Dark Souls III: Scholar of the First Spoiler Filled Dark Souls III Thread

[Renzatic]

In this thread, the owners of Dark Souls III who are actively playing the game will post their favorite moments and various theories regarding stated game amongst themselves. If you do not own Dark Souls III, and wish to remain unspoilered, then it'd obviously be in your best interest to avoid this thread for the time being. In the off chance that you happen upon this thread, and read something that ruins a surprising part of the game for you, then you have no one but yourself to blame, and should feel great shame concerning your obvious stupidity.

In one hour, we shall commence.

[Renzatic]

Casual observation time! I've made my character, and beat the first boss, which...shamefully, took me three tries to do.

It's fast. Much faster than DS2. This might not be too much of a surprise to those who've played Bloodborne, but it took me a bit to get used to.

I started off as the mercenary, but it seems that rolls and attacks take less stamina now than they used to. I was able to get three rolls in and two heavy swipes before my meter ran dry. The downside to this is that the stamina bar doesn't refill quite as quickly as it did in DS2. It's not super slow, but it's something you'll need to keep in mind, and compensate for.

And speaking of rolls, they shouldn't be called that anymore. You're flipping about, like when you'd wear the Dark Wood Grain Ring in DS1. The good thing about this is that the invincibility frames are now very obvious. They seem to be much, much faster now too. Probably to compensate for the fact that enemies now hit that much faster, too.

The hitbox seems to be absolutely precise. The first boss did this thrusting spear attack that missed me mere inches. In any other DS, I would've been hit. In DS3, those spare ingame inches actually counted.

Ragdoll corpse kicking is back! Oh how I've missed it so!

Okay, that's enough chatter from me. I'm going back in.

[twisty]

I played for about an hour before work this morning, including adding the final cosmetic touches to my avatar. Great to see the parry move and kick make a glorious return, and yes, the movements in general are much more fluid. Going in hard and fast, I managed to beat the first boss on my first try without getting hit once; which I think is largely the result of having played through Bloodborne -- it taught me how to play a little more aggressively without going overboard. I had a much harder time with the katana guy up the hill though, who took my first life after a short struggle, losing my souls just 100 or so souls short of the next level. I'll try again tonight when I get back...

[Renzatic]

The thing that threw me for a loop was his second form, when the bloby black snake thing pops out of him. It became hard to read his attacks then, or tell where he could attack from.

it's a problem I'm still having with it, now that it's popping up as a regular enemy. It's hard to predict, and hits like a fast Mack truck.

[Phatose]

You can avoid those if you kill the mobs before they change.

Enjoying it so far. Forgot the joy of discovery these provide so well. Seems a little easy though. For a souls game, anyway. Beat the second boss on the first try -not usually something that happens in a souls game.
Wish I could find a 100% physical shield. The large leather shield takes chip damage, but it's the best I got. Fortunately, I found a Deep Axe on the wall, from a mimic beyond the dragon.. I think it's the fire longsword equivalent of DS3 - certainly helping me out plenty.

[Renzatic]

Yup, figured that out just a little while ago.

As for the second boss...three tries again. He's down.

And the game itself? Well, it started giving me a lot of trouble when I reached the knights, since they don't have too predictable of a pattern to base your attacks around. After a bit, I just decided to start acting like a scrub, and equip a shield. Once I did that, the game became considerably easier.

...even though it feels like I'm cheaping out. I can go through the entirety of DS2 without a shield, but the faster pace in 3 is throwing my game off.

[Renzatic]

Hello from Dark Souls 3! Wish you were here!

[Gryzemuis]

Good to see you guys are enjoying yourselves. Have fun !

I might be done with DS1 in a few weeks (I think I'm over half-way now).
Once I'm done, what do you reckon I should play next ? Just continue with DS2 ?
Or start immediately with DS3 and play DS2 later ?

[Judith]

A few months break would be a good thing, since every game takes roughly 100-120 hours to complete (once). Take your time and avoid the DS fatigue that is likely to occur after the DS2 (bigger, more badass, not exactly better).

[Phatose]

Hello from Dark Souls 3! Wish you were here!

Isn't that the beginning of Resident Evil 4?

[Renzatic]

That was about the first thing I thought of when I arrived there, too. So I'd say yes. Yes it is.

Once I'm done, what do you reckon I should play next ? Just continue with DS2 ?
Or start immediately with DS3 and play DS2 later ?

You know, that might be the best way to approach the series, since DS3 feels more like a direct continuation of the original than DS2 does. Excellent though it may be, and very much worth your time, 2 does feel more like an aside, both in gameplay and style, when compared against the other two.

Though I'd take Judith's advice into consideration if I were you. Playing through the whole series from beginning to end does have an inherent risk of giving you extreme Dark Souls burnout.

[Aja]

I preordered the game yesterday, but I probably won't get a chance to touch it until the weekend, in which case I'll be touching it for like 36 hours straight.

[Renzatic]

Welcome to puberty, Aja.

One thing's for sure, it's a damn pretty game.

I couldn't have timed this one better. Bastard snuck up behind me while I was lining up for a nice screenshot. It was rude.

[Judith]

I love how they mix geometry with tiled textures (I'm actually trying to imitate that effect in my work, with some success). And they sure love those wall-generator scripts and MassFX to make those bricks tumble down nicely

[twisty]

Don't forget to play through the DLC for DS1 though before/if you take a break. You will probably want to look up how to access the two new areas (particularly the Astorius DLC) though.

[Renzatic]

I love how they mix geometry with tiled textures (I'm actually trying to imitate that effect in my work, with some success).

Speaking of the technical details, they screwed up a tiling texture in one part in a very incredibly obvious way. When you get to the swamp just past the Undead Settlement, you'll see it.

Also, one Lord of Cinder down! It was a fun fight, probably one of the best yet. But like all the bosses I've come across thus far, it was fairly easy.

As usual, it took me three tries. Seems to be a running theme for me.

edit: Hey, let's be all nerdy and post our characters!

Here's Mine!

[Phatose]

The boreal valley is just gorgeous. So gorgeous, it's almost possible to forget everything is trying to kill you.

[twisty]

I've just reached there myself actually. The first section is a little drab, but once you get through the gate it's clear how much they've upped the eye candy ante over DS2; pretty much on par with Bloodborne I think but with larger vistas. The level design is awesome btw.

[Phatose]

I like the levels themselves, but the world design is far more linear - you could skip ahead quite a bit in DS1 and 2, while DS3 is a lot more closed off so far. A lot more bonfires too.

[Renzatic]

A lot more bonfires too.

I wouldn't get too used to that if I were you.

[Twist]

Boy is this game fun. Nobody does that oddly intoxicating blend of exhaustion and exhileration like FromSoftware.

Initially, I was disappointed we don't have a single contiguous world with interlocking areas like in the first Dark Souls, but each area is so densely packed with nooks and crannies to explore and goodies to discover that I'm so over that disappointment.

I'm also still getting used to how much it helps to be relentlessly aggressive compared to previous Souls games. I haven't played Bloodborne, so this feels pretty different for me.

I second the suggestion that someone playing DS1 can skip to DS3 when they're done with DS1. It feels much more like a proper sequel to the original Dark Souls.

[Renzatic]

Well, the whole game is one contiguous area, save for the Firelink Shrine. In fact, there are a few shortcuts that take you almost, but not quite back to earlier sections buried throughout the game.

As for it's linearity, it probably is the most straightfowardly laid out of the three, but it's not one straight A to B path from beginning to end. There are about two or three branching points you'll come across that take you to separate parts of the game.

[van HellSing]

You can unlock some of the endgame areas extremely early, but it's a difficult task. You need to Kill Emma and deal with a boss.

Also, Firelink is connected to the rest of the world. In a way. A very, very intriguing way.

[Phatose]

That's a fight I'd rather not try early.

This is probably going to be the strangest complaint ever, but DS3 seems less rage inducing then the others. The others had a way of driving me to a near homicidal mania - pretty sure the evidence of the tantrums they caused me is still here. Not sure if the game is easier, or if I'm older and calmer, but it just doesn't seem to fire up the fury like the other souls games did.

I'm not actually sure that's not an improvement - but it seems so off for a souls game.

[Renzatic]

This is probably going to be the strangest complaint ever, but DS3 seems less rage inducing then the others.

Funny you should bring this up, because I was just two hits away from killing the last boss, when I got caught up in his cheesy combo that takes off 90% of your life, and is entirely inescapable. Unfortunately for me, I wasn't quite at full health.

...I think I blew a blood vessel in my left eye.

IT IS DONE!

I really liked the implications surrounding the last boss. Shame I can't talk about it yet.