An astounding follow up to Dark Souls, and a clear mid-point before Dark Souls 3. This game had a lot of great ideas mired by some of the most bland areas and confusing layout. I never have felt as pointlessly lost as i had trying to figure out where to go for so much of the first half of this game.
The combat remains incredible and while i don't think i prefer the changes made to estus and how healing works in this game i do think it is very well constructed and works very well here. Unfortunately the actual bosses of this game were underwhelming to me. There are some great standouts the smelter demon, Velstadt, and the Darklurker all were fantastic. but for each great encounter there are 2 boring ones.
I lack the words to properly explain this but i can see both how this game came from Dark Souls 1 and how Dark Souls 3 came from this but the gap between Dark Souls 1 and 3 still strikes me as a profound downgrade.
The combat remains incredible and while i don't think i prefer the changes made to estus and how healing works in this game i do think it is very well constructed and works very well here. Unfortunately the actual bosses of this game were underwhelming to me. There are some great standouts the smelter demon, Velstadt, and the Darklurker all were fantastic. but for each great encounter there are 2 boring ones.
I lack the words to properly explain this but i can see both how this game came from Dark Souls 1 and how Dark Souls 3 came from this but the gap between Dark Souls 1 and 3 still strikes me as a profound downgrade.