[Video Game] Dark Souls 3

Can't wait to play it, still haven't gotten a PS4 so need to play Bloodbourne first.

 

Is Bloodbourne part of the Dark Souls world? I want to play both. I've never played any of the games. Should I start with Dark Souls 1 or does it matter to enjoy the story?

 

Had the most fun with Dark Souls but I'd recommend if you are starting out just play Bloodbourne and Dark Souls 3.

There is no story. Just a really awesome combat system.

 

Actually, there's all kinds of story, it's just that it's told through environmental clues, item descriptions, and occasional hints from NPCs rather than through in-game books or other lore dumps. Dark Souls in particular is pretty much the epitome of this type of storytelling. I find the story in Dark Souls way more engaging than, say, the stories found in the Elder Scrolls games.

To answer clutch citizen more directly, there is not much relation story-wise between the four games. There is a connection between Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2 (the latter takes place at least a thousand years after the events of the former), but there is no narrative connection between any of the other games.

As to which one(s) you should play first, it really all depends on what systems you have available. Demon's Souls is only on PS3, and Bloodborne is only on PS4. Regardless, I would probably start with Dark Souls (which is on PC, PS3, and 360) simply because I think it's the best one, then play the others in order of publication if it grabs you.

 

There is a story, it's just that it's not "presented" to you so much. It's there in all the extra NPC dialogue or item descriptions that a lot of people just don't bother reading.

Also, my personal opinion is that Demon's Souls and Dark Souls 1 are the best entries in the series. Dark Souls 2 is the "worst" (though still a good game). Bloodborne did some cool things to make combat faster and more aggressive, but I liked the environments & enemies better in the first two. I also felt like there were less items & secrets to find in Bloodborne.

 

I think the first time you play dark souls it's a lot of fun and painful at the same time, which makes it great. The second go through you know a lot more and you are just more aware, and it's a little easier because you know how to manage the game. Still was a lot of fun, but not as good as my first play through in Dark Souls II. I do wish there was little bit more presentation to make the game whole. I have no idea why you create a character though as I spend half my time dead.

I had a really hard time with those priests this go around. And that one big blue flame boss. Oh man. brutal.

I would like to see them take the story presentation up a notch, but a rewarding game no less. Proud to finish it!

 

Oh and that dog. I sweated that one out for what seemed like a week.

 

Anyone know if I can coop with my Friends in this one instead of random people?

 

Kinda surprised this thread hasn't been bumped. The review embargo ended yesterday, and people have been playing the Japanese version since March 24th. There are LPs of the whole damned game out there at this point... some speedrunner has already beat it in under two hours.

Early indications from reviewers I trust are that it's better than Dark Souls 2, but probably weaker than Demon's Souls, Dark Souls, and Bloodborne. But hey, even a relatively weak weak Souls game is still great. And it has its proponents... IGN gave it a 9.5.

Anyway, looking forward to finally getting my hands on it. Probably going to do a strength/faith build. Chucking lightning bolts at things worked out really well for me in Dark Souls 2.

https://soundcloud.com/the1099/epis...-souls-3-with-kevin-vanord-and-suriel-vazquez

 

Series is starting to grow stale, but I will still put in hundreds of hours and love every second of it. I hope they end the Dark Soul series with this. Would love to see a reMake or sequel to Demon Souls.

 

I'm curious as to what you think the relevant differences are between Dark Souls and Demon's Souls that make you want a sequel to the latter but not the former, because to me they're so similar that they may as well be the same series. Hell, Dark Souls 3 even returned to the mana bar that was present in Demon's Souls.

 

You're right, they are very similar.

It's probably nostalgia because I played Demon Souls first and there wasn't much about it on the internet.

Differences is the player/world tendency.
Nexus hub vs branch
DE is more difficult, no impale
Weapons felt more diverse and armor played a huge role in how you fought a boss.
DE has a faster move speed vs DS and less cheap/unfair enemies
Inventory weight
Penalty for continuously dieing
No NPC white phantoms

There's actually quite a bit of little differences, you'll just have to play both to fully grasp them.

 

Love the souls games... Even bloodborne, this'll def be day 1, I'm going pc tho... Instead of one/ps4

 

Well first of all, I've played both many times. Dark Souls something like seven times, Demon's Souls I'm not sure. Probably about the same, maybe a bit less. Dark Souls 2 only twice, Bloodborne 1.5 times.

As for the differences you posted, some are very subjective, and some are just things that I wouldn't want back.

I mean... inventory weight? Why the hell would you want your character to get overburdened? It doesn't add anything to the gameplay experience, it's just annoying as hell to deal with.

There were NPC white phantoms in both games, not that I ever cared about it that much. Coming from a King's Field background (the action RPGs that From Software made before Souls), I've generally preferred to play them offline anyway, both to spare myself from reading spoiler messages and to avoid invasions. I've never been interested in PvP.

The hub thing... Dark Souls did not have a central hub, but all of the other four games do: Demon's, Dark 2, Dark 3, Bloodborne. Personally, I find it a little annoying to need to level in a specific place, it just adds load times. The world structure of Demon's was unique in the way it was separated, but Dark Souls 2 felt similar in the way that Majula was like the center of a wheel, and you could proceed out along the spokes.

I actually loved the idea of world tendency, but the execution was problematic. If it had remained a mysterious mechanic that no one could ever quite pin down, then it would have added a lot of cool mystery to the game. But the internet being the internet, the exact mechanics were soon discovered, and it became an element of the game that you had to jump through hoops to manipulate to get cool items (like the Beast Talisman) or Colorless Demon's Souls. That led to stupid crap like suiciding in the Nexus once you beat a boss so you wouldn't accidentally die in-world and send the tendency back towards black. In short, I'd be happy to see world tendency return (I like the concept more than covenants), but they'd have to figure out a way to implement it that doesn't encourage doing dumb things like suiciding seven times in a row.

"Armor played a huge role in how you fought a boss." Well, no one in Demon's ever used equip load above 50%, because poise was not a thing yet, and so losing the speedy roll was never worth it. I think Dark was squarely better in this regard. There was actually a reason to pick heavy armor instead. For that matter, Dark having four levels of rolls rather than two added even more diversity.

"Weapons felt more diverse." A very subjective thing, but even if true, the problem was that they were unbalanced in relation to later games. The Blueblood Sword and Meat Cleaver were the best weapons in the game (at least for PvE)... if you didn't end up using one of those, you were basically handicapping yourself. Sure, there were specialized situations where you might prefer the Moonlight to bypass shields, or the Scraping Spear to break armor, but there really wasn't balance there.

Penalty for dying... again, Dark Souls 2 had this, so it's not unique to Demon's Souls. In addition, Dark Souls 3 has something very similar, where dying will cause you to lose "ember status," which reduces your max health.

Less cheap/unfair enemies... very subjective. I'd like to think that one could make the argument that no enemy in these games is actually unfair, although we could certainly debate some examples. But even those archers in Anor Londo--possibly the most hated duo of enemies in any of these games--can be easily taken care of with Dusk's invisibility spell. There's a way to handle everything.

More difficult... again very subjective. There was still backstab. And it would be hard to tell without going back to it again, but I suspect we've all gotten better at playing the Souls games and might find it easier now than we had before. I certainly haven't played Demon's in a while.

All of this is to say that I don't think there is really any characteristic you can pin down as belonging solely to Demon's Souls... anything you could name has appeared in at least one other game, aside from a few things like item burden that I wouldn't want back. Yeah, world tendency was cool, but also problematic, and the wholly disconnected worlds I likewise do not consider a plus... most people liked how Dark joined things together with all those neat shortcuts. Which is why I think that wanting a sequel to Demon's as opposed to Dark is... strange. Other than possible lore connections, I'm just not sure how the game would be materially different with one name rather than the other.

 

Based on some reviews, that sounds like a good call... Jim Sterling actually gave the PC version a 9 but the console version only an 8 because of the performance differences.

http://www.thejimquisition.com/dark-souls-iii-review/

 

I was watching some twitch streams and this one def looks cool. Got me to finally break out my copy of Bloodborne I got on the cheaps for black Friday.

I think when I finish Bloodborne(having fun with it btw!) I will take on DS3 when I have time in the summer.

 

Love Dark Souls, will have fun playing, great level design, fun to struggle, and like the mystery of it, will likely be a 9 or 10, but I would like to see a little more unpredictability in boss fights, and a little more, although not a total reveal, of the story. I still need a purpose to drive forward and they do not give it. Think we've all gotten better at the game, so they need to step it up a little too.