What's the official verdict on Dark Souls II?

I don't like the lore of DS2 as much. Anyone know what the canon ending was for DS1 then? Burn or burner? Gods seem to be long dead, humanities are gone, and their lord souls passed around like Beiber in a prison so I guess burner. I kind of wish it had nothing to do with Dark Souls 1 and stood on its own lore-wise. Different unrelated dying world without DS1 baggage. I don't think I would be as hard on it then.

Its a great game, but Dark Souls 1 has the better world/bosses and Demon Souls has the better atmosphere. Gameplay I think I do like DS2 better. The co-op is fun and the wider environments work better when raiding in a party. I'm planning on doing another DS1 run on pc after I finish off the last boss and her guards in DS2.

Sublime bone dust implies that the flame was rekindled by someone at some point, regardless of what you chose in DS1. The ending to DS2 also sort of implies it a bit. While there is no real 'canon' ending, as it's left flexible and open to interpretation like a lot of stuff, it does heavily suggest the rekindled ending is what happened. Or if it didn't, that someone removed the darkness and rekindled anyway, just not the chosen undead.

Hopefully Company of Champions is in every Souls sequel. Best covenant ever, makes the game much more challenging than Demon's Souls was and im loving the shit outta it!

Flexible difficulty is definitely one of the game's biggest strengths compared to the previous games. Giving the player covenants and items to change difficulty, as well as meaningful NG+ changes, really does help the game cater to vets and new players alike. People complaining about the game being too easy really need to try CoC, bonfire ascetics, and NG+.

yeah and i love how they're presenting to you company of champions at the beginning instead of unlocking it 2/3 in the game or something. I just wish you unlocked something by beating the whole game with this covenant because it is much harder.

Well you can always have the satisfaction being on top of the CoC leaderboard if you plow through and get tons of awestones.

Heh I'd rather be a Blood Bro though.

Wow, you really are dense. I don't suck. Sens Fortress is just simply an annoying level, because the game level design wasn't balanced. And while Earthen Peak is similar to Sen's Fortress, so is the Lost Bastille, both heavily trapped areas. And you know what? Both areas have FAR better enemies than Sen's Fortress. And here is another victory for Dark Souls II when it comes to level design. Traps. In Dark Souls II, traps and environmental danger is spread out all over the game, but in Dark Souls 1, its only really Sen's Fortress that contains traps. This is why its an annoying level, because its full of traps, the rest of the game isn't.

Na, you suck, it's obvious. Can't even hang with the Blood Bro's I bet you'd be crying for a blue sentinel in a hot second.

Lost Bastille has almost no traps by the way, I'm not even sure where you're getting that from. There's one trap where you hit the rock into the well, maybe an undead citizen or two behind bars, the rest is just black barrels but those aren't even traps. Nothing like swinging blades or pressure plates or mimics.

Not a big fan of the Souls games, but Dark Souls 2 feels like the weakest in the series.

If by unique you mean invisible and pointless bridge, then yes. I'll admit that I think the Painted world and the DLC content is still the best in the series, but there are poor parts of the Dark Souls including the Crystal Caves.

Lets take a look at the bosses as well, Bed of Chaos sucks and they reuse the Asylum Demon 3 times. Seath and Nito are push overs that offer no challenge and the end boss can be killed with 2-3 parries. If we compare Vanilla Dark Souls to Vanilla Dark Souls 2 there's no contest.

If I'm going to level a solid complaint its that I missed the inter connectedness of the original's first half. However even when looking at that it disappears after you aquire the Lord Vessel. The paths to the end bosses are all linear.

NG+ is kind of cool since they thrown some phantoms your way and change a boss or two a bit. Lost Sinner and Flexile sentry get significantly harder, especially if you try and solo them. Biggest thing I've noticed is that invasions are a lot more common.

It's too early to really say, given that patches will be a thing for quite some time. That said, in it's current form, it's the weakest of the three. The atmosphere and environments are fairly flat and feel uninspired. The bosses are largely forgettable, save for a few. More than a couple mechanics are redundant, bizarre, unfortunate, or just downright bad. And the Pvp...things seem to be consistently going downhill in this regard.

The game itself is solid, and some of the features are more than welcome additions(especially if they improve upon them), but I see it as filler chapter in an otherwise stellar book. As for going into details, the good and bad mechanics I mention are pretty much that of the generally shared opinion(or downright fact) that any community known player has discussed. On a more personal note, they could have done more with the pursuer. A lost opportunity for something interesting there, I think. Something about it fascinated me.

I think it is easily as good as its predecessors. The story is much better and more alive than DS1's, but not as good as demon's souls. It is too early to say something about the lore, however it seems that it lacks the concrete foundations DS1's lore had. I like the new gameplay mechanics in PvE but PvP is broken at the moment. If I see one more havel/santier/hex build I will smack my head against the wall. Also spells do way too much damage, and it seems that the lag is as bad as DS1's lag.

To be honest I disagree with people who say that the level design isn't as good as in DS. I think that the enviroments this time round are a lot more interesting and beautiful, but the bonfire placement isn't as good as it should be.There are way too many bonfires. The world design is a proper mess though, and it is sad that they didn't care about it this time round.

The soundtrack is great, but it lacks variety. I still think it is the best OST in the series so far though.

Now about the bosses, I think that most of them fall under the "meh" category, but many bosses are good. However, the game doesn't have a proper "signature" boss, like O&S, the false king, or gwyn. Perhaps From Software could put some top-class bosses in a future dlc though.

To me it seems that people are sugar coating their memories of DS1 and that's why they are bashing DS2. The boss argument is especially comical. Are you trying to tell me that bosses like the Taurus demon, the asylum/stray/firesage demon, capra demon (cheap,but easy boss), the moonlight butterfly,etc are actually memorable fights? Give me a break. Also there isn't a fight in this game as terrible as the BoC one.

I also think that DS2 is the most difficult souls game so far. I leveled up sufficiently(finished the game at SL100) and still had a lot of trouble up until halfway of the game. DS1 had a some hard bosses, but the areas where easy as pie. Demon's souls is the opposite. DS2 manages to strike a good balance between the two, although it is cheap at parts,more so than its predecessors.

When it comes to atmosphere, demon's souls is king. The dark colour palette and the ambience adds a lot to it. You actually felt that you were in a f***** up world, and a feeling of depression was present in all areas.Dark Souls 1 had a very bland atmosphere in my opinion, save for one or two areas. Dark Souls 2 improves slightly upon Dark Souls 1, but pales in comparison to demon's souls.

I still think that DS1 is the best souls game though, but DS2 could easily reach first place with some good patches(soul memory especially). Demon's Souls was in my opinion the most unique and memorable of the 3,but I wasn't a big fan of its gameplay mechanics.

people only call Demon's Souls the best because it has been their initial experience with the franchise, therefor it always remains the most memorable.

The official word is buy it on pc or wait for the "remastered(lol)" edition.

@groowagon

What about the people who played Dark Souls 1st then played Demon Souls ?

Perhaps they don't exist.

@Praisedasun: You think that DS2 is easier than DS1? I found that to be the opposite. I struggled A LOT in the first game (makes sense since it was my first Souls game) but in DS2 I don't think a single boss took me more than like five tries. not trying to brag, but it's the truth.

Granted, the game is much more difficult in subtle ways in NG+ but I still found the initial run through with my tank character to be easier. Still a tough game, but felt a lot more manageable.

Also, I'm glad you pointed out the boss fight thing. I'd say the boss fights in DS2 are equally as memorable in that some are huge and epic and others are fairly meh (like you mentioned ones such as Capra demon, etc.).

I'd say overall the game is as good as DS1, just in different ways.

The series isn't as great as people make it out to be.

Demon's soul > Dark souls - Dark souls 2

Difficulty depends on your build. In my first DS1( I also started with dark souls, and then proceeded to demon's souls) playthrough I had a tank/fatroll build and the only bosses that gave me considerable trouble were O&S and gwyn. In DS2 I started out with a str/dex build mostly built around dodging, so I was bound to die more times. In DS2 there were a number of bosses that gave me trouble in my first playthrough, like the Old Dragonslayer, the Pursuer, Mytha (that damn poison), and the ancient dragon(around 25 deaths with that guy), but unlike dark souls 1, there were some pretty challenging enemies, like the guys in the dragon shrine. Also in DS2 there are many 1vsN situations, which were rare in DS1, and that is why I think DS2 is harder, along with the reduced i-frames and the less viable backstabs and parries.

@Praisedasun: Old Dragonslayer? Hm. I suppose that I could see trying to make a roll build making the game much harder since, as you said, there are far less I frames. For me, I made a fat roll build but instead of focusing on dodging I was all about absorbing damage... Lots of two handing the Eagle Shield (forget its name in Dark Souls II) and hitting with the Greatsword (I love that damn thing). I don't believe I died on Old Dragonslayer, but the Pursuer gave me a lot of trouble (since I'm offline) and Mytha also did (until I learned that you can burn the wind mill and drain the poison).

I will admit that I did not fight Ancient Dragon or King vendrick, though. I honestly had no idea about the side quest until after the fact (did an almost totally blind run through). Aside from that, I am fairly certain I killed all the bosses.

I think the one that gave me the most trouble was Pursuer or the Ruin Sentinels (those guys are absolute dick weeds). but I was honestly surprised by how many bosses I was able to beat on my first try.