Dark Souls - Reprise

I've gone back to Dark Souls.  This isn't really a surprise.  Ever since I bought it the game has been a constant distraction.  It's seen off plenty of honest-to-goodness blockbusters during that time; including Skyrim, Battlefield 3, something that I think had Batman in it and most recently Dragon's Dogma.  These other, inferior, games have occupied my spare time for short bursts here and there - but Dark Souls has always been waiting in the background for me to come to my senses and return to its unforgiving arms.

I've got some idea as to why that is and I've already detailed what makes the game different to so many other things on the market.  Even so, this is quite something here.  For a game to occupy that space for 9 months is unheard of.  I'm beginning to worry that this is a sign of a creeping problem, that I'm going to end up unable to leave the house - sitting here endlessly doing the run through Undead Burg until I finish it without getting hit and parrying every single opponent.  Because the game is just so deep.  There is so much to it.  It's hard to stop.

My current project is to go through the entire game without advancing in level.  This is a response, really, an attempt to re-capture that crushing difficulty which made the first play through so amazing.  It reminds me of eating chilli or something - there's a reaction to the pain.  Maybe endorphins are released, God knows what it is, but it's making me try to make this hard game even harder.  To be honest, I'd kind of forgotten how difficult it really is.  And the brilliant thing about it is that it's made me start thinking again about how I can maximise every advantage.

Because once you've finished the game once it gets (kind of) easy.  You know where stuff is and you know how the weapon improvement thing works and you can use this knowledge to make things a lot more manageable.  And not only do you know this, but so do most other people - so when you summon them they're also totally tooled up supermen and off you go merrily laying waste to enemies that were once the bane of your very lives.  Now this is fun, sure, but it's not quite the same as it was way back when.  So I started trying to recapture how it was the first time.  When I did NG+ I decided to do it only using Black Knight equipment.  Now, to be entirely honest, this is hardly a massive hindrance.  Black Knights have good armour and very big, hurty, stabby axes and swords and things; so it's all good.  The only problem I had was in the catacombs.  Down there you need Divine weapons - and I couldn't use them.  So I spent a lot of time kicking skeletons off bridges and making suicide attacks on fellas with lanterns in their beards.

Anyway, that was then.  This is now.  As a starting level character I have a pitiful amount of health.  I also (stupidly) picked a character with 9 strength.  This means I can't use any straight sword, and only one metal shield.  I am an idiot.  If any of you are thinking of following in my footsteps then DON'T PICK THE THIEF, that's all I'm going to say.  But!  This has made me think about how to overcome the (huge, slobbering) obstacles in my path and has inspired me to give the following tips to anybody who might fancy doing the same....

1.  I said this just now but... DON'T PICK THE BLOODY THIEF!!!  Pick the Knight or, even better, pick a weapon you might want to use and pick the character that can use it.
2.  Poison.  Poison.  Poison.  Lovely, useful poison.  This is your greatest friend and companion.  Three arrows will take down a Royal Sentinel (the big guys in the hall in Anor Londo.)  Two arrows will kill most other things.  Poisoned throwing knives, dung pies - whatever.  Use them and use them often.
3.  Pyromancy doesn't have any statistic requirements.  I'm just going to say that.
4.  Pick your weapons.  There is no point using anything other than fire, chaos fire or lightning.  And divine, obviously, for the catacombs.
5.  Pick your equipment carefully.  Most armour can be improved to +10, special stuff to +5 and things like the gold-hemmed set, not at all.  Bear in mind that some items can look bad to start with, but really reward you if you max them out.
6. Your maximum equip load will only ever be increased by items, so stick to light armour if you want to be mobile.
7.   A heater shield, available from the Male Undead Merchant, has the lowest strength requirement for any shield which stops 100% of physical damage. 
8.  Practice your technique.  Going toe to toe is not advisable.  Dodge.  A lot.  Parry.  Not only does it mean you don't have to spend ages dancing about, it is also monumentally cool.  You will feel like some kind of Dark Souls god.
9. Don't feel like you have to do everything.  Your aim is to beat the game.  You don't have to kill everyone to do so.
10. You will not be able to summon anybody, or be summoned, much past Undead Parish.  Save your humanity so that you can summon Solaire for Ornstein and Smough - you'll need him.

Finally, there will be times when you wonder why you are doing this.  You are doing this for the same reason that Edmund Hillary conquered Everest; so that, like him, you can say  "Well, George, we knocked the bastard off."  Assuming, of course, that you know someone called George.

Help a Brother Out - Being Good in Dark Souls

Dark Souls pt. 2

So... we've talked about the difficulty and why it's important (or even vital) to the game.  Let's talk about something that's more optional - dealing with other people.

This is an area of Dark Souls that is a little bit more um... experimental.  There are other words I could use but I think that's probably the most polite.  When it works it is sublime, but more often than not it doesn't work, or it is abused.

You have choices to make here.  In broad terms you can be a goodie (by helping others) or a baddie (by brutally murdering others.) 

First up.. let's be nice and talk about helping each other (aah). 

Dark Souls is a tough game (you may have read this somewhere already.)  The toughest bits are probably the start (because you don't have a clue what you're doing) and the bosses (because they are generally huge, slobbering demons or other nightmare creatures that want to dismember you and then eat your still twitching, armless, body.)  It can get disheartening to continually pit yourself against overwhelming odds and get beaten. 

Oof! Ow!  Oh god, it's the bonfire again.  Right, dodge that zombie, kill that giant.. ah, boss... Bang! Aaagh! Bonfire again.  Repeat. 

A guy could start to feel a little low.

But!  Don't worry!  Help is at hand!  Get some humanity (and the game will give you some if you beat enough enemies without killing the boss), reverse your hollowing and touch one or two of the white (or, even better, yellow) signs and you will be joined by a friend.  An actual human friend.  In a lonely, desolate world it is nice to have a friend.  It is even nicer to have a friend who can fire lightning bolts and has a huge sword (ahem.)  Now go!  Go and work together to defeat your enemies!

Of course, what with this being Dark Souls and everything, you don't get to build a strong working relationship.  You can't chat.  You're not friends.  You can only communicate with a series of hand gestures (like a kind of medieval Marcel Marceau)  or by being the one who obviously knows where they're going.  As always, this fits in with the whole ethos of the game.  Dark Souls' world is lonely.  Most of the game is spent on your own, but occasionally you get to see shades of others going about their business.  They prove strangely comforting.  Similarly it can be encouraging to hear the bell tolling in the Undead Parish, you know that somebody somewhere has succeeded.

Summoning, or being summoned, fits in with this.  A little bit of comfort, a glimpse of other worlds, but really you are still on your own.  Once the local boss is defeated your new friend will go back where they came from, leaving you alone again to face the horrors ahead.  While they are here, though, they are your companion and your protector.  Cherish them.

The benefits of summoning somebody are obvious.  There are 2 (or 3) of you instead of 1 but what's in it for the summonee?  Is that even a word?

Well, the summonee (yeah, just going to go with it) actually gets a few rewards.  You get half the souls of anything that's killed, including bosses, and you also get 1 humanity if you assist in killing the boss.  In addition members of the Warrior of Sunlight covenant get a shiny medal.  Nice.  However, probably the most important thing is that you get the satisfaction of helping others.

Because Dark Souls is hard.  I don't mean to go on about it, but it's kind of unavoidable.  Most of the bosses can seem impossible until you work them out, and the start is especially punishing.  So it's nice to help somebody through that.  It would be a shame for them to start the game and give up because they just can't beat those damn gargoyles.  You can show them how to beat them, you can show them where the secrets are that you found, you can take this poor lonely wanderer under your immensely skilled wing and keep them safe.  It's a beautiful thing.  You're a beautiful person.  In amongst all this dying and horror and desolation you can create something wonderful - brothers and sisters looking out for each other like proper human beings.

Summoning Tips:
1.  You can only summon, or be summoned by, people within 10% of your soul level.  So be careful of this.
2.  Some people go through the game at a deliberately low level - this means you may be dumped into NG+ when you don't expect it.
3.  Summoning somebody may make an area extremely easy.  There are lots of ways to get great equipment without being high level.  I summoned somebody in crystal caves once who basically completed the area for me.  Great, but I missed out on doing it myself.
4.  Put your summon sign near a bonfire.
5.  Think about joining the Way of White, or Warrior of Sunlight convenants - they get more chance of being summoned.
6.  If you are summoned, it is your job to protect the summoner.  If they die, so do you.
7.  Check with the summoner who they want you to kill first when fighting Ornstein and Smough.
8.  Belfry Gargoyle area is very popular - stick your sign down by the side entrance to the chapel.  So is Capra Demon - stick it outside his fog gate.
9.  If you are summoning remember to keep your helper's health topped up with your estus flask.  They're no good to you dead.
10.  If you plan on regularly being summoned then it's worth getting the "Heal" spell, or using humanity or divine blessing to keep yourself healthy.



Next up:  The Baddies..  (boo!)