Dark Souls 2 journal #6: I did it! - the final verdict

News by Dave Cook Contributor

Published on May 6, 2014

Dark Souls 2 obsessive Dave Cook has finally finished From Software's sequel and he's formulated a final opinion that he's sure at least five of you have been waiting for. It's all been leading up to this.

This entry covers Dave’s progress up to level 167 and over 59 hours into the quest. He has now completed the game, but you can catch up with his previous journals here:

Here’s his final completion status:

Well, that was... easy?! Wait, what?

Yes it's true. I managed to defeat the final boss in Dark Souls 2 on my first attempt with no summons or co-op buddy (I'm running an offline-only debug version anyway), and the ending left me feeling quite short-changed. I absolutely was not expecting to feel this way by the time those credits rolled.

Life has lost some of its lustre as a result, but let's back up a bit first.

The Deadliest Sing-A-Long Ever

When we last left my human punching-bag, he was standing outside the Shrine of Amana, a water-logged s**t of a place where the mages just WON'T STOP CASTING HOMING SOUL ARROW. The big bold capital letters suggest irritation, by the way, because this place really gave me a headache the first time I entered its soggy pain-hole. What struck me initially was the fact this area has music, well, sort of.

I later found out that the softly sung words echoing throughout the lake were coming from the Milfanito sisters, a pair of siblings who keep singing despite all of the death and nasty s**t going on around them. If you remember from my fifth journal entry, there's a third sister caged up in Drangleic Castle who's being guarded by a weird creature called the Embedded, and she can only be freed by defeating the Shrines boss, a giant monstrous frog-thing called the Demon of Song.

He's easy too. Now, I've been saying that Dark Souls 2 is getting easy for a while now and that's because - and I really hate to say this - it is. There's no other way I can say this, and it pains me to do so, but the game started to get really simple around this point, and right up until the very end, I felt that the last truly challenging boss was the Smelter Demon. That's not a good sign.

But of course, part of this 'easy' progression is due to my obsession with the first Dark Souls. Going into the sequel I knew exactly what sort of class I needed to beat certain enemies, how to spec my build properly, and how to read then react to attack patterns. I know this sort of suggests that beating Dark Souls games is more like a science than a show of true skill, but anyone who's played these games knows that's not true.

Behold my final character stats. You can tell I'm a man of little faith. HAHAHAHA!

But yeah, I just felt that where I was initially intimidated by the fact that enemies could become extinct after ten deaths each, this actually makes the game easier as you progress. For example, those mages in Shrine of Amana may be annoying sure, but there's so little space between bonfires that I was able to kill the first wave of those guys, hit the bonfire to respawn them, and repeat the process until I never had to worry about them again.

People on the social feeds and the Dark Souls 2 wiki forum have been saying that this extinction makes farming crafting items difficult, except it really doesn't. If you speak with Stone Trader Chloanne by Harvest Valley's 'Poison Pool' bonfire until her dialogue runs out, she'll relocate to Majula and sell an infinite number of large and regular Titanite Shards, along with finite amounts of every mineral in the game. You have to pay for them sure, but trust me, you won't find souls hard to come by.

If you do run out of enemies and souls - you seriously won't - you can burn an item called Bonfire Ascetic that will respawn nearby enemies and make them one New Game+ harder. By the end I had levelled named armour and boosted weapons thanks to Twinkling Titanite and Petrified Dragon Bones, along with an abundance of souls thanks to my Covetous Silver Serpent Ring+1, which gave me more souls per kill.

Put it this way, while the grind of travelling back and forth between the first game's merchants in Anor Londo and Darkroot Forest is no longer an issue, I felt that From Software's attempts to keep everything convenient by simplifying the unique weapon and crafting systems, as well as placing every merchant you need in one place, to be a welcome move at first. By the end, I felt like it was making things too easy. I'll repeat at this point that I still thoroughly enjoyed Dark Souls 2. Seriously.

Woah this has been a big tangent. Sorry. So anyway, I'll skip through Shrine of Amana because if you stick behind pillars, take the mages on slowly and in small numbers while avoiding the big ogre guy - you won't miss him - then you'll get through it with some patience. The Undead Crypt came after that, and that proved to be a touch more challenging, with a big chamber full of bells that, if you allow a Hollow to ring them, summon a gang of spirit warriors into the area that pile on top of you like some sort of rugby death-scrum.

Basically, you need to smash the warrior's tombstones to stop their ghosts from spawning. Once they're smashed those guys never come back, even if a Hollow manages to ring a bell. It'll catch you off guard the first time I'm sure so because I love you guys, here's a screen grab of me standing before the area in question. It's down this hole, beyond a pair of big knights who use two shields as weapons. Prepare yourself, health-up and get ready for a fight:

The knights before this section are intimidating, but with good poise and a strong shield you can take them out. After clearing out the grave site down that hole I was able to lower a drawbridge that gave me a shortcut to the next boss, the notorious Velstadt. I'll admit that this guy was a pain in the ass, and getting to him sees you fighting through wave after wave of big iron knights. Making them extinct isn't really an option unless you have hours upon hours spare.

Velstadt's weapon of choice is a bloody great hammer that can utterly smash through your stamina unless you have it levelled up to a suitable degree. As I said in previous entries, I knew from my time with Dark Souls that stamina is important, so I had it levelled higher than my health from the start of the sequel. Like many bosses, crushing this guy is a matter of memorising attack patterns and knowing when to retreat and recover.

After getting the sequence down I found the first half of this battle to be a breeze, but then he started using Hexes and dark magic around 50% health. He can absolutely destroy you with his ranged magic attacks, so the key here is to stay close. During the battle that finally saw Velstadt killed, he never used ranged shots on me once, purely because I stayed close and circled the bastard until he keeled over. It works, try it.

So with him out of the picture it was time to move on to Aldia's Keep, but first, did someone say 'cheating'?

Life Can Be Easy, If You Want It To Be

Now, I'm not really a fan of cheating in games unless, say, you're truly miserable and a game is being ruined because of an annoying difficulty spike or something like that. Back in my previous entry you may recall that I found the King's Ring, which can be used to open up all of those 'Produce the Symbol of the King' gates around the world. There's one in The Forest of Fallen Giants, another in the Shaded Woods and a third gate in Drangleic Castle itself.

The image above shows the castle gate. It leads to a long precarious path above a sheer drop in a new area called Throne of Want. I decided to follow the path just to see where it led and it took me to another fog gate. With full health and flasks I decided to go for it, only to be set upon by a pair of bosses called Throne Watcher and Throne Defender. They're not all that difficult, and I managed to take them out first time.

What I didn't realise at the time was that this chamber is where you fight the final boss - and for the sake of spoilers I won't ruin who the last battle is against - but unless you take these guys out early, you have to fight them both, then the last boss in quick succession. Now, that may have made the final encounter much more trying, but I'm not so sure because they were simple. Seriously, I'll get to that last fight soon and explain why it was so simple in a bit, but if you want an easier ride, kill these guys early.

I'm aware this blog is now getting a tad long and I've not even got to my verdict yet. I'm sitting here sipping coffee with the game booted up just riffing my thoughts on this keyboard, so I'll quickly batter through the rest of the areas and any interesting or useful tips as I go.

So, Aldia's Keep isn't so hard, until you get to the long corridor with the caged ogres in them. These are basically the same as the big brute meandering around Things Betwixt at the start of the game, except with more health and tendency to grab then one-hit kill you without any means of escape. Seriously, if ever I felt the need to improve my ranged stats in Dark Souls 2, it was here. You can take these dicks out from a distance if you position yourself correctly, or hide in a doorway that's too small for them to fit through and sweep their legs.

Hah, 'sweep the leg'

Anyway... there's a big gap between bonfires at the start of the Keep, right up to the Ancient Dragon boss. Seriously, it p**sed me off so many times when I had to go miles back, slowly battle through those ogres with my bow, only to be killed in a few hits by the dragon at the end. Luckily, there's a hidden bonfire that I may - of may not - have found by using the Dark Souls 2 Wiki guide.

Like the helpful sod I am, here's what you need to do to find it. First, find this corridor. You can't miss it:

Run past the ogre in the cage. He'll only smash his way out of there and attack you if you hit him first. Take the first door on the left as you pass. Go inside.

See those stairs? Go down them.

This door isn't there to begin with, but just nudge up against this wall and hit X (or A on 360) to open up the secret panel and there you have it, super-secret-but-totally-welcome-bonfire-happy-fun-times.

Now then, the boss in this area is the Guardian Dragon and he can kill you with one hit of his fire breath if you're careless, like I was. About five times. Basically, all you need to know is that as soon as he starts to fly, he's getting ready to spew fire on you, so just run towards him and stand beneath his legs to avoid the blast. Just don't get stomped on when he comes crashing back down to earth. Hit his legs a few times in each flourish, block often and repeat until he's brown bread.

Next up is Dragon Aerie, otherwise known as 'the place with the big dragon bridge from the E3 trailer.' I was a little s**t-scared when I realised that the Guardian Dragon I had just beaten was now a common enemy. I mean seriously From Software what the h- oh, they're actually quite easy now. Oh well. Hit their legs, block and so on.

At the end of this area you'll encounter that damned rope bridge, which leads to a small castle. I started trotting over and then the camera went all cinematic with a mega-close up as my guy started struggling as the bridge swayed. Almost there, almost there, almost there, AHHH WHAT THE HELL IS THAT DRAGON DOING STANDING ON THE BRIDGE? DOESN'T HE KNOW THAT IT CAN'T SUPPORT HIS WEIGHT?

So yeah, if you take too long a dragon will perch itself on the bridge, causing it to snap and making you fall to your death. The first time it happened looked cool, but on repeat attempts it got annoying.

What I later learned through a friend is that the dragon takes longer to appear if you refrain from smashing any of the eggs found dotted around this area. I'm guessing the dragon that lands on the bridge is their mum or something. So just remember: don't smash the eggs, and remove all your gear to make yourself faster before sprinting over the bridge. It'll improve your chances of survival. After that, you fight your way up the castle, past lots of knights, then you'll speak with a friendly dragon who gives you the Ashen Mist Heart item.

We're so very close now!

Ah, Such Sweet Memories

Did you ever wonder why the castle in the Forest of Fallen Giants got so destroyed? Well wonder no more because that Ashen Mist Heart item allows you to jump into the memories of those sleeping giants dotted around the area and relive the castle's downfall. It took me a while to figure this part out admittedly, as you can only access the areas within their memories in a certain order. Above you can see the first giant you should visit. His name is Vammar.

Just touch him to enter his nightmare to enter Memory of Vammar. All you need to do in order to complete this area is run around as many giants as you can and touch a dead giant at the end to come out of the memory and unlock the next one. I was a little worried when the game warned me that these dream areas come with a time limit, but it doesn't kill you once it expires. All that happens is you arrive back outside in the waking world.

Once Vammar's memory was done, I went to see Orro, who can be found sleeping in the room next to the Solider's Rest bonfire. I managed to mostly sprint my way through that memory too, while picking up some loot as I went. The final memory can be found through the King's Door over the bridge from the Cardinal Tower bonfire. It's called The Place Unbeknownst on the fast travel menu, which is a silly name indeed. The last giant is called Jeigh, and you'll have to fight him in boss form within a five minute time-limit.

That sounds harsh, but he's not that bad. Strafe round his legs and hack away once or twice before blocking, then avoiding his leg stamps. He's not that bad honestly, and drops over 100,000 souls if you have the Covetous silver Serpent Ring on. Once I defeated him I was able to access the game's final boss, but before I move on to my final verdict on page three, I'll tell you what is perhaps the best secret in the game, and an absolute must for those who want to tackle New Game-Plus.

So, once you've killed Jeigh, you can go back to The Place Unbeknownst bonfire and burn a Bonfire Ascetic to respawn him, but at a much higher difficulty level. Doing this only respawns enemies within Jeigh's memory, so don't worry about repopulating the whole of the Forest area with brutal enemies. You can absolutely keep going into the memory to defeat Jeigh for 100,000 souls each time - which I did several times - but be warned, he will get much harder as you go. Do this, stock up on souls, level up lots and prepare to have a slightly more manageable NG+

You're welcome.

Now then, it's the moment you've all been waiting for...

My final Dark Souls 2 impressions.

With Jeigh dead and all of the pieces in place, I was able to return to the Throne of Want beneath Drangleic Castle. It's down that big creepy path seen in the image above. I took that path down to the final chamber and stepped through the fog gate expecting a tough fight on par with Lord Gwyn from the first game. However, I was met with an encounter that I managed to win first time, against a slow, rarely threatening and uninspired boss. I wasn't expecting that at all.

I promised that I wouldn't spoil who the final boss is, and I'll stay true to my word, but if anyone doubts my completing of the game, here's a screen grab of me standing at the Majula bonfire, hovering over the New Game-plus option:

So what's wrong with the boss then? Well it's just more of the same predictable strafing or rolling to dodge clearly-signposted attacks, while taking time to heal up when required. There was the added layer of having three regularly respawning cursed vessels floating around the arena, that lower your max health if you stand too close for long, but by this point my curse resistance was decent, and I had enough Human Effigies and upgraded Estus Flasks to heal effectively if need be.

I also tore through the boss with my Drangleic Sword+3 and Pyromancy Flame+9 and in all the battle took about eight minutes. Here's a Twitter record of what happened so you can see the timing on the night it happened:

Attempting the final Dark Souls 2 boss. *gulp*

— Dave Cook (@davescook) April 25, 2014

YAAAAS! Dark Souls 2 complete! :D

— Dave Cook (@davescook) April 25, 2014

I just felt it shouldn't have been so easy, and the ending that followed was similar to those in previous 'Souls' games in that it was both short and ambiguous, but had even less of a resolution to its predecessors. I don't know if there's an extending ending for slogging through all of the NG+ runs, but I know I won't be doing that any time soon, if at all.

Although it sounds like I'm totally slamming Dark Souls 2, regular readers of this series will know I adore it and the other games. I really do, but I've still got a few criticisms that I need to get off my chest. First of all, I know that some people really like the fact that there's less distance between bosses, and that there's less hassle to get to their fog gates after each death, but I felt those shortened gaps took away a lot of the gratification.

As I said before, the fact that enemies could become extinct was s**t-scary at first, but once I realised it meant I could kill off especially annoying enemies with a little time, the game became much easier as a result. I was actively making enemies extinct to make those short runs to bosses much easier.

Also, you're honestly never going to run out of souls or crafting material as a result of doing this. Everything you need to forge weapons can be purchased from Stone Trader Chloanne, and granted the cost is high and some of her stock does run out, but I promise you won't have too much trouble.

For your reference, this is Chloanne:

Add to this the fact that you can fast travel from the start of the game, so heading back to Majula to level up or forge at the blacksmith is no longer a task in itself. Crafting is also easier thanks to Straid standing right next to a bonfire in the Lost Bastille, so you can simply trade boss souls with him for a unique item, rather than forge them yourself like in the first game. All of these factors makes for an experience that trades perseverance and gratification for convenience. I'm not a fan of that change.

My completion time for both Dark Souls titles ended up being quite close, so it's obvious that while I found the sequel easier I still spent a lot of time grinding and making sure my class specs were how I wanted them, and I think a lot of that came from just knowing what to expect after finishing the first game. I actually wish I could have all knowledge of Dark Souls wiped from memory so I could play this as a newcomer, because I'm sure it would be a much harder, rewarding experience.

I also have issues with the slivers of plot that you can find in NPC conversations and the world itself. The game starts off as a quest to lift a terrible curse inflicted on the player, but by the end I honestly had no idea why I was saving the Milfanito sisters, or diving into the memories of those giants to unlock the final boss battle, although I did enjoy the reasons for the giant's armies storming Drangleic. I'm sure someone will come here and explain something I've missed. If so, then please, let's discuss it.

In the end, my favourite insight came from an NPC at the start of Drangleic Castle. It was this ghostly guy who stands in front of the throne room:

He tells you so much about the fallen monarchy, and why the world has gone to s**t. Second place on the dialogue insight chart is Queen Nashandra. Exhaust her dialogue for even more superb back-story, and suddenly the world feels little less ambiguous.

The weird thing is, I like ambiguity. I was one of those people who preferred the original Mass Effect 3 ending because it gave me space to imagine my own post-Shepard world state. But I felt there was less of an overall context that previous Souls games that kept me marching on without any real purpose.

I think that's one of the reasons I just didn't feel like punching air once the Dark Souls 2 credits rolled. Why had I just done all of that? What was I doing exactly to begin with? But I'll tell you this with 100% honesty, despite the lack of purpose I still felt like I'd endured a challenging, emotionally draining and memorable quest.

Better still it really feels like a Souls game thanks to its unique aesthetic and harrowing tone, not to mention that unmistakable control scheme that - while clunky to newcomers at first - is actually perfect for this type of game. It all just works together to make something you can depend on, plus, it's a nicer-looking game than its predecessor, yet still retains that murky charm. It's hard to deny that this series has a special identity.

Whether I had just come off a rough day at work or I was feeling bored at home, I knew I could always reach out to my PS3 and fire up Dark Souls 2 then lose myself for hours in its quiet, dark but incredibly personal world. These are some of the most engrossing and - dare I say it? - relaxing games I've ever played in my life. Something about its quiet world and its lack of music just calmed me in a way few games can, and that's good because as a critic games and their problems stress me out often.

From Software's series is always going to be there like a dependable friend that doesn't ask much from me, and who will strive to help take my mind off life's worries time and time again. I can count on it, and while these may be punishing games that demand a lot of hard work, they've always felt like the exact opposite of work. They are my down-time, and have given me immense respite from my otherwise stressful life.

If you're a sceptic who hasn't played a Souls game yet, I suggest that you pick one and start playing, then, when you die for the first time, simply shrug it off and try again. Choosing to be defiant in the face of defeat, only to overcome the enemy that killed you first could be one of the best decisions you make as a gamer.

It happened to me once, and it could happen to you, if you let it.