A Dark Souls Thread ft. Bloodborne and, begrudgingly, Sekiro (2020 4 phase boss fight mix ft. McGarnagle stomping Bloodborne in his sleep)

So, it’s a hello and goodbye from me!

Threw my head against the wall of O&S for a couple of hours tonight. Tried a few different builds based on advice I’d seen - super heavy to soak up hits, super light to dodge everything, but nothing came together. I’d catch a bad shovel from the big lad or a lightning bolt in the back - it never felt like I was getting better or closer, just luckier on some runs than others. When I played Celeste, however hard it was, I felt like I could work it out and persist. This just felt desultory. I understood what to do, but I felt my hands would and brain would never bring it together.

So, given the fun I’d had before on some summons, I tried again. And by god, it was worse. I got mashed by a sentinel during the animation for summoning Solaire. I tried a couple of other players for very mixed results - one immediately ran from the bonfire to the spear knight opposite and died. COME ON MAN. One ran up the stairs through the funhouse and I never saw him again. One time I just got invaded by a cunt dressed like Daredevil.

But then I met vikingqueen. They followed me over the stair jump. They ran with me past the sentinels. I bowed by the fog gate, they saluted, and off we went.

Suddenly a beating became a ballet. We ducked and dived. We passed them off between each other, swapping hits and healing. First skinny went down. Then we worked together on fatty, enraging him to do his Mario squash attacks leaving me open the rush in with the heavy hits. And just like that, it was done. Vikingqueen, we hardly knew ye. But I will always love you.

It was exciting and exhilarating, and maybe it’s not as satisfying as doing it by myself, but it was fun. And as someone with limited time to play, I kind of missed that.

I respect Dark Souls immensely. I’ve put 25 hours into and will remember all of it vividly. I understand why people love it. But I don’t think I’m going to play much more, at least not for a while. I guess I’m going hollow.

Praise the sun, boys. Praise the sun.

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What a great post.

I think you’ve nailed the Dark Souls experience that so many of us fall in love with at some point. And in some respects, once you’ve tasted it that first time, every subsequent morsel is mere leftovers of that initial feast.

I had a sense when I beat O&S that I was done too. I’m insanely glad I carried on to the bitter end as I think the DLC is spectacular and betters anything the rest of the standard game has to offer. But if you do choose to bow out now, I really don’t blame you. And you can rest knowing that you’ve played and beaten the best half of the game.

Played it solid the week it came out and it took me 60 hours to get to O&S, had to restart because my build was shite. Checked out the ebay prices. Swore I’d never put the disc in again

Couldn’t stop thinking about it so I rerolled a week later. I’m still an addict.

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So many relationships like this with summons over the years. I don’t know who you are, where you come from or anything about you, but you have made such an impact to my life, I thank you!

Anyway, don’t quit now, you’ve finally earned the ability to fast travel!

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Finally did the Fume Knight! Probably died in total about 60 times, in my last few attempts some of them I was just silly and died in his first phase. When I did finally beat him I’m pretty sure I didn’t get properly hit by him once in his 2nd phase, just glancing hits a couple of times. Ooof. Sometimes you don’t know if it’s luck or all your experience coming together over a beautiful 7 minutes.

Not much more to go now before I start my ng+ run for the rest of the spells/hexes/pyromancies.

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With the Fume Knight it’s definitely the experience and skill. Think I was doing it naked by the end.

And my character wasn’t wearing any armour!!!

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I’ve had a Havel/STR build for the entire game (first time I’ve ever done this in souls I’m usually a slippery DEX build) so obviously realised pretty quick this wasn’t working so I got comfortable just going in pretty much naked but with just a shield and helmet on. SEXY

Always forget just how bad bed of chaos is. The run-up, the respawning prick on that run-up who can one-shot you if you make a mistake skirting round them, the fight itself… Really frustrating.

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If they had just put a bonfire beside the boss door it would make such a difference. Not ashamed to say I do the quit out and respawn tactic every time

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Just got the Platinum on DS2. Just DS3 to do now and then I’ve done all the soulsbourne games though I’m not counting Sekiro but will get around to that eventually.

As everyone said on here the DLC is the best bit, but there were some areas I really loved in the main game like the dragon area, dranglaic castle, the spider level… but I dunno, it was just missing something that DS1, Bloodbourne or Demon Souls had. Bosses were generally too easy? The pace? I can’t put my finger on it.

I can’t see me playing DS3 for a while yet, need something pretty light and breezy, maybe that Spider-Man game?

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And the worst. Those fucking invisible horses in the blizzard are such a bag of dicks.

There were probably too many bosses that should have been minibosses like the boars or black knights of the original. As soon as the boss life meter appears your expectation goes up for a major fight and I think the minor ones like the slugsack of cum or gremlin rat take away from the better ones.

If you’re going light and breezy before ds3, I’d change genre completely - 2 point hospital is a lot of colourful cartoony fun but with a lot of depth behind the mechanics.

Me neither :wink:

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SE :clap: KI :clap: RO

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:grinning:

Finished up The Surge 2 at the weekend. It doesn’t reach the heights of my favourite types of these games, but it was a lot of fun. It was great to have a ‘lighter’ one of these games. The combat is fast and pretty fluid, liked the way they dealt with difficulty by having certain implants (like Nier: Automata) which gave you more on-screen information for parries and other bits and bobs that you could take off for more power, or keep on to help track more information for you. It was continuously fun doing the limb cutting thing for armour and I had a blast.

The story is absolute bobbins, and I did not care about anything that happened. Also, it got really easy towards the end, I didn’t take any time out to grind so maybe just got better at it? Overall though, if you see it cheap and fancy a 20-hour one-of-those I think it’s worth your time!

I bought Dark Souls Prepare to Die edition (PS3) before lockdown started. Going to start playing it tonight. No idea what to expect. Anything I should know before starting?

Choose the master key as your gift. Think that’s it.

Strongly disagree, great when you’ve been through the game once but can easily send you down some paths too early for a newcomer.

First Dark Souls? Lots of tips but think you’re better coming at it wihout them and just asking in here if you get stuck or don’t understand how the concepts work.

You don’t have to fight the first big lad you see. You’ll know the one.