To be fair, I wouldn’t say LOTF is on par with Dark Souls in terms of difficulty, but it would probably make a decent stepping stone in terms of working as a warm up to the style of game, and the combat/punishing concepts.
Like he said, it’s free right now, and you can’t beat free.
I will try to either find a good review or write a bit of a summary later, but it won’t be for a few hours. So anybody who wants to step in, feel free.
I demand you to post every single page in that book 
Starting a brand new run of Dark Souls 2 on the Xbone:
I’m considering grabbing it. I really wanna play it. It looks REALLY good. Fluid and brutal gameplay. Dark, saturated, nasty looking yet wondrously rendered visuals. 60 FPS on all platforms. New weapon specific skills. Awesome enemies and gory attacks with a chunky armored feel.
It’s like they’re mixing all the cool bits from the previous Souls games and mixing it with bits of Bloodborne for extra flavor. I might not get it on launch since I have way too much stuff coming in April (the free games with Gold, KI S3, Doom Beta, College Finals… Plus I need to save up for my Hisako, Fulgore, and Wulf figures) but I certainly look forward to grabbing it soon.
I don’t know how I feel about you now. You like Dark Souls but prefer 2 to 1?
Seriously though, I’ve never had the patience to put up with Dark Souls 2’s systems long enough to beat it. On the other hand, I’ve speed run/played through and 100%'d Dark Souls 1.
I’ll be picking up DaS3 on the 12th.
So what is so bad about DS2? Ive heard a lot of bad things about it from its too hard, to the guy that made 1 and bloodborne wasnt a part of DS2?
DS2 is the easiest of them all. It got more difficult with the dlc. Aside from this, DS2’s major complaints is in both enemy design = too many humanoid enemies & the level design. The world isn’t as connected as DS1 & there are lots of big empty squareshaped rooms. Often short of objects & details in them.
The last dlc included an area called Eleum loyce. It was the best designed area in the game & it is also sporting the best name of an area 
Basically a frozen castlearea.
Myazaki didn’t work on DaS2 and thus didn’t have as intricate a level design. The worlds of Bloodborne and DaS1 were very layered and we’ll thought out. There was a lot of “I wonder where this goes” followed by " Oh, I remember this place".
DaS2 has basically 4 branching paths that end abruptly and have no connection to one another. Whereas, DaS1 is very connected aside from 1 area (not including DLC).
Also, I didn’t like the parry system in DaS2. It felt slow and unresponsive. Same with the movement (running, dodging, etc.)
I did like most of the UI changes, however.
This is not true. Cryptic yes, but if you pay attention to dialog and other details in the games they are def connected. But I agree they don’t force feed you plot and it is indeed cryptic.
A great resource for the souls games is VaatiVidya. In 10-20 minutes you can basically get the gist of souls 1 and 2.
For specific videos to catch you up:
1st: https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/2hwCGxhFOlM 2nd: https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/nNo9Ow6XG10
@Ziarist @Nightswipe0
So are you both talking about Scholar of the 1st sin version? Wasn’t this version updated a bit to correct some of those issues?
Is dark Souls 1 good enough to play after DS3? What I mean is graphically will it be like “oh man this looks and feels awful compared to the nex gen DS3?”
I ask because Im not sure if I should get the Digital version that comes with free DS1 backwards compat or the Gamestop Physical version with the key chain, starter guide, soundtrack and game stop points.
I bought Bloodborne yesterday brand new off Ebay for 17$ (I had a 15$ Ebay coupon)
I’ve beaten both, but just happened to prefer 2 in the end.
I have a lot more specific memories of 2, found more of the secrets in 2, enjoyed the fact that there were easier ways to co-op with my uncle (the only Dark Souls fan I know personally) - I also enjoyed the fact that most of the NPCs will eventually gather in the town in 2, rather than having to visit a bunch of places to visit the basic vendors like the blacksmith.
I’m not saying 1 is bad, in any way. I loved 1. But I played 2 for over 100 hours, including a partial New Game + run; I just recently bought the Xbox One version of 2 because I wanted to play it again. I definitely didn’t spend as many hours playing 1, and never went back to play it again after finishing it. I don’t think I even started New Game +.
Scholar of the first sin includes all 3 dlc episodes so yeah.
Issues? The design/enemies? The leveldesign in the dlc episodes are better than most of the entire DS2 game yes(not saying that the DS2 leveldesign is god awful, that is not the case at all, just not as good as the other games) As for the enemies, no. Still humaniod monsters/knights mostly.
DS1(especially DS2) will probably make you think that way after DS3. Comparing DS2 to Bloodborne is night & day. Just google some pics or watch vids and you can tell the difference. Bloodborne is detailed as F in comparison to DS2. - but also a shorter but better game.
You should get the physical edition and send me the keychain & soundtrack
edit - another thing. DS2 is very easy to finish if you go pure magic. EXCEPT there is one boss in the 2nd dlc episode that is almost completely resistant to magic. I could not beat that boss with that character how hard I tried. He was an optional boss so I could skip him but… I made another character and beat him with that one instead
If you jump to 35:27 in this video you can see quite a prime example of one of the empty square rooms
I’ve watched some of Max’s live stream of DS3, and to me it looks like the speedier combat system from Bloodborne (I’ve only watched some videos of BB) and the details in the environments I saw reminded me a lot of DS1.
I have a feeling DS3 will end up being my favorite once I’ve had hands on time. The mana/energy meter for spells and special weapon attacks looks interesting. I just hope my typical heavy-armored tanky approach to these games will still be a viable way to play. I typically run the full Havel armor set, including the greatshield, with two longswords (fire and lighting enchanted) and a greatsword. I had enough stats to still have full mobility with all that on, too.
I play all of the souls games on PC. I’ll be getting DS3 for PC as well. If it’s the method you use the graphics will NOT be cringeworthy if you go back to a prior game. DS1 has had a number of mods that enhance the graphics and textures. And DS2 looks really good on high settings after the scholar of the first sin update. That said from what what I’ve seen DS3 still looks the best, but I suspect that holds true comparatively to most games in general.
TLDR; I’m confident if you have a decent PC you won’t be disappointed with the graphics on prior versions after playing DS3, despite DS3 being superior graphically.
Huge dark souls fan here. I will pick it without hesitating.
I had a pyromancer in dark souls 1, a "tank warrior in ds 2, and a mage/fencer in both
Maybe I should try something bizarre like an archer in this one
from what Ive watched and listened to Fighting Cowboy say about DS3…you can definitely “go the tank approach”. He seems like the main streamer for the game as he is even quoted in a DS3 strategy guide Is seen online.
I like his videos on the Lords of the fallen, and DS/Bloodborne series.
EpicNameBro, a youtuber who has probably the most Dark Souls videos, actually wrote a lot of the Dark Souls 2, and Bloodborne guides. Some other notable players who have actually had input with Myazaki directly include; Oroboro, VaatiVidya. There are a couple of other names I can’t remember.
Also, a big streamer for the souls series goes by LobosJr. He’s a challenge runner who has done the most recorded challenge runs in Dark Souls 1 and 2.
Edit: Also, the DaS1 soundtrack is amazing as hell. Motoi Sakuraba is a great composer.
I’ve already pressganged @TheNinjaOstrich and @FallofSeraphs76 into co-oping with me on DS3, is anybody else getting it on the One and interested in grouping when possible? The game’s obviously fun to play through solo, but I also really enjoy the shared experience and ridiculous things that can happen when very different playstyles are paired up.
I beat three bosses in a row during my initial playthrough of DS2 with the same person; some random guy I happened to invite through his summon sign who ran a Pyromancy build; I stood up front holding the boss’ attention and dishing out hits when I could, and the other guy was free to hang back and blast away without fear of dying.
Thanks to @TheNinjaOstrich for sticking around for several hours of DS2 streamed tonight.
Lots of progress, boss kills, and general killy fun was had. Hoping to clear the next major boss (past the Gutter) and get my hands on that sweet, sweet Havel set in the next day or so!
