I’m continuing to progress through Dark Souls 2. Things have really started coming together.

Which is a shame, because it only serves to highlight how awful the general design philosophy is/was in this game. When first starting out (especially as a Sorcerer) you really don’t have the tools to survive well, presuming you weren’t already a veteran of the Souls genre. Each defeat reduces your maximum HP by 5% down to 50%, and the consumable that reverses that is not is ready supply. And you wouldn’t really know that unless you looked things up. Nevermind the invasions from other players who are likely to kill you. Which, by the way, counts as a regular death meaning your HP goes down too.

At a certain point though, things improve. My character was heading towards a pure Sorcerer build, but then veered off into Hexer and I’m loving it. Early on you barely have enough casts to step 20 feet from the Bonfires before running dry, but now I have 50 Dark Orbs, 75 Soul Arrows and whatever else I want to slot in. And those consumables? I have 38 of them ready to go.

Aside from being bullied in No Man’s Wharf, I encountered no other PvP invasions for probably another 20ish hours. Until Iron Keep. The fight was actually going my way for a bit, until the invader popped the Warmth spell on the bridge, a stationary AoE healing spell. Then he got in a stable rhythm for dodge-rolling my Affinity/Dark Orb casts and I was stuck either trying to bait him into overextending or run into melee myself. Eventually I baited him out, but an ill-timed block on my part (instead of just dodge-rolling) meant I got staggered and then he executed some combo attack on me that deleted 70% of my HP. Then he finished me off when I tried to stand up.

After the fight, I was kicking myself for not slotting in Dark Fog. See, Dark Fog is a ranged, obscuring fog that can poison foes very quickly. Aside from using it for area denial (like around his Warmth spell), it would also be good for casting spells through to hopefully give opponents less time to react. Plus, most Hex spells are hard to distinguish during the cast, so it can also bait them into rolling before/after the damage is done.

But the thing is… that’s dumb. Dark Fog has some PvE applications, but there’s a reason I didn’t already have it “equipped” in Iron Keep. That’s when I realized this is all by design. The threat of PvP is a “balancing” mechanism that keeps you from focusing on pure PvE (not equipping optimum souls-farming gear/spells), or if you ignore it, actively slowing your progress by killing you with invaders. Indeed, there are numerous spells in the game whose only real purpose is as PvP fodder – the “homing” spells are harder to dodge but deal less damage than normal, for example.

I understand the design logic. Adding PvP increases the design depth (“useless” weapons might be good against human players) and adds longevity and relevancy to your game. From what I have seen on some forums, Dark Souls 2 still has a relatively thriving PvP scene despite being eight years and two sequels old. That can be considered a design win, even if I don’t personally care for it.

Luckily for me, I figured out how to disable PvP via Windows Firewall. So I did.

Time will tell if I continue playing however. One of the common criticisms of Dark Souls 2 is how much of it involves “gank squads,” e.g. enemy ambushes. I can absolutely confirm that the majority of the game indeed feels like jump scares. While the original Dark Souls had plenty of surprises, Dark Souls 2 takes them to another whole level with just an absurd amount of harassment. I appreciate that enemies do not technically pop into existence (except when they do, like the Pursuers… and Forlorn… and NPC invaders…) and thus you can often snipe them from certain angles if you are aware of them. But it gets really exhausting stopping at every single doorway and swiveling the camera around to check the corners all goddamn day. Earthen Peak in particular took ages.

“So why keep playing?”

Because I want to play Elden Ring but don’t want to spend $52 (current sale) on it. Other games exist, but when I develop an itch to play a particular genre, playing something else as a distraction doesn’t make the itch go away.

Plus, you know, I do have fun after a fashion. The game is gorgeous, the dopamine hits from defeating bosses/unlocking Bonfires are legit, there is a tangible sense of both character and player progression, and the buttons feel good to press. In fact, if not for the HP penalty for dying (which amplifies the gank squad problem), I would rate Dark Souls 2 very high. There are a lot of improvements it brings to the formula, which I might talk about in a later post.

It’s just hard to enjoy a 1,000 mile journey with a rock in your shoe.