Dark Souls

Dark Souls is known as punishing, unforgiving and very challenging game. But it is also very rewarding and satisfying. It is tough, but fair (mostly). The game design, the level design, the inter connectivity of the world, is outstanding in every possible way. The story, yet very vague and cryptic, is more deep and emotional that you would have thought. Hidetaka Miyazaki's masterpiece is an unforgettable, memorable experience that every serious gamer should look for. For example, you pass hours, hours, trying to kill a certain boss, getting more and more frustrated. But the moment you land the final blow on this boss, you'll feel so happy, satisfied, proud of yourself, and the game will reward you for that. It has flaws for sure, but this is a complete, and unique gameplay experience. Try it someday. Or now, if you haven't already. It is a must-have for every gamer looking for a brilliant, unique experience, that you won't find anywhere else.

Having finished Dark Souls 2 and Dark Souls 3 spending a crazy amount of time (I still play them), I was hoping to see the HD remaster of the first Dark Souls on PS4, but realizing it's not gonna happen in the near future, I considered buying PS3 to play it. Am I happy I did it? Oh yes! More than happy! I can't find the words to express what a greatly constructed and smartly programmed game it is. The detailed enormous world here stands out as one of the most spectacularly designed ones ever with plenty of enemies/secret passages/traps, you name it, and a wide variety of weapons. The first installment delivers in spades everything we love about Dark Souls. This game is so addictive my sleepless nights have again begun. In a nutshell, if like myself you are crazy about Dark Souls 2 and 3, don't hesitate to buy an old console to play Dark Souls and Demon's souls.

Dark Souls. Unforgiving. Impossible. Brutal. Hardest video game ever made. Until you learn how to play ...

Before i attempted to play Dark Souls, i first finished its spiritual predecessor Demon's Souls. From this experience i learned not only the mechanics of the combat system but i learned how one should approach and play the game itself. You die. Often. And you cannot load some previously saved state just before you died. You "reincarnate" as do the minor enemies and you have to march back up that hill one more time. The trick is to learn how to gain from dying, and more importantly, how to spend your currency before you do die (and potentially fail to retrieve your blood stain). You literally can make suicide runs and pick up some great booty in the process, although you won't know to do so on your first run with your first character.

Dark Souls is controversial, no doubt about it. You either love it or you hate and i happen to love it (and my Chaos Scythe +5). While playing Dark Souls, i was distinctly reminded of many classic arcade, console and computer games that stood out: Atari 2600's Adventure and Dolphin, NES's Castlevania, Contra and Rygar, the Mario series, the Grand Theft Auto series, the Diablo and Baldur's Gate series and even the Sonic the Hedgehog series (mini speed-runs). Dark Souls is now one of my top games, along with GTA Vice City, Morrowind, Half Life, Thief 2, Might & Magic 5, Ultima 4, Super Mario World, Zelda (Ocarina of Time), Jade Empire, Assassin's Creed, Fallout 3 and Mass Effect. And i haven't even had the time to sign on and participate in online Player VS Player ... just do a Youtube search to see what i mean.

I think what makes Dark Souls so special and deserving of praise is in its replay value and the reward you gain for accomplishing what most would consider impossible. Every adversity is an opportunity to learn new combat styles and to adjust your strategy. If you get stuck in Blighttown and decide to backtrack it out of there for more supplies (because you were too impatient to get down there in the first place), you feel the relief when you see daylight again. You learn from this game. It just doesn't spoon feed you like most games do these days.

Patience is not a virtue in this game, it's a requirement for survival.

(p.s. I think the current speed run is around 55 minutes to solve the game, but you can expect to put in nearly 200 HOURS before triggering the end scene.)

This is a truly inspired game, it brings a breath of fresh air into a stale market and gives us something truly wonderful.

From start to finish it is simply riveting and it's challenging combat has you between fits of rage and despair to an ecstatic state of joy that no video game has done before (even it's predecessor Demon's Souls). The story, although perhaps not the most obvious nor linear is amazing if you can be bothered to look into it, and that is another point about the game, it requires your unwavering attention. If you play this game with the right mindset, it can be truly breathtaking.

And to people who say that it is 'overrated' or has 'artificial difficulty' all I can simply say is, you just went full retard.

It is certainly a factor in my opinion of Dark Souls that I'm not the type of person who easily gets angry at games. If you are easily frustrated or simply not willing to put in the attention this game deserves, just stop playing. This game has flaws, yes, but they are not the ones pointed out by so many of the negative reviews. THOSE flaws are non-existent and these people just quit the game before they even saw any real issues. It is perfectly fine to admit you are simply not compatible with this game, it is not fine to fault the game for this. Dark Souls is enchanting, it has kept my mind captive from the moment I picked it up. It is difficult but there are only a few specific moments I consider unfair. Blighttown's framerate has been fixed in the remaster and it honestly is not the hell I was led to believe, that had me full of dread as I descended through dark root. The world excites my curiosity and has me digging for information as desperately as a heroin addict, the combat is methodical, frantic, and tense and above all else no other game has matched the sense of wonder and accomplishment Dark Souls has given me. I pity the millions who will never play this game. I pity how they could never know how empty life is until Dark Souls comes along.