@Puflwiz said:

@kishinfoulux said:

Forgot to mention I'm really looking forward to EpicNameBro's take on all this. He always breaks things down in meticulous fashion.

This. ENB already says he is on the case, and if I trust anyone in the DaS community, it is him.

Lol. I have been waiting for this the minute I saw that there was going to be a DS2.

@Sanious: yehp im expecting the delay is just because hes makign another 1 hour discussion of the future of souls , possibly with some npc speech animating the entire time eheh

Well boo. ENB just said on Twitter he's having a "worldwide copyright block" on his video.

https://twitter.com/EpicNameBro/status/277688541788651520

That sucks. We could be watching right now it seems like. Hope everything gets sorted out.

well thats a black iron farkus

@kishinfoulux said:

Well boo. ENB just said on Twitter he's having a "worldwide copyright block" on his video.

https://twitter.com/EpicNameBro/status/277688541788651520

That sucks. We could be watching right now it seems like. Hope everything gets sorted out.

It's up in a limited version.

just noticed the gold hemmed robe of the mystery lady

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpS0HMzqnTQ&feature=g-subs-u

ENB's analysis. He makes a lot of good points, especially about the masked people.

@envane Gold Hemmed Robe? I didn't notice this anywhere in the trailer. If she was that would indicate one of the Sisters of Chaos.

@KingGiddra: its not the same looking tattered robe ,but the lay in the trailer does have a gold hem around her hood , its just some speculation.

@Fredchuckdave said:

Doesn't really matter where it's set, really the only design decision I care about is the removal of bosses like Four Kings and the addition of more bosses like Gwyn that get up in your face and wreck your shit.

Edit: Various things could be done to make PvP better but ultimately the playerbase is at fault for playing with generic lightning 2 hander havel mask builds and From can't stop the playerbase from being idiots, a very common trend in console games.

To be fair, a lot of those PvP issues have been addressed in patches. If you are still playing you'll probably see a lot fewer heavily armored dudes since they can no longer use shit like Havel's with no weight penalty (DWGR nerf).

@YOU_DIED said:

@Fredchuckdave said:

Doesn't really matter where it's set, really the only design decision I care about is the removal of bosses like Four Kings and the addition of more bosses like Gwyn that get up in your face and wreck your shit.

Edit: Various things could be done to make PvP better but ultimately the playerbase is at fault for playing with generic lightning 2 hander havel mask builds and From can't stop the playerbase from being idiots, a very common trend in console games.

To be fair, a lot of those PvP issues have been addressed in patches. If you are still playing you'll probably see a lot fewer heavily armored dudes since they can no longer use shit like Havel's with no weight penalty (DWGR nerf).

What part of the Four Kings was bad? That they continue to spawn until you get their life bar all the way down? The health they gain when they summon phantoms?

EDIT: They did add bosses like Gwyn in the DLC. Artorias and Manus were superior to Gwyn in every way. Even the Sanctuary Guardian was better than Gwyn.

@golguin: Four Kings is a gearcheck like maneater, you either have the dps and its super easy or you don't and you're fucked pretty much (I beat it on my first try ever since I had a pretty good setup on a blind run); not good design unless you're making an MMO and even then gearchecks are specious at best, I'd much rather have something like Kalecgos which shits on anyone and everyone that's not organized or skilled enough to pass it.

Gwyn is an excellent fight unless you cheese it (Iron Flesh earlier on for example), easily the best fight in the game and the only one comparable to Flamelurker from Demon's Souls.

@golguin: Four Kings is a gearcheck like maneater, you either have the dps and its super easy or you don't and you're fucked pretty much (I beat it on my first try ever since I had a pretty good setup on a blind run); not good design unless you're making an MMO and even then gearchecks are specious at best, I'd much rather have something like Kalecgos which shits on anyone and everyone that's not organized or skilled enough to pass it.

Gwyn is an excellent fight unless you cheese it (Iron Flesh earlier on for example), easily the best fight in the game and the only one comparable to Flamelurker from Demon's Souls.

Part 2 of ENB's thoughts here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rh9auqHz2U0&feature=plcp

Regarding both of the videos. I agree on most of his points such as having the story be a puzzle in it's own right, the possibility of a separate Singleplayer and Multiplayer mode killing half of the fun of the game, and you not being able to roleplay and create your own character being terrible.

Although I am going to gloat about the fact I guessed that the game was going to be a prequel and ENB agrees (Just throwing that out there).

I need to see more of what this new director is going to do before I decide to be angry or rejoice. I am a bit scared and worried though.

My primary question is, why is there a "2?" I thought Dark Souls was the second game, and Demon's Souls was the first? Why are they changing the naming conventions?

@Sticky_Pennies said:

My primary question is, why is there a "2?" I thought Dark Souls was the second game, and Demon's Souls was the first? Why are they changing the naming conventions?

Demon's Souls is owned by Sony.

Dark Souls is not.

Hence, while they COULD be really cool guys and call it something else, they have an established franchise now.

I'd like it if they went back to the Demon's style hub world. I didn't care for the way they scattered the merchants around in Dark Souls. Kinda tedious.

@rebgav said:

@Terramagi said:

@Sticky_Pennies said:

My primary question is, why is there a "2?" I thought Dark Souls was the second game, and Demon's Souls was the first? Why are they changing the naming conventions?

Demon's Souls is owned by Sony.

Dark Souls is not.

Hence, while they COULD be really cool guys and call it something else, they have an established franchise now.

It seems as though it's set in the same world as Dark Souls though, so maybe it's an appropriate title.

Apparently so, set in the same world, just different areas/kingdoms from what the interview suggested. Seems a lot easier than coming up with a whole new Souls lore, considering the work they put behind the games.

As for discussion...heres hoping for 3 things. Better dual wielding, more ranged options/viability and no backstabs in PvP (or at least a system to resist/counter). I know backstabs in PvP are a huge issue that divide the community but I still feel that a straight up duel is far more entertaining than a strafe dance followed by 1 lame animation that wins the fight.

Backstabs will never be fixed without outright removing them, which I kind of personally don't want. Does it suck to die in one hit? Yeah. But that's kind of what made PvP tense. It was a game of patience between you and your opponent to see who could take advantage of a hole in your opponent's movement and attacks first. Until they lag backstab you.

Removing PvP backstabs would also remove being backstabbed by enemies in the game, which is just one of the many dickish things that makes ____ Souls a ____ Souls game. If anything, they could reduce the hitbox of the backstab area so you can't be backstabbed from the side. But that's about it.

@Morbid_Coffee said:

Backstabs will never be fixed without outright removing them, which I kind of personally don't want. Does it suck to die in one hit? Yeah. But that's kind of what made PvP tense. It was a game of patience between you and your opponent to see who could take advantage of a hole in your opponent's movement and attacks first. Until they lag backstab you.

Removing PvP backstabs would also remove being backstabbed by enemies in the game, which is just one of the many dickish things that makes ____ Souls a ____ Souls game. If anything, they could reduce the hitbox of the backstab area so you can't be backstabbed from the side. But that's about it.

I enjoyed PVP matches that didn't involve the BS dance, but that came out of natural openings when someone used a strike that had could be punished like the majority of heavy weapons. The best PVP matches were Parry/Riposte matches and it is a far better mechanic than the BS because of the huge risk you are taking in predicting the attack of your opponent. It was such a rush to fight for about a minute and get a sense for the other guy's attack pattern and land the parry/riposte on the first attempt. It was through learning the parry/riposte system that I became aware of my own fighting patterns and used that knowledge to set up a feint attack.

I knew it was going to be a good match when me and my opponent would parry at the same time and roll away.

Edge Scans

Gallery

I really wanted to like Dark Souls but i couldn't find a reason to, it felt mainly like an open world single player wow raid.

The only purpose was killing time-consuming trash and "bosses" to get items. The plot was minimalistic in game and for a PC-game I felt like the combat system lacked. I never saw a real reason to play this instead of modded skyrim or wow if I just wanted to go in,kill shit and get loot.

I hope that they actually get rid of the DRM that made it unplayable in my country without getting it cracked, make a combat system that fells good on PC and maybe just fucking maybe add a bit of "on the side" lore and some good graphics.

This games felt like a game I should enjoy greatly and sink hundreds of hours into when i heard the concept and than I only played maybe 10 before becoming sad :( Really hope 2 manages to redeem the series for me because I really try to fucking like those games !

@Aterons: Eeeeer, it seems you have a case of "not for you" I don't agree with a single point you are making and I can guarantee you that DkS2 will be in the same vein. It's not going to be "fixed" because it wasn't broken.

@Aterons said:

I really wanted to like Dark Souls but i couldn't find a reason to, it felt mainly like an open world single player wow raid.

The only purpose was killing time-consuming trash and "bosses" to get items. The plot was minimalistic in game and for a PC-game I felt like the combat system lacked. I never saw a real reason to play this instead of modded skyrim or wow if I just wanted to go in,kill shit and get loot.

I hope that they actually get rid of the DRM that made it unplayable in my country without getting it cracked, make a combat system that fells good on PC and maybe just fucking maybe add a bit of "on the side" lore and some good graphics.

This games felt like a game I should enjoy greatly and sink hundreds of hours into when i heard the concept and than I only played maybe 10 before becoming sad :( Really hope 2 manages to redeem the series for me because I really try to fucking like those games !

Uh...did you play the same game as everyone else? For one thing, you don't kill enemy for loot. How far in did you actually get?

Honestly, I couldn't care less what the story is, as long as they keep the "Fuck you, player" design.

@Aterons said:

I really wanted to like Dark Souls but i couldn't find a reason to, it felt mainly like an open world single player wow raid.

The only purpose was killing time-consuming trash and "bosses" to get items. The plot was minimalistic in game and for a PC-game I felt like the combat system lacked. I never saw a real reason to play this instead of modded skyrim or wow if I just wanted to go in,kill shit and get loot.

I hope that they actually get rid of the DRM that made it unplayable in my country without getting it cracked, make a combat system that fells good on PC and maybe just fucking maybe add a bit of "on the side" lore and some good graphics.

This games felt like a game I should enjoy greatly and sink hundreds of hours into when i heard the concept and than I only played maybe 10 before becoming sad :( Really hope 2 manages to redeem the series for me because I really try to fucking like those games !

I don't even know where to start. I'll just say play it again?

Another thing I'm sure others have brought up is the non-linearity of time in the Dark Souls universe, right? Like some stuff is happening concurrently even though events of Dark Souls are chronologically after the resolution of those events. Isn't that kind of what's happening with the NPC invasions?

So, yeah. Even if they set it in an earlier time, they're under no obligation to remain faithful to how those events played out in the first game.

I would love it if we could see Exactly how shit hit the fan with Gwyn's rule, and Anor Londo in it's prime would be sweet!

@rebgav said:

@MuttersomeTaxicab said:

Another thing I'm sure others have brought up is the non-linearity of time in the Dark Souls universe, right? Like some stuff is happening concurrently even though events of Dark Souls are chronologically after the resolution of those events. Isn't that kind of what's happening with the NPC invasions?

So, yeah. Even if they set it in an earlier time, they're under no obligation to remain faithful to how those events played out in the first game.

I would hope that they're obligated to commit to the events of the first game and the key points of lore which set up the world state for that game. All of the "heroes adrift in time" stuff was just the janky lore justification for the pvp mechanics, I don't remember it having any bearing on the actual events of the game. The dlc is predicated on you travelling back in time and experiencing events prior to the main setting so time must progress in a linear fashion up to a certain point.

The new game is likely set in a different time and a different place, at least far enough from the original game's setting to make the events of that game irrelevant to the new game. There is no reason to revisit the characters or places from Dark Souls unless it's to show the gods in their prime, being badass at a great distance. Even that would just be fan service of a sort.

Well, yeah. I imagine the stuff about the Age of Fire and Seath's betrayal of the everlasting dragons, etc. etc. etc. would all be considered as real parts of the world in which Dark Souls II takes place. I guess it depends on whether FROM is convinced that it's their lore that's the most compelling or the characters. I'd love to learn more about Lautrec, for example, or Petrus, but unless they were really paying close attention, I imagine most players didn't even realize that there were character arcs for the random NPCs. Judging from the way the first game was built, I imagine the characters are largely secondary, so the likelihood is higher that I'll see Carim, rather than hang out with Lautrec.

Though, who knows? The way they folded the DLC into the original game also happened to flesh Dusk out a bit more.

I want the next Dark Souls game to be as different as Dark Souls was from Demon Souls, to have PC be the lead platform, and for the overall interface, UI, menus & all the caveats that go along with that to be cleaned up. Basically I want Dark Souls 2 to be to Saints Row The Third that Darks Souls was to Saints Row II.

Also borrow more aspects from Western RPGs, less from Monster Hunter. Which was already a trend in Dark Souls from Demon Souls.

Hope they do something to prevent me from defaulting to spears and poking weapons. Demon’s/Dark Souls and a combined 300hrs with those is quite enough.

Having said that, I just hope they make more oppressive, terrible places to visit, and some nice palate cleansers like Anor Londo as well.

@rebgav said:

@MuttersomeTaxicab: Those NPCS had their arcs though, you've already seen just about all of the interesting aspects of their character play out over the course of the first game. To go back to those characters and fill in the details would rob them of their mystique. I think that Lautrec, for example, is a great Souls game character - an unpredictable and dangerous guy with hints of malevolence about him, who gives with one hand and takes with the other. I think that his character would be severely diminished if you were privy to his backstory, his motivations, and the sequence of events which put him in the cell at the start of Dark Souls. Those mundane details would add nothing to the interactions that you have with him. The titbits of information that you get from his gear are enough to suggest some context without explicitly stating anything about Lautrec himself, which is how I like these characters to be handled. The Souls games are usually pretty good about withholding all of the information that you think you want and instead giving you just the bits that you need to make some sense of the characters.

Yeah, don't get me wrong, part of what I love about the characters is how obtuse they all are. It's not a souls game if every goddamn NPC doesn't laugh inscrutibly at the most inappropriate moments. As much as I kind of want to figure out why Petrus or Lautrec did what they did in Dark Souls, part of what keeps that game interesting for me is that mystique. To have those stories fully surfaced would run counter to the world and mood that From seems to have built.