What Games are you playing 2016?

[DjinnAndTonic]

So... I have almost zero interest in Dark Souls, but I like reading Scar's posts because his bewilderment about the game is charming (and Scar's a bro). I am intrigued by the idea of Berserk's Behelit in a video game because I think that's a cool plot macguffin that hasn't been overdone and I could stand to see it used in a new media form. Tell me more about its role in Dark Souls?

[jsh357]

So... I have almost zero interest in Dark Souls, but I like reading Scar's posts because his bewilderment about the game is charming (and Scar's a bro). I am intrigued by the idea of Berserk's Behelit in a video game because I think that's a cool plot macguffin that hasn't been overdone and I could stand to see it used in a new media form. Tell me more about its role in Dark Souls?

Eye orbs are the items you use to essentially become a dark spirit and invade other people's games. Typically you either do this to get more souls our to restore your humanity, depending on the game. The real reason, of course, is because you feel like it and are giving in to a violent urge beyond your control.

The souls serious has a metric ton of berserk references. The head designer is a big fan.

[Captain K]

Beat Bort and then discovered this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DK3YhdOv0oI

Then I hit some guy in his 50 testicles but he called his buddies to curbstomp me.

[Grefter]

DS3 - STill in cathedral.  Still in the rafters.  Went through it on my brothers game.  Easy as.  Go through it on mine.

Berserk in 10 minutes.  Shit that was easy on his game is just full fucked on mine.  FYI apparently crossbow fuck face has some seeking on his shots so just side stepping isn't enough.

Of course that knocked me off the edge and made me ragequit for a day.

[Twilkitri]

Gray Matter - played through

Fairly decent. A few times there wasn't enough guidance provided as to what else the game was expecting me to do and I had to wander around trying to find whatever flag I was missing, which was annoying.

The use of magic tricks was interesting but ultimately I think it fell fairly flat, given that you a) got a prompt that you were going to need to use a trick rather than needing to realise this naturally, b) had to select a trick from the book where the vast majority of the time only one of them matched the context you were in, and even if you selected another one it the game would just reject it and ask you to select another, and c) the actual performance of the trick simply involved copying out the instructions in the book into the list of steps. That said, I'm not sure offhand what a good way of going about it would be.

I missed a few bonus points in the final chapter (related to talking to a number of people before looking at a newspaper...), but as far as I can tell the bonus points don't actually do anything for you in the physical version of the game so I'm not particularly broken up about that.

As far as I can see, a sequel to Gray Matter was passed up in favour of Moebius which I've heard only bad things about. If that sequel ever does end up being made I'd be interested in playing it.



Fairune - played through

Mostly pleasant. Until the final boss, which is done in a completely different genre. To be fair, the combat from the rest of the game wouldn't have been a good fit, but there must have been a better solution than that.

Pretty much every secret pathway in the game is required for progress, which I don't feel works in its favour. Some of them are reasonably obvious but not all of them.

To anyone playing it in the future: Always pick the statue back up.

[Fudozukushi]

Dark Souls 3: Midlogue of the Epilogue: First order o new business was finally getting around to finding the corpse somewhere in Irithyll.  Was in the waterway right before the art room.  Dropped ashes, so yay?  Back at Firelink, I used knowledge brought to me by a stream to find the crows on top of Firelink.  There's also an estus shard and the silver serpent ring ugh.  Turning in the ashes; brought a bunch of stuff into stock.  Including the washing pole and a bunch of Lothric Knight gear.  There's also that green blossom with a weird quote on it and... wait, Pit of Hollows is a real place.

I go and check, nothing.  Well, maybe above?  I wanna check giant pal while I'm at it.  Yep, another summon sign right before the CRGW boss door.  NPC quest complete?  Pure accident all the way through.  Plus another covenant.  I go check where an NPC used to be and find not a surprise.  Then I go check up on the pal and get the hawk ring.  Weird.

Back at Firelink I get a loyal knight!  Maybe someone will have a happy end after all.  Nice new armor set for sale to wear on my next venture.

Go back to the Catacombs to find what I missed earlier.  Turns out my new spear wrecks the boneheads damn hard.  Their damage has also been reduced to nubbins for some reason and my armor's kind paltry...  Whatever!  Find stuff, loot stuff.  Didn't see this upper area before and...  wait, this is a nearly identical copy of a room over in smouldering lake.  What the hell?  Also I destroy the big balls of fun somehow...  And get another estus upgrade.  13 +10 estus oh boy!  (There were some ashes too but I don't think they did anything).

Since I'm so close, I go and farm a dark sword.  It's pretty neat!  I go test it out, and a couple other things, on enemies outside Firelink.  Find some loot I missed earlier and... ugh...  Yep, really should have expected that...

Time to start making inroads against the last part of the Grand Archives.  My spear lets me really thrash the Lothric Knights, it's great.  The Winged Knights were a huge pain but gave me a titanite slab for vanquishing them.  I bonfire up to get ready for the three dudes at the start of the run and... spot a bloody elevator that goes straight to the archives bonfire.  God dammit.  Anyway, fight those three, kill those three because my spear rules.  New weapon!  Dual-katana.  Let's upgrade you!

And now the miracle trainer is missing.  Lovely.  I've been buying spells with spare souls and I wasn't done yet!  No surprise where she's ended up and...

...well didn't see that coming.  Yay?

Uh, whatever.  The katanas are fun enough + cool hat and Farram armor for sale.

I scrounge around in the archives for a looooong time trying to get the last bits of loot.  Avelyn was no surprise, really.  There was another titanite slab too.  Still want to find the scholar ring though.

Few things left to do before grinding armor sets/spells.  There's the dogs near the AF covenant to deal with.  Eat Dragonslayer Greatbow +5 asshole!  Oh, they have a weakpoint hit like the freaks in Profaned Capital.  RING OF FAVOR!?  I could have used you a long-ass time ago!  (Also bonfire).  The ring's a pale shade of itself though.  I'm just a few equip load short of making my loadout work without Havel's ring, but RoF though.

[Sierra]

Fudo: yeah, I guess ember status could just explain the fire bit for that boss. My line of thought there was: which prior Souls bosses would not necessarily be canonically dead by the player's hand (due to being mandatory fights in their respective games).

Anyway, picked up some missed odds and ends late last night:

-Warp to Profaned Capital to explore the lower levels. The ogres might be the most insane monster design From has ever perpetrated, which is really saying something. Also found my onionbro again! I did not figure out how to get into his cell. The invisible jailers was a mean, mean trick that someone should feel bad for. So I got the cell keys and now I have to revisit the zone because I don't remember where all the locked doors were. Fuuuuuuuck. Also it took revisiting the Capital bonfire to notice Gilligan's corpse sprawled on the ground. No wonder there were ladders everywhere!

-Went back to spoiler town and took a leap of faith. Found a new covenant. The covenant chief is pretty much Zelda transported into a Souls game. Then she asks me how I got here, can I fly motherfucker? I can fly, motherfucker. She takes this claim completely seriously, it's great. Then I went the opposite direction and found another new covenant. Which I accessed purely for trophy purposes and will never ever touch again, barf.

-Accessed Archdragon Peak! Gonna clear this place and then probably end the game. If nothing else, I'll give the zone this much so far: clear blue sky is immensely gratifying to see again.

Deathroll intensifies:

40-49: (As phantom) Trying to help my brother beat Dancer. Why was this so much easier solo? I'd guess boss AI is just more predictable vs a single player.
50: Trying to find McBlob's covenant, get mauled by second outrider beast. I really have zero idea of how you're supposed to deal with these things, why are they in the game.
51: Go back to exploring Profaned Capital for missed loot, that ledge down there looks easily reachable, let's go for it! (It is not, it is scenery and I pass right through it.)

[Fudozukushi]

Fuuuuuuuck. Also it took revisiting the Capital bonfire to notice Gilligan's corpse sprawled on the ground. No wonder there were ladders everywhere!

Pffffft, I didn't notice that at all.  Profaned Capital tower Majula pit confirmed?

50: Trying to find McBlob's covenant, get mauled by second outrider beast. I really have zero idea of how you're supposed to deal with these things, why are they in the game.

Hitting the head during one of its attacks will make it stagger and ready for a riposte.  I have no idea which one because hitting it myself was just random dumb luck.

[Sierra]

Yeah, I got one visceral attack off on the first one in the basement but had no idea what triggered it.

Final post of deathrolling

52-55: Please stop putting gimmick bosses in your games, From. They are dumb and no one likes them.
56: Rolled off a cliff fighting twin-dagger serpents. Anything that dual-wields in this game is utter bullshit, guaranteed. The skellies are probably worst, but these guys suck too.
57: Knocked off a cliff trying to run past all that shit. Crystal lizard vengeance.
58: Met the real boss of the zone, died almost instantly, said Nope Nope Nope, never went back.
59-62: Final boss.

Last fight was pretty great, even though I spent a lot of that time swearing at the screen because trying to heal almost guarantees you'll just get hit again (this was also a huge problem with the prince). As of the winning attempt, I still hadn't seen the second form yet. I had two estus left when that happened and was sure I was fucked, but somehow managed to squeak through winning at like 10% health with no healing left. Amazing times. Probably that part flowed a lot more smoothly because, well...the dodge rhythms, man, I knew them all. Because Dr. Jones had to learn them the hard way.

Hey Fudo, go ahead and tell me your lore speculation about who NK is, because I'm sure as fuck not beating him anytime soon. I like this game a lot but I'm not sure if I like any game that much. (Actually, I hated that entire zone, not sure if I'll bother going back there on a replay.) Actually I just went ahead and looked up fan theory for this and...yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And is also awesome.

Final level was 95, time on the clock was 35 hours and change. Death occurred on average every 34 minutes, but in practice there were long stretches of often death-free exploration punctuated by repeat death against specific bitchy things.

Stats: 30 VIG, 40 END/STR, 22 or so VIT, 16 DEX for some backup weapons, raised INT by 1 (to 9!!!) to try crappy demon fists, ATT/FTH/LUK stayed at starting levels forever. Man why is Luck a stat again, really.

Principal armament was Butcher Knife +10. I had the Avelyn equipped at the end but I dunno why, it wasn't any use in that fight. I shoulda dropped it to free up the equip load. Grass Crest Shield was in the other hand but purely as an accessory. I need all that stamina! I think I used it as an actual shield once (vs. crossbow bolt running the cathedral buttresses).

I was wearing the pontiff knight set for the last fight but spent most of the game cosplaying Dusk. I was so happy I had the option. There's actually a fair amount of heavier armor I would've liked to have worn in this game, actually, had it been statistically feasible (Dancer's set is great, Outrider pretty boss too, also very happy to see Brass set back again, it's another old favorite). We're back to DS1's style of everything being properly shiny--instead of DS2's heavy armor tending to look grubby and worn--and it's very nice. But I'm not gonna level up a stat just for that unless there's nothing else to spend levels on, because as always Souls armor just does jack shit for you defensively.

Ring selection for the end was: Not!hollow ring, because I have to look my best at all times and my Hollowing stat was 99 for this run; Chloranthy Ring; Estus Ring, because I never got my heals fully powered (missed 2x shard and bone each); FAP ring (which marks the first time I ever actually equipped that).

Good game! Very good game. You know, I liked Dark Souls 2 and Bloodborne a lot and in the end definitely played them way too much, but I still found plenty to bitch about while struggling through them for the first time. I generally didn't feel inclined to do that here, which is pretty telling considering my basic personality type inclines towards damning with faint phrase. I think that for the most part From did a good job of identifying which mechanics of their other games worked and which ones didn't and in general exercising good judgement about what needed fixing. (Granted, this is me speaking from running one specific type of character, which of course was Murder Princess; I'm told that two out of three schools of magic in this game are outright crap, so it's possible some balance fixes are in order with regard to things outside my personal experience.) Yeah, there are some enemies and attacks that I think are genuine bullshit, it's not perfect. But in terms of general polish and just natural flow of game progression, this feels like improvement. I didn't feel like things tanked in the second half like these games to varying degrees have in the past. It's a lot more linear than DS1, but in a way that still gives you some immediate decisions about which pathsplit to explore first in the short-term. This is probably better with regard to keeping you focused and not having your later bosses get steamrolled because you're OP from clearing the others.

Combat maybe draws more heavily from Bloodborne than from Dark Souls 1. I ignored blocking altogether and just relied on BB dodge reflex and it usually worked out pretty well. Even lategame when all the bosses turned out to be overpowered chain attacking bastards, this felt like the right approach. It's faster paced than DS1&2 so bring your best reflexes to the table. This is fine for me since Dodge More is how I'd played From games since DS2 anyway, but it's hard to overstate how brutal the endgame bosses are compared to the earlier ones...and to what we might be more used to expecting from endgame Dark Souls, which is honestly where challenge has traditionally gone to die in this series.

There are fewer bosses here than we may be used to from the series, but that doesn't bother me much. Given how much time I've spent rerolling different characters in the previous installments, and given how much I'm likely to continue experimenting with this one, I can't say I mind much the game being on the shorter side in comparison. Aside from the obligatory crap gimmick boss, I'd say it's largely a quality over quantity approach. At the very least, I'd say all the other bosses have something very memorable going for them between enemy design and arena atmosphere. Rarely did any of them pass without perpetrating at least one striking HOLY SHIT WHAT IS HAPPENING moment, which is honestly a huge part of the series' appeal in the first place, it's not many games that can evoke genuine pants-shitting terror like these bosses do. Winning against opponents like these remains the most amazing high that gaming can provide.

Set design is amazing again because this time Miyazaki made it.

I'm listening to the OST right now though and it's mostly tuneless mush again. Ah well. Some of Kitamura's stuff works pretty well for mood at least (Abyss Watchers, I promise I won't cheese you out with an NPC next time, for reals, I'm sorry). Sakuraba's side pretty forgettable.

Exploring the world is just the best. DS3 is loaded with callbacks to earlier games. Some are just level design echoes or returning enemies or items, but the plot callbacks are by turns subtle and blatant, and either way it's always amazing to find them just because we're so unused to From reusing actual plot elements. None of this feels lazy or like pandering. Pretty much everything that's brought back is in a carefully considered place for very deliberate reasons. It makes it all feel like a place with a history that continues to inform the present. Also the frequency with which things in this game just make you go NOPE but it doesn't matter because you have to deal with it eventually anyway is just staggering.

I'm just going to spoiler-text a whole pile of amazing shit:

-The fact that there's a cult of Sif/Artorias is the best damn thing.

-Crystal lizard vengeance!

-Finding Quelana's corpse. Her mutated, cragspider corpse. Oh dear.

-ANOR LONDO! Dark Anor Londo. The darkest Anor Londo. I guess that really should've been a tip-off to what was up the moment I walked through the door. Burn in hell, Aldrich! Actually, the scythe spell description makes it sound like it was inspired by Gwyndolin's memories rather than by eating Priscilla too, but still. There was a real sense that something upright and respectable had been profaned by this gross sack of shit. Do you know how much time I've spent in that room, you fucker? It's not yours, you don't live here!

-The art gallery, man, the motherfucking art gallery. One painting notably missing. I realize it wouldn't fit, but still, you have to wonder...

-I didn't personally finish his quest the right way for this to happen, but I love the fact that Onionbro basically solos a boss for you if you save him. It's a really nice touch after you had to carry Siegmeier through everything in DS1 and he'd still die anyway.

-Similarly, I also like that Not!Crestfallen is genuinely a big help and has an ending to his quest that is him making a personal decision to do something instead of just giving up.

-OoooOoOOceeEeeEloOooooOOoOoTtte!

-Gilligan! What happened, man? Creditors finally catch up to you?

-Untended Graves, everything after the boss. Holy shit. WHAT'S GOING ON HERE. It's so scary and it's just an empty house. That's why it's scary. This was also the first time that I noticed the Tree of Giants.

-What are those things floating in the sky over the castle now and wait what are you doing in the middle of this murderiffic boss fight WHAT ARE YOU DOING

-Last boss form 2. I can read your mind! OH MY GOD the OST just hit this song and Gwyn's theme is outright in there, I couldn't tell while playing because pants-shitting terror, but wow, this is great.

Cool times. DS3's probably not going to change your mind if you don't already appreciate From's general design approach, but if you've enjoyed any of their games in the past then you should be playing this right now.

Anyway to absolutely no one's surprise I started another file already. Running pyro mode and god what is the best way to portion out my INT/FTH investments for scaling purposes I must know right now! Eh, I'll just shoot for 25/25 since that seems to be where spell reqs cap out. (Grefter I'm totally not going to try to lap you but I guess it might happen anyway.) The first thing I did was save up all my souls so I could buy the tower key and get my permanent armor set. Last time I took kind of a dickish ending, but this time we're all about the fire and we're going all in from fashion on down. Sure I may be grossly behind on levels, but looking good is worth the trouble, right?

[Fudozukushi]

NK: Yeah, the soul, his weapon and armor set pretty much confirms that he's Gwyn's firstborn.  The original dragonslayer who decided to say FUCK THAT and joined the dragon's.  Daddy got rightfully pissed off to expunge him like that man...!  Ornstein's armor and the Dragonslayer Spear are actually looted after you beat him.  The armor is actually really damn good stats-wise and looks more amazing than ever.  It's so shiny!  I was gushing about the Dragonslayer Spear too, it's great now.  The weapon skill has an almost absurd priority over everything and it attacks so fast!

Ornstein was also apparently Firstborn's student.  (Firstborn uses a Dragonslayer sword-spear.)  Ornstein left Anor Londo at some point to go confront him.  The one in DS1 was just some sort of Gwyndolin illusion.  Smough's set says he was the last knight to remain in defense of the capital.

Smouldering Lake Lady: Quelana?  Pretty sure that's (unfortunately) just the Fair Lady.  Quelana herself is still an unknown.

ART!: I'm damn well willing to bet one of the DLCs has to do with Priscilla and Yorshka.

Crestfallen: Well, he gave up in a different way...

Untended Graves: Is it the real Firelink?  And since Firelink is the Kiln, and those are Black Knights...

Flying Things: I tried following their path upwards at some point but they all just converge at some random point above the Archives.  Whatever they are, the hollows on sticks in Highwall become them, or imitate them.

[Sierra]

SLL: I thought the item you picked up there gave a specific name reference, but maybe I'm thinking of another spot. Will go back and check later I guess.

Amidst all the other crazy stuff, I forgot to mention that Gower's Ring of Protection is now a boss.

Also pyro souls is sitting at like 25-30% equip burden and wow you fly crazy far with the roll at that range. Not used to that! Was sitting at 50% most of the time first run; dodge range is still respectable for that, but wow this is way different. I constantly overshoot things I'm trying to maneuver behind for backstabs. I guess the equip burden scale works more or less like DS2's: dodge range gradually decreases as equip burden goes up until you get fat roll at like 70%.

[Fudozukushi]

SLL: I thought the item you picked up there gave a specific name reference, but maybe I'm thinking of another spot. Will go back and check later I guess.

If it's the key item you can turn in then I, personally, wouldn't reaaaaaallly take that as confirmation myself.  The talisman stuck in lava effectively concerns paley.

Dark Souls 3: Midlogue of the Midlogue of the Epilogue: Just getting stuuuuuuffffff.  Found two more estus shards.  One in the chest outside ADOG and the other in an elevator leading to Consumed King's Garden.  Finished out the armor set outside ADOG.  Got most of the set + greatsword of dudes in Untended Graves.  Lost Ember status from NK from an evangelist hitting me through a wall and throwing me off a building.  The Flame Stoneplate ring is located in an absurd off-path spot in Undead Settlement.  Got all the stuff in lava in Smouldering Lake + the stoneplate ring after I turned THAT back on.  The ashes that let Chunks be sold are up in Archdragon Peak in a path I never would have found because the enemy there came out sooooo far I never looked too deep.  Also steel protection!

EDIT: Also found Havel's armor.  What an absurdly guide way to find it.  And no surprise everything just cuts right through that poise.

[Magic Fanatic]

Pokken Tournament - I main Braixen.

Anyone else have this game to play against?

[Sierra]

Fudo: yeah, it's possible I'm misremembering things. Will pay more attention to what I pick up where next time!

Man, this game, I just keep remembering cool things that I somehow forgot to mention before. From's horrid imagination was really working overtime.

-So was Oceiros technically the current king and he was just too bonkers to notice that the undead princes had resumed residence in his castle, or what? He can't be just some random dude since he gets an extensive (by DS3 standards) dialogue introduction pre-fight, but damned if I know how else he ties into the lore. I loved that fight, one of my favorite parts of the game to watch him break down and just go totally batshit. It's also strongly reminiscent of Queen Yharnam, except this time the dead baby crying can't stun us.

-I'm curious to know approximately how long it takes the First Flame to fade and need to be relinked again, and by extension to know how long the various Lords of Cinder were dead before being reawakened for DS3 plot. It's interesting to notice that everyone you meet seems casually aware that relinking the First Flame is a thing that needs to happen with regularity and which requires human sacrifices (which is obviously a marked difference from the player getting tricked into doing it in DS1 because it hadn't happened since Gwyn did it and no one seemed to know how that turned out anyway). These aren't really things I expect to be answered precisely, and which probably don't need to be answered precisely (vagueness with regard to chronology probably serves the game's sense of mythology better). I just find it interesting to consider how long it took humanity to accept this as a cycle, and wonder what kind of timespan there is for peaceful civilization for flourish before everything goes to shit again and another game happens. The series is all over recurring cycles--even if you opt to snuff out the First Flame, the firekeeper pretty much outright tells you the age of dark won't last forever either. I guess someday the dark will fade and only fire will remain?

-We somehow got through an entire Fromsoft game without a giant spider boss. What the hell? The wolfspider made up for a lot, though.

-Just noticing that Aldrich's music opens with a phrase from the DS1 Gwyndolin/Moonlight Butterfly track. Nice touch there. Apparently Gwyndolin talks to you before 'porting you back to Emma if you fight Aldrich after Yhorm? I fought Yhorm second on my game and don't remember that happening in this situation, but it's possible my memory is jumbled from being too confused and alarmed about getting shunted from one boss fight to another with no interim to recover.

-I dig the Storm Ruler/Yhorm item descriptions. "Yo humans, as a show of trust, here is a weapon that can murder the shit out of me if I get out of hand." That's exactly what happens and apparently Siegward shows up carrying the second copy if you save him. This is great.

-Yeah, I still have no good idea what was up with the dark Firelink Shrine. I do know that stepping into the final zone of the game was an epiphany and how did I not point that out earlier. Amazing times, jaw hit floor, etcetera.

[Fudozukushi]

Fudo: yeah, it's possible I'm misremembering things. Will pay more attention to what I pick up where next time!

Man, this game, I just keep remembering cool things that I somehow forgot to mention before. From's horrid imagination was really working overtime.

-So was Oceiros technically the current king and he was just too bonkers to notice that the undead princes had resumed residence in his castle, or what? He can't be just some random dude since he gets an extensive (by DS3 standards) dialogue introduction pre-fight, but damned if I know how else he ties into the lore. I loved that fight, one of my favorite parts of the game to watch him break down and just go totally batshit. It's also strongly reminiscent of Queen Yharnam, except this time the dead baby crying can't stun us.

-I'm curious to know approximately how long it takes the First Flame to fade and need to be relinked again, and by extension to know how long the various Lords of Cinder were dead before being reawakened for DS3 plot. It's interesting to notice that everyone you meet seems casually aware that relinking the First Flame is a thing that needs to happen with regularity and which requires human sacrifices (which is obviously a marked difference from the player getting tricked into doing it in DS1 because it hadn't happened since Gwyn did it and no one seemed to know how that turned out anyway). These aren't really things I expect to be answered precisely, and which probably don't need to be answered precisely (vagueness with regard to chronology probably serves the game's sense of mythology better). I just find it interesting to consider how long it took humanity to accept this as a cycle, and wonder what kind of timespan there is for peaceful civilization for flourish before everything goes to shit again and another game happens. The series is all over recurring cycles--even if you opt to snuff out the First Flame, the firekeeper pretty much outright tells you the age of dark won't last forever either. I guess someday the dark will fade and only fire will remain?

-We somehow got through an entire Fromsoft game without a giant spider boss. What the hell? The wolfspider made up for a lot, though.

-Just noticing that Aldrich's music opens with a phrase from the DS1 Gwyndolin/Moonlight Butterfly track. Nice touch there. Apparently Gwyndolin talks to you before 'porting you back to Emma if you fight Aldrich after Yhorm? I fought Yhorm second on my game and don't remember that happening in this situation, but it's possible my memory is jumbled from being too confused and alarmed about getting shunted from one boss fight to another with no interim to recover.

-I dig the Storm Ruler/Yhorm item descriptions. "Yo humans, as a show of trust, here is a weapon that can murder the shit out of me if I get out of hand." That's exactly what happens and apparently Siegward shows up carrying the second copy if you save him. This is great.

-Yeah, I still have no good idea what was up with the dark Firelink Shrine. I do know that stepping into the final zone of the game was an epiphany and how did I not point that out earlier. Amazing times, jaw hit floor, etcetera.

-The Sorrow: I thought he was just some sort of ancient king figure that got locked away ala Old King Dorran to Allant and Orstrava, but the items referencing the Queen made things really odd and dubious.

-Flames Will Fade: I presume that linking the flame is based on how strong the soul uh, linking it is.  Gwyn, being the bossest boss ever, managed it for a thousand years; but all the Lords of Cinder now progress so fast that we have multiple other dudes straight connected to them just wandering around.  AW: Hawkwood; ADOG: Anri and Horace; Yhorm: Siegward apparently; Lothric: Emma.  Age of Dark will just be humanity spiraling out of control until it hits the last ember then the flames will just devour it all with a raging ferocity.

VOICE!: I think that's just Emma.

Top o' the Shrine: I was randomly checking out where you find the fire keeper soul and looking at the castle and it doesn't match up with what you see when at Lothric proper.  You can't see the Undead settlement and stuff from Firelink, so you'd presume they're at opposite sides, but at the very peak of Lothric, you can see a giant body of water where Firelink would presumed to be.  The Hidden Blessing mentions the Queen Lothric was aware of Untended Graves, somehow.

[Grefter]

I wonder what a Queen knowing something hidden driving her King in specific directions could possibly be??  Dudes I don't know what your are even talking about and this smells like what happens if Vendrick doesn't bug the fuck out.


Also I guess this doesn't need to be tiny text but is general DS cycle discussion, but I think what happens after the Age of Darkness is fairly obvious.

Some one finds the Lord Soul.

[AndrewRogue]

Dark Souls 3: Got this. Started deprived, like a boss.

Tutorial boss was... much harder than expected and actually killed me a couple times while I tried to remember this wasn't Bloodborne. Made it up to VoBV and kept getting creamed by his overhead mace swing and... realized my TV was set to movie display, so I had like a full half-second+ of input lag which probably explains a lot about why the game felt much, much, much slower than Bloodborne. Beat him after.

Currently dicking around the Undead Settlement.

[Grefter]

Things I didn't know that I learned from Vaaiti Vidya that he didn't even have as a point in the video.

You can parry the tutorial boss.

Feels bad man.

[AndrewRogue]

Parrying is for cowards.

[Grefter]

Cowards who maybe didn't die to rule tutorial 5 times like me.

DS3 - Beat rafters boss in Cathedral.  Started a keep.  My brother rolled up a Dex guy and has swapped over to that.  He might be alternating between toons as we play.

2Uchi2Strong.

Has anyone played with Greatsword post patch?

Also my reading said 30/30 for soft cap for hexes Cid.  Assume same for Pyro, but not read hard math.

I dunno if straight Miracle is bad, but 3/4 of my spells at the moment are miracles.  I run Fire Orb (Great Combustion does the same damage for 6 more FP and less range lololol ok), otherwise it is Med Heal/Replenishment depending on if I want dat cleave heal or efficient self heal and Esuna.

[Sierra]

Fire Orb is boss. I just cleared out the swamp and it made the big cleric beast guys a joke. I just keep pumping attunement with my levels because nothing else offers immediately obvious rewards and I need all the fire I can get and I need it right now. Generally sitting at like 50% flasks on ashen estus, still more likely to run out of fire instead of health just because I use it on everything.

You know what I missed in the swamp the first time? I mean aside from the cool callback gear the CB trio were hoarding (which is nice but not of any real use to me on this file). What I missed was the mushroom massacre corner. Awwww. Also there's some loot in that zone which I still don't know how to get. Northeast corner (if we're presuming the entrance is south), where the basilisks hang out. There's a series of ledges overhanging this with shiny items on them but I see no way to reach them. Confusion! Drop down from Keep wall maybe? I dunno.

So there's one pyromancy that you get from ranking up a covenant, right? Said covenant is PVP covenant. UGH. I figured I might as well start working on that, hopefully get it out of the way early. I don't like inconveniencing people when they're just trying to progress through the game, you know? I invaded some in DS1 because it was this new thing, but it's not really my style. This covenant, though, it's a little different. You have two options as a "mad phantom": invade or put down a summon sign. Invade is what you'd expect, except you can kill any other kind of of phantom and you get your reward regardless of who you kill, host or phantom of any variety (Mound-Makers don't care who they kill, so long as there's another corpse for the pile). Summon sign is also this but has the added quirk of making enemies hostile to you. So you can, kind of sort of, be helpful assuming you can make your host realize you're not there to kill them. This is difficult, but trying to communicate nonaggression without verbal communication to people who may or may not be capable of interpreting that intent is sort of entertaining in its own way. Not everybody's patient enough to let you actually make friendly gestures before attacking (or trusting enough to believe them--which, as we'll see, may be a sound policy). The summon style is tricky though, because it doesn't spawn you on your summon sign--it drops you in a random corner of the zone like an invasion would, which is bad if you drop in a place surrounded by enemies (this happens a lot).

So anyway I decide what I'm gonna do is spam this in the woods because that zone's earlygame invasion central. Maybe I can pull some hosts with Watchdogs to put down, right? I can get what I need without impeding anyone's progress. My hitrate here is pretty spotty, I lose to the other invader in the few solid connections I get because magic's easily dodged by other players and I don't have the stamina to spam my rapier R1 like a boss should. Occasionally I just get lucky and the host dies offscreen without me interfering. Still counts as a win for me as far as the game's concerned. So I don't get much in the way of rewards out of this, but the idea's kind of neat because you turn up as this wild card that can form whatever unpredictable alliances you want on the spot. This leads to some ridiculous stuff:

-The one host who is absolutely hells-bent on murdering the fuck out of me even though I'm obviously trying to kill his enemies for him, so we spend like five minutes dodgerolling around this giant fucking crab until crab claw smash finally lands and ends me. Okay guy, kill your own crabs!

-2v2 in the middle of the swamp when 2 Watchdogs show up and giant enemy crab is trying to smash the fuck out of everyone the whole time. I didn't even see who ultimately died, but it wasn't me so it still counted as a win!

But the best part is when I finally decide to give up on it for the day. Maybe I'll try something else. I figure, my hitrate's pretty bad here, but if I kill other phantoms that happen to be part of this covenant, maybe they'll still drop the item I need to rank it up even if I'm not actively in it myself. So I switch over to Blue Sentinels, hoping the "Target world with hostile invader in it" covenant actually fucking works right in this game. Wait a couple minutes, no summons occur. Typical.

Then I get invaded.

Ohshit, I thought I couldn't get invaded here myself because I killed the boss. Wait, the woods are linked to the swamp, there's no fog gate as far as zoning is concerned? So I'd have to kill both bosses to make the zone invasion-free. Ohshit. Well, okay, it's a big place, I'll hide and wait it out. There's a little alcove by the very top entrance that's hard to see from the bottom of the bonfire room, so I hide out there. I also activate one of the other mad phantom signs littering the area. Let them take each other out, right? After a couple minutes, the purple phantom I summoned walks up to the bonfire room. Looks around a little, doesn't see me, leaves. A couple minutes later I see healthbars going down off behind the scenery. My summon gets killed. Dangit! So I summon another mad phantom. Eventually I see both healthbars ticking down way far away. This means they're in the swamp getting eaten up by poison. Okay, so far so good. But eventually poison wears off so I don't know where they are anymore.

Then they both appear at the entrance to the bonfire room. Ohshit, they teamed up! I am so fucked. I hope they'll keep overlooking my hiding spot, but nope, the original invader strolls up the hill and finds me. Some awkward flailing ensues, nobody really gets an obvious advantage. Then my summon runs in and starts trying to hit me too and I know I'm toast.

Then he turns around behind the original invader and murders the everloving shit out of him. He gets his prize and goes home. Delicious betrayal, I am saved. And several thousand souls richer.

So I guess there are some more amusing possibilities in this system then I really considered.

[Grefter]

Cid, are you playing PC or PS4?  Because my plan for covenant stuff is to just Password with my brother, drop a sign, get summoned.  Knife him in the face.  Rank up.

We could work out win trading if you are PC.

Swamp = keep, not trail of tears.

I personally run 1:4 or so for HP Estus to FP Estus if I am feeling confident or doing trash.  If boss is hard I might switch it up.

PVP is always max HP estus.  This is part of the problem with world PVP because everyone just has 999999999999999 Estus to heal with.

[Captain K]

DS3:  Killed a big thing with Onionbro.  Or rather he killed it while I stayed the fuck out of the way.  Then we had ze brewskis.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PHw80S5TQ4

KHUx:  This game seemed interesting initially but it's really fucking boring.  Like there is nothing to do.

MAA2:  Up to rank 5 in PVP, which is mainly just Drax soloing the other team because my other people suck.  Dropped Hawkeye and put Captain America in, seems to be an improvement.  Working on getting She Hulk up to speed.

[Scar]

Ds3: the pain train won't let me off. I appreciate the bro love djizzle. I'm using the rest if the gangs posts for spoiler /not spoilers help, I guess?

Ok, so I feel bad now. Giants in the cathedral are chumps. Boss fight was an oh shit moment, then super cheese. First boss I did not die in. Success! I find the rafters and the creepy lady I start to worship, but that was it. I feel like I missed something.

There was another ff3 guy here, but I bought his gear and he vanished. I think he was different than the other one I met.

Onto the other boss in the catacombs.  OK found out what was killing me. My second go around I made mince meat out if him. Not too shabby.

Really liking ultra great sword for non boss areas I'm sweeping through a second go around. It's super good against heavy knights. That stagger us the real mvp. Up swing with 2 handed aproach can 2hko stuff. Upgraded that to +8.

Catacombs seemed super short, no? Bah who cares. New area!

Looks pretty freaking nice. Who else is running this on a ps4?

Instantly lose ember after bridge. Avoid getting eaten, but samurai guys team up with knight guy and ruin my day.

Did I mention how much I like UGS for these types of foes? Just backstep until they charge and wreck their shit.

This area scares me. Everything is in pairs. Find a new bonfirevand...pitch black...oh gawd what's in there?

Run back to bonfire and buy a torch.

Run around in the water find a new bonfire. Yayness. The area is less scary now.

Estus soup! And uh. Toxic sucks. Find a knight starring at a photo. Hi mr. Knight meet my dragon slayer. As I am about to give him the business, a fucking spear impales me.

Dead. Turn my camera around and...wtf is that archer launching lances from above? Unfair.

Bleh.

More searching around I find my way back to the starting area. I seem to have missed some spots but I find a shortcut right by a boss!

Uh boss shreds me. Repeatedly.  Ouch.  Retreat.

There was a tunnel I could explore. Might lead to a dead end....nope!

New area. Weeeeeeeee. I can avoid fuckfacemcdoubleblade for a little while longer. In prison. Shots scary. Get pushed off a ledge my a minion  and...evil nun ladies. These things are a joke...

They are..

Wait. What?

The fuck?

Where's my life bar!?! What did you doooooooooooo.

I mean even looking back now I still have no idea what they did to do that. I could be around a corner and see my bar start to shrink. No earthly idea.

Anyways. I find so many keys that don't open anything up.

Do many mimics. Swinging my sword like a mad man at every loot crate.

Find some shortcuts, find a new area. As well. Leads me to a narrow hall way with little shiny lizards!

Yay item. Looting time.

Oh hi mr. hole. Why I'd love to jump down you accidentally. What lovely surprises await me down here?

Death.

So much death.

Getting out of the toxic swamp isn't so bad but hand mouth guys are brutal. Wtf even is that!? I still need to clear that tri room me thinks. Maybe?

This leads me in a circle and I'm thinking there has to be more.

I see a ladder right by the bonfire I clearly missed oh so many times and this leads me to the double box death corner and a boss!

Who slaughters me. Weeeeeeee. The run to two bosses is quick enough now. I just can't beat either.

So giant guy. You aren't taking any damage, hey what's that in the corner?

Grab. Die. Read. Hmm.

Smoke giant. Wow.

Cool. Now onto the other boss. Look around in hopes I find another boss slaying. Nada.

This guy is tough. Toughest boss fight yet. I try numerous things. 1 handed sword works best. Rolling into him instead of my side to side or retreating method seems promising.

Die some more. Ugh 2nd phase. Die. Wait there's openings now. Die some more. So close!

Finally beat him. Wow. Super rough boss fight. Good times.

Next area has spirirs, giants mage and yup someone invades me when all of them are attacking me. Die.

Fake wall. Die. Eaten. Die. Team up, die. Bonfire reward. I'll take it.

Find some more shortcuts, get speared by unfair archer guys on roofs, find a new area past all that mayhem and call it a night.

Phew. I feel like I missed a ton of things. This game has a good replay factor.

[Otter]

dks3: beat this yesterday, started a sorc run today.  Spoilers but like really not even but whatever.

For my first run I went Warrior and never messed around with spells.  Used a longsword from start to finish, mostly used Lothric Knight Shield for exploration and two-handed with the Grass Crest Shield for bosses.

Get a feeling so complicated.  Part of me wants to gripe that the game's too easy -- the endgame and even optional bosses went down in a couple tries.  I have obsessively played and replayed the first two Dark Souls games though and I think the hardest one's just gonna be whichever one you start with.

The consolation is that these are really good bosses.  Many of these fights are on the fun-level of previous games' DLC bosses, which have always been the best in the series.  There's like three I'm not crazy about, out of nineteen?  Cid you're cheating yourself if you skip Nameless, he's a lot more fun than hard (similar to Champion Gundyr).

Bottom line is I'm too happy to be playing new Dark Souls to feel like complaining.  I can make the game harder with weapon and build choices, I couldn't have made the bosses not-lame if they'd been lame and overwhelmingly they're great instead.

What about the lore, atmosphere, setting, mood, do these bosses have personality?  Do I feel something when I fight them or do I just kill Boss X in Zone Y?  Well, if my buy-in to the world was 100% in the first Dark Souls and 40% in Dark Souls II, it's like 80% here.  Haha, these numbers don't mean anything.  I don't feel a conspicuous absence of atmosphere as a flaw here like in dks2, it's impossible to beat dks1 nostalgia, I like a lot of the stuff they did here and we'll see how it grows on me.  I like playing the game so much that it'll have a lot of time to.