Dude I know it's been 5 years but I listen to these at 4 am while working and the sudden child cooing was the scariest thing ever. Like blood freezing, heart pounding fear.
One of my favorite things is Eleum Loyce is how in one of the chest rooms you see a frozen mimic that is then a suspiciously normal-looking chest when you re-encounter it.
Jan Christian Frodahl You're extremely naive in child psychology. Therefore, I suggest you either read up on it, or you simply don't say anything about it.
That shit was so frustrating that I gave up running for the boss door and just repeatedly cleared the chambers of knights and salamanders then went back to the bonfire until they all stopped spawning
I must admit, the opening to the Old Iron King blew me away. Walking up that chain onto Brume Tower was breathtaking and reminded me a lot of Anor Londo, like you were actually a much smaller being wandering around the ruins of a once mighty world. It made me feel small, something which Dark Souls 2 failed to do (in my opinion at least) and is something Dark Souls 1 did spectacularly. Brume Tower has to be my favourite level/area of any Souls game, it feels like you're crawling around a massive machine that you're slowly bringing to life, and it's home to one of my favourite Boss fights in the series (Sir Alonne). The base game may have been a poor sequel to Dark Souls 1, but the DLCs just did so much right.
you know if you fight alonne without a shield and take no damage, when he gets low on health he'll kill himself. not sure if you have to use a katana. sadly i could never pull this off but it's a really cool detail.
@@theirlovecantcutourknife3253 no idea, you can probably look it up and find out pretty quick though. i wouldn't risk it, you still technically would have a shield equipped.
@@adamiadamiadami Dark Souls 3 has *more* tracking than 2, actually. Don't get me wrong, I think that 3 is a colossally superior game, but the tracking in both games is a non-issue. Dark Souls 3 is just deceptive about its tracking because when the enemies do it, it doesn't look fucking ridiculous like it does in 2; they don't spin around like they're standing on a turntable. The enemies that people complain about in DS2 do. Like Joseph says, the tracking is necessary at times in order to force you to actually learn how to roll the attacks. Obviously there are ways to do this without the tracking, but if it weren't there, then overhead swings, stabs, etc. would be made completely trivial by just circle strafing. This is actually an issue with a lot of enemies in DS2. Look at the pursuer for an especially obvious example. DS3 fixes this and does a great job of it because it fooled people like you into thinking that it's not even a thing at all, when in reality it is, it's just implemented better so it's not something worth complaining about.
The oil at 18:00, once ignited, will also ignite the enemies. Those, in turn - will become much stronger once aflame, presenting a greater challenge to the player. Notice here how you have to carefully decide where to kill the monsters, since their explosion upon death will also ignite the oil.
+Learthion Those enemies will are also more likely to explode once set ablaze, so a simple whap from a torch is sometimes quicker than hitting them with a regular weapon.
@@Swatyo yeah ds2 is the only ds i can bring myself to play ng+ in. the others just feel like easy mode on ng+. apparently the bosses get harder but everything else is so easy i never stuck with it long enough to find out. there are very few games i can play ng+ on, if i replay a game i want it to be more (or at least equally) challenging.
Im in ng+++? Or ++++ anyway, i can't bring myself to play on a different charecter cause i know im going to have to do all the stuff again, but i sometimes find fun in stomping iudex gundyr or vordt, but im going to have to stop playing for a while as twin princes was so hard i had to cheese them with poisen fog with his blind spot for phase 2
DatBoi SmiddyPants What confuses me the most is that he says it's one of his favorites, then comes to the conclusion that it's one the worst. I love this video, but that one contradiction left me scratching my head.
He explains pretty clearly that he loved the concept of the area and felt that if more had been done with it it could have been great. It really is a fine line between great and awful in this series, a few tweaks here and there can greatly improve or ruin something. Like, Ornstein and Smough is generally a universally well received fight, but it could've easily been completely ruined just by making the arena you fight them in smaller so you couldn't separate them and were just constantly spammed with overlapping attacks - which is something that happens all too often with gank fights in DS2. If that were the case it wouldn't be incorrect for someone to say "This is one of my favorite fights in the game, I think it would've been amazing if they just had you fight in a larger arena"
@@matthewthomas8407 love the DS2 dlc. Sunken City is still my favorite level of the series, even including Elden Ring. Frigid Outskirts had a remake in Elden Ring, visually-the run to Melania-and spiritually-the lake of rot-which I loved.
In Brume tower it is even heavily implied by there being two doors right at the start. I think there is even a sign that explaines the point of that erea.
@@niek3839 They were explicitly designed for co-op. Players who didn't have the DLC could still enter the beginning DLC area, but would not have the item needed to open the big elaborate door and access the main part of the DLC. However, if they put their summon signs down in the first area before going through the door, they would be able to be summoned in the offshoot areas (Halls of the Dead, Iron Passage, and Frigid Outskirts respectively). The areas were intentionally overtuned for single players because they were balanced for multiplayer. Each area also gives you two NPC summons in case you are playing offline, or don't have any friends to play with and don't want to summon randoms. I think the areas largely failed though. For one thing, they are accessible even without multiple players, which breaks the encounters because they were never designed for single players. Also, the areas have new loot in them, albeit not particularly good loot in the case of the Halls of the Dead and the Iron Passage. You can even make a magic version of the Smelter Sword and two completely new items from Lud and Zallen, which is kind of terrible if you're alone but still want the items. Lastly, the areas would be fun to play through with three players coordinating, but don't really work with one player and two NPCs due to the generally lacking NPC AI. I think instead that those areas should have been offshoots from the DLC start area, rather than optional areas to find within the DLC. This would have made it a lot more obvious that they were intended specifically for multiplayer (a sign out front would likewise have done it). Furthermore, I think that they should not have included new loot. They should have had more copies of good items like Titanite Slabs along with hard-to-access items like rings from higher NG+ cycles for defeating the bosses. This would have helped make it obvious that they were intended only as multiplayer challenges, would still have allowed people who didn't buy the DLC to access them, and wouldn't penalize people who didn't or couldn't play multiplayer for skipping them. Overall though I like the idea behind them, as multiplayer is something that the Soulsborne games are known for, yet never got any support other than matchmaking and more fleshed-out arenas in DS3. The difficulty in almost every level in every Soulsborne game can be broken by playing in a group, as the regular enemies and bosses are not designed for fighting multiple people and can often be cheesed simply by having an extra 2-3 friends helping you. Likewise, while invasions are never really "fair," as the player being invaded isn't expecting the invasion and can be caught off guard in a bad position, invasions are mostly fair when taken as "I invade and then fight my opponent one-on-one." Having multiple players breaks invasions because the invaders must now deal with 3 or 4 players instead of just 1, and while this can lead to entertaining cat-and-mouse fights, it isn't really balanced in any of the games. Having an actual area set up explicitly for multiple players to work through in a coordinated fashion, along with a boss intentionally designed for multiple players to combat, is a great idea that sadly was not as fleshed out in DS2 as it deserved to be. Maybe we'll get it in an upcoming From game is they switch back to enabling multiplayer. Personally, though, I don't like Soulsborne multiplayer and loved Sekiro despite (or perhaps because) it didn't have any multiplayer, so if Elden Ring likewise is purely single player it won't bother me either way.
Man I’ve watched this video many times now since it’s release. I graduated high school in 2015 and I remember working graveyard shifts at a hotel listening to your videos. Changed my life and really opened my eyes to what UA-cam would become. Thanks brother.
I like to call the three shitty parts of the dlc; co-op areas. I found them enjoyable when playing with friends and it seems From had "co-op challenge" in mind when making them. People that didn't have the dlc could also try them out by placing their summon sign before the dlc doors. They could even get some dlc items that way(random rare drop).
Yes! Everytime someone criticizes one of those three areas, I always am asking in my head, "did they attempt to play the coop area solo? That's their fault". All three areas are a blast when played coop. I do question why Fromsoft didn't just make it impossible to progress solo, though. Why even bother allowing players to solo the brume tower run or frigid outskirts?
@@glowerwormWell the game doesn't explain or show you it's coop. It introduces that concept of a level in Forest of the Fallen Giants, but nothing is really shown or taught to the player about it. Therefore, those levels are poor video game design. But because those levels are not mandatory or mechanics that you have to engage with, it's tolerable.
"I wonder if going from Dark Souls 1 to 2, after achieving some level of mastery of the mechanics in the original, was an uncomfortable experience for some people." Completely agree that this is likely. I've known a few people who are veterans of Dark Souls 3, and they legitimately think Sekiro is a terrible poorly-made game, because when they try to play it like it's Dark Souls 3 they get their asses handed to them. When I try to explain that it's meant to be played differently they get angry and tell me that all Fromsoft games play the same and that I don't know what I'm talking about. It's pretty ridiculous.
The games are slightly different enough that I still get my ass handed to me for the first few areas and bosses but once you get used to it they are pretty similar and become way easier from your other experience
While I enjoyed ds2 for the content it provided, I have definitely fallen for the trap that I think every from soft game plays the same, and every single one of those games has handed my ass back to me for playing it (except for demon's souls, by then I learned my lesson, and it's actually not as difficult as I thought it was.) It's really hard going from each game to the other because of how different they are, and it's funny that isn't talked about more. I feel like it's why people shouldn't play the game for it's difficulty, and should do so more for the different experiences. Because for the most part, they're all hard in different ways and even playing through each of them isn't going to make you any better at games. They each just have different lessons to teach everyone.
To be fair Sekiro isn’t that great. It’s a rhythm game. All you do is parry and deal death blows (which aren’t even death blows when enemies can fucking survive being stabbed in the throat), repeat. That’s literally. There is no strategy to it. There are no decisions to make in combat.
Another thing that I really enjoyed about Shulva was finding the opened chests, as if adventurers had already come in and looted the place clean. Dealing with the traps and exploring the temple also had a cool "Indiana Jones" quality. And the Sinh fight is absolutely amazing!
"the dragon wall from the skyrim trailer opens up-" killed me. really great analysis, and entertaining too! your dry (in a good way) tone makes the jokes you throw in so unexpected that it heightens the humour. well made.
Sorry you like your games with nits... I don't see a reason analysis vids like this shouldn't be nitpicky, as minor criticisms like this do little to detract from the game as a whole, but are excellent to keep in mind for future games' design. It seems to me like persistent elevator locations are a weird relic of shifted mechanics between DS1 and 2. Since DS1 doesn't allow you to warp between bonfires for a significant chunk of the game, you're much more likely to backtrack through areas, making persistent elevators much more convenient. Alternatively, it can set up unique low risk-reward scenarios where you have to decide whether you're more likely to next use an elevator to backtrack, or in the same direction after dying. At least there, there's SOME justification. Since backtracking is almost completely trivialized by the ability to warp from the start of DS2, it means elevators are practically guaranteed to be inconvenient, either forcing you to plan ahead for future attempts or to wait your next time around. Sure, it's minor, but it's not nothing.
@@onearmedwolf6512 nitpicking is his gimmick. people must like it because he has a lot of subs. then again the rad brad has millions of subs and he may be the most dull and boring person i've ever heard in my life.
Help, I'm watching all of your videos apparently and don't know how to stop. Never thought I'd find a person with such eerily similar taste because of No Man's Sky of all reasons. At the end of the day, Dark Souls 2 is a fantastic action RPG and one of my favorite games of all time, just like the other four Soulsborne games. It's flawed, but they're also the somewhat odd kind of flaws that only really register when someone is already super invested in a game. It's kind of a bummer that the game gets so much flak for not living up to the Legend That is Dark Souls even though most of Dark Souls doesn't live up to the Legend That is Dark Souls. Oddly enough it seems that the spinoff Bloodborne seems to now hold the mantle for having the most successfully Dark Souls level design. I adore DS2, but seriously, fuck every single DLC co-op area and every NPC invader gauntlet where they just kind of gave up. If you didn't like the enemy clusters in DS2, boy would you not take kindly to SOTFS. Some of the campaign changes are actually super interesting, and there were more surprises than I ever expected. They sure cranked up the crowds, though.
Super late reply but whatever. I only played SotFS and i found it interesting that some of the, in my opinion, worst enemy placements were exclusive to it. A good example is the two elephant men on the bridge to drangleic castle. Without the room to run around them they make a really shitty encounter. So i was wondering, having played both versions, which did you like more?
I only ever played Scholar and was honestly surprised with how few situations I had trouble dealing with enemy crowds after hearing so much about how bad the gank squads were even in the base game. I think so much of this comes down to playstyle. Before I ever played a Souls game I was a big Vindictus player, which is an MMO with very Souls-like combat. That game is mostly about the boss fights but the gauntlets leading up to them are always fights against groups of enemies that die like fodder but can actually be threatening if you don't handle them well and let them hit you; it also didn't have a lock-on feature except for a sortof shitty option to always keep the camera focused on the boss, and only one of the classes had a shield but even that one relied very much on timing parries rather than just blocking because most heavy attacks would either totally drain your stamina or even damage you through a regular block. So when I went into Souls I was already conditioned to dodge attacks rather than consider shields my first line of defense, to use movement and positioning when fighting groups of lesser enemies, and especially to fight without a lock-on. Nowadays I've learned when it's beneficial to use the lock-on but even in boss fights I'll often disengage it to move more freely and only keep it locked when I know I need my camera to follow a boss's movements closely or want to keep my attacks directed at single enemy. When I see people playing Souls and always using the lock-on by default instead of thinking of it as a tool to be toggled on or off in different situations it really baffles me.
"It's kind of a bummer that the game gets so much flak for not living up to the Legend That is Dark Souls" This is an unfair statement to make. There is enough wrong with at least SotFS (only version I have played) to warrant the flak it gets.
@@Nuvizzle Yeah, I noticed this too. I didn't have a particularly hard problem fighting multiples in ds2 as much as I did in the first game even despite keeping the lock on for most of the game. Also some parts in SOTFS actually have even less enemies, like the staircase up to the dragon shrine.
Great video and analysis, one thing though: Your mic has too much gain on it. You can both deal with the clipping as well as the background noise by easing up on the gain a bit. It could also be that you're too close to your microphone, but it doesn't sound like that.
Thank you so much for saying this. I'm learning as I go with making these things and I'm flat-out ignorant about much of it still. I'm guessing what you're describing is most prevalent in the Gary section? I'll mess about with settings some more.
+Joseph Anderson Yeah the background noise (baby) is highest around Elena, and the clipping/high gain is worst in the Gary section. I think having a more directional mic may help with this, depending on your setup, and reducing the gain as Xendran mentioned should help too. Regardless, amazing analysis video, I found myself enjoying this one the most out of the series, and I find myself agreeing with most of your comments! Looking forward to hearing your game design thoughts re: having to change up your build for specific bosses too :)
Great video series! Excellent analysis and some genuinely funny parts, particularly towards the end of this video. I'm glad someone on reddit posted your Darkest Dungeon video, I'll definitely check out the rest of your videos now.
"... The Dragon Wall from the Skyrim trailer opens up after Elana is dead..." I was so caught off by this that, once my brain and eyes finally processed everything, i was just dying laughing. Great delivery. Such a dumb joke, but good job making it! Thank you for these videos. They are fair and well thought out critiques with wonderful dry humor hidden throughout. The ending bits were especially great. Wife needs more dragons in her life, bro.
Your videos are fantastic and I'm sad that this is the final of these 3 videos. I really hope you have plans for more to do because you have a die-hard fan in me. Thanks for the great content!
I liked this video but the suggestion that a boss becomes stronger every time it kills you is maybe the worst idea I've ever heard in my life. I can't imagine a more efficient method to get new players to abandon your game. EDIT: You're so spot on about the ego and first game bias.
Holy shit I watched this really stoned and kept thinking I heard a baby then I would pause the video and not hear it etc. I got suuuuper creeped out when I heard it unmistakably in one part, then I watched the bloopers at the very end 😭
I think the Ivory king is a good example of the game letting you choose your own difficulty. You can choose to try the super murder impossible way with only 1 ally, get a second so that there are less corrupted knights but it is still very challenging, allow 1 portal to be open so that there is at least one corrupted knight with the boss, or close all the portals and make it easy. I think it is a great system too. I wish more bosses were like this.
this is the last of the reviews I have to watch from you, and to be honest, Im really glad I saved these ds2 reviews for last. I remember beating ds2 and thinking "it's not like 1 or 3, but it's still pretty good, I don't know why people shit on this game so much, it's just... different", and you've definitely encapsulated what about the game was different and good. I also really appreciate how much you defended the multiple enemy encounters and how you're providing a deeper analysis on the dlcs here. I'm not even done with the video but I'm absolutely astonished by how much I missed in the sunken crown dlc. I really loved the atmosphere and environment of it but I remember it being a nightmare to get through, and now I'm realizing the whole thing with the bow and it makes so much more sense now. I still stand by a lot of my other points I left in your other videos- I think you play the games in a really specific way that is reinforced throughout the fanbase to an oversaturated degree- (melee only, no story, like it solely for gameplay and difficulty) that almost everyone does their first playthrough, and that's pretty limiting. But at the same time, I see how your perspective has been constantly built up throughout the years and how it has taught you a lot of lessons and unique ways at looking at the games, which makes me re-inspired to play them. You think very critically which I feel I have lost a lot of through playing these games so many times so many different ways. Very recently after Sekiro I finally played each of the games with a shield thanks to the lessons it taught me about how blocking in a game can be used "offensively", and I think after watching these videos I would like to really take in fighting multiple enemies at once unlocked- which ironically is something I did a lot in the beginning without realizing it, but playing the games again with an actual conscious mindset sounds like a good time.
Nice man. Great series. I'm so glad I picked DS2 back up, after having abandoned it early on when it wasn't matching my expectations based on DS1. The DLC is remarkable. Some of the greatest FROM content is tucked away at the end of their rushed project.
Great video series. The reindeers aren't buggy, though. They simply spawn out of sight in the blizzard from their own set spawn point. The part between the 2nd and 3rd building simply has more spawn points. Plus, they don't spawn infinitely. They have the 12 death limit like most other enemies. (The Stone Soldiers being one of the few exceptions.) You can theoretically kill all of them in one life and never see them again.
Great vid, I completely agree. I started with DS2 after reading some suggestions online and after I beat it a few times I played DS1, and the experience was really interesting. I love both games and recognize that both have their flaws, and the second one doesn't deserve the amount of hate it gets from some of the DS veterans.
Once you get the eye of the princess from Eleum Loyce, you can also see and lock onto the invisible guys in the shaded woods. I thought the Ivory King was the hardest. The Loyce Knight helping me died in about 10 seconds.
Maybe I'm wrong but didn't from openly state that the 3 npc boss and blue smelter were designed to be attacked with summons? Wasn't it there idea of a single player experience in the main Dlc and the optional bosses were for some fun Co op with summons? I might be wrong here.
I hated this game enough to quit it early, but i think I might go back and beat it after your video series. When the 64bit version goes on sale that is. Btw, I think the challenge mode idea is brilliant and really needs to be implemented. Force people to beat the game as a knight, rogue, mage, pyro etc.. A randomizer run would be fun too. Great video dude you've made a fan of me
I actually like the fast pace of your speech, Mr Anderson. I have watched and rewatched all of your videos multiple times, I find your critiques interesting and while I don't always agree on every point you give interesting and well thought out perspective and I rarely think your opinion is not justified whether I had the same experience or not. Keep making videos, and I'll keep watching them. I also like the longer length, I listen to your videos like podcasts while I'm playing games and I would actually not mind if you started making podcasts on game critique, although sometimes the video can help you illustrate a point you're making I suppose. Having played most of the games you talk about though I can usually remember and picture whatever issue you're talking about which is a credit to how well thought out your scripts are. Keep it up.
it's probably been mentioned about a hundred times, and this makes the "Gary Areas" by no means any better, but i believe those sections were designed with coop in mind, hence why the little non-dlc player summon statues are placed right at the entrances to the optional areas. They still suck, but some of the more baffling choices make more sense when designed around the idea of context-less cooperative play.
the three bad areas where made for co-op, the even let you summon palyers that down own the dlc, and drops them the dlc items. It's better when you realse that.
+marsgreekgod Damn I never saw it that way, good call. That explains the cancer that is the Iron Passage, and the multiple-enemy bosses in Cave of the Dead and Frigid Outskirts.
Sincerely for me Sir Alonne is my favorite boss of the whole series, even if the way to him kinda sucks. I actually fought him without a shield, dunno why but his attacks depleted way too much stamina when I blocked them with my shield.
This is probably the most fair critique of Dark Souls 2 I've heard. You stay as objective as possible and make sure to note both what the game does well and where it fails and more importantly note how all the changes interact with each other. I don't fully agree with everything you say. For an example I never considered the interconnectedness of the original an integral part of the game. It was kinda fun at moments but it was never something I did really miss at any point. But you make fair points and I think this is a fairly subjective aspect of the experience. DS2 is a flawed game which I still love and you managed to pinpoint so much of both what I like and dislike about it. Good job.
Are you serious?! It is riddled with bad camera and often inconsistent moves! It is the most challenging, but not fun and it stops being interesting because so hard to kill solo.
I've watched your Dragon's Dogma and first two dark souls video series, and the more I watch, the more I'm convinced that you really need to try the monster hunter series. Most things you mention as being parts you love about the combat is exemplified in MH, and a lot of the things you complain about are generally avoided. You even mention wanting a sort of boss rush mode as a feature in these games... and that is basically what MH is. Imagine a game focused around boss fights, most with the same quality as Sinh or better, especially in the "Actually feels like you are trying to bring down a dragon/giant wolf/land fish/dinosaur" department. Simply put, not only do I think you would enjoy them, but I also think you would enjoy picking apart what makes those games tick (both good and bad). These items include: the skill requirement to avoid punishment, the different ways the game punishes you, the way the game keeps from punishing you too much, the unique qualities that come with the healing system, the different play styles that come with the different weapon types, how the game changes when playing solo versus online with others, how breakable parts changes combat, how the light atmosphere makes it feel different from something like dark souls, and much more. The biggest obstacle to the game is that playing it is a huge time commitment, and the time spent trying to get the game to "click" can be long for many (upwards of 5-10 hours for some) and feel like a huge waste, but once it does click, the previous time doesn't feel wasted, and, at least in my experience, is a better game for it. So much so, that I like to watch streamers who are new to the game, just to watch them figure it out, and have some sense of that same feeling over again.
Thank you so much for making these - and all your analysis videos. Looking forward to see what's next! Maybe something in-depth to do with New Vegas? Unless you're burnt out on Fallout.
Elana is definitely a fair fight. But she's also incredibly, mind-numbingly lazily designed. Visually she's too close to Nashandra to feel new. Her melee swings ape Nashandra's, and aren't new. Her spells are all spells players can get and are, at most, slightly tweaked. They are not new. The melee summons are ALL enemies you fight at other points in the game, and, shocker, aren't new. Nothing in this fight feels interesting, new, or unique. And the fact that most people just quit out and reset the fight if she summons Velstadt first. A boss where nothing feels new and you'll probably want to quit out a third of the way into the fight if you get bad RNG. How fun.
EDIT: this comment was a mess, so I deleted it. Now I'm regretting it because I had a like for it, lol. I'll try to remake my statement. So, I thought that your comment was great because of how much you can differ about how good the boss is, and for very different reasons. Now I think the same, also, anyone should be entitled to choose why they like what they like. Thanks for your comment.
The inconsistency of Elana's design made me really dislike the fight because I only got 2 runs at the boss. The first time, she threw Velstadt at me and I was so surprised I died pretty quickly trying to panic-heal. The second time I was more prepared and entirely ready to take on both bosses simultaneously, had a plan in mind, mentally hyped myself up when she went into the summoning animation, and then she just threw a few skeletons at me that I smacked down in one hit and the rest of the fight was trivial. I think the fight would've greatly benefited from having three phases - Elana alone, Elana summoning skeletons, and Elana with Velstadt. During the second phase she could be more defensive and keep teleporting away from you while sending skeletons at you - the skeletons aren't very threatening but they keep you occupied while she pegs you with spells from a distance, and the phase would train you to watch for her spells while fighting something else and trying to close the distance, so that when Velstadt popped out you'd be more prepared to avoid magic and Velstadt at the same time while finishing Elana off.
Joseph's son reflects how the audience feels perfectly. "I think the only bosses that get close are" *baby mumbles in a disapproving tone* "What's that, you disagree?" "His attacks are dangerous" *Baby has a ptsd flashback to fighting sinh* "they're not that dangerous"
To heal you from your hate of non-resetting elevators: They are all designed to simply send them back everytime you are using them. So YOU decide where they are when you respawn, not the game, ergo you are comlaining about yourself.
Interesting. I despised the Sinh fight (though I love the aesthetics and themes of both Shulva and Sinh) because the damn lizard was spending 90%+ of its time in the air, making the "fight" tedious and more drawn out than it needed be. The only boss fights I truly enjoyed in the DLCs were Sir Alonne and to a lesser degree the Ivory King.
you enjoyed the frigid wastes! i thought i was the only one! For me the oppressive empty space somehow captured the feeling of what darksouls was more than any other area. In a sense it is a foreshadowing of gael's ash waste.
I was rewatching your videos on DS2 just to rethink my opinion a bit. Then you said, 'Difficulty is the main reason people play this series.' (I might be paraphrasing a little here.) Maybe you don't really think that. In any case, I feel compelled to write about how much I disagree with that statement and think otherwise. There's a lot more to the Souls series than just the difficulty that makes them such memorable games to play. I believe that most players can feel and appreciate these other qualities even when they don't actively notice them. For me, it isn't about the difficulty. It was, at first. But by the time I reached Anor Londo, it wasn't anymore. It was the design, the enemy placements, the atmosphere, the lore, the world design, and the emotions that the game managed to evoke. Now, everyone doesn't have to appreciate game design to like a game. That being said, surely, it wasn't the difficulty that 'wow'ed you when you found out that the church in Undead Parish connected to Firelink Shrine? Surely, it wasn't the difficulty that made a lot of the areas in Dark Souls look so hauntingly beautiful? Surely, it wasn't the difficulty that made many players sad for Sif? Surely, it wasn't difficulty that made me feel like I had given Artorias an honorable, deserved death? Surely, it wasn't the difficulty that gave the walk to Gwyn a sense of finality? Difficulty is what immerses you into the world. I'm not obsessed with Dark Souls for the difficulty. It's what they use that difficulty to convey. That's what I play these games for. That tone, atmosphere, and feelings. You would be correct to say that difficulty is a vital part of the equation and if you take that away, Dark Souls will fall apart. However, if difficulty is the only thing it had, and it had no world design, level design, carefully designed enemies, carefully designed enemy encounters, carefully designed mechanics, and well integrated sense of progression, and the lore, it would become a difficult game for the sake of difficulty. Dark Souls wasn't difficult for the sake of being difficult. It was difficult to evoke emotions, to create tension, and joy. It had bigger goals than to be just a difficult games for people to conquer, as evident by the amount of thought that went into the lore. I think we can all agree that it managed to achieve some of those goals. That is why we call it a 'Flawed Masterpiece', right?
In my opinion difficulty might be one of the biggest reasons people play these. But it's not because how difficult they are, it's because how well these games (usually) implement the difficulty into the level, combat and boss design. Maybe that's what he meant.
It is interesting. Back in the days, when I first saw the Demon's Souls trailer on Gametrailers website, I was sooo intrigued (aside from the weird name). It seemed like it had the gothic atmosphere that I craved in any RPG. Then the game came out (I didn't have a PS3 but wanted to get one to play it), people reviewed kept saying it was very difficult. As a person who sucks as "challenging" games I hated the idea. I hate repeating things in games, I get bored quickly because I thought it was going to be hard just for the sake of it, I thought it was going to be unfair. Years later, Dark Souls comes out on PC, I buy the game, it is riddled with technical problems but then fixed by the community. I discover that these games are something else, and the challenge is most of the time is very fair. Something clicks and it is all because of the things you listed. Amazing level design, the lore, the atmosphere, the way you are challenged but at the same time feel empowered because you can learn to deal with every encounter. Dark Souls games are not difficult they are challenges that you learn to overcome which all tie to the bigger picture.
"Challenging" is probably the more suitable word, and I do think the games' challenge is one of its main draws, and for most people probably the singular thing that makes it a great series. It's easy to make something difficult, but it's a rare and excellent game that manages to test you in a way that is both challenging and fair. I believe JA said as much himself. The level design, enemy design, more or less everything else you talk about, is all part of that carefully designed challenge. But so is the damage and health of everything in the world and the availability and function of healing. If the game was exactly the same but everything did a third of the damage it does and your healing was instant I don't think anyone would consider the game very good or memorable.
On unfairness. Ds2 is unfair because of combat, enemies will lock on and spin 360 around in order to hit you reguardless of where you are, this is true for most enemies in the game. This is added to the broken hitboxes and the fact that most the game is just pitting you against multiple strong heavy enemies together that make it seem unfair and cheap rather then difficult.
Hey! I beat Ava my third try, and Sinh on my 47th try! Sinh is my second hardest boss in souls, apart from Ebrietas in BB, and maybe the Ivory King, with Gael being close.
Dark Souls II's base game was good, but the DLC's just nailed it. All of the DS games are amazing, but the DLC for DS II just pushed it to become my favorite Souls game.
I loved, loved these videos. I hope you become one day as famous, or even more so than matthewmatosis. I agree with all of your points, mainly because you have an argument behind everything you say. These are honestly my favorite videos on the Souls Series and I'm glad that you are a fan of the game and didn't hate it. I look forward to seeing your future content and I personally hope that you'll also analyze some older games because I don't have a current-gen console and I wouldn't see your videos on new games. :'( About recommendations, I would love to see a video on Demon's Souls (hopefully a very long one) and on God Hand, made by Clover Studios.
My god, totally love all 3 videos, and the very end of this one make me smile so much, such a cute moment with the kid ahahahah XD Thx for those amazing videos Man
I really loved his series of videos, since DS2 was the first souls game I ever played and it did the same thing for me that DS1 did for a lot of people, so I don't get all the hate, I became a fan of the whole series and all thanks to this game
Good, enjoyable review, dude! I don't agree with everything, of course, but here's a couple of special sore points: I completely disagree on your opinions about Elana. The boss in itself is alright, I don't consider it anything amazing or horrible, but the summons (specially Velstadt) and the striking similarity of the model to Nashandra's (?) makes the boss that much worse to me. I would have enjoyed much more if, keeping with the muddy summon theme(which is great), she would have had a big mud creature instead of Velstadt and small other mud critters instead of skeletons or pigs. Recycled content like that is a special pet peeve of mine. Sinh I had a lot of fun beating, considering I used vanguard seal and it was farly challenging for that build. I also feel the Darklurker fight to be placed in a really discouraging spot to get to, specially considering the fact that you have to waste humanities as some short of ticket ride. I didn't bother beating him with the above mentioned build since it was too much of a hassle.
the velstadt summon is meant to reference demons souls, again but yeah it certainly doesn't wow, feels like they were reussing assets, which is awfully characteristic for everything in DS2 except the DLC, so it stands out negatively.
@@genericgorilla Velstadt has reason to appear tho as Velstadt is originally from Sanctum city before he left to serve Vendrick, even if its reuse of assets it does build up on the lore
I totally agree that the areas you are discussing in the "gary" section are not good. But just so you understand a little why they are so, it's because they are meant as a coop area. They are ridiculously difficult and populated by lots of monsters and 2 of them have a multi-enemy boss encounter because you're supposed to have a friend with you to watch your back... still even with that in mind they could have been made better.
I still don't see what the problem is with just sending the elevator back up once you've used it though. I also thought that Elana was just flat out annoying because the length and difficulty of the fight heavily depends on the RNG factor of whether or not she summons Velstadt and how many times. Once I fought her and she summoned him non stop. Another time he didn't get summoned at all.
I'm an avid watcher of these, but 0:49 "Considering the lack of interconectiveness already missing..." is a flaw in semantic logic, it would suppose that an interconectiveness is present. Again, I'm sure you receive a lot of these daily, but keep up the good work!
You forgot to mention one mechanic in fight with Sihn, that hitting him in the chest area where the Yorgh's spear got stuck deals extra dmg, not much but enough to try and go for it, while being completely optional way of fighting him. It also lore friendly :)
The reason (I think) as to why 2 gets called cheap and 1 doesn't is because you lose maximum health in 2. In 1 if you die, so what, you lost some souls that you can get back because enemies respawn infinitely. In 2 there's a punishment for dying; enemies don't respawn indefinitely unless you join the Covenant of Champions even though the game doesn't tell you about that aspect of the covenant, you are now more susceptible to death because of your lowered health, and effigies are finite (but there are ways to become human) So now every death hurts more because of the bigger punishment, so the game forcing damage/death on you isn't fair because it's the game deciding to make itself harder. No matter how many times you die in 1, the game never gets any harder. In 2 the more you die the harder it gets, which is why unavoidable deaths are cheaper.
NebulousIdea Decreasing health has been a facet of the series in every single game _but_ DS1. Demon's Souls halves your health immediately upon death. Dark Souls 2 actually makes this a much fairer mechanic by only decreasing your health gradually per death. Both games have rings which half the amount of health you lose. Dark Souls 3 also lowers health on death, where you lose about 25% of your health immediately.
@@auctoritate8254 The Dark Souls 3 one isn't the same though. You only lose the HP buff from using an ember, which isn't the same as losing from your max HP no matter what you did before you died. Embers are more like bonuses, so you still retain your original max HP at least. I never liked this mechanic in DS2, and hated that I almost always had to wear the ring of binding just so I don't have to use an effigy. It just seems like a weird mechanic to me, punishing you even more by making the game harder, and potentially to every new player, especially since it goes down as far as 50% without the ring, and it's not like you get many effigies in the beginning.
I know i'm late but i disagree. I tried fighting aava with a greatsword and the fight was incredibly difficult for me. i went back and changed my stat allocation to a dex build with a faster weapon and it made the fight leagues easier. i guess its still do-able with certain builds but the difference in difficulty is the point of the critique. why should fighting this boss with my greatsword be so much harder than with a falchion. this speaks for boss design and balance if nothing else. It's impossible to balance every fight for every build, just because there are so many weapons and spells. But at the very least, it's undeniable that aava does this worse than other bosses.
I love these videos man! souls/borne fans are the most intelligent gamers (in my opinion). your very articulate and perceptive. I love the games n the way u break em down. great job. this is like the 4th time I've run through your videos.
Not entirely sure those pillars in Shulva "teach" you what they do though and its a massive failing imo. I noticed the glowing pillar but it never occurred to me to swing at it (very few things other than hidden walls are activated by hitting them in dark souls) this led to me A) Having to get through these enemies without cheesing them (by having the pillar do all the work for you) B) Being stuck for a good hour or two when they expect you to hit more of these pillars to open up paths later in the level. I feel this mechanic was one of the only times From Software seriously dropped the ball in the "show and not tell" style of design. It's made doubly annoying by the fact that you find a bow shortly after in a place where it looks like you've gotten yourself "stuck" by hitting a pillar switch, the fact they've given you a bow clearly indicates that you can also shoot these switches. I wish they could have programmed something in to the game to indicate that you could melee attack the switches, maybe you see an enemy do it first or something...?
Same, I didn't notice you could hit the switches til my second playthrough and that was after watching a speedrun where the guy hit them, I didn't figure it out for myself. It made the very first section of the dlc very hard and kinda tainted the rest of it for me.
same thing for me but with the soul statues in Drangleic Castle. At first I thought that certain stone enemies corresponded to statues/doors, but then I realized that you could actually lure any stone enemy to the ruin sentinel doors to open them, and then i realized that they don't have to be made of stone. it was a really confusing experience
The three areas you pointed out in the gary section are intended to be played with a friend or online with someone. They were not at all designed with solo play in mind. I remember reading about that, hence why the areas are quite literally hell.
That final section was 100% on point with my feelings. I love replaying the souls series, but if I ever go online to check on opinions about them I see so much more vitriol for what I consider my favorite one in the series than I thought it deserves. Every time I play Dark Souls 1 or 3 I am reminded of what the second one did wrong, but at the same time I would have to go out of my way to dismiss everything it did better than its pre/sequel. People basically wanted more DLC for dark souls and what they got was a different core game. And boy did they let everyone know it was a mistake.
All three Gary parts are, in fact, co-op areas - that's why there's a lever (in Ivory King DLC) that opens a door that the player can't enter - you let your phantom(s) go there and clear monsters, that you can't reach. That's why the trio boss is a nightmare to fight on your own, as well as the multiple reindeer and, not to forget, the cat duo. I believe that should've been mentioned in the "Gary" section :) In fact, those areas are a way for players, who don't own the DLC to experience a small part of it. When you enter each respective area, BEFORE you use the item that is key to the DLC, there are a bunch of standing stones, that look a bit like graves. If you place your summon sign there, it will appear at the identical standing stones at the begining of each co-op area, and players can summon you there.
YEAH! That was just awesome and felt real ( in a way ). Running away from the thing and then fighting it in a "small"room. Chasing it down when it escapes on the bridge. Holding onto it when it's flying and then a great last battle in a great arena type location. And you got the Dark Souls Version ( in difficulty )of Grigori... the Ur-Dragon..... still haven't beaten that one.
I like all the dragon fights in DD, especially the BBI fights after you defeat the boss, where two dragons are there working together. Trying to take out two of them can be something else especially if you aren't an archer. And unlike Souls games can't be easily cheesed due to their spells. I still prefer Vindictus dragon fights though. They feel more epic than in Souls or Dogma, might be the players or massive environments you fight them in.
@JosephAnderson I strongly feel that you should give Salt and Sanctuary a try if you haven't already. Its a great title for anyone who is a fan of From's Souls series and it implements a number of good ideas and level design aspects that I'm sure you'll appreciate and enjoy.
Dude I know it's been 5 years but I listen to these at 4 am while working and the sudden child cooing was the scariest thing ever. Like blood freezing, heart pounding fear.
I tought I was the only one. tought i've gone crazy
This literally just happened to me. I paused the video and looked out my window to see if someone was at my house at 5 AM for some reason.
I wasn't scared but I thought the storm we had at that time began to make weird noises, like I am going insane or something.
Holy shit I just posted the same comment lmao. Saaaame
I also just experienced this at 3am, watching in the dark and in bed. Thought my baby nephew was awake or that I was hearing things.
One of my favorite things is Eleum Loyce is how in one of the chest rooms you see a frozen mimic that is then a suspiciously normal-looking chest when you re-encounter it.
i went thru that room so many times knowing the mimic was frozen there and i still fell for the chest
I just replayed last week. Reentered the room and forgot which one was the mimic. I hit every chest but rolled away too late and got grabbed
Fume Knight has a really cool easter egg where if you go into the fight wearing Velstadt's set he enrages and starts the fight in his powered up form.
Always loved that touch
Just the helmet but yeah, for me it makes the fight easier.
you could say he is fuming
where did you acquire baby?
Baby store. Got him on sale.
+Joseph Anderson baby 2 dlc was nerfed i feel
Lol I at first genuinly thought it was a add on to the music
Drops after you defeat Lonliness boss and in Hospital area
meijer
Goddammit Gary.
fucking gary, man.
Level Design Gods can't make game only by themselves during our lifetimes, you know. They had to hire Garies.
So, it's OK, Gary.
Gary >>> Miyazaki
You recorded the Sinh part with your baby in your hands? :p
He is definitely prepping future gamer.
It gives me warm fuzzies to think that he is explaining all this Dark Souls stuff not to us, but to the baby
What a shitty parent..
What does he play? dark souls, layers of fear, shooters and the evil within?
No wonder kids these days are fucked in the head..
And you seem to be the most notable example of that.
Jan Christian Frodahl You're extremely naive in child psychology. Therefore, I suggest you either read up on it, or you simply don't say anything about it.
Gary also designed the approach to Sir Alonne.
Ah yes, fireball lizard and weeb gauntlet
Holy. Shit yeah
Classic Garry *shakes head*
That shit was so frustrating that I gave up running for the boss door and just repeatedly cleared the chambers of knights and salamanders then went back to the bonfire until they all stopped spawning
@@darko1295 me too man me too lol
I must admit, the opening to the Old Iron King blew me away. Walking up that chain onto Brume Tower was breathtaking and reminded me a lot of Anor Londo, like you were actually a much smaller being wandering around the ruins of a once mighty world. It made me feel small, something which Dark Souls 2 failed to do (in my opinion at least) and is something Dark Souls 1 did spectacularly. Brume Tower has to be my favourite level/area of any Souls game, it feels like you're crawling around a massive machine that you're slowly bringing to life, and it's home to one of my favourite Boss fights in the series (Sir Alonne).
The base game may have been a poor sequel to Dark Souls 1, but the DLCs just did so much right.
you know if you fight alonne without a shield and take no damage, when he gets low on health he'll kill himself. not sure if you have to use a katana. sadly i could never pull this off but it's a really cool detail.
@@Jack_80 you just have to no hit him
@@emanuelc.8579 i'm pretty sure you can't use a shield, because he considers the use of a shield cowardly and not honorable.
@@Jack_80 What if you two hand and carry the shield on your back?
@@theirlovecantcutourknife3253 no idea, you can probably look it up and find out pretty quick though. i wouldn't risk it, you still technically would have a shield equipped.
"from doesnt need to rely on attacks that lockon to player movements"
"I hope thats a lesson learned for dark souls 3"
*cries internally*
I really enjoy almost every part of ds3
@@adamiadamiadami now thats just blatant lying
@@adamiadamiadami Dark Souls 3 has *more* tracking than 2, actually. Don't get me wrong, I think that 3 is a colossally superior game, but the tracking in both games is a non-issue. Dark Souls 3 is just deceptive about its tracking because when the enemies do it, it doesn't look fucking ridiculous like it does in 2; they don't spin around like they're standing on a turntable. The enemies that people complain about in DS2 do.
Like Joseph says, the tracking is necessary at times in order to force you to actually learn how to roll the attacks. Obviously there are ways to do this without the tracking, but if it weren't there, then overhead swings, stabs, etc. would be made completely trivial by just circle strafing. This is actually an issue with a lot of enemies in DS2. Look at the pursuer for an especially obvious example. DS3 fixes this and does a great job of it because it fooled people like you into thinking that it's not even a thing at all, when in reality it is, it's just implemented better so it's not something worth complaining about.
"I hope the concept of NG+ is expanded upon in DS3"
I audibly chuckled
and now scream internally because elden ring does the same exact bullshit
The oil at 18:00, once ignited, will also ignite the enemies. Those, in turn - will become much stronger once aflame, presenting a greater challenge to the player. Notice here how you have to carefully decide where to kill the monsters, since their explosion upon death will also ignite the oil.
+Learthion Those enemies will are also more likely to explode once set ablaze, so a simple whap from a torch is sometimes quicker than hitting them with a regular weapon.
I just throw a Fire Ball at them then they attack you realy slow und kill themself.
"bonfire astetics are a great ideia... ...good start that's hopefully expended in DS3" :(
when i heard that i literaly screamed NOPE NG+ IN DS SUCZ.
But for real Dark souls 2 is my favorite....
One of my favourite things in ds2 is the NG+, excellent implementation and it gives replay value to the game.
@@Swatyo yeah ds2 is the only ds i can bring myself to play ng+ in. the others just feel like easy mode on ng+. apparently the bosses get harder but everything else is so easy i never stuck with it long enough to find out. there are very few games i can play ng+ on, if i replay a game i want it to be more (or at least equally) challenging.
*Expanded
Im in ng+++? Or ++++ anyway, i can't bring myself to play on a different charecter cause i know im going to have to do all the stuff again, but i sometimes find fun in stomping iudex gundyr or vordt, but im going to have to stop playing for a while as twin princes was so hard i had to cheese them with poisen fog with his blind spot for phase 2
"The frigid wastes is one of my favorite areas in dark souls 2"
What
The
Hell
DatBoi SmiddyPants What confuses me the most is that he says it's one of his favorites, then comes to the conclusion that it's one the worst. I love this video, but that one contradiction left me scratching my head.
He explains pretty clearly that he loved the concept of the area and felt that if more had been done with it it could have been great. It really is a fine line between great and awful in this series, a few tweaks here and there can greatly improve or ruin something. Like, Ornstein and Smough is generally a universally well received fight, but it could've easily been completely ruined just by making the arena you fight them in smaller so you couldn't separate them and were just constantly spammed with overlapping attacks - which is something that happens all too often with gank fights in DS2. If that were the case it wouldn't be incorrect for someone to say "This is one of my favorite fights in the game, I think it would've been amazing if they just had you fight in a larger arena"
*horsefuck valley
@@Nuvizzle Funny thing is Code Vein did exactly that with their O&S type of boss.
jengaaaaa Was it bad?
I see that you and your baby are Cosplaying as Oceiros and Ocellette, uncut edition.
I'm 4 years late, but I just beat the Dark Souls 2 DLC today, and now I can finally watch this video that I've been saving forever lol
Congratulations, no easy feat
Good job my guy! Definitely not a task for the meek of will
@@matthewthomas8407 love the DS2 dlc. Sunken City is still my favorite level of the series, even including Elden Ring. Frigid Outskirts had a remake in Elden Ring, visually-the run to Melania-and spiritually-the lake of rot-which I loved.
Those 'Gary' areas are definitely designed for co-op
In Brume tower it is even heavily implied by there being two doors right at the start. I think there is even a sign that explaines the point of that erea.
@@niek3839 They were explicitly designed for co-op. Players who didn't have the DLC could still enter the beginning DLC area, but would not have the item needed to open the big elaborate door and access the main part of the DLC. However, if they put their summon signs down in the first area before going through the door, they would be able to be summoned in the offshoot areas (Halls of the Dead, Iron Passage, and Frigid Outskirts respectively). The areas were intentionally overtuned for single players because they were balanced for multiplayer. Each area also gives you two NPC summons in case you are playing offline, or don't have any friends to play with and don't want to summon randoms.
I think the areas largely failed though. For one thing, they are accessible even without multiple players, which breaks the encounters because they were never designed for single players. Also, the areas have new loot in them, albeit not particularly good loot in the case of the Halls of the Dead and the Iron Passage. You can even make a magic version of the Smelter Sword and two completely new items from Lud and Zallen, which is kind of terrible if you're alone but still want the items. Lastly, the areas would be fun to play through with three players coordinating, but don't really work with one player and two NPCs due to the generally lacking NPC AI.
I think instead that those areas should have been offshoots from the DLC start area, rather than optional areas to find within the DLC. This would have made it a lot more obvious that they were intended specifically for multiplayer (a sign out front would likewise have done it). Furthermore, I think that they should not have included new loot. They should have had more copies of good items like Titanite Slabs along with hard-to-access items like rings from higher NG+ cycles for defeating the bosses. This would have helped make it obvious that they were intended only as multiplayer challenges, would still have allowed people who didn't buy the DLC to access them, and wouldn't penalize people who didn't or couldn't play multiplayer for skipping them.
Overall though I like the idea behind them, as multiplayer is something that the Soulsborne games are known for, yet never got any support other than matchmaking and more fleshed-out arenas in DS3. The difficulty in almost every level in every Soulsborne game can be broken by playing in a group, as the regular enemies and bosses are not designed for fighting multiple people and can often be cheesed simply by having an extra 2-3 friends helping you. Likewise, while invasions are never really "fair," as the player being invaded isn't expecting the invasion and can be caught off guard in a bad position, invasions are mostly fair when taken as "I invade and then fight my opponent one-on-one." Having multiple players breaks invasions because the invaders must now deal with 3 or 4 players instead of just 1, and while this can lead to entertaining cat-and-mouse fights, it isn't really balanced in any of the games. Having an actual area set up explicitly for multiple players to work through in a coordinated fashion, along with a boss intentionally designed for multiple players to combat, is a great idea that sadly was not as fleshed out in DS2 as it deserved to be. Maybe we'll get it in an upcoming From game is they switch back to enabling multiplayer. Personally, though, I don't like Soulsborne multiplayer and loved Sekiro despite (or perhaps because) it didn't have any multiplayer, so if Elden Ring likewise is purely single player it won't bother me either way.
I know that's the intention but they're still terrible. That explains why they're sectioned off though.
Old comment I know but summoning a person or two for the Graverobbers fight actually makes it really fun for me.
Even in coop these zones are terrible, especially Friggid outscirts
Man I’ve watched this video many times now since it’s release. I graduated high school in 2015 and I remember working graveyard shifts at a hotel listening to your videos. Changed my life and really opened my eyes to what UA-cam would become. Thanks brother.
Those outro bloopers were some of the cutest things I've ever heard.
I like to call the three shitty parts of the dlc; co-op areas. I found them enjoyable when playing with friends and it seems From had "co-op challenge" in mind when making them. People that didn't have the dlc could also try them out by placing their summon sign before the dlc doors. They could even get some dlc items that way(random rare drop).
+
Yes! Everytime someone criticizes one of those three areas, I always am asking in my head, "did they attempt to play the coop area solo? That's their fault".
All three areas are a blast when played coop. I do question why Fromsoft didn't just make it impossible to progress solo, though. Why even bother allowing players to solo the brume tower run or frigid outskirts?
@@glowerwormWell the game doesn't explain or show you it's coop. It introduces that concept of a level in Forest of the Fallen Giants, but nothing is really shown or taught to the player about it. Therefore, those levels are poor video game design. But because those levels are not mandatory or mechanics that you have to engage with, it's tolerable.
"I wonder if going from Dark Souls 1 to 2, after achieving some level of mastery of the mechanics in the original, was an uncomfortable experience for some people."
Completely agree that this is likely. I've known a few people who are veterans of Dark Souls 3, and they legitimately think Sekiro is a terrible poorly-made game, because when they try to play it like it's Dark Souls 3 they get their asses handed to them. When I try to explain that it's meant to be played differently they get angry and tell me that all Fromsoft games play the same and that I don't know what I'm talking about. It's pretty ridiculous.
They’re weird cuz I was a dumbass and played sekiro like ds3 for embarrassingly long and I still enjoyed it (I learnt at the owl)
The games are slightly different enough that I still get my ass handed to me for the first few areas and bosses but once you get used to it they are pretty similar and become way easier from your other experience
people who get angry and say "you don't know what you're talking about" are usually the one that has no idea what they're talking about at all.
While I enjoyed ds2 for the content it provided, I have definitely fallen for the trap that I think every from soft game plays the same, and every single one of those games has handed my ass back to me for playing it (except for demon's souls, by then I learned my lesson, and it's actually not as difficult as I thought it was.) It's really hard going from each game to the other because of how different they are, and it's funny that isn't talked about more. I feel like it's why people shouldn't play the game for it's difficulty, and should do so more for the different experiences. Because for the most part, they're all hard in different ways and even playing through each of them isn't going to make you any better at games. They each just have different lessons to teach everyone.
To be fair Sekiro isn’t that great. It’s a rhythm game. All you do is parry and deal death blows (which aren’t even death blows when enemies can fucking survive being stabbed in the throat), repeat. That’s literally. There is no strategy to it. There are no decisions to make in combat.
Another thing that I really enjoyed about Shulva was finding the opened chests, as if adventurers had already come in and looted the place clean. Dealing with the traps and exploring the temple also had a cool "Indiana Jones" quality. And the Sinh fight is absolutely amazing!
"the dragon wall from the skyrim trailer opens up-" killed me. really great analysis, and entertaining too! your dry (in a good way) tone makes the jokes you throw in so unexpected that it heightens the humour. well made.
Okay? No one asked for your opinion.
Thank you so much for these videos, that was really interesting.
You're very welcome. :)
Great analysis, but you know that you are easily able to reset an elevator before walking away.
i feel the same like walking over the button to reset it before heading out isnt that tedious
***** this just seems very nitpicky.
Sorry you like your games with nits... I don't see a reason analysis vids like this shouldn't be nitpicky, as minor criticisms like this do little to detract from the game as a whole, but are excellent to keep in mind for future games' design.
It seems to me like persistent elevator locations are a weird relic of shifted mechanics between DS1 and 2. Since DS1 doesn't allow you to warp between bonfires for a significant chunk of the game, you're much more likely to backtrack through areas, making persistent elevators much more convenient. Alternatively, it can set up unique low risk-reward scenarios where you have to decide whether you're more likely to next use an elevator to backtrack, or in the same direction after dying. At least there, there's SOME justification.
Since backtracking is almost completely trivialized by the ability to warp from the start of DS2, it means elevators are practically guaranteed to be inconvenient, either forcing you to plan ahead for future attempts or to wait your next time around. Sure, it's minor, but it's not nothing.
@@onearmedwolf6512 nitpicking is his gimmick. people must like it because he has a lot of subs. then again the rad brad has millions of subs and he may be the most dull and boring person i've ever heard in my life.
Jack M bro you're a conspiracy believer i thought that sort of thing was a joke what the hell
Help, I'm watching all of your videos apparently and don't know how to stop. Never thought I'd find a person with such eerily similar taste because of No Man's Sky of all reasons.
At the end of the day, Dark Souls 2 is a fantastic action RPG and one of my favorite games of all time, just like the other four Soulsborne games. It's flawed, but they're also the somewhat odd kind of flaws that only really register when someone is already super invested in a game.
It's kind of a bummer that the game gets so much flak for not living up to the Legend That is Dark Souls even though most of Dark Souls doesn't live up to the Legend That is Dark Souls. Oddly enough it seems that the spinoff Bloodborne seems to now hold the mantle for having the most successfully Dark Souls level design.
I adore DS2, but seriously, fuck every single DLC co-op area and every NPC invader gauntlet where they just kind of gave up.
If you didn't like the enemy clusters in DS2, boy would you not take kindly to SOTFS. Some of the campaign changes are actually super interesting, and there were more surprises than I ever expected. They sure cranked up the crowds, though.
Keith Ballard I'm watching them all & we have different taste. Good vids
Super late reply but whatever. I only played SotFS and i found it interesting that some of the, in my opinion, worst enemy placements were exclusive to it. A good example is the two elephant men on the bridge to drangleic castle. Without the room to run around them they make a really shitty encounter. So i was wondering, having played both versions, which did you like more?
I only ever played Scholar and was honestly surprised with how few situations I had trouble dealing with enemy crowds after hearing so much about how bad the gank squads were even in the base game. I think so much of this comes down to playstyle. Before I ever played a Souls game I was a big Vindictus player, which is an MMO with very Souls-like combat. That game is mostly about the boss fights but the gauntlets leading up to them are always fights against groups of enemies that die like fodder but can actually be threatening if you don't handle them well and let them hit you; it also didn't have a lock-on feature except for a sortof shitty option to always keep the camera focused on the boss, and only one of the classes had a shield but even that one relied very much on timing parries rather than just blocking because most heavy attacks would either totally drain your stamina or even damage you through a regular block. So when I went into Souls I was already conditioned to dodge attacks rather than consider shields my first line of defense, to use movement and positioning when fighting groups of lesser enemies, and especially to fight without a lock-on. Nowadays I've learned when it's beneficial to use the lock-on but even in boss fights I'll often disengage it to move more freely and only keep it locked when I know I need my camera to follow a boss's movements closely or want to keep my attacks directed at single enemy. When I see people playing Souls and always using the lock-on by default instead of thinking of it as a tool to be toggled on or off in different situations it really baffles me.
"It's kind of a bummer that the game gets so much flak for not living up to the Legend That is Dark Souls"
This is an unfair statement to make. There is enough wrong with at least SotFS (only version I have played) to warrant the flak it gets.
@@Nuvizzle Yeah, I noticed this too. I didn't have a particularly hard problem fighting multiples in ds2 as much as I did in the first game even despite keeping the lock on for most of the game.
Also some parts in SOTFS actually have even less enemies, like the staircase up to the dragon shrine.
Great video and analysis, one thing though: Your mic has too much gain on it. You can both deal with the clipping as well as the background noise by easing up on the gain a bit.
It could also be that you're too close to your microphone, but it doesn't sound like that.
Thank you so much for saying this. I'm learning as I go with making these things and I'm flat-out ignorant about much of it still. I'm guessing what you're describing is most prevalent in the Gary section? I'll mess about with settings some more.
+Joseph Anderson Yeah the background noise (baby) is highest around Elena, and the clipping/high gain is worst in the Gary section. I think having a more directional mic may help with this, depending on your setup, and reducing the gain as Xendran mentioned should help too.
Regardless, amazing analysis video, I found myself enjoying this one the most out of the series, and I find myself agreeing with most of your comments! Looking forward to hearing your game design thoughts re: having to change up your build for specific bosses too :)
Great video series! Excellent analysis and some genuinely funny parts, particularly towards the end of this video. I'm glad someone on reddit posted your Darkest Dungeon video, I'll definitely check out the rest of your videos now.
Thanks man. I really appreciate it. Hope you like some of the other videos. The Dark Souls series is a little rough. It was my first time making them.
"... The Dragon Wall from the Skyrim trailer opens up after Elana is dead..."
I was so caught off by this that, once my brain and eyes finally processed everything, i was just dying laughing. Great delivery. Such a dumb joke, but good job making it!
Thank you for these videos. They are fair and well thought out critiques with wonderful dry humor hidden throughout. The ending bits were especially great. Wife needs more dragons in her life, bro.
Your videos are fantastic and I'm sad that this is the final of these 3 videos. I really hope you have plans for more to do because you have a die-hard fan in me. Thanks for the great content!
+JETwardCentrella Thanks man, I really appreciate the encouragement. :)
@@JosephAndersonChannel you are welcome
I liked this video but the suggestion that a boss becomes stronger every time it kills you is maybe the worst idea I've ever heard in my life. I can't imagine a more efficient method to get new players to abandon your game.
EDIT: You're so spot on about the ego and first game bias.
When he said "two load screens" and two adds popped up.
Not even mad. That was good.
Whoever upvoted, thank you for the reminder to watch this series again.
@@MinecraftNerd1985here's your three year reminder again
I enjoyed the light puzzle elements of the Sunken City, and kind of hoped the series as a whole had more gimmick's like that
I wish players could use that FUGS buff with the black flames, it looked so cool...
Holy shit I watched this really stoned and kept thinking I heard a baby then I would pause the video and not hear it etc. I got suuuuper creeped out when I heard it unmistakably in one part, then I watched the bloopers at the very end 😭
I think the Ivory king is a good example of the game letting you choose your own difficulty. You can choose to try the super murder impossible way with only 1 ally, get a second so that there are less corrupted knights but it is still very challenging, allow 1 portal to be open so that there is at least one corrupted knight with the boss, or close all the portals and make it easy. I think it is a great system too. I wish more bosses were like this.
Same with Fume Knight and I think Mythra was trying to do that.
So it was your child @13:44, good to know I wasn't hallucinating XD
Yet again a great review on your part, I'm looking forward to the Witcher Series!
holy shit the part about Gary were exactly the things I were thinking about while going through the dlc :o
Great video !
I think this series really gave me some proper perspective on why and how people can even begin to like this game from a PvE perspective. Thank you.
Rewatching this has made me reconsider going back in to finish the DLC.
And for that matter, Darklurker.
this is the last of the reviews I have to watch from you, and to be honest, Im really glad I saved these ds2 reviews for last. I remember beating ds2 and thinking "it's not like 1 or 3, but it's still pretty good, I don't know why people shit on this game so much, it's just... different", and you've definitely encapsulated what about the game was different and good. I also really appreciate how much you defended the multiple enemy encounters and how you're providing a deeper analysis on the dlcs here. I'm not even done with the video but I'm absolutely astonished by how much I missed in the sunken crown dlc. I really loved the atmosphere and environment of it but I remember it being a nightmare to get through, and now I'm realizing the whole thing with the bow and it makes so much more sense now. I still stand by a lot of my other points I left in your other videos- I think you play the games in a really specific way that is reinforced throughout the fanbase to an oversaturated degree- (melee only, no story, like it solely for gameplay and difficulty) that almost everyone does their first playthrough, and that's pretty limiting. But at the same time, I see how your perspective has been constantly built up throughout the years and how it has taught you a lot of lessons and unique ways at looking at the games, which makes me re-inspired to play them. You think very critically which I feel I have lost a lot of through playing these games so many times so many different ways. Very recently after Sekiro I finally played each of the games with a shield thanks to the lessons it taught me about how blocking in a game can be used "offensively", and I think after watching these videos I would like to really take in fighting multiple enemies at once unlocked- which ironically is something I did a lot in the beginning without realizing it, but playing the games again with an actual conscious mindset sounds like a good time.
Nice man. Great series. I'm so glad I picked DS2 back up, after having abandoned it early on when it wasn't matching my expectations based on DS1.
The DLC is remarkable. Some of the greatest FROM content is tucked away at the end of their rushed project.
Great video series.
The reindeers aren't buggy, though. They simply spawn out of sight in the blizzard from their own set spawn point. The part between the 2nd and 3rd building simply has more spawn points. Plus, they don't spawn infinitely. They have the 12 death limit like most other enemies. (The Stone Soldiers being one of the few exceptions.) You can theoretically kill all of them in one life and never see them again.
Great vid, I completely agree. I started with DS2 after reading some suggestions online and after I beat it a few times I played DS1, and the experience was really interesting. I love both games and recognize that both have their flaws, and the second one doesn't deserve the amount of hate it gets from some of the DS veterans.
Just realized you had Majula playing underneath all these videos.
Once you get the eye of the princess from Eleum Loyce, you can also see and lock onto the invisible guys in the shaded woods.
I thought the Ivory King was the hardest. The Loyce Knight helping me died in about 10 seconds.
Maybe I'm wrong but didn't from openly state that the 3 npc boss and blue smelter were designed to be attacked with summons? Wasn't it there idea of a single player experience in the main Dlc and the optional bosses were for some fun Co op with summons? I might be wrong here.
This guy's dark souls paper dissertation was so cool, I'm subscribing
I've put over a thousand hours into this game and I've just now learned about the buttons on the ceilings in shulva
I haven't played through the DLC yet, this makes me want to go through them for sure. Very good video.
I hated this game enough to quit it early, but i think I might go back and beat it after your video series. When the 64bit version goes on sale that is. Btw, I think the challenge mode idea is brilliant and really needs to be implemented. Force people to beat the game as a knight, rogue, mage, pyro etc.. A randomizer run would be fun too. Great video dude you've made a fan of me
I actually like the fast pace of your speech, Mr Anderson. I have watched and rewatched all of your videos multiple times, I find your critiques interesting and while I don't always agree on every point you give interesting and well thought out perspective and I rarely think your opinion is not justified whether I had the same experience or not. Keep making videos, and I'll keep watching them. I also like the longer length, I listen to your videos like podcasts while I'm playing games and I would actually not mind if you started making podcasts on game critique, although sometimes the video can help you illustrate a point you're making I suppose. Having played most of the games you talk about though I can usually remember and picture whatever issue you're talking about which is a credit to how well thought out your scripts are. Keep it up.
Eleum Lyoce was probably my favorite area in all of DS 2.
my favorite area in the series, with drangleic castle, brume tower and shulva not far behind
absolutely love the atmosphere in ds2
it's probably been mentioned about a hundred times, and this makes the "Gary Areas" by no means any better, but i believe those sections were designed with coop in mind, hence why the little non-dlc player summon statues are placed right at the entrances to the optional areas. They still suck, but some of the more baffling choices make more sense when designed around the idea of context-less cooperative play.
the three bad areas where made for co-op, the even let you summon palyers that down own the dlc, and drops them the dlc items. It's better when you realse that.
+marsgreekgod Damn I never saw it that way, good call. That explains the cancer that is the Iron Passage, and the multiple-enemy bosses in Cave of the Dead and Frigid Outskirts.
+simongolddrone Yeah it's all build to punish single player actions and reward multiplayer. now if only they told you that in game
It's implied with the summoning rooms (with the weird stone sarcophagus things) but I agree that it's far from optimal.
+simongolddrone are there NPC summons available when the playerbase gets low? DS 2 will not have a lot of available players forever i imagine.... :
+Algirdas Šalomskas Yes a matter of fact there is
these videos make the DLC seem amazing Q . Q i might play it, i really want to now.good to see the DS2 team came in to their own in the end
Sincerely for me Sir Alonne is my favorite boss of the whole series, even if the way to him kinda sucks.
I actually fought him without a shield, dunno why but his attacks depleted way too much stamina when I blocked them with my shield.
This is probably the most fair critique of Dark Souls 2 I've heard. You stay as objective as possible and make sure to note both what the game does well and where it fails and more importantly note how all the changes interact with each other. I don't fully agree with everything you say. For an example I never considered the interconnectedness of the original an integral part of the game. It was kinda fun at moments but it was never something I did really miss at any point. But you make fair points and I think this is a fairly subjective aspect of the experience. DS2 is a flawed game which I still love and you managed to pinpoint so much of both what I like and dislike about it. Good job.
wow, you must have really hated the gank squad optional boss.
sentient oven Sorry to ruin this but
>Nameless King
>Optional Boss
>best boss in DS3
Are you serious?! It is riddled with bad camera and often inconsistent moves! It is the most challenging, but not fun and it stops being interesting because so hard to kill solo.
Earned my sub. Great analysis, this one and the one of the base game. I like your fallout analysis and bloodborne analysis as well.
"Creepy because they have human-like teeth."
is that you Michael Stevens?
im watching these in the middle of the night and ur baby scared me shitless multiple times
The Gary joke is top notch, and full of catharsis for those of us who are... moer vocal DS2 critics...
I've watched your Dragon's Dogma and first two dark souls video series, and the more I watch, the more I'm convinced that you really need to try the monster hunter series. Most things you mention as being parts you love about the combat is exemplified in MH, and a lot of the things you complain about are generally avoided. You even mention wanting a sort of boss rush mode as a feature in these games... and that is basically what MH is.
Imagine a game focused around boss fights, most with the same quality as Sinh or better, especially in the "Actually feels like you are trying to bring down a dragon/giant wolf/land fish/dinosaur" department. Simply put, not only do I think you would enjoy them, but I also think you would enjoy picking apart what makes those games tick (both good and bad). These items include: the skill requirement to avoid punishment, the different ways the game punishes you, the way the game keeps from punishing you too much, the unique qualities that come with the healing system, the different play styles that come with the different weapon types, how the game changes when playing solo versus online with others, how breakable parts changes combat, how the light atmosphere makes it feel different from something like dark souls, and much more.
The biggest obstacle to the game is that playing it is a huge time commitment, and the time spent trying to get the game to "click" can be long for many (upwards of 5-10 hours for some) and feel like a huge waste, but once it does click, the previous time doesn't feel wasted, and, at least in my experience, is a better game for it. So much so, that I like to watch streamers who are new to the game, just to watch them figure it out, and have some sense of that same feeling over again.
Thank you so much for making these - and all your analysis videos. Looking forward to see what's next! Maybe something in-depth to do with New Vegas? Unless you're burnt out on Fallout.
Killing invisible Aava was one of the most satisfying experiences i had in dks2, and shes probably my favorite boss in the game after this xD
Elana is definitely a fair fight. But she's also incredibly, mind-numbingly lazily designed.
Visually she's too close to Nashandra to feel new.
Her melee swings ape Nashandra's, and aren't new.
Her spells are all spells players can get and are, at most, slightly tweaked. They are not new.
The melee summons are ALL enemies you fight at other points in the game, and, shocker, aren't new.
Nothing in this fight feels interesting, new, or unique.
And the fact that most people just quit out and reset the fight if she summons Velstadt first.
A boss where nothing feels new and you'll probably want to quit out a third of the way into the fight if you get bad RNG.
How fun.
EDIT: this comment was a mess, so I deleted it. Now I'm regretting it because I had a like for it, lol. I'll try to remake my statement.
So, I thought that your comment was great because of how much you can differ about how good the boss is, and for very different reasons. Now I think the same, also, anyone should be entitled to choose why they like what they like. Thanks for your comment.
I actually think it becomes way more interesting with Veltsadt.
Thats a true and thats probably he said that she is the boss that should be last in main game which is also true :-(
The inconsistency of Elana's design made me really dislike the fight because I only got 2 runs at the boss. The first time, she threw Velstadt at me and I was so surprised I died pretty quickly trying to panic-heal. The second time I was more prepared and entirely ready to take on both bosses simultaneously, had a plan in mind, mentally hyped myself up when she went into the summoning animation, and then she just threw a few skeletons at me that I smacked down in one hit and the rest of the fight was trivial. I think the fight would've greatly benefited from having three phases - Elana alone, Elana summoning skeletons, and Elana with Velstadt. During the second phase she could be more defensive and keep teleporting away from you while sending skeletons at you - the skeletons aren't very threatening but they keep you occupied while she pegs you with spells from a distance, and the phase would train you to watch for her spells while fighting something else and trying to close the distance, so that when Velstadt popped out you'd be more prepared to avoid magic and Velstadt at the same time while finishing Elana off.
I used the dried fingers and summoned a bunch of people for the Burnt Ivory King, was pretty epic to have 2 equal armies dueling eachother
Joseph's son reflects how the audience feels perfectly.
"I think the only bosses that get close are" *baby mumbles in a disapproving tone* "What's that, you disagree?"
"His attacks are dangerous" *Baby has a ptsd flashback to fighting sinh* "they're not that dangerous"
To heal you from your hate of non-resetting elevators: They are all designed to simply send them back everytime you are using them. So YOU decide where they are when you respawn, not the game, ergo you are comlaining about yourself.
Interesting. I despised the Sinh fight (though I love the aesthetics and themes of both Shulva and Sinh) because the damn lizard was spending 90%+ of its time in the air, making the "fight" tedious and more drawn out than it needed be.
The only boss fights I truly enjoyed in the DLCs were Sir Alonne and to a lesser degree the Ivory King.
Did I stutter?
Kevin Gracey D-don't tell me what t-to do!
Kevin Gracey there's nothing "wrong" with it, I merely did not enjoy the fight ('mechanics' and hitboxes, boss design and overall mood. )
you enjoyed the frigid wastes! i thought i was the only one! For me the oppressive empty space somehow captured the feeling of what darksouls was more than any other area. In a sense it is a foreshadowing of gael's ash waste.
I heard some strange noises in the video, like at 13:10 and a few other places. Otherwise a great video
+arralich baby
IT SCARED THE SHIT OUT OF ME LMAO
It his attempt to take over his channel and make reviews
@@Superschokokeks "helo evybody, am here to rivioo drank sulz too for teh pc, furst of hole, combaet is haaaarrd !"
oh my god! I was listening at night and at 10:00 as I turned a light off his son started talking and it scared the HELL out of me
I was rewatching your videos on DS2 just to rethink my opinion a bit.
Then you said, 'Difficulty is the main reason people play this series.' (I might be paraphrasing a little here.)
Maybe you don't really think that. In any case, I feel compelled to write about how much I disagree with that statement and think otherwise.
There's a lot more to the Souls series than just the difficulty that makes them such memorable games to play. I believe that most players can feel and appreciate these other qualities even when they don't actively notice them.
For me, it isn't about the difficulty. It was, at first. But by the time I reached Anor Londo, it wasn't anymore. It was the design, the enemy placements, the atmosphere, the lore, the world design, and the emotions that the game managed to evoke.
Now, everyone doesn't have to appreciate game design to like a game. That being said, surely, it wasn't the difficulty that 'wow'ed you when you found out that the church in Undead Parish connected to Firelink Shrine? Surely, it wasn't the difficulty that made a lot of the areas in Dark Souls look so hauntingly beautiful? Surely, it wasn't the difficulty that made many players sad for Sif? Surely, it wasn't difficulty that made me feel like I had given Artorias an honorable, deserved death? Surely, it wasn't the difficulty that gave the walk to Gwyn a sense of finality?
Difficulty is what immerses you into the world. I'm not obsessed with Dark Souls for the difficulty. It's what they use that difficulty to convey. That's what I play these games for. That tone, atmosphere, and feelings.
You would be correct to say that difficulty is a vital part of the equation and if you take that away, Dark Souls will fall apart. However, if difficulty is the only thing it had, and it had no world design, level design, carefully designed enemies, carefully designed enemy encounters, carefully designed mechanics, and well integrated sense of progression, and the lore, it would become a difficult game for the sake of difficulty. Dark Souls wasn't difficult for the sake of being difficult. It was difficult to evoke emotions, to create tension, and joy. It had bigger goals than to be just a difficult games for people to conquer, as evident by the amount of thought that went into the lore. I think we can all agree that it managed to achieve some of those goals. That is why we call it a 'Flawed Masterpiece', right?
In my opinion difficulty might be one of the biggest reasons people play these. But it's not because how difficult they are, it's because how well these games (usually) implement the difficulty into the level, combat and boss design. Maybe that's what he meant.
So I agree with you after reading your comment again it seems :)
It is interesting. Back in the days, when I first saw the Demon's Souls trailer on Gametrailers website, I was sooo intrigued (aside from the weird name). It seemed like it had the gothic atmosphere that I craved in any RPG. Then the game came out (I didn't have a PS3 but wanted to get one to play it), people reviewed kept saying it was very difficult. As a person who sucks as "challenging" games I hated the idea. I hate repeating things in games, I get bored quickly because I thought it was going to be hard just for the sake of it, I thought it was going to be unfair. Years later, Dark Souls comes out on PC, I buy the game, it is riddled with technical problems but then fixed by the community. I discover that these games are something else, and the challenge is most of the time is very fair. Something clicks and it is all because of the things you listed. Amazing level design, the lore, the atmosphere, the way you are challenged but at the same time feel empowered because you can learn to deal with every encounter. Dark Souls games are not difficult they are challenges that you learn to overcome which all tie to the bigger picture.
"Challenging" is probably the more suitable word, and I do think the games' challenge is one of its main draws, and for most people probably the singular thing that makes it a great series. It's easy to make something difficult, but it's a rare and excellent game that manages to test you in a way that is both challenging and fair. I believe JA said as much himself. The level design, enemy design, more or less everything else you talk about, is all part of that carefully designed challenge. But so is the damage and health of everything in the world and the availability and function of healing. If the game was exactly the same but everything did a third of the damage it does and your healing was instant I don't think anyone would consider the game very good or memorable.
Quite surprised you didn't mention the best part of the whole of DS2 DLCs, Maldron the Assassin.
On unfairness.
Ds2 is unfair because of combat, enemies will lock on and spin 360 around in order to hit you reguardless of where you are, this is true for most enemies in the game. This is added to the broken hitboxes and the fact that most the game is just pitting you against multiple strong heavy enemies together that make it seem unfair and cheap rather then difficult.
Hey! I beat Ava my third try, and Sinh on my 47th try! Sinh is my second hardest boss in souls, apart from Ebrietas in BB, and maybe the Ivory King, with Gael being close.
Sunken king has the best bosses?
Are you kidding me?
Well, you've officially earned yourself a very, very happy subscriber.
Dark Souls II's base game was good, but the DLC's just nailed it. All of the DS games are amazing, but the DLC for DS II just pushed it to become my favorite Souls game.
The ending is golden, Jeez. I hope the three of you are happy
I loved, loved these videos. I hope you become one day as famous, or even more so than matthewmatosis. I agree with all of your points, mainly because you have an argument behind everything you say. These are honestly my favorite videos on the Souls Series and I'm glad that you are a fan of the game and didn't hate it. I look forward to seeing your future content and I personally hope that you'll also analyze some older games because I don't have a current-gen console and I wouldn't see your videos on new games. :'(
About recommendations, I would love to see a video on Demon's Souls (hopefully a very long one) and on God Hand, made by Clover Studios.
+Juli This was a wonderful comment. Thank you so much.
My god, totally love all 3 videos, and the very end of this one make me smile so much, such a cute moment with the kid ahahahah XD
Thx for those amazing videos Man
From now on when I encounter "bullshitery" in a From Software game I'm just gonna shake my fist and shout "GARYYYY!"
I really loved his series of videos, since DS2 was the first souls game I ever played and it did the same thing for me that DS1 did for a lot of people, so I don't get all the hate, I became a fan of the whole series and all thanks to this game
Good, enjoyable review, dude! I don't agree with everything, of course, but here's a couple of special sore points:
I completely disagree on your opinions about Elana. The boss in itself is alright, I don't consider it anything amazing or horrible, but the summons (specially Velstadt) and the striking similarity of the model to Nashandra's (?) makes the boss that much worse to me. I would have enjoyed much more if, keeping with the muddy summon theme(which is great), she would have had a big mud creature instead of Velstadt and small other mud critters instead of skeletons or pigs. Recycled content like that is a special pet peeve of mine.
Sinh I had a lot of fun beating, considering I used vanguard seal and it was farly challenging for that build.
I also feel the Darklurker fight to be placed in a really discouraging spot to get to, specially considering the fact that you have to waste humanities as some short of ticket ride. I didn't bother beating him with the above mentioned build since it was too much of a hassle.
the velstadt summon is meant to reference demons souls, again but yeah it certainly doesn't wow, feels like they were reussing assets, which is awfully characteristic for everything in DS2 except the DLC, so it stands out negatively.
@@genericgorilla Velstadt has reason to appear tho as Velstadt is originally from Sanctum city before he left to serve Vendrick, even if its reuse of assets it does build up on the lore
I totally agree that the areas you are discussing in the "gary" section are not good. But just so you understand a little why they are so, it's because they are meant as a coop area. They are ridiculously difficult and populated by lots of monsters and 2 of them have a multi-enemy boss encounter because you're supposed to have a friend with you to watch your back... still even with that in mind they could have been made better.
I still don't see what the problem is with just sending the elevator back up once you've used it though.
I also thought that Elana was just flat out annoying because the length and difficulty of the fight heavily depends on the RNG factor of whether or not she summons Velstadt and how many times.
Once I fought her and she summoned him non stop. Another time he didn't get summoned at all.
I'm an avid watcher of these,
but 0:49 "Considering the lack of interconectiveness already missing..." is a flaw in semantic logic, it would suppose that an interconectiveness is present.
Again, I'm sure you receive a lot of these daily, but keep up the good work!
He loves Sinh so much he's reversing to his child self!
You forgot to mention one mechanic in fight with Sihn, that hitting him in the chest area where the Yorgh's spear got stuck deals extra dmg, not much but enough to try and go for it, while being completely optional way of fighting him.
It also lore friendly :)
The reason (I think) as to why 2 gets called cheap and 1 doesn't is because you lose maximum health in 2. In 1 if you die, so what, you lost some souls that you can get back because enemies respawn infinitely. In 2 there's a punishment for dying; enemies don't respawn indefinitely unless you join the Covenant of Champions even though the game doesn't tell you about that aspect of the covenant, you are now more susceptible to death because of your lowered health, and effigies are finite (but there are ways to become human)
So now every death hurts more because of the bigger punishment, so the game forcing damage/death on you isn't fair because it's the game deciding to make itself harder. No matter how many times you die in 1, the game never gets any harder. In 2 the more you die the harder it gets, which is why unavoidable deaths are cheaper.
NebulousIdea Decreasing health has been a facet of the series in every single game _but_ DS1. Demon's Souls halves your health immediately upon death. Dark Souls 2 actually makes this a much fairer mechanic by only decreasing your health gradually per death. Both games have rings which half the amount of health you lose. Dark Souls 3 also lowers health on death, where you lose about 25% of your health immediately.
@@auctoritate8254 The Dark Souls 3 one isn't the same though. You only lose the HP buff from using an ember, which isn't the same as losing from your max HP no matter what you did before you died. Embers are more like bonuses, so you still retain your original max HP at least. I never liked this mechanic in DS2, and hated that I almost always had to wear the ring of binding just so I don't have to use an effigy. It just seems like a weird mechanic to me, punishing you even more by making the game harder, and potentially to every new player, especially since it goes down as far as 50% without the ring, and it's not like you get many effigies in the beginning.
Excellent series on one of my favorite games! Thank you so much for the vids! Great job!
Aava really isn't that hard and definitely doesn't "require" you to change your build
I beat Aava somehow but the bosses in the frigid outskirts are just plain impossible for me.
yeah aava was far from the most difficult for me. even though most people say fume knight i think alonne may have killed me more times.
I know i'm late but i disagree. I tried fighting aava with a greatsword and the fight was incredibly difficult for me. i went back and changed my stat allocation to a dex build with a faster weapon and it made the fight leagues easier. i guess its still do-able with certain builds but the difference in difficulty is the point of the critique. why should fighting this boss with my greatsword be so much harder than with a falchion. this speaks for boss design and balance if nothing else. It's impossible to balance every fight for every build, just because there are so many weapons and spells. But at the very least, it's undeniable that aava does this worse than other bosses.
I love these videos man! souls/borne fans are the most intelligent gamers (in my opinion). your very articulate and perceptive. I love the games n the way u break em down. great job. this is like the 4th time I've run through your videos.
'souls/borne fans are the most intelligent gamers' ua-cam.com/video/lhckuhUxcgA/v-deo.html
Not entirely sure those pillars in Shulva "teach" you what they do though and its a massive failing imo.
I noticed the glowing pillar but it never occurred to me to swing at it (very few things other than hidden walls are activated by hitting them in dark souls) this led to me
A) Having to get through these enemies without cheesing them (by having the pillar do all the work for you)
B) Being stuck for a good hour or two when they expect you to hit more of these pillars to open up paths later in the level.
I feel this mechanic was one of the only times From Software seriously dropped the ball in the "show and not tell" style of design.
It's made doubly annoying by the fact that you find a bow shortly after in a place where it looks like you've gotten yourself "stuck" by hitting a pillar switch, the fact they've given you a bow clearly indicates that you can also shoot these switches.
I wish they could have programmed something in to the game to indicate that you could melee attack the switches, maybe you see an enemy do it first or something...?
Same, I didn't notice you could hit the switches til my second playthrough and that was after watching a speedrun where the guy hit them, I didn't figure it out for myself. It made the very first section of the dlc very hard and kinda tainted the rest of it for me.
I never tried, but I'm willing to bet if you use Guidance you'll find a developer message near the pillar.
same thing for me but with the soul statues in Drangleic Castle. At first I thought that certain stone enemies corresponded to statues/doors, but then I realized that you could actually lure any stone enemy to the ruin sentinel doors to open them, and then i realized that they don't have to be made of stone. it was a really confusing experience
The three areas you pointed out in the gary section are intended to be played with a friend or online with someone. They were not at all designed with solo play in mind. I remember reading about that, hence why the areas are quite literally hell.
That final section was 100% on point with my feelings. I love replaying the souls series, but if I ever go online to check on opinions about them I see so much more vitriol for what I consider my favorite one in the series than I thought it deserves. Every time I play Dark Souls 1 or 3 I am reminded of what the second one did wrong, but at the same time I would have to go out of my way to dismiss everything it did better than its pre/sequel.
People basically wanted more DLC for dark souls and what they got was a different core game. And boy did they let everyone know it was a mistake.
All three Gary parts are, in fact, co-op areas - that's why there's a lever (in Ivory King DLC) that opens a door that the player can't enter - you let your phantom(s) go there and clear monsters, that you can't reach. That's why the trio boss is a nightmare to fight on your own, as well as the multiple reindeer and, not to forget, the cat duo. I believe that should've been mentioned in the "Gary" section :)
In fact, those areas are a way for players, who don't own the DLC to experience a small part of it. When you enter each respective area, BEFORE you use the item that is key to the DLC, there are a bunch of standing stones, that look a bit like graves. If you place your summon sign there, it will appear at the identical standing stones at the begining of each co-op area, and players can summon you there.
Sinh was great... but best dragon fight will always be Grigori from Dragon's Dogma.
YEAH! That was just awesome and felt real ( in a way ). Running away from the thing and then fighting it in a "small"room. Chasing it down when it escapes on the bridge. Holding onto it when it's flying and then a great last battle in a great arena type location. And you got the Dark Souls Version ( in difficulty )of Grigori... the Ur-Dragon..... still haven't beaten that one.
I like all the dragon fights in DD, especially the BBI fights after you defeat the boss, where two dragons are there working together. Trying to take out two of them can be something else especially if you aren't an archer. And unlike Souls games can't be easily cheesed due to their spells.
I still prefer Vindictus dragon fights though. They feel more epic than in Souls or Dogma, might be the players or massive environments you fight them in.
@JosephAnderson I strongly feel that you should give Salt and Sanctuary a try if you haven't already. Its a great title for anyone who is a fan of From's Souls series and it implements a number of good ideas and level design aspects that I'm sure you'll appreciate and enjoy.