Topic: Dark Souls

[Acid]

I'd never dare and spoil the game for you.

[Flame]

gonna bump this topic back up since there's now gonna be DS2 DLC.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_24S4j-jWU#ws

[Blue Valkyrie]

Ooo, more content is always welcome; but oh god who decided to make those poison statues from the gutter mobile!?

Crown that grants immense power? Sounds like a Shadow Tower 1 reference to me, Dark Souls II was full of King's Field nods too.

[Fxeni]

Yeah, I kinda like how they're planning this out.

[Blue Valkyrie]

Crown of the Sunken King is out now.

Over all thoughts? Well worth the $9.99 price.

Level design is fantastic, the two areas are huge and full of hidden paths and multiple ways at progressing, the idea of using switches to alter the geography was genius and I'm sure I missed a few things. Speaking of switches there alot of hidden ones in the temple area and it very much feels like a LoZ dungeon.

Enemy variety was also really good, the enemies are all hard to stun lock and hit hard or can inflict poison or break your equipment but the level design often lets you inflict damage on them ahead of time to balance the playing field. Bosses on the other hand were more of a mixed bag, certainly not as good as Artorias of the Abyss from Dark Souls 1, the last boss is fun and challenging but one of the optional bosses is just a lazy NPC gank squad. I have yet to face the second optional boss so I can't comment I believe it's a dragon so maybe something like Kalameet?

The new weapons/armor/spells and rings are all usefull or should be fun to play around with. Some of the consumable items added in are neat too.

If the next two DLC are this long and have this much new content I'll be getting them too, all they need to work on is boss design a little more. This DLC really brought back nostalgia for King's Field 4 for some reason, the sunken city reminds me of the Ancient City.

[Da Dood]

DLC is really huge, especially considering that was only 1/3 of the whole extra content (parts 2 and 3 will come out in Aug and Sep). Overall, I'd say it's worth the $8-10 for the exploration and new items, but sadly not for the bosses.

You can see that they had to design X bosses to populate these gigantic new areas plus 2 more DLCs, and at some point they must have realized it was easier to alternate recycled stuff and new exciting stuff. One of the bosses is expectedly epic (the "final" boss), but the others are lazy and dumb. DkS1's DLC bosses kick this DLC's ass.

Still, I don't know if it's because I played on NG++, but the bosses were no piece of cake. I could generally tank them with a billion healing items, but I still relied on NPC summons and a little luck. The levels were fairly simple to survive, at least. I was dealing good damage, and the Alonne Greatbow could handle most rooms from a distance. The new regular enemies aren't as obnoxious as you'd expect. Only bosses killed me. Most bonfires are well placed, and sometimes well hidden. And I didn't see any Black Phantoms outside of scripted NPC invasions.

That all said... holy hell, these new areas are sweet. One of them has a Tomb Raider/Indiana Jones vibe, with traps, switches and secrets. When you first enter the DLC and see the enormous temples in the distance, wondering if you'll get to explore them... whoa. I kinda regret playing online because the messages spoiled some secrets that would have been interesting to figure out on my own. There are new consumable types (like temporary STAT increase!), new rings, and some interesting weapons/spells. I gotta farm enemies to see if they drop anything good.

Looking forward to the next DLC, but I hope the bosses are more creative.

[Fxeni]

I think I'm going to wait until they're all out, then start a new character from scratch.

[Blue Valkyrie]

Make sure to visit Vendrick after getting the crown because that Ashen Mist memory hints at story to come, to say nothing of the description of a certain DLC boss soul.

I'm calling it now, Primordial Serpents are going to be part of this; the design of shrine of winter and in the area after the Rotten seems to hint at them heavily.

[Flame]

If I had known there would be DLC I wouldn't have started NG+. Shulva alone is kicking my ass.

then again, the DLC came with a buttload of balance changes, so theres that too.

And this [parasitic bomb] is clearly intended to be endgame content, while I'm not done with NG+

Also using the full heide set, which while all around strong, isn't the best.

[Blue Valkyrie]

I'd say the Ancient City..err Shulva is best tackled with a character at the 90+ level range, honestly you can be that strong around the half way point if your build doesn't require too many purchases outside leveling up. Honestly the trick of the enemies of the DLC is to not be an R1 spammer, this DLC was designed to punish stun lockers and reward players who fight smart.

Playing through the DLC again on my mundane duel dagger build, lots of fun still making me nostalgic for King's Field IV due to the level design.

[Flame]

pretty sure Im like level 200+

problem is more that everything hits like a truck, armor or no armor. One guard break with low stamina and half my health is gone.

I'll manage

[Blue Valkyrie]

Heres a few tips that might help you out.

1) The humanoid enemies here can't be staggered at least not without two or more hits, this means spamming attacks won't get you far in this DLC. Bait an attack and roll away then quickly counter.

2) Use the switches to you're advantage, the rising pillars can harm the early mobs greatly, later ones can be used as cover.

3) The lizzards with the poison spitting statue shells can be killed, either smash them with a hammer type weapon (downward swings) or arrow/magic the fleshy parts in first person view

4) The ghosts later have a puzzle around them solve that and you can damage them normally, unless you want spoilers I'll just say look at the environment around the first two and you'll figure out what you need to do.

5) The large monsters later are weak to lightning damage, stick near their rear by the feet and roll to avoid their stomp or jump attack. The bite attacks are FAR more dangerous.

6) Try to backstab the knights in the final area, I honestly haven't figured a better way of dealing with them due to their agile attacks.

Hope that helps a little, honestly be as mobile as you can and don't get greedy with attacks and the enemies aren't too bad.

[The Drunken Dishwasher]

Looks Amazing !!!

[Blue Valkyrie]

Blood Souls---err Borne looks very nice, I love the new era they are using.

Transformable weapons - I'm curious how this will turn out, maybe it's treated like power stancing in Dark Souls II where you hold the triangle/Y button for a second to activate it.

Improved Agility - The new dodging looks really useful, we already know rolling is the basic dodge maneuver and with shields no longer a thing I can't wait to see what kinda evasions I can master.

Enemy Behavior - It looks like enemies have some neat things they will do when not in battle, much better than just standing around in mobs waiting for the player.

Interconnected City - I'm really looking forward to seeing the exploration of Dark Souls I with the dark atmosphere of Demons Souls. Interviews said that theres many ways to draw enemy attention as some mobs will be way to large to safely handle in normal combat.

[Fxeni]

It's looking pretty good... I'm curious to see just how many of the weapons are transformable.

[Blue Valkyrie]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-25S6bxg-6E

Silver Mont has a game play analysis video up. I love how the infected talk...some screaming murder at you others begging you not to kill them, that's unnerving and way better than that groans of the hollowed undead or soul starved from the previous three games.

Also the Darkness Mechanic better make it into the final game unlike Dark Souls II 

[Blue Valkyrie]

Dark Souls 2, second DLC impressions. Finished the whole thing in about 4 hours.

Quality is about the same as the first DLC. The new area is bigger than Sunken City, and very pretty. The enemies are okay. I don't like the constant spamming of a certain enemy type, but at least the ambush situations are super predictable. There were tons of Black Phantoms, dunno if that's an NG+ thing or if they're always there. As for the bosses... well, I liked one of them a LOT. At the very least they all fight solo, which is a plus after the ridiculous gank squad of the first DLC.

Can't say I like the damage I'm doing with my weapons. I can't tell if it's a nerf or if NG++ is that brutal there.

Mini Review now that I've mostly 100% the DLC

Crown of the Old Iron King continues to push game play design not often found in the Vanilla Dark Souls II, while the Sunken City of Shulva had a focus on puzzle solving both in combat and in manipulating the environment to progress through it's bow triggered switches, the tower of Brume offers a highly vertical design as you slowly descend the tower and discover keys needed to unlock other areas of the tower. While the initial areas of Brume are more linear than Shulva once you find some keys you begin to discover there are quite a few areas off the beaten path to explore and suddenly Brume is one of the largest areas in the game.

Enemy diversity is better than in Sunken King, you encounter the basic soldier type enemies in three flavors, however you also encounter possessed armor that can separate their body parts to attack from various angles and a new mage type of enemy that's challenging at both range and melee. Several giant enemies also exist and offer a neat way to punish players who just strafe larger targets to avoid their attacks, you also encounter several hollowed enemies that do not react well to fire and can be used to open some hidden passages if exploded correctly.

This DLC has three bosses like Sunken King, and only one boss is one that is reused however said boss has had it's A.I. and attack patterns tweaked and is quite challenging yet feeling fair compared to the gank squad of the challenge path of Shulva. The next two bosses are completely original and feel fresh.

Over all this DLC is beautiful, it's offers many breath taking views as you move outside during your decent and the artistic design within Brume is also top notch, mobs feel fair and playing smart can save you a lot of deaths. There is one red phantom mob I feel is kinda cheap but over all this content is balanced and enjoyable, there are a ton of new weapons, several new armor sets, more than few new rings and three new spells (1 Hex and 2 Pyromancies).

Like Crown of the Sunken King this DLC is well worth the $9.99 cost and is full of content. I got through the Tower of Brume in about 5 hours and missed two enemy drop weapons and one part of the Brume Mage set (gloves). If you love Dark Souls II I would recommend picking this up.

[Flame]

The DLC is pretty fantastic.

Sinh is a great fight, and I didn't mind Elana being a reskin that summons a reskin. the Velstadt clone was VERY unnessecary, but as long as she only summons skeletons, the fight is a neat one.

so far, Iron king is cool as well.

[Flame]

Looks like we've finally got screenshots of the Ivory King DLC.

FINALLY, SNOW











looks like we've got some more non-humanoid enemies. Including icy versions of those Vendrick Golems

[Blue Valkyrie]

I love the design, although thats been true of all the DLCs so far.

[Flame]

more screenshots.

The place is as pretty much everyone guessed, accessed from the Shrine of Winter, most likely the serpent cup fire thing behind that sealed door.






looks like that street fighter moveset people found in the PC version WILL be an actual item.









apparently also, once you have gotten the 3 crowns, you can visit Vendrick in his memory for some sort of "surprise"

[Kieran]

I suppose I should actually pick up the DLC at some point.

[Da Dood]

Ivory DLC got delayed until the 30th.

http://kotaku.com/dark-souls-ii-dlc-delayed-crown-of-the-ivory-king-par-1637546285

[Blue Valkyrie]

Yeah a shame but apparently the recruiting mechanic for the final boss was causing some serious performance issues. Rather have it late than have game breaking issues either way.

[Da Dood]

Finished Crown of the Ivory King, and the full DLC quest.

Well, technically I still have one optional boss to fight. It's located in what has to be the most obnoxious area in the whole game, and since the boss is just another rehash of a previous fight, I don't really care about it right now.

I loved the real boss fights in this DLC, though. The first boss is sort of like a guardian, not very difficult but (as expected) has something unique about it that'll make you scratch your head. In my case, I got lucky because I found the solution to the boss puzzle before I actually fought the boss. Needless to say, people are pretty mad about this one on the message boards.

The final boss is absolutely insane, but in a good way.

*SPOILERS*
This fight has an interesting concept: you can recruit four other NPCs (plus the regular phantoms that appear before bosses!) to help you win the fight. The idea is that these knight NPCs will sacrifice themselves to seal the portals from which the boss's minions are summoned. Seal the portals and your reward is a (still tough) 1v1 fight. The problem is that the four knights are all locked somewhere on the icy land, and you need to do some hardcore exploration to find them all. But man, when you save them and go fight the Ivory King, it is such a great sight watching those 4, 5, 6 phantoms trade hits with the boss and his minions.
*END*

As for the DLC area, it was okay. Less complex than Iron King, still massive. I think I liked the Sunken City better, but maybe it's because I wasn't in such a hurry to finish that one. There were several parts of the snowy land that I just kinda rushed through, and I also used a guide to find one of the knight NPCs.

The "big surprise" that From was promising us for beating the DLC quest was very disappointing, to say the least. Bleh.

Still, it was a fun ride. I did the whole thing in NG++, so there was plenty that I didn't explore because I wanted to fight the bosses ASAP and see if I could beat them. I will take my time and explore these areas more carefully in some other opportunity.