I'm revisiting Dark Souls II because I have nothing better to do with my time. Y'know... I still think DS2 is mechanically jank and hideously gank heavy. To that end? DS2 is shockingly generous with levels and upgrade materials, and the sheer nonlinearity of the game means you're free to be as casual or as sweaty as you want..
Funny you should mention that: there's this zoomer DS2 challenge runner that's been in my recommendations for the last couple of weeks called "Yazmania." Basically, imagine if Ymfah wasn't Korean, spoke more often in his videos without relying on WildPie101 text, and also had tons of fun despite the pain.
This is the video that I ended up watching first, and I gotta say... this nigga's actually playing DS2 in such a manner that I've never seen anyone else play in. Like yeah, it's mechanically jank and gank heavy, but to that end? It's just taken for granted and he's basically playing the game to have fun. He plays offline with CheatEngine speed hacks enabled to make his game go 1.5x faster, plus he also has the DS2 Lighting Engine mod installed to basically give every video of his a different "feel." Oh, going for a Pursuers build? Lemme change the skybox in Majula to match type of shit.
Knight+Bonfire Ascetic is always his starting origin. General "flow" of each build once he has a weapon in mind:
- kill Maughlin for his drip
- kill Saulden after getting the Blue Seal to get his Ring of Steel Protection
- make the mad dash to FOFG,
- buy stuff from Malentia for the Silver Serpent Ring+1
- make the suicide jump near Cardinal Tower with the Blue Seal and the Life Ring to grab the Fragrant Branch
- free Rosabeth and make the mad dash in Shaded Ruins to get all the soul items (5 souls of a proud knight topping out at like 40k souls), plus twinkling titanites, petrified dragon bones, and titanite chunks as needed
- buy the cat ring from Shalquoir, then plunge into the Majula pit to tap the Grave of Saints bonfire before plunging into Gutter and Black Bulch.
- Maybe farm up some large shards and chunks by rolling around in the tar pits in Black Gulch with a torch
- ALWAYS kill the giants under black gulch for the Forgotten Key.
- Make the trip back to Majula to grab the Sunken King DLC key from the pit
- Return to Black Gulch, tap the bonfire closest to Rotten (use the Fragrant Branch from Malentia's shop if needed), and begin farming The Rotten for souls.
- Make the trip through Shulva after killing The Rotten once to grab extra bonfire ascetics, Flynn's Ring, and other assorted goodies
- Farm The Rotten like maybe 3-4 more times for extra souls by burning ascetics over by the bonfire nearby.
Tbh... this is basically what Ymfah does for most of his DS2 videos, except Yazmania actually goes way further and actually sounds like he's having fun the entire time. The speedhax via CheatEngine is basically a concession to make videos go faster. He doesn't really do co-op or PvP, focusing purely on the PvE side of things. He also abstains from using CheatEngine to spawn weapons in directly, opting to show how to get late game weapons before ever killing Last Giant (Rotten doesn't count because it's a soul farm that also opens up Shrine of Winter).
Just a heads up, lies of p is a lot more similar mechanically to sekiro than bloodborne, despite every faggottuber and news outlet claiming otherwise. I thought it was pretty good though. It's level design is lacking and I wish the character was a bit more mobile but for a first attempt it's a worthy offering.
I've finished Lies of P and almost done with the DLC, definitely agree on the level design. I have never felt more like the levels are just a series of corridors in any souls game than P, the world aesthetic is solid but it does feel like one long hallway.
Think its a better implementation of the rally system than BB but the block/parry doesn't feel as refined as Sekiro. In Sekiro you felt a flow to the combat to the point where the parrying almost felt like a rhythm game. P feels way more jank and inconsistent, at least to me. The enemy design doesn't help with ridiculous windups and delayed hits trying to fuck with your timing.
They also clearly saw the winter lantern things in BB and said "lets add like 5 more status effect and put them in every level and every enemy to annoy the player".
Overall though these are minor gripes and the game is pretty fun overall, definitely the best of the souls-clones I've tried so far.
Dark souls 2 is such an endearing game. It tries to do a lot of things and even when it fails there is a charm to it, the game is filled with fun details. I was in love with it until I entered the Crown of the Ivory King DLC, specifically the Frigid Outskirts...
I was able to put up with everything else in the game, played through it with Champion's Covenant. Frigid Outskirts was the point where I took it off. I regret it now since I was so close to completing a full CoC playthrough, especially as it was my first real attempt at beating DS2.
That being said, everything other than that was great fun overall. Beating Sir Alonne hitless was the peak of my playthrough (took a bit but it was worth it).
I can see a remaster for this game where they could adjust the absolute worst parts of it to make it a little more bearable (please add a bonfire somewhere in the middle of frigid outskirts), but honestly there is little to actually change.
I always wanted an autistic to show off the beauty of ORIGINAL DARK SOULS on a CRT. Using his PS3. I'd like more DSFIX PC footage for oldfags still using old monitors and PCs.
I always wanted an autistic to show off the beauty of ORIGINAL DARK SOULS on a CRT. Using his PS3. I'd like more DSFIX PC footage for oldfags still using old monitors and PCs. https://youtube.com/watch?v=Hj_pQj6gHfo
Dark Souls retards are so bad that this guy called Fromsoftserve, a pencil necked faggot undid 3 years worth of progress he made on his re-remastered mod. All of his efforts in unfucking the broken lighting were undone. All the feedback we gave was for nothing now that he went back to the dogshit default shiny look the demaster has. The whole fucking point of fixing the remaster gone. Not that there was ever any hope with his early deviations from the developers intent, and not like it matters since the switch port was sadly the best form of ptde audio aside. He loves ds2 trannies.
And Fromsoftserve still acting like the pencil-necked soyboy he is today. And right now, he's picking slapfights with random people instead of finishing his work.
A reminder that he's also a simp of Alyssa Mercante, and a dickrider of Antifa terrorist Airbagged.
I heard Amygdala was meant to be the final boss of BB instead of the Moon Presence, and I don't understand why the change was made. Amygdala has a much better and more horrifying design, while MP looks like a Sonic.exe variant.
Look at them:
Honestly it's shameful how badly bloodborne plays. Your most popular game Sony and you can't have the courtesy to give it an fps boost on ps5? It barely keeps up at 30fps and stutters more than Andy Warski.
Speaking of which, what's even up with them? Looks like lore only Zaki and fromsoftware would know. What became of the rest of the primordial serpents from the age of dark ending? Where are they if the age of fire ending happened, etc. It's possible they didn't really think that far ahead as well.
The Church of Sable is Kaathe related at least in the localization. Otherwise info is minimal.
I've discovered my own answer to this, after thinking about it again thx to someone who reacted.
The fucking arch trees/caves man was born from. Specifically, the Great Hollow if it's arch trees. None of this would make sense, but a lot of shit doesn't.
That's where the serpents sprouted from. There's no other place they really could have room in, Ash Lake expands across seemingly the entirety of Lordran as far as the eye can see. And if it's the cave of man seen in the ds1 intro, it makes more sense because aspects of mankind like greed, is parallel to serpents in the lore, which is why the serpent ring exists.
If not, and if it's just a reach like most speculation is, I can definitely state that the Primordial Serpents in Dark Souls come from below. Kaathe lurks in the abyss, below Sol Londo (New Londo for English localization). Frampt comes from below fire link shrine, and seemingly even below the kiln.
I know this isn't that big of an epiphany, I'm sure everyone already figured this out but sometimes simple visual storytelling can be lost when you're busy checking the item descriptions and looking for answers to line up, instead of connecting what's not stated definitively, only visually to the scripture they leave to you.
Bloodborne doesn't stutter maybe aside from a few heavier map pieces, it's a consistent 30fps however it's the bad frame pacing that makes it look like consistent stutter.
Honestly it's shameful how badly bloodborne plays. Your most popular game Sony and you can't have the courtesy to give it an fps boost on ps5? It barely keeps up at 30fps and stutters more than Andy Warski.
IT'S ABOUT PERSISTENCE! You gotta persist the stutters. Honestly the longer it goes untouched the better, given every other remaster/remake. Fromsoft not letting them do anything to Bloodborne is a blessing.
Bloodborne being playable on ShadPS4 in whatever framerate and resolution I want has mostly quenched my desire for any sort of remaster or remake. It’s really not necessary anymore beyond having better performance and Steam integration.
