Metacritic: 91 ...HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

[You Kissed a Boy and Liked It]

Visuals - Ps2-esque; female avatar looks like a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ in need of a heavy course of HRT; some enemies look like they're high res. PsX assets; Majula water looks like early 90's CGI and nothing like water; other water effects look like that waterfall viewed from that Dark Root Basin bridge, in DS1... and said game looks miles better than than its successor (and this is compared to the "new and improved, 64-bit O.S. version!)

Audio - nothing like the classic 'Souls' tunes; rubbishy atmosphere; attacks sound like cardboard weapons; voice acting is extra hammy

Animations - hilariously stilted; rag-doll corpse physics gone, leaving corpse in some very strange, immersion-breaking positions after death

Combat - clunky-as-f#@! stun-lock fest (even in the context of 'Souls' combat, it's utterly abysmal -- the worst for a FromSoft game); weapons and their abilities seem limited and uninspired; the hit-box issue is cranked up to full ♥♥♥♥♥♥ in '2', with attacks seeming to land contingent upon when they're initiated, and not whether or not they actually connect with a target

Platforming PlatFROMing - although the infamous jumping works somewhat better than in other 'Souls' titles, it's still unreliable and causes many unnecessary deaths; little level interaction besides jumping and ladders (as usual)

Gameplay design - dumb Pharros Stones busywork to reveal hidden walls; useless "power stances"; 'magic magazines'; too many healing items that render Estus all but useless; torch mechanic good, but underutilised; fire =/= fire (re. lighting Windmill)

Gameplay mechanics - the lock-on aiming is totally broken -- almost as if it is designed to lock on to anything BUT what is right in front of the player

Enemies - one-pattern robots; walk a few meters away and spam (ranged) or bait an attack, mash and roll (melee)

Bosses - butt lust... every, single one of 'em

Game world - doors can be closed (a nice addition, that was inexplicably dropped for '3'); horrible map design (point-A to point-B linear); bonfires all over the place; very few areas are memorable or worth replaying

Content - worst / ugliest armour selection in a 'Souls' game; all weapons feel 'meh'; magic feels 'meh'; bows are either too easy to abuse or useless; lots of useless rings; some weapons are not available for player use (e.g., Mangus staff)

Difficulty - easiest of the 'Souls' games; moar = better autism; bosses are almost universally exploitable via butt-råping; NG is all but pointless, (i) because it's too easy (for 'Souls' vets) and (ii) most will likely not bother with an NG+ thereafter (esp. with '3' available)

Online - albeit connecting more quickly (in co-op), inane "soul memory"; dumb Draconian soft ban system

Narrative - N/A (*game's not good enough to bother with beyond a quick run-through, followed by an immediate deletion)

This game is an exemplar of why reviewing of entertainment media should never be left up to the unwashed masses. For mouth-breathers will always vote with their pea-brains, and not based upon objective facts.

[ThePresident]

ok

[TheDukeNukedEm]

Git gud, n00b.

[King Robert Baratheon]

You are f*cking r3tarded and wrong about basically everything you mentioned. You clearly just suck at the game and are a miyazaki fanboy who can't adapt to dark souls 2 so you have no choice but to talk sh*t about it.

[King Robert Baratheon]

Also look at your username and profile picture. No one is going to take you seriously. Grow the f*ck up.

[Tankslayer]

Git Gud.

[(Edgy) Asriel Dreemurr]

Nice bait, where did you copy it from?

[You Kissed a Boy and Liked It]

NPC's - holy CRAP!, are they bad in '2': just standing there and getting mashed is their modus operandi; always copping the first attack before their "mash back" script kicks in; literally blind to non lockable enemies (e.g., in that PsX-looking 'poison vase' area); always getting stuck in the environment / level geometry; garbage pathing script that seems to be tethered to player position (they're unable to navigate outside a few meters range from player); constantly getting trapped between enemies and stun-locked to death; infinite healing...

Stupid U.I. - you can only see weapon use requirements as you're equipping them; messy, cluttered inventory and stats menus

Effects - sconces do not emanate enough light to warrant lighting them; fog etc. just 'blinking' into existence; dumb bonfire noise that sounds like someone playing a triangle

Noobish crutches - NPC's seem to be in every area (not only for boss fights); blood stains seem to remain forever (died a bunch of times, only to return an area I was in hours ago and an old bloodstain still there... complete with ~25K souls!)

Areas - too small; most are cul-de-sacs; many seem inconsistently themed; as a sum of their parts the world feels disjointed, rather than a logically contiguous whole like the other three games (even compared to the HUB-based Demon's Souls)...

Seriously, if you crematoria kindling, clinical moron millennials really think sperg that this game is up to par for a 'Souls' title ― much less, a decent game in its own right ― you should earnestly consider swilling Drano®, and saving the future Einsatzgruppen the trouble of applying the cattle bolt gun to your napes, 'Anton Chigurh' -like.

> JUST - DO - IT!! 🔫

[MagnusCerebrum]

low quality bait

[TheDukeNukedEm]

Dark Souls 2 is crap because you don't get to fight Ganondorf at the end.

[ThePresident]

You Kissed a Boy and Liked It eredeti hozzászólása:

NPC's - holy CRAP!, are they bad in '2': just standing there and getting mashed is their modus operandi; always copping the first attack before their "mash back" script kicks in; literally blind to non lockable enemies (e.g., in that PsX-looking 'poison vase' area); always getting stuck in the environment / level geometry; garbage pathing script that seems to be tethered to player position (they're unable to navigate outside a few meters range from player); constantly getting trapped between enemies and stun-locked to death; infinite healing...

Stupid U.I. - you can only see weapon use requirements as you're equipping them; messy, cluttered inventory and stats menus

Effects - sconces do not emanate enough light to warrant lighting them; fog etc. just 'blinking' into existence; dumb bonfire noise that sounds like someone playing a triangle

Noobish crutches - NPC's seem to be in every area (not only for boss fights); blood stains seem to remain forever (died a bunch of times, only to return an area I was in hours ago and an old bloodstain still there... complete with ~25K souls!)

Areas - too small; most are cul-de-sacs; many seem inconsistently themed; as a sum of their parts the world feels disjointed, rather than a logically contiguous whole like the other three games (even compared to the HUB-based Demon's Souls)...

Seriously, if you crematoria kindling, clinical moron millennials really think sperg that this game is up to par for a 'Souls' title ― much less, a decent game in its own right ― you should earnestly consider swilling Drano®, and saving the future Einsatzgruppen the trouble of applying the cattle bolt gun to your napes, 'Anton Chigurh' -like.

> JUST - DO - IT!! 🔫

youre trying way too hard

[it's_w4yne]

Did you play another game? That's 95% false...

[You Kissed a Boy and Liked It]

Enemy agro range - laughably exploitable, even in the context of 'Souls' games; an effective "invisible wall" exists, past which enemies cannot go ― essentially allowing players to creep through the game, keeping enemies out of attack range, and retreating to heal where necessary

Bosses - lazy deigns, both visually (Rat Covenant... lol!) and in terms of their battles; rote, boring boss strategies, with the moar™ philosophy ensuring that the lock-on aiming is every boss's best ally; poor boss intro scenes; zero fanfare or atmosphere; unmemorable (*I can barely even remember most of them, despite having played through the game before)

Game mechanics inconsistencies - many breakable props do no break from arrows, but some do; 'kick' action replaced with some oddball-looking 'parry' animation, that neither breaks props nor has much use whatsoever; really slow stamina regeneration (even with Chloranthy Ring +2), making players feel like they're 2-pack-a-day smokers with lung cancer

Physics - cloth physics added, but they look like everything is made of the same material; clothing / armour sways independent of wind or char. movement

[El Fuerte]

i lost it at "butt lust" roflmao

But yeah. DS2 is the weakest of the series obviously. Anyone who do a little research knows it:

-Developed by Fromsoftware team B
-no Hidetaka Myazaki
-Troubled graphic engine development that resulted in the director getting fired so the co-director could take over in order to re-write and downgrade. And so it was able to run decently on the PS3.
-an apparent, oversaturated and uninspired Motoi Sakuraba (composer of the previous game)

Here is a summary of DSII development (credits go to reddit user GravelordDeNito)

If memory serves:
Miyazaki had already started work on Bloodborne as director by the time production on Dark Souls II began. Tomohiro Shibuya and Yui Tanimura were given co-directorship of the project in lieu of series creator Hidetaka Miyazaki. Miyazaki himself was relegated to a supervisory role and according to interviews, tried to remain as hands-off on the project as he could so as not to stifle the new directors' creativity. Meanwhile, Miyazaki continued to work on Bloodborne.
Around halfway into development, the higher-ups decided that the direction that Dark Souls II was taking was undesirable and Shibuya was booted from the project. Tanimura was then handed the reigns as sole director of the project and the entire world and narrative were rewritten. Characters were remade entirely and existing assets from earlier in development had to be slotted into the game as best they could and stitched into the new narrative. The production continued this way and Dark Souls II as we knew it at launch was born.

People who say that DSII is the best in the series are blinded by PvP nostalgia (which is one of the few spotlights of DSII). They don't understand the meaning, artistic value and core brilliance of the Souls series. They think that its popularity comes from PvP and being a "hard game", which saddens me deeply.

[King Robert Baratheon]

6 DIAS SEM CAGAR eredeti hozzászólása:

i lost it at "butt lust" roflmao

But yeah. DS2 is the weakest of the series obviously. Anyone who do a little research knows it:

-Developed by Fromsoftware team B
-no Hidetaka Myazaki
-Troubled graphic engine development that resulted in the director getting fired so the co-director could take over in order to re-write and downgrade. And so it was able to run decently on the PS3.
-an apparent, oversaturated and uninspired Motoi Sakuraba (composer of the previous game)

Here is a summary of DSII development (credits go to reddit user GravelordDeNito)

If memory serves:
Miyazaki had already started work on Bloodborne as director by the time production on Dark Souls II began. Tomohiro Shibuya and Yui Tanimura were given co-directorship of the project in lieu of series creator Hidetaka Miyazaki. Miyazaki himself was relegated to a supervisory role and according to interviews, tried to remain as hands-off on the project as he could so as not to stifle the new directors' creativity. Meanwhile, Miyazaki continued to work on Bloodborne.
Around halfway into development, the higher-ups decided that the direction that Dark Souls II was taking was undesirable and Shibuya was booted from the project. Tanimura was then handed the reigns as sole director of the project and the entire world and narrative were rewritten. Characters were remade entirely and existing assets from earlier in development had to be slotted into the game as best they could and stitched into the new narrative. The production continued this way and Dark Souls II as we knew it at launch was born.

People who say that DSII is the best in the series are blinded by PvP nostalgia (which is one of the few spotlights of DSII). They don't understand the meaning, artistic value and core brilliance of the Souls series. They think that its popularity comes from PvP and being a "hard game", which saddens me deeply.

You're just as r3tarded as OP but what's worse is you think some people don't like the PVE. I love the PVE. Go f*ck yourself.

[You Kissed a Boy and Liked It]

Retarded Meg eredeti hozzászólása:

People who say that DSII is the best in the series are blinded by PvP nostalgia

LOL! Then they truly must be some of these most 'special' kinds of snowflakes our species has ever whelped through generational inbreeding -- if the chug-athon, roll fiesta PvP experience is what gilds the wilted DS2 lily weed.

It's no more irrefutably demonstrated, than through the dismissive Trumpian, inarticulate spërg responses, which form the counter arguments of these plebes, to legitimate, factual, detailed criticisms, that they deep down know DS2 is trash. (...Admittedly, most are likely just burnt buyers, trying to justify the lubeless rectal ravaging 'date råpe' by FromSoft, using the digital butt-plug that is the inglorious DS2.)

The only thing that makes DS2 playable, is that it's made in the 'Souls' mould (albeit poorly and half-åssedly) and the modicum of ensuing 'Soulsness' it elicits. If the game did not bare the "Souls" moniker ― and were it not released as a much-anticipated sequel to DS ― I'd wager a shiny, new, Palestinian-infant-blood-stained shekel that it would have gotten roundly panned, by critics and players alike.

I recall some interview with one of the voice artists prior to DS2 release (done by some feral / feminist -looking "gamer girl"... her name / affiliation escapes me), and the guy was so effusive with the wistful expositions about his time with the game, that he nearly―I kid you not―teared up! LOL! And yet, despite the corpuscles of pre-ejaculatory fluid dribbling forth from his urethra, he still prevaricated when asked plainly, whether or not the game lived up to its predecessor/s ― replaying: "It's the same game... but different [...] It's more of what we loved... Just not the same." (🚨) LOL!... Pîss right off, shill.

I'm no newbie to this game (was watching pre-release streams, before playing from day-1). But what got my goat was the "91" plastered on the Steam store page ― an arrant, asinine, Nolan Batman-esque, gross over-exaggeration of the reality of this game (both in the context of the 'Souls' franchise and adjudicated on its own, stand-alone merits). This is tantamount to false advertising and serves to dupe potential customers unfamiliar with the series, into buying something they think will reflect DnS and DkS... Which is unacceptable.

Dark Souls II is a 6.5 / 10 video game... at best. Anything above that is self-fellatio of the most pathetic order.