Dark Souls II (PC)

In the action RPG genre, very few titles can boast an uncompromisingly high difficulty level yet still manage to become popular hit games. In this respect, the Souls series is almost legendary. Getting started in the series is notoriously difficult, as paltry character stats, flimsy armor, and overpowered enemies guarantee an excruciating learning curve, even for hardened veterans of the genre. The game’s fan base must have some masochistic tendencies, though, since there was no outcry when the developers of the newly-released Dark Souls II announced that they would be turning the difficulty up a notch or two, as they consider brutal difficulty to be a “core element” of the game. Read the following test review to find out why computerized self-flagellation can still be satisfying even after you’ve attempted to kill the same enemy for the thousandth time, only to watch your digital alter-ego die an ignominious death.

The root of all evil

The storyline of Dark Souls II takes place in the same world as its predecessor, though there’s no direct connection to the previous game’s plot. It follows an undead protagonist as he tries to rid himself of a dark curse that threatens to rob him of his memories. To this end, the player must collect souls found throughout the world, which help him regain some of his lost humanity. Unfortunately, these precious spiritual treasures are not so easy to come by in the world of Drangleic, as the other undead inhabitants of the world are after them as well. This means the protagonist will have a lot of competition to put up with, and at the beginning he’s in way over his head. Fortunately, the he receives guidance from a woman calling herself the “Emerald Herald”. She reveals to him that only the “Four Great Souls” are capable of healing him permanently, and continues to offer help and advice throughout the game. Smiths and various merchants can also be very helpful, though they’ll expect to be paid handsomely in souls, which double as a universal currency in this world. The hero’s ultimate destiny is to rid Drangleic of the monsters that plague it and to break the curse that afflicts him, unless he wants to become a raging beast himself, preying on other undead as they search for a cure.

Jumping in at the deep end

In terms of gameplay mechanics, there’s really not that much of a difference between Dark Souls II and its predecessor. You take control of a nameless undead character, and after a brief introduction you’re allowed to choose a character class. The eight starting classes are the Warrior, the Knight, the Swordsman, the Bandit, the Cleric, the Sorcerer, the Explorer, and the Deprived. The class you choose will determine your character’s base attributes, and each one will start your character off with a different set of equipment. For example, Sorcerers focus on the Intelligence and Attunement attributes, allowing them to cast devastating spells and slay their enemies from afar. On the other hand, the Warrior fights his enemies in classic melee fashion, so he relies more on Strength than anything else. There are a total of nine attributes, which you can increase by spending souls. Many of them have an influence on your character’s stats such as stamina, health, or resistance against various kinds of attacks. And remember, it doesn’t make sense to equip certain items if your character doesn’t posses the right attributes for them.

Your inventory plays an even greater role in the latest Souls title, since high attributes don’t matter much if your character faces his first enemy dressed in rags and armed with nothing but a broken stick. Even harmless-looking skeletons, often found in groups, can easily kill a poorly equipped character and cause him to lose all the souls he’s carrying, forcing him to go back and collect them at the scene of his demise – if he can, that is. This means you’ll have to constantly keep an eye on the condition of your items. You can repair damaged shields, swords, and armor at the nearest bonfire (a sort of checkpoint) for free, but you have to bring broken items to a smith and pay for the repairs with souls. Of course, resting at a bonfire also restores your character’s stats. The only downside to taking a rest is that every enemy that’s not designated as a boss will respawn. However, in contrast to the first Dark Souls, enemies can only respawn a certain number of times, meaning that with a little bit of effort, you can actually clear whole areas.

Unfortunately for Dark Souls fans, AI-controlled monsters aren’t the only thing to worry about. Like in the previous game, Dark Souls II includes a permanent multiplayer mode that allows players to encroach on foreign territory. You might find yourself embroiled in a tough battle after entering an area that pushes your skills to the limit, only to receive a notification that a human enemy has invaded your game. The intruder will often exploit your already-precarious situation and attack you from behind. Then again, there are also good-natured interlopers who might help you defeat a boss by placing a summoning marker near its location, allowing you to call for help if you need to. Many of these helpful players are pros who know all the secrets of a given area, which can reduce the difficulty level quite a good bit.

Dying at the hands of AI-controlled enemies is penalized more harshly in Dark Souls II than in its predecessor. Not only do you lose your humanity as well as all the souls you’ve collected, but each time you die you’ll receive a stackable penalty to your maximum health, until your health bar can only be filled halfway. The only way to get rid of this negative, semi-permanent effect is to restore your humanity by burning a certain item in the bonfire. Of course the title has a lot more to offer than continuous combat. There are also various treasures, secrets, and NPCs hidden throughout the game, which you are invited to discover. And then there’s the constant drive to acquire more and more powerful weapons and armor. On top of that, you can theoretically collect enough souls (from PvP at least) to get every attribute to 99, allowing you to play as any class you want to in the next run-through.

In the course of the adventure you will pick up tons of equipment that you won’t be able to carry around with you because the weight would make you unable to move. Fortunately, from the very beginning, each bonfire allows you to store items, meaning the only things you’ll have to take with you out into the world are the things you need. Bonfires can also be used as travel portals, allowing the protagonist to travel quickly to any location he’s already discovered. In Dark Souls, this feature wasn’t unlocked until relatively late in the game, meaning you had to spend a lot of time running from one place to another. I can really say that in general the developers have done a great job of addressing several of the gameplay issues the previous game was criticized for without making any real changes to the difficulty level. The result is that Dark Souls II is a real challenge because of its content and not because the gameplay makes it difficult.

Honing your reflexes

It’s clear that Dark Souls II was not necessarily designed for the PC, and the game is best controlled with an Xbox 360 controller, which you can also use on a PC running Windows 7 if you have the right adapter. Combat maneuvers require a level of precision and skill that most players will have a hard time reaching with a mouse/keyboard set-up. In particular when you’ve got to block, counter, or avoid an enemy’s attack, you can forget conventional PC controls – and in Dark Souls II, one false step or one misaimed dive for cover can quickly land you in a bottomless pit. Like before, the in-game menu is intricately complex, and a lot of actions and items can only be selected by navigating through several submenus and responding to various confirmation prompts. Other RPGs like Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen have in-game menus with a much more practical layout despite having a similar structure and gameplay.

Through the looking glass

While the launch version Dark Souls showed some pixelated textures and crude effects that were already out of date when the game came out in 2011, Dark Souls II looks like a modern game. The world of Drangleic is fluid and authentic, due in no small part to some excellent light and shadow effects. Figures are really well animated, and this makes combat scenes especially enjoyable to watch. Of course, Dark Souls II is far from perfect as far as graphics are concerned, which might have a lot to do with the fact that the PC version is a direct port from the consoles. The classic problems that plagued its predecessor are still around in this one, like clipping errors that allowed items and characters to slip through seemingly solid objects. Combined with the ragdoll engine, this can have some pretty funny results, such as enemy corpses getting their heads stuck in walls. One can only hope that the talented members of the Dark Souls modder community take up the task of optimizing the graphics in this title like they did with the first Dark Souls game.

Deceptively calm

The music in Dark Souls II is epic and sweeping – just like it’s supposed to be in an action RPG. Atmospheric sounds do an excellent job of conveying a creepy and threatening vibe, and the authentic clash of weapons in combat is satisfying, especially when you first raise your shield to block. An added bonus with the download version is that after you install it, you’ll have the soundtrack saved on your hard drive as a series of MP3 files.