f13.net

DS 3 unlocked at midnight for most of us so I figured a dedicated thread might be in order.

Haven't played much so far. Just character generation and the tutorial area.

A few observations. Combat is basically like DS 1 but a little faster. Parry/riposte seems to be harder to pull off than in previous games. Enemy reactions are like in DS 1, so no enemies tracking your movement while swinging.

Load times are much improved from Bloodborne even though it uses the same engine. Even basic enemies do combos now and you're staggered more easily (could just be the low poise though)

PS 4 version is fine but only 30 fps, my PC doesn't meet the minimum requirements for the PC version though and so I could not test it.

Probably the most well realized tutorial area of any souls game.

Can't wait to get home today and play until I pass out. I know this will make me angry for lots of reasons, but it's Dark Souls so pretty much videogame heaven no matter what. I hate that the Dual Shock 4 doesn't seem to work with Dark Souls 2 and 3 on the PC, so I'll have to go back to the Dual Shock 3. A minor quibble, but the Dual Shock 4 is really the best controller ever so I really wish I could have used it especially considering it works with all the other PC games.

EDIT: PSA! Your save games are not held in the Steam Cloud! Which is completely "WTF?!?" - Anyway, save your saved games, to avoid losing everything in case of file corruption or hard disk failure. MEH!

After killing the tutorial boss I noticed how much quicker combat felt compared to 1+2, its a huge difference for someone that never played bloodborne. It will be interesting to see if that's a good or bad thing.

I vote bad.

There are some workarounds to get the DS4 to work but might require more fiddling around than you want to deal with.

You've been playing a lot of it since last night Velorath. What's your take on the combat (even though I don't remember your take on the hyperspeed of Bloodborne).

My issues with Bloodborne had less to do with combat speed and more with the lack of options (shield, magic, bows, etc...) which also led to limited tactics. Dark Souls 3's pacing in general seems to be off from previous Souls games in a way I can quite articulate yet. As far as combat in particular goes, it does seem faster paced and less deliberate early on with only a couple enemies at a time that don't react too quickly and go down in a hit or two. Then you'll occasionally run into a somewhat challenging enemy.

I started off as an Assassin (Dex and Int). Normally i start off straight Dex, but i felt like going with some magic this time. Picked up the Soul Arrow spell, and found a bow also but haven't used it much yet. I'll have a lot of time to play in the next couple days so we'll see how this goes.

I caved and picked this up last night.   I just had time to download it though, I didn't actually fire it up.  I think my biggest decision is whether or not to update my NVidia driver before playing, the last time I updated it bricked my PC (first time that's ever happened).  Hopefully things are sorted out by now, it's been a few weeks.

My favorite weapon in the first Dark Souls was the Claymore, so I'm guessing I'll do a Strength build of some sort for this one.

Welp it's a Dark Souls, but way forgiving. For example you can just mash the roll button to make a string of perfectly timed rolls until your stamina runs out.

But what really interests me is why they changed all back stabs into ass stabs. Seriously, you stab everyone right in the butthole.

Praise the Sun!, then try but hole

Back stabs everywhere. I hate it. I also hate that it randomly crashes over and over.

Twice so far (invader and summon) I've seen player characters hovering around with no animations completely immune to damage. Not sure if it's a bug or hackers, but I'm 0/2 on non-exploitable multiplayer with this and The Division. Blah.

I did but I probably wouldn't do it again. I dislike the whole "NVidia Experience" thing immensely. For example since a few updates ago the SW is no longer able to optimize Kerbal Space Program even though I haven't deleted and/or reinstalled it, it's still in the same directory it always has been. The NVidia SW claims though that it can't optimize it because it's installed in a directory NVida Experience has no access to - even though it worked for a year or more until an update to the NVidia SW broke it.

I installed it because I assumed that the SW could tell you or set up the optimal graphics setting for the majority of games but what it usually does is give you settings that are less than optimal for your HW. With DS 3 it even says that "this computer doesn't meet the minimum requirements for optimized settings" which is a very ass-backwards way of telling me that my computer doesn't meet the minimum HW requirements for the game.

It's usually a crapshoot if it works or if a new version of the driver and the support SW breaks shit and I usually only touch it if shit doesn't work.

So, random Dark Souls 3 observations so far, which is only two hours in.

- Great game. How could it be anything less?
- Feels forgiving. Dislike.
- Feels less grim. Dislike.
- Fantastic visuals.
- Combat is tight and satisfying as expected, but stamina recovers too quickly. It is of course better than Bloodborne cause shields are back and no silly attack-to-regenerate HP crap.
- The whole game seems to be a tribute to ALL the previous chapters including Demon's Souls. A lot of references, more or less subtle. "Then touch the demon darkness inside me".  :heart:

It's not a bad game and I'm having some fun with it, but I also feel a bit like I'm just buying these games out of habit now and that From is just making them out of habit. It's still too early to really judge, but I think right now my biggest problem with this game is that the level and enemy design feels a bit uninspired. It also feels a lot more linear so far than any previous entry.

Fuck it. I started again with Deprived. Solved most of my issues.

Honestly, Dark Souls 1 didn't even feel like an improvement to Demon's Souls. That we're three chapters in at this point is just silly.

I ended up doing a clean install of the latest driver and so far I've had no issues and the game seems to run great (and it looks amazing).  Overall I don't have any strong opinions on NVida Experience but I will say that I love Shadow play.  So for me it's worth installing just for that.   The game optimization stuff I can live without.

I really like how they made a variety of weapons easily found right at the beginning.  I am a little curious if the game is actually much more forgiving or if everyone is just much better at the game from the start now that we're a bunch of games into the series.  The stamina does seem to refill pretty quick which is maybe the most forgiving thing I've noticed in just the first few hours.

My lack of completion of the previous games leads me to join your camp.  I get less far into each installment.

If only there were better games to play, let alone worth completing.

This is exactly why I've not bought DS3. If my progression curve followed the same pattern as the previous games I'd probably get beaten by the installation process this time round.

GIT GUD!

No, not really. This is one of those games where there is an actual learning curve and it gets rewarding as you get better. Like real rewarding. Not like raiding in WoW.

The downside that I have seen so far is that, similar to Bloodborne, charging any enemy and going towards their weapon side is too effective. Even bosses.

Play aggressive, but it may take you a long time to get comfortable with the idea of playing aggressive.

This is like action RPG chess. I don't even consider these games unfair anymore. Maybe it's a new mental state?!

I think mental state has a lot to do with it.  Playing defensively is a hard habit to break in Bloodborne even though it generally gets me killed.

I've picked up Demon's Souls again and I figure if I can at least get one more trophy, that will be enough to annoy my DS3-playing friends.  Maaaaaybe I'll finish it, I don't know.  I do know that being aggressive in Demon's Souls gets me killed, at least as a mage.

Said it when it launched, will say it again - Demon's Souls is the most fair game ever made. 100% of the time when you die it's your fault. That carries onto the other games for the most part.

You still want a 100% physical block shield. You just use it much less than you would otherwise. The safest place to be, almost as an all-encompassing rule, is as close as possible to the enemy. Just like Bloodborne.

Unless you're fighting those wacky inflatable chaos monsters. Dear god. Almost as scary as the quadruped frost knights.

The more I play from software's d.souls the more I go away from the overwhelming experience that you had the first time to it turning into just another game to beat. I simply don't get the adrenaline kick fighting bosses anymore, its just another time learning how to counter the attacks. I the same thing I had with raiding at the end with the exception that all wipes are caused by my mistakes and there is no waiting between fights.

I need something new. No idea what that would be.

Contextually not relevant but these conversations often remind me of

Yeah, every time one of these games launches I think "I should go back and beat Dark Souls 1 before I play this one" then I start a new game and get to Firelink Shrine, kill a few skeletons and call it a day, and never log in again.  Then I spend the rest of the week feeling like an alien for being the only person who doesn't know what the hell anyone on the internet is talking about suddenly.

Nah, you're not alone. I've never gotten past the first campfire. Game bored me enough that I stopped and haven't ever gone back. Not my style of fun.

I appreciated what Demon's Souls was doing back when I played it.  It was very hard but rewarded mastery.  The atmosphere was perfect. 

I ended up getting to the point where I could do pretty decent, but overall, the frustration of learning every new encounter, memorizing monster placements and dealing with the control scheme (which is fine for the game) wore me down.  I don't really want to play a game where I need to continually improve over the course of the game.  20 year old me would probably love it.  37 year old me wants to relax at some point and just faceroll. 

I think I got to the first bonfire in Dark Souls 1 and never got much beyond.  The game doesn't offer me anything at this time in my life that's worth the skill climb.  That sort of need for continual improvement only really appeals to me in a competitive PVP environment where at least my baseline to carry me to a comfortable place in many instances.

tl:dr I don't want to get gud. 

I found Dark Souls really boring, and Dark Souls 2 I watched most of and found REALLY boring.

Demon's Souls and Bloodborne are the best games in the series. From should give it a break for a bit- an HD Remaster of Demon's Souls would be something I'd want instead of a new game at this point.

Yeah.... no.

This right here.

Found a new (optional) zone tonight and two minutes later was shot into a sub-floor by a crossbow bolt the size of a subway car. The sub-floor, of course, was filled with demon rape. :drill:

I love this shit. Even though I'm over 30 and by default now bad at video games. Best Dark Souls to date--it has all the loot.

Diablo Souls?

Don't say that. Makes me want to play it.

No, still definitely Dark Souls. Just the fashionest of souls.

If... I've never played a Dark Souls game before... should I jump straight to Dark Souls 3, or start somewhere else? Assume I only have a PC, and that consoles don't exist. :X

You can start from this one, no problem. As said an infinite amount of times, Demon's Souls is the best one, but you need a PS3. As a PC gamer, your options are limited to the three Dark Souls and while cases can be made for which one is the best, they are all awesome games so pick whichever you want. Note: 1st was a bad port unless they patched it somehow, and 3rd has the best graphics. 2nd has probably the best expansion which raises the overall value, and that has to be taken into account if you are buying the "Scholar of the First Sin" edition.

The series has gotten less and less about mastery, memorizing enemy placements, and encounters that have little margin of error. You can farm souls without fear of losing them on death by putting down your co-op sign and getting summoned into someone else's game. You can't pick up items or progress in the game while you're doing it, but you get souls at the rate you normally would when killing enemies. You can summon people to help you even when you aren't at a boss enounter. Dark Souls 3 is in a lot of ways as easy or as hard as you feel like making it.

I re-bought DS1 for PC two weeks ago.  I already have it on the PS3, but didn't want to bring out that old dinosaur.  I had heard about it being a bad port, and when I first fired it up...the graphics are just terrible.  As in "they literally just ported this thing and did nothing to improve it" and it probably ends up looking worse than the original if you are trying to view it in 1080p.  Luckily, it took no time at all to figure out there is a must-have patch (called DSfix or something).  Apply that sucker and it makes a world of difference, all sharp and shiny.  Bad port becomes Great port, and worth every bit of the 5 or 10 bucks I paid for it.

I second the recommendation for DSFix. It turned the PC version from being a very poor port into the definitive version of the game.

I was looking into ways to emulate the PS3 and re-play Demon's Souls on my PC but due to the Cell processors on PS3 that is not gonna happen. Eventually, I'll get the PS3 back to form as I will need a Demon's Souls fix in a few months.

I really don't care about bad graphics but I would care if for any reason the controls or the reaction times were 1 milliseconds different from the originals, and that's true for Dark Souls 1 too. It's good to know the port has improved over the years, as I am seriously considering to replay all the four games (minus Bloodborne, I'll do that in a few years, after Bloodborne 3) in the next few months.

This series started as a darkest horse in the history of gaming, and it has somehow evolved into a semi-mainstream sensation that a lot of people like to dislike. The legends about its difficulty are vastly exaggerated though, because as Velorath said it can be played (and cheesed) in so many ways that it can be pretty much whatever you want. As Schild also said, these games are amongst the fairest ever made but they don't really force the player to be fair too. And Demon's Souls was definitely the hardest, the most impenetrable and the least forgiving. Since the Dark Souls era, things have become "friendlier" with every iteration. Luckily though, the overall quality is still stellar.

Lots of hindsight when people talk about Demon's Souls.

I replayed it recently at Halloween. I played three entire sessions (~8 hours?) without dying once. I wouldn't discount the later games because of difficulty. The reduced difficulty perception has to do with everyone getting used to the systems.

The camera problems and accidental moves are way more prevalent and frustrating in Demon's Souls as well.

I mean, I have played an entire game of the whole series since October. It's somewhat fresh in my ancient mind. The only thing that stands out as being difficult to the point of being a cock punch is Ornstein and Smough.

I'd suggest that you pick up a PS3 on craigslist and see how you fare. You may be surprised.

I agree with pretty much all you said. My reasoning behind Demon's Souls being less forgiving was mostly about the fact that "save points" were less common than any of the following titles. Hence, a tendency to lose all the souls much more often. Also, a lot of stuff was completely obscure, like the separated world and character tendencies that made, among other things, the mobs easier or harder. You could effectively crank the difficulty up without even knowing. Now THAT was punishing.

Man, they really did nerf magic in this one. I went high int and I'm still a melee dude most of the way. Crazy high requirements if you want something else than bog standard spells too.

Also, currently fighting loads of skeletons. Their mightiest weapon is standing on ledges and fucking up the camera.
 

Playing Dark Souls for the first time (PC), installed DSFix and all it did was cause my game to crash, a LOT.

I ended up adapting my gamestyle for this one, I have gone from UGS and hiding behind a sturdy shield to quicker swords and relying far more on dodge. Abyss watchers and the pontiff forced me to play better which is nice. There has been a few gimmicky bosses which i generally dislike and a few that turned into the usual, hit their back leg. Hope the late ones are good.

So far the biggest problem has been finding a weapon I like and a proper build. My current build so far is mostly about trying to test all sorts of weapons. Also, not enough material to upgrade all the nice looking boss weapons.

Traditionally requires multiple plays to get all weapons and to even upgrade the ones you get the first time.

Demon's Souls has a few bothersome quirks, like how the arrow always goes to the right of the crosshair.  Also I will often waste arrows on invisible geometry.  I'm wasting arrows because I don't know how to aim Soul Arrow.

Dark Souls boardgame reaches goal within 3 minutes. Asked for $70000, it's at 1.3 million (1875% of goal) after three days and with twentyfive to go.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/steamforged/dark-soulstm-the-board-game


(https://ksr-ugc.imgix.net/assets/005/759/821/ab7fa312b4ec81d4ce3d5e33e81f1b5c_original.jpg?w=680&fit=max&v=1461075050&auto=format&q=92&s=1b6e075a816c1daf2dbfb70ee8034ac6)

Dude on cover is giving "thumbs up" gesture.

That's the official cover of all the Dark Souls 3 things. I hate it because that is exactly what I see. Instead, he's letting some sand/ash drop. Very shitty cover/picture for this year's game if you ask me.

This one grew on me, found it better than both dark souls 1 and 2. Some really good fights and I definitely cursed my slow reflexes at times but still doable without relying on summons or other cheesy stuff. Felt like a good ending of the series.

This might end up being my favorite as well.  I'm not done yet but slowly getting there.  Just finished Aldrich which was a really fun one.  Screw that second form arrow attack though  :awesome_for_real:

It's a very very solid iteration. My only complains so far are about the backstabs (too easy to perform), and the unreliable net code at least on the PC. And maybe it could have used a bit more gloom, but that's just me. It's as great as any Dark Souls game should be. I am taking it super slow, checking every nook and cranny and refusing to advance until I have killed everything in sight in every zone. It doesn't have that my build is a deliberate self-gimp: ranged is forbidden, magic is forbidden, miracles are forbidden, co-op and summons are forbidden. And I refuse to over-upgrade my weapon (so far a Claymore +3) to avoid trivializing the content. And I started as a Deprived. So after 41 hours of /played I have only just killed the fifth boss. But hey, I get one of these games every 12 months, so I want it to last.

Went back to Crusader Kings II for a week. Still haven't bought the later DLC--I don't like what I've read about what they do to the game. There are definitely some hilariously appropriate unpredictable things that can happen over time. I also really enjoy the strategic problems it throws in your face now and again--how to hold out against a superior force of rebel nobility long enough to have the cash for mercenaries, etc.

I seem to have settled into a groove and I am now playing the well known Stealth-Muscle-Wizard class; good times.

Fiddled around with a new character to see how things were if you used all advantages and knowledge on beating things and most things become a cakewalk. It wasn't until fourth boss that I upgraded my weapon on my original playthrough and what was really tough stuff the first time became really easy now. There is no doubt that you can ruin your early enjoyment if you optimize yourself early.

However, it got bit crazy when I was at the road of sacrifice. Was going to fight a giant crab when I get invaded by an npc, backtrack and aggroed another giant crab and then I get invaded by a player as well. Figured that I would die fairly quick so I ran to the bonfire where the crabs can't reach me. Player comes and I beat him quickly, kill the npc invader, and then beat the two crabs. It helps that I was already at the health softcap, nice stamina and had a decent shield but it was still a pretty crazy sequence.

That area is a joy for PvP. I am a Watcher of Farron so I get summoned there to defend it from players all the time, and two times out of three there's already a red player trying to kill the host. It usually ends up in a weird three-way thing, but sometimes me and the baddie team up to kill the host as that's why we are both there in the first place. Good times.

Same here. Taking my time and having a blast. Killed up through Aldrich, and then proceeded to get seriously rolled by the jailers in Irithyll Dungeon (), so I decided to spend some time doing PvP in Anor Londo. Extremely fun. I'm really loving the game.

The Grand Archives are a fun place, Archdragon Peak not so much.

I guess you've already heard of the exploit that enables scumbags to softban other players in PvP?

Apparently cheaters found a way via deactivated code in the DS 3 engine to give opponents in PvP hundreds of thousands of souls simply by hitting them. Basically by activating the souls+ "spell" that's also used to give a player souls from enemies. This huge amount of souls then leads to a softban for the affected player because of Bamco's anti cheat mechanism.

If you dig on youtube you will find lots of dickbags using this exploit to grief and ultimately ban lots of players already.

This is almost as bad as Poise -my favourite stat- not working.

I was convinced to buy DS3 and immediately after I relented and purchased it, the guy tells me that Poise doesn't work.  Fucking shit.  Without poise, might as well just play whip bitch in Bloodborne.

Use a dark sword.

Finally finished.  A few of those last bosses are real treat.  Mainly    All of them have easy first forms then just drill you with their second forms. 

Feels good to be done.  :grin:

I made it past the first boss.  Do you people have jobs and families?

Yes. htfu

Hey, I clocked 55 hours so far. But it has been out for a month. Come on.

It's OK.  My free time is something I'm working on.  Note that I've been "wasting" it trying to complete Demon's Souls.

Beat the game on ng+, although have some of the optional stuff left. Some of the bosses at the end had some added stuff although not enough to really make it hard. It was a fun run but now its time for something else.

From says poise works.

http://kotaku.com/from-software-says-dark-souls-3s-seemingly-useless-pois-1776079738

Always had the impression that poise worked properly when swinging big weapons like ultra greatswords, curved greatswords, big hammers and axes. For quicker weapons like regular swords and curved swords it has no effect.

Given how bosses and mobs in general favors an agile gameplay I mostly used quick weapons while I felt that big weapons only seemed useful for PvP gameplay.

Believable speculations on how the new Poise works.

(long)

https://www.reddit.com/r/darksouls3/comments/4j4f94/ds3_poise_researched_and_explained/

In short, it's similar to how it was in Demon's Souls as opposed to Dark Souls 1 and 2. It's a chance, modified by your poise value, the weapon you are using, the weapon the enemy is hitting you with.

Managed to get a friend to finally play dark souls 1. He almost stopped after going into graveyard from firelink shrine, even moving into catacombs until I told him, you know there are other ways to go. He was so sold on this idea that the game was super brutal that he expected you would die endlessly just to progress from the tutorial area. Now that he walked into undead burg instead he is totally hooked.

I installed dark souls 2 myself, played a bit, didn't like animations, found the areas looking bad and not really interesting to walk in so after 1.5 hours I uninstalled it. I guess there was a reason why I never played it after I finished it the first time.

I tried going into the crypts first too. After four hours and several "fuck this game" moments I went to the burg and wrecked the place.

Yeah, believable aside from how it not only completely contradicts hours of footage and testing (while offering no actual proof of his own, while also being on a throwaway account), but is also counter to the style of deterministic gameplay that the Souls series has been built around.

It's almost certainly either a troll post or someone who is wrong, but genuinely believes he's right.

More believable speculations on Poise then.

https://www.vg247.com/2016/05/16/dark-souls-3-poise-2/

I do know that after failing a dodge it felt like consequent hits had a tendency to hit you as well. If getting hit removed invulnerability frames from dodging it certainly would explain a lot but it sounds like an awful game mechanic that better not be true.

Clearly I just need to ignore this and play the game or not.

I'd like to beat the first boss with my sorcerer but I suck.

Sorcery is one of the things they kind of shit the bed on in this. You're basically a melee guy for a long time until your stats and gear get up there, especially your rings.

I kinda feel like any ranged is boned at the beginning.  Or I suck.  Might be both.

I think saying "I think I should be able to play the game from the beginning as class X" is kind of silly for a dark souls game.  Even when starting as ranged was viable it was never optimal, there were so many rpg's back in the day that didn't even let you pick a class until you were a few levels in so I just don't see this as much different.

Sure, that's fine.  I don't have an issue with that, insofar as there is a deprived class and that my knight isn't prevented from eventually learning spellcasting.  I do wish I could personally get my sorceror past the first boss, but it makes me tired and so I end up playing something else.

Do you mean Gundyr or Vordt?  I'm not one to parry much but I found Gundyr is pretty easy to parry once you get his moves down.

Also don't be afraid to summon people to help you. There's no shame in it, IMO.

Hell, I got tired of bashing my head against Champion Gundyr yesterday and summoned two players to help. They got toasted immediately, which left me alone against a boss who now has much higher health.

I managed to knuckle up and win, which made me feel even better in the end.

That's the thing: Dark Souls may be hard but you can make it easy in so many ways if you so wish. Summoning people is the most obvious way and barring surprises, when you summon it's usuall a guaranteed boss kill. Worst case scenario you rinse and repeat a couple of times. I never summon because I don't think these bosses are balanced for more than one person so they usually die so easily that I feel robbed of the fun, but as Koro says there's really no shame. Better to summon than to get stuck and put the game away.

I don't know.  That first dude that I inexplicably de-sword.  I guess I need to learn to parry or go play Bloodborne.

Learning to parry never hurts, but for his first phase I got away with it as an absolute Dark Souls newb by just rolling a lot.

His second phase though, I had to just ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ that shit and go HAM until you finally win.

I hate Pus of Man (which is the goop that comes out of him), and I cheese the ever-loving fuck out of every one I see because I can never learn their attack patterns and they hit like trucks.

Sorceror shield is not awesome, so rolling it is.