UPDATE: The game is out, and it appears to be heavily broken, if not universally busted for everyone.

Last I checked Darksiders 2 was sitting on completely negative reviews with multiple users stating it crashes at the very outset of the game. Apparently even when it does run none of the jankiness from the past had been addressed and no extra graphical options had been added. What is also a little weird is that Steam owners of the franchise pack are eligible to receive the upgrade to the re-master for free - so if you own that you should head up to the Steam store and nab it - but people that own both games and all the DLC have to pay to upgrade, although they do get a significant 80% discount. Some are obviously not happy with that, especially given the sorry state of the release, not counting the constant crashing.

Below I described recently installing the PC version of the original Darksiders 2 release which I considered to not only run awkwardly but also not look that great, not to mention that it would hard lock my entire PC if v-sync was not enabled. A lot of people posted saying that it ran wonderfully for them and it was a phenomenal port, which left me feeling like I was crazy. So I dug around Google and sure enough there were plenty of gaming websites stating what a terrible port the original was. I had to install a Skyrim 60hz fix to get the framerate and V-sync to even work properly.

Original thread:

So Darksiders 2 got a remastered edition sort of deal going on for the new consoles. That in of itself is nothing weird, but it was also announced that the uprezzed game will be coming to PC as well.

While waiting for Fallout 4 and Tomb Raider to be released I recently realized that I own Darksiders 2 on PC from some Steam thing a long time ago. Perfect, something to tide me over until those shiny new games are out and it theoretically should look as good as an HD remake on the new consoles. Well first of all it started to freeze my entire machine at random. This was apparently fixed by turning on V-sync, go figure, PC gaming and all. Second, for a pretty old game that uses stylized art rather than hi-res textures it runs pretty poorly on a PC that could easily handle the Witcher 3 on high settings. What struck me as most perplexing is how poor it looked. PC ports vary in quality but the Saints Row games, also put out by THQ, were usually pretty good. Not only does Darksiders 2 look pretty bad for a 2013 release but all the menus seem clunky as hell even on a gamepad which I assume they were designed for. This was all kind of surprising as here I somewhat smugly thought that I'll be able to play the "HD" version ahead of time by simply booting up the original PC release but that seems to not be the case.

For those of you that played this when it originally came out - was this your experience as well? The whole game just looks grungy as hell. Am I just spoiled by the Witchers and Metal Gears of current day?

Also is this kinda scummy of them to release an "HD" version on PC like this? I'm inclined to say no because they had to make the new textures and work them into the existing game.. but at the same time.. I dunno. Seems like something that could have been patched in, especially since the old PC version appeared to be quite buggy for a number of people.

Ah, interesting, Never played Darksiders 2 so I might get this one.

But yeah these sort of "remasters" are always a bit scummy on PC, but who knows, maybe they'll go the "honorable" way and give it for free for existing Darksiders 2 owners

Maybe these few years have fogged up my memory, but I remember Darksiders 2 looking good even on PS3. Not constantly, mind, but some of the landscapes were quite nice, I thought. Jesper Kyd's brilliant music added to that some, though. It was certainly better than the first Darksiders. I was rarely bothered by a console game's poor performance or visuals, but that one looked soooo jagged and also didn't run that great at times, that I was really bothered by the performance. Luckily the game itself was pretty good, so I ended up enjoying it.

In regards to that, I think I was also one of the few people who liked two better than one. At least that's how I seem to remember people reacting around the time of it's release. That said, I didn't like it enough that I'd buy this re-release to play it. Not for a full price at least. Maybe if it's under ten euros during some Xmas Sale, I'll consider.

Don't know about the scummy part. I guess same thing was pulled with Scholar of the First Sin version of Dark Souls 2? Though I believe that had some sort of discount thingy for people who already owned Dark Souls 2?

What? I played Darksiders 2 on my old PC that likely would have run Witcher 3 at 5fps on low settings if at all and it looked and performed just fine. Never had a single issue with it. Are you getting issues right out of the gate? I've been meaning to play both games again; I'll download it now and see how it runs now on this PC.

I played Darksiders 2 with a 7770. It looked crystal clear, I had zero crashes, and there wasn't a single dropped frame. This doesn't make it a great port - your options are basically just vsync and resolution - but your experience with it wasn't common.

I am still kinda weirded out that 1 isn't included

Yup! Without one no sale! We want to good one!

Loaded it up on the new PC and zero issues, so no idea what's going on with your game.

@gunslingerpanda: I don't know, it doesn't run poorly, I think it's a steady 30fps but it just looks subpar.

EDIT: now it sounds like I'm contradicting myself. It's hard to explain. I don't think I'm dropping frames or anything like that but the gameplay just doesn't seem smooth. Maybe that's just the way the game is and I have to get used to it.

Your PC can handle Witcher 3 on high but you're only running Darksiders 2 at 30 FPS? Something doesn't sound right about that.

You should definitely be getting more than 30fps, though.

Unless it also includes the first darksiders I'm not really interested

lol darksiders 2 does absolutely everything better than 1 (not that 1 is a bad game by any means)

this is good news since the pc version of 2 is.....okay, but not great.

Darksiders 2 ran great on my PC when it was new. Only problem was that the game itself lost my interest once I got past the first area.

I'm with all the people saying that the game looked and ran fine for me. Maybe it's some weird driver issue or something?

That said, game was suuuuper boring. I liked the first Darksiders a lot for what it was: a Zelda clone. I felt like the sequel maybe tried to go a little too "open-world" with it. Too bland, not memorable.

Hey, maybe they'll add in an actual ending this time?

Runs fine on my pc, it ran like shit on 360 and i could never finish it because it crashed every 10 minutes. I made it pretty close to the end to but just couldn't deal with that anymore, so i bought on pc like last year or something but only got like a couple hours in and never went back to it. Ran at a smooth 60fps for me and looked pretty good with some sweetfx.

@gunslingerpanda: I'll just blame it on ATI as usual. Whenever I had problems with PC games in the past it was always due to having a radeon rather than a nvidia card. Everyone says it looked fine for them so yah, maybe it is something to do with drivers. Checked mine out and they're the latest I can get so who knows. I asked some people I know on Twitter and some of them had issues as well and Steam forums for the game indicate that people had problems also but I guess those were all people from the minority. This is partly why I don't really game on PC much anymore. You can have a good PC and everything but if something about your particular setup doesn't agree with the game then you're out of luck, cause apparently no one else has issues so you're on your own.

That aside, I can't help but feel weird about a PC release getting a "remastered" version just 2 years after it's been out. Consoles I get, it's a whole process, but for PC it feels weird.

EDIT: Actually I looked around and apparently I wasn't the only one to have issues according to these benchmark tests. Their complaints of low resolution textures and whatnot mirror my own. LINK

Man, I really like these games and I'm concerned they're going to use this remaster's success or failure as a metric for gauging interest in a potential Darksiders 3. I think this remaster is coming out at a bad time. Right in middle of the most crowded season and just a few weeks before Xbox One has backwards compatibility available for everybody. Even if this game isn't on that list, the idea of backwards compatibility probably doesn't help a remaster sell very well.

I don't know. I wouldn't mind playing this, but I do not have the time for it now. Hopefully it does well. I want Darksiders 3.

? It ran fine on my Radeon 7950 when i had it, actually haven't tried it on my nvidia card i don't think. Textures are definitely not the highest resolution though

@hatking: As much as I honestly don't care about this franchise I like the idea of having 4 games with each of the horseman. It's a really cool idea, even if the games are sort of hit or miss with me. Not sure how the first two sold but I'm sure they could find an audience for another one of these if they modernized it a bit.

I remember it running at 60fps on my Geforce GTX 660 back when it came out, but it did suffer from some microstutters. Weirdly enough, what fixed it for me at the time was using a d3d9.dll file which was originally meant to be a stutter fix for Skyrim, in conjunction with forcing V-Sync from the Nvidia control panel. Looking at the PC Gaming Wiki just now, they claim this still works, but strangely there's no download link.

Pretty sure this file on the Nexus was the .dll file I used.

Also, I've seen lots of people reporting that limiting the max pre-rendered frames to 1 in the control panel helps.

Darksiders 2 was an excellent PC port. Zero issues. It ran at 60 and without much effort on middling hardware at the time.

Well the PC version is out, and owners of the franchise pack can grab the limited time free upgrade to the Deathinitive edition but should probably hold off on actually installing it.

I got it for free. I remember Darksiders 2 ran choppy when I first installed it, maybe last year or so, but I found a steam thread where a user posted a download link to some file that apparently fixes it, and it did! I'll try and find it again now.

Edit: Here it is - https://steamcommunity.com/app/50650/discussions/0/864957183143623061/

^ After installing that everything ran so smooth and great.

I bought it quickly without looking at the reviews. Loved the game originally and thought this was a good excuse to play it again. Too bad.

My controller wouldn't pick up at all. And then I changed a couple of things in the options and the game just crashes. First game I've asked for a refund... wonder how that works.

So, forget the PC version (which I found subpar originally)...how is the PS4/Xbox One versions?