Souls Thread: Dark Souls, Demon Souls, Bloodborne

[Rick The Stick]

Unless it's a meme gift and she's trolling me (which is just as likely). Did you play the original, and does the gameplay hold up? Dark Souls has a lot going for it, but I much prefer the faster playstyle and build options that it evolved into with Bloodborne and DS3 respectively.

I think the remake holds up, yeah. They really didn't change much as far as the actual gameplay goes. But that's just me.
I will say that Demon's is arguably slower than Dark Souls 1, as well as being the objectively easiest game in the series. And you definitely won't have the same build variety.

But I do think it's a very good game, OG and Remake, that's worth playing for any Souls fan.

 

[Asian tech support]

The one advice you might be aware of already, is to level ADP early, as it increases your invincibility frames for dodge rolls and the collision boxes in this game are atrocious.

Agility is another can of autistic worms entirely. Because seemingly all of DS2's far too many stats do more than just upgrade one character parameter, agility is increased by both attunement and adaptability. They were so determined to avoid DS1's "this nigga leveled res" meme that they overcorrected with a stat virtually 100% necessary in every build. I'd say the absolute minimum cutoff for agility (NOT adaptability) is 99 to hit the 12 i-frame roll breakpoint but I was always more comfortable at 105 (13 i-frames).
Agility roll and backstep breakpoints (stolen from the wikidot):

• 85: 5 i-frames, 3 backstep frames
• 86: 8 frames
• 87: 5 backstep frames
• 88: 9 frames
• 91: 6 backstep frames
• 92: 10 frames
• 96: 11 frames
• 99: 12 frames
• 100: 7 backstep frames
• 105: 13 frames
• 108: 8 backstep frames
• 111: 14 frames
• 113: 9 backstep frames
• 114: 15 frames
• 116: 16 frames

Low agility feels awful and it's part of the reason I think a lot of players who enjoyed DS1 were put off by DS2's gameplay. Getting clipped by shit that you'd have 100% avoided before coupled with the less precise nature of the movement and attack animations was a universal downgrade. Obviously, it very quickly became apparent that there was way more wrong with the game than just agility.

Tagging @Scream Aim Fire just a heads up.

 

[Safir]

Fountains is a top-down 2d soulslike. Attack with sword, roll away. Sword attacks gather mana for magic and healing. No experience or levels, some permanent buffs to be found around the map.

The good: as in Dark Souls, you can read (and leave) hints on the online for other players.
The bad: someone came up with a way to advertise buttsechs through the hint system. Also, all the game's own characters talk like redditors.

In 3.5 hours, I explored the whole area gated by the first boss (the bipedal dog on the hero image pixel art), then I killed it. The fight was ok but not particularly fair, there's no reliable pattern to the boss' attacks and how often it opens to counterattacks, it can just decide to machinegun you nine times in a row. After about half an hour, I got lucky with openings and hacked it to pieces. Got a new power.

Did a pass over the discovered map to see where to use it (few opportunities), unlocked two small areas, got gated by another boss. Farmed cash to buy otherwise bad armor that's slightly stronger against physical attacks, re-confirmed there's nothing else to do until I kill the bastard.

Otherwise, money is meaningless. You lose 50% of your cash on death, with no way to recover it. Therefore, you should be saving and even buying vendor trash for if/when you actually need some. Items however are scarce (extremely rare drops from monsters) and vendors' stock is limited in quantity. Most of the temp buff items I have I found in the wild, in chests and on biers and such; if I burn through them fighting the boss and die anyway, I'll be left with almost nothing. The one semi-reliable source is a guy who trades mana potions for skulls, no limit; skulls are also random drops but more reliable. Shit sucks.

No bugs. One annoyance: plasma taskbar covers the fullscreen window, I have to manually hide the taskbar every time I want to play.

 

[VeePeeN]

I think the remake holds up, yeah. They really didn't change much as far as the actual gameplay goes. But that's just me.
I will say that Demon's is arguably slower than Dark Souls 1, as well as being the objectively easiest game in the series. And you definitely won't have the same build variety.

But I do think it's a very good game, OG and Remake, that's worth playing for any Souls fan.

Sounds like what I expected. I've seen plenty of youtubers praise the atmosphere of it, so I'm looking forward to that at least.

After Demons, all I have left to experience is Sekiro. I don't know what Fromsoft has planned for the future, but I definitely don't want another Elden Ring.

It is a really good game, they knocked it out of the park imo, but I'm not really interested in another open-world. Unfortunately, the classic linear Souls formula is at risk of getting stale and the Soulslikes I tried just didn't do it for me (Mortal Shell and Lies of P).

 

[Safir]

Fountains is a top-down 2d soulslike.

TL;DR I'm very pleased with the amount of fucking around (going where you're "not supposed" to go) this game rewards and requires.

Full update (14 hours):

killed the second boss (hook guy). Unlike the first one (machinegunner dog nigga), this one was a pussy, only added a jizz drizzle knife attack in the second phase and gave plenty of opportunities to heal. Sword + heals, no consumables.

Got the hook upgrade, which is fun, because it's only possible to hook onto designated objects (trees, houses, one specific minecart), which means some gaps are one-way. Found two more bosses, currently camped in front of the easier-looking one.

Found one (1) whetstone. Some weapons (like the starting sword) are "dull" and can be sharpened for money + 1 whetstone (not tiered; once it's sharp, it's sharp). The starting sword deals 20 damage; at the point it's possible to reach the whetstone, I already had three much better (24-25 + stat increases) swords. Then, while trying to save up money and dying to Cloud Strife rape ghosts, I found a sweet 33 damage + 1 mana scimitar and decided to sharpen it instead. The sharpening only added +3 damage and kept the +1 mana enhancement. I'm left wondering what the starting sword upgrades to (it probably adds more than +3 but ends up being worse than the scimitar).

Found the fishing minigame, caught a plot item. Selling fish gives fish tokens, which it will eventually (gated behind a boss) be possible to exchange for fiat money. It's not possible to buy tokens with cash and insure money that way, but at least it's yet another source of death-proof money. For now, I bought a better fishing pole with these same tokens, hopefully when I buy an even better pole, I'll catch something nice and unique, too.

There's a guy selling character upgrades; I found 3 locations so far and he sells 1 choice of 3 upgrades at each: +10 energy, +1 mana, and +1 tool slot. I was thinking what to buy -- on one hand, switching tools is annoying, on the other hand, the main obstacle to progress are boss fights, and they PROBABLY won't need more than 2 tools. Then I got a windfall of fiat money and decided to buy the mana upgrade before I lost it all.

The lantern (no dedicated boss, requires dog nigga and hook guy) is also well-designed, it takes up a tool slot and eats mana (spend a heal's worth of mana and it flares up and gradually fades). Found it in a dark-ish area. Then found a completely dark area which first has easy monsters to feed into the lantern and then massive armless rape apes that can kill me in three hits (but with my new shiny sword, I can hit them back).

Got attacked by sandworms and fell into hell! I'd seen glimpses of it from other locations (the game is a single maze of several top-down levels, and you can sometimes catch sight of yet-unreachable locations on the same level). Picked up a few items but got cockblocked by a missing upgrade (bomb), currently trying to kill the flaming fat faggot that has it.

 

[Zertes]

Sounds like what I expected. I've seen plenty of youtubers praise the atmosphere of it, so I'm looking forward to that at least.

If you want a video with the negative aspects of the remake, this is a good one:

 

[Safir]

Final Fountainsposting unless I win, because I hit a wall like a e-thot at 30: (update: redeemed)

There's a guy selling character upgrades; I found 3 locations so far and he sells 1 choice of 3 upgrades at each: +10 energy, +1 mana, and +1 tool slot. I was thinking what to buy

^ I got it wrong. There are four upgrade spots and he sells one upgrade of your choice out of the unique three. So there are no builds, just these three upgrades, one of your choice reachable after the first boss and two after the second.

Highlights:

• Boss #3 (Commander Vodka, fat flamer with the bomb) was a hard but fun fight. I baited him to blow up the wall the player is supposed to blow up after winning, but it didn't work. A missed opportunity.
• Optional Boss #4, the other fatty, is designed to be fought with bombs, and was a pussy, I only died once because he's fat and I didn't have skull cups on quick item.
• Optional Boss #5, the kraken, was more fun but also easy.
• Next up is Pajeet the god of fire, the first of the end bosses.
  • update: Pajeet bugged out and gave me two unlimited heals in the first phase, and in the second he's much weaker, redeemed
    • it gets better, next up is a literal BBC
• Blowing up the first prominent breakable wall in the game, in a picturesque, mournful, but mostly peaceful clearing, leads to a musty, dark cave, water dripping from the ceiling THE CHURCH OF SHAPE, a neon-lit vaporwave palace with a glitching statue and impending tentacle rape (cockblocked by Pajeet so just the foyer for now).

In conclusion (for now),

1. Builds are nice to have if they're done well and the "community" is large enough to do the math -- then a player can shore up his weaknesses with a good build. In a smaller, less prestigious game, it's good to not have builds.
   • What the game should have had is "exploration grinding": more buffs, items, optional bosses and whatnot in various corners of the map, so that a normal player can spend time exploring and getting stronger and an unemployed tranny can chart a path to grab the bare minimum and do his no damage run. Lots of games do this, but Fountains is "hard and harder".
2. It's not 3D, it's a flat graph of 2D rooms. inb4 "couldn't you tell by the screenshots, retard": what I mean is it's impossible to fall off a level. If you fall into a pit, you don't fall onto the lower level directly below, you just take damage and respawn up there. When I fell into hell, I spawned on the hell level in the designated spawning spot -- there's only one, no matter where in the overworld you fell off from.
3. I know I complained about the plot, and it still doesn't make sense and there's some reddit/tiktok (((humor))), but when the writing is epic, it's epic.

 

[Rick The Stick]

If you want a video with the negative aspects of the remake, this is a good one:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=5lx0CRVVvV8

Disagree because most of the complaints come down to purely subjective things like music, ambience, art etc.
Things someone who's never played the OG won't care about because they have no connection to Astraea's original theme or the what the Fat Officials used to look like or the redesign of the Vanguard.

Illusory Wall and AGermanSpy both had much more in depth videos on the remake and even they defaulted to the exact same, subjective, complaints. And that's not to say I don't understand. I have my preferences in the OG as well, but still.

What I'm getting at is when the only things people can actually point to and complain about are purely opinion based, then the game is actually pretty good regardless of whether or not you prefer the original.

 

[capitalBBustard]

are purely opinion based

This is just demakelet cope. The entire video is showing off demonstrable changes in the art direction that objectively alter the impression the player has about aspects of the game, many times in a completely careless and contradictory manner because the changes were made in isolation. And that many of the redesigns are just lame diabloified dogshit with all the fleshly bloated titty monsters.

More to the point, why should anyone give a single ancillary fuck about the opinion of a tourist and what they care or don't care about? "Omg the secondary won't care about the changes!" Way to argue in favor of the lowest common denominator.

Here's what that kills this line of thought: anything good about the game can be traced back to the original and its merits. All the complaints can be solely attributed to the shit they fucked up by changing it.

 

[ShitLurker]

Well, this is a bit awkward; I was thinking about giving SOTFS a shot on PS4. I picked up a copy of the game, haven't really started it yet, never even beat the original game on PS3, so... anyone got a suggestion for a build?

Aside from what others have told you, always have a bow on you and a good stash of arrows. SOTFS loves bunched up mobs, with bow you can ping them and aggro in your terms. It's the reason why I don't hate shrine of Amana nearly as much as the consensus.

I'm personally a fan of str/faith builds.

Another vote for this. Served me well.

As for the Demon's Souls remake, game looks pretty and if you know fuck all you will think it's great, but to me it reeks of western pigus thinking they are smarter/more clever than the original creator with their arbitrary aesthetics choices and diversification. It is another one in the pile of how remasters manage to lose a piece of the soul of the original each time.

 

[Nameless One]

Try it out, it's fun. Mostly PVP tech but destroys PVE phantoms and could work on most humanoid enemies.

It is evidently most useful for DS1 (PTDE) since it has dead angles. It was patched in Remastered.
Ain't it funny how original DS1's PVP was essentially made fun from all the insane glitches and tryhard strats?

 

[Asian tech support]

Ain't it funny how original DS1's PVP was essentially made fun from all the insane glitches and tryhard strats?

This is why 14 years later I still believe DS1 had the best pvp and none of the other titles have even come close. A lot of DS1 tech could have been added as actual mechanics in subsequent titles but real poise died on a cross and now it's all gay kosher shit like "true combos" that make my eyes fucking glaze over.

 

[Nameless One]

This is why 14 years later I still believe DS1 had the best pvp and none of the other titles have even come close. A lot of DS1 tech could have been added as actual mechanics in subsequent titles but real poise died on a cross and now it's all gay kosher shit like "true combos" that make my eyes fucking glaze over.

I hate hyperarmor.

 

[Asian tech support]

I hate hyperarmor.

Hyperarmor worked with toggling which is part of why Demon's pvp was pretty good too imo. It also worked because it was a state and not a value like it is currently.

 

[modern horrors]

A funny thing just happened. I watched a OnlyAfro video and in the sidebar there was a Eddie Izzard 1996 stand-up comedy video. Why? Because they're both gamers faggots, I guess.

 

[Rick The Stick]

Try it out, it's fun. Mostly PVP tech but destroys PVE phantoms and could work on most humanoid enemies. https://youtube.com/watch?v=MXQpZcFTW58https://youtube.com/watch?v=VXFODQk-BTshttps://youtube.com/watch?v=pPmDIqSJ-Hkhttps://youtube.com/watch?v=0bngFuXrKyMIt is evidently most useful for DS1 (PTDE) since it has dead angles. It was patched in Remastered.
Ain't it funny how original DS1's PVP was essentially made fun from all the insane glitches and tryhard strats?

I love this kinda shit because of the autism required to figure it out, but I hate it because you know devs eventually get wind of this kinda stuff and start thinking of ways to tune enemies in ways to catch people who do these things.
Because if it can give you such a massive advantage against a human, it can wreck the AI.

 

[umseriously]

Finally beat Sekiro. Wow. What a ride. Return ending is the best ending.

 

[ShiftyBoi]

Decided to pick DS2 SOTF back up last night, just for the hell of it.

Currently at huntsman's copse after beating the lost sinner. I've softened on the game over time but even picking it up now I think I've found what's wrong with it.

Spoiler: Dark souls 2 rambling

The first few areas are very stark, boring, and needlessly punishing. Enemy arrangements are haphazard with gangs of power armored or flailing enemies sort of bunching together a lot. Worst offender early on is No Man's Wharf and those fucking oil guys, even today I can't stand playing that area. The game also has a lot of "fuck it" areas where the only suitable answer just seems to be running past everything, like putting a flexile sentry right before the lost Sinner that respawns, fuck that I'm just running past it every time. Same with all the Heide Knights waking up after you beat the Dragonrider, fuck that.

One of the bigger problems, and it's especially noticeable after playing From's latest games, nothing reacts to your attacks at all, unless you have a giant club that flattens enemies and breaks poise, everything enemy or object acts like you're hitting them with a wet towel. Combine this with the terrible i-frames for early game rolling, the game feels like you're playing it underwater.
It's not so bad fighting an enemy one on one, but when you deal with a pack of enemies, like some of the more notorious ganks, you really start to feel it. Some enemies are unpredictable, in that you can't tell how they'll react to your strikes, and certain enemies like Royal Swordsman I've noticed don't have unsheathing animations for weapons, they can switch near instantly between their heavy crossbow and their zweihander.

Bosses are another story. Bosses in this game can't be stance broken like in Bloodborne, you either have to rush them down or play along with their attacks. There's no natural eb and flow to bossfights so much as just a constant flow. I don't see this is a bad thing save for a few stinkers. In a way I think it is nice that some boss fights are just continuous brawls with no stupid phase changes or riposte animations, but some bosses are so tedious or their hotboxes are so busted that you just want the fight to be over.

I will say for DS2, something it will always have over DS1 is that with few exceptions, the game gets better as it goes on. I would take the openness of Ds2's second half over the shitty areas and bossfights from DS1. Although DS 1 will always feel better to play

.

 

[pogoroooo]

I want to share this ds2 miracle build I finished just the other day and some random shenanigans (yay, ds2 autism!). Nothing remarkable, just a healer and a sorta "glass cannon" type to blast shit away with bolts.

Spoiler: build

Could have make it more hideous but I was happy with the end result.

I made it just to help randos here and there at low levels of soul memory (some early areas are pretty active around 700k to 1 million). The other day though (and what's really funny in hindsight) and just a day later I finished the build, an actual troon summoned me, no joke. The guy had the voice chat on and he sounded just like any other tranny you have heard. I couldn't stop laughing for a whole minute (I don't have a mic so the guy couldn't hear me). It seemed that he was streaming because he was talking from time to time about random shit and refering to chat (at some point he said something like "yeah guys, in this game you can get harrassed more easily because you can't block players like in the other souls games". He didn't reacted to my character's name at all though. It seems the word troon gets censored since he didn't mentioned it at all. (The word tranny afaik doesn't get censored but who knows):

Spoiler: tranny

Although this was months ago, this guy was so much fun to play with. He was playing with a friend and both had voice chat on and they were saying nigger and faggot at every turn. It's rare to me to find players that don't give a shit like that. My autist mind wants to believe they are kiwi farmers.

I wish I would've recorded that session but I'm not a fast thinker and only occured to me after I finished helping him. Didn't even take a screenshot of his in-game name (I usually take screenshots of funny names I came across, but the troon's name was something un-interesting). Not that something noteworthy happened or anything. Maybe I could've fuck around with him (throwing shit at him, or not helping at all) and get a funny reaction... but I take this game seriously enough to not want to do something like that, even against a tranny. Took a screenshot of his steam profile though:

Spoiler: eww

Make what you will about those other names.

So, why make a post fixating in this autistic not-so-interesting shit? Well, this is actually the first time I have encountered a troon in the wild in this game, and I've playing it consistenly since it launched (yeah, I'm one of those turbo autists) and I found it interesting enough to share around here.
Speaking about the build a little bit to not get too offtopic, even though the lighting spears were nerfed a long time ago, they're still extremely viable. Couple with the crown of the iron king and you have almost infinite shots. Still pisses me off to this day that they never made the binoculars viable like in this game. It has its serious compromises though and you need to know what your doing if you don't want to die quickly (picking your shots wisely, mind your distance to take enemies out from afar, being able to cancel the shots when an enemy gets too close, things like that) not to mention that you have to cover a good portion of the game to get all the stuff needed to set up the build (the crown being the most difficult). At the end of the day, very fun build to use all things consider.

Well, this is a bit awkward; I was thinking about giving SOTFS a shot on PS4. I picked up a copy of the game, haven't really started it yet, never even beat the original game on PS3, so... anyone got a suggestion for a build?

I would suggest a faith and strenght build. Investing in some miracles is a good idea to have some extra heals, which are very much needed at the beginning of the game. Also I will strongly suggest to use the bandit's axe as your weapon of choice; you can get it very early and that thing rocks. It's fast, has a great moveset and deals great poise damage. The running r1 attack is super fast and you can chain it with an r2 to deal great damage. This combo staggers pretty much any enemy too. Later on you can infuse it with lightning and once you get the sunlight blade, it will melt any enemy.

 

[Asian tech support]

It seems the word troon gets censored since he didn't mentioned it at all.

Fascinating. You'd think DS2's name filter predated the proliferation of the term "troon."

Well, this is actually the first time I have encountered a troon in the wild in this game, and I've playing it consistenly since it launched (yeah, I'm one of those turbo autists) and I found it interesting enough to share around here.

Back in the DS1 heyday there used to be a tranny that was part of the pvp circles I frequented. He was pretty good and never brought up being a troon. The only reason we even found out was because he never joined voice chat and he posted pictures of a "girl" in the group that a sleuth traced back to a social media account of his. This was during 2012-2013 and was probably the first time I crossed paths with a tranny that I knew of.