This review contains spoilers
Dark Souls III was an absolute blast !
For context, I did play this years ago, but I was really bad, got stuck at Abyss Watchers and gave up. Since then, I played through Elden Ring and absolutely loved it. I recently went back to ER to beat Malenia since I was really hyped for the DLC. I still had a From soft/souls-like craving so I decided to try Dark Souls III once more.
Dark Souls III feels really good to play. It's very similar to Elden Ring, missing some features like jump attacks, but it's still really good. The character movement is butter smooth and every attack feels really satisfying to hit. The sheer variety of weapons and builds you can use is also really impressive. I ended up going with twin blades and it felt really fast and strong.
The art direction of the game is also nothing short of amazing. The biggest highlight in term of art direction and scenery is easily Irithyll of the boreal valley, the architecture and grandeur of everything in the city is just jaw dropping and I also like the abundance of blue in the zone being a nice change of pace. The other best looking zone for me was the Ringed City from the DLC, simply beautiful, and looks absolutely huge. Some places were not as good looking though, like all the swamps in the game and the catacombs of Carthus that were my least favorite areas of the game.
The game's level design is also really good, unlocking shortcuts is satisfying and the run back to every boss is usually not too bad, even though I prefer Elden ring's placement of respawn points. Exploration was also a big highlight for me. It felt so rewarding exploring every areas of the game and sometime finding cool weapons, armors and sometimes whole different secret and optional area. Finding a dark and twisted version of the shrine by randomly exploring was a big highlight for me, especially since it allowed me to unlock another ending !
Speaking of bosses, the first few bosses of the game felt pretty underwhelming and were not the most fun to fight, but the game quicky picks up. Dark Souls III has a some really great bosses, especially towards the end. Lothric, dancer of the boreal valley, Pontiff and the souls of cinder were probably my favorite bosses from the main game. They were not that hard, but still challenging, for me at least maybe because of my recent experience with Elden Ring or my build, but they were really fun. they felt like a dance and were for the most part really fair.
The part of the game I have way more mixed feelings towards is DLC. Both DLCs have absolutely beautiful and stunning areas for the player to explore, the problem being that exploring them were, for the most part, straight up not fun to explore and traverse. Indeed, each areas were filled with enemies that were really annoying to deal with, they had either to much HPs, too much damage or an annoying move set, and they often had all 3 of these problems. So all of this eventually made me run past everything in search of bonefires, a key item, or a boss which is a shame because I think exploration is one of the best aspect of the game and usually feels really rewarding. Running past everything and picking items so fast that I'm not even sure of what I picked up felt really unrewarding. The biggest redeeming quality of these DLCs are the amazing bosses they hold. Sister Frieder can be a bit annoying with her 3 phases, but the fight was probably the most challenging for me and I found it pretty fun. The demon prince was also pretty cool, starting up as a duo boss and then fighting a giant demon was pretty awesome. The best boss, though, is hands down Gael, and he's not only the best boss of the DLCs but probably of the whole game. The fight against him felt so epic and his moveset was so fun to fight against. His 3 different phases were all really fair and the most fun "dance" of the game.
In the end, even though the DLC left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth, I really loved Dark Souls III. When I first played it years ago, I just assumed that the game wasn't for me, but now I think I understand why people love these games so much. I might not like it more than Elden Ring, but i'm really glad I finished it and I'm now really interested to try From Software's other gems.
For context, I did play this years ago, but I was really bad, got stuck at Abyss Watchers and gave up. Since then, I played through Elden Ring and absolutely loved it. I recently went back to ER to beat Malenia since I was really hyped for the DLC. I still had a From soft/souls-like craving so I decided to try Dark Souls III once more.
Dark Souls III feels really good to play. It's very similar to Elden Ring, missing some features like jump attacks, but it's still really good. The character movement is butter smooth and every attack feels really satisfying to hit. The sheer variety of weapons and builds you can use is also really impressive. I ended up going with twin blades and it felt really fast and strong.
The art direction of the game is also nothing short of amazing. The biggest highlight in term of art direction and scenery is easily Irithyll of the boreal valley, the architecture and grandeur of everything in the city is just jaw dropping and I also like the abundance of blue in the zone being a nice change of pace. The other best looking zone for me was the Ringed City from the DLC, simply beautiful, and looks absolutely huge. Some places were not as good looking though, like all the swamps in the game and the catacombs of Carthus that were my least favorite areas of the game.
The game's level design is also really good, unlocking shortcuts is satisfying and the run back to every boss is usually not too bad, even though I prefer Elden ring's placement of respawn points. Exploration was also a big highlight for me. It felt so rewarding exploring every areas of the game and sometime finding cool weapons, armors and sometimes whole different secret and optional area. Finding a dark and twisted version of the shrine by randomly exploring was a big highlight for me, especially since it allowed me to unlock another ending !
Speaking of bosses, the first few bosses of the game felt pretty underwhelming and were not the most fun to fight, but the game quicky picks up. Dark Souls III has a some really great bosses, especially towards the end. Lothric, dancer of the boreal valley, Pontiff and the souls of cinder were probably my favorite bosses from the main game. They were not that hard, but still challenging, for me at least maybe because of my recent experience with Elden Ring or my build, but they were really fun. they felt like a dance and were for the most part really fair.
The part of the game I have way more mixed feelings towards is DLC. Both DLCs have absolutely beautiful and stunning areas for the player to explore, the problem being that exploring them were, for the most part, straight up not fun to explore and traverse. Indeed, each areas were filled with enemies that were really annoying to deal with, they had either to much HPs, too much damage or an annoying move set, and they often had all 3 of these problems. So all of this eventually made me run past everything in search of bonefires, a key item, or a boss which is a shame because I think exploration is one of the best aspect of the game and usually feels really rewarding. Running past everything and picking items so fast that I'm not even sure of what I picked up felt really unrewarding. The biggest redeeming quality of these DLCs are the amazing bosses they hold. Sister Frieder can be a bit annoying with her 3 phases, but the fight was probably the most challenging for me and I found it pretty fun. The demon prince was also pretty cool, starting up as a duo boss and then fighting a giant demon was pretty awesome. The best boss, though, is hands down Gael, and he's not only the best boss of the DLCs but probably of the whole game. The fight against him felt so epic and his moveset was so fun to fight against. His 3 different phases were all really fair and the most fun "dance" of the game.
In the end, even though the DLC left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth, I really loved Dark Souls III. When I first played it years ago, I just assumed that the game wasn't for me, but now I think I understand why people love these games so much. I might not like it more than Elden Ring, but i'm really glad I finished it and I'm now really interested to try From Software's other gems.