Dark Souls II didn’t prove to be as popular as it’s prequel, or it’s spiritual predecessor Demon’s Souls. However, it offered even more boss battles to give you a headache, and more of the same incredibly unforgiving gameplay.
Psychobudgie provided a detailed account of their experience with the game. One of their biggest issues with Dark Souls II was the developers adding more mobs into the boss fights “rather than innovative move sets or abilities”. There was nothing worse in the first Dark Souls than getting picked off by a meagre wolf during a boss battle.
They also weren’t a fan of the removal of torches, “which in turn led them to replace the darkness with more enemies”. This quickly became frustrating as the “game’s key mechanics are based around 1 on 1 combat”, which isn’t the best when you can’t see.
NazzyQ was also critical of Dark Souls II saying it “pales in comparison to its predecessor”. They weren’t a fan of the level design, slating it for lacking “intricate secrets and short cuts”, resulting in the game feeling like a “collection of disparate stages strung together rather than a cohesive whole”.
Keeping with the negative comments for Dark Souls II was The Von Braun, who again felt the game didn’t “come close to holding a candle to Demon’s Souls in terms of story, sense of scale and giving player such a rewarding feel for defeating Bosses”. It didn’t help either with the developers adding in more boss battles in an attempt to make it a better game.
Starman, however, had nothing but praise for Dark Souls II calling it “more user friendly than the first” thanks to “simple improvements like clearer mission objectives and menus for fast travel”. The game didn’t dumb down difficulty for them either with even the weaker enemies able to “quickly deplete your life bar if you aren’t careful”. You should never let you guard down in the Souls’ game!
For Matthangzou, Dark Souls II, was “More of the same but on a much larger scale”, but overall a “more refined experience”, as well as an easier one. The final comment this week comes from MadBoJangles who was straight to the point: “great game still, but I prefer Demon’s Souls myself”.
So it seems Dark Souls II isn’t quite up to the quality of the original Demon’s Souls or the first Dark Souls game. The boss battles seemed to have been tweaked for the worse, with mobs becoming a frustrating addition. Despite this Dark Souls II received Buy It votes from everyone who commented, 5 to be precise. The latest Souls game is definitely worth purchasing for RPG fans, then.
I think we’ve almost got through all of the last generation exclusive releases now that we’ve got Dark Souls II out of the way, but there are plenty of games to come. We’ve got Strider coming up tomorrow, and the new poll for next week is below.
