So, I bypassed the entire Valley of Defilement, because I'd watched some of Breaking Brad, and fuck that place. My soul level was 78, so I figured I could just go kill Old King Allant and be done. And I did kill him after a few tries (funny thing: I was only able to beat him after I put away my shield and two-handed my Crescent Falchion - since blocking was pretty useless against him in most situations anyway). But no, it turned out I do have to get to the end of every world and beat every Archdemon to open up the path to the game's real end :-p Oh well, here's hoping I can breeze through the Valley, being pretty damn overleveled now.

Funny thing: I had not been grinding at all, and still my soul level was pretty much ideal for the challenge of Allant. I mean, no grinding above and beyond having to do bloodstain-runs and racking up extra souls every time I did that. And still I was at a pretty decent level for Allant while having bypassed an entire world. Maybe I just suck at the game and had to do more bloodstain-runs than most players, but it didn't feel like it :-)

Valley of Defilement only has only has one really bad part, and those are the swamps that compromise the second part of the area. Once you unlock the shortcut there it becomes a lot less painful but roaming around poisonous swamps in the dark looking for it, or looking to find any direction at all, is definitely not a lot of fun. Hug the edges of the map and you should be fine.

I didn't mind the Valley. I actually kind of liked it. I think the poison swamp mechanic actually fit the game really well. It's just a huge fuck you to the player. Especially when the meat cleaver phantom fucking wrecks your shit for the umpteenth time. Once you overcome, it's such a rush. This is what Souls is about!

Valley of Defilement is easily the worst area in the series, has a lot more to do with the giant rat ogres having bullshit hitboxes than the poison swamp and all of the bosses being jokes though. Actually the ending of the game isn't that great (stepping on a certain someone's head aside), if you just skip the Valley of Defilement entirely and just put the game on the shelf/make a new character you'll probably find that the game is more like a 9-9.5/10 instead of an 8/10-8.5/10, the zone is that bad.

I wish I could, but I can't. I have to reach the very end :-) I'm not a game completionist in the sense that I have to find every secret and 100% games, but I do need to see the end of the games I play. Like I said, I am hoping that being massively overlevelled will make it less painful. I'm at soul level 82 now, so. Gained 4 levels just from Old Allant!

Old King Allant is harder than the entire Valley of Defilement.

(Still, the giant club guys will wreck your shit. 2-handing is a good idea because they don't care about most/any shields. Warding also helps.)

OK, I just blew through 5-1 including the leech boss in barely 20 minutes. I think I'll be fine ;-) Yikes that old vendor lady has it in for Astraea.

Very happy that the Valley does not have the framerate issues that Blighttown has in Dark Souls.

@joques: Blighttown is generally much worse than Valley of Defilement because not only does it run like garbage but it's painfully dull looking in addition to the poison etc. VoD has this awesome atmosphere where it really does justice to the word "defilement." Everything looks filthy and rotten. I agree it's a pain in the ass to get through but man it really oozes style. Blighttown is just a shitty cave with ninjas and a swamp.

Similarly Tomb of the Giants is a really lackluster version of 4-1 Shrine of Storms. The moment you enter Shrine of Storms and see those manta rays floating everywhere it's really awesome. Not to mention how that entire area ends with a spectacular archdemon boss fight, with one of the coolest area-specific weapons in the entire series.

Yeah - I probably missed out on a lot of the grandeur and catharsis in that fight by simply soul ray-ing everything that moved ....

Ok, 5-2 was a breeze too, and Garl was super easy to kill with shield countering. I think I spent just a little over an hour on the whole Valley. Sure, just critical pathing it and not exploring, but I felt done with the game anyway. Loved the ending with the Old One!

World wise, it was my second favorite world. 5-2 is design to pretty much test your patience and perseverance to it's limits. It also has a really cool npc and an amazing boss encounter that sticks with you.

I would probably have enjoyed it more if I'd played it during the natural course of my playthrough. Instead of "OK, I've killed Allant, here comes the Old One! Oh shit, I have to plow through the Valley first?".

I will definitely take my time in my next playthrough. This time I went the easy route with a Royal and picked up the Crescent Falchion early, and focused on the Magic stat. Much like Brad. Want to go with a strength build next time - with maybe a few miracles.

5-2 is terrible on your first run--it's so huge and easy to get lost and murdered. Once you know exactly where to go, though (follow the wooden rubble), it's just an annoying thing you can just run straight through.

Now, if you happen to fall in that aborted baby swamp...

I ended up getting platinum very recently with my Dragon Bone Smasher strength character. Dat running R1

Nice! You can easily take down Garl with a bigass weapon (say, the dragon bone smasher for example) if you just bait his immensely long Bramd attacks. You haven't really missed much in 5-2 (and you chose the easier, more reasonable path in 5-3). There's a black phantom off the critical path you'll need to fight if you want a unique weapon, along with the Moonlight Greatsword after the first fog door.

I think.

I don't know what made you think you could just skip an entire level

@dprotp: So what is another, more unreasonable path in 5-3? :-)

The Valley of Defilement was not that bad, some of the hyperbole posted so far is pretty funny. The zone certainly produced some annoying moments but that's about it.