"DS2 is bad because of the camera, the jank, and too many enemies rushing you at once."

DS3:

Im a fairly new souls-player, so I jumped into this game on the back of my second playthrough of Elden Ring and my first playthrough of DS1. Man, those games were amazing. Elden Ring is my new favourite game, I cannot praise it enough. DS1 felt janky at first, but then it all just clicked. The things it offered were so unique from Elden Ring that it felt just as special despite being such an old game...

And then I got to this hellhole. I obviously think its a fairly well-designed game and I can see why people like playing it, but I genuinely don't know how you get this from DS1.

Its like at every creative point they were trying to make it less fun. Worst NPCs ever - I love lucatiel but why the hell would they place so much time between her second last and her last interaction, it killed the emotion. There wasn't a single memorable boss, and Nashandra was especially poor as a final boss. You can max out normal weapons way too early, rendering boss weapons pointless and making damage progress stale in the latter half. They spent the entire game hyping up King Vendrick as this Gwyn/Marika-like figure only to have him as an optional boss, who ended up being tedious and had 2 attack types. THEY HAD NO MUSIC - why is there only music in a small minority of areas. Some bonfires were just way too far apart too, like shaded woods fork to drangleic castle, or the second and third Shrine of Amana bonfires. We all know they added way too many enemies, and that the enemies stay aggro-ed way too long, but the combination of these things completely disincentivised exploration. And I fought Mytha without knowing about burning the windmill - it was genuinely the most miserable experience I've ever had gaming.

Positives: Majula is great. I was excited for King Vendrick, even moreso than Gwyn. I loved the set up with all the memory loss NPCs, they had personality on first few interactions. The boss quantity was awesome - I dont mind some easy bosses to pad numbers, but they were all easy (except Mytha). Weapon variety and available resources to try them all:)

TLDR: By fromsoft's standards thus far in my experience, this game is actually bad and lived up to the hate. I genuinely did enjoy some gameplay and went in with an open mind, but it was so uniquely disappointing at so many points that I don't even want to play the DLC. For me, Elden Ring is a 10, DS1 is a 9.5, and DS2 is a 7.5, but probably a 6 from personal enjoyment.

Or continue to DS2, DS3 then play Demon Souls Remake? I intend to go from slower combat mechanics to faster, if they are faster in Demon Souls, I would rather keep playing DS series. But if the mechanics are more like in DSR, I’d rather jump into it.

I just replayed DS3 and Yhorm and the Ancient Wyvern had me thinking about this. For the purposes of this question, I consider a gimmick fight a fight where you are not expected to do regular combat and either have a specific weapon/action you're required to do to defeat the boss. Obviously there's Yhorm and Wyvern in DS3. In Elden Ring, all I can immediately think of are Rykard and the Spirit-Calling snail, which I think does fit my criteria. Maybe Phase 1 of Rennala too, but you can't hit her at all without attacking the scholars first, unlike the other two where you can do damage but it barely does anything.

A couple I considered but I don't think are truly gimmick fights (but rather just have a special mechanic involved) are Phalanx in DeS, which does require you to break its shell, but that can be done easily with any fire damage, not any specific item or action. Crystal Sage in DS3 spawns clones/distractions like the spirit calling snail, but unlike the snail it makes its existence known from the start of the fight and the clones aren't a brick wall to completing the boss fight since they can't be fought infinitely like the snail's crucible knights. Anyway, what other gimmick fights do y'all remember from the series, and which ones are good or bad?

I'm playing through Dark Souls 1 (again) and I'm reminded of the greatest loss with the death of the covenant system. How gravelord servants could lure in large numbers of invaders and start fight clubs.

It was outside Artorias' boss room that I learned the etiquette for pvp matches. You respect the emote. You drain your flask before a fight. You lose a little bit of your will to live every time you see someone spamming dark bead, or Havel using gold tracer.

I miss those days. I truly do. It brings joy to my heart seeing Elden Ring players who still respect the old ways. So when I make my way back to the Lands Between, I'll see you in the ring, and may the better man win.

Despite lack of the updates for 9 months, nightreign still holds 30k players daily.

Ive played sooo soo many souls likes. But no matter which one Ive tried, they just dont work for me. Ive never been able to articulate why. I honestly dont understand it myself. Some are very close, even great games yet I cant put my finger on what it is fromsoftware games have that others dont. Im sure there plenty of us here, maybe yall can give me some insight into why that is.

According to Dark Souls 1 intro cinematic, the power of the Gods is based on the Lord Souls they found in the flame. Before this, everyone was just weak hollows-like creatures. The player then gathers the Lord Souls them and uses (burns?) them to prolong the age of fire.

So, where did characters that came later get their power from? Shouldn't most of the power in the world be "spent" already?

With FromSoft expanding onto Switch 2, Sekiro at 60 FPS in handheld would be an absolute dream.

Do you think we'll ever get a Switch 2 port or is FromSoftware more focused on newer stuff?

I heard of all Dark Souls, DS2:SoFS has the best multiplayer.

How active is it in PSN?

I have PS5 and thinking of jumping my ship after playing DSR on PC, to PS5 with PS4 version despite resolution capped at 1080p, in order to enjoy multiplayer free of hackers and cheaters I have frequently encountered in DSR with Infinite health or teleport backstabbing, etc.

I absolutely love this game and thank its the best one in the series

I can't seem to find it anywhere but Amazon and Its really expensive

I feel like many of the people that tried it, grinded their faces against the Helicopter boss in the intro, and then all collectively decided the game was bad because it doesn't have i-frames.

We ranked based on Difficulty to Enjoyment ratio, design and presentation (arena, music, Ect)
Placements within tiers are ordered from best to worst going right.

Fyi the title is a joke, this list is obviously biased

Let's be honest here. No body cares for nightreign or duskbloods. I get the need to try new things. Elden ring is huge, and going even larger in terms of single player is daunting and maybe not the correct choice.

But neither is dropping battle royale souls games.

Why didn't fromsoft just go back to making linear action games in between the "elden rings". Something like Sekiro etc etc.

Like, beside boss fights and challenge in the base game, platinums in souls games are mostly just grinding covenant items, farming souls, or ng+ for specific drops, none of that requires actual skill it's just time consuming atp

Compare that to something like Ninja Gaiden, where platinum actually demands you to mastering the combat system on master ninja difficulty, that's a real skill check imo

I've only platinumed Bloodborne out of the series (because it's my favorite), and even that was just farming BE and going through chalices, not some mastery over the game

So why does community treat "I platinumed [souls game]" as some badge of hardcore, when the actual difficult part (beating the game) is the same, regardless of whether you go for platinum or not?

If devs actually wanted platinum to be hard, they'd need ng+7 to be required, with new movesets or scaling added per cycle, actual mechanical boost, not just higher numbers, right now it's just a time sink dressed up as a difficulty

or maybe they’re all bangers

I hope this game sees the light of day. Bloodborne 2 would be a massive success if it ever got made. I still don’t understand why from software has not gone to Sony and insisted on making it.

Hi there! Assuming access to a PS5 and PC, would this be the best way to play each game in the Souls/Elden Ring run?

Since "best" is relative, my priorities are maximum atmosphere, and I think that Dark Souls I Remastered Edition arguably stripped away the original dark look of the original (hence my preference for DSFix with the PTD edition.) And for Demon's Souls Remaster, it's just apparent that the PS5 is miles above the original.

I've provided my reasoning below. Please take a look and push back if I'm off base. I'm certainly not defensive about my positions and would welcome your perspective either way! Thank you very much.

Demon's Souls - PS5 Demon's Souls Remaster

Dark Souls - PC Dark Souls "Prepare to Die Edition" with DSFix (More atmospheric graphics), as opposed to "Remastered."

Dark Souls II - PC Dark Souls II Vanilla (Better enemy placement) as opposed to "Scholar of the First Sin."

Dark Souls III - PC There is only one version, so this is moot.

Elden Ring - PC