Are Dark Souls 2 loyalists just contrarians?

No, it's simply their first Souls game, especially for many PC players

ER > 1 > 2 > 3 > DS

>>712580808 (OP)
I like the lore and the build variety

usually they're just mentally retarded

no
it's DS3 babies that started with peak rollslop that don't know what a good game is
I bet most of them don't like DS1 either but you can't say anything bad about the original

>>712580808 (OP)
DeS (Chadriginal) > DaS2 Kino of the First Sin > Bloodborne = Sekiro > DaS1 > DaS3 > Elden Ring > Nightreign > Duskbloods > DeS (Crapmake)

>>712582128
The only people more obnoxious than ds2 fans are des fans.

>>712582094
this
ds2 caught flak at the beginning for being admitedly very different from ds1 with its own pros and cons, its less so "ds1 2" and more like "a different take on dark souls"
and then the meme of ds2 being unforgivably bad is forever perpetuated by ds3 babies that mostly never even played ds2 in the first place

>>712581168
>>712582128
here's the /v/ poll on most hated. hope this clears it up

>>712580808 (OP)
People like DS2 because it's a fun video game.

>>712582678
how many of those started with DS3?

>>712583352
I just asked them, and all the ones who agreed with you did, and the ones who agree with me did not.

>>712580808 (OP)
On the contrary. I don't care what other people think about a game I like, just like I wouldn't expect you to care about what games I consider good or bad.

>>712583352
Probably 140

>>712582094
Truke. I imagine most DS2 haters fall into that category or people who are still mad about the graphical downgrade.
I'm mad too, but that's consoles' fault.
I hate how 3 abandoned both the open-ended world design and methodical gameplay in favor of roll roll roll into flashy shounen move

I like the vibe of Dark Souls 2, but everything about the movement and combat is so dogshit.

>>712581168
Worst taste I have ever seem

elden slop is easily the worst non-mecha fromsoft game. You could delete 60% of the map and nothing would change. The open world part is made just to make you lose time. Dungeons become shitty and boring after you complete five or six of them. There's no weight on your leveling choices. Builds are flexible as fuck and you can respec very easily so retards don't drop the game because their shitty elon build is disfunctional. Consumables are useless. Rune arcs are useless. Quests are linear af and you hardly lose track of npcs movements and/or there aren't decisive points of interests in their questlines. Sites of Grace point where to go. Small enemies you find around don't drop anything important or not even that many runes for that matter with the exception of two or three mobs. You can become overpowered from the very start by obtaining powerful equipment by pure chance (e.g the trapped chest you find below the first lake that takes you to caelid). Lore is sparse in the base game and the 40 dollars dlc somewhat completes it but it still remains sparse compared to dark souls or even bloodborne.
Despite everything people still put dark souls II below this garbage. Sure it was poorly polished and some gameplay choices were way too severe towards the player (like halving your health with deaths) but at least it had cool mechanics, quests were fun and builds were ingenious.

I can't even imagine the mindset behind making threads for a game you dislike every day for years.

>>712580890
fpbp

>>712582516
>the meme of ds2 being unforgivably bad is forever perpetuated by ds3 babies that mostly never even played ds2 in the first place

At this point it's obvious ds3babs don't play either ds1 or ds2. Zoomers will watch video essays on DS1 and BB so they'll constantly rank them high for good boy points. Meanwhile they will call DS2 clunky and unfair with bad bosses when it unilaterally improves on the controls, mechanics, and boss design of DS1. Once you notice these patterns of critique it's impossible to ignore how much of the fanbase are post-DS3 secondaries.

>>712583648
>still mad about the graphical downgrade
I'm still made we didn't get actual pitch dark lighting mechanics

>>712580808 (OP)
It's a good game

>>712584337
i wouldnt say unilaterally but i have no fucking idea why people call ds2 a clunky game, its very smooth specially compared to its predecessor
i genuinely believe all these sorts of gamefeel complaints entirely boil down to people being mad at
>having to actually dodge out of the way of attacks instead just phasing through them
>having to actually deal with enemies and some ganks here and there

>>712584941
>but i have no fucking idea why people call ds2 a clunky game, its very smooth
Yeah sure

>>712584941
>its very smooth specially compared to its predecessor

>>712585512
how does a video showing someone walking around an easier tutorial boss convey that ds2 is clunky to play

>>712584941
>its very smooth specially compared to its predecessor
Like when NPC AI is utterly confused by the focus system or misses because it assumes the animation can behave as in Dark Souls 1

>>712580808 (OP)
Notice how they can't talk about their game without shitting on more popular games. Textbook contrarianism baka

Dark Souls was very good and had good DLC and a good community
Dark Souls 2 continued this but suffered a bit from really gay patches constantly buffing dexterity weapons but also had really good DLC and the community loved it
I never played Dark Souls 3 so I cannot pass judgement on it
I dropped elden ring after 2 hours but a friend bought it for me so I never even bought it. I just said the same thing I always do - if I want to play dark souls i'll just play 2. i have it on steam. it's right there. it's not 90+gb. Sure it isn't SOTFS with a more lively community but I do not care.

>>712580808 (OP)
DS2 was a flawed game, but it was probably Fromsoft's most ambitious iteration on the formula, it had a ton of ideas, genuinely tried to shake up the formula and gameplay while keeping both recognizable, brought objective improvements to the formula that somehow still haven't found their way back into it, and yes, it did have a lot of soul. Its execution was middling to shit in a lot of places, and that dragged down the overall experience, but never to the point where it's a bad game in totality. Merely one with its share of flaws, but also its share of merit.
DS2 the way it was meant to be, before getting downgraded, cut up, and hastily reassembled, is very high on my list of nonexistent games I'd love to have seen.

>>712584458
Don't worry anon, you'll get them in the Flames of Old mod! Coming any day now! Aaaaaany day now...

>>712584941
>i wouldnt say unilaterally but i have no fucking idea why people call ds2 a clunky game, its very smooth specially compared to its predecessor

It has 8 points movements, dude. That's a fact. That's not a bug. This game, this "smooth game", has 8 point snapping movements. In 3d space. Oh, players will notice VERY FAST that there is something wrong with the movement, though most will not be able to say what, beside it's very clunky.

Because 8 points snapping movements. Which no other Fromsoft game had since arguably King's Field.

Why does Dark Souls 2 have 8 points snapping movement with tight platforming that will kill you due to 8 points snapping movement? What wasn't it patched half a dozen years ago when it fucked every player in the ass at a five dozen times in a single playthrough? Why did this game decide to do something so absolutely retarded for no reason and keep doing it for eight years?

Then there is the whole ADP debacle. ADP, secret to everything told in the game, control the number of invincibility frames you get in your roll, but not actually the animation. At low ADP (which if you were trying to genuinelly play the game blind you are), it gives you 1/3 of the invincibility frames you should get in your roll animation, fucking you randomly in pretty much all your rolls.

Though of course some of the hitboxes are so bad you can't tell if you couldn't move right due to the 8 points snapping movement, if you had ADP too low to get a roll that works, or if the hitboxes were so bad you were just hit by an invisible hitbox.

And that's some of the lesser and most obvious issues with DS2.

>>712585706
I literally have no issues with spinning on DS2. I never minded doing spinning motions when PVPing with a controller, and i just booted it up on mouse and keyboard and did it just fine (pic related)
Your video is outright disingenuous because it shows a guy on vanilla exclusively pressing the fully vertical/horizontal directions and nothing in between
Its silly but it does very, very little for hindering your ability of controlling your character in combat, you are bitching about a non issue

>>712586007
>buffing dexterity weapons
does any souls weapon compare to DS2 Estock?
I still have the thump thump thump attack chain sound in my head

>>712584941
>Swords phase through enemies weightlessly
>Animations that are wooden
>Messed up collisions, somehow fucked up Havok implementation too
So smooth

>>712586404
Yes, DS2 warped sword.

>>712586123
Dark Souls 2 was dogshit and even with 3 billion years of development it would remain dogshit because the quality and talent just wasn't there

>>712586374
>with tight platforming that will kill you due to 8 points snapping movement?
almost no platforming will fuck you up because of it
insanely overblown problem all things considered and it also doesnt even affect the input method of 47~% the active playerbase in current day
>fucking you randomly in pretty much all your rolls.
or you could not be retarded and realise the game is playable without iframes just fine, and its often more interesting that way instead of braindead i-framing
yes the game should have better conveyed that, but its not like its predecessor and pretty much the whole series is filled with unexplained shit
> some of the hitboxes are so bad you can't tell if you couldn't move right due to the 8 points snapping movement,
extremely overblown issue, i literally just did my first playthrough with zero points in ADP and i found it wonderful to roll through or around smelter demon, sir alonne, fume knight, old sinner, etc; its far better than ds1/ds3 hitboxes because this one game has been specifically made around being able to dodge enemies without iframes, the only FS game that usually has better hitboxes is sekiro

also based on the insane level of reddit spacing alone i am pretty sure i know what kind of ds fan you are

>>712586381
DaS2fags are clinically retarded, the point of the webm is that you can't walk in a circle in 2. Your toon can only move in 8 directions and you never noticed because 2 was your first souls game and you thought it was normal

>>712586381

>>712586768
>well yeah you can jump more smoothly, run more smoothly, far more effectively sidestep enemies without iframes, do fancier motions in pvp, have more fleshed out movesets...
>But you look slightly ugly when walking in a circle!!! Outrageous!!!!
1 was my first souls game and i appreciated how much better much of it is in terms of movement and pressing buttons. 3 was your first souls game and youre parroting shit off the web that you heard of it

>>712583652
This. At times it has more soul than ds3, but it just feels like a cheap knock off game most of the time.

>>712585706
You guys still to this day have never provided an argument against the 8 way run style movement system.

Yes.

>>712586881
>and i appreciated how much better much of it is in terms of movement and pressing buttons.
*how much better much of ds2 is

>>712586687
>Dark Souls 2 was dogshit
But anon, I thought you liked it? I mean, the image has the same filename and everything...

Iron passage and Cave of the dead exist in ds2. That makes ds2 the worst fromsoft game in existence.

its actually hilarious how all these assblasted DS2 haters will talk like 8 directions while walking around (non issue in 99.999% of circumstances) is an absolute catastrophe, but completely ignore how the first game literally had you stuck with 4 directional rolling if you were locked onto an enemy which is an infinitely bigger atrocity

>>712586930
>tilt the stick where you want to go
>character moves slightly left or right of where you want to go
There's nothing to argue about, it's objectively wrong. Luckily the b-team learned from their mistake and never did it again.

>>712580808 (OP)
>loyalists
it's a fucking video game

>>712587236
>What is Readchan
Retard

>>712580808 (OP)
People who have a strong opinion on the topic are the contrarians since nobody gives a fuck

>>712587458
And why can't you just adapt to the gameplay and immediately go where you want to go instead? Sounds like user error to me.

>>712587517
>phoneposter
lmfao okay anon, that is all I needed to know

>>712587341
Most of the complaints I've seen regarding the 8 directions is that it's really bad for platforming. You don't really lock on to anything when you're platforming, so I could see why people didn't see that as an issue in demon's souls and dark souls 1. And ds2 is a sequel, it's supposed to improve upon the previous games not walk back like that. I personally didn't find the 8 directions that bad since platforming has always been dogshit in fromsoft games though.

>>712580808 (OP)
it's a great game
Majula is still unbeaten to this day

>>712580808 (OP)
100%. Certain aspects of it were better than DS1, though. It's still mostly shit but better than DS3.

>>712583496
>On the contrary. I don't care what other people think about a game I like, just like I wouldn't expect you to care about what games I consider good or bad.
I wish everyone on /v/ was like you (the 6 others that play vidya, I mean)

What build for a Shield Turtle in Dark Souls 2?
What gear to rush for and stats?
I just want to block & poke

>>712587762
Enjoyed it a lot. It still feels like a chore to play sometimes though, more than the other games anyway.

>>712587517
>ds2 haters are phoneposter zoomers that get their opinions off of hour long YouTube essays they watch on their phones alongside Subway Surfers

>>712587517
Kill yourself phone poster

>>712587723
8 way movement helps platforming though, since you can now tell exactly which way you will run and which way you will jump whereas previous games were a crapshoot.

>that ds2 defender on youtube ended up being a tr00n
You can't make this shit up.

>>712587341
>Having trash movement is not that bad actually
>It's a non issue, nevermind Demon's Souls (2009) being smooth as butter

>>712587926
The problem is that the direction you're going doesn't always align with the snap point though. It gives you less freedom when jumping sometimes. Like I said, it didn't really bother me though since platforming always sucked in fromsoft games

>>712587656
>>712587868
>>712587874
Weak retort, try again

It's that old story: your first Souls is actually the fondest one. I have a friend who started Soulsborne with fucking Bloodborne and nothing hit the same for him. He moved to PC eventually and he has the first trilogy on Steam but never played more than 20 hours total and the faggot even sometimes swears they are shitty games. kek

>>712588103
Where's the la creatividad of the Japanese creator?

>>712588164
Bloodborne was also my first soulsborne game. I ended up enjoying every single game in the series, even ds2. You're right though. Bloodborne will always have a special place in my heart.

>>712581168
1=Sekiro>>3=ER>>2
I only own a PC.

>>712588073
I don't know, anon. It's all just personal experience and taste in the end, I guess. I never once had an issue going where I needed in DS2 and I would not call myself good at videogames, let alone good at platforming. In DS1, which I played after DeS, DS2 and DS3, I died a ridiculous amount of times trying to platform.

>>712588103
The hole is the real enemy in that boss fight. Great design.

>>712587957
Every.
Time.

>>712588164
I played 1 -> 3 -> 2 -> Demon's -> Elden Ring, and my preference is in the exact opposite order.

>>712588313
Yeah, I never really had any problems specific to ds2 when it comes to platforming. The one thing I've noticed about ds2 is that I've experienced way more bugs in one playthrough of ds2 compared to all my playthroughs of ds1 and ds3 combined.

>>712581374
>I like the lore
the most braindead thing anyone could say about a fromsoft game

>>712588515
The lore it's the headcanon you created.

>>712588273
Dark Souls 2 is notoriously uninspired and generic-looking.
Basically a shitty gook mmo

>>712588507
>The one thing I've noticed about ds2 is that I've experienced way more bugs in one playthrough of ds2 compared to all my playthroughs of ds1 and ds3 combined.
Well I don't think anybody would argue that DS2 doesn't have the most problems, even if they say it's by the size of the game and the somehow even rockier development process. I think generally the take I see for people who like DS2 is that the quantity of good aspects outweighs the bad stuff.

>>712581374
The lore of Dark Souls 2 is utter shit

>>712580808 (OP)
>Are Dark Souls 2 loyalists just contrarians?
No, they're just autistic PVP build fags who obsess about stats. That's it.
That's why they cant see how uncohesive Dark Souls 2 is as a game because they dont care about shit like that, they just like numbers.

>>712587957
>>that ds2 defender on youtube
who?

>>712580808 (OP)
I love the understandable plot, I love the dreamlike setting, the characters, the comfy home base, and the tactical combat that isn't just a rythem game. 3rd best From game and best souls game. They are all good though, except Sekiro.

>>712588850
>and the somehow even rockier development process
Yeah, this is the reason why I don't really hold it against ds2.

>>712581168
ER>BB>2>1>3>Des>KF>Sekiro

>>712588949
that guy who's critiquing that furry who made a 7 hour critique of ds2. can't remember any of their names

>>712589047
Sekiro>BB

>>712580808 (OP)
I liked it more than DS3.

Demon Souls > DS1 > Bloodborne / Sekiro > DS2 / Elden Ring > DS3.

>>712588957
>understandable plot
>Nashandra told Vendrick that the giants with glory hole faces were about to attack, and Vendrick instantly in vaded them
Woah, great writing there
Maybe you mean, I appreciated that this parody of a Souls game was written by a retard so it's mundane and badly written down to my IQ level

>>712589087
You should make an 8 hour video.

>>712588949
>>712589087
It is Domo and Mauler, probably. Domo apparently has horrible political takes going by the out of nowhere video that showed up on his channel, while Mauler has horrible videogame critiques.

>>712587723
The platforming is probably the worst part of all Souls games, in all honesty.

>>712587762
Forest of Fallen Giants is such an underrated level. I honestly think it's the best fromsoft level, at least in the souls games.

>>712589168
LOL, not going to let some uneducated retard too stupid to even apply for university with the grammar of a 16yrold girl shit talk the only game a normal person who has sex can follow becuase we all don't spend our hours watching vidyavaati. We both know you barely passed English and haven't read a book in years, kek!
>>712589129
Middle 3rd was real fun, last 3rd I found hard but it was still fun and a me problem. That first 3rd though was just brutal, the gang fights are so much worse than you remember. I think the NG/Demonbell fans just forget how bullshitty that first 1/3rd is till Lady Butterfly.

why does it cause such a strong reaction? no one is even arguing about DS3, some people like it, some people dont but you never see heated debates between haters and defense force of DS3

>>712589736
DS2 is just comfy, the soulless will never get it.

>Dark Souls 2 had 4 years of development
>Same as Elden Ring, more than any previous Fromsoftware games
>Bandai Namco spent more in marketing for Dark Souls 2 than any game before Elden Ring
>Bandai Namco invited hundreds of journalists at a fancy restaurant for the Dark Souls 2 reveal event and held 2 super expensive press events
>Bandai Namco pressured Fromsoftware to set up a story that open too many sequels
>Bandai Namco stated that they were treating Dark Souls 2 as their main triple A with massive marketing push to reach the Skyrim audience
>To this day retarded Dark Souls 2 fans still desperately try to push the narrative that Dark Souls 2 was unfairly treated, misjudged, rushed or that wasn't a piece of shit with unbearable stank of design by committee from corporate all over it to milk the brand like FF

>>712589871
DS2 is such a mixed bag that some people willingly ignore either the good or bad of it and come out with completely different visions of what they had played. The levels, enemies, bosses, and even music vary wildly between great and horrendous.
Or they never played it in the first place and just watched a """video essay"""

Yes. They can't bear to like popular, quality games like DS3 or Elden Ring.

>>712589805
I too liked when Aldia told his backstory of doing nothing and then proceeded to do nothing up until the ending where he sets out to do nothing in the game where nothing happened

>>712589871
There's some retarded tranny that keeps spamming these threads for attention.

>>712580808 (OP)
You mean haters?

>>712580808 (OP)
Depends how you define loyalist. I like it but it's got lots of problems.>>712589805
>That first 3rd though was just brutal, the gang fights are so much worse than you remember. I think the NG/Demonbell fans just forget how bullshitty that first 1/3rd is till Lady Butterfly.
This. It's rarely said, but it's true. Right after Lady Butterfly it clicks into fun mode but it's hard being that patient.

someone give me the lore of the anon posting anti ds2/pro ds3 bait threads all day with webms in the chamber

>>712590376
>DS3
>quality
im laffin

>elden ring
literally, and i do mean LITERALLY Dark Souls 2 2.0
you cannot like Elden Ring and hate Dark Souls 2 unless you suffer from cognitive dissonance

>>712590231
Didn't they have to change a lot mid-development for ds2 though? Not sure how true that is, just read it somewhere.

>>712590548
Both me.

>>712590382
aldia escaped the curse by becoming part arch-tree
you escape the curse by uniting all the crowns togheter
the ending involves you and aldia going on a journey helping other undeads and trying to fix hollowing for good

ds2 protag is by far the most chad protag out there

I demand an apology from ds2 fanboys for the existence of Cave of the Dead.

>>712590586
>literally, and i do mean LITERALLY Dark Souls 2 2.0
Lol
>>712590382
Kek it truly is like that

>>712590753
Nightreign protagonist fucks his own sister. You can't get more chad than that.

>>712590586
>literally, and i do mean LITERALLY Dark Souls 2 2.0
speaking of that....
does a god of dream named Quella sound familiar to you? Who's symbol is a giant tree?

>>712580808 (OP)
I know it's hard for you to believe but I just like the game, no matter what lengths you go to trying to understand it
Game fun.

>>712580808 (OP)
I was a Dark Souls 2 hater but then I actually pllayed it and i dont know, it is a fun game that reminds me of early, less successful FromSoft. It has that Japan-meets-western-fantasy vibe that I like, and the only thing I can hold against it are the obvious things like the lack of polish, some bad systems like Soul Memory, things like that.

It also just feels unique compared to DS3/ER that sort of just blend together too much and stop giving me fun feels.

My personal tierlist is: DS1>BB=DeS>Sekiro>DS2>ER>DS3

Dark Souls 1 has the worst boss in the entire franchise bar none.
Dark Souls 2 has the lamest, most uninspired boss fights in the entire series.
I don't remember anything about Dark Souls 3 except I thought there were too many puzzle bosses.

>>712590861
>muh dick

>>712590753
>aldia escaped the curse by becoming part arch-tree
It's a shame that Dark Souls 2 writers never played Dark Souls, otherwise they would know humans turn into trees on their own as part of the curse

>>712589871
DS2 fans feel it's unfairly criticized and singled out for both things that are objectively inaccurate about it and things that the other games did to the same extent, which it was by retarded content creators.

Regular Fromsoft/souls fans who were waiting have a generally leaning negative opinion of the game because of the blatant prerelease lies and the godawful first version of the game. Scholar being really good and fixing most of the glaring problems obviously doesn't negate the first impression.

Then you have the DS2 haters who religiously hate on the game that I am biased against, so I don't know how accurately I could describe them and so I won't bother incase I make a strawman. They can explain if they want.

Even though we can argue about how DS3 went too far away from the adventure game exploration aspect or whatever, the other games never really got a perfect storm of social situations surrounding it nor was it popularized to hate on them.

>>712590382
Aldia's got some pretty great lines, even if he was just kinda... there.
>>712590586
Who ever said I hated Dark Souls 2? The story's pretty forgettable until you get to the DLCs, and Elden Ring plays more like DS3 than DS2.
Honestly, I'm glad I don't meet too many Soulsbourne fans in real life, you fuckers are getting high off of your own farts

>>712582516
it's closer to 1 in mechanics and world than 3 ever was

>>712590382
This but unironically.

>>712590548
Nobody talks about 3 until 2fags start shitting on it to deflect criticism against their game

>>712590868
>does a god of dream named Quella sound familiar to you?
No, because Dark Souls 2 is noncanon trash

>>712590989
>otherwise they would know humans turn into trees on their own as part of the curse
name one single instance of this in dark souls 1

>>712590753
>aldia escaped the curse by becoming part arch-tree
Beyond retarded even if true
Almost as retarded as Demon of Song

>>712591174
you're a fucking low IQ ape nigger
this isn't about dark souls it's about elden ring

As someone who has played kingsfield dark souls and armored core im confident in saying that FROMSOFT lore is some of the best in the industry. Pic related is just one more interesting recent discovery recovered as an unused asset from the PC version of AC6. No clue what its intended original use would have been.

>>712590989
At first I thought you were bullshitting, but I think you're on to something. Tell me moar

>>712580808 (OP)
it is a good game though, it's just hilariously undercooked
still has the best multiplayer in the entire series and a lot of fun mechanics they just never brought back like bonfire ascetics or bone fist

I used to be a dark souls 2 hater because of all the criticisms I've read about it online, then I played the game and fell in love with it. Then I played it further and realized that some of those criticisms actually had merit. It's a fun game with a lot of flaws. It probably is the worst fromsoft game, but the amount of hate it receives is overkill.

>>712591191
The 4 Kings, the complete stage of the curse of those that tried usurping the flame. The Silver Barks are also used in Nightreign and grow in the Castle where the cutting gifted tribe entombed the sacrifices for the Nightlord Rune

>>712586381
>posts a webm proving his point
LMAOOOOOOO

>>712591434
Uh... Konnichiwa?

>four ki-
headcannon trash as expected from this nigger
concession accepted

>>712590382
His story was that he was researching how to break the curse and he figured out that relighting the flame is a pointless cycle that will never fix anything. This is why the game begins with the fire keepers in despair, he's basically just reinforcing the point of the Emerald Herald.
So now he's trying to lead people into finding a new path forward that isn't lighting the flame to postpone the end and hope the next guy does too. He didn't do nothing either, a significant amount of the things you encountered in the game was his doing and he directly influenced many of the major players.

>>712580808 (OP)
It was their first DS game. They bought the game because of the hype (they wanted to be "hardcore").

>>712591285
This is actually about how you fuckers fellate an alright game because apparently you hate DS3 and Elden Ring. I'd respect you guys more if you weren't trying to be contrarian about it.

>>712591568
It was my third DS game

>>712591554
So I guess he failed then? Considering the state of the world in ds3.

>>712591554
This. I swear DS2 is the ultimate retard filter.

>>712591602
what the fuck are you on
what the fuck does your reply have to do with my original post

>>712580808 (OP)
I think DS2 is a good game even if it does have some retarded gameplay and the weakest set of bosses. In particular I really like the more subtle story connections to DS1, where we the player can see the influence that characters and events from DS1 have over the world of DS2, but the characters themselves are so far removed from the first cycle that only Aldia really knows what happened.

>>712591434
Ok, I'm starting to see it now. Especially with Manus and the CURSE ROTTED Greatwood.

>>712591602
Huh? >>712589047

>ds2fags are trans activists
Kek. Amazing

>>712591756
(You)

>>712590613
DS2 was developed twice, the first version spiraled out of control and only some of the assets survived into the second iteration after development was restarted with a new director and rushed to completion. The original story was scrapped, areas and NPCs repurposed and new assets were made during the second dev cycle to bridge the gaps since there wasn't enough material for a full game, people have discovered entire unfinished dungeons and alternative boss death cutscenes for branching story paths. And Fromsoft was making a brand new engine for DS2 that had all kinds of visual upgrades compared to the DS1 engine that were never actually used in DS2 because the last gen consoles couldn't handle them.

>>712590292
I think you have the right of it. I played it on release and found it to be fun but more difficult until I changed my approach; didn't care for ADP, durability, how humanity worked, or the stamina changes but I liked the locations, the torch/light mechanics, powerstancing, and the number of bosses. Quite a mixed bag.

>>712591687
Or you know, they had to rework the entire game mid-development, so they could only fit so much references to the first game. I honestly don't know which is worse, this or ds3 sucking ds1's dick at every turn. It feels like 2 extremes.

>>712580808 (OP)
Fantastic level design and fashion souls. What more can you ask from a souls game, its also the last souls game before combat went full retard.

>>712591658
I don't really know anything about DS3 lore, so I dunno. But I guess. I think it's kinda lame how everything inevitably ends badly all the time, but that seems to be the preference for every other Soulsborne Ring game.

>>712582094
>I bet most of them don't like DS1 either but you can't say anything bad about the original
TRVTH NVKE

Do Archtrees have anything to do with the Curse? The Fog and the Archtrees seem to play a huge role in Demon's Souls, but I don't know if it goes any further than that.
>>712592049
Fashion Souls was kino, and DS2 still has the best PVP experiences for me since everything isn't going at Bloodborne speeds.
>>712592065
The whole Soulsbourne series is Cosmic Horror if you think about it. You either sacrifice yourself to keep the dying Age of Fire alive, or you destroy it all and succumb to the horrors of the Abyss.

I don't like Dark Souls 2 very much but I like where it was aiming.
Everything they showed pre release and the remnants of it that is still in the game pointed to them trying to make a game that is slower and more methodical than Dark Souls 1. Many people will disagree, but in my opinion The Gutter is one of the best exploration based zones Fromsoft has made, simply because of its gimmick that is so effective. Weird makeshift wooden structures in the dark and you have to light one beacon after the other to finally find your bearings and orient yourself. Exploring it for the first time was exciting. Not to mention how cool it is that a well in the main hub of the game leads down some bottomless hell hole. Really loved that.

I think games that are trying to ape the souls series would be a lot different nowadays, had dark souls 2 fully delivered on its promises. Instead we have the fast paced roll sims of today.

How do people who like DS2 excuse things like invasions being cucked and soul memory?

>>712591285
No, this is about how Dark Souls 2 is a parody of Souls games and Elden Ring reusing a name has nothing to do with Dark Sun Gwyndolin and Miyazaki's trickster prince.
>>712591303
The hollows grow roots of darkness as humanity flows outwards as cause of the darksign. Only those with powerful amount of humanity can survive the process before dying or falling to the curse.

The Church of Londo wants a Dark Lord capable of usurping the First Flame, with enough humanity to survive the process of Usurpation which is why they collect humanity.

The form of extreme prolification of roots is due to attempting to embed the First Flame and failing Kaathe.

The Souls of Firekeepers has also the same roots of Darkness because the Bonfire is linked to their Souls, which is why they require sacrifices of Humanity and why the Anor Londo Firekeeper is deformed and hollowing as few undeads can reach her

Dark Souls 2 doesn't understand Dark Souls, hollowing and how the curse of the undead works so it couldn't even pick up on those elements.

Am I doing something wrong or does powerstancing in ds2 take a lot of stamina? I should have the right stats.

>>712582094
I started with DS1, but that game was still unfinished and you can really feel how rushed everything was after Ornstein and Smough. DS2 had a mediocre ending, but DS3 and DeS actually end themselves with a bang.

>>712592326
Why do you think we need to excuse them? A game can have bad qualities and still be good.

>>712592331
Kek, you reminded me when DS2 was like "Hollowing means you turn into a green zombie, right?" Can't believe I forgot about that.
I can see this tree thing more, especially if the Furtive Pygmy and the other Lords started underground first.

>Needs a rerelease to add a shortcut

DAS2 will always be mid

Anyone have the chart showing off DS2's shit graphics?

>>712587423
How did this even happen?

>>712592449
thats normal, power stance just uses an insane amount of stamina
get the third dragon ring and invest in endurance

>>712587850
use greatshield jumping attacks. flattens shit and wrecks shit. the crossbow shield and talisman shields are also kino. probably going to want to be naked for flynns ring so cap vitality at 14. Best bet early game is probably to rush pursuer then cash in the soul to straid. moon butterfly shield can be used to poison. remember shields can be infused. scaling is pretty bad so use raw or lightning. experiment with all kinds. use them like a swiss army knife.

>>712591864
Is that why the world doesn't seem cohesive between locations? They tried, but it still feels fuckin' off.

>>712592302
>Do Archtrees have anything to do with the Curse?
No, it's complete headcanon from Dark Souls 2
The Fog in Dark Souls represents time dilation effect around powerful souls due to the First Flame fading, which is why bosses "reset"
The Hollowing is represented by roots of Dark while the Curse is Crystallized humanity
Crystallized gems and sorceries are souls, while crystallized dark gems and affinity are humanity, as crystals, sorceries and humanity are intertwined.
>>712592710
Whoever designed the Dark Souls 2 undead should have been fired instantly after presenting the draft

>>712588930
ds2 was the most "game" game though, when the backlash over the improved rpg systems happened, they decided to go harder on the rollsloppa

>>712592814
I don't remember the details, but it's a flaw carried over from DS1 where the game thinks you fell from way higher.

>>712592686
Because invasions are a core part of the dark souls experience. By completely ruining them you are taking a dramatic step back from the previous game.

>>712593009
>improved rpg systems
No RPG system was improved by Dark Souls

>>712592942
Have you considered gitting gud, or at the very least having sex. Im sorry DS2 was too hard for you, just call it janky.

>>712593084
no one ever said that, i said ds2

>>712592326
Idk, I just played online and had fun
Especially hosting duels at the bridge at Iron Keep

>>712593073
Okay, but I can admit that it is a problem. Why would I ever need to defend it? Besides, I doubt you'd hold this standard for DS3 and ER.

>>712580808 (OP)
>>712581168
1 is the worst, by a good margin too. It’s the only one that becomes bad at certain parts.

>>712593138
No RPG system was improved by Dark Souls 2
The series won't delve into RPG mechanics any harder than Demon's Souls until Dark Souls 3

>>712580808 (OP)
Obviously
Either that or BRs, BRs love DaS2 for some reason

>>712593248
I was never interested in Elden Ring and I never beat DS3 because I had souls fatigue after 2. Especially hard to go back to standard souls gameplay after Bloodborne. Each of the games have flaws, but DS2 is more flawed and was a step down in most ways. The main thing I appreciate about DS2 is the new game plus.

>>712580808 (OP)
stay mad

>>712592930
Yep. Some of the areas that were from the first build were meant to loop into each other like in DS1's first half and some levels were completely different, there's an entire second Iron Keep and an unused nexus-esque hub room under Majula.

>>712592326
>How do people who like DS2 excuse things like invasions being cucked and soul memory?
Those are good design choices though, if you want to invade better git gud and not die a single time while you are raising your character.

>>712593674
>people honestly believe shit like this

>>712593674
>>712593847
I played multi-player constantly on DS2 and had a blast especially the Bell towers, i never even had to concern myself with soul memory at all

>>712590989
This shit is baffling though. How did a second team at Fromsoftware not understand how the first game works?
>>712591554
>His story is stating the obvious from the first game but with faux-deep prose and then proceed to do *something* because trust ke he is really doing stuff.

>>712593543
lmao elden zoomers will fucking seethe at this

>>712593943
Soul Memory sounds much worse than it actually does, but it's still kind of a shame it's in there to begin with. Unfortunately, like many systems in the series, they never really figured it out.

>>712594017
Are you actually retarded, or just having a laugh?

I like Dark Souls 2, not because it's good, but because it fits my specific niche of "cozy retard" games. Mechanically and artistically it feels like a FAS struggling to pass 9th grade, you can tell it's trying and it has a lot to give even though it barely passes. It's the kind of game I like to enjoy on a lazy Sunday morning, or when recovering from a cold. See also: Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Mass Effect 1, FFXIII.

>>712593286
interesting, and how would you feel if you didnt have breakfast this morning?

Ds2 is dogshit from top to bottom.
If you are STILL coming to it's defense in the year 2025 then you probably have a humiliation fetish.

>>712595487
So how would you feel if you had played DS1 yesterday?

>>712595787
fine cause ds1 is good, like ds2

DS2 had the best multiplayer and it's not even close. I had a blast roleplaying as a bare chested Josef Stalin with a blacksmith hammer and sickle up in the bell towers and rat domains. I ran mundane weapons, since i had to evenly distribute my attributes to fulfill my communist character, and only used red colored rings and spells.

The game itself is pretty weak compared to the others. Really clunky all around, but still an enjoyable mess.

>>712595787
Ds2 feels like it takes place underwater when compared to DS1. everything is so slow and it takes 1/3rd of your stamina bar to do literally anything. also DS1 doesn't have DS2's appalling deadzones that restrict your movement to 8-directions

>>712596050
this is why anyone ever defends ds2 honestly, because it made the best memories

>>712596154
i tried to replay it and it was extremely disappointing. It's one of those 'you had to be there' kind of games, and not in a good way.

It's the Modern Warfare 2 of the souls games. It's the direct sequel to a suddenly popular game, and it's terribly balanced and buggy as fuck. But damn what that hot pile of shit our home for a while.

>>712590992
dark souls 2 is just an objectively bad game. it's still my favorite ds game though

>>712596327
I played it for the first time after 3. I skipped it cause of the reception and didnt come back til much later. Dont really get the hate, I liked the stats and thought aesthetics were the coolest shit ever, same with powerstancing

>>712596327
>It's the Modern Warfare 2 of the souls games.
absolute delusion

>>712596580
>objectively
retard

>>712596580
We get it, Mauler. You worked hard on that series.

>>712580808 (OP)
No. I like Dark Souls 2, but I also like all the other games except for Dark Souls 3 which was insanely disappointing. My favorite is Bloodborne.

>>712584182
I think Elden Ring has the worst “lore” by far. It’s utter nonsensical garbage and clearly half-finished including the DLC that really added nothing and just further muddied the “story.”

>>712591390
>I used to be a dark souls 2 hater because of all the criticisms I've read about it online
peak npc behavior, but at least you got out of it

>>712580808 (OP)
No

>>712580808 (OP)
one thing I do notice is that dark souls 2 players will admit its faults
something the other faggots wont
t. Demon's Souls loyalists

it's butt ugly

>>712582678
>/v/ has shit taste
shocker

>>712580890
DS1 doubled the fanbase with its original release then almost doubled it again with PTDE. DS2 didn't sell as many copies, there's no way in hell that any appreciable amount of people started with DS2.

>>712597560
kek stay mad failednormalnigger

>>712597342
only because it has a lot of faults that they have to at least own some of them if they don't want to sound like rabid fanboys

>>712597661
Perhaps the same could be said of all Fromsoft titles.

>>712597978
Nah, this shit is exclusive to ds2

>>712597661
na, no way.
people to this day try to excuse dark souls 1 later half. Lost Izalith, Crystal Cove, all of that.

>>712594921
i hate when people phrase this question wrong. lol
it's "how would you feel if you hadn't had breakfast yesterday morning?"

>>712596834
>>712596913
it's like getting angry when someone tells you grass is green. screech all you want, but the truth remains true

For me it's
1 > 2 = BB > DeS >> Elden Ring >>> 3

>>712580808 (OP)
2 was better than 3 in every way

>>712582678
>Bloodborne is the best souls
555-come-on-now

>>712599267
3 had way better bosses. I liked the areas in 2 better though

>>712599267
Except for ds2 feeling like shit, looking like shit and having the worst bosses in the series

>>712592326
Soul memory literally only effected co-op shitters. I never had any problems invading.

>>712599005
Sure, buddy. I'm sure you won't say something like "tying the core game mechanic to a stat is bad therefore ADP bad" at all, and then when asked why that is bad you definitely won't respond by restating the question.

>>712580808 (OP)
There are no dedicated DaS II fans. Tis a jest to make you hate DaS III and Elden Ring without realizing it's BB fans because that would imply they're mad about post BB multiplats tanking the value of their prized possession.

>>712599460
nobody shitposts about Bloodborne anymore it's actually emulatable now

DS2 is shitty but people have an idealized version of DS1 in their head that frankly isn't real.
1 had console versions with framerates so low entire sections are borderline unplayable, a PC port that barely functioned, a dogshit second half, and the most ridiculously unbalanced and unfun PVP in the series.
Dark Souls didn't get good until 3.

>>712599631
They stopped shitposting about it years before that, they switched to "From Slop" around the time DaS III came out.
It's Fox and Grapes, the old Anecdote they used to love to toss at people.

People found grapes they could actually reach, so now they're saying you're a fag for enjoying grapes, because you no longer desire the grapes they had high up their tree.

>>712580808 (OP)
No it's the just the first souls they played so it must be good right?

they just played it first

>>712580808 (OP)
No, the people hyperbolically claiming it is the worst game ever are.

>>712588515
>the most braindead thing anyone could say about a fromsoft game

It's insane becausedmost soul loregods literally ignore ds2's lore

>>712599267
Yeah coming from 3 to 2 I can say I really enjoyed those spambush clearly superior design, and those bosses too the best in the serie and it's not even close

>>712598727
is it the "hadn't had" that fucks retards up so much?

>The graphics in 2
Yikes blud ngl

>>712580808 (OP)
If this game was called lord of the fallen sucky edition no one would even try to defend all the dogshit they puit in this pathetic copy of ds1

>>712580808 (OP)
The truth (most times) is often in the middle. DS 2 is good, but it does show obvious signs of being a B team project, from the high quantity of forgettable bosses to the lousy level design, to the rushed final boss, to the weak NG+ mechanics, to all sorts of other mechanics that are running directly counter with one another. Its fine, but certainly on the lower end of Souls games(better than Bloodborne fuck you)

MiyazakiGawds don't fuck with inferior slop.
We want the unique vision of our God.

DS2 is the only game to get shit for its hitboxes when every souls game has horrible hitboxes.

>>712600828

>>712583352
and let me guess, you started with DS2?

>>712600439
>The truth (most times) is often in the middle.
>*proceeds to give a completely one sided take*

>>712600975
>one sided
I said its good, but its not incredible.
Its not an abortion like Souls 3 retards say
But its not the best souls game like Souls 2 exclusive retards say.

>>712598165
I was going to say the same thing. As cool as DS1 is, half of it is fucking bad. By character 5 I was considering S&O the end of the game.

It's objectively inferior but I can see how some people prefer the more assertive brawny character feel (+new weapon options like whip or caestus) to the more meek turtlelike feel in DS1 where you're carefully inching forward and poking. However Bloodborne and Sekiro profoundly obsolete it in this respect.

>>712601460
yep, same
I realized the more I played, the less I enjoyed the later half. I would do everything up to Painted World and then just stop.

>>712601096
>Souls 3 retards say
Why is it 2 versus 3 all the time? DaS II hate and the subsequent Matt Matosis dick riders were all shit talking the game before DaS III was even announced.

>>712602682
3 made some people realise Miyazaki's involvement isn't a silver bullet

>>712601968
DS2 has the best RPG mechanics and replayability of any souls game as a result. STILL has not been topped in that respect. Also it has the best multiplayer system.

>>712603285
>RPG mechanics and replayability
its why i still love DS2. obviously it has flaws, all of them do, but in others the flaws get to the point I no longer have fun with the game. ds1 has too many areas late game that are just awful back to back and ds3 was too linear and felt more like bloodborne than dark souls
all i want is a proper sequel, dont really care who it comes from. NG+, bonfire ascetics, fragrant branches, and larger areas per level are all these I really enjoyed and are missing from the others

>>712602810
DaS III was more Tanimura but also it's overhated because of this gay clusterfuck anyway.

The elephant in the room is 2 wasn't what was hyped as a squeal to DaS and that's fine, but also that people shit on DaS III for all the problems BB had but pretend BB was perfect in every way.

>>712580808 (OP)
Its the one that grew on me the most

>>712603670
Stonesword keys pretty much are fragrant branches desu but too common

>>712603695
I keep wondering if I underappreciated DS3 in some way but overall it felt like picking the crumbs off the floor after BB

>>712605282
They are similar, but they don't have the same function. Keys basically just open up side areas with items in them, branches are more tied to progression and forcing the player to make a decision. It's another example of how games past DS2 have been afraid to try anything but the tried & true approach and moved further away from the exploration/rpg side of the series.

>>712580808 (OP)
no but its definitely overhated by people who most likely havent even played it.

>>712605527
>I keep wondering if I underappreciated DS3 in some way
You didn't, that game was straight up unfinished. The map that came with the fancy version had locations that didn't make it into the game. The purple spirits had their whole bounty hunter mechanic removed. Scamco definitely forced From to drop DS3 early.

>>712582678
Wow, so it's just like every USA political opinion poll.
Only the most mouth-breathiest, bottom-barrel sloptard slurpers are clicking that link and answering sincerely.

I honestly love the intro for DS2 but god I can't remember anything notable from it.

>>712605949
crypt blacksword

>>712605527
To say it somehow was less polished than BB is a lie. I played BB after it and then it after BB. It's not some sort of massive fall from grace like people claim it is.

A certain group of people, not naming names, loves to exaggerate all of DS2's problems so they can pretend Bloodborne was a glorious return to form.

>>712606041
I mainly mean the art and atmosphere are similar but less compelling.

>>712588452
Sure thing zoomer

>>712580808 (OP)
Bloodborne then dark souls 2 had the best pvp, but overall games in my opinion

>BB > ER > DaS2 > Sekiro > DaS1 > DeS > DaS3

I am biased against DaS3 because I just hated replaying it due to how linear it was and I have fond memories of the hate mail I got from invading people in the abyss in DaS2

>>712605949
As nothing as it was, I mainly remember Heide's Tower of Flame and what an unusual flavour that was for a starting area

>>712605949
One of the worse things about DS2 is that it sets up this epic journey across time and space with the intro, and then never mentions it again afterwards. The only thing from it that could be considered important is the fact that the protagonist traveling back in time to Drangliec is a closed loop like the Ashen Heart memories are. Considering the fact that the protagonist comes from a time long after the fall of Drangliec, with both civilization and the undead curse still existing, there is never the possibility that Nashandra brings about the Age of Dark.

>>712606849
it was supposed to be about going in and out through time. The whole ashen heart mist you get from the dragon, fighting the Giant Lord, that KINO set piece in the Duke's Dear Freja. But the whole making of ds2 was fucked as we all know

Recently played through the DS trilogy back to back for the first time after only playing ER and BB as my introduction to the franchise.
I can say that DS2 is my least favorite souls game I've played, but I don't think it was absolute shit. Just different from the others.
My first thoughts when I played it for the first time is that it was like the Doom 3 of souls games. Which is to say it feels like Dark Souls if Bethesda made it.
Most of the bosses I was able to just cheese with the power of "stand behind them"
My biggest struggle was just getting lost and trying to figure out what/where I had to do/go.
I think my biggest complaint I can personally cite against DS2 though was just how much of a comparable anti-climax the final bosses were.
Like, when I finished DS2, I didn't even realize I had just beaten the game until the credits started rolling. Just a giant "Wait... That's it? Where's the rest of it?"
Ranking just the ones I've actually beaten:
>BB > ER > DS1 ~ DS3 > DS2
Haven't beat Sekiro yet because christ, I suck at it and Genchiro is filtering the fuck out of me.
Never played DeS.
I like DS1 and 3 for different reasons. I liked DS3 because it felt familiar, like a stepping stone somewhere between DS1, BB, and ER. I did find beating bosses in DS1 more satisfying though, most especially Gwyn. Only other Souls boss that really compared to that feeling was when I finally beat Orphan of Koz, but with Gwyn it was just because the fight was fun, rather than the "FUCKING FINALLY" that came with Koz.

>>712606849
The whole intro was for a completely different version of the game.
Hell, Dragon Shrine is still Drangleic Castle in it.

>>712593286
retard

>>712599305
truth hurts faggot, ever since DeS DS1 and Bloodborne are the only games in the series to truly advance the formula significantly

>>712606507
Heide's Tower of Flame is a really good starting area in Scholar, it's very memorable and has some interesting concepts. It basically starts as a beginner area, then turns into a mid game one when you defeat the boss and trigger the aggro of the Heide Knights.

i love 2 but it always felt really disconnected from the 1 and 3, like it should have been it's own game instead of part of a series.
like king's field and eternal ring.

>>712607918
Yeah the idea of areas going through state changes (also explored with ascetics/NG+) is something I'd like to see taken further.

>>712607835
>DaS Truly advanced the formula
Nigger it's DeS with the fringe ideas that didn't work removed.

>>712580808 (OP)
I just like it. Majula was peak. In a lot of ways it was the most experimental of the trilogy (even if that didn't always actually work out) and it has my favorite DLC in the Ivory King.

I cannot even articulate how fucking mad I was when I got into DS3 and realized they went back to the 'all weapons in the same class have the exact same moveset' design philosophy. The single most important lesson they could have taken from 2 but noooo, the greataxe is back to having three flavors of overhead slams and calling it good. Also greatweapon parrying was cool as shit and that was gone too. I spent so much time doing bridge PvP and just experimenting with different movesets. Build variety in DS2 was nuts.

>>712581168
For me 1 > ER = 2 > 3
I didn't play Demons

>>712606849
the original idea for the game involved this item called the pendulum of time.
the development of DS2 is honestly the most interesting thing about it, because there is so much stuff sitting in the game, and deep into the data that shows you what some of the ideas for that original version of the game was supposed to be.

>>712580808 (OP)
How is it possible to like Dark Souls III? It is the Peacewalker of the Souls series.

I know DS2 is the 'worst' and for good reasons, but the build autist in me can't help but love it. So many neat weapons.

https://youtu.be/UScsme8didI?si=BbsKm4x0wn3TYL9G

>>712590753
>aldia escaped the curse by becoming part arch-tree
Wow, Dark Souls 2 plot is even stupidier than I thought

>>712608969
The worst is actually Dark Souls 1.

>>712609187
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRTfcMeqhig
now to wait for someone to post Mauler's infinity long response to this video

>>712580808 (OP)
No. Dark Souls 2 is charming. There's something very enigmatic about it. In all ways it was a step in the right direction for the Souls series just one killed in its infancy and cobbled together, never to be fully realized.
It is by no means a bad game just a let down off of the back of Dark Souls 1. Unlike Dark Souls 3 is far more competent sure, but it also completely soulless and the first step away from what the series should be.
What Dark Souls 3 lacks is all that Dark Souls 2 has but it is the key to what makes the series so loved.

Dark Souls 2 was ruined by Bamco's horrible decision to make it a 7th gen game. DS1 barely ran on 7th gen systems so trying to make a sequel on the same consoles was asinine.

>>712580808 (OP)
Needless contrarians and people who don't like Dark Souls like DS2.
Though it has the most autistic community and everyone knows it. A few days ago someone asked what kind of weapon they should use. I said anything that only has ONE damage type and scales with as few stats as possible because split damage is inefficient.
Someone called me a DS2 shitter. I asked how many hits it takes for them to kill Gwyn, because my cleric with a Plus 15 mace can do it in two shots, they didn't respond.

>>712582094
You can tell that they started in DS3 because all of their comments have something to do with bosses, which is completely missing the point of the earlier souls titles.

>>712609283
Maulers response is exactly what vidya related autism should be and if you don't agree with his points than hbomberguy slop is what you deserve.

灵魂记忆 Soul Memory 适应性 ADP 虚假广告 False Advertising 预发布游戏演示 E3 2013 Gameplay Demo B隊 B-Team 8向运动 8-Directional Movement 生命宝石 Lifegems 糟糕的图形 Bad Graphics 平面纹理 Flat Textures 不存在的照明 Nonexistent Lighting 性别转换棺材 Gender Swap Coffin 敌人太多 Gank Squads 猎鹰人奔跑动画 Falconer Running Animation 燃燒的風車 Burning Windmill 鐵堡電梯 Iron Keep Elevator 失重動畫 Weightless Animations 反馈不佳 Poor Feedback 損壞的碰撞箱 Broken Hitboxes 抓取命中检测 Grab Hit Detection 过度调整的跟踪 Overtuned Tracking 无限敌人耐力 Infinite Enemy Stamina 笑奶奶 Laughing Grandmas 不一致的背刺 Inconsistent Backstabs 過度墜落傷害 Excessive Fall Damage 人为的困难 Artificial Difficulty 無意義的世界設計 Nonsensical World Design 備受爭議的重新發行 Controversial Rerelease 分裂玩家群 Split Playerbase 數量重於質量 Quantity Over Quality 搶錢續集 Cashgrab Sequel 模仿直肠抓取 Mimic Rectum Grab

>>712609751
>the way too long video series of repeating remarks and outright lies is what we need

>>712609751
Videogame criticism should be inaccurate, subjective and supported by staged evidence?

>>712609709
>which is completely missing the point
Yet Dark Souls 2 designers felt the need to add several dozen boss fights in flat empty circular arenas
Curious

>>712609853
Before I try to argue with you, American?

>>712609751
well here's someone more autistic debunking anything mauler has to say.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnHf2wemSsk&list=PLkei3Zc3mbYmcj_blebrY5rn7koclcYYs

>>712609961
Your example is literally a gimmick arena boss fight, anon.

>>712610028
a reliable source indeed

>Second highest critically rated souls after DeS remake (which is also hated here)
Lads you're in so deep you don't realize you're the contrarian.

>>712609880
>>712609853
Mate you're defending a video where he says a game that has no attack cancelling is designed for multiple enemy boss fights and he thinks he invented the idea of "play conditioning" because he hasn't done enough reading to know about intrinsic design or the invisible tutorial.
Sorry but I really think youre not equipped to have these conversations.

>>712610071
No, it's just a shit boss with no personality, one of many dudes in armor

>>712610107
i don't see the issue

DS1>ER>SEK>BB>DESO>DS2>DS3

Dark souls 1 for what it was at the time of release had the greatest impact I think. Elden ring is just open world slop married to a beautiful from soft game. Of course their child is cute. Their mom is smoking.

As a lore and lore through level design fag only ER is worse than DaS2.
I don't think B team figured it out until the dlc, and then ruined it with Aldia.

>>712609961
>Pic unrelated
Even the first dragonrider fight was way more dynamic than any DS3 fight.
>You can explore to expland the arena
>or you can keep the arena as is on the off chance the enemy will also fall
Those alone had more thought put into than every boss arena in nuSouls like games.
Also its your first time playing ds2 there is literally no way you know the timing on how to make the dragonrider fall

>>712609998
Europoor.

>>712610140
Not defending either. Both suck, but one is only an hour long of shit and the other is almost ten.

I just wish people would admit that being the worst souls game doesn't make it a bad game.

>>712610285
>American
Kojima was right.

>>712610372
True, DS3 is a great game on its own but its just not a good souls game.

>>712610201
I know people call ER's open world 'slop' but I'm genuinely not sure the game would be improved without it. I do get that it probably hurts the game's replayability, but it's easily the Souls game that feels most like a complete journey to me. Plus Altus and Liurnia are both really goddamn pretty. I liked riding through them.

>>712593009
Dark Souls 2 improved the RPG systems by... Making shield and armor useless and locking builds to singular damage types that you are incentivize to use as one and only strat by buffing on infusions?
Dark Souls 2 is an awful "RPG". You are better off using Fire buffed Fire sword against Fire bosses to DPSmax than actually adapt and smartly differentiate your toolset
Oh boy, how do I love Havel set in Dark Souls 2 reducing damage taken of 1/10th by midgame because it worls off flat damage-defense subtractions

>>712610028
That's actually a damning video. Mauler should make another 8 hour series responding.

>>712610140
I didn't defend anybody, nor did the other guy. I simply called Mauler a liar because he is one. Evidenced by the fact that he constantly claims the game is nothing but ganks (a lie) and the only evidence he ever provides is videos of obvious situations where the player has ran through the entire area aggroing everything before returning to a choke point at the start or an incompetent player getting scared of an enemy and deciding to run towards more enemies further into an area instead of retreating. That's not even getting into his retarded objectivity claims he condescendingly makes before giving an entirely subjective opinion every time. Maybe he actually knows about television and movies, but the man is an absolutely terrible videogame reviewer.

Also you are retarded too for that matter. The game is designed for multiple enemy encounters, that's why you have sweep attacks and the like.

>>712610251
>words words words words words
It's a dude in armor taller than the player with a big weapon swung horizontally
Dark Souls 2 got plenty of those and it's boring as shit

>>712610148
Pursuer was KINO though
>Lets you fight him way earlier than intended
>First arena has balistas you can use to basically 1 shot him
>If you managed to kill him in his first appearance he disappears from the first arena
>Has a grab attack that changes his moveset when it connects
>Follows you throughout the game staying true to his name

>>712610451
It felt like dark souls copied borderlands 2 homework to me. There were areas of the game that shined, and I mean really shined. Any of the linear* dungeons or areas felt amazing to play through. The open world surrounding it was just a way to get around having to connect it all via load screens. I feel confident giving this criticism with the context of how high I’ve rated it in my list. Open world was mostly unnecessary and watered down the experience for me.

I miss hexes. One of the cooler aspects of ds2 is faith/int or int/faith us a viable build

No idea why they took them out for DS3, ER has a couple int/faith spells and weapons but nowhere near as many as ds2

>>712610631
I forgot for ds3 fags a good boss consists of gay incestuous brothers and an animu girl with a giant scythe

>>712610451
Elden Ring open world is interesting because the order in which you progress affects your build and what you use in gameplay, while the archeological and investigation aspect of the story shines and each corner of the world has personality and ties specifically to the Lands Between.

>>712589047
>>712581168
BB>ER>Des>2>3>1>Sekiro

>>712610372
What I don't understand are the fans who will skip 1/3 of a trilogy but then buy every D-rate soulslike to show up on steam early access. There are "people" who will buy pure garbage like Mortal Shell and Ashen while insisting they will stoop so low as to touch DS2.

>>712610028
That guy is a troon

>>712610743
>Even the horse is a dude in armor standing still and swinging sideways
Grim
>>712610723
>No idea why they took them out for DS3,
Because Dark Souls 3 was designed by smarter people, so Hexes were split in three categories
Clerics and Sorcerers get to access to Dark Damage using their own catalysts and being very effective overall, while dedicated Faith+Intelligence builds get to use specialized Chimes and Staves that scale off both stats

Nothing changes for Hexers EXCEPT more builds can access organically Dark Spells, which is a net improvement

This design carries over in Elden Ring (Dark Souls 3 2) that further committs on it and dual hand casting like Scholar Candlestick, making Faith+Int a dedicated caster build that can access any spell using their own seal and staves.

All of this factors in Dark Souls 3 striving to make sure all builds get a whole deal of options that include at least 2 damage types if not 3, in different ways.

Dark Souls 2 fans don't understand this because they are not RPG fans, and in Dark Souls 2 you don't adapt to the enemy elemental weakness to get around enemy defenses and you are instead incentivizing into a dps fest of buff on infusion getting around any kind of defense.

>>712611306
and mauler's a dumb faggot, so it evens out.

>>712610723
My theory is either Miyazacki or Tanimura figured that hexes already had a degree of redundancy by being used on both catalysts so they just broke them across the 3 types. Pyro didn't scale with anything in DaS, following a sort of free magic with the cost of upgrade limitations, so it just seemed cleaner to make them the hybrid build.

Remember DaS II scalings works differently, with int and fai both buffing their respective damages (magic and lightning) AND fire, where as Dark scaled off the lowest of either stat. These damage stats then scaled with items that stated they scaled with them.

Dark Souls III runs off the older DeS system where the magic adjust modifies the damage of the spell and the scaling the catalyst has determines the magic adjust, so while Dark spells usually require int/fai their damage was determined by the catalysts (I.E a pure int catalyst would only take advantage of the int with the scaling).

>>712611343
He's a furry

>>712581168
This is accurate

>>712580808 (OP)
>10 years ago
>Dark Souls 2 releases and everyone enjoys it
>A couple of autistic freaks don't and remind everyone of their hatred daily for a decade
Nah, non-loyalists are the contrarians.

>>712611416
mauler?
i believe it

>>712599443
>gets triggered before anyone even says anything
lol

>>712600279
good question, but in my experience (i'm an asshole and i get a kick out of asking black coworkers this question), it's moreso the "yesterday morning" part that short circuits them

>>712612058
isn't it because of the hypothetical though

>>712611450
I saw him being called a furry somewhere. I'm not really sure, but I wouldn't doubt it either, to be honest.

>>712612232
of course, but it's that specific piece of wording that makes the hypothetical hard for them to comprehend

>>712580808 (OP)
Are anons pretending that DAS2 is the worst game ever made just contrarians?

>>712612330
I really don't get what's so hard about that to comprehend. It's an IQ thing, right?

>>712612365
No, but they're just parroting what their resident video essay creator told them. DS2 has a shitload of flaws though, so they end up being half right at least.

>>712585793
All of the 'criticism' of 2 is like this. They claim "x is bad" about the game and try to post some webm that's irrelevant, but when you actually look into it 2 does whatever thing they're talking about at least as well if not better than the other games.

It has easily the more refined gameplay in the series. Like, I love 1, but is has absolutely degenerate and mindlessly cheesable gameplay in comparison unless you go out of your way to heavily restrict yourself.

>>712580808 (OP)
Nah. My friend prefers 2 over 1 and 3. Its literally just a matter of "this clicked with me more" which I totally understand. Its really as simple as that. No need to wage wars over shades of preferences.

>>712612420
its the context of it. either its someone being dismissive of a hypothetical because it doesn't matter to the topic at hand, or its someone who doesn't/can't comprehend the hypothetical
ever saw/heard an argument and someone says something so profoundly stupid, you can't even fathom a reply?

>>712585793
>Easier tutorial boss

>>712612885
>out of estus
>half health
>playing like a bitch
what is this webm trying to prove?

>>712612976
>It doesn't count
>B-b-but
Tell me, which boss isn't some dude swinging his weapon horizontally
All I know is that Dark Souls 2 is unbearably boring all the way through

>>712613081
b-but dark souls 1...

>>712597073
DS3 was worse if you don't count the dlc

>>712613081
im asking what the webm is for. but since you asked, here's a few
executioner chariot, sinh, rotten, darklurker, demon of song, covetous demon, the rats, Freja, and the guardian dragon come to mind.

>>712611309
You're not supposed to be minmaxing your elemental damage output by swapping entire spell schools. Specialization is the point. I make my character and I'm going to play a "fire guy" and put on the fire clutch ring and throw fireballs and hit you with my fire mace or whatever. If you'd have fire/ice/lightning all be reskins of each other that everyone can use like its final fantasy, that'd be a straight downgrade.

>>712586930
Soulcalibur is a fighting game. Dark souls 2 pvp is also a fighting game.

I certainly miss when healing left you vulnerable like in DS2

>>712580890
this
they played it before they had a standard of what a souls game should be. that's it for like 80% of them.

>>712595787
I didn't play DS1 yesterday.

>>712613201
>All dudes standing still and swinging weapons sideways and the worst dragon boss fight to ever exist in gaming
Grim, no wonder the game is so mind numbingly boring
>>712613290
>You're not supposed to be minmaxing your elemental damage output by swapping entire spell schools. Specialization is the point.
No, that's just retarded and boring. Dark Souls 2 incentivizing it shows how it didn't understand Dark Souls at all. The tradeoff between buffing and infusing, how each works better in different and cases and damage reduction each component gets in either cases, actually mean you can't simoly ignore the systems and spam your highest damaging move unless you are using Standard physical damage. Buffing your infusion isn't a tradeoff, it's broken as shit dumbed down dps stacking for the sake of ignoring the game
>>712613502
>I certainly miss when healing left you vulnerable
Dark Souls 2 lets you heal the damage you will take in your punish, because the whole game is braindead

>>712613502
you certainly missed lifegems as well

>>712606458
>Bloodborne... best pvp
You must be trolling. Nobody on earth has this opinion.

>>712613773
Not being able to spam backstabs anymore was good, I don't know about it being the best though

>>712613665
ah, so we reached the point where you have to lie? if there's problems with the game, why do you have to make all this shit up?
oddly enough, dark souls 3s roster of 'dude swinging his weapon horizontally" makes up of probably 80% of the bosses. I'd look at the wiki if I cared to name all of them, but I know there's Vordt, Dancer, Nameless King, Soul of Cinder, Dragonslayer Armour, the handicapped prince at the end, both Gundyr's, Pontiff, the Demon Prince or whatever his name is in the vanilla game. There's Yhorm, Deacons of the Deep, and Abyss Watchers. There's probably more in the DLC if I could remember them.

anyway, im off to bed. enjoy this (You)

>>712613081
>>712613665
So the essence of your argument is ds2 bad because bosses dont do 10 EBIN backflips while breakdancing, how does it feel being a brainrotten zoomer.
Just play DMC or Baynonetta because you clearly dont like Dark souls

>>712613845
It only had 2 things going against it IMO, but they are both pretty bad. First, guns are just obnoxious. Having an extremely low-risk, ranged parry made attacking always feel like a crapshoot, because you could just die for pressing R1 regardless of your positioning. Second is that the outcome of a fight often just came down to who had better bloodgems. Not a huge deal in a fight club where everybody has their chalice gems, but absolute AIDS for invasions.

Oh, it was also the game that fucked invasion matchmaking, making it only work on people who were co-oping or opted into it outside of 2 zones in the game. But that continued being the case in all games going forward, so it's not uniquely bad to BB.

>>712613665
>because the whole game is braindead
>he uses lifegems
maybe try it without next time. It's like playing Elden Ring with Mimic Tear, of course it's braindead if you use all the tools for casuals

>>712614368
>fucked invasion matchmaking
Is that what the problem was? Played it 4 times, always online. I didn't get invaded or seen any summon signs a single fucking time. In fact only summon I remember is the guy in front of Bloodstarved Beast.

>>712614391
Lifegems were plentiful and cheap. They were always meant to be used, therefore healing in DS2 did not, in fact, leave you vulnerable.

>>712614472
Summon signs don't exist for players, you use the beckoning bell to summon people instead.
>Activate bell
>Other players who have activated their resonant bell will just materialize in your world
It is to Dark Souls' co-op system, what invasions are to red soap signs. Instead of picking the person you want to summon, you just get matched with somebody.

And yes, BB is the game that started the "you don't get invaded while playing solo" thing that DkS3 and ER also do. But with how blood gems work, it's probably good that you can opt out of invasions, because the degree of twinking that they enable is absolutely brutal. After going through defenses, the damage difference between a +5 weapon with random gems you get progressing the game, vs. a +10 weapon with maxed blood gems can be close to 10x.

>>712614735
you didn't beat the game.

>>712614826
I never said I used them. I'm just proving that the statement that anon posted is objectively false. DS2 is easy as shit.

>>712614735
that does remind me of the rite of kindling in 1. kinda ruined the balance of healing, especially considering you can get it effectively as soon as you touch down in firelink shrine.

>>712614824
Huh, can't believe i missed that. I guess FromSoft knew they couldn't balance PvP and just gave up, making it so we couldn't get invaded at all. DeS had twinks and broken shit like scraping spear and running firestorm. Ds1 had twinks, ds2 had soul memory, and then BB just removes all of that and goes, 'It's up to you now :)'
kinda wack, but I see why

>>712614913
I have a news flash for you: every souls game is easy if you utilize all the tools you get. Dark Souls was never hard, it's as hard as you make it.
That's why a lot of players don't use summons or sorcery. Or life gems, or all the other things that you can use. You know exactly what the point about being vulnerable while healing was, estus is slow and delayed in DS2, you need a window to heal (ESTUS) in DS2 unlike in the later titles.

>>712580808 (OP)
People here hate on DS2 for being jank with some segments yet they forgive ER’s boring open world, shit dungeon design and unsatisfying combat. What’s funny is how ER is basically a discount DS2 as well

>>712615185
The presence of lifegems itself already makes the whole "window to heal" argument moot. There's no such resource like a lifegem in the other games. Something that you can get a lot of in a short amount of time. Something you can use while moving. Humanities in ds1 take too long to farm in ds1, and moongrass still stops your character when you use them. You're right that every game gives you tools that you can opt not to use, but no other game gave you an alternative to the main healing mechanic.

>>712591554
He also doesn't seem to want to sniff out the fire either. The age of dark also seems pretty shitty, we see in all the games that darkness causes human emotions to take on dangerous forms. The profane flame in DS3 for example was probably born from the collective desire to keep the flame going (it came from the abyss, in any case). The age of dark is still full of greed, only the ones who followed the path of dragons transcend that greed.

>>712615447
Lifegems are incredibly slow to use, can be knocked out of, and stopped in its tracks. Humanity is immediate, full health, and can't get knocked out of. Then we have Rite of Kindling which brings it up to 20 estus flasks that also scale depending on the Fire keeper souls given. Rite of Kindling can be earned within ten minutes of the game if a player wants to.
We've never had a good healing system.

People bring up the game's movement as a critique pretty often but I never really see anyone talk about the sfx. The weapons all sound like shit. When the giga big enemies swing at you it makes a fucking cartoon whooshing noise. And some of the sfx are great like the torch or pretty much everything about the gutter. But the most crucial shit to get right has got to be the weapons, and they did just fucking awful there.

>>712615759
>sfx
honestly i dont think ive ever paid attention to any of that in any game. but i distinctly remember in des and ds1 the torch goes "tch.... tch tch..... tch" on repeat. not in ds2 and beyond, i dont think. but yeah, listening to the Berenike knight swing his mace sounded pretty good. but thats the only time i can think of

>>712586374
Being so assblasted by the deadzone (a non issue) is a telltale sign of Mauler Derangement Syndrome

>>712615719
You can just spam lifegems with relative ease though, and I'm just talking about the smallest ones. I've never even had the opportunity or need to use the big ones. Humanities are indeed overpowered IF you have them. Unless you're willing to farm rats in the depths, chances are you won't really have many on your person most of the time, so it's not really a viable replacement for the estus. I'm not gonna go into whether the system is good or bad, but saying that DS2 is the prime example for healing leaving you vulnerable is just outright false, because a viable alternative to it actually exists. Whether you choose to use said alternative or not is completely irrelevant to the argument.

>>712580808 (OP)
"loyalists"
Idk man, I also watched Matthewmatosis video and I agree with him, but vanilla DS2 is still not a bad video game at all.
Sure it's worse than 1 but it still has a lot of shit to play around with unlike the piece of shit that is 3 that forces you into r1+roll spam due to everyone being fast but you still being very slow.
Idk about scholar but it seems all the changes they made for it, made the game worse so maybe that's why you don't like 2.

>>712615719
>We've never had a good healing system.
True desu. Even the ds3/elden ring system is mediocre, it never feels good to give up healing flasks for FP. Not a real tradeoff.

>>712606849
The point is that most of the NPCs you meet have come to Drangleic from your timeline as well. Places like Lanafir and Melfia don't exist in the same time as the events of the game, they're from the future you also came from

>>712616085
I think we wouldhave to talk about whether the system is good or bad otherwise we can't really figure out what could have worked. Demon's Souls tried to balance healing with weight and failed, Dark Souls 1 used limited esttus but still gave us Rite of Kindling, and Dark Souls 2 tied healing to progression but undercut it with unlimited life gems. If Lifegems weren’t so plentiful, I think they’d actually be a solid idea. I also think it's important to consider the use of alternatives, since those shape how people actually play.
Doesn't matter, I'm tired, it's late, and I got work in the morning. Goodnight, fren.

>>712610028
that troon in general doesnt get (or intentionally ignores) why people dont like ds2 combat yet love ds1 which has even more mobs and more ambushes, TotG and bonewheels alone are worse than anything base DS2 throws at you yet no one hates the first game for it

THe main reason i like DS2 so much is because i started with DS3 andf didnt play DS1 yet. DS2 is more fantasy /adventure compared to the constant bleakness of DS3 which is bleak not only visually but in level design etc, more linear, a bit more lifeless but in a bad way, while also being rollspammy etc.

Also areas are nice, bunch of easy bosses with nice gimmicks like the rising water, chariot boss. areas you got the falling bridges, the castle with paintings and acid etc was mre video gamey

As for the stuff "people" complain about like ambushes, gangbangs, trolls, fighting the pursuer several times, the mages that shoot blue balls etc, i actually think these were good parts.

artistically it was quite weaker than DS1 overall but i like the videogamey simplicity so it still feels good. Beyond explanations, i just ENJOYED playing it through. its the cozy game of the souls series.

I think people dislike it becaus eof their expectations of it being a killer jawdropping game when it was simply a nice filler, kinda flet like a ps2 game in some way. I didnt have expectations so i just enjoyed it.

>>712615759
>mfw hitting those ballsack-goblins with a sword
>m fucking fw jumping on a wet floor

>>712617683
that troon probably puts every ds2 fanboy here to shame when it comes to pure devotion towards ds2

>>712580808 (OP)
why did they turn off the servers for this on ps360 but left Dark Souls 1 servers on?

>>712587656
>>712587868
>>712587874
who actually cares about this in the year of our lord 2025

>>712588515
>>712588885
You have bad taste

>>712589168
>understandable plot
>Nashandra told Vendrick that the giants with glory hole faces were about to attack, and Vendrick instantly in vaded them
What’s wrong with that?

>>712620568
Could you tell the class what your favorite part of the dark souls 2 lore is?

>>712615759
not just weak sound design, the sound in ds2 is technically broken and glitching cause they dont have enough sound channels and sounds interrupt eachouther, and it was never fixed, its inexcusable and yes it hurts the immersion and atmosphere

>>712598165
>Lost Izalith
It's pretty shit. Siegmeyer quest is good though. Farmable titanite demon is good. Atmosphere is good.
>Crystal CAVE (it's cave btw)
i.e. You got mad because you fell off an invisible walkway
>all of that
gif related
Ds1 second half holds up

>>712620625
No its 6 am im about to fall back asleep

>>712620775
It's alright. We all know that dark souls 2 lore is utter dogshit anyway.

>>712620869
its fine and the way it unfolds is fine, certainly not the reason to hate the game

>>712620869
Your bait worked. My favorite part is that its about people. You travel through a kingdom built by men and experience its downfall due to one guys arrogance that left him a shambling zombie. DS1 is about a weird recluse god that you never learn anything about and I literally don't even remember what DS3 was about. More gods or something idc. The time travel beta plot would have been 100x more interesting. Now im going to bed for real.

>>712580808 (OP)
It is simply the superior game

>>712621830
Why do we pretend that ds2 looks like shit again? The grey filter ds3 is so awful compared to the dynamic lighting of ds2.

>>712623606
Because that dynamic lighting is usually put over Blizzard tier designs
Whether that's better or worse than Bloodborne sloppy seconds is for you to decide

It's amazing how Fromsoft can shit out a 7/10 game like Dark Souls 2 and you'll still have this many people who make liking it their entire personality and will defend every terrible aspect of it.

>>712623927
People just like correcting people, especially if the people hating it clearly have never experienced the thing they are critiquing and are just mindlessly following some influencer

>>712594676
BASED

>>712580808 (OP)
I like Drangleic more than Lordran, it felt like a real adventure with the various zones and I enjoyed it more than 1, even if 1 is a tighter game.
Still I'd put any FS game over DS3, not out of any made up rivalry but because it just felt off. I've never been able to succinctly put it in writing but pretty much every single aspect of it dragged the whole thing down. I am of course very subjective here.

>>712590753
>Aldia escaped the curse by becoming part arch-tree
>You escape the curse by uniting all the crowns together
>The ending involves you and Aldia going on a journey helping other undead and trying to fix hollowing for good

No. Curses are about having your life force/existence being eaten away. This is a problem for all humans because their being is made up of two souls, a white soul and a dark soul. You cannot escape the curse because it is a core aspect of humanity.

Hollowing cannot be stopped, because all fire fades except the dark soul.

And no, Aldia did not become part arch-tree. Aldia is human, he isn't a giant.

>>712581168
DeS > DaS > DeS remake > DaS3 > NR > DaS2 > BB > ER

Sekiro is its own thing entirely.

>>712591721
That's more like a rib cage on his back than roots. The Pilgrim Butterflies have had the same effect.

>>712580808 (OP)
No, but people who claim that this game is bad are.

I played it for the first time after playing Kings Field 1-3, and I appreciated it more because of that. The things that people find annoying or unfair about the level design & enemy placement just felt like standard issue dungeon crawler chicanery to me

>>712592942
>The Hollowing is represented by roots of Dark while the Curse is Crystallized humanity
No, hollowing is just another way of saying your body vessel has hollowed out (lost its soul). But being hollowed is specifically on about losing your white soul while your vessel of a body is being powered by the dark soul.

>>712627909
>>712592942
>Curse is Crystallized humanity
I forgot to talk about this.

Interesting idea, but incorrect. Crystals are a different form of stone, which is why Seath infused his lower body with it because he's after the scales of immortality. There's some link between those crystals on his body and the Primordial Crystal, like there is between the Dark Sign fire circlet and the bonfires. Seath (as well as Oceiros) breathing curse mist is a mystery to me, and I have never seen anyone explain this ability from the pale drakes.

>>712621094
Weird way to say Drangleic has no personality and story beyond being the setpiece of Vendricks mediocre and borderline nonsensical marriage drama

>>712628939
No, Crystals are souls, Dark Souls 1 already states this, and sorcery is in itself the manipulation of Souls, like it was in Demon's Souls too

This is why those who get cursed turn into crystals in the real Dark Souls games (not the headcanon fanfic that is 2)

>>712627909
>No, hollowing is just another way of saying your body vessel has hollowed out (lost its soul). But being hollowed is specifically on about losing your white soul while your vessel of a body is being powered by the dark soul.
Nope, try again

>>712580808 (OP)
Yes.
DS2 is actual trash and widely considered to be the worst soulslike From ever produced. But some people just love feeling like a special snowflake with oh-so-unique tastes. See also: the actual braindead fucks who (pretend to) like Nioh.

>>712629380
>No, Crystals are souls, Dark Souls 1 already states this
You specifically said curse is crystallized humanity. That's incorrect. It's worth noting that humans have two souls in them, a white soul and a dark soul. The white soul crystallizing can work, and would explain why half your health locks off because souls are a concentration of life and crystallizing it stops its flow.

>>712629725
Gwyn isn't human dumbass, and in game dialogue goes out of its way to describe humans as hollows, not gods. What you fight at the end is the last remnant of Gwyn's original form. The rest of his power (soul) has been fused with the First Flame. In effect, Gwyn is now the bonfire, which we see manifest as the Lord of Cinder's final form.

>>712592457
DS2 has the best ending, you have shit taste

>>712630550
>You specifically said curse is crystallized humanity. That's incorrect
Nope, it's correct actually
This is why Crystals are the secret to Seath Immortality and Seath causes curse
>The white soul crystallizing can work
It is, I actually studied the lore of every game. I know it
>Gwyn isn't human dumbass
Because Hollowing has nothing to do with humanity, but the inherent lack of soul. And again you fail to draw the correct conclusions and make some headcanon about it. Hollowing is the inherent state of a being stripped of his soul, as seen with Undead Dragons whose souls have been removed to be used for research, but as they are eternal they live in a state of undeath

>>712630793
>Link the Fire or Walk Away again
>But there's also a talking tree at the Walk Away ending
Epic

We take the good with the bad and recognize how unreasonable all the hate was; especially with the shit 3 and Ring pull, yet you don't see people bitching about those as much.

>>712632461
It is perfectly reasonable to hate a shit game

>>712580808 (OP)
speaking for myself, NO. I genuinely like it, at first it was frustrating and I died more than 500 times during 1st run compared to around 10 in the first one, some locations had low quality assets and level design based on a dream structure which felt off at first but later I got to appreciate most of these stuff because I learned how to deal with enemies, how to allocate points (into ADP) etc. I immediately fell in love in the tone and atmosphere of the world, it was very different from dark souls 1 but different in a good way. I think story and lore is also superior, majula is the comfiest place in all of vidya and emerald herald is best waifu.

>>712580808 (OP)
>why do you like DS2 so much?
it was the first souls game I beat without a guide. That's it. It will always be my favorite because of that.

>>712632620
true, that's why I hate DS3

>>712632332
>Nope, it's correct actually
>This is why Crystals are the secret to Seath Immortality and Seath causes curse
You said humanity. There's no humanity on Seath

>>712632332
>Because Hollowing has nothing to do with humanity, but the inherent lack of soul. And again you fail to draw the correct conclusions and make some headcanon about it.
I know exactly what it means, but your comparison to Gwyn when the term hollowing in game is referring to humans going hollow AFTER becoming undead, which is powered by the dark soul. Do you understand the difference now. It's more than just a slight mechanical difference, there's in game propaganda and ignorance reinforcing it because it is an undesirable state (the white soul is gone but the body is animated by the dark soul).

>Hollowing is the inherent state of a being stripped of his soul, as seen with Undead Dragons whose souls have been removed to be used for research, but as they are eternal they live in a state of undeath
Dragons existed before souls existed. Those specific dragons are rotted, plus the dragons in DS1 do not drop unique souls, which should tell you everything about them being outside of life.

>>712580808 (OP)
I don't even think ds2 is that bad of the game. Its entertaining while its on and I like it more than Nioh. Its just that anyone that claims its better than ds1, ds3 or any other game in the series is either coping because its the first one they played so they feel loyalty to it or they're baiting

fuck i've been posting in the same thread for like 4 years now. Have we figured out if this game is shit or not yet?

>>712634160
Its not shit but its the worst game in the series except maybe the ds demake

>>712634335
>Worst game in the series
For me, that goes to Elden Ring
>Except maybe the Demon Souls remake
That doesn't exist (I command it).

>>712634565
You dont truly believe elden ring is a worse video game than dark souls 2.

>>712633681
>You said humanity. There's no humanity on Seath
Yes there is, Seath snatched women to research for immortality and the Primordial Crystal is the result of such research, the use of humanity as form of immortality
>Body powered by Dark Souls
There's no "Dark Souls" in hollows
They are hollows because they have no Dark Soul, which instead rekindles the Darksign, with the resulting overflowing roots of darkness from it. You still don't understand how hollowing works
>Dragons existed before souls existed. Those specific dragons are rotted
No, they are undead dragons, called undead dragons, and they have had their souls removed

>>712635243
>There's no "Dark Souls" in hollows
>They are hollows because they have no Dark Soul, which instead rekindles the Darksign, with the resulting overflowing roots of darkness from it. You still don't understand how hollowing works

Now you're talking nonsense. The dark soul is humanity, and it is that which powers the body when the white soul has gone.

>>712580808 (OP)
/v/ is a contrarian board.
Still, DS2 has lots going for it.

>>712581168
3 = 1 > ER > DS > 90% of souls clones > Literal feces > 2

>>712635706
>/v/ is a contrarian board
only if you're blind and can't read the code.

>>712635071
NTA but yeah, I do. Not like it's a "bad game". But i do not replay it. I say this as someone who made their own homebrew builds with 1-3 hrs of time and google docs for each build. Going over the map and all the items, creating hollistic builds that focus on one stat and get all the best items / upgrades at a fast pace. 400 hours in ER, plat trophy and holy fucking shit everything is so far away.

I actually replay 1-3 because it's a quick trip through hallways.

>>712635625
You didn't understand shit
They are hollows because they don't have humanity

>>712580808 (OP)
They have victim complexes.

>>712581168
BB > Sekiro > DS3 > Elden Ring > DS1 > DeS > DS2

When I went to drangleic castle there were no rain sfx. Was my shit bugged or is that just how the game is?

>>712636839
i'm pretty sure there's meant to be rain, yeah

>>712636574
>You didn't understand shit
>They are hollows because they don't have humanity
Then what animates hollows?

>>712600607
The results speak for themselves.

>>712603285
It has the worst replayability because who the fuck wants to go through that garbage twice?

>>712636951
Nothing because they are hollows, they have burned their humanity and now they are left as an husk

i fucking love dark souls. Give me more. MORE

>>712637609
>Nothing because they are hollows, they have burned their humanity and now they are left as an husk
Then why do they move anon?

>>712580808 (OP)
>>712580890
It was on PS3 for over a year before PC was available

I like the themes. Unlike these two >>712637976 >>712637609 fags, I acknowledge that the "story" of all of Dark Souls is brain poison written on a napkin. Nobody gives a shit about metaphysics of a soul or how many hollows you can fit on a tip of a crystal. The themes are the only thing of any value in DS games, and I like the theme of mortality and of the desire to escape fate that's present in 2.

>>712636452
The code is telling you /v/ agrees with GCJ and Resetera?

>>712608490
Weird how thoughtful posts like this get no replies.

>>712638379
>This response in a nutshell.

Sekiro > ds2 > er > das > ds1 > ds3

>>712637976
Holy shit you are massively retarded faggot
They are husks with little remains of drained out soul, luke Gwyn's soul being little remnants of his actual power.

I have been telling you since 5 posts that there's a metric fuckton of examples of undeads that are not hunan, that hollows are literally hollow, without soul inside.

The Curse of the Undead is just one way to lose your soul, due to the Darksign linking humanity to the fire, and rekindling their soul at each death for the price of humanity, and was created by Gwyn to push humans to link the Fire.
>>712638379
Retard

>>712608490
In what ways what it the most experimental?

>>712638670
What a weird order, I give you pionts for originality. Now go play BB.

>>712638937
It experimented by making a shit Souls game with no meaningful improvements and stale boss design

>>712580808 (OP)
DS2 is a very solid AA action rpg with a lot of content and equipment variety. It's just has the worst production value out of everything made by From.

>>712638812
I have already explained that Gwyn isn't human, so he isn't undead. In the Japanese text, undead is called immortality. How in the fuck is Gwyn the same as humans when he isn't immortal. This is the reason Gwyn feared humans, because no matter what the fuck he does, humanity wins in the end.

You're an absolute lorelet. Go and do some proper research right now because you're wasting my time.

>>712580808 (OP)
it's a kusoge game but the good kind

>>712639448
My God you are actually truly retarded

>>712639448
What he is saying is that hollows are being that lose their soul
Gwyn is hollow because it lost his soul when he linked the Fire

>>712639448
>undead is called immortality
They don't have a word for undead in Japanese?

>>712580808 (OP)
No. They are just people who liked the series for it being a hard, punishing and harsh game. Dark Souls 2 embraced the difficul game expectation from the series and cranked it up.

HP% loss on death that stacks.
Estus flask doesn't heal you instantly but more slowly.
Way less estus to begin with.
Way less base i-frames on rolls.
Weapon durability was actually a thing, your weapons could break during a run on a long map.
Way more enemies on the maps in general.
Maps that were really brutal like Shrine of Amana.
Removed the invincibility of animations like passing fogs, which made it more troublesome to completely ignore enemies.
Shields with 100% phys damage reduction were less common.

And the list goes on. After people cried about Dark Souls 2 being too hard, all of those things got removed from the series.

>>712580890
>>712613583
My first Soulslike was Sekiro, then Mortal Shell, then Dark Souls: Remastered, and only then Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin. My favourite is still Sekiro, but I consider DS2 to be a straight improvement over DS1 in basically every way. The starting area does a better job of introducing you to the game and its mechanics, the hub area is super comfy, the levels are more interesting and more varied, the enemies are more engaging, it has better fashion, better weapons, better upgrade system, better NPCs. The only thing that is not clearly better is the bosses.

>>712640581
>better NPCs
solaire and andre clear ds2's entire cast on their own

in 5 years we will look back on Dark Souls 2 more favorably because From is a multiplayer game developer now.

>>712583496
/thread

>>712639872
Yes, I've already explained that, but what that lorelet doesn't understand is that humans have two souls in them, with the white soul fading and the dark soul being left behind because it has the aspect of immortality. All other souls do not have this, which is why they all fade. You know how Gwyn gifted shards of his lord soul to Seath and the Four Kings? Basically all humans have been gifted shards of the dark soul by the Furtive Pygmy. Eventually, when the fire fades, so to do all others apart from the dark soul. This is what's left in human body vessels that powers them, nothing but a beast animating on its most primal instincts, the need to feed (hence all the themes of eating when talking about the dark). This is what is labelled as hollowing within the universe of Dark Souls. The people have been tricked into believing that 'hollowing' is a human curse, when it is in fact a gift. Gwyn tries to subvert this by recreating the advent of the first flame to flourish the world with life again(life, death and rebirth), but this recycling can only happen so many times because again, only humans are immortal. All other souls fade to nothing.

>>712640401
Absolutely, ds2 is the ultimate shitter filter even with shit like lifegems, zoomies cant help but rush into a multiple mob fight and then complain about being gangraped. Shrine of amana still invokes fear in shitters who tried to rollslop their way through it, and frigid outskirts alone is harder than the entirety of ds3's map

>>712640401
Which Dark Souls game you find hardest depends significantly on your play style. I played Dark Souls: Remastered, Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin, and Dark Souls III in that order. For me DS3 was clearly the hardest and DS2 the easiest, with DS1 in between. Though I understand that OG DS2 was significantly harder, with enemies being less spread out and more aggressive.

>>712640095
>They don't have a word for undead in Japanese?
I dunno, but it is likely it was changed for the Anglosphere because it sounds cooler.

>>712640581
>I consider DS2 to be a straight improvement over DS1 in basically every way

>>712593272
2 is bad from start to finish.

>>712640753
Solaire is a bro, but Lucatiel losing herself hit me harder than Solaire. Also, Aldia is the best NPC in the whole of Dark Souls. His monologues are geat. So I stand by what I said.

>>712580808 (OP)
Yall remember when this game almost ended vaati’s career? Sad to see

>>712640401
>>712641119
People will say shit like this as if the problem people have with ds2 is its difficulty. It is the easiest game in the series by far and I played it not levelling adp at all because I didn't know it increased i frames. The only boss that gave me any trouble was fume knight

>>712623927
holy projection you are the ones obssessed with shitting on it

>>712641185
I assumed it was changed because in English, 'immortality' has generally positive connotations, while 'undead' has more negative connotations, and they wanted to highlight that being one of them is not something to desire or envy.
Also undead means you died at least once, which every DS undead did, while immortality means you never die at all.

>>712640581
Everything about Dark Souls 2 is shitter Dark Souls. Worse setting, worse art direction, worse boss roster, worse moveset, worse story.
>>712641106
>that humans have two souls in them, with the white soul fading and the dark soul being left behind because it has the aspect of immortality.
No they don't. Humans go hollow when they have no humanity, which is why you can extract humanity from human npcs but not hollows. You clearly are completely confused.

>>712640401
this is the thing that i dont understand. dark souls 3 is way harder than DS2 and no one complains

>>712641818
>infinity i-frames on rolls
>estus heal you instantly
>dying doesn't have any penalty at all, not even turning your character ugly
>your character is so fast that it looks like a Ninja Gaiden game
>you cam spam OP weapon arts

Yeah, Dark Souls 3 was way harder...

>>712585512
0 estus
show the gameplay before the boss bro. that's part of the package.

>>712641735
Yeah, me too. There are faggots out there that think translations need to be 100% accurate, but they refuse to accept that different languages have different context for the same words.

>>712641119
Frigid Outskirts was truly peak. A massive area with poor visibility, infinite respawning enemies that were one of the strongest mobs of the game, with no bonfires at all and a hard duo boss at the end. And i say that unironically. For people that wanted a hard Dark Souls game, 2 was the perfect thing. Shame that it filtered the "hardcore gamers" who couldn't handle it after being humbled.

>>712638516
if you're implying /v/ always has to have opposite view from these places you are retarded. and if you can't discern genuine hate from shitposting you should probably lurk more.

>>712580808 (OP)
i dont think its the best but for many including me its their favorite, also my first souls game, played on x360

>>712642149
Between the ginormous attack hitboxes, the really fast movesets, and the absolutely godawful camera, I found myself getting my ass kicked way harder by both regular enemies and bosses in DS3 than in DS2. The hardest boss for me in DS2 was Darklurker, who took me 11 attempts. In DS3 Pontiff, Dancer, and Twin Princes all took around 15 attempts, while Nameless King took 24. Which game you find hardest is really dependent on playstyle.

>>712642446
Which brings me back to the question of 'doesn't Japan have a word for it'?
Surely they don't just call vampires and zombies and liches and skellys 'immortals' as a group name?

>>712580808 (OP)
DaS2 represents the last true souls game where the emphasis was on challenging gauntlet levels and exploration. Everything after put more and more emphasis onto rollslop boss rush spectacles with levels serving as empty filler to pad out the game.

This has now reached its natural conclusion with ER Nightreign, where it's literally just a boss rush mode with open "levels" that feel like they're randomly generated backdrops straight out of minecraft.

.

>>712580808 (OP)
Sir, I like all the games. They all got something they're good at.

i played darksouls prepare to die edition on my brothers xbox and slowly beat it with the usual sword and board + circle right and backstab method. I never got to do any pvp because my brother didnt have xbox live or whatever. I first played ds2 maybe 8 years later on my pc, and i continued the same sword and board style and had a lot of fun with it. I really enjoyed all the weapons and items you could get, it felt more like an rpg than ds1 did, and i think the game was developed with the slower sword and board style in mind, not using rolls very often, as they had a high stamina cost. Now that we've all had like 10 years to play the game, we can show the flaws in the combat by walking around enemies, but thats knowledge we didnt have when we first played, and playing like that can get punished very quickly if you make one mistake against mobs or bosses.

>>712645609
Exactly, that's what souls used to be all about. Keeping a calm nerve and slowly methodically making your way through challenge-oriented levels. Compare that to Elden Ring where you can pretty much mindlessly wander through every level or area, and even if there are any challenging bits, you can just navigate around them and bypass any challenge entirely. Even legacy dungeons that everyone jerks off, like Stormveil, don't actually provide much satisfying challenge. Sure, Stormveil is impressive in terms of its scale and how much to explore there is, but exploration and challenge are not the same. These large explorable levels in Elden Ring often just feel like you're going through a mental checklist, making sure you went down your list and explored all the side paths before fighting godrick, which you can access with a quick walk from the start of the level anyway. Compare that to older games where a first time player was fighting for survival and just making it to the boss fog in one piece was an accomplishment in and of itself.

>>712580808 (OP)
I think people might just like things you don't like, anon
free your mind from this bullshit

>>712641539
maybe not for you, but most people bitching about ds2 after playing it just got owned by it