#but the fact you can start ringed city from the kiln means clearly it wasn’t THAT crucial in their eyes

[mailperson]

Replaying Dark Souls 1 one thing I noticed is that it has something in common with 2 (and to a slight extent Bloodborne and to a STRONG degree Elden Ring) that it doesn’t have in common with 3: the ability to restrategize.

If you hit a roadblock in DS1 or DS2 more often than not you can try fighting the boss in a different way, or leaving the area and fighting a different boss to get stronger, or maybe going somewhere else and focusing on a different objective altogether. For whatever flaws they have (which they have many, believe me), they’re rewarding to scrappy players that are willing to put in the time to make progress in some way even if they don’t have what it takes to win the next pressing story boss fight yet.

Dark Souls 3? Not so much. Get stuck on a boss fight? Sorry, probably no secret trick to knock down even just a quarter of their health. No later-game area you can pop into to loot some items or get a feel until you stop by later. No warp points or shortcuts to other areas. No shops with hidden helpful items. You encounter a boss? You’ll struggle to learn when to put those i-frames to use until you get past it, almost no exceptions. Even the 2nd paid DLC is strictly gated until you’ve either basically cleared the main game or beaten the first DLC’s boss, a boss NOTORIOUS for being gruelingly tough. There isn’t even a particularly efficient way to level grind until nearly the game’s final area should you feel you just don’t have the stats you need.

At the end of the day it felt like Dark Souls 3’s motto was “the only way forward is through”. That game had some STELLAR late game areas, really cool gear, and intriguing DLC sections too. I can never bring myself to appreciate them as much though because anytime I think of DS3 I just think of the awful tedious grind it is to get through most of that game.