Dark Souls 3 is a game for masochists. It’s also one of the most rewarding (and frustrating) gaming experiences of the last few years. It’s not perfect, but Dark Souls 3 adheres to the core philosophies that have driven development of the Souls franchise for the better part of a decade. Most importantly, the latest iteration of FromSoftware’s torturous franchise builds upon a solid foundation, offering new ways to defeat one's enemies while simultaneously demanding more focus from the Dark Souls community.
Let’s back up a bit. Dark Souls 3 is the latest action role-playing game from FromSoftware. Unlike many franchises, each new iteration of Dark Souls doesn’t pick up where the previous game left off. There are recurring themes and items, and occasional callbacks to past characters or events. It’s kind of like Final Fantasy but with a thicker thread weaved through each game in the series. That connection is stronger than ever in Dark Souls 3, but FromSoftware does a masterful job of incorporating previous plot elements in a way that won’t alienate new players.
One thing that never changes is the series’ trademark difficulty. Death is the most common activity in the game. For many, Dark Souls 3 will be brutally difficult, requiring more patience and concentration than any other triple-A franchise on the market. Longtime fans will find the early hours a bit easier to handle but the difficulty ramps up considerably in the latter half of the game. To put things in perspective, we spent almost as many hours trying to beat the final four bosses as we did completing the rest of Dark Souls 3. It gets rough.
The payoff in Dark Souls 3 is the satisfaction you get from passing some of the major milestones on your path. Instead of parroting the insane boss count (32) from Dark Souls 2, DS3 sticks to a manageable number of the most interesting boss fights we’ve seen in recent years. Each challenge is unique, frequently forcing players to master (or at least compensate for) new tactics and strategies. There’s lots of trial and error, and you’ll lose thousands of souls along the way, but few feelings match the joy of killing an enemy that blocked your progress for multiple hours.
Dark Souls 3’s improvements go beyond the boss count. The game is easily the best-looking in the series. Our VR-ready PC could run the game on its highest settings, and the console versions boast some of the most impeccable visuals on either platform. More importantly, Dark Souls 3 never crashed on us or offered up any bugs that would force us a manual restart of the game. We did see occasional dips in framerate, mostly while exploring the kingdom of Lothric, but never in ways that negatively impacted our experience. Early reports suggest not everyone with an early build of the game has been so lucky, though.
Some of the design decisions in Dark Souls 3 are pretty clearly informed by the lessons of the game’s predecessors. FromSoftware toys with the player’s expectations in many ways, especially in combat. The information gained in prior games, like peeking around corners with the camera, is still useful. But it won’t always save you. Ambushes aren’t the only threat, either. Dark Souls 3 features dozens of new enemies, along with variants of old favorites, and the battles are easily the most complex we’ve seen from the series. Most of Lothric’s inhabitants have had their figures warped in truly horrifying ways, for others the monstrous transformations happen in the middle of battle, forcing the player to adopt new strategies on the fly.
As usual, the road to success typically involves memorizing the attack animations and patterns of the various enemies spread throughout the kingdom. But that task gets a bit trickier in Dark Souls 3, thanks to your opponents’ newfound penchant for aggression and delayed attacks. Rather than stick to a set pace, the combat in Dark Souls 3 seems to ebb and flow more than ever before. Enemies will swap from slow attacks to faster ones without warning, and the increased frequency of group encounters makes proper health/stamina management more important than ever. This includes a new Focus Point system that players can think of like a mana bar in a traditional RPG. Spells and weapon skills both consume focus points, which can be replenished at a bonfire or during combat by using the new Ashen Flasks..
Combat is generally more complex in Dark Souls 3. The community’s most cynical members will be delighted to hear that the traditional “sword and board” build isn’t quite as effective this time around. It’s still great for beginners, especially those struggling with the dodge roll, but there are dozens of situations where players will be slaughtered repeatedly if their only strategy is to hide behind a big shield. Many of the enemies waiting in Lothric will require a balanced approach, combining risky aggression with the slow and steady approach preferred by tanky players.
FromSoftware uses a dizzying array of brief dialogue snippets, environmental cues and item descriptions, along with spoken and silent cutscenes, to give you the history of Lothric and the fallen kingdom’s inhabitants. Deciphering all the information presented can be a daunting task, one that will require several hours and (eventually) a YouTube summary or two. Most impressively, Dark Souls 3 delivers a single-serving narrative that can be enjoyed by newcomers while simultaneously offering deeper stories for those who’ve lost dozens (maybe hundreds) of hours to the franchise.
The traditional Dark Souls user interface remains largely unchanged in the series’ third outing. Longtime fans will likely appreciate the continuity, since they’ll already be familiar with the menus, but the clunky web of inventory screens can seem a bit outdated to new players. That frustration will only be compounded once you realize Dark Souls 3 still doesn’t give offer players a way to compare the stats on potential armor purchases and the gear you currently have equipped.
Summoning and player invasions remain a major fixture in Dark Souls 3, just as they did in the game’s predecessors. Players can pledge themselves to a covenant, or swap allegiance if/when they have enough time to access the equipment screen, or summon other players to assist them with particularly troublesome sections of the game. Each covenant has its own currency, which can be earned by completing tasks related to the group’s overarching goal. Unsurprisingly, the red covenant rewards players for successfully invading other members of the community. But there are also groups that offer rewards for helping other players take down bosses or repel invaders.
If you decide to play offline, FromSoftware compensates for the lack of human intervention by occasionally spawning invaders from a random covenant. In true Dark Souls fashion, DS3 has a nasty tendency to spawn invaders at the worst possible moment; times when the player is already surrounded, low on Estus Flasks and/or carrying more souls than they’d ever want to lose. NPC invaders are still generally easier to kill than their human counterparts, particularly if you manage to fool the AI’s pathfinding systems, but don’t assume switching to offline mode will save you from Dark Souls’ infamous invasions.
Of course, anytime a new Souls games heads to market, there is a chorus of people wondering who exactly the game is for. Admittedly, we were a part of this crowd for a time. For all the PR team’s musings on death, few people ever bring up the sense of accomplishment you find in FromSoftware’s action RPGs. People take pride in their ability to defeat the challenges laid out in Dark Souls 3. You can’t button-mash your way to victory. The uphill climb from one boss to the next reminds many gamers of the difficult, bordering on unfair, video games of the 8- and 16-bit eras. While plenty of games still include harder difficulties, like Halo’s famed Legendary mode, few modern releases feature bosses seemingly designed to weed out less-talented players.
For us, the appeal is largely rooted in the fact you always feel like you’re just moments away from discovering some amazing new tidbit of lore in Dark Souls 3. Figuring out the convoluted histories behind each new Dark Souls game can feel a bit like trying to assemble a freshly-opened jigsaw puzzle. Most of what you learn about Lothric will lack context at the time of discovery but the big picture slowly begins to reveal itself once you’ve uncovered corollary information about the person, place or thing in question. After dozens of hours with the game, it still feels like there’s a plethora of information waiting to be discovered in Dark Souls 3. And the only way to learn more is by carving a path deeper and deeper into the fallen kingdom.
Even if you’re not a lore junkie, Dark Souls 3 finds a variety of ways to make exploration worth your time. There are numerous non-combat NPCs to interact with, some of whom will set up additional shops in the central hub, and helping the remaining residents of Lothric frequently yields new loot. Completing certain tasks also gives you the ability to summon NPC allies during some of the game’s toughest boss fights. Backtracking is also an excellent source of extra souls if/when you need a few extra levels or upgrades for your gear.
There’s still plenty of familiar FromSoftware jank in Dark Souls 3: from camera bugs to attack animations clipping through solid objects. Players can still kite many enemies by standing just outside their aggro radius, and it’s not hard to trick aggressive foes into charging off cliffs and other high places. But learning to take advantage of the AI’s shortcomings begins to feels more like an added tool for the player than a shortcoming of the game. When you’re struggling to fight your way through Lothric, death count rising fast, the chance to dispatch your tormentor(s) without fighting ultimately feels like a net gain for the player.
Dark Souls 3 won’t be for everyone. Those offput by the series trademark difficulty won’t find any reason to revisit the franchise in 2016. Early sections of the game are a bit less complex, giving new fans a few hours to get acclimated. But you’ll have to fight tooth and nail, and maybe even rely on help from your fellow players, to beat Dark Souls 3. It’s easily one of the hardest games we’ve ever played and will likely be one of the most difficult titles on any platform for many years.
FromSoftware perfects the core mechanics that separate Souls games from a growing field of imitators, ensuring Dark Souls 3 will entertain for years to come. In less than a decade, FromSoftware has completely redefined the action RPG genre, leaving dozens of other teams scrambling to emulate Dark Souls’ success. If you’re not a fan of the franchise’s over-the-top difficulty and trial-and-error gameplay, DS3 isn’t going to change your opinion. But fans of FromSoftware’s recent work shouldn’t hesitate to add Dark Souls 3 to their collection.
Full Disclosure: The PC copy of Dark Souls 3 used in the creation of this review was provided by a representative of Bandai Namco; however, the publisher did not retain any editorial oversight/privileges.
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