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I sit here right now with an oil lamp, a stiff drink (actually it’s just an Arizona Arnold Palmer, who may or may not be sponsoring this blog now – they’re not), and my thoughts. The snow has been falling for a day now and at last check we had a foot outside and I’m trapped; so what better way to spend what are, more than likely, my final hours before I’m overtaken by a wintry demon than writing this weekly blog. I’m expecting Dennis Quaid to show up at the door at any second to save me… a man can hope.

It is also fitting that my topic for this week is the Souls series. You are alone; trapped in a place where the only people who can help you will most likely just dance around like idiots while a giant boss strikes you down with his own arm. I’m not sure how long I have before the snow consumes me so I may as well hurry and get to the games.

1. Dark Souls II: Crown of the Sunken King

THOUGHTS: There was always a criticism of Dark Souls 2 that it was too easy when compared to the previous entries in the series. My play time of the base game was 164 hours which involved me beating the game twice and running through a few other bosses on the third before putting it down for a bit. I loved the game but just as I did with the original Dark Souls I really had no intention of going back and playing any of the DLC but then I started doing this blog series and used the theme of “Things I Love in Gaming” for February and I had to talk about the Souls series. I didn’t want to just talk about what I have already played of DS2 because I was going to be doing that with Demon’s and Dark Souls so I went ahead and picked up the first piece of DLC, Crown of the Sunken King.

It took around 6 hours for my initial run through and I can say that while some of the enemies were tough I didn’t feel like it was any more difficult that I found some sections in the main game. One of the few things that I had read about Crown of the Sunken King before playing it was that it was supposed to be harder than Dark Souls 2 to appease the players who found it easier but I never got that feeling. I love the opening area with a cavernous area that looks like it could have been pulled out of an Uncharted game or an Indiana Jones movie. The toughest enemies to deal with were ones that were already in Dark Souls 2, those damn poison statues, and the bosses were a bit disappointing with the exception of the final boss which I thought was pretty cool.

VERDICT: The reason that I don’t play much DLC, especially in a game that I enjoyed, is because I don’t want to be disappointed. Dark Souls 2: Crown of the Sunken King is fair and seems like an extension of the main game but doesn’t do anything to stand out.

2. Dark Souls

THOUGHTS: The only thing I can think about when when the original Dark Souls comes to mind is how much I love it. I picked it up after not enjoying Demon’s Souls when it initially released which I will talk about in a minute but I was standing in a GameStop needing something to play because I had exhausted all of my currently owned games and there was a force that pulled me in the direction of Dark Souls; actually, that’s a lie, it was the Quick Look with Rorie, Brad, and Vinny that convinced me to give the series another chance. I’m a huge RPG fan and thought that it looked like a lot of fun so I plopped down 60 bucks and took it home.

I didn’t have the same issues with Dark Souls that I did with the previous entry for some reason. It came to me. I realized the way that I need to play it to have some fun and almost immediately I was hooked. I spent almost 200 hours without playing any of the DLC doing every possible thing that I could do and loved every single second of it. I had 3 characters with my highest level being a 365… I absorbed every bit of content that Giant Bomb put out about it and was happy to see them giving so much time to a game that so many people didn’t understand. This is one of my favorite games of all-time.

VERDICT: Play this game. It’s incredible.

3. Demon’s Souls

THOUGHTS: Extremely frustrating. That’s how I can describe my first few hours with Demon’s Souls. I had no idea what I was doing and was too stubborn to check online to find a guide to help me out. I had been playing video games for nearly 20 years so I didn’t need someone else to tell me how to play a game; I could figure it out on my own. Then I didn’t. I turned the game off and didn’t play it for nearly three years after I finished Dark Souls. I decided to go back and give it another shot after I had traveled so far down the rabbit hole and came out on the other side with the knowledge needed to play the Series effectively.

The second time around was a whole different experience. I played for 60 hours and completed 1.5 playthroughs before putting it away and feeling a sense of pride that I hadn’t given up completely and found out that sometimes you just need a little guidance even if it from your future self (everything is like the Terminator) to overcome what can seem to be an insurmountable challenge.

VERDICT: It is a bit more archaic now than the games that followed it but you will still feel a great amount of accomplishment when you see the credits roll.

THE WEEK AHEAD

As we move into the final week of February and I prepare to end my theme I saved my biggest gaming love for last. RPG’s. Whether it Zelda, Final Fantasy, or Fallout… I have always loved them. There are a couple of games that I will mention here that I will give a more in-depth analysis of when I release my Top 10 Favorite Games list in a few weeks but there are a couple that I plan to spend a little time with in the coming week.

• Majora’s Mask 3D
• Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
• Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions

OPINION TIME

Two weeks in a row I had a negative topic to discuss for this section and I wanted to find something to talk about this time that was a bit more positive and I found it when I turned on some YouTube videos that were heaping praise onto Darkest Dungeon. I haven’t had a chance to purchase it yet but I plan to and I wanted to get a few opinions, including the GB Unfinished, that would hopefully tell me if the game was good or not and I could only really find a ton of people who had nothing but great things to say about it. Seeing this much positivity coming from the gaming community is a awesome and it is really cool to see a game make people feel good. I know the subject matter of Darkest Dungeon is, well, dark but still I would much rather see people come together and share an opinion about something so positive than all the hate and vitriol that we have come to expect.

COMMENT REQUEST OF THE WEEK

Have you played any game in the Souls series and given up? If so, why?

STEAM KEY GIVEAWAY!!!!

I appreciate every single person who has viewed and/or commented on this series since I started it and to show that, I have a bunch of duplicate Steam keys that I have no use for; therefore, the reader chosen by me who gives the best response to the comment request of the week will receive a Steam key for Papers, Please.

Thank you all so much for the support; it makes me want to keep it up. So, have an incredible week everyone and have a Happy Monday Duders!!!!