From Software Dark Souls 3

[Metro]

WAB guy is good at times but woefully hypocritical at others. I remember he trashed some AAA game for being nothing but generic filler with outposts and and fetch quests and then he praises stuff like Far Cry 3/4. He also trashed the combat in the Arkham series but then tried to differentiate it from the recent Mad Max game... when it's nearly identical.

 

[Wolfe]

Well, the boss difficulty has finally picked up. Pontiff took me 5 tries, Aldrich 7. The ones before them went down usually within the first try.. so I can't wait to see what comes next.

 

[Invictus]

Performance for me seems fine, I can get mostly solid 60 fps with my 960 but it hits the 80% power range and the fan goes bonkers; even Metal Gear Phantom Pain lingers bellow 60% load.
I tried Riva and while the fps counter doesnt seem to work it did cap the game at 30 fps. It seems more stable somehow and I get high settings while the load stays under 60%.
I have not updated my drivers for a awhile since the newer versions messed up with GTA5 so maybe that has something to do with it. I feel perfectly fine with 30 fps and my timings are the same for the PS4 version and PC so that is good, the performance will probably get patched up so I can try 60 fps on later date
Playing all nite yesterday and it definetly helped to change my playstyle to something similar to Bloodborne; since in that game you cant tank for shit you need to be aggresive on the offensive and dodge like a jumping jack. It definetly helps to be on the offensive with the knights and other smarter AI enemies, still kind of annoying that most feel like they are not playing by the same ruleset than the player since they dont seem to have the same stamina system.
So far I am liking the game a lot and the more you adapt to the changes like the faster combat speed, sword arts and more aggresive the more fluid it gets...I made a brand new assassin for the PS4 and his style seems perfectly fitted for this game; stunlocks, magic as a backup, hi risk hi reward combat jumping and counterhiting I beat the first 2 bosses on my first try

 

[Damned Registrations]

Having a good time so far. Been killing lots of friendly NPCs to see what they drop, got a couple pleasant surprises so far but nothing amazing. Boss soul weapons seem really cool this time around, with interesting movesets instead of the garbage from DaS2 where it was a bunch of shitty split damage weapons with an innate buff or something. Sadly, my stats aren't really up to snuff for using most of the weapons; I've got a kinda shitty hybrid dex/int build because I got a katana early and was basically using it up until I found the second sorcery vendor, at which point I figured I'd invest in that since nothing else interesting had shown up yet. Now I've got way more options in terms of equipment and spells but my stats are basically locked into buffed katana build, which is effective, but rather boring. Hopefully the endgame sorceries are worthwhile, so far they've been fairly lacklustre as well. Soul shower is just as garbage as it was the last time, and plenty of other too weak spells showing up so far. Soul greatsword isn't even that good any more.

Levels feel like they come a lot slower this time around, which I think is a good thing. Though they're clearly not balanced very well, plenty of dump stats that are clearly worthless until you get super high level.

 

[rashiakas]

Just killed Abyss Watcher and still using starting gear (Knight). I upgraded my Longsword with a fire gem and put level ups in Stamina/HP/Equipment Weight, works really well so far. I Enjoy it a lot more then DS2, even if it is a bit linear the locations are superbly designed. I think there are a bit to many bonfires, kinda miss that feeling when I finally found one in DeS or even DS1. Also enjoy the slower pace of the game.

 

[Mr. Pink]

One missed opportunity was making pyromancy more interesting. It was OP in ds1 and 2 because it didn't need stats, but now it's just the same thing as magic.

Maybe have no stat requirement, but have pyro spells drain HP instead of mana.

 

[AngryEddy]

Man, they nerfed the fuck out of magic. Back load the game with all of the mid level equipment and spells put towards the end of the game, so while im still using starting shit tier spells at midgame and craving for just an inch of momentum, melee characters start off the game with a fucking katana. Completely unacceptable: if they didnt want pvp or magic then they shouldve just cut it out, because both of these things clearly punish the users engaged in them.

 

[Metro]

Might have something to do with the limitations on invasion/coop within 2 weapon upgrades. Would be harder to do something similar for spells. Then again, I haven't played so I have no idea how pyromancy or sorcery works.

 

[eric__s]

Spoiler

Just killed Abyss Watcher and still using starting gear (Knight). I upgraded my Longsword with a fire gem and put level ups in Stamina/HP/Equipment Weight, works really well so far. I Enjoy it a lot more then DS2, even if it is a bit linear the locations are superbly designed. I think there are a bit to many bonfires, kinda miss that feeling when I finally found one in DeS or even DS1. Also enjoy the slower pace of the game.

This boss blew me away, probably the best boss fight I've had in a Souls game. Even when it beat me, I couldn't wait to get back and try again because it was so much fun and I wanted to try different strategies. My pal told me this fight is based off of a fight in Bloodborne, which I've still got to play. So far, all the boss fights have been very good and the only clunker has been the one after this, but it still wasn't that bad. The game is just so well balanced.

Also, let's try to use more spoiler tags, I don't want to see stuff I don't know about yet.

 

[rashiakas]

Yeah sorry, didn't thought the name alone is a spoiler, but you're right. Loved that fight as well, btw.

 

[eric__s]

Yeah sorry, didn't thought the name alone is a spoiler, but you're right. Loved that fight as well, btw.

Yeah, don't worry about it, I was talking more to everyone in the thread in general. I've gotten spoiled on some minor stuff, which is why I'm hesitant to even look here.

 

[Invictus]

Assassin is so much fun; I got the katana right away so start off and bought magic missle so I can either go slow and sneaky pulling enemies with magic or bum rush everyone by two handing the sword sticking in a couple of hits and then dodging like a monkey. Still trying to have more practical uses for the sword arts rather than using magic or parrying but the class is simply so versatile I can go either way
Oh and fuck PS Plus; I got the game on PS4 too to see about that connectivity with passwords for friends but forgot you have to pay the service for online unlike on PS3

 

[made]

Game crashing like a mofo in the undead castle. None of the fixes posted online seem to help.

 

[Night Goat]

I'm getting to the point where I need to make difficult decisions. Questions for people who have gotten farther than me:

1. STR or DEX, which is better and why?
2. Can you respec, or are you stuck with your decision once you've made it?
3. Which weapons are worth upgrading?

 

[Wolfe]

I think you can respec up to 5 times per playthrough. At level 70 something, I'm sitting at 20 Str/30 Dex, going for a quality build in the end (~40/40). Both Str and Dex builds are viable since there are so many cool weapons out there (especially from boss souls), but I went more for Dex since I prefer the faster speed and also the katanas.

 

[Mystary!]

Abyss watchers second stage....

Spoiler

I tried playing defensively for probably 5-6 times but there's just not enough stamina in the whole goddamn world to avoid the constant barrage of attack combos without pause.
Got frustrated to the point where I just said fuck it and bumrushed him. Turns out you can just stunlock him like a common mook...
Meh, felt so cheap.
I was trying to play "smart", slow and methodical, like previous installments have taught you to do, but basically got punished for it.

 

[cvv]

Boss soul weapons seem really cool this time around, with interesting movesets instead of the garbage from DaS2 where it was a bunch of shitty split damage weapons with an innate buff or something.

How does split damage work? Of all the boss/miniboss weapons I like the Gargoyle Flame Hammer the most but it's half physical, half fire and people say that's bad? I just wanna consider this carefully before I blow all my scales on upgrading these things.

 

[cvv]

Btw how the fuck did people figure out the Yhorm fight? Are you kidding me? Miyazaki is known for some fucked up obscure secrets but when he kept it for side quests (Solaire) it was fine. But to put a gimmick like that in a main questline?

Spoiler

So obviously after doing almost no damage to him I figured I gotta do something first before attacking him. Running for an hour around the whole damn Profane Capital I found jackshit. So I thought maybe I have to get a specific quest item or a weapon first. Did the whole Demon Ruins and Ithyrill and nothing. Only then I caught a mention on the interwebz YOU HAVE TO RUN PAST HIM, GRAB THE ITEM, SUICIDE TO HIM, TRY THE WEAPON BACK AT THE BONFIRE, SOMEHOW FIGURE OUT YOU HAVE TO HOOOOOOOLD THE CHARGE AND PRESS LMOUSE AT THE SAME TIME FOR THE SECRET ATTACK TO UNLOCK? I...don't even.

Abyss watchers second stage....

Spoiler

I tried playing defensively for probably 5-6 times but there's just not enough stamina in the whole goddamn world to avoid the constant barrage of attack combos without pause.
Got frustrated to the point where I just said fuck it and bumrushed him. Turns out you can just stunlock him like a common mook...
Meh, felt so cheap.
I was trying to play "smart", slow and methodical, like previous installments have taught you to do, but basically got punished for it.

Yeah, stunlocking is the only way to go for frenzied motherfuckers like that. Just to give you a little taste of things to come, there are NORMAL mobs like that a short way ahead.

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

Btw how the fuck did people figure out the Yhorm fight? Are you kidding me? Miyazaki is known for some fucked up obscure secrets but when he kept it for side quests (Solaire) it was fine. But to put a gimmick like that in a main questline?

Spoiler

So obviously after doing almost no damage to him I figured I gotta do something first before attacking him. Running for an hour around the whole damn Profane Capital I found jackshit. So I thought maybe I have to get a specific quest item or a weapon first. Did the whole Demon Ruins and Ithyrill and nothing. Only then I caught a mention on the interwebz YOU HAVE TO RUN PAST HIM, GRAB THE ITEM, SUICIDE TO HIM, TRY THE WEAPON BACK AT THE BONFIRE, SOMEHOW FIGURE OUT YOU HAVE TO HOOOOOOOLD THE CHARGE AND PRESS LMOUSE AT THE SAME TIME FOR THE SECRET ATTACK TO UNLOCK? I...don't even.

Abyss watchers second stage....

Spoiler

I tried playing defensively for probably 5-6 times but there's just not enough stamina in the whole goddamn world to avoid the constant barrage of attack combos without pause.
Got frustrated to the point where I just said fuck it and bumrushed him. Turns out you can just stunlock him like a common mook...
Meh, felt so cheap.
I was trying to play "smart", slow and methodical, like previous installments have taught you to do, but basically got punished for it.

Yeah, stunlocking is the only way to go for frenzied motherfuckers like that. Just to give you a little taste of things to come, there are NORMAL mobs like that a short way ahead.

or you could just follow

Spoiler

siegward

questline and let him use his own stormruler to beat yhorms ass. you even get special cutscene. no need to check web for that

 

[Zep Zepo]

So, I passed up a fight (I think).

Spoiler

Walking down a corridor covered with purple flowers. To the left was a big room with some un-dead worshiping a big tree thing.

I went right instead and thought I'd explore a little...a few hours later, I want to go fight the tree..but fuck, can't remember where that area is.

Help me bros! Where is it? What bonfire? etc...

Zep--

 

[Villagkouras]

So, I passed up a fight (I think).

Walking down a corridor covered with purple flowers. To the left was a big room with some un-dead worshiping a big tree thing.

I went right instead and thought I'd explore a little...a few hours later, I want to go fight the tree..but fuck, can't remember where that area is.

Help me bros! Where is it? What bonfire? etc...

Zep--

Spoiler

It's the bonfire after the sewers. You get back through them and continue straight ahead where the giant arrows fly from the sky. You get to the shack, up the stairs and to the right you get to the tree boss building. If you opened the right door which was locked you can take the 1st Undead Settlement bonfire, I think it's easier to run past the enemies without the arrows from the sky.

 

[Zep Zepo]

So, I passed up a fight (I think).

Walking down a corridor covered with purple flowers. To the left was a big room with some un-dead worshiping a big tree thing.

I went right instead and thought I'd explore a little...a few hours later, I want to go fight the tree..but fuck, can't remember where that area is.

Help me bros! Where is it? What bonfire? etc...

Zep--

Spoiler

It's the bonfire after the sewers. You get back through them and continue straight ahead where the giant arrows fly from the sky. You get to the shack, up the stairs and to the right you get to the tree boss building. If you opened the right door which was locked you can take the 1st Undead Settlement bonfire, I think it's easier to run past the enemies without the arrows from the sky.

Oh, I opened the shortcut with the rats. So I think from that bonfire, I take the shortcut, then go left?

Zep--

 

[GrainWetski]

Played a few hours last night and the combat kind of clicked for me after about an hour of playing. I still see it as worse than the 3 prior games, but it was actually decently fun for a bit. This game will definitely join DS2(for different reasons, only the combat in this game and everything else in vanilla DS2) as the two games in the series that I haven't immediately wanted to replay. Demon's Souls/Dark Souls 1 I wanted to try different builds just a few hours in and in this I can already tell there will barely be any different in playstyles.. A real shame.

Hopefully they release some awesome DLC and I might replay it at some point. I should probably replay DS2 with SotFS after I finish this up since I still haven't touched any of the DLC..

that is absolutely normal

first off TW3 looks good but its art design doesn't require unique high poly models all over the place.
DS3 on other hand goes absolutely bonkers on geometry everywhere.
So to play it you actually need strong GPU that can eat all those high poly models AND strong CPU to feed GPU properly.

I have 7970 and i5-3470 and i need to set it back to 1600x900 to lock it down to 50fps where i still have sometimes dips in framerate.

You could just say that the game is poorly optimized because it is. No need to sugarcoat it.

Wow, I'm currently runing this maxed at 40 fps (capped) on 1680x1050 res on a gtx 760. That 660 would perform that much worse is impossible.

I have a 660 and I'm around 45-60 FPS. Averaging something like 52. He's probably being bottlenecked elsewhere where as the 660 is definitely the weakest part of my PC.

Make sure to update the drivers:

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/ar...tual-reality-dark-souls-iii-and-more-released

Or don't. People are saying that ~2 year old drivers(this one, supposedly: http://www.nvidia.com/object/win8-win7-winvista-64bit-314.22-whql-driver.html ) make the game run much faster than the newest driver on older cards(4/5/6 series). I haven't tried myself since it runs fine with the newest one for me.

 

[Villagkouras]

Oh, I opened the shortcut with the rats. So I think from that bonfire, I take the shortcut, then go left?

Zep--

Spoiler

No, my bad. From the bonfire after the sewers you go straight up, you don't take the shortcut back to the sewers. The first enemy you see is the one with the saw. Continue straight up and you'll find more enemies and flying giant arrows. Sorry I'm at work and cannot load the game, but 100% I'm sure that's it.

 

[Surf Solar]

You can just 'disable' the giant arrows if you take the elevator up instead of down where you met the Siegmeyer 2.0 guy.