YouTube Channel: Let's Play Dark Souls 3 Part 2: High Wall of Lothric

This is a no commentary playthrough of my first run of Dark Souls 3. In this episode we finally make our way to the High Wall of Lothric and brave the first real area of Dark Souls 3.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Dark Souls 3 Part 1: Cemetery of Ash

This is a no commentary let's play of my first run of Dark Souls 3. I have beaten almost all the previous Soulsborne games and have a good idea of what I am doing, but don't worry I still die many, many times. In this episode we start the game and brave the Cemetery of Ash, go to Firelink Shrine for the first time, and explore the area before heading to Lothric proper.

YouTube Channel: Dark Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin Random Bits: I Hate Maldron The Assassin

I don't like invasions at the best of times when playing Dark Souls, but when there's an NPC invader that acts like a real, dickish human invader and can't do anything to prevent them from invading you. You know you're in for some deep frustration.

Secondhand Opinions: Inside

Speaking as a PlayStation focused gamer I have to admit that I'm very jealous of Xbox One owners and people with actually decent PCs because they get to play what is looking to be one of the most interesting and memorable games this year. Inside is the long awaited follow up to Playdead Studios first project Limbo and at first glance one could be forgiven for thing that Inside is nothing, but a shinner, newer version of it's spiritual predecessor. Both games begin with a young boy in a forest, solving simple block puzzles, and avoiding hostile enemies that can make short work of you. But where Limbo didn't ever really evolve beyond that Inside takes its rather simple premise and takes it to some very dark places. Exploring themes of corporate greed, mind control, and bodily violation all without ever uttering a single word of dialogue and instead relying solely on the player's interactions with the game world to convey its themes. The game has been getting tons of perfect review scores from many gaming new outlets including ones that are very fickle with their praise. If you lack the proper means to play Inside like I do I highly recommend looking for a playthrough with absolutely no commentary because the atmosphere and sound design are masterful and it would be ruined if one were to watch with someone droning over it. Inside is one of those rare, near perfect games that is nearly impossible to be describe and must be seen to believed.

YouTube Channel: Dark Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin Random Bits: Defeating Sinh The Slumbering Dragon

Well after wallowing in despair of the inevitable heat death of the universe I final decided to stop being such a baby and upload videos again. Here is a video of me defeating Sinh The Slumbering Dragon in Dark Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin aka one of the only good boss fights in that game.

YouTube Channel: Dark Souls 3 Random Bits: All Boss Fights

After several millions years of absence, I finally return with a video featuring my Herald Tyler of Astora conquering all of Dark Souls 3 boss fights. I tried my best to beat every boss by myself and in the end only had to summon for help against one single boss.

Big Thanks to Sky for helping me take down The Nameless King.

YouTube Channel: Star Wars Battlefront Random Bits: Triple Kill

Just a short and sweet video of my sister getting a pretty good triple kill in a Cargo Match.

Brief Site Update

Sorry for the lack of content the last few weeks, but a lot of stuff has happened in that time. My sister moved out of my parents house and I've been driving back and forth a lot as we have been moving stuff to her new apartment. I've also been helping my parents clear out my dead grandmother's home so we can put it up for sale and then just to top things off my laptop decided to crap out on me so I had to wait a few days for new parts to come so I could fix it. But I have my laptop back now and the free time to work on projects again. I plan to upload a few new videos over the course of this weekend. I'm working a series of reviews and editorials that I plan on publishing over the next mouth and my next Let's Play series on Dark Souls 3 will start Wednesday next week. Big Thanks to everyone that has been checking out my blog and I hope to deliver better, higher quality content over the next year. This is The Gaming Lycanthrope signing off.

Alien Isolation Review: In Space No One Can Here You Scream

The title screen perfectly captures the tone of the game.

Developer: Creative Assembly 
Publisher: Sega
Version(s): PC, PS3, Xbox 360, PS4 (reviewed), and Xbox One
Price: $59.99
Release: October 7th, 2014

When it comes to the Alien franchise, I have always been a bigger fan of the original Ridley Scott movie than James Cameron's actionized sequel. Don't get me wrong, both of them are great movies, but I prefer the “slasher movie in space” vibe of the original over the “military bros shooting up aliens” vibe of the sequel. Most video game adaptations set in the Alien universe draw inspiration from the James Cameron movie and most of them are pretty mediocre. 2013's Alien Colonial Marines by Gearbox Software was different, if only due to the fact it was a complete trainwreck that sold itself on false promises and fake gameplay footage, and to this day is one of the biggest shitshows to ever happen in the video game industry.

Aliens Colonial Marines summed up in a single thirty second video. 

So when in 2014 developer Creative Assembly revealed its horror game Alien Isolation would take inspiration from the original film rather than the sequel, I was very interested. I played it back in 2014 and remember absolutely loving it and giving it a very positive review in my student newspaper. 2014, however, was also one of the worst years in video game history. So was Alien Isolation merely a mediocre games that felt great at the time when compared to the garbage coming out around it? I recently went back to play it with that and mind and found that it does, for the most part, hold up. However, I do have quite a few problems with it.

You just have to look at a screenshot of Alien Isolation to know it's better then Aliens Colonial Marines.

The story of Alien Isolation is as follows: you are Amanda Ripley, daughter of the sole survivor of the original film's Ellen Ripley, who is drawn to the remote space station of Sevastopol with the knowledge that they have found the flight recorder of her mother's ship and may find closure for her mother's disappearance. When she arrives, she finds that the station has been torn apart by fear of an alien organism that is picking them off one by one. Now trapped on the station, Ripley must find a way to escape while dealing with paranoid human survivors, malfunctioning synthetics, and of course, the alien itself.

Amanda Ripley most certainly takes after her mother.

The plot of Alien Isolation is nothing special. It gets the job done and drives you through the game just fine, but don't expect any big plot twists or anything especially if you are a huge fan of the Aliens franchise. There are likely twists you will see coming from a million miles away even if you're not a huge fan of Alien. However, the writing redeems itself when it comes to subverting clichés that have plagued the Alien franchise for years. Rather than the iconic Weyland-Yutani being the central evil corporation working behind the scenes, their failing competitor Seegson takes the role instead. We also don't have the ally being revealed as an android or the evil executive trying to capture the alien. There are characters that play with those expectations, but thankfully subvert them. The role of antagonist is squarely put on the alien and malfunctioning AI running the station.

Meet your new worst nightmare.

The real narrative achievement of Alien Isolation has to be it's setting of Sevastopol Station. Sevastopol is a wonderfully realized place that feels real and lived in despite being what amounts to a space version of Detroit. Computers files and audio diaries you find throughout the game paint a picture of a once shining beacon of man's rise to the stars reduced to a barely functioning heap of metal floating in a part of space ignored by everyone else. The main things that make Sevastopol so memorable is Alien Isolation's excellent art direction, lighting system, and sound design. Alien Isolation perfectly captures the 1970s view of the future from the original film with vacuum tube computers, cassette tapes, and CRT monitors. The lighting of the station’s many rooms and hallways are always dimly lit or outright malfunctioning, creating a constant sense of unease. Finally, the sound design is simply breathtaking, with every creak of the ship being audible and many sounds designed to make you feel like you are being watched.  This finally leads us into the gameplay aspects of Alien Isolation.

Sevastopol Stations deserves to be counted along side the USG Ishimura and Rapture as one of the best video game setting ever.

Sound is the most important aspect of Alien Isolation's game design. Throughout almost the entire game, Ripley is being hunted by the alien, and unlike the cannon fodder it has been reduced in other media adaptations in recent years, this one is an unkillable horror that WILL kill you if it finds you. At first your only tool to help you survive against the alien is a motion tracker that detects movement around you. Every time you hear that tracker beep your heart rate increases, as you know the alien is almost certainly nearby. You can also usually hear the alien crawling around in the vents or prowling the halls long before you see it. The motion tracker gives you an advantage, but the alien can hear it's beep if it's close enough so you also have to be careful when using it; otherwise, it's instant death.

The motion tracker lets you detect enemies movements, but also blurs your vision when using it. It also malfunctions when in tight spaces like vents.

There is more than the alien you have to worry about on Sevastopol. There are small pockets of paranoid human survivors you will have to contend with. Some of the groups will not become hostile unless you provoke them, other might give you a chance to leave before open fire, and others still will just attack on sight. There are also the station's synthetic work force called Working Joes found in certain parts of the station which are often malfunctioning and will attempt to grab you and strangle you to death. You can try to fight off human attackers and Working Joes with a small collection of weapons you fight throughout the game, but you are always better off sneaking around threats as the sound of guns going off will almost certainly draw the attention of the alien. You can potentially trick humans into attacking you and escape a sticking situation while the alien is munching on them instead of you, but it is a risky move and more often than not will result in your death as well. While almost all your weapons are pretty much useless against the alien, you do have a trump card in your arsenal. The Flamethrower is the only weapon in the game that can drive off the alien, but fuel is scarce so it should only be used when absolutely necessary.

The Working Joes move slowly, but are hard to take down, deal a lot of damage if you do catch you, and often appear in groups. So don't underestimate them.

Thankfully, you do eventually get more than a measly motion tracker and a few weapons to help you survive against the alien and the other threats Sevastopol throws at you. Throughout the game you find blueprints and components that let you craft tools that can help put the odds in your favor. Tools like flashbangs can stun humans so you can run past them, EMPs can stun synthetics, and Molotovs can drive away the alien. You also get Noisemakers and Flares that you can use to divert the attention of enemies, including the alien, so you can sneak past unseen. However, the alien in programmed in such a way to adapt to the strategies the player uses. Use a noisemaker to draw alien's attention one too many times and it’ll look for you instead. Hide in a locker too many times, it will start investigating them. Use the flamethrower to drive it away too much, and it’ll relentlessly attack you to make you waste fuel. Combining all of these gameplay variables and enemy types with open levels featuring multiple routes to the same objective makes for a truly excellent core gameplay loop of navigating dangerous gauntlets from one objective to another.

The Flamethrower is the only reliable way to drive off the alien making it the the most precious tool in your arsenal. Fuel is very scarce so use it only if you absolutely have to.

So I have pointed out that the core gameplay loop of Alien Isolation is great, but with mechanics so brutally tough, especially on higher difficulties, you need to focus that into concentrated bursts as not to exhaust the player. Sadly, Alien Isolation suffers from a bad cause of unnecessary padding. Alien Isolation's campaign is about 20 hours long and could probably benefit from having at least 8 hours of that cut. It feels like the developers had a lot of ideas for creative scenarios to put the player in and wanted to put as many in as possible without thinking about how exhausted it would make the player feel. A good example of this padding is a hospital level early in the game. After finishing the area the is an elevator to the beginning of the area is clearly accessible to the player's right, but rather than simply let the area end on a high point, the developers instead force the player to take a detour into the vents towards another area of the station simply to pad out the length. There is also an entire chapter of the game that consists of nothing but walking and doing simple interactions. While the chapter is visually spectacular and important to the story, it’s very tedious to go through on a second playthrough when you just want to experience the game.

The need to find upgrades for your hack tool and blowtorch just feels like arbitrary ways of extending the length of the game then an incentive to thoroughly explore the station.

The feeling of padding the length is also not helped by the manual save system that Alien Isolation has in place. I personally love the manual save system of Alien Isolation as it goes a long way towards increasing the feeling horror and dread as you don't have the security of an automatic checkpoint to fall back on if you die, and you have to be on the lookout for save points which encourages exploration. However, some areas of the game have a critical lack of save points and certain save points are separated by loading screens. So if you die before reaching a save point in a new area, you'll have to wait for the game to reload at your last save point and then wait through another loading screen to get back to the new area you died at. I believe that Creative Assembly has addressed several of these issues; I remember finding more save points than the first time I played in 2014, and the game will reload from the beginning of a new area if you haven't found a save point in that area yet, but I think adding the option for automatic checkpoints wouldn't be a bad idea either so long as you had the option to switch between manual and automatic at will.

When you activate a save station the option to save is always defaulted to no. This makes it very easy to accidentally not save in a panic and screw yourself over. Which is really annoying.

There is more to Alien Isolation then just the campaign. There is also a few cool extra modes that offer concentrated bits of pure gameplay and light story elements that expand upon the experience. There is Survival Mode, which pits you against predetermined threats on themed maps that challenge you to complete objectives in tight time limits to get high scores that are put on online leaderboards. There is Gauntlet Mode, which challenges you to finish three maps in a row without dying. And finally, there is Salvage Mode, which has you choosing between two objectives across several rounds to see how long you can survive. Sadly, the base game only launched with a single survival mode map with all the other modes and maps being DLC, which kind of sucks. There are also two DLC scenarios taken from Ridley Scott's Alien and the fact they were used a preorder incentive is just disgusting, especially because they got the original cast back to record new lines.

It's great they got the original cast to come back to do more Alien stuff, but it's a crying shame that most of it was relegated to preorder DLC.

The last issue I have with Alien Isolation is admittedly a minor nitpick, but it still annoys the hell out of me. There are these items throughout the game that open up new paths like a wrench you can use to take barriers off doors, a blowtorch you can use to burn through metal panels, and a hack tool you can use to open locked doors and terminals. However, there're arbitrary restrictions on how you can use they items and how they are used. The hack tool minigame is fine for the most part, but the fact you keep running into doors that you can't hack without higher level access is really annoying. Same goes for the blowtorch where you have to keep finding more intense fuels to cut through tougher metal. There is also the obsessive number of "immersive" button inputs that really started to annoy me late in the game.

The amount of times I had to press L2 to hold a door handle and then press the Left Stick down to actually open it is frankly ridiculous. 

Despite the issues that I have with Alien Isolation, I still really enjoyed the game and still think it was one of the best games to come out of 2014. I don't like the fact that most of its post game content was relegated to DLC, but if you haven't already played Alien Isolation, you can get The Collection version that comes with all the DLC on Steam, PSN, and the Xbox Store for $60. The game also had an update that added two new difficulty modes for free. Novice Mode for beginners who just want to enjoy the experience and Nightmare Mode for masochists that want the ultimate challenge. Alien Isolation is a must for Alien fans, especially if you were burned by Aliens Colonial Marines. It's the Alien experience we deserve. Now let's just hope Sega lets Creative Assembly make a sequel.

This review was written by The Gaming Lycanthrope and Edited by Forma

Link to my preview of Alien Isolation I did for The Lycourier before I played it. Sadly my original review has been lost to the sands of time: http://lycourier.lycoming.edu/2014/10/a-preview-game-review-anticipating.html

YouTube Channel: Star Wars Battlefront Random Bits: Droid Run Domination

Here is a video of my sister winning four games of Droid Run in a row.

YouTube Channel: Bloodborne Random Bits: Chalice Dungeon Framerate Tank

There are a lot of weird things hidden deep in the chalice dungeons. Found this one room where the framerate tanked to extremely low numbers. I found what was causing it, but couldn't help but think why did this cause the framerate to die?

YouTube Channel: Bloodborne Random Bits: My First Invasion

Never been a huge fan of invading in the Soulsborne games, but having done pretty much everything else you can in Bloodborne I decided to build a character focused on invasion. This is my first invasion and I have to say it felt underwhelming mainly because I used a Chikage and Old Hunter's Bone combo while he was using a transformed Simon's Bowblade. Expect more invasion videos in the near future.

P.S. I've been invaded before and defended myself. This is just the first time I was on the other side of the coin.

YouTube Channel: Bloodborne Random Bits: Network Connection Fail

So I was engaging in some jolly cooperation against the Witch of Hemwick when my host's internet connection failed and reality kind of collapsed in on itself. It really funny actually.

YouTube Channel: Bloodborne Random Bits: Waifu Suicide

I'm back baby! It's been a hectic few weeks for me, but I'm back to making videos. So here's a random thing I found in Bloodborne. It seems that a lot of Bloodborne fans have a creepy obsession with The Doll as the abundance of Blood Stains around the Doll in the Abandoned Workshop make clear.

Dark Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin Review: Attack of the Forlorn

Hidetaka Miyazaki, the creator of the "Souls" series, wasn't present for the design of Dark Souls 2 due to being busy with the development of Bloodborne at the time. And boy, does it show!

The character is one of the Forlorn, which are a group of dark spirits that invade you at random points throughout the game and are only found in the Scholar of the First Sin edition of Dark Souls 2.

Developer: From Software
Publisher: Namco Bandi Games
Version(s): PC, PS3, Xbox 360, PS4 (reviewed), and Xbox One
Price: $49.99
Release: March 11th, 2014

I'm going to say this right off the bat: Dark Souls 2 is a good game. While I have a massive number of issues with the game that I will cover in this review that make me seem like I hate this game's guts, my issues are likely not going to affect the average consumer. Dark Souls 2 and its rereleased version Scholar of the First Sin, which I played before doing this review because it is the definitive edition of the game, are everything they say they are. Dark Souls 2 is an extremely difficult action role playing games set in a dark fantasy world on the brink of collapse. If that is what you are looking for, Dark Souls 2 has you covered. But if you are looking for a game that is a worthy successor to Dark Souls 1, you will be severely disappointed.

This is a prerelease screenshot of Dark Souls 2. This area in the final game looks no where near as good as  it does in this screenshot.

The story of Dark Souls 2 is that you are some random schmuck suffering from the Curse of the Undead, who goes to the ancient kingdom of Drangleic, which supposedly has a cure for the curse. You get there and get laughed at by a bunch of weird old ladies. After that, you do to the tutorial area and get to the hub town, Majula. There you speak with the Emerald Herald, who tells you to seek the king and usurp his throne. So then the story goes from “find a cure for your curse” to “become the next monarch of Drangleic.” The story is divided into roughly three acts. Act 1 is to explore the land and find the defeat to Four Great Ones and take their souls so that you may prove yourself a worthy monarch. Act 2 is find out how to ascend the Throne of Want, and Act 3 is to find the crowns of all the previous kings so that you may become the "true monarch" -and this act is only available to players of the original version of Dark Souls 2 if they bought the DLC trilogy that came out after the game's release.

Brume Tower is one of the areas exclusive to the Crowns DLC Trilogy that came out after the original Dark Souls 2 and is integrated directly into the Scholar of the First Sin edition.

It seems that the developers got the purpose of lore and plot structure of Dark Souls 1 mixed up in Dark Souls 2. In the original Dark Souls, the world you were exploring was very mysterious, strange, and you had little knowledge of what exactly was going on. Even so, what your goal was throughout the game was crystal clear. In Dark Souls 2, however, every character you meet over-explains everything about every area you go to ruining that sense of mystery that made Dark Souls 1 so great. However, when it comes to your actual goal in the game, the thing that is motivating you to beat it, the game is very tight lipped. In fact NPCs will often tell you you're doing the things you do "without really knowing why." Even the intro cinematic feeds you that line. If I don't know why I'm doing the things I'm doing, why should I care? None of the NPC ever seem to come up with a good reason to care about anything to be honest.

The intro cinematic for Dark Souls 2 is visually fantastic, but lacks any concrete context for your characters actions or goals.

Speaking of NPCs, another thing that makes the narrative of Dark Souls 2 far inferior to Dark Souls 1 is its lack of quality NPC storylines and quests. Most NPCs in the game have quest lines copy and pasted straight from Dark Souls 1 and the ones that don't are woefully underdeveloped. I also have a hard time remembering most of the names of the NPCs since they’re so unremarkable. The lone character in the entire game that I found extremely memorable was, ironically, a character that was forgetting who they were. Forgetting seems to be a major theme that Dark Souls 2 wanted to explore, but the developers were too afraid to stray too far away from Dark Souls 1 themes of fire and darkness, so they dropped it, and all that is left are traces of the theme of forgetting.

Lucatiel of Mirrah is one of the only interesting and compelling characters in Dark Souls 2.

From a mechanical level, for every step Dark Souls 2 takes forward it takes another step back. You can now warp between different areas of the game using bonfires from the very start which is good, but this seems to have caused the developers to be lazy in developing levels, since they could just put a bunch of bonfires in one level and not have to think as hard about the layout of levels. Contrast this with Dark Souls 1 where there was usually one bonfire area per area, and you opened shortcuts that lead back to the bonfire allowing you to bypass areas you have already gone through. Dark Souls 2 also touted the addition of a new lightning system that would have forced players to forsake a shield for use a torch in dark areas, but the lightning system was removed right before the release of Dark Souls 2 and the areas that would have used the lightning system had there brightness level artificially increased, which looks just awful.

This room was shown in early previews as a pitch black area that could only be lit by a torch. In the final game you can easily navigate this room without ever having to use a torch at all.

The balance between Dark Souls' real time combat and its stat building RPG mechanics have also been destroyed thanks to the inclusion of the Agility stat. In Dark Souls 1 the only thing that could affect your rolling speed was your equip load, but it was built around the idea of characters wearing light armor focusing on dodging, while characters wearing heavy armor rely on poise to absorb enemy attacks. The addition of Agility, however, makes it possible for light armored characters to get hit even when dodging and a heavy armored characters impossible to hit even at close range. It’s a shame that the Agility stat hurts the game so much because Dark Souls 2 has the best character building options out of all the Souls games thus far. The amount of armor sets, weapons, and spells is just amazing and one of my favorite aspects of Dark Souls 2.

The Agility stat forces you to put points into it just to be good the real time combat and discourages making more experimental character builds. 

Another good idea that the developers screwed up was the new Hollowing mechanic and how it ties into the multiplayer. In Dark Souls 1, when you died in human form you became Hollow and to get back you had to sacrifice a rare item at a bonfire to become human again. However the only real penalty of Hollowing was you couldn't summon other players for help, but you also couldn't be invaded by other players. So players that like playing by themselves never really saw a reason not to just stay Hollow unless they wanted to kindle bonfire for a few extra sips for their Estus Flask. In Dark Souls 2, hollowing is a more gradual process and every death would decrease your maximum health a small until your health was half of what it should be. This is, in theory, a good system that encourages players to try and stay human more often leading to more cooperation and invasions.

Dark Souls 2 has an abundance of NPC summons you can use to help with boss fights and tough areas. Which is great for when the online servers will inevitably go offline years from now.

Where Dark Souls 2 screws this up in practice, however, is that cooperation is locked off the instant you die once in human form. It would have been better if cooperation was cut off after a few more deaths, giving you a few more chances to beat a boss before you had to use a Human Effigy to restore your humanity, and might have made it so the developers didn't have to give out Human Effigies in the end game areas like they were Christmas presents to compensate for the difficult boss fights in the end game areas. Also unlike Dark Souls 1, you can be invaded by other players while Hollow now, though thankfully you can block them for a limited time by burning a Human Effigy at a bonfire. Too bad you can't block the abundant number of NPC invaders Dark Souls 2 has to offer. These NPC invaders have also been designed to act like real human players, and some of them are just evil in the tactics they use against you. I would praise the AI of these NPC phantoms if they weren't so common and played by different rules from human player phantoms. To end this diatribe on the multiplayer of Dark Souls 2, the Covenants are as unfinished as they were in Dark Souls 1, which is just a crying shame.

The abundance of NPC invaders mean that players will be able to feel the thrill and terror of being invaded even after the servers are gone, but the fact they play by very different rules then human players is infuriating.

Enemy and boss design in Dark Souls 2 has also taken a major hit with the vast majority of them being large humanoids wielding giant weapons. Any enemy or boss that doesn't conform to the "dude in armor wielding a giant weapon" archetype are lifted straight from Dark Souls 1. Scorpioness Najka is just Chaos Witch Quelaag, but uses sorcery instead of pyromancy. The Royal Rat Authority is just Great Grey Wolf Sif without a sword and with four rat minions that inflict toxin to arbitrarily increase the difficulty of the battle. Enemies also track you with their attacks making it hard to dodge them, and often makes them look like they are standing on top of a record player. Hit boxes are also wonky with enemy weapons hitting the ground two feet away from my character somehow registering as a hit. Regular enemies also tend to have ludicrous amounts of health that makes them take many hits to take down, and they often attack in groups. This design philosophy of "if something seems to easy then dump a bunch of enemies around to make it harder" is the worst thing about Dark Souls 2, and it made me almost just quit on it multiple times.

The Smelter Demon represents some of the worst elements of Dark Souls 2 boss design.

I've spent the vast majority of this review criticizing the hell out of Dark Souls 2, but there are things I really like about this game. I'm a big fan of the streamlined weapon upgrading and boss weapon creation, even if you still have to jump through a lot of hoops to find the merchants that do it. There are a few levels I really liked such as the Forest of Fallen Giants, No Man's Wharf, and The Gutter. Some people don't like the new emphasis on weapon degradation, but I think it's a good idea. It encourages you to rely on more than one weapon and set of armor and experiment a little. I also like that magic feels better to use and is visually cool to look at… though I'm still mad that you can no longer be a Pyromancer when you begin the game.

The Gutter is one of the only areas that make use of the torch which makes for a very nice change of pace.

There is a lot to like about Dark Souls 2, but it simply just isn't as tightly focused as the original Dark Souls. Dark Souls 1 was about being a nobody trying to make an impact in a world so much bigger than you. A world that didn't care about you and could kill you are a moment's notice, but also didn't feel particularly malicious towards you either. The world of Dark Souls 1 was indifferent to you, but the majority of the people you met on your journey always wished the best for you. You felt that despite all the game was throwing at you that you could win and that the people that made the game wanted you to win too. Dark Souls was about keeping hope in the face of utter hopelessness and that it such a powerful message for a game to have and one I will never forget.

I will never forget the Kiln of the First Flame, the final area of Dark Souls 3, but I can't even be bothered to remember the Throne of Want, the final area of Dark Souls 2.

Dark Souls 2 on the other hand focuses entirely on you. You, the bearer of the curse. You, the next monarch of Drangleic. You, the one that will sit the Throne of Want. You, the one that will gather the crowns and transcend the curse. You are extremely important and everyone seems to hate you. The world itself seems to want you dead with impossible odds around every corner. The respites you do find feel undeserved as you had to resort to cheap tactics to win many or your battles because so many fights are simply stacked against you. You feel who designed these encounters wanted only to watch you suffer and die over and over again. And even you do succeed and either sit the throne or renounce it you feel nothing, it’s almost as if the game is mocking you for finishing it, after all you've been the only thing you feel is...Hollow. At least how I felt after beating Dark Souls 2. The exact opposite of how I felt after beating Dark Souls 1. It would have been a great artistic statement if I also wasn't sure that it was intentional or not. It feels more like the result of various designers disagreeing about how things should go and compromising with each rather than one creative vision.

Majula, the central hub area of Dark Souls 2, looks gorgeous and has beautiful background music, but feels no where near as lively as The Nexus from Demon's Souls or Firelink Shrine from Dark Souls.

So if you're in the mood for a decent dark fantasy role playing game, Dark Souls 2 has you covered as long as you don't expect something that blows Dark Souls 1 out of the water. I'm not sure how Dark Souls 3 is going to play out, but it looks like it going back to its roots taking elements from both Dark Souls 1, Demon's Souls, and even a little Bloodborne to make the best Souls game there ever was. And with series creator Hidetaka Miyazaki back as the director, I think that Dark Souls 3 will be just fine.

You can buy the original version of Dark Souls 2 for PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 for $20 at pretty much any game retailer, but I would highly recommend getting the Scholar of the First Sin Edition which comes with the 3 Three DLCs bundled in and a host of graphical and design improvements for $50 at most game retailers.

This review was written by The Gaming Lycanthrope and Edited by Forma.

Dark Souls Prepare To Die Edition Review: A Flawed Masterpiece

Dying in a video game has never been so compelling.

Developer: From Software
Publisher: Namco Bandi Games
Version(s): PC and PS3 and Xbox 360
Price: $19.99
Release: October 4th, 2011

In recent years the Soul series of game have taken the video game community by storm. After the cult hit Demon's Souls From Software release a spiritual successor in the form of Dark Souls which went one to be a major success and eventually spawned a direct sequel and a spin-off franchise in the form of Bloodborne. I absolutely adored Bloodborne and with Dark Souls 3 right around the corner I wanted to dive in and experience all of the Souls games. I have beaten Dark Souls, almost done with Dark Souls 2, and currently starting Demon's Souls. I decided to start with the game that make this series a mainstream hit and I was skeptical of it living up to they hype that has been built up around it over the last few years. Thankfully, it did indeed live up to those lofty expectations.

Characters gather around a bonfire at Firelink Shrine.

Dark Souls begins with the creation myth that tells of an unchanging gray world ruled by everlasting dragons that is challenged by four powerful gods that have gained immense power from something called The First Flame who defeat the dragons and establish the Age of Fire. However the Age of Fire is ending and mankind is afflicted by the insidious Curse of the Undead. Those afflicted are unable to die and will endlessly be reborn at the mysterious bonfires that scatter the land until they lose their minds and go Hollow, attacking anyone on sight. You are an Undead locked up at the Northern Undead Asylum who is saved by a man named Oscar of Astora who asks you before he goes Hollow to go to Lordran, The Land of Ancient Lords, and fulfill the Prophecy of the Undead that will liberate mankind from the Undead Curse. When you arrive in Lordran you are told to ring the two Bells of Awakening so that the fate of the undead can be known. Thus, begins a quest of seemingly endless trials and many, MANY deaths.

You will die many times in Dark Souls and I'm certain that this drake will be responsible for at least one of those deaths.

That is the clearest idea that most people will have of the backstory of Dark Souls the first time they play it because Dark Souls does not spell out it story and themes for the player. Instead it communicates it narrative though environmental storytelling, item descriptions, and conversations with friendly NPCs that you find in the world and slowly builds a massive world with many characters, locations, and factions to get to know. The environmental design of Dark Souls is for the most part some of the best video games have to offer with every level connecting to each other in logical and natural ways which makes navigating them so stratifying. Levels like the strange forest of Darkroot Garden and the trap filled Sen's Fortress will forever be etched in my mind.

Darkroot Garden is an area that is simply dripping in atmosphere.

But Dark Souls isn't known for its excellent environmental design its know for being hard and yes Dark Souls is a very hard game, but not as hard as some people may think. Dark Souls gameplay is split between a real time combat system revolving around stamina conservation and weapon combos and Dungeon and Dragon style stat building that governs the effectiveness of your combat prowess. Getting the hang of the real time combat is very hard and even in the early game the simplest of enemies can wipe the floor with you, but the stats that you slowly build throughout the game using the souls of the enemies upgrading you character and your weapons to better deal with the dangers of Lordran and conquer Dark Souls legendary boss fights. 

Great Grey Wolf Sif is many people's favorite boss in Dark Souls.

Beating a boss in Dark Souls is hands down one of the best feelings that I have ever felt and only got better with each new challenge I faced. The great secret of Dark Souls is that if you know what you are doing the game can be surprisingly easy. It has a Legend of Zelda-esque design of always having the right tool you need to beat an area or boss. I remember feeling that the Bell Gargoyles guarding the first Bell of Awakening were impossible until I realized that I had a shield that could block fire damage and that the gargoyles were weak to lightning and I had found a resin that I could use to buff my weapons with lightning damage. Even though I still had to dodge and block the gargoyles attacks in real time I was more than able to put the odds in my favor. 

The Bell Gargoyles are what I and many others consider the first real boss fight of Dark Souls.

The main thing I deeply respect about Dark Souls is that it respects your intelligence and your time. You can see a lot of the devious traps and enemy encounters the game throws at you simply by taking a minute to stop and look around. The game is does have harsh penalties for death which involving losing all of your souls upon death. But you are always given a chance to get them back and even if you fail you just have souls items that you find throughout the game that you can fall back on if needs be. You can pause the game which is kinda dumb, but the game auto-saves every few seconds so you can pretty much quit at anytime to take a break and never lose that much progress. This auto-save system means if you make a make a choice you can't undo it so it makes every choice you make feel all the more important. 

One must tread cautiously to brave the traps of Sen's Fortress.

Perhaps the most unique aspect of Dark Souls is its very unorthodox and obtuse multiplayer. To even access the multiplayer you have to be in human form , but if you are you might notice glowing white symbols on the ground. These are summon signs that players leave on the ground and you can use them to call them into you game they can then help you with the boss and after you beat the boss they disappear. However, being in human form also makes you vulnerable to invasion in which other players invade your game and try and kill you. I have never been a huge fan of the competitive multiplayer of Dark Souls as the odds are almost always in the favor of the invader and the only incentive to invade is gain Humanity which you need to access the multiplayer to begin with. There are multiplayer covenants that you can join to gain rewards by cooperating or invading, but they are for the most part underdeveloped. My favorite part of the multiplayer element of Dark Souls is the messages that you can leave on the ground to either help or hinder other players progress, though most of them are sadly left by trolls that leave messages on the sides of cliffs that tell you to "try jumping." If you are playing offline you can still reap the benefits of being human as you can summon help from NPC allies against certain bosses, but it also opens you up to being invaded by NPC characters as well. For the most part, the multiplayer of Dark Souls is ambitious, but underdeveloped though I feel that its inclusion still benefits the game by giving meaning to player interactions in world which helps pull you into the game even more.

A player fighting a giant rat in the Depths with the assistance of another player summoned into their world.

While I have spent the majority of this review praising Dark Souls to high heaven there are quite a few issues I have with the game. Weapon upgrading is confusing and the game never really gives a good explanation on how to forge powerful weapons and finding all those different embers and blacksmiths is just tedious. Certain enemy encounters also run counter to Dark Souls "difficult, but fair" design philosophy with a pair of archers in an area called Anor Lando taking the cake. The entirety of the Demon Ruins and Lost Izalith levels scream of cut content and feature some of the worst designed boss fights in the game. There are some appalling frame rate issues in certain areas of the game particularly. And as I have already stated that the multiplayer while unique and ambitious is underdeveloped.

Knight Artorias is a boss exclusive to the Artorias of the Abyss expansion pack.

But in spite of those few issues with the game Dark Souls is still a masterclass in environmental design, interactive storytelling, and deep game mechanics. I would recommend that any person that considers themselves a gamer should try at least once. And if you get stuck at anytime in the game the Souls Community is one of the best online gaming communities I have ever been a part of. While there still is the occasional elitist asshole that scoff at newcomers most of the community is more then happy to help newcomers anyway they can. Dark Souls is truly something special and proof that video games can be something truly spectacular and worthy of being called a piece of art. 

You can find Dark Souls at most video game retailers for pretty cheap these days and I highly recommend picking up the Prepare to Die Edition if you can as it comes bundled with the fantastic Artorias of the Abyss DLC which adds a fantastic new area, four new bosses, and a lot of narrative elements that make the base game feel much more complete. Dark Souls is available for PS3, Xbox 360, and PC.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 15: Escape From The Evil Tetris Block Puzzles

In this episode I tire of the evil tetris block puzzles and escape to another area of the island.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 14: More Evil Tetris Block Puzzles

In this episode I struggle with more evil tetris block puzzles. Please help me!

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 13: Evil Tetris Blocks

In this episode I leave the Keep and head towards a new area. I find a marsh where all the puzzles revolve around tetris blocks. These are the most difficult to understand puzzles yet.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 12: Panels and Mazes

In this episode I explore half the the keep, but leave before solving all the puzzles.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 11: The Second Laser

Finally solve all the puzzles in the forest area and activate the second laser. I then start exploring the mysterious keep right next to the forest with puzzles revolving around mazes and pressure pads.

Secondhand Opinions: Unravel and Firewatch

Unravel

The reveal of Unravel at E3 2015 was one of my personal favorite moments from any E3 press conference over that last few years.We saw nervous game developer Martin Sahlin come on stage and tell us of his dream game and introduced us to Unravel's protagonist Yarny in the form of a handmade doll he held in his trembling hands tearfully telling us how much love and effort went into his game. The trailer showed Yarny going on an epic adventure using his own yarn as a tool. When the game finally released I was sad to discover that the game had a lot of problems. Its puzzles were confusing and hard to understand and its central mechanic of Yarny string unraveling is criminally underused. This lead to the game getting middling reviews with some journalists like Jim Sterling being pretty harsh towards it. But in spite of its many issues, there is no denying that Unravel is a labor of love from Coldwood Interactive and that alone save it for many people. I still plan on picking it up one of these days when I have the time and money. If love and passion is enough to for you to forgive a few bad design decisions I recommend it as well.

Firewatch

The debut title of Campo Santo and the brain child of former Telltale developers Sean Vanaman and Jake Rodkin, who helped make the critically lauded first season of Telltale's The Walking Dead. Firewatch follows the story of Henry who works as fire lookout in the middle of Shoshone National Forest during the summer of 1989. His only regular human contact during this time is his supervisor Delilah who Henry only ever talks to via walkie-talkie. Together they get to know each other and learn of each others mysterious pasts while also trying to solve a series of mysterious events happening around the park. General consensus is that Firewatch is really good with fantastic writing and excellent chemistry between the two main characters. The only major issues of note are some technical hurdles on Playstation 4 with frame shuddering and other minor glitches and an anticlimax of an ending. However, some critics such as Laura Kate Dale have defended the anticlimactic ending of the game as a culmination of the games main themes of loss and missed opportunity. It's best to go into Firewatch with as little knowledge as possible to get the most out of it. If you are a fan of narrative focused games then give it a go. I know I'm going to once I get the cash to obtain the game.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 10: Stuck On The Final Purple Shadow Puzzle

I finally get the hang of these purple shadow puzzles only to get stuck on the last one. It's a nightmare!

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 9: Perception and Shadows

Finally discover the final series of shadow puzzles I need to do to open the second gate and reveal the autumn forest final puzzle solution. These are the hardest puzzles yet so I'm going to be a while yet.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 8: Only Half Done

In this episode I spend about twelve minutes trying to solve a puzzle that I only have half the solution of until I realize that and go looking for what I have to do to get the rest of the solution.

YouTube Channel: Bloodborne Random Bits: Invisible Snake Head

During a trek through the Forbidden Woods a came across a rather amusing glitch in which the game forgot to load the mass of snakes that erupt from the heads of the snake villagers shortly after they notice you. So a snake villager chased after me with what looked like a regular head, but the game treated like he had the mass of snakes on his head instead. I hope to find another glitch this funny sometime soon.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 7: Playing With Shadows

Starting to dive into the shadow puzzles in the autumn forest area of the island. I'm going to be here awhile so sit back and relax.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play The Witness Part 6: Deserts, Quarries, and Forests Oh My!

After exploring the Desert and not being able to understand the puzzle logic of the area I go explore more of the island and eventually find a forest with puzzles revolving around shadows.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 21(Final Episode): I Will Always Find You

Red has gained complete control of the Transistor and with it the entire city of Cloudbank. She now has the power to reshape reality as she sees fit. What does she do with this incredible power? Nothing. She makes a different choice.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 20: Stay With Me

Red finally reaches Royce's bunker and returns the Transistor to it's cradle to get rid of the Process. However, Red and Royce are transported outside of Cloudbank to a strange countryside covered in Transistors. Royce then challenges Red for control of Cloudbank with a Transistor of his own.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 19: I'm Starting To Get A Little Nervous Now

After finishing off all the challenges in The Backdoor, Red finally makes it to Royce's bunker in the deepest parts of the Processed Fairview District.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 18: Like Staring At The Sky

Red continues her trek towards Royce, the last member of The Camerata, in the Processed Fairview District. Along the way he explains the Camerata's beliefs and ponders what the Process and the Transistor's purpose are.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 17: The Key to the City

Aftercrossing the entirety of the Processed Goldwalk District, Red finally makes contact with Royce Bracket, last member of the Camerata. Through a proxy he tells us how to channel the true power of the Transistor to create a bridge to the remote Fairview district which has been utterly consumed by the Process.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 16: Comfort In Knowing

After completing a few more tests in The Backdoor, Red returns to Cloudbank to continue her trek to Fairview and passing some somewhat familiar places along the way that have now been completely consumed by the Process. Things keep going from bad to worse.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 15: Escape From Reality

Red and the Man in the Transistor decide to take a break from reality and do some more tests in The Backdoor. It's fun trying to take you mind off the inevitable end of absolutely everything.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 14: Not Our Town Anymore

After learning that the last member of The Camerata and the only hope of saving Cloudbank is in the remote Fairview District, Red begins to backtrack thorugh Goldwalk to get to Fairview. Goldwalk has now been almost completely consumed by The Process along with every single other person in Cloudbank. Things aren't looking good.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 13: Cowards

After taking a quick bathroom break, Red accesses the final terminal to unlock the door leading to the leaders of The Camerata hiding on top of Bracket Towers. Red doesn't find what she thinks she's going to though.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 12: Hand Picked and Unique

Red most find a way to bring down the firewall gate that Grant and Asher Kendrell are using to hold back the process from The Camerata headquarters. We find a terminal in the Maintenance Wing of Bracket Towers disables part of the gate and it seems like another one must be in the Archive Gallery.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 11: The Process Are Out of Control

After completing all the challenge currently unlocked in The Backdoor. Red then begins exploring Bracket Towers to find a means of opening the gate to the top of the building so she can confront the leaders of The Camerata.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 10: Breaking Its Heart

Red finally confronts the Spine of the World and breaks its freaking heart which restores the mind of the Man in the Transistor. They finally make it into the headquarters of The Camerata. There she meats Asher Kendrell, the second in command of the Camerata, who has confessed to the people of Cloudbank about their crimes and apologizes to them for not being able to stop the Process that are destroying everything. Red takes another trip to the Backdoor to process all of this new information.

YouTube Channel: Let's Play Transistor Part 9: On The Run

Red continues her trek up Bracket Tower and evading the Spine of the World along the way. Meanwhile, the Man in the Transistor is rapidly losing his grip on reality. Also on my side of things, my mom decided to come into my room while I was recording to tell me about some swim trunks she got for me.

Secondhand Opinions: XCOM 2

Join Us or Become Them.

The idea of leading an elite team of soldiers against an overwelming alien enemy while balancing researching alien tech and support from countries around the world is just great to me. That is why I absolutely adore XCOM: Enemy Unknown despite the fact that I'm absolutely shit at it. Even when playing on Easy Mode I always end up either losing my best soldier, researching the wrong tech, and losing support from an important country country, having all my rookies devastated by giant alien monsters I wasn't prepared for, or all of the previous things I said all happening at once. When the expansion Enemy Within was released I just decided rather then try and play a game I was complete shit at I would instead watch Let's Plays of people that were actually good at the game and I really enjoyed doing that.

XCOM 2 features many new alien threats to face and many new weapons and tools to face them with.

Now with XCOM 2 out I'm probably going to do the same especially with it now being PC exclusive and my five year old laptop praying sweet release of death just running Steam. XCOM 2 also changes up the XCOM fomula in a very interesting way. Instead of being the commander of a global organization with the backing of every major country on your side you are now a rebel leader leading a small group of freedom fighters up against an alien controlled Earth. The reviews from most major gaming outlets have been very positive and gaming commentator TotalBiscuit, who is a big fan of XCOM, has given XCOM 2 a very positive impression. So if you are a big fan of turn based tactics games and have a beefy PC gaming rig give XCOM 2 a shot.