Dark Souls (PS3/XB360): In Soviet Lordran, Game HATES you.

I'm going to start this review by referring you to another review. Take five minutes to watch this review of Demon's Souls from "Zero Punctuation." Go ahead. Watch. I'll wait.

For those of you who haven't played Demon's Souls, let me explain to you why this was hilarious.  How Yahtzee describes his first play is by no means at all and exaggeration when he completely shredded the game. How he recited every single action of the game is quite literally how every single person who has picked up that game played it. The game was relentless, brutal, and unforgiving. Admittedly even through my first play through, I was so aggravated and frustrated i took it back immediately. But I kept reading all the high scores it would get and how beating certain parts were some of the most satisfying in gaming. So i took another crack at it, had a better idea of what type of character i wanted and even though there was still a huge struggle, I managed to push through the game, now have a powerful mage/melee build and can pretty much walk the game at will. Its become one of my favorite games on the PS3.

DARK SOULS: (PS3)

While they claimed there would be no sequel to Demon's Souls, Dark Souls is essentially a spiritual successor to the game. So as you can no doubt imagine, I was very excited to hear this game was coming out, and very disappointed that my PS3 was in the shop when it did, But I did play a little on the 360 before really hammering into it on my proper system. Story wise, its about as descriptive as the previous game...

At the creation of the world, there was nothing but darkness and fog, and this world was ruled by dragons. Then came the Fire of Lords which brought the human race.  A group of 4 entities used the Fire of Lords to harness their powers and rose up to usurp the dragons, leaving them completely laid to waste. As time past, a plague called the Darksign began to hex the human race, cursing them to live on as undead and slowly lose their sanity and become hollow. Here we find our created hero (Lady Velfir the Red, in my case), trapped in a cell in the undead asylum, a place where the undead is corralled to wait out the end of days. You gather that they still have their humanity and sanity, and an unnamed knight frees your character and you then begin a brief tutorial level to learn the mechanics of the game. As the knight dies he tells you that there is a legend amongst the undead who are not hollow and you need to leave. After getting past the beginner boss, a massive bird yanks you away from the asylum and takes you to where the actual game takes place, the Citadel of Lords. You meet a bit of a prick at the Firelink Shrine and he informs you that there are two bells to ring  in the legend and where to find them. And thus dost the true Dark Souls begin..... 

God that was hokey. When you start up a new game you will have to create a character, just as you did in the previous version. it seems with all new options and sliders that the game provides you with, your character will still end up looking  like a half evolved troglodyte regardless of how you set it, and by the time you get equipment you aren't going to be able to see their face. In my last game I started off as a mage class (royalty actually) who had some melee potential because of the weapons I aimed to get using my magic stat. Since I have had so much success with this class and I figured i could replicate it, i started with the Sorcerer class (the weakest starting class in the game, technically). What is cool about this game is that the starting class is not a definition of the character, once you start playing the game and leveling you are able to allocate your stat points where you want, giving you the freedom to equip a character and learn abilities as you decide to do. So you may start as a soldier class but if you add enough to your faith you can learn the cleric abilities and etc. 

You'll note I didn't go into too much detail when I was describing the tutorial level. The Main reason for this is because if you had played the previous game at all, nothing of the controls have changed for the most part minus a few minor tweeks. The game uses the shoulder buttons for your respective weapon uses and blocks and parries depending on what class and gear you chose. The D-pad is used to navigate your menus, you have the same dodge/roll/dash button, square still uses items. To new players to the series, these controls may seem awkward to start but once you get the knack of them, the become second nature. Oh yeah, and going to your start menu doesn't pause the game still.  So if you need to manage your inventory or rush to a specific item, make sure you have a safe place to do it or you will find the business end of a hollow's sword quickly, trust me.

Many of the same game mechanics are in place. Souls are the end all be all currency in the game. You get them mainly from killing enemies or finding soul items to use. Souls are used to level your character, upgrade your items, buy spells, or any other transactions in place. When you die, you go back to zero and you have have to return to the spot where you died to reclaim what you lost. If you die again, they're gone for good and you need to get them back the hard way. The online mechanic operates the same way as well. There is no lobbies and no way to join your friends in a game, but occasionally you will see the ghost of another player of a similar level in your game, and you can drop a soul sign to be teleported into someone else game to help them, or use their soul signs to summon them to your quest to help you. You can't heal when summoned, so you gotta play even more carefully. You can also drop into other peoples game to kill them for rewards.

There are a number of changes though, too. Most notably is that the game isn't broken up into stages as the first was. Now you have a gigantic Non linear map that you are free to explore as you please, with no real wrong way to follow, as most locations link to others. Two things I will happily debase myself on is that the game actually has checkpoints where you can recover and respawn as you progress through the level. The other is the absence of healing herbs in exchange for Estus Flasks, which can be refilled at all checkpoints for free and boosted to recover more health per use. Instead of becoming just a spirit and losing half your health like in the previous game, in this version you have your Hollow Undead form and your Human form. Functionally, its main purpose is to affect your drop rate determined by how much humanity you have. You can gain humanity by finding items, killing random enemies, or finding them on corpses.You can use the humanity to switch from undead to human form, and kindle fire pits to allow you to carry more Estus (Kindling fire is helpful because it refills other players estus as well). You can also join covenants, which basically choose your alignment for who's game you will invade. There is no World Tendency to affect the characters you see or how you are viewed this time around, as there was in Demon's Souls.

Now, I've discussed that the game is difficult, but how much more so than the first game? Well, allow me to go through my first few hours of the game. The game starts and I work my way through the tutorial level and come across a massive boss, just like in Demon's Souls. I try to hit him and only do one damage, I figure this is a supposed to lose fight and I get crushed in one hit. Wrong. I spawn back and march into the boss again, this time trying to actually fight him. Easily crushed again. The third time I find a door off to the side that gets me better equipment and have a much better go. I kill the boss and move to the main game area. Its open ended so talking to some broody smart ass at the Firelink Shrine, he tells me have I to go either up or down to find the bells I need to ring. Following the most obvious path takes me to this extended graveyard. Sliding down the cliff side I found a pair of skeletons. I march up and start hacking away, doing very little damage. They swing back and in 2 or 3 shots, my ass is dead and back at the start. Marching my way back down there I try using my spells to keep them at bay. Don't do enough damage fast enough and they cut me down. After 3 or 4 attempts at this and learning that killing them gives me no experience, I say eff it and try another way. Follow some downward stairs and an elevator, I find a dark area with a number of hollows. Easily cutting through them I confidently march along a bridge to get surrounded by a pair of ghosts. My spells do zero damage and I try to melee them. Zero damage, they swing massive ghostly blades and kill me in one hit.  Next attempt I try to outrun them as they are slow. I get by and march into a thin corridor that opens to a square room, and 6 ghosts come from the floor and promptly cut me to fucking ribbons.

After a few hours I had to put the game down. I was ready to scream. I am very good at Demon's Souls and this game is humbling me on an insane level. But after cooling down a bit, I found an off beaten path with enemies more my level. Obviously the path I was supposed to take I trudged my way along the castle to find a checkpoint. Pushing further on the battlements I reach my first boss, the Taurus demon. After slinging a spell or two he lunged at me and turned me into a red magical splatter on the stone.

Now why would I continue to play a game like this? It's the sign of crazy person. The reason because this as frustrating as the game can get, you get this immense feeling of satisfaction. When you finally squash a boss. It hinges back this old school original Nintendo philosophy of memorizing every nuance of a stage each time getting just a little farther, just a little farther. At the time of writing this, I was at the tail end of the game. I am in a stage called the Tomb of the Giants. Its a stage with pitfalls and virtually no light, with massive skeletons hacking at you the whole time. Dying multiple times on my way down to find a lantern, but at the cost of my shield, making me able to see but that much more vulnerable. HOURS I spent trudging my way down, dying and losing all my souls every time. But at the end with the right combo of help, I managed to beat one of the most dangerous bosses Ive had yet.

At the Time of writing, this is the last boss I got through. I was unable to do it without summoning help.

The tagline for Dark Souls is "Prepare to Die". This couldn't be a more accurate description. This game will chew you up, spit you out, feed you to it's dog, and bury its shit in the garden. You will scream, you will cuss, you will spike controllers. But if you are determined, or just flat out stubborn this game will give you immense satisfaction if you can barge through it. But don't be surprised if your hair goes a little grey from the stress. Every time I play I think of starting over with a new build, just to try all the new equipment, see which plans are most effective. I give this game a very high recommendation, but buyer beware. Dark Souls is NOT for everyone.