Dark Souls 1 vs. Dark Souls 2, and why the sequel is better

[drauch]

I think we're making progress!

[Obscura]

As I said before, basically you have to ignore the entire history of the game's changes for this to make sense, and the fact that at launch only one system, the "we really care about this one, I guess" broken PC port one allowed 60Hz; the PS4 and Xbox One ports you like to talk about didn't come along until November. Your argument is "I think I can imagine a way in which somehow From intended things to happen one way, but they didn't, but then bugs happened and I like it." Does a painter who releases their portrait to a client after dramatically overpainting features from when they started really "intend" the portrait to look like it did in the underpainted version, when somebody pulls out a knife and scrapes away? In no way can you really make the argument that is the face of the game From "intended" to reveal to the public. You do seem to agree with me that From doesn't always patch things immediately, so that leg of your argument never was on firm ground.

First off, I like the circular logic in saying "well obviously the PC port's behavior was unintentional and the console's behavior was because the PC port's behavior was broken because it was different than the console's behavior!" That's actually a really funny fallacy, kudos for that one.

If the lead platform was PS3/X360, how come for most of development the game had visual effects running at high framerates that had to be scrapped to get the game to still not run at 30 FPS most of the time on the PS3/X360?

You said this why? Half of this seems to be "I LIKE IT," the other half seems to be "EVERYBODY ELSE IS AN ASSHOLE."

Your reactions to things changes dramatically depending on whether you like something or not. Bugs get fixed that erases some unintentional gameplay that you profess to like = CURSE THE LOT
Bugs don't get fixed when you don't care = TOUGH LUCK CHUMP

What are you even talking about?

I'm not saying it's good that Ninja Blade's port wasn't fixed. I'm saying it never had any outcry because the game isn't very popular. I have no idea where on earth you're getting any of the above from.

Honest question, is English your native language?

[Necronopticous]

This thread is more entertaining than Dark Souls 2.

[Bananamatic]

i just want lightning spears back now

[trap15]

I've never played any games and the series but I'm quite enjoying this thread.

[Ed Oscuro]

I think we're making progress!

I KNOW RIGHT

Obscura:

Oh, what a belly laugh that must have been! Unfortunately for you, the check bounced; that's not an example of circular reasoning and additionally has no similarity to what I've argued. The only part of my statement which even looks close was a summary (maybe not the best possible) of your position. In my best attempt to translate:
A. (the PC port is broken)
If A, then B (if the PC port is broken, then the console port is broken. And? The last part of this is something nobody said, and the next bit is redundant.)
Therefore...
A & B (I can't really decide what you're trying to have me end with; "because it was different" is, again, redundant)

The fallacy you're looking for is called begging the question (and possibly denying the antecedent). Circular reasoning can be valid, and all you've added to the discussion is some new information about 60Hz in development which you apparently just discovered.

You have quite likely imagined continuity where there is none. That's a logical problem (see David Hume for the lowdown). Concretely, there's only the similarity of an early 60Hz development, when targeting that as the original baseline, since changed on consoles, and the later appearance of 60Hz as the maximum framerate on PC, where wide performance differences are the norm. You can't point to mechanics being developed for 60Hz past that apparent framerate change. We could, after all, have easily had 60Hz gameplay standard on consoles, and anomalies still could have appeared for consoles running at different framerates (for performance reasons) if the game code still had framerate assumptions baked in.

Isn't this attempt to tie the past and the present necessary, and exactly what you were doing on your fishing trip through the watchdog analysis post earlier? "This post from only months ago will help me discover From's intentions back in 2014." There's nothing necessarily wrong with that.

I'd agree that I should be able to provide a timeline where we don't rely only on later evidence to prove things earlier, even if you don't follow that standard yourself. Nor should we believe that one kind of change necessarily ties to another kind of change - visual effects and how many hits a weapon takes to break are obviously different things, with changes in behavior trickling out of a part of the code we all agree leads to uncertainty and a slow trickle of changes for real 60Hz support. Where we don't agree is on your analysis of the clearly stable 30Hz as anomalous. Nobody else has identified it as such, including From. Your own reasoning end up looking more like that joke argument.

Am I shocked or dismayed to find out that From (possibly) once targeted 60Hz on 360 and PS3? To find out that From originally targeted 60Hz on Bloodborne (remaining unclear on the point of whether this change was accompanied by any other changes of the type seen in DS2, but apparently not)? Well, no, that's just life. The only thing that's unusual here is that there end up being two "platforms" split by framerate, so that focus gets lost, but where you lose the thread in in saying that the obscure continuum of variances in 60Hz gameplay must obviously have gotten noticed, and despite the silence of From on the issue until now when they have denied it we should assume they intended the 60Hz gameplay but not the entirety of gameplay on the much-scrutinized launch 30Hz platforms where no framerate variances could obscure any breakage of mechanics. The fact of an apparently successful Bloodborne launch - in terms of giving intentional mechanics - shows that the critical question here is not a 60 to 30 to 60Hz switch, but the framerate variability on PC, which has nothing to do with their original frame rate target at all.

Hence my comment about the stages of painting a portrait. From didn't originally release 60Hz gameplay to the world. They released 30Hz gameplay and that effectively ended the appropriateness of talking about later versions with odd behavior triggered by framerate as being "intentional" in any truly relevant sense. They took weeks after the original console launch to finish up the PC version, it seems, and they only unlocked FPS, instead of making 60Hz with proven consistent mechanics standard - there are 30Hz players on all three original platforms, and anybody who has their frame rate dip on PC will get mechanics closer to the other platforms again. There's no clear indication that From retained or extensively checked 60Hz mechanics again after that decision was made.

There's yet more evidence that in fact the PC version of the game was once again a rather slipshod port with poor support; embarrassingly unsuitable code underpinning its potentially-60Hz engine was only part of it. Steam is not the same market as consoles, as games like TF2 show: There's certainly no evidence of the original PC port getting appropriate, let alone special treatment in other regards. From / Namco decided to give that version the boot when it came time for new content. So much for being the lead platform on a capable platform without Sony and Microsoft-style DLC restrictions if you don't get an option to run the updated version as DLC (instead, you get an exceedingly generous option to purchase the new version for $30, $20 shy of DSII's normal price, when purchasing the original and each DLC separately would still run to nearly $70, today, or still $15 more if buying the original game and season pass). This is just another bit of evidence in the long chronicle of fuckery regarding From and Namco's handling of the series port on flexible hardware. At the time of the issue of SotFS for PS3 and 360, From / Namco again had, and passed, the opportunity to revamp gameplay on those systems. Being charitable to From; I put this down to simple lack of resources to handle the issue properly.

Speaking of logical fallacies, here's what you're apparently trying to say:

If the lead framerate for DS2 is 60Hz, then the lead framerate for DS2 is not 30Hz.
DS2's lead framerate is 60Hz.
Therefore apples and kitten-shaped cupcakes and gameplay differences, because I LIKE IT.

If A, then ~B
~B
___________
C

[Obscura]

A. (the PC port is broken)
If A, then B (if the PC port is broken, then the console port is broken. And? The last part of this is something nobody said, and the next bit is redundant.)
Therefore...
A & B (I can't really decide what you're trying to have me end with; "because it was different" is, again, redundant)

Define "broken".

Because unless you define "broken" to mean "the world simulation behaves differently at different framerates" (which it has been confirmed is the case on every single platform the game has ever been released on, and also the case in Dark Souls 1 at certain framerate values between 15 and 30), then I have literally no idea how you're getting my position to be anything like this.

If you mean "broken" to mean "The PC port isn't functioning as From intended when it runs at 60 FPS", then that is most definitely not my position, because in that case, I don't take "A" to be true.

The evidence for 60Hz being intended is huge.

1. Development history and reduced graphical features pointing towards a last-minute rush to make it work on consoles (if you ever wondered why some of the rock textures in certain semi-dark areas look so ass, the reason is because those areas were supposed to originally be ultra-dark, and it was changed at the very last minute). The need for such a last-minute rush would indicate that the lion's share of development was done on PC.

2. The way the engine itself works. The console versions don't run at a steady 30Hz, and the "world simulation" behavior fluctuates with the framerate exactly as it would on PC. Furthermore, DkS 1 hackers have proven that From intentionally locked certain areas to 15Hz in DkS 1 so that they could just multiply and divide values by 2 to keep the world simulation "correct". The only cap that is ever present in DkS 2 is a hard-cap at 60Hz, which is in practice only seen in the PC and "next-gen" versions. Which do you think is more likely -- that From intended the way the game works to constantly fluctuate with changing framerates, or that it's supposed to play at a steady 60 Hz? Indeed, arguing that the "console version" is the "intended version" is, in fact, the exact same as arguing that From intended the "world simulation" to constantly differ based on framerate! Hell, if you go back to the NeoGaf thread on Dark Souls 2's release, you see a million complaints about shitty controls on the consoles in low framerate areas. You don't see any complaints of that type from PC players -- in fact, the control thoughts from the PC world have consistently been positive. Tell me, do you think that From wanted the controls to be less responsive (note, responsive controls aren't the same thing as player movement speed, attack startup, or similar values!) than in the predecessor in certain areas based entirely on "how many shiny effects are on the screen", and only on consoles?

I didn't bother reading most of the rest of your post, because when someone needs that many words about such a simple topic, it means that they have no clue what they're trying to say, and are trying to cover that up with "bla bla bla".

(Oh, and the reason you can't run the updated version as DLC is because the underlying engine has been modified in SotFS. Again, go back to that Reddit thread you linked earlier.)

As for your little bit of logic at the end, it's more like:

A implies not B
HUGE FUCKING PILE OF EVIDENCE, BOTH HISTORICAL AND WITHIN THE ENGINE BEHAVIOR, FOR A
Therefore A
Therefore not B.

[Bananamatic]

someone get this hothead outta here

[Volteccer_Jack]

5. Level design is mostly better.

I have no idea what's happening in this thread because I stopped reading here.

[Ed Oscuro]

@ Obscura: Likewise, I see you're quite enamored of the subject Every time I go away from this thread for a while I think "oh, here's a nice way to come to an amicable challenge and agreement," and then come back, and THIS.

The best suggestion I can give is this: If you want to do something concrete to bolster your case, find some documentary evidence that the mechanics changed in development from that called anomalous and being fixed at 60Hz. I would take your view more seriously if it could be shown that movement speed and durability were as they are now. As it is, you're just assuming that 60Hz behavior was never touched, despite the obvious decision to switch to a new baseline of 30Hz for the original console versions. "Visual effects" at 60Hz could mean a number of things, and this tells us nothing about whether durability (for example) declined at the same real rate.

The (soon to be former) special 60Hz mechanics only appear in one set of circumstances: Frame rates diverging from 30Hz. They only appear in this one set of circumstances. Nobody has said the console ports are the "ideal" version of the game or had any illusions that these were anything but a compromise - but all design is compromise. What's actually being said is that From most likely retargeted the games to run at 30Hz (anywhere from 22-36 FPS, depending on the system), probably at a quite early date as the result of rendering tests, to accommodate systems that could not run as intended while maintaining 60fps, at a time when From had no assurance that there would ever be a 60Hz version of the game outside perhaps the PC version (as with the port of the original DkS, that was not without a substantial amount of arm twisting by fans). You assume that, at 30Hz, literally all the other mechanics remained identical, except for this select set that (by your rationale) diverge from 60Hz, despite there being no evidence that From missed unintentional mechanical changes on two platforms that could render at no other rates, while the third platform itself can run at 30Hz. The only things that push this argument one way or another are circumstantial, if you can actually see beyond your own self-enforced frame of reference of assuming that the mechanics were only designed for 60Hz and never properly fixed to 30Hz. Not only does this ignore the evidence I gave before (i.e., your dismissive response to the watchdog post), but now you want to talk PS3 and 360 framerates? There's evidence that From spent time and effort retargeting the original console versions to run well at 30Hz with specific tweaks not just at 30Hz, but for each system individually. Digital Foundry found evidence that the Xbox 360 and PS3 ports have very different characteristics: The 360 version has on average about 10 fps over the PS3 version, at the cost of tearing, while the PS3 version is V-Synced but has a frame rate often well below 30Hz and different LoD settings.

Nobody has said that the 30Hz versions cannot have any mechanical anomalies related to framerate, but they will be much less noticeable as the farthest deviations from 30Hz. Compare this with the much greater difference in frame rates available on PC, from 30 to 60Hz. The farthest variations in any direction on PS3 are close to 10fps, whereas they can be as high as 30fps on PC. You still have to assume that From did literally no testing of the relevant gameplay mechanics at 30Hz, including on PC when running at 30Hz, despite the fact that it is the only way to run on two of those systems. You say this despite only one thing obviously needing to change to get the PC to 60hz, from From's original point of view - a relatively simple change increasing the framerate cap to 60Hz. The PC version is brimming with other possible differences by way of exposing functionality that wasn't available on the other platforms. Your argument is that the platform that is most customizable should be the reference...rather than the systems which are locked down and have gone through their entire external QA process and quite probably the majority of the initial development at 30Hz, after failed rendering tests at 60Hz. On top of that, now that these differences have been exposed, you prefer to believe that Namco's and From's statements are wrong when they define the behavior as an issue.

They definitely flubbed at one framerate - but it is likely the 60Hz rate, which affects only a portion of 1/3 of the launch platforms, a system which you agree was never From's strong point before and with the complete debacles of Ninja Blade and Dark Souls 1 not far behind, and you believe they did not carefully target consoles despite their successful launches of literally 13 PS3 or 360 games before DSII.

Your arguments about logic are still garbage - you have tried to claim that I didn't bring up any evidence to ground my earlier points, when I gave quite a bit in various areas. Meanwhile, your own arguments about "the way the engine works" are totally dependent on not budging from your frame of reference or the unspoken assumption From just didn't pay attention to the console ports. Without a smoking gun of footage or a dev quote, it is unfortunately all going to be circumstantial, but nevertheless I'm quite convinced that this is far from a coin toss and that one answer is much more clearly supported than another.

[Blinge]

Staying under 25% (which is a necessity if you don't want to be driven insane by how long it takes to walk around the world) involves putting a billion points into endurance even with light armor. My DkS 1 character had endurance maxed and still had to wear Havel's ring despite only wearing the crimson robes for armor, just because my damage stat was strength and all of those weapons already put you over 25% without just going "herp de derp, everything in endurance!"

Endurance maxed? This statement doesn't add up at all. how many points were actually in your endurance because I refuse to believe it was MAXED.

You didn't answer me properly. So you were at 99 Endurance?

Also if you insist on hefting the biggest weapons yeah, then wear havel's ring.. or favour&protection. *shrug*

[Obscura]

@ Obscura: Likewise, I see you're quite enamored of the subject Every time I go away from this thread for a while I think "oh, here's a nice way to come to an amicable challenge and agreement," and then come back, and THIS.

The best suggestion I can give is this: If you want to do something concrete to bolster your case, find some documentary evidence that the mechanics changed in development from that called anomalous and being fixed at 60Hz. I would take your view more seriously if it could be shown that movement speed and durability were as they are now. As it is, you're just assuming that 60Hz behavior was never touched, despite the obvious decision to switch to a new baseline of 30Hz for the original console versions. "Visual effects" at 60Hz could mean a number of things, and this tells us nothing about whether durability (for example) declined at the same real rate.

The (soon to be former) special 60Hz mechanics only appear in one set of circumstances: Frame rates diverging from 30Hz. They only appear in this one set of circumstances. Nobody has said the console ports are the "ideal" version of the game or had any illusions that these were anything but a compromise - but all design is compromise. What's actually being said is that From most likely retargeted the games to run at 30Hz (anywhere from 22-36 FPS, depending on the system), probably at a quite early date as the result of rendering tests, to accommodate systems that could not run as intended while maintaining 60fps, at a time when From had no assurance that there would ever be a 60Hz version of the game outside perhaps the PC version (as with the port of the original DkS, that was not without a substantial amount of arm twisting by fans). You assume that, at 30Hz, literally all the other mechanics remained identical, except for this select set that (by your rationale) diverge from 60Hz, despite there being no evidence that From missed unintentional mechanical changes on two platforms that could render at no other rates, while the third platform itself can run at 30Hz. The only things that push this argument one way or another are circumstantial, if you can actually see beyond your own self-enforced frame of reference of assuming that the mechanics were only designed for 60Hz and never properly fixed to 30Hz. Not only does this ignore the evidence I gave before (i.e., your dismissive response to the watchdog post), but now you want to talk PS3 and 360 framerates? There's evidence that From spent time and effort retargeting the original console versions to run well at 30Hz with specific tweaks not just at 30Hz, but for each system individually. Digital Foundry found evidence that the Xbox 360 and PS3 ports have very different characteristics: The 360 version has on average about 10 fps over the PS3 version, at the cost of tearing, while the PS3 version is V-Synced but has a frame rate often well below 30Hz and different LoD settings.

Nobody has said that the 30Hz versions cannot have any mechanical anomalies related to framerate, but they will be much less noticeable as the farthest deviations from 30Hz. Compare this with the much greater difference in frame rates available on PC, from 30 to 60Hz. The farthest variations in any direction on PS3 are close to 10fps, whereas they can be as high as 30fps on PC. You still have to assume that From did literally no testing of the relevant gameplay mechanics at 30Hz, including on PC when running at 30Hz, despite the fact that it is the only way to run on two of those systems. You say this despite only one thing obviously needing to change to get the PC to 60hz, from From's original point of view - a relatively simple change increasing the framerate cap to 60Hz. The PC version is brimming with other possible differences by way of exposing functionality that wasn't available on the other platforms. Your argument is that the platform that is most customizable should be the reference...rather than the systems which are locked down and have gone through their entire external QA process and quite probably the majority of the initial development at 30Hz, after failed rendering tests at 60Hz. On top of that, now that these differences have been exposed, you prefer to believe that Namco's and From's statements are wrong when they define the behavior as an issue.

They definitely flubbed at one framerate - but it is likely the 60Hz rate, which affects only a portion of 1/3 of the launch platforms, a system which you agree was never From's strong point before and with the complete debacles of Ninja Blade and Dark Souls 1 not far behind, and you believe they did not carefully target consoles despite their successful launches of literally 13 PS3 or 360 games before DSII.

Your arguments about logic are still garbage - you have tried to claim that I didn't bring up any evidence to ground my earlier points, when I gave quite a bit in various areas. Meanwhile, your own arguments about "the way the engine works" are totally dependent on not budging from your frame of reference or the unspoken assumption From just didn't pay attention to the console ports. Without a smoking gun of footage or a dev quote, it is unfortunately all going to be circumstantial, but nevertheless I'm quite convinced that this is far from a coin toss and that one answer is much more clearly supported than another.

Your entire argument here is reliant on the incorrect idea that absolute FPS count is what matters in terms of difference in engine behavior.

It's actually proportion.

Which means that a small disturbance at 30Hz has a bigger effect than that same disturbance at 60Hz.

Oh, and as for "dev quote", From did specifically say that the PC was the lead platform. Your entire argument otherwise is "but but consoles are always better by the way we should consider the definitive versions of Doom, Unreal Tournament, and Quake 3 to be the console versions rather than the PC versions because the PC versions can be customized because PC!" Never mind the fact that only one of these platforms runs Dark Souls 2 at a stable framerate, and that we've already established that the game mechanics change with framerate changes. You are literally claiming that it's intentional that the game behave differently when different amounts of shiny stuff on the screen, just because "well, it's on console, so it HAD to be intentional, because consoles are the best because they're all the same!"

(And why the hell am I even responding? I know you won't actually learn anything from this post. You'll just post your same nonsense dragged out over a million paragraphs when you're making a one-sentence argument.)

[trap15]

That reading comprehension though.

[Obscura]

Oh, I'll readily admit I only skimmed it and replied to a few key sentence of what he wrote.

I'm not reading a million more paragraphs of him trying to play silly semantic games to cover the fact that he has very little to say.

[trap15]

The previous post was full of filler sure, but this latest one is pretty much all substance.

[Obscura]

Because I hate myself, I actually tried reading a full paragraph of Oscuro's stuff.

The best suggestion I can give is this: If you want to do something concrete to bolster your case, find some documentary evidence that the mechanics changed in development from that called anomalous and being fixed at 60Hz. I would take your view more seriously if it could be shown that movement speed and durability were as they are now. As it is, you're just assuming that 60Hz behavior was never touched, despite the obvious decision to switch to a new baseline of 30Hz for the original console versions. "Visual effects" at 60Hz could mean a number of things, and this tells us nothing about whether durability (for example) declined at the same real rate.

Guess what -- I can provide evidence that the movement speed was always faster than in DkS 1!

http://www.ign.com/videos/2013/04/10/da ... inute-demo 1:44 in this vid. Walk speed is slow here, but the movement speed in combat is quite a bit faster than in DkS 1.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pspaOayk_ZY Later trailer -- sped up even further. 27 seconds has standard "walk" footage, and it's at 60Hz walk speed.

http://www.polygon.com/2013/6/11/441798 ... e3-preview From a 2013 E3 preview build: "The control of characters felt noticeably different, speedier perhaps, and without the weight of characters in Dark Souls."


So yes, there's plenty of evidence that the 60Hz speed is how the game was supposed to play.

[MJR]

I got unused copy of Dark Souls 2 limited edition (PS3) for sale.

After reading this thread, I decided that I don't want to play it. Who wants to buy it?

[CMoon]

Maybe this is a fast way to respond:

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.ph ... 5#p1040635

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.ph ... 0#p1040840

It is actually pretty interesting reading the last few pages of this thread. My arguments in that thread was that Dark Souls 2 had some questionable design choices. The goal from obscura (as stated in his opening post) is to show that Dark Souls sucks. I don't really think any of the entries suck, but I am perplexed by the choices made with DS2.

A few things I want to emphasize from the links:

I think DS2 is slower / clunkier. I haven't done frame analysis or anything. Obscura states the opposite.

I think the lock-on system in DS2 is inferior because of the removed dynamic lighting. Its worth noting that even bloodborne won't let you lock on to enemies that it wants to hide from you, even if you can clearly see them.

I still don't see a good counter-argument to my thoughts on the stats.

I absolutely do not understand the claim of world design being better in DS2. Very few shortcuts to discover, linearity undermines the idea of creating routes in future playthroughs. With DS you can access a very large part of the world before fighting the first boss. Aesthetically I like it more too, but that doesn't really mean much.

[ryu]

I think the lock-on system in DS2 is inferior because of the removed dynamic lighting. Its worth noting that even bloodborne won't let you lock on to enemies that it wants to hide from you, even if you can clearly see them.

But that was the same in Dark Souls II? It's just that there were very few areas where it was "dark" and spacey enough to allow for it to occur.

[CMoon]

I think the lock-on system in DS2 is inferior because of the removed dynamic lighting. Its worth noting that even bloodborne won't let you lock on to enemies that it wants to hide from you, even if you can clearly see them.

But that was the same in Dark Souls II? It's just that there were very few areas where it was "dark" and spacey enough to allow for it to occur.

I think you mean DS1? It seems really clear that the game was meant to look very different and the lock-on was affected by lighting. No, this doesn't seem to be true in DS1 which just seems to function off actual distance (note tomb of giants for instance which is darker than any area in DS2.) This might have been a neat concept if they had kept the lightning intact, but I remember it being enormously frustrating when using a spellcaster or archer. I ended up using manual aim a lot, and fortunately that trick still works.

[Obscura]

Maybe this is a fast way to respond:

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.ph ... 5#p1040635

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.ph ... 0#p1040840

It is actually pretty interesting reading the last few pages of this thread. My arguments in that thread was that Dark Souls 2 had some questionable design choices. The goal from obscura (as stated in his opening post) is to show that Dark Souls sucks. I don't really think any of the entries suck, but I am perplexed by the choices made with DS2.

A few things I want to emphasize from the links:

I think DS2 is slower / clunkier. I haven't done frame analysis or anything. Obscura states the opposite.

I think the lock-on system in DS2 is inferior because of the removed dynamic lighting. Its worth noting that even bloodborne won't let you lock on to enemies that it wants to hide from you, even if you can clearly see them.

I still don't see a good counter-argument to my thoughts on the stats.

I absolutely do not understand the claim of world design being better in DS2. Very few shortcuts to discover, linearity undermines the idea of creating routes in future playthroughs. With DS you can access a very large part of the world before fighting the first boss. Aesthetically I like it more too, but that doesn't really mean much.

Out of curiosity, what platform did you play DkS 2 on? I've seen the debate on whether DkS 2 is faster or slower than 1 before, and usually it's people who played on PS3 who found it overly slow, with people who played on PC typically finding it faster. As mentioned earlier in this thread, there are platform to platform differences in the game other than the visuals, thanks to From's somewhat lazy coding.

Agreed that there's a couple of areas where the lock-on range is shorter than it looks like it should be. I have no problem with "shorter lock-on range in dark areas" as a mechanic, but it does stick out when it happens in a somewhat brighter area, which does happen a few times. It's a lot more minor for me, since I'm playing primarily melee.

On the stats, it results in more character variety that not every character just has to pump Endurance because it's the stat that does everything. ADP doesn't have to be pumped -- there's plenty of people who have beaten the game with the default 85 AGL. You only have to get it to 88 to have as many iFrames as the DkS 1 fatroll, and you have a faster recovery on top of that (that's four character points in ADP, which is nothing in a game where you end at SL 150 or so). You don't "need" to raise vitality either; it's an optional thing. Fatrolling isn't a death sentence or anything (I've had it happen to me accidentally when Third Dragoncrest Ring broke), and the reduced stamina regen penalty isn't that bad, especially if you wear Chloranthy Ring. Or you can just go Royal Soldier Ring + Dragoncrest Ring and wear fairly heavy armor (I'm going full Vengarl) while staying at about 55% without too heavy of an investment in Vit; four ring slots means you have a lot of flexibility like that. In reality, splitting up End does the exact opposite of what you claim it does -- it makes more combinations of builds possible, at least in PvE (no comment on PvP, since I know nothing of the PvP metagame, and don't really care about it much).

As for the "world design", remember, I used the term "level design", not "world design". I won't claim that DkS 2 has as much interconnectivity as DkS 1 (it obviously doesn't), and there are, of course, some goofy contradictions in its world geometrically (elevators to Iron Keep and Dragon's Aerie). However, in terms of pure "how interesting of a challenge is this area to get past" -- how good is the "obstacle course" I'm running through, if you will -- DkS 2 blows 1 out of the water. Clever archer usage (and most of them actually respawn in this game, so you don't just negate the area by doing it once), more neat environmental tricks like terrain types that slow movement down, generally more hazards than "walk through big rooms that have enemies" like DkS 1 generally was (really pretty much all of it other than Sen's, a brief part of Anor Londo, and the awful Crystal Caverns). I mean, does DkS 1 have any area as constantly pressuring as Shrine of Amana, with its hail of long-range caster sniper-fire with reduced player movement? Everything even remotely like this that wasn't a non-respawning one-off was kept to Sen's Fortress -- just one location out of the game, whereas DkS 2 has tons of areas where environment + long range + short range are all combined to create some really heavy pressure on the player (the Alonne Knight captains all over Iron Keep are another example, or the respawning statues in The Gutter and Black Gulch, or the mage area in Tseldora). Also, DkS 2 doesn't have any shitty Izalith/Crystal Caverns/Tomb of Giants areas (the closest are probably Tomb of Saints and Pharos Doors, but those are more "short throwaways" than truly bad). Oh, and it doesn't make you circle-strafe a bunch of non-threatening black knights every time you want to retry the last boss (although that long jog through nothing is still obnoxious, I'll give you that).

[ryu]

I think the lock-on system in DS2 is inferior because of the removed dynamic lighting. Its worth noting that even bloodborne won't let you lock on to enemies that it wants to hide from you, even if you can clearly see them.

But that was the same in Dark Souls II? It's just that there were very few areas where it was "dark" and spacey enough to allow for it to occur.

I think you mean DS1? It seems really clear that the game was meant to look very different and the lock-on was affected by lighting. No, this doesn't seem to be true in DS1 which just seems to function off actual distance (note tomb of giants for instance which is darker than any area in DS2.) This might have been a neat concept if they had kept the lightning intact, but I remember it being enormously frustrating when using a spellcaster or archer. I ended up using manual aim a lot, and fortunately that trick still works.

Oh, I just misunderstood you. I thought you meant to say Souls II wouldn't have the lock-on restriction in dark areas.

Of course areas in Souls II aren't really dark, which is the problem...

[Bananamatic]

Oh, and it doesn't make you circle-strafe a bunch of non-threatening black knights every time you want to retry the last boss (although that long jog through nothing is still obnoxious, I'll give you that).

just run past them dude

[Volteccer_Jack]

The reason Dark Souls 2 is slower is because stamina is ridiculously limited, and since every fucking thing uses stamina, everything takes longer. Having to retreat and reengage every fight every few seconds is really stupid. Even MGS3 didn't make Imposing Imperator run out of breath halfway up the ladder.

On the stats, it results in more character variety that not every character just has to pump Endurance because it's the stat that does everything.

It's pretty silly to make this claim in the same breath as the claim that Adaptability is unnecessary. I just killed Gwyn last night with 14 END. I don't care much about the endgame build possibilities, except to complain that locking a significant portion of game content until after the player has beaten the game is terrible. What gets me is that A) you spend several hours at the beginning of the game just patching up holes that are built in to your character, and B) only 2 of the classes are worth choosing. If someone could explain to me why the Warrior starts with a weaker weapon than any other class, I would be eternally grateful.

Also raising Vigor in order to enter the Gutter is amazingly dumb, but that's neither here nor there.

Shrine of Amana

"Literally the only area in Dark Souls 2 that isn't crap" is a bit of a specious comparison.

I also don't know why you keep praising Sen's. The enemies are boring as they come, mostly existing to filter out weak player characters with their high defense, and the level is empty of tension or pressure except for the fun little gimmick traps. Duke's Archives, the upper portion of Blighttown, Painted World, Tomb of Giants, etc. are all much better areas.

The respawning statues in Black Gulch do nothing but annoy. At best, they're an Estus Tax, but they even fail at that because there's a bonfire right next to the boss. Black Gulch is the epitome of awful design. Similarly the Tseldora mage's projectiles are so slow as to be harmless, the only thing they accomplish is hitting you in the back when you have to stand still for twenty minutes to open doors.

Oh, and it doesn't make you circle-strafe a bunch of non-threatening black knights every time you want to retry the last boss

You can just run past them. In fact you can do this for most every boss, except Seath, but Seath is a pushover so only people trying to get MLG notice. Dark Souls 2 on the other hand is filled with enemies that exist for no reason other than blocking your path when you run to the boss. Check out that run to Duke's Dear Freja after you get hit by a random gotcha instakill ("luckily" torches make that entire area a braindead joke in Scholar).

[Obscura]

Re: "spending the start of the game pacthing holes in your character".... what? I started the game with the Swordsman class (which I later learned was one of the "crap" ones), and didn't spend the early game trying to grind for levels or anything (in fact you can't, because if you try, the areas empty); I just played normally, and it was fine. "Oh noes, I can't create a god character at soul level 1 like I could in DkS 1 because that game's gear curve was stupid and broken"... I don't see this as a problem.

What is the "significant portion of game content" that's locked until after the player has beaten the game?

You don't have to raise Vigor to enter The Gutter. Fall Control on a character that's naked other than the catalyst will get you there with zero damage. Or you can have the guy in Earthen Peak build the ladder for you (one of the NPCs even suggests this) -- the longest ladder also gets you there with zero damage. EDIT: I just realized you probably meant the second set of falls after RRV, which I had completely forgotten about. Silvercat Ring or Fall Control both get you down there with zero damage.

If you think that Shrine of Amana is the only good area in DkS 2, you're insane. If you think it's even the best area in DkS 2, you're insane. It's good, and it's the most obvious one to prove my point, but I can point to tons of equally interesting areas (basically everything except the two kinda crap Rat Covenant areas [although Tomb of Saints has an incredibly fun boss] and the "newbie areas" of Things Betwixt, Forest of Fallen Giants, and Heide's Tower of Flame). Meanwhile, Duke's Archive starts pretty cool but the "imprisoned" area is incredibly dull, and Tomb of Giants is entirely awful (even my friends who loved DkS 1 agreed that ToG was terrible). Sen's is the best area in the game because it actually turns the environment on the player and gives them something to actually do other than "hold LB and strafe to the left -> backstab for victory!".

Dark Souls 2 having enemies that are actually threatening (as opposed to being an exercise in "hold LB while strafing" or "attack it while it runs away because otherwise it turns on you when you try to just run past") on the path to bosses is an improvement (and the lack of this in the Sunken King DLC once you open the shortcuts was a glaring flaw). DkS 1's "herp de derp, 5-10 minutes of doing absolutely nothing between attempts at the boss!" rhythm was utterly grating. Punishing the player with being bored but not losing any actual progress after killing a boss is retarded. Putting some actual opposition in between turns it from an annoyance to an actual challenge, since it forces you to play at least "not awfully" for longer, like the difference between 1ccing an arcade game and savestating your way through it. The path to Veldstadt in DkS 2 or, in fact, the exact one you mention as being bad, the path back to Freja, are perfect examples of the "right" way to do this. Or, if you want a DkS 1 example, the path to Taurus Demon (the early parts of the Burg are probably the best designed area in DkS 1 that isn't Sen's Fortress).

[Bananamatic]

why do you keep bringing up the circle strafe backstab

it's by far the most tedious way to kill stuff and you shouldn't be relying on it

honestly the only stuff you should really be backstabbing is easy to parry (which also does more damage than backstabs) maybe except the parish black knight, who i just backstab once and then drop off the tower, he falls after you and dies on impact

[Obscura]

It's a boring as fuck and annoying strategy, but it's also the single most effective way to fight about 90% of the game's common enemies.

And even if you're not circle-strafe backstabbing, the emphasis on blocking in general fucking sucks. "Hold LB for defense" is awful in any action game. Dark Souls 2 did a very good thing by making shields weaker; honestly, that, and the fact that so many fewer enemies use shields, are the biggest two reasons I like 2 so much more than 1. Shields fucking suck in action games. I don't care that it's realistic that they were good; it's still bad for fun.

[Squire Grooktook]

My guard tends to get broken or I get stamina screwed if I block for more than a few seconds in ds1.

Never found back stabbing that useful against normal enemies either, due to the above + you'll get just as many no less risky options to attack them normally anyway.

[Volteccer_Jack]

Re: "spending the start of the game pacthing holes in your character".... what? I started the game with the Swordsman class (which I later learned was one of the "crap" ones)

Swordsman is one of the good ones, having the best starting weapon and by far the best stat distribution. The other is Cleric. Try playing a Sorcerer sometime. You have to spend your first 10 levels raising Str/Dex just to be able to equip even mediocre weapons, or else play the first half of the game with nothing but Soul Arrow (and Soul Arrow+1 and Soul Arrow+2, for "variety"). You have to raise Str 2 points just to two-hand a Cestus. You can effectively be better than Sorcerer at everything by picking Swordsman, grabbing the staff+Soul Arrow from FoFG, and then raising ATN/INT, which still leaves your other stats equal to or better than the Sorcerer, except the Sorcerer doesn't get two free weapon upgrades. Swordsman is also better than Hunter and Knight at everything, and Cleric is better than Warrior, Knight, and Sorcerer at everything.

What is the "significant portion of game content" that's locked until after the player has beaten the game?

Titanite Chunks for a start . Also like 25% of the rings, a bunch of other gear, the fun version of Lost Sinner (which is the only good boss in the entire game), covenant rewards are technically acquirable if you enjoy grinding for a hundred hours

Tomb of Saints has an incredibly fun boss

It's LITERALLY a popcorn enemy with a healthbar.

The path to Veldstadt in DkS 2

That's one of the ones you can just run past. Thank god, Syan knights are the dictionary definition of circlestrafebackstab

Dark Souls 2 did a very good thing by making shields weaker

It didn't though. If anything, the nerfing of rolls at low equip load and buffing of rolls/movement at high equip load made Shields better. Greatshield+thrust weapon still makes the entire PvE experience a laugh, only difference is now you use a Rapier+10 instead of Lightning Spear+5. Most shields are weaker, yes, but since some aren't weaker (Eagle Shield at first vendor lawl), all that changed is that shield choice became less interesting. My first run through I got so sick of looking at Drangleic Shield that I deliberately gimped myself by taking it off.

[Obscura]

Swordsman is one of the good ones, having the best starting weapon and by far the best stat distribution. The other is Cleric. Try playing a Sorcerer sometime. You have to spend your first 10 levels raising Str/Dex just to be able to equip even mediocre weapons, or else play the first half of the game with nothing but Soul Arrow (and Soul Arrow+1 and Soul Arrow+2, for "variety"). You have to raise Str 2 points just to two-hand a Cestus. You can effectively be better than Sorcerer at everything by picking Swordsman, grabbing the staff+Soul Arrow from FoFG, and then raising ATN/INT, which still leaves your other stats equal to or better than the Sorcerer, except the Sorcerer doesn't get two free weapon upgrades. Swordsman is also better than Hunter and Knight at everything, and Cleric is better than Warrior, Knight, and Sorcerer at everything.

You're the first person I've ever seen who has said that; everything else I've ever read has said that Cleric and Knight are the two good ones.

Titanite Chunks for a start . Also like 25% of the rings, a bunch of other gear, the fun version of Lost Sinner (which is the only good boss in the entire game), covenant rewards are technically acquirable if you enjoy grinding for a hundred hours

Gear isn't content. And why would it be bad for New Game + in an action adventure game to have new items to give you incentive to explore the nooks and crannies of the world again? (Hint: it wouldn't be bad)

It's LITERALLY a popcorn enemy with a healthbar.

Actually, it's a shit-ton of popcorn enemies, one of which has a healthbar and only spawns after you've killed a bunch of them already. That kind of crowd management is fairly unique in the Dark Souls games, and is really damn fun.

That's one of the ones you can just run past. Thank god, Syan knights are the dictionary definition of circlestrafebackstab

When I tried it, the Syan knights with Halberds raped the shit out of me as I was trying to go through the fog gate, since the fog gate animation isn't invincible in DkS 2.

It didn't though. If anything, the nerfing of rolls at low equip load and buffing of rolls/movement at high equip load made Shields better. Greatshield+thrust weapon still makes the entire PvE experience a laugh, only difference is now you use a Rapier+10 instead of Lightning Spear+5. Most shields are weaker, yes, but since some aren't weaker (Eagle Shield at first vendor lawl), all that changed is that shield choice became less interesting. My first run through I got so sick of looking at Drangleic Shield that I deliberately gimped myself by taking it off.

Except 100% damage resist shields require a much heavier STR investment and weigh more, and stamina drops much harder when you block something. There's no Spider Shield/Silver Knight Shield equivalent in this game, and the closest thing requires killing Throne Watcher + Defender (so, in other words, it's ultra-late game only).