Dark Souls 3 - April 2016 : You Died, You Died, You Died

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HIxuGi_2TQ

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2015/09/16/hands-on-with-dark-souls-iiis-new-magic-system.aspx

that crowned skull looming out of the darkness at 1:24 is giving me the serious heebie-jeebies

psyched for this obv

coma until March, please

i signed up for the beta network test

same. if i get in i look forward to explaining to my gf why i have to play video games for three hours on a Friday night.

ditto

japan needs me

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-09-17-dark-souls-3-is-a-surprisingly-different-beast

Critical Arts are special attacks tailored to each weapon and available when you're two-handing. With a scimitar, for example, you launch into a dervish of blades, while a greatsword can be used to launch enemies comically high into the air. There's a magic meter sitting between your health and stamina bar, a throwback to Demon's Souls own approach, and performing critical arts as well as summoning spells eats into this. Restoring MP's more straightforward than the spice gathering of Demon's Souls, too - you've now got in your possession a second, blue estus flask that can be glugged to top up that bar.

Hoping this comes out for PC also.

they make too many of these games

it'll have been two years since the last dark souls came out by the time this is released, and four-and-a-half since the first one was released - it's not exactly fifa in the churning-them-out stakes

but also bloodborne! that's one every 1.5 years

three games in one series, each with their own subtly different take on the template, and one offshoot with distinct differences in its combat system and overarching theme, all packed with content - i dunno, i'm happy to play them as regularly as they come out as long as the level of quality remains this high

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyd8dY8rRtA

If Bloodborne is any indication then this is going to be the best souls game yet.

http://cdn.yourepeat.com/media/gif/000/085/261/88fed98d30151cb92ae8c81165ac80f8.gif

I'm in on the beta!

nice! i didn't get in, but at least i don't have to explain why i'm cancelling all Friday night plans now.

yeah, there's a conversation i'm looking forward to.

have You Died yet?

testing is fri/sat/sun from 8pm to 11pm

should i liveblog tonight, y/n

just post I DIED every time you get killed

k

y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcAa8gHHfg4

fucks sake, this is 8pm PACIFIC
which is 11pm until 1 in the morning.

still not working...

a quick look around reddit and the internet suggests it's borked

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyARBkovYCw&

i died about six times. this looks fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=c2EJMd7ZN7w#t=253

http://i.imgur.com/NmX9h6f.gif

that's pretty much my dark souls experience except i'd be getting stuck in the corner and accidentally rolling off a cliff, too

if it ended with the rolling guy running out of stamina then getting one-shotted by his opponent it'd be more true to my dark souls experiences for sure

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI09ZVuX5XI

looks predictably fuckin' awesome.

cool that you can kinda go into Bloodborne-mode using those knife/bow weapon arts.

i dunno about you but what i really needed was a dark souls branded endless runner for my phone
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LputQewHUIw

lol.

it's getting really hard to avoid knowing more about this game than i want to. truly excited.

feel like today opened the floodgates of early game DS3 footage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igWjGlNlgH0

so far it looks really good. a bunch of references to Dark Souls get spoiled in the above video btw.

i have seen some people freak out (not here of course) that it isn't a totally interconnected world like Dark Souls was. except Dark Souls wasn't. Undead Asylum was cut off from the rest of the world, so was Anor Londo, so was the Painted World.

i think the areas themselves will be bigger and more intricately designed. already just from watching this footage it looks 100x better than the starting Betwixt/Forest Of The Fallen Giants areas from DS2.

cannot wait to die.

i'm not worried about it. i know there's warping from the beginning, and Although I did love the parts of Dark Souls where it felt like you really might not be able to get back (like going down into Blighttown or the Great Hollow for the first time), I'm sure they know what they're doing.

I'm also super excited for pvp in this game. I never really did it in DS1 because i missed the learning curve (everyone still playing was already way too experienced for me to even learn from my mistakes, it seemed like), and by the time i wanted to go back and try, I didn't have XBL anymore. I kinda sucked at DS2 and didn't want to keep playing it after finishing, and played Demon's Souls offline on a borrowed PS3. But Bloodborne is where I finally did enough pvp to mentally relax and not care about dying (which is really 90% of it), and learn some of the psychological tricks (switching up attacks & weapons, not repeating attacks on people who will parry you, baiting people into getting parried, etc). Feel like this is going to transfer over to DS3 pretty well.

Worst parts of being into these games:

1) Looking at Reddit for info. I'd never actually looked at it before Bloodborne came out and the depressing parts definitely creep in.

2) Most people who make Souls videos are into terrible music.

3) Occasional hate mail from children when playing online.

Do these games have a story? And is there a larger, interconnected story?

they have a story but it's really up to the player to piece it together.

as for are the games connected there are many theories and i thought the world of 2 was largely completely disconnected from the world of 1 but 3 has a lot of things returning from 1 so who knows maybe we will be playing in the past or future of places we have been to before. the first game was tightly directed by creator Hidetaka Miyazaki, then he took on a more supervisory role for 2 so that he could make Bloodborne at the same time. 3 looks like it will be a return to form in many ways receiving his full attention and his intention for it to be the final game in the series. so chances are good there will be some overarching story themes concluded or fleshed out.

imo dark souls 1 starts when you are cursed/hollowed/undead. the main mechanic of the games - dying over and over - is part of the story. as a hollow you cannot die; that is your curse. this is the same with all of your non-boss enemies and many of the NPCs that populate the world. how this curse is tied into the king-queen-god-monsters whose thrones you usurp remains to be seen. the motivations for many characters, including the "helpful" ones who guide you, is unclear. the writing and voice acting is pretty great. then there are the major themes of the series: the meaning between Light and Dark, the flames, the bonfires and kindling, death and rebirth, etc.

i've beaten the two Dark Souls games multiple times and can barely grasp the story. there is a lot of symbolism and ambiguity there. if you want there are dozens of hours of lore analysis waiting for you on youtube.

i think from software's games are some of the greatest examples of environmental storytelling in gaming history tbh

what adam said, but basically the story is very vague and easy to miss/ignore (both the main one and those of the characters you meet). a lot of it has to do with reading the descriptions of the items you pick up.

i also love how it's done, partially because i like the option to completely ignore it much of the time. they provide just enough details to create atmosphere and let you fill in the gaps.

there is massive complex deep lore if you want it and it's totally not necessary to know while you play.
http://soulslore.wikidot.com/

Did it! Had to do it the old-fashioned way learning every move and how to deal with it, but I honestly think it's way more doable solo than with phantoms. When there are multiple players its movements are much less predictable, and harder to react to.

Now I'm having sooo much fun with the covenant that gets unlocked.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_19er_GOOk

Tonight. 7 PM Pacific. Jesse Farrar will attempt to speedrun Dark Souls 3 (all bosses). https://t.co/zACHXnrQDd

— Stefan Heck 💻🚽 (@boring_as_heck) August 14, 2017

Quick update: Jesse has apparently never played Dark Souls before.

— Stefan Heck 💻🚽 (@boring_as_heck) August 14, 2017

I like Jesse's style

This is a silly thing to do but I recently started pressing 'save video clip' after invasions that seemed interesting or exciting:
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDz6pkTVAF3WWgYGLstA-UbokJwJpKA7i

NB I have no video editing software

i'm having a great time with DS3, no surprise. i'm most of the way through the undead village portion of the game (the area the demons fly you to after the second giant beast hound boss).

most quintessential dark soulsy moment, so far: sloooooowly taking down the dragon from afar with tons of crappy wooden arrows, only to get torn apart by a mimic as i tried to claim the treasure from the building the dragon was resting on top of.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMbzmfx6GYs&t=0s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMbzmfx6GYs

oh that is brilliant

Karl, i envy you your first playthrough; DS3 is the jam

All his videos are ridiculously clever.

Have fun Karl! Tell us your character name so I know if I invade you! ;)

I think I am Valdiev

but i am super stingy on embers so i'm rarely invadeable (iirc)

The other night I was invading at low-ish levels, and got invaded myself. The invader dropped me, like 130 embers. I felt slightly guilty since I don't need them, and when I find solo hosts who seem nice or new I only drop like 5. I've been trying to pay it forward though, so if you want embers and are on PS4, lmk.

for some reason the last day or two i haven't been able to connect to the network anyway, so i've just been in offline mode. it's weird because i can stream tv/movies and other games on my ps4, but i can't connect to the Dark Souls network.

one very underrated feature of dark souls 3 is the atmospheric barfing noises. i've been playing the game on headphones and it is VIVID.

this whole undead village is just wreeeetching

♫♪♩· ♪♩·

don't wanna close my eyes

I think that's a widespread thing, something to do with the PS network (haven't tried to connect though).

hah yes there are some great sounds, lots of ghoulish shrieks, moans of the damned, gargles of the undead, etc. later on there is a dungeon that has some random screams that never cease to scare the shit out of me

good luck on your quest!

that dungeon has one all-time jump scare too iirc

i am trying to figure out whether i should go ahead and do the fight with the giant cursed tree, or try to ascend the tower and take out the crazy watchman who can shoot out giant arrow/bolts/trees/spears, whatever they are. meanwhile, everyone is throwing up

I highly recommend the tower first, but, um, keep an open mind.

The giant cursed tree is always the hardest boss in the game for me for some reason, and the only one I routinely try to summon for. Having a weapon with some vertical action/range can help.

it's remarkable how widely ppl's experience of these games vary. the tree boss was a relative breeze for me each time. my worst boss was the one grimes is fighting there, the guy on the rooftops. if it took me literally 50 tries the first time i would not be surprised. i remember being baffled by my friend who nearly quit demons souls because he couldn't beat tower knight and then (twice) beat maneater on 1st try. also interesting to me how sometimes after eventually beating a very hard boss it's like the code is cracked and i can then beat them easily on subsequent occasions, e.g. ornstein and smough

Yeah, it's so subjective! I've never had a problem with the one you're talking about.

I think I have an easier time with the humanoid ones, and a harder time with the ones that are so big that when you're close to them, there are parts that are off-camera (so you really need to be observant in order to see their tells and not get smushed).

uuuugh, real life and dark souls just collided in the most intensely frustrating way. I went to the tower and resolves the spear thrower situation, then kept going and took out the monster thing circling the fire. I thought about home boning to level up, but decided to keep going a bit further. I got in over my head with the evangelists but managed to whittle them down to the last one, no estus flasks left, no stamina, evangelist down to one last hit, they’re winding up and I’m literally going “aaaaagghhhh!!” IRL and then - the fucking power went out in our building! Everything just shut down (except for the loudest carbon monoxide detector in the entire world, just outside my door, which will now beep every 30 seconds and keep me awake through the night until maintenance comes to fix it 2-3 days from now

Time to walk the dog

But good lord that was intense. Also, very biased because I was on a winning streak there, but this whole undead town and surrounding area is my favorite part of the game so far.

Do keep posting here, with your DS3 thoughts/observations. It's interesting. Tempted to start a new build tbh. Can't work out which the monster... oh wait the woman priest with the hug? She's a fucker, even when you're totally late game overpowered. Excited for some of the stuff you're yet to encounter. Still haven't beaten the final boss in this game (rebuilt my build and fucked up on load carrying and now can't carry on with it).

if i do manage to make it all the way to new game+, i'd like to try some sort of sorcerer or magic-based build. i went with a standard knight STR-based build for this first attempt. i'm trying to test out various weapon styles as i get them, but i reinforced a battle axe with dark damage early on and it's been my go-to during more difficult portions of the game so far. i'm so STR-heavy that it doesn't seem super-slow to swing, either.

i took down the curse-rotted Greatwood last night and also explored the sewers with the key. getting ready to head back in now :D

Melee is more fun imo. I always intend to make these hybrid builds and abandon them for another dex character (I do have a poise + strength one but it's not as fun for me).

Melee is more fun imo

it's a lot more terrifying, too. this game scares the bejeezus out of me, and it's never more frightening than when you're 5 feet away holding up a shield, before you have the enemy's movement patterns memorized.

i'm a couple bonfires into the road of sacrifices. in a game of spooky sound effects, the scream of the magic using dude who emits green fog and fire (don't know most enemy names, sorry) might take the cake so far. luckily they're really easy to kill just by rushing them, but still. i'll be glad to get out of these woods (and i haven't even been into the swamp yet, fuck)

i'm trying to strike a balance between trying to discover everything on this first runthrough vs pushing ahead to new areas. i know there's all sorts of gear i could have collected at this point, but right now i'm at the second bonfire of the road of sacrifice, LVL 32
Vigor: 15
Attunement: 10
Endurance: 14
Vitality: 16
Strength: 25
Dexterity: 16
Intelligence: 9
Faith: 9
Luck: 7

RH: Deep Battle Axe+2 (Physical 116 and Dark 116)
LH: Wargod Wooden Shield (lol at me for having a wooden shield this far in the game but it's better than the knight shield so)
Longbow

Knight Helm, Lothric Knight Armor, Lothric Knight Gauntlets, Northern Trousers

That part is hard! And the swamp can be ridiculous if you get lost/turned around.

Not to be that guy, but I would say the knight shield is better, it blocks 100% of physical damage and the wooden one does not. The starting knight gear is solid for the whole game. Also you're doing great but I would try to get some more vigor as soon as you can.

swamps poison so tiresome. boss battle at end is all time tho.

and yes dex or str builds 4ever.

kinda wished i wouldn't have just blown 20,000 on the tower key...:-/ (i don't think i care about hollowing and don't really want the free levels)

although i guess i am enjoying this conversation about pickle-pee and pump-a-rum. very thought provoking!

i found a boss in the swamp (not sure if there's more than one) on accident but i'm leaving it alone for now.

tower key may seem like a waste but is worth it! there is a very valuable secret near the Pickle-Pee Pump-A-Rum

Yeah I would try to get in the rafters and poke around.

Have you tried giving the crows any presents?

chucking random stuff into the nest is u&k imo

Thoughts and observations: this was my first Souls game and I got near the end (The Nameless King), quit, and can't continue because the controls/mechanics are too difficult to remember.

ayo karl
http://www.usgamer.net/articles/dark-souls-3-all-crows-nest-trade-items-pickle-pee-pump-a-rum-crow

it's not cheating if you have no idea what the game mechanics are. also the covetous serpent ring is IMPORTANT, don't miss that

dang. i never made it far enough to find a crow's nest in DS2, so i had no idea.

Heh I've never used that. Although, I was making this lvl 40-ish invader character, and killed an over-leveled, password-summoned phantom in the forest. Voila, I had enough souls to level up to 44. I was like, ok, I guess my build is done all of a sudden?

(been having fun with this one btw, they have an offhand scythe to mess around with spacing/timing, and I can invade in the catacombs and cathedral)

xp

I think the crow's nest is in the tutorial area in DS2? ;) It's been awhile though. Probably easy to miss.

heh yeah i cannot remember for the life of me the crow in DS2. honestly i thought they skipped it.

the Deep Battle Axe is a great weapon. its a nice reward for fighting the mimic and can probably last you the entire game if you want. it does great base damage and the dark bonus makes it hit twice as hard. i think pretty much everything in the game is vulnerable to dark.

the Tower Key area becomes important later on once you visit the Cathedral of the Deep (a good contender for the best level in the game). if you revisit the area later on there is a story event related to the Onion Knight.

you can also climb up the tree and jump onto the roof to get up there are the very start of the game. it's a pain though, you have to run up the tree just right.

I put some of my recent invasions on Youtube because I apparently did not have anything better to do with my mid-30s

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDz6pkTVAF3WWgYGLstA-UbokJwJpKA7i

just downloading this now... trying not to read the thread for spoilers

spoiler: it's good!

i'm wrapped up in a project right now but i hope to You Died many more times once mid-May hits

It IS good isn't it? it has reminded me how bad I am at the souls games though... or no, actually how bad I am at the *bosses* in souls games