Dark Souls III Review Thread
- Thread starter HoJu
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Orthogonal
Member
What if I told you it was a really gnarly tree branch.
DealWithIt
Member
Maybe. Take a chill pill? Maybe? You're coming off a bit intensely.
OT: Looks like it's performing well. Congratulations to FROM. For me Dark Souls was exactly what I wanted in a video game. It scratched all my itches in terms of narrative tone, gameplay, setting, challenge and even multiplayer (ignoring the issues with connectivity). I am looking forward to DS3.
I have a horrible feeling this will be Dark Souls 2 all over again, hyped as the second coming of Jesus for a month before being trashed as a mediocre effort..
I have a friend who got an early copy of the game. He said theres one transitional moment from area to area that is as baffling as Earthen Peak to Iron Keep.
It doesn't really matter though, does it? I mean the people who love DS2 aren't suddenly wrong
What? The vast majority of reviews are positive and even those that are a bit mixed are still high (Like 7/10). I'm not seeing what you're seeing.
I don't think I've seen a single positive post from you in any of the DS3 prerelease threads.
GwyndolinCinder
Member
Err there is no such thing, i can guess where he's referring too, but explaining requires major spoilers
JudgmentJay
Member
Having played through the game twice I'm blanking on what he could be referring to.
Ah, I understand. All I can say is that your friend is wrong.
I think I need to get out of this thread. Concern posts were annoying enough with previous Souls games when I was waiting with everyone else. Now that I've played the game ahead of most of the English-speaking world and know how good it is it's twice as bad.
StriKeVillain
Banned
I think he's just severely beat down from DS2 and GAF hyping it up when it was a pile of garbage.
Another reason why the release schedule was so messed up. People are kind of being drip fed information about the game structure and such like and thinking about how that will affect their enjoyment rather than just playing the game and getting lost and finding out for themselves. I'm sure I would have been the same if I hadn't played it already, lol
DoubleTake
Member
Seriously...really seems like he's looking for reasons to not enjoy the game. Wait till the damn thing is in your hands to make a better assessment. You can read as many impressions as you want but youll never know how it really stacks up until you play it yourself.
Impression have me excited. Build variety is there(needs a bit of tweaking), the levels are on the whole great. And the world makes sense even if it isnt as non linear in progression as Dark Souls 1.
1 more week to go.
Emedan
Member
Not fully, but someone who critique games should fully understand the systems behind them. All art is subjective too in some sense but there's difference between a Dutch masterpiece and a finger painting from 1St grade.
I would definitely say that someone who thinks DkS2 is a better game than the first one fundamentally does not understand good game design. They might prefer one over the other but there are absolute truths to be found even in game design. And those who prefer the latter over the former does not understand it at all
Granted it's not perfect, but it's one of the games who have come the closest in the past 2 decades.
Your second point though is just factually wrong. Besides level design Dks1 is a better designed game in every way.
One is fantastic and the other one is nothing more than good.
Oh please, tell us stories on the wonderful design of Lost Izalith, a zone that was nerfed time after in in pretty much every single thing that makes it a level, outside of art design. Or the complete 180 with regards to build design that was patched into the game.
You'll really fucking hate Dark Souls 3, given how liberally it takes mechanics and aspect of its game design from Dark Souls 2, more than any other game in the series.
It takes a lot from Dark Souls 1, but that is primarily its lore, and art design with how it relates zones to eachother, not their actual gameplay connection.
F0rneus
Tears in the rain
From needs to fix pure casters T_T.
This might be one of the worst posts yet in this thread. What a mess of bullshit.
MikeE21286
Member
Looks like the Deluxe Edition is on sale on GMG for $69.99.
Very close to pulling the trigger.
http://neo.greenmangaming.com/r/?id=h17a19c94,d364af7,d364e2f
Very close to pulling the trigger.
http://neo.greenmangaming.com/r/?id=h17a19c94,d364af7,d364e2f
could they fix them?
I mean, is this a problem of damage only? or it needs more changes impossible to apply from a patch?
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
People can spout this stuff nonstop, but when asked for concrete examples, it ultimately comes down to highly subjective opinions that are presented as objective fact.
Maybe I've just missed the solid analyses of why Dark Souls II is objectively worse from a design perspective, but I haven't seen anything but a bunch of platitudes about B-teams and based Miyazakis. Will you be the one to finally shed some light on the topic?
As an aside, it's really going to be a hoot to see how all of the people who talked shit about DSII's hub and spoke world design react to the world in Dark Souls III.
If we wanted to follow your bizarre logic of absolute truths, calling DkS2 the better game would actually just mean that the person values the things it does better than its predecessor design-wise more.
DealWithIt
Member
To say nothing of the factual problems of this post, it's layered with epistemological problems as well. I don't love DS2 near as much as Its predecessors and BB, but that's an opinion. Why do you need to start this shitstorm? It's funny that you would believe yourself to be some fount of objective gaming truth as though you were nerd Elijah, reborn in his mother's basement.
LegendofLex
Member
It's been awhile since I saw someone actually correctly define what "quality" means.
tbh, this transition didn't throw me at all (just traveled through those areas yesterday). There are mountains in the background of Earthen Peak and everything!
I will say, though, that DSII does a much worse job of depicting the distance between locations realistically given the size of the map segments that run between them.
Yeah, no. If you
think it's a area-to-area transition that doesn't make any sense, you weren't paying attention to how you got there. Nor were you paying attention to the boss you killed to open that passage.
Cloud Strife
Member
Here you go: http://youtu.be/UScsme8didI
This isn't true, but even if it was I'm glad a game can't be ruined for me because of how Area X connects to Area Y.
WadiumArcadium
Member
GT review was great. Can't wait for next week.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Fucking A, a nearly hour long video and no summary of the points to discuss in this thread?
Thanks for the link, and I'll definitely take a look later, but damn...
That's still a subjective opinion, my dude. Do you not know the difference between, "Here's why this isn't fun (a subjective element)," and "The framerate of this game is below 30 oftentimes."
One is fact, one is opinion. You're free to have opinion, but do not tout it as irrefutable fact. Game design by it's very nature is not a science--there is no formula for fun. It's iterative and ruled by mass and individual sensibilities.
Sorry but the gameplay quality of life improvements in ds2 are factually better
to the point it's legitimately a pain to back to ds1.Or are you implying that rolling in 4 directions is superior simply because ds1 did it?
thats not including huge balance improvements in the magic department, removal of resistance which was literally useless and a newby trap.
I could make a huge list of the quality of life changes what make me prefer it over ds1, but I've done it before, and it's been told ad nausea, so let's agree to disagree, and that we have different opinions rather than playing the "factual" game.
Cloud Strife
Member
Why does anyone have to cater to you? The guy beings up literally everything that has been discussed in this thread regarding irks with the game, objective and non.
If you don't want to watch it, that's fine. But don't go around claiming people have no idea what they're talking about when they critique the game when videos like this exist.
Poimandres
Member
Is this a joke of some sort? Meta crit of 90 is pretty damn great!
Regardless of how good the game is compared to previous entries, I was expecting lower scores based on franchise fatigue.
He also said that he thinks people are going to call it "linear" while he didn't think it really is linear, but it felt like there's a certain thrust to it that the other games didn't have.
Pretty sure it was a reference to the QB review thread.
Emedan
Member
See this is where your arguments fail. Dark Souls contained less well developed parts that one might have wished for to be better designed, I don't argue this at all. I agree that DkS1 late game don't at all feel as well designed at its extremely strong first 60-70%. But you people seem to completely misunderstand or overlook the achievement that is the core design choices that was made for Dark Souls 1. The core elements are excellently designed in every way and compared to most modern games is so far a head I find it hard to think of ANY other game that have succeeded as well in recent memory.
You CAN'T compare it to the perfect game, you HAVE to compare it to contemporary games. And if you truthfully do so you COULDN'T argue against how well designed it is.
I find it hard to put into words cause I'm not expressive enough in English since it's not my first language but let me say that it feels that all design choices in DkS1 was taken to serve the overall experience and world of the game.
Enemies are designed to work well with the combat system, level design as well. Progression is too. Gameplay is formed around not just he player but also to serve the story and the world. The difficulty was never an end in itself but to convey that the world you're in is a hard and unforgiving place as it would've been had this place existed. The story does not take into consideration that you're in a game and just because you are the player you should automatically know everything (Since this is not logical in the game's world). The storytelling is through the design of the world. In sense of difficulty and art.
I find it hard to fault Dark Souls 1 for obviously having to be rushed in end development due to realities above the game designer. Had it been given enough time to be developed as well as its creator wanted to the end game wouldn't had been flawed as it is and more like how it started out..
All that aside, all aspects of the game design serves to tell a compelling story.
This much care and thought is something we almost never see in modern games, and the same can be said about Dark Souls 2. Its designers simply does not understand why Dark Souls 1 was such an amazing game, and neither do you.
I am sure you're well aware of Matthewmatosis Dark Souls 2 critique, he is a native speaker and put some of the flaws in comparison to DkS1 into a better light than I might be able to, I recommend you watch it again if you haven't in a while.
And your might be the most useless one.
All i have to say to this is that there's certainly some objective truths to be had of some things, that's not down to opinion like: Enemy design in conjuncture with combat system. Is it fair to the player?
What facts? And I don't.
Sorry but the gameplay quality of life improvements in ds2 are factually better
Or are you implying that rolling in 4 directions is superior simply because ds1 did it?
thats not including huge balance improvements in the magic department, removal of resistance which was literally useless and a newby trap.
I could make a huge list of the quality of life changes what make me prefer it over ds1, but I've done it before, and it's been told ad nausea, so let's agree to disagree, and that we have different opinions rather than playing the "factual" game.
I agree, DkS2 made lots of "Quality of Life improvements", I don't believe this means it makes it a better game, such improvements are to be expected in a sequel, what is not to be is how other fundamental design elements wasn't improved but instead regressed.
Poimandres
Member
Dang, I've been on holidays for two weeks so I'm out of the loop!
Got to love the "excuse ds1 it had trouble in development" but completely ignores that it's got nothing on the crap that happened in ds2's development
Also that video was for the vanilla release of the game, and while very detailed it does have strong subjective aspects to it.
In its current form ds2 solves a lot of the gameplay problems ds1 had, that doesn't mean you have to like one more than the other.
I place a lot less importance on lore in these games, preferring the combat, and as I stated quality of life improvements in ds2 for me make me dislike going back to ds1's combat, this it's the better game in my book.
The point is that while the quality of life changes are factual, the actual importance one places on them is subjective. You don't place much importance on them so of course to you ds1 is better, that's fine!
But notice how I pointed out you making an excuse for ds1 that also applies to ds2, (more so even) and you ignored it. That's hypocrisy at worst, or blind bias at best. It's something I notice a lot when people from both sides compare the games and it's something that people need to reflect on beforehand to properly understand an argument.
DealWithIt
Member
You literally say something is "objective truth" in one breath and then say you're not using "facts" in the next.
That's what I'm critiquing. It's very un-self-aware
The idea that there are "absolute truths" in game design is the kind of shit idea that made Demon's Souls (and subsequent Souls games) an oasis in a pile a dumbed down garbage in the first place.
Emedan
Member
There's huge difference between the problems in DkS1 and DkS2 though. DkS1 has a stable foundation that even with badly paced and lacking end game content is still vaild. DkS2 just lack the base to begin with. Why I give DkS2 such a hard time is because they got it all for free and have no excuse not to be better than DkS1 in those regards.Got to love the "excuse ds1 it had trouble in development" but completely ignores that it's got nothing on the crap that happened in ds2's development
Also that video was for the vanilla release of the game, and while very detailed it does have strong subjective aspects to it.
In its current form ds2 solves a lot of the gameplay problems ds1 had, that doesn't mean you have to like one more than the other.
I place a lot less importance on lore in these games, preferring the combat, and as I stated quality of life improvements in ds2 for me make me dislike going back to ds1's combat, this it's the better game in my book.
The point is that while the quality of life changes are factual, the actual importance one places on them is subjective. You don't place much importance on them so of course to you ds1 is better, that's fine!
But notice how I pointed out you making an excuse for ds1 that also applies to ds2, (more so even) and you ignored it. That's hypocrisy at worst, or blind bias at best. It's something I notice a lot when people from both sides compare the games and it's something that people need to reflect on beforehand to properly understand an argument.
It's also quite telling that DkS2s flaws is strictly in its core design while improvements is made in its technical bit, it really does show that the directors were different.
Well I disagree with you that Combat is better in DkS2, enemies simply aren't designed around the system which makes it inherently worse I think. I also think a game should be looked upon as a complete package. They're more than the specific aspects, it's how these are put together to build a coherent experience. DkS1 is just a better game in that case.
I'm not sure what you're referring too with your last point? Maybe I missed something?!
That's not at all what I said. A wheel that is round is better fit to roll on the ground than one that is square. A slow methodical combat system is better suited for enemies that are designed around that philosophy, DkS2 retained the combat system but changed enemy design and placement which did not play to this systems strengths. Which is objectively correct and not subjective.
Bloodborne had different enemy design and placement from DkS1 cause the combat system allowed this. Miyazaki understood that these two have to correlate, and DkS2 directors did not.
Wrong, here's an example. I create a platforming game, I put a platform at the first screen of the games first level, it's 2 meters tall, then I program the player to only be able to jump 1,7 meters. Great design, cause I think so..
Pretty much, and it's such a cheap argument too, it's literally "no you don't get it doe" or "your too stupid to understand".
It's probably the one thing that geniunly pisses me off when people say it, because it shows a person incapable of actually defending their points and trying to stifle all discussion.
Wish people would just ignore Emedan tbh
Well we have to disagree on the enemies not fitting the design of he combat, though I find that perplexing when in ds1 you can side strafe tones of enemies without rolling to get free backstage instead of at least working for it a bit.
The last point was because it's ridiculous to grant ds1 the whole "rushed" argument when ds2 was literally restarted and its assets repurposed completely from their original design, that's leagues of a bigger setback than being rushed. My point being that acknowledging the first but not the second shows bias and is unfair.
In terms of the whole package once again it depends on what you value more, I value consistency. Ds1 has some of the best bosses, but it has two of the worst bosses in the entire series for example.
Ds2 doesn't reach the same highs as often, but it doesn't come close to the same lows for me. Again the whole package is super subjective based on what you prefer.
* oh cool member!
DealWithIt
Member
Point well taken.
Mechanized
Member
I want to play this already. 
True, at this point it's way too off track from the topic.
Can't wait to try ds3 though! Glad to see its bring well recieved
