Why they tore off their faces
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- Опубліковано 14 лис 2024
- Dark Souls II had a lot of difficulty finding its look and feel, especially having had to entirely switch its director, and direction, partway through development.
Song used: Stone Tower Temple - The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask OST
Sometimes I also wonder if the inspiration for the hole faces may have come from the low-LOD versions of the giant models, where their facial features disappear and all that's left is a big indentation from where their mouths used to be.
Yes, my favorite boss fight in DS2 is definitely Giant LOD.
But how can the short faceless giants be better than the massive army of faced giants coming from across the ocean and towering over the castle walls. Seems that'd be better to me, maybe put the hole in their chest for the symbolism. But it seems they were massively dumbed down. Kinda sad to me...
That's my headcannon, that it was an engine restriction. Don't get me wrong, i really like the design but i felt almost vindicated when i saw that yhorm had a face lol
@@leedonghae668 It's definitely not an engine restriction. Nothing about the engine would have kept them from giving the giants faces.
@@doc1439 my ideal is keeping the size AND the lack of face. The facelessnes adds a really ominous feel to them, but the size being wound down is dissapointing
I think the final design of the giants give off a vibe completely opposite of "artificial". If anything they look as if the earth itself manifested into a being to fight off Vendrick and his forces. Them turning to trees upon death also helps sell this notion, and it just makes me curious to see what the "kingdom" they come from is actually like.
absolutely
also they look metal af
They definitely feels earthly,maybe the invaluable thing vendrick stole from them is the means by which they reproduce? It would explain why he was capable of making golems with it and building drangliec castle.
@@ntz752
I'm taking notes on this entire thread. I'm sure I can use this somewhere...
I really wish they gave more information about ds2 in 3. So much was left unanswered about the giants
Unless you want to stretch the definition and just call trees themselves artificial looking. 😅
Seriously though, some trees creep me out IRL.
Their open hole faces are another connection to trees. If you look up images for "tree cavities" they very much resemble the giants' face holes. Cavities result when the tree is injured somehow and the inner deadwood begins to decay, but the exterior living wood is protected by a barrier. The tree literally hollows out over time.
So giants are indeed spawned by the earth
With this in mind, the hole probably serves to represent that in the war with the giants vendrick did something truly horrible/irrevocable to them in order to win the war. This makes sense considering him and his brother’s penchant for performing incredibly questionable experiments.
Cavities also result from excessive consumption of sugar... And what do hollows offer, if not sweet, sweet souls?
@@SIGNOR-G My personal theory is that DS2 giant are simple soul imbued fragments of arch trees.
@@OneNationUnderPug that would explain why their seed turns all living creatures against red phantoms. Its like reality itself rehects intruders
It really adds to the enigma of who they are, what happened, what transpired. And then you look at their face and it's just nothingness, and empty space that makes you wonder...
i feel like the old monstrous giant models were already dehumanized, the new faces just make your first opinion of them go from "this guy wants to squash me like a bug for fun" to "i have absolutely no idea what's going on with this guy", which helps to make the reveal that the giants weren't invading but rather defending themselves from drangleic feel like an answer to a question that you already had
this, thank you, the best way to describe what my head-canon. Basically is that Nashandra created a story that the giants are the bad guys, when basically they were doing their best to survive
making them faceless holes removes a humanizing aspect well alsp not making them outright monsters. it really works to help push the concept that in a historical sense, they arent some random enemy or even an ally but rather another faction in the long stream of warring states in history.
Reminds me of Zaku. I think giving a circular eye invokes a sort of innocence due to having no perceivable emotion.
The hole faces are genius primarily in that they’re jarring and memorable. Giants are a cliche, hackneyed trope in high fantasy. But seeing something this unnaturally alien take the place of your usual Tall Men™️ really sticks with you
This is why I kinda prefer DS2 the most out of the series in general - it has a very distinctive personality, for better or worse, which is subjective.
seeing them turn into trees when died made them even more distinctive.
@@lehelisbored Your favourite souls game is ds2?
@@tmsplltrs yes.
I would've loved a mix between the currwnt and final design of the giants but with the size and presence they we're planned to have in the game.
The idea of actually watching the giants cross the sea by foot is so cool
How cool would it be if DS2 had a time cycle like Bloodborne/Sekiro and the giants got closer to Majula with every lord soul you gathered? And maybe they would actually reach Majula once you defeated Velstadt and saw Vendrick. God, I know pretty much all FromSoftware games except for Sekiro were rushed to some extent, but seeing all the wasted potential in DS2 hurts way more than others.
It looks like From Soft figured out some way to up the size constraints of humanoids considering the size of Yhorm in DS3. Also, from the footage I've seen of the Elden Ring test stuff, they definitely are pushing it for non-major bosses too. There are the smaller giants you see in the trailers and most of the test server footage from players of course, but if you missed it SPOILER ALERT:
There is a HUGE armored giant you can find laying surrounded by the corpses of other giants. It seems like they all fell from a kingdom in the sky or something, according to a nearby item or the boss item I think? But anyways, the giant had a boss healthbar, but it was out in the middle of a field, laying down like it was dead. Like a semi-hidden in plain sight field boss. I'm excited to see what they might do for a true giant boss.
*SHINZO WO SASAGEYO!*
@@Jaimyoutubing Nah, that guy didn't have a boss health bar, it was a usual enemy health bar. Though it didn't respawn, so it was a mini boss.
Retaining the size would also make a particular environmental element more reasonable; the huge statue sword that's thrust through the wall of the fort
When I first saw it, having heard about 'Giants', I could only imagine a massive giant ripping the sword off the statue and thrusting it through the wall. Which would be awesome, especially if you got to see it happen in the memories. With the resize I can't think of a reasonable way it could have ended up in the position it is
Honestly, I like the faceless/hole-face giants as a design way more, I think it fits their thematic/role in the story better (as noted by the artist/you) and wish they were the standard giant in the Souls series.
My thoughts exactly, as early and rudimentary that first design might have been, it looks pretty stupid imo, just a generic monster, with weird proportions. The faceless, lanky stone giants are much more eerie and fit in the world far better
I agree
The problem with that is it would interfere with touching, humanising moments in 1 & 3 imo
I agree
Same, it's gives them an ancient, otherworldly vibe
Just saying, DS2 has problems, but when you realize that the Giant Lord is also The Last Giant, and he goes nuts when he sees you because you were also the same one who defeated him during his conquest of Drangleic is some awesome storytelling without actually telling anything.
Brilliant.
TBH I'd go apeshit too.
And it's funny, given the 'timeline' from his perspective, you are a significantly weaker creature than you were when you faced him.
You're both shadows of your 'former' selves, battling it out in a dying world once more, for no other reason than to settle a score you didn't know you had.
isnt that just a memory of him he should not actually reconize you
I just wish he didn't rip his own arm off, despite that looking more lethal than just hitting him in the legs a bunch of times...
Like, maybe rip a stone pillar and turn it into a stone club or something instead
@@fernandovasconez-taylor3144 It's actual time-travel going on in DS2, not just peering into a memory.
As funny as the "butthole face" jokes are, I do really like the hole face design. Along with the moaning noises I think they fit the "grotesque" mantra that Dark Souls design goes for being both disgusting but empathetic
Well said.
I don't think they look especially butthole-like, as they're too open, circular, and reminiscent of holes in trees, but the Smelter Demon with all the wrinkles around the hole? That absolutely looks like a fiery anus.
@@mastermarkus5307 Lol more like Chipotle Demon, amirite?
"Yet I have seen the void that screams where his face used to be." ... that hole made them super cool looking, running into last giantdaddy for the first time was kinda spooky and then seeing the invasion happen in the past ... its really interesting how such "simple" change can turn generic monster into something so iconic .. also RIP Yhorms hoodie ..
Very nice Ahriman reference, didn't, expect to come across it here of all places lol
@@petepleeb9675 Haha :D greetings fellow WH player
I dont think the hole conveys them as more inhuman tbh, in fact reminds heavily of the darksign and the dark souls, which all humans bear in the game's world
But it's still way cooler
i think of greed/soullessness when i look at their faces, like the golems’ chests that are filled with souls, which is kinda funny cause Vendrick is seen as greedy
@@tietaejae9869 well, vendrick did create the golems. might explain why you have that notion based on them
Honestly, I dont really get a sense of artificiality from the hole in the face at all. For whatever reason, it makes the giants almost look less animalistic and more of a peaceful race. Which I still like over the angry looking faces. I never really thought that the giants were inherently evil, the were just another sentient race trying to make their way.
DS2 Giants were enigmatic and interesting. I'm happy they went with the hole-face design. Also it reinforces that there can be several different versions of species/races. It's better than just having ONE giant race.
The hole faced giants are one of my favorite designs from the Souls series. They're so striking. I was honestly quite surprised to see the original designs as being so generic.
Giants in DS2 look like force of nature, revolting against humanity. It's pretty fitting when you think about it, since the theme of the game is set around the curse and first sin: gods and kings tampering with natural order of things and trying to prolong their reign, creating calamities, disasters and desolate lands in the process. Ds3's DLC - ringed city, which is also made by Yui Tanimura, shows us the ultimate outcome of never ending cycle of fire.
The old giants almost look aquatic. Like some kind of shark.
It would make sense with their originally planned crossing of the sea scene.
The main issue with the giants I have with DS2 is how little information we get on them relative to the world and their connection to the original game, especially with how important they become towards the end. What's their own connection to the Throne? Why/how are they so different compared to giants in the first game?
One thing I really liked in DS2's story is how it does feel like a continuation to the series. This is a world without the Gods, where their mistakes are still present, but humanity has ruled for ages, building kingdoms ontop of each other that eventually fall, leaving behind their own histories and stories. Where the only remnant are a few lingering souls or monuments that fail to fully capture who they were. (The Gwyn-bird statues are a nice touch.)
What we really needed was a bit of lore on the giants themselves. Maybe where they came from, whether or not these giants are just what the original giants turned into without the Gods ordering/enslaving them. It'd be an interesting parallel to how humanity built itself up.
DS2 is, for better or worse, definitely one of the games that just sort of let's creatures "be". There's a lot more monster species that aren't specifically linked to any event or lore, even when they have lore significance, which is honestly something I like about the giants. They surely have some kind of rich culture and history unique from everything we've seen in the series so far, but they're ultimately the victims of the story, hunted down by Vendrick and then exterminated during their attempt at revenge, so there's no one around to tell it, leaving the giant's culture to die out with them.
That said, we get some pretty meaningful hints about them. The DS3 description of their seeds calls their final tree form "Watcher Trees", which seems to imply that like dragons, they're entities from before the fire, and as a result not living in the traditional sense. This is also highlighted by their status as trees, closely linked to ages outside the age of fire - that's why so many hollows are covered in roots/are turning into trees in DS3, because the age is coming to a close. Finally, we know they have incredibly powerful souls - the souls, used to build golems, are what Vendrick brought back from his giant hunts.
That was immediately my thought, is that they did that to make them sort of an “other,” so that the player could see them as brutish monsters as opposed to the often loved giants of DS1
I think the original faces make them look more like brutish monsters; the hole makes them completely unknowable. They must be intelligent, and clearly they can be moved to anger, but we can only guess at their motives and values.
Imo the hole just makes them faceless and makes me wonder how the hell do they eat-breath-etc in a world where everlasting dragons and gods had mouths and noses
@@Fuck_handles
The dragons acted as a steward of the skies 9f the old, grey world. Perhaps the Giants acted as the stewards of the ground, or perhaps they are the result of the Archtrees declining. Similar to how the dragons declined into Wyverns. I can definitely see these more ancient Giants growing into Archtrees, and perhaps what Vendrick stole was the seed of their next generation's birthing tree.
@@peat_moss856 they have a giant lord, they can understand the concept of monarchy and hierarchy, definitely intelligent
I think the hole faces l make them look less brutish and monstrous than the original design. Instead, they seem more mysterious to me. Besides, I've always kind of sympathised with them, especially after seeing their sad tree-corpses being endlessly attacked by hollow soldiers and the piles of their experimented on, discarded corpses in Aldia's house of horrors. They seem more like tragic figures to me.
I like the face hole because while it is spooky and inhuman it also conveys a sense of sadness.
I love when things distort or forgo entirely a classic facial structure. Makes stuff much more creative and memorable. Do it with the appendages too and you've got an instant classic design imo.
I understand they tend towards regular "limbs" most of the time so that enemies have readable attacks but I'm sure they're ways to do more unique designs that still have intuitive attacks as well tho.
Always love a bit of DS2 content. Great job!
Considering the lore of something having been stolen from them, and their generally mysterious but mostly unthreatening design (besides their size), I honestly always felt bad for them. Yeah they were pissed off and invading, but seems to me like it wasn't something they would just "do" without good reason. There was undoubtedly a reason important to THEM even if we'll never know what that was. The fact that they turn into trees upon death, also gives them a sort of "natural" feel to them, as though they had a deep connection to nature or plant life. And if you think about it, the vast majority of plants aren't DIRECTLY aggressive (if you exclude carnivorous plants) even if some of them have sort of aggressive growth habits (i.e. climbing up and over other plants to steal sunlight). Trees specifically are about as un-aggressive as it gets, despite often being praised for traits like size and strength, even though that's mostly being a trait of their large size. Which is again a feeling I get from the giants in DS2. Their weapons and armor don't really seem particularly advanced or complicated, giving them a semi-primitive culture feel, yet again seemingly bringing them closer to nature. It feels like they only developed combat equipment to the bare minimum needed to defend themselves when aggressed upon, unlike the human race that constantly seeks newer and more deadly weaponry to aggress upon others.
Size and strength dont equate to being aggressive in any way shape or form imo
I totally agree with you, commenter from 2 years ago, I always pitied them. From my perspective its a race of gentle giants driven to necessary violence to regain a crucial piece of their race that had been stolen from them.
Thats it, the top 3 moat bizzarre giants from Ds2 have to be:
the massive giant with mountains for shoulders and no lower half.
The way bigger Giant Lord model that has a ship stuck on its neck.
And last but not least the four armed giant presented in this video...
i always saw the facelessness as symbolic, that it represented the way they were wiped out completely, that even what remains of them is devoid of an identity
You kind of get the feeling that the whole team was just chugging along with production, and at some point someone drew a giant with that hole-face and showed it around, and everyone just threw their old stuff in the garbage and replaced it with the hole-faces because it was such a good idea.
To me the four-armed giant has shark-like features, especially the fin-shaped head.
Seeing how the giants are so frequently discribed as a threat that came from the sea I would have loved the see them double down on said theme.
Also, heh.
my thoughts exactly, seeing how a whole army of them is "hidden" in an object file for the giant lord and they are literally down in the sea, they wouldve looked like a school of sharks, unless they go on land. from all the stuff i watched and read on the development of DS2, its clear to me that there wouldve been a HUGE "water/sea theme" going on in the game, which somehow got dropped. just look at the concept art for what is now Earthen Peak - bunch of windmill over a waterfall. also early artworks show the player character walking on the beach as well, among other things. the intro cinematic is almost all that is left of the concept.
For that you have Bloodborne, they have better giants too.
Honestly the hole faces are one of the few visual designs in ds2 that I can call truly iconic and unique to the game. If someone says "enemies with holes for a face" I immediately think of dark souls 2. Whereas the old faces are just "yep they're the bad guys with sharp teeth"
The fact that the unused boss content literally has the boss sticking his tongue out in the tpose is killing me right now lol
I agree. The holes for faces convey a dark, literary sentiment that has more impact than beady eyes and sharp teeth.
This change was absolutely FANTASTIC!
I still remember the first time playing Dark Souls II, my first game ever of the series. All the talks that NPCs were making about "the giants that crossed the sea" and then I find the Last Giant. *MY. GOD.* It was unforgettable!
Having this absurdly different, alien and outworldly design for the giants felt so magical and so creative! And not in a way that felt it didn't fit with the setting at all! Many things in Dark Souls II feel displaced or "jumbled up", but the Giants certainly aren't one of them. They're my favourite of the entire game! (followed by the Gyrms, the Dark Souls version of the Dwarves)
Looking at the early design artwork for the giants, they actually look a lot like the Ogres in the original Final Fantasy. Just imagine if we had had to fight not only melee Giants but Ogre Magi too. Would have needed a four stack for that showdown for sure, lol.
That toothy four armed creature looks like what I imagine a Goron to look like in Miyazaki's head.
The four pecs is a nice touch
Honestly, I love the DS2 design. I wished DS3 kept it (aside from the one tree in firelink shrine). Yhorm having a face makes me saaad :(
Which is possibly the strangest sentence I've ever written, lol
I will never get over the bait and switch they pulled in the DS3 teaser, where they had Yhorm rise out of the coffin and look exactly like the Giant Lord, only for you to reach him in game and, nope, he has a face.
@@RecurringExtra honestly i preferred that yorm wasn't of the same species of giant because doesn't make sense that one of them decided to link the flame and help humanity
I like the design of the Dark Souls 2 giants because the hole in their face is very evocative of something having been taken from them.
the old face just looks like something you'd hunt for one of your first fetch quests in an mmo, Im so glad they changed it last minute
Something about the big hole face has always read as "sad" to me. Like the giants were all just big, ferocious Eeyores.
Recently got to play Dark souls 3 (sadly late) and i was pretty surprised to see Yhorm the giant had a face underneat his hood.
I love how they are ultimately a race of golems. And Vendrick was tricked into stealing their only means of reproduction. No wonder they sacrificed themselves to get it back.
I don't know why, but their hole faces makes them seem friendly.
Perfect music choice! Been loving the videos lately Zullie, thanks for all your hard work
Seeing the old designs feels like looking at a photo album from an embarrassing time.
The tall-headed giant's face really resembles a goblin shark, so from the beginning you could tell they wanted to go for something very different from ds1 giants.
The faces on the Giants look like they came straight from the Grummites in the Shivering Isles. Glad they changed from those creepy faces.
For how hard of a time they had designing the giants, they really did fuckin nail it in the end
That unused four-armed giant looks like a Street Shark reject.
I absolutely love that you used the midmir theme from herdy Gerdy for this
I think the face-hole design also adds to the giants’ air of mystery. Nobody is quite sure what they are or where they came from, and this is one of the most unique ways of establishing a feeling of “otherness” that I’ve seen in games.
If you look in the back of the hole, at least on the tree giants, you can see a small eye nestled in the center
Gael shows us that, given enough time, hollowing will burrow a hole in your chest. I wonder if the hole-faces and the petrified color their skin mean they are suffering a similar curse.
If that's the case, that they turn into living trees could also allude a future for undead humans.
Tbh it only makes them look creepier without the faces, the four armed model with a face looked goofy, and I can just imagine how they would've looked with their faces
I’ve heard of a theory that they’re actually the souls of the giants that found their way into golems, which would explain how they managed to travel to drangleic somehow. It makes a little sense, as golems like the stone golem and the ones at the end cutscene share a lot of similarities.
Interesting theory, but the golems are explicitly said to be based off of them, and more to the point, Vendrick made them using an artifact stolen from the giants, leading to the invasion...
Though that does open up the idea that maybe the stolen artifact was important because it was how they made new giants in the first place, giving life to Giant Trees that would return to Trees in their final hours.
@@robbietoe I think the solution to this theory is that the answer is really both. The souls of the giants are exactly what Vendrick stole. After all, we know that he also hunted them, and that the only real way to make golems in the dark souls universe is to inbue them with the souls of others. People like to assume that there was some kind of hugely important artifact that got stolen when we never see it and it never really comes up. And while the Dark Souls series definitely doesn't follow through on every single lore point, it doesn't make sense to support an evidence-less theory rather than one that's pretty simple and intuitive based on our understanding of the facts.
Just realized that the mountaintop of giants in elden ring is an obvious visual reference to these guys. As are the golems.
I always thought that Dark Soul's giants looked so sad and weirdly cute with their hole-y faces
Kinda like giant walking belly buttons lol
Never would've thought that stone tower temple would go well with the Giants lol
Really interesting to see how these giants seem so disparate from the giants of 1 and 3, especially yhorm.
The hollow faces make them the most unique giant design I have ever seen and they will always hold a special place in my heart
One of if not the most memorable enemies in any game
0:41 looks like the face you make at a sleep over trying not to laugh too loud after already waking someone's parents up that just yelled at everyone for not sleeping.
I always thought of their missing faces as a clever design incorporation of those sort of "holes" that some trees have in their trunks, thus making it clear their connection with trees, which itself seems continuous with the arch tree theming throughout DS1, and the way that fallen stone dragons appear to have become mountains. It's almost like an implied creation myth for features of the world as we know it, part of what the process actually looks like when the "disparities" of light and dark etc. are introduced.
That cut off boss made me get a heart-on.
Dude has four pecs 💪
I agree the design of the giants with hole-faces is pretty cool.
It makes them seem like mystical, unnatural creatures, a bit like the everlasting dragons of DS1, whom are more elemental forces embodied than living beings. The intention with the giants may have been similar. They do appear to have a connection with the Age of Ancients, given their habit of turning into trees.
love that the giants in ds 2 is kinda unique and have this unerving feeling about them with faces that would actually fit into a silent hill game before the downfall that is
I always thought that the point of it was to show that they aren't immune to the effects of hollowing.
And weirdly there are those trees with creepy faces
The hole face for giants is actually amazing.
"One of the most complete of these leftover models is this four-armed giant, with a strange elongated head."
That's a land shark, don't lie to me!
As much as I love the DS2 giants, that 4-armed 5head giant is also pretty interesting on its own, like instead of being tied to trees, they were initially tied to rocks and mountains. Still prefer tree-giants, mind you, but maybe mountain-giants could work, too?
The hole face is actually really cool
@1:36
When it zoomed out, my immediate thought was the giant had his underwear down around his ankles.
It certainly makes them much more unique than quite many other giants (but they would have been quite unique even without the hole so what do i know)
I think the hole gives them the feel of a creature that evolved down a different track than “people”. It reminds me of the faceless heads of certain Cambrian animals. Or the hole in a rotten tree where it’s limb used to be.
Brilliant design tends to be really simple, it shows time and time again
Not only does it convey them better as non-human creatures. The hole really makes them seem emotionless and not evil. It makes them seem to be a force of nature
Thank you for the stone tower temple music, bringing back old memories ❤️
I can always appreciate your choice of music in these videos, especially the Zelda songs
I love how the comments here show us how the human psyche works.
Half of them say the face hole make the giants look alien, mysterious and unknowable. And the other half say it makes them easier to genocide because you empathize with them less.
Some of you really worry me honestly.
I like the theory that this hole is because they are golems, which is how they found the key to immortality, and Vendrik stole it
That 4-Arms Giant can be an actual boss. What about:
"Talos, the Giant Hermit"
Ahh, thanks now i have it stuck in my head again and have to listen to it after your video
Dragons in dark souls are often linked with stone. The intro to DS1 presumes that there was no life or death before fire, and yet there were dragons and arch trees as if these things represented something removed from life and death altogether. This concept of rare and ancient creatures possessing properties beyond our shallow preconception of the world is one of my favorite bits of Dark Souls lore and I think the alien nature of giants builds into this. Unfortunately I don't really feel like we got all the required details to flesh out the Dark Souls universe so I really hope Elden Ring is more fleshed out.
Also, it seems like the archtrees make a fair number of appearances outside of Dark Souls. The best example I can think of as being in the Hunter's Dream surrounding the workshop.
Combined with the hole faces, the decline of the dragons into Wyverns, and the fact these Giants become trees when they die, I cannot shake the idea now that the Giants are what happened to the Archtrees after the Age of Fire began. We know that the Dragons bred before the age of fire, otherwise Seath wouldnt have been born. It stands to reason then that the Archtrees spread seeds as well.
When the Age of Fire began, perhaps the Giants were born out of the Archtree seeds, or maybe the Giants are the way the seeds arrive in new areas. With the Age figure infusing white souls into everything, these wandering seeds take on a life of their own instead of settling and build their own kingdoms. And thus we get the face hole giants, the place they fell from the tree being the hole. What Vendrick stole, then, could have been the seed for their next Archtree mother, meaning he stole what let them reproduce in the first place. Once giants were lured there, it wouldnt matter if he had it, cause hed have tons of seed Giants to run experiments with. Also a war.
We could also explain the giants of DS1 and DS3 as accidental and deformed offspring of Gwyn's royal family. Maybe they were attempts to breed with humans (they grew huge in size, but intelligence was stifled due to that size and the Dark part of the soul bleeding out due to mixed genetics), ergo the humanish faces, or even organic Golems.
Somewhere along the line "Make their faces butt ugly" just turned into "Make their faces buttholes"
Still the best design for a giant race I've seen in media.
"Making generic monsters into something unique" Fromsoftware
"Making something unique into generic monsters" Bluepoint games
The design is kinda a stroke of genius if you ask me; evoking the dark sign. Something they clearly followed up on in DS3. Makes me wonder if there was a giant lord soul and the Giants we see in DS2 have long since gone hollow.
I really like how you examine the development and struggles DS2 went through! A lot of people just ignore it, but your videos really enhance it for me.
The brutish faces made the giants too similar to the standard fantasy giant. The hole was an improvement, at least in terms of making them unique.
I love your videos about DkS2, man! You doin really good!
This background music... I can feel it.. cooming in the air tonight. Oh lord...
It was a great choise at the end! I had my reservations with several things about the art direction of DS2, but the giants and the trees are beautiful and ominous, I love it. It was great that they were not for those generic faces
Love the music you use for these videos
You know what the perfectly circular hole in a lot of enemy designs reminds me of? The Dark Sign that all of the protagonists carry.
I really like the idea of them turning to trees after death. Like they look like they're made of stone when they're alive, but when they pass on they root themselves and become something more.
Stone Tower Temple music, noice. Never fails to make me want to play Majora's Mask again.
I feel that the hole-faces also help de-humanize the giants a lot as well. It makes them into a largely generic force that makes you call to mind other aspects of them when pointing one out (and I feel the lack of the face makes it harder to give them/associate them with names, but that might be just me). I also wonder if the holes could technically be a reflection of the character(s) losing the memory of the giant's faces. It's a bit of a stretch, but it could have happened that not many have actually seen a giant and could describe it's face. I dunno, just a thought.
The four armed giant could have been such a cool enemy
Hey Zullie, it would be super cool if you grant us some info about mannequins and why they were changed so much during development.
The fact that you can headshot them with arrows, even when they have no head. (Probably they have heads, just invisible.)
That the trailer show us some other cooler mannequins masks.
Some say that Naruto sue Fromsoftware because they "copy" the masks from the manga etc.
It would be awesome if there it's some early concept from mannequins mask in the game.
Keep in mind though, no actual official statements were made about some Naruto legal threats. It's all just rumor.
Would be curious to see what Zullie has found within the game itself of course.
Something to bring up though is how this concept of mask assassin actually was repurposed in DS3. Pale Londor Shade wears a mask and literally uses the DS2 manikin claws.
I'd like to see that too.
The manikin mask from the trailer was awesome, but what we got was meme material.
Nice choice for the stone tower music, giant mask, giant video i caught that lil refrence