Dark Souls II

This game ultimately failed.

Bosses

In Souls 1 (I'm just talking about Dark Souls 1 and Dark Souls 2), On my first play through, I never beat any bosses on my first try.
In Souls 2, I beat well over half of the bosses on my first try.

Most of the bosses were just straight up bullshit: specifically the Throne Watcher and Defender.
It's a 2V1, and they can heal each other to full health. Who the fuck thought it would be a good idea for 2 bosses with high as shit poise to be able to heal each other to full health.

The Lost Sinner, The Rotten, Velstadt, and the Chariot bosses were fucking awesome. I'd say they were the only good bosses in the entire game.

The Medusa boss: If you don't set the windmill on fire, her room is full of poison. Cool idea. Problem: the windmill of made of fucking STONE.
I remember going to that windmill, smacking it, and the turning away 2 times. There was absolutely no indication that I could set it on fire- no dry plants, no oil, NO INDICATION at all!


Making a boss fight with multiple bosses doesn't make the hard. It makes it literally unfair.
The game is unfortunately full of 2V1's - and some cases, 3V1's.

SIMPLE FIX: Make it so instead of 3 Ruin Sentinels, make it 1 Sentinel, and a Sentinel Elite. After the normal one dies, the Elite jumps in.
Why the fuck didn't they do this?!?


Dual wielding

They added a new mechanic: when you have 2 weapons of the same weapon class on both hands and you hold the 2 hand button, you can attack with both weapons at the same time.

Problem: it's either not worth it, the move set poor, or it barely gives a benefit to make it useable.
With 2 daggers, the strong attack is a... Well strong attack that uses both blades.
Why not have a flurry of stabs with both blades, there is a ring that makes it so poise goes down that every hit, and you could put poison on the blades. If that were the case, I would've done that through the entire game. But no.

multiple weapon classes have the same move set when their dual wielded. So why even make them dual wield-able?


Level design


Some areas were fucking beautiful. But the level design can be easily exploited.

Take the Shrine of Dragons for instance. The level design is across that entire area is: a flat platform, with 2 enemies at the same time. And they're coded so that if 1 agros, they both do.
Editfix- meaning the entire area is unavoidably full of that '2V1' bullshit.

In the Shrine of Amana: There are multiple enemies who shoot homing magic. and they're placed so that if you walk up and slash one, another far off agros on you.
Causing you to slowly pick every mage off with a bow and arrow. 10/10 level design.

It felt like the entire game could be exploited with a bow and arrow.


Some of the puzzles, you straight up have to look up a guide.
I already mention the windmill bullshit, but there are some others.

The Ashen Mist. No where does it mention- or even hint that you're supposed to use it on the dead giants.
The fight with Hollow King Vendrick - no where does it say- OR EVEN HINT that the souls of dead giants are used to weaken Vendrick's defense.

A lot of the bosses in the original dark souls did seem unfair, but only at first. the gargoyle boss was really annoying, but you could exploit it's tail weakness and the second one only drops down after the first is at half health.
the gargoyle in dark souls 2 you have to fight both at once and then third one comes in like a minute or two.
and then there's really dumb "bosses" like the Skeleton King or Royal Rat Vanguard. I actually got poisoned and died after I beat the rat vanguard, and it didn't count somehow so I had to re-fight them. it even said victory achieved but it apparently doesn't count unless you can get the boss soul.

also the weapon degradation system is meh. it gives a sense of urgency but i don't think weapon durability should be that big a part of the game. especially since it either forces you to have the Bracing Knuckle ring or multiple copies of the same weapon just in case one breaks while you're traveling.