From Software The Dark Souls II Megathread™

[DragoFireheart]

Wow, talk about downgrade in lighting. Damn shame.

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

Of more concern is how this affects gameplay. From made a lot of noise talking about their lighting system and that torches will play an integral role in dark areas. The Beta did have some complaints about how dark some areas were, but I didn't expect From to revert that design choice to such an extent. Apparently torches are hardly needed now, going by the early players, and that makes me wonder if From managed to rebalance most of the encounters to not needing a torch anymore, that too in a handful of months.

i dunno dude i have seen plenty of dark areas like new blightown and pirates cave that really needed torch to see anything. also at least two streamers put their brightness setting to max...fucking pussies.

anyway i dont doubt that fucking ps3/xbox36o versions could not handle all that fucking lighting/shadows/rain/particle effects in mirror knight fight

 

[Kanedias]

Hahaha that trailer is so amateurish it's hilarious. Why is marketing always so bad?

 

[DragoFireheart]

Hahaha that trailer is so amateurish it's hilarious. Why is marketing always so bad?

Because they funneled money into the game while relying on word of mouth and viral marketing to get sales.

Hey guis look at this:

Spoiler

Red Rust Sword

Acquired from Vengarl of Forossa

23 STR (A), 13 DEX (E)

136 -> 205 physical

This weapon sounds familiar...


http://castlevania.wikia.com/wiki/Red_Rust

y halo thar Castlevania!

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

we want call of duty audience? who else could that trailer attract? hardcore fans will buy it anyway

 

[DragoFireheart]

we want call of duty audience?

I hope that was rhetorical.

 

[Echo Mirage]

Here is the embedded launch trailer.



Amateurish at best. I guess none of the music they have for the game could cut it when it comes time to actually explaining stuff about the world and game.

 

[J_C]

What the fuck is this? It's like a shitty youtube video made by a 12 year old.

 

[J_C]

Apparently torches are hardly needed now, going by the early players, and that makes me wonder if From managed to rebalance most of the encounters to not needing a torch anymore, that too in a handful of months.

I can confirm that while you can use torches, and set other beacons on fire with them, it is not needed because the levels are not too dark.

 

[LivingOne]

I can confirm that while you can use torches, and set other beacons on fire with them, it is not needed because the levels are not too dark.

A bit of a shame.Anyway,if Bamco sends it to your workplace snatch the PC version review copy too and let us know if anything changes.

 

[80Maxwell08]

Ok I'm trying not to read too much of your posts now because it's getting a bit too specific for me but quick question. I got the Collector's Edition for the PS3 version of this game but now I'm wondering if I should keep it or not from some of these early reviews. Can anyone tell me if it's still worth it?

 

[LivingOne]

I've avoided spoilers too but so far it seems people are mostly discussing if it's slightly better/slightly worse/equal but for different reasons compared to DaS1.Nothing to worry about,in short.

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

Ok I'm trying not to read too much of your posts now because it's getting a bit too specific for me but quick question. I got the Collector's Edition for the PS3 version of this game but now I'm wondering if I should keep it or not from some of these early reviews. Can anyone tell me if it's still worth it?

i woudnt pay 100bucks for any game. 40 more bucks for shitty figure and artbook that is already leaked? nope

 

[80Maxwell08]

Ok I'm trying not to read too much of your posts now because it's getting a bit too specific for me but quick question. I got the Collector's Edition for the PS3 version of this game but now I'm wondering if I should keep it or not from some of these early reviews. Can anyone tell me if it's still worth it?

i woudnt pay 100bucks for any game. 40 more bucks for shitty figure and artbook that is already leaked? nope

What can I say I like physical things. Granted I don't give a damn about that figure but for everything else why not.

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

i mean i also bought physical version for ps3 just saw no reason to pay 40 euro more for ACTION MAN and artbook.

 

[80Maxwell08]

Well to me I could pay $40 for the artbook and soundtrack. Still think that figure is stupid as hell.

 

[praetor]

yeah, that figure is really shitty, but the map and artbook could be cool. i'm also still thinking of cancelling the CE preorder and go either digital or "black armour". other than the somewhat more cartoonish art direction (but it's much better later on), the uneven first half, some way too easy bosses, the retardation of the maiden in green (thus making the game feel even more "disjointed" than it already is) and the absence of a gravelord-like covenant, it appears to be an improvement over its predecessors in pretty much every other way. GOTY every year

 

[J_C]

I can say that the artbook of Dark Souls was amazing. A hardcover, high quality book full of great pictures. I hopw DS2 will have something similar.

 

[Nugs]

What the fuck is this? It's like a shitty youtube video made by a 12 year old.

exactly, i would make a better trailer by editing random bits of gameplay and music in 2-3 hours

 

[Admiral jimbob]

bet the lighting will still look fine on the PC version no reason for it not to, anyway.

 

[Manjuice Nutella]

Matters of life and death

• There is a ring players can discover early on that makes players lose less of their health bar when they die.

Equip the ring!

 

[Kanedias]

By the way, I could finally put the finger on what the "disjointed" feeling was. They made way too many areas, they're really different, and they struggled to actually mesh them together in the way the Dark Souls world was. While the game is supposed to follow Dark Souls world design, it feels much closer than Demon's Souls, because every time you change areas, it feels like you're changing worlds. I couldn't realize what it was that I was missing, and it's that feeling when you realize how wrapped around itself the world of Dark Souls is, and how it makes sense for the wildly different areas to be connected together.

Checking the Dark Souls 2 map will show you what I mean much better (I put the image in spoiler tags because its huge):

Spoiler

As you can see, the areas themselves are quite far apart, which means the game isn't all wrapped around itself anymore.

It's not too bad, and the warping between areas tends to be clever, but it's still warping, which I think is a downgrade from Dark Souls. It's funny that Dark Souls improved from Demon's Souls, and this new director seems to have tried to improve on Dark Souls's world by adding quantity of areas, which in turn made them impossible to include in the same way, which brought us back to Demon's Souls.

Also there's another thing that I believe weakens the world design early/midgame, and it has to do with the plot of the game (the plot is still excellent, by the way, so that's not where I'm going). This has story spoilers, I'll put it in tags, it's quite heavy but it's also stuff that the Emerald Herald says minutes into the game, the moment you get out of the tutorial. Still, if you want 0 plot spoilers, do not look.

Spoiler

Anyways, you know your character wants to find the cure for the curse, but then you reach Majula (the hub) and the Emerald Herald instantly asks you if you're the new Monarch, tells you to "seek King Vendrick" and to first find some beings with powerful souls, a clear nod to the first game where you have to gather the Lord Souls. It's also funny because like I mentioned the first part of this game is weaker, just as the last half of the second game where you do the same thing.

Of course, everything isn't as simple as the Emerald Herald lets on. The problem is that you don't really get that sense of motivation/direction you have in Demon's Souls or Dark Souls. I dislike the plot of Demon's Souls because it's very simplistic, but it still gives you a sense of direction and motivation to go defeat the demons, and Dark Souls has you meet Oscar in a very powerful scene which gives meaning to your journey. Here the game seems to play (on purpose) with a sense of confusion, you'll eventually find a lot of things that make you scratch your head, and the game uses this to make you curious about the story/lore and to give you, the player, a reason to forge on and find out more things. And it works, but I believe it also puts more focus on the disjointed way the areas mesh with each other, since you don't even know why you're going through them or why you should care about these beings with great souls, the early/mid game areas can feel like mere dungeons. This changes later on, of course, and like I said, the story of the game is excellent, but it does affect the feel of the world at first, in a negative way.

This is probably the main flaw of the game, and the worst thing I can say about it.

I have seen other criticism in 4chan but most of it was nonsense or outright lies.

--

As for the person that said we were wrong for spoiling things for ourselves, well, that may be true, I'm a bit sad I spoiled so much. I'm really into the story/lore of the Souls games, however, and when I played Dark Souls people had already analyzed the plot to death, and everything else was already discovered and told to me through videos.

I'm not into making videos, but I would really like discovering something myself and contributing a semi-popular theory or explanation. So yeah if for some reason anyone cared that's why I spoiled things for myself. I wanted a heads up of where the story was heading so I could try to find something when I play the game (I'm going to be reading every item description and trying to find evidence for my theories).

On that note, I was a bit worried when I saw ENB and Vaati got to play the game in advance (especially ENB, who worked in the strategy guide) I hope they didn't get told of the lore, or something. It'd suck if the first day the game comes out they start crapping out videos about what everything means instead of having the usual Souls experience of people slowly figuring things out.

 

[DragoFireheart]

So tl;dr they mashed together the level design of Demon's Souls and Dark Souls together.

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

well seems that bosses have also new moves/attack patterns in ng+

Spoiler

The NG versions of bosses are balanced around the limitations (eg stamina) that a player would have in that point in the game. They get new moves and attack more aggressively in NG+ because those factors aren't as limiting when you're a higher level.

Don't burn a bonfire ascetic on the Lost Sinner unless you're nearly capped on ADP and END

 

[Cowboy Moment]

bet the lighting will still look fine on the PC version no reason for it not to, anyway.

It will look the same as the console versions, probably. A straight port without major changes is easier to maintain, and publishers/developers will always choose the path of least resistance here.

I'd like to believe the PC version is delayed because they're trying to make the old lighting work, but it's unlikely.