Tuesday, March 20, 2018

Microreview [video game]: Dark Souls 3 by From Software (developer)

Hard But No Diamond


A short while ago, I'd committed to ignoring games described as inspired by Dark Souls. I'd played some Dark Souls and didn't enjoy it much, played some Dark Souls inspired games like Lords of the Fallen and Bound by Flame and I didn't like any of them. But this isn't a consistent dislike. I really really enjoyed Salt & Sanctuary, but the qualities of Dark Souls that inhabited Hollow Knight turned me right off. And almost immediately after I'd decided that Dark Souls-like games were not for me, Humble Monthly gave me a copy of Dark Souls 3. I beat Dark Souls 3. I enjoyed Dark Souls 3.

I am ill equipped to describe what makes Dark Souls 3 so different from Dark Souls, and even less equipped to compare it to Dark Souls 2, but Dark Souls 3 hooked me fairly quick. I know how these games work and they're very unforgiving, particularly of my overly-aggressive playstyle. With the help of a build guide to direct my efforts on creating a character I would enjoy playing with, a simple melee sword-and-board fighter, I sliced and chopped my way through hordes of monsters. The variety in combat encounters and enemies ensured that even my simple character build was never boring. Maybe Salt & Sanctuary made me a more patient player, but I rarely felt like the fights were unfair, even when I was dying to bosses over and over. I'd eventually learn their patterns and weaknesses, and chop them to pieces with my sword. Where as I found Dark Souls to be a largely frustrating affair, Dark Souls 3 never felt frustrating; it was rewarding.

What isn't rewarding in the game is the storyline, or lack thereof. It starts with a cutscene explaining that the lords of cinder have left their graves and need to be returned to their thrones to rekindle the dying world. From there, there's more or less nothing much to offer until you reach the end, and you get a short cutscene for your efforts. Sure, you'll find other non-hostile people with some "quests" of their own, but there's no journal. No quest log. Often, I struggled to even remember their names. Most items have a sentence or two of flavor text but that's about it for worldbuilding. You could go end-to-end through this game and never learn a single thing about the lords of cinder that you're mercilessly hunting down and killing.

This is a bit of a shame because the world they've built, without the exposition, is really interesting in that it's not standard fantasy or grimdark. If anything, it's sorrowful. This is a dying world, roamed by undead things, desperate for purpose and meaning. I find myself wanting to go back to Dark Souls again for another try to see if I can fill in the blanks because I want to learn more. Even if I can't, if I can find in Dark Souls what I found in Dark Souls 3, that'll be enough. Dark Souls 3 is a challenging game that rewards persistence and learning without feeling cheap.

The Math

Baseline Assessment: 7/10

Bonuses: +1 a huge variety of enemies and worlds that never gets boring

Penalties: -1 non-existent storytelling does the world no justice

Nerd Coefficient: 7/10 (an enjoyable experience, but not without its flaws)

***

POSTED BY: brian, sci-fi/fantasy/video game dork and contributor since 2014

Reference: From Software. Dark Souls 3 [Namco Bandai, 2016]