demons's Souls just gave you barely anything to work with at all, leaving me with no implications to play around with like I had in Dark Souls.(The lack of Boss Soul descriptions really didn't help.)The characters in the Nexus were boring and had no development to speak of and felt more like NPC vending machines than actual characters with motivations that moved from place to place and had goals outside of the player. The Maiden in Black is one of the worst characters for this, she has little to no development or dialogue and just turns into a plot mcguffin right at the ending of the game.

The levels barring Latria (Which I will get to later.) were all fairly mediocre and the idea of redoing an entire level grew tiresome and led to the fact that the areas were criminally short and underdeveloped. I also despised the whole Nexus/Archstone system and much preferred the fully developed and interconnected world of Lordran, it felt so much larger and more real and really pulled me into the setting, and while I did enjoy Demon's Souls, I just felt like I was moving from video game level to video game level with absolutely no connection or immersion in the setting.

The Bosses were definitely the highlight of Demons's Souls, and were consistently good, but the only boss that I would say was actually great would probably be the Old Monk, purely from an imaginative standpoint.

The gameplay just felt like a clunkier and undeveloped version of Dark Souls's combat, which I entirely expected.

The atmosphere presented in Demons's Souls was okay overall, and varied a lot from being virtually nonexistent to very well done.

The exception to all my gripes was Latria, which had an absolutely fantastic atmosphere, great bosses, great design and had the most present and interesting back story, and I'm glad From Software is basing the atmosphere Bloodborne off of the level.

I still enjoyed Demons's Souls, I would never say it was anywhere near a bad game, but in terms of the Souls Series, it's mediocre. Really not up to the hype.

I'm gonna put the Demons's Souls obsession down to a case of Baby Duck syndrome. Which could be said for me and Dark Souls I guess, but I fail to see how Demons's Souls could be seen as such a superior Role Playing Game from an objective standpoint.
 
AlphaPromethean said:
Just finished Demon's Souls all the way through for the first time.

Really don't get what the whole hype was about, especially from SnapSlav.

It was really underwhelming.

...

I'm gonna put the Demons's Souls obsession down to a case of Baby Duck syndrome. Which could be said for me and Dark Souls I guess, but I fail to see how Demons's Souls could be seen as such a superior Role Playing Game from an objective standpoint.
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Whoa... Fightin' words notwithstanding, I cannot fathom how you reached your conclusions...

For one thing, the levels were designed almost perfectly in the sense of encouraging players to be explorative yet cautious, because EVERY level presented a shortcut to bypass much of the tedium, however most of them required effort to unlock said shortcuts and reach point in the game without dying. These both provided challenge yet emphasized the need to not rush through the level. They compensated for the levels having you "restart" from the beginning if you died (which is still present in Dark Souls, only worsened because so much as sitting at a bonfire respawns the entire world, not simply dying, and you can "choose" which Archstone you respawn at without having to activate it, unlike the bonfires), so I never found the length of the levels to be a problem once I got the hang of their design and their accessibility shortcuts.

HOW you felt the levels and overall world were SMALLER just boggles my mind, though. They are objectively larger, and segmenting the world- while admittedly hampering game immersion because you recognize and interact with loading screens as opposed to seamlessly traveling from one region to the next -allowed for each level to be more realized and far grander. In Dark Souls they make exceptional use of the ILLUSION of grandiosity, but in fact once you get your bearings and begin to track where each location connects to the rest, you realize how small the game really is. As I said early, I'd attribute liking one game's map design over the other as a case of "one man's meat is another man's poison", because each clearly has its ups and downs. In the case of Dark Souls, having an interconnected world strengthens that immersion, but at the cost of a smaller and cramped world. In Demon's Souls each level can be more realized and larger, but they cannot interconnect to the same degree, and you face loading screens that have the potential to take you out of the game.

The background lore and the characters were abundant in their detail; you simply had to hunt for it. If you felt that the characters were underrealized, you probably didn't unlock them as early as possible. This is one of the intricacies of Demon's Souls which Dark Souls simply lacks. e.g. You can't unlock them ALL as early as possible; heading to level x to rescue NPC y before event z means you're postponing visiting level a to rescue NPC b after event c, and each has the potential to impact each other. Ostrava and Biorr and Yuria are three such examples, all of whom can be located in Boletaria, but rescuing one necessitates backtracking at certain locations and postponing rescuing of the other. Depending on when you unlock the NPCs at the Nexus, they may have completely different background story information to impart with you. I've played Demon's Souls so many times that I've unlocked each NPC as early as possible in at least one playthrough, and listened to 100% of their dialog lines (which changes as you progress through the game to reflect your actions) so it's simply false that the characters are underrealized and have little to offer. You gotta explore them often to see what they offer, but it is there. Meanwhile, as for the setting's lore itself, it's exactly the same as Dark Souls in the "hidden but there" sense, because items and location explanations (something DkS lacks, because there are no Archstones to read the description of), and dialog from NPCs you can miss are all there. You just have to find them!

Like I said, ergonomically, this is the only area where Dark Souls truly shines, because the UI was heavily improved upon after Demon's Souls, and if you go backwards from the former to the latter, you can feel it, which you've indicated. I wouldn't call it "clunkier" by any stretch of the imagination (because frankly I HATE the Poise system and the Darkwood Grain Ring circus flips bullshit) as much as "far more grounded", but certain aspects of the combat certainly are less refined. This is for obvious reasons, of course, as it is the earlier title. Not that it's to be excused, because a game so well designed that it never ages is to be heralded for such attributes, which Demon's Souls does not entirely exhibit, but I still feel that your analysis was far too extreme.

As for "hype"... Well I dunno what you're talking about. The game HAS no hype, because so few people outside of Japan owned a PS3 in 2009 compared to a 360, and unlike Dark Souls it didn't have any other ports to speak of. Dark Souls enjoyed a renaissance after it got a rerelease of the game for PC in the form of the "Prepare to Die Edition" a FULL YEAR after the game's initial release, again something its predecessor never benefited from. I adore Demon's Souls because of its qualities, in spite of its relatively few drawbacks, but it's not remotely hyped at all because of how underpopulated it is compared to its younger cousin.

One thing it has which I didn't see you mention (probably because you didn't encounter it much?) was far superior PVP. No lagstab bullshit, just mano e mano duels... mostly. Dark Souls improved upon the CONCEPT of PVP in some areas by creating the covenant system and allowing FAR MORE players to exists within the same world simultaneously (I forget how many, but I believe I counted a total of 11 at once, a few years ago?) almost all of whom would be at odds with one another, while Demon's Souls ONLY permitted 4 players in one world at the same time- 1 host, 2 phantoms, 1 invader. Far more simplistic by comparison, but at least the combat system allowed for far better fights, unlike DkS's buggy catastrophes.

All that said, I dunno what "baby duck syndrome" is. I just know in many ways it's not only a fine game, but a superior game. Not 100% superior in every respect, but in several and more so than number of areas inferior.

Gripes I had with Dark Souls:

Spell Memory? What's wrong with MP? Lame and limiting to the a character's longevity...
Resistances vs Damages just not properly realized. Lightning damage was WAY too overpowered, and they never addressed this.
Characters max out at 40 to all stats. Scaling to SL900+ is meaningless.
Aforementioned Poise and backflips made combat cowardly and buggy (way too easy to abuse invulnerability frames that offered SIGNIFICANT mobility, and you couldn't interrupt it, either)...
Worlds being run server-side as opposed to locally made for low average lag, but average and consistent, resulting in the infamous lagstab exploits. Combat suffered grievously for a "fix" to a rare problem.
Fixes almost always resulted in worse problems. Several bugs were implemented just trying to fix other bugs. The infinite souls glitch, the lagstab, the "field of death", just to name a few...
Lack of branching specialty in the upgrade paths made for generic and poorly-scaling weapons. Archery in particular suffered heavily from this, making it not worth specializing in.
Multiple patches reduced a game that was already inferior in challenge to its predecessor into a hand-holding easymode mess. If you were a veteran, you hated the patches.

There's plenty more where that came from, as well as others I've already mentioned. But you can see that these are absolute problems, not just matters of taste or nostalgia. But the game still clearly has its perks. I LOVED the Rusty Iron Ring, especially because, while I adored the CONCEPT of the swamps in 5-2, I hated how cripplingly nasty they were and how there was no way to avoid that whatsoever, meanwhile a return to the Asylum and finding the Rusty Iron Ring means I can now traverse water as if it weren't there! Great ideas. I LOVED the expansion of choices in the addition of the Covenant system, even if half of them were quite worthless (Joining the Chaos Servant covenant ONLY offers 1 spell and 1 shortcut that allows you to save Solaire if you invest heavily in the covenant, and NOTHING else!) especially because of how I mentioned they allowed for MANY more players to exist within the same world all at once. While you NEVER saw it happen, the game had the POTENTIAL for gigantic free-for-alls to be exploding all around each other, with Darkwraiths being hunted by Darkmoons and Dragons hunting invaders while hosts are trying to invade a Gravelord Servant, etc. If those happened more commonly, that would've been awesome. Sadly, they hardly ever occurred ever at all, but I still liked that potential. While I disliked the less-specialized upgrade paths of Dark Souls, I AM appreciative that the game didn't have the same clusterfuck of mindnumbingly tedious grinding that was Pure Bladestone from Demon's Souls. If you don't know what I'm talking about, suffice it to say that one upgrade path was STUPIDLY luck-based and hard-as-fuck-to-farm (I've even written guides to aid in the process, in the past) making it a bitch if you wanted to specialize in a weapon with that upgrade. Some ores were hard to come by, but Pure Bladestone was just terrible. I hate how easy it is to come by and "create" EVERY ore of EVERY grade you need in Dark Souls, but at least it doesn't have the absurdly rare Bladestone problem... ~_~

In the end, I think you're coming away with a negative impression just a bit too early. If you've only played it once, that's probably why. That's a game you gotta enjoy in the long-run. I'm positive you never felt fulfilled having played Dark Souls only once and never arrived at the conclusion that this was it and there was nothing more for you to explore or attempt or enjoy or test or try out, right? =)
 
Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to gooo
I wanna be invaded!
Nothin' to fight and no boss to ru-un
I wanna be invaded!
Just get me into Lordran put me on a drake
Hurry hurry hurry before I go hollow
I can't control my summons
I can't control my souls
Oh no no no no no

Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go....
I wanna be invaded!
Nothin' to craft and no player to du-al
I wanna be invaded!
Just put me on an eagle, get me on a drake
Hurry hurry hurry before I go hollow
I can't control my summons
Can't control my body-o
Oh no no no no no
Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go
I wanna be invaded
Nothin' to do and no where to go-o-o
I wanna be invaded
 
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I'd consider it clever if it didn't contradict the game's rules, and thus itself. You gotta have a boss to "run" in the area you're at in order to be invaded. =P
 
Well, there not being any bosses to run doesn't necessarily mean the boss is absent or defeated. It could mean the player no longer considers the bosses a worthwhile fight, thus not being able to run them due to lack of interest. :wink:
 
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