Dark Souls 2 - DLC Levels and Bosses 

I tought I was the only one. tought i've gone crazy

This literally just happened to me. I paused the video and looked out my window to see if someone was at my house at 5 AM for some reason.

I wasn't scared but I thought the storm we had at that time began to make weird noises, like I am going insane or something.

Holy shit I just posted the same comment lmao. Saaaame

I also just experienced this at 3am, watching in the dark and in bed. Thought my baby nephew was awake or that I was hearing things.

i went thru that room so many times knowing the mimic was frozen there and i still fell for the chest

I just replayed last week. Reentered the room and forgot which one was the mimic. I hit every chest but rolled away too late and got grabbed

fucking gary, man.

Level Design Gods can't make game only by themselves during our lifetimes, you know. They had to hire Garies. So, it's OK, Gary.

Gary >>> Miyazaki

Baby store. Got him on sale.

+Joseph Anderson baby 2 dlc was nerfed i feel

Lol I at first genuinly thought it was a add on to the music

Drops after you defeat Lonliness boss and in Hospital area

meijer

Always loved that touch

Just the helmet but yeah, for me it makes the fight easier.

you could say he is fuming

He is definitely prepping future gamer.

It gives me warm fuzzies to think that he is explaining all this Dark Souls stuff not to us, but to the baby

What a shitty parent.. What does he play? dark souls, layers of fear, shooters and the evil within? No wonder kids these days are fucked in the head..

And you seem to be the most notable example of that.

Jan Christian Frodahl You're extremely naive in child psychology. Therefore, I suggest you either read up on it, or you simply don't say anything about it.

Ah yes, fireball lizard and weeb gauntlet

Holy. Shit yeah

Classic Garry *shakes head*

That shit was so frustrating that I gave up running for the boss door and just repeatedly cleared the chambers of knights and salamanders then went back to the bonfire until they all stopped spawning

@@darko1295 me too man me too lol

I really enjoy almost every part of ds3

@@adamiadamiadami now thats just blatant lying

@@adamiadamiadami Dark Souls 3 has *more* tracking than 2, actually. Don't get me wrong, I think that 3 is a colossally superior game, but the tracking in both games is a non-issue. Dark Souls 3 is just deceptive about its tracking because when the enemies do it, it doesn't look fucking ridiculous like it does in 2; they don't spin around like they're standing on a turntable. The enemies that people complain about in DS2 do. Like Joseph says, the tracking is necessary at times in order to force you to actually learn how to roll the attacks. Obviously there are ways to do this without the tracking, but if it weren't there, then overhead swings, stabs, etc. would be made completely trivial by just circle strafing. This is actually an issue with a lot of enemies in DS2. Look at the pursuer for an especially obvious example. DS3 fixes this and does a great job of it because it fooled people like you into thinking that it's not even a thing at all, when in reality it is, it's just implemented better so it's not something worth complaining about.

"I hope the concept of NG+ is expanded upon in DS3" I audibly chuckled

and now scream internally because elden ring does the same exact bullshit

DatBoi SmiddyPants What confuses me the most is that he says it's one of his favorites, then comes to the conclusion that it's one the worst. I love this video, but that one contradiction left me scratching my head.

He explains pretty clearly that he loved the concept of the area and felt that if more had been done with it it could have been great. It really is a fine line between great and awful in this series, a few tweaks here and there can greatly improve or ruin something. Like, Ornstein and Smough is generally a universally well received fight, but it could've easily been completely ruined just by making the arena you fight them in smaller so you couldn't separate them and were just constantly spammed with overlapping attacks - which is something that happens all too often with gank fights in DS2. If that were the case it wouldn't be incorrect for someone to say "This is one of my favorite fights in the game, I think it would've been amazing if they just had you fight in a larger arena"

*horsefuck valley

@@Nuvizzle Funny thing is Code Vein did exactly that with their O&S type of boss.

jengaaaaa Was it bad?

when i heard that i literaly screamed NOPE NG+ IN DS SUCZ. But for real Dark souls 2 is my favorite....

One of my favourite things in ds2 is the NG+, excellent implementation and it gives replay value to the game.

@@Swatyo yeah ds2 is the only ds i can bring myself to play ng+ in. the others just feel like easy mode on ng+. apparently the bosses get harder but everything else is so easy i never stuck with it long enough to find out. there are very few games i can play ng+ on, if i replay a game i want it to be more (or at least equally) challenging.

*Expanded

Im in ng+++? Or ++++ anyway, i can't bring myself to play on a different charecter cause i know im going to have to do all the stuff again, but i sometimes find fun in stomping iudex gundyr or vordt, but im going to have to stop playing for a while as twin princes was so hard i had to cheese them with poisen fog with his blind spot for phase 2

you know if you fight alonne without a shield and take no damage, when he gets low on health he'll kill himself. not sure if you have to use a katana. sadly i could never pull this off but it's a really cool detail.

@@Jack_80 you just have to no hit him

@@emanuelc.8579 i'm pretty sure you can't use a shield, because he considers the use of a shield cowardly and not honorable.

@@Jack_80 What if you two hand and carry the shield on your back?

@@theirlovecantcutourknife3253 no idea, you can probably look it up and find out pretty quick though. i wouldn't risk it, you still technically would have a shield equipped.

Congratulations, no easy feat

Good job my guy! Definitely not a task for the meek of will

@@matthewthomas8407 love the DS2 dlc. Sunken City is still my favorite level of the series, even including Elden Ring. Frigid Outskirts had a remake in Elden Ring, visually-the run to Melania-and spiritually-the lake of rot-which I loved.

+Learthion Those enemies will are also more likely to explode once set ablaze, so a simple whap from a torch is sometimes quicker than hitting them with a regular weapon.

I just throw a Fire Ball at them then they attack you realy slow und kill themself.

In Brume tower it is even heavily implied by there being two doors right at the start. I think there is even a sign that explaines the point of that erea.

@@niek3839 They were explicitly designed for co-op. Players who didn't have the DLC could still enter the beginning DLC area, but would not have the item needed to open the big elaborate door and access the main part of the DLC. However, if they put their summon signs down in the first area before going through the door, they would be able to be summoned in the offshoot areas (Halls of the Dead, Iron Passage, and Frigid Outskirts respectively). The areas were intentionally overtuned for single players because they were balanced for multiplayer. Each area also gives you two NPC summons in case you are playing offline, or don't have any friends to play with and don't want to summon randoms. I think the areas largely failed though. For one thing, they are accessible even without multiple players, which breaks the encounters because they were never designed for single players. Also, the areas have new loot in them, albeit not particularly good loot in the case of the Halls of the Dead and the Iron Passage. You can even make a magic version of the Smelter Sword and two completely new items from Lud and Zallen, which is kind of terrible if you're alone but still want the items. Lastly, the areas would be fun to play through with three players coordinating, but don't really work with one player and two NPCs due to the generally lacking NPC AI. I think instead that those areas should have been offshoots from the DLC start area, rather than optional areas to find within the DLC. This would have made it a lot more obvious that they were intended specifically for multiplayer (a sign out front would likewise have done it). Furthermore, I think that they should not have included new loot. They should have had more copies of good items like Titanite Slabs along with hard-to-access items like rings from higher NG+ cycles for defeating the bosses. This would have helped make it obvious that they were intended only as multiplayer challenges, would still have allowed people who didn't buy the DLC to access them, and wouldn't penalize people who didn't or couldn't play multiplayer for skipping them. Overall though I like the idea behind them, as multiplayer is something that the Soulsborne games are known for, yet never got any support other than matchmaking and more fleshed-out arenas in DS3. The difficulty in almost every level in every Soulsborne game can be broken by playing in a group, as the regular enemies and bosses are not designed for fighting multiple people and can often be cheesed simply by having an extra 2-3 friends helping you. Likewise, while invasions are never really "fair," as the player being invaded isn't expecting the invasion and can be caught off guard in a bad position, invasions are mostly fair when taken as "I invade and then fight my opponent one-on-one." Having multiple players breaks invasions because the invaders must now deal with 3 or 4 players instead of just 1, and while this can lead to entertaining cat-and-mouse fights, it isn't really balanced in any of the games. Having an actual area set up explicitly for multiple players to work through in a coordinated fashion, along with a boss intentionally designed for multiple players to combat, is a great idea that sadly was not as fleshed out in DS2 as it deserved to be. Maybe we'll get it in an upcoming From game is they switch back to enabling multiplayer. Personally, though, I don't like Soulsborne multiplayer and loved Sekiro despite (or perhaps because) it didn't have any multiplayer, so if Elden Ring likewise is purely single player it won't bother me either way.

I know that's the intention but they're still terrible. That explains why they're sectioned off though.

Old comment I know but summoning a person or two for the Graverobbers fight actually makes it really fun for me.

Even in coop these zones are terrible, especially Friggid outscirts

i feel the same like walking over the button to reset it before heading out isnt that tedious

***** this just seems very nitpicky.

Sorry you like your games with nits... I don't see a reason analysis vids like this shouldn't be nitpicky, as minor criticisms like this do little to detract from the game as a whole, but are excellent to keep in mind for future games' design. It seems to me like persistent elevator locations are a weird relic of shifted mechanics between DS1 and 2. Since DS1 doesn't allow you to warp between bonfires for a significant chunk of the game, you're much more likely to backtrack through areas, making persistent elevators much more convenient. Alternatively, it can set up unique low risk-reward scenarios where you have to decide whether you're more likely to next use an elevator to backtrack, or in the same direction after dying. At least there, there's SOME justification. Since backtracking is almost completely trivialized by the ability to warp from the start of DS2, it means elevators are practically guaranteed to be inconvenient, either forcing you to plan ahead for future attempts or to wait your next time around. Sure, it's minor, but it's not nothing.

@@onearmedwolf6512 nitpicking is his gimmick. people must like it because he has a lot of subs. then again the rad brad has millions of subs and he may be the most dull and boring person i've ever heard in my life.

Jack M bro you're a conspiracy believer i thought that sort of thing was a joke what the hell

You're very welcome. :)

+

Yes! Everytime someone criticizes one of those three areas, I always am asking in my head, "did they attempt to play the coop area solo? That's their fault". All three areas are a blast when played coop. I do question why Fromsoft didn't just make it impossible to progress solo, though. Why even bother allowing players to solo the brume tower run or frigid outskirts?

​@@glowerwormWell the game doesn't explain or show you it's coop. It introduces that concept of a level in Forest of the Fallen Giants, but nothing is really shown or taught to the player about it. Therefore, those levels are poor video game design. But because those levels are not mandatory or mechanics that you have to engage with, it's tolerable.

They’re weird cuz I was a dumbass and played sekiro like ds3 for embarrassingly long and I still enjoyed it (I learnt at the owl)

The games are slightly different enough that I still get my ass handed to me for the first few areas and bosses but once you get used to it they are pretty similar and become way easier from your other experience

people who get angry and say "you don't know what you're talking about" are usually the one that has no idea what they're talking about at all.

While I enjoyed ds2 for the content it provided, I have definitely fallen for the trap that I think every from soft game plays the same, and every single one of those games has handed my ass back to me for playing it (except for demon's souls, by then I learned my lesson, and it's actually not as difficult as I thought it was.) It's really hard going from each game to the other because of how different they are, and it's funny that isn't talked about more. I feel like it's why people shouldn't play the game for it's difficulty, and should do so more for the different experiences. Because for the most part, they're all hard in different ways and even playing through each of them isn't going to make you any better at games. They each just have different lessons to teach everyone.

To be fair Sekiro isn’t that great. It’s a rhythm game. All you do is parry and deal death blows (which aren’t even death blows when enemies can fucking survive being stabbed in the throat), repeat. That’s literally. There is no strategy to it. There are no decisions to make in combat.

Thanks man. I really appreciate it. Hope you like some of the other videos. The Dark Souls series is a little rough. It was my first time making them.

Okay? No one asked for your opinion.

+JETwardCentrella Thanks man, I really appreciate the encouragement. :)

​@@JosephAndersonChannel you are welcome

Keith Ballard I'm watching them all & we have different taste. Good vids

Super late reply but whatever. I only played SotFS and i found it interesting that some of the, in my opinion, worst enemy placements were exclusive to it. A good example is the two elephant men on the bridge to drangleic castle. Without the room to run around them they make a really shitty encounter. So i was wondering, having played both versions, which did you like more?

I only ever played Scholar and was honestly surprised with how few situations I had trouble dealing with enemy crowds after hearing so much about how bad the gank squads were even in the base game. I think so much of this comes down to playstyle. Before I ever played a Souls game I was a big Vindictus player, which is an MMO with very Souls-like combat. That game is mostly about the boss fights but the gauntlets leading up to them are always fights against groups of enemies that die like fodder but can actually be threatening if you don't handle them well and let them hit you; it also didn't have a lock-on feature except for a sortof shitty option to always keep the camera focused on the boss, and only one of the classes had a shield but even that one relied very much on timing parries rather than just blocking because most heavy attacks would either totally drain your stamina or even damage you through a regular block. So when I went into Souls I was already conditioned to dodge attacks rather than consider shields my first line of defense, to use movement and positioning when fighting groups of lesser enemies, and especially to fight without a lock-on. Nowadays I've learned when it's beneficial to use the lock-on but even in boss fights I'll often disengage it to move more freely and only keep it locked when I know I need my camera to follow a boss's movements closely or want to keep my attacks directed at single enemy. When I see people playing Souls and always using the lock-on by default instead of thinking of it as a tool to be toggled on or off in different situations it really baffles me.

"It's kind of a bummer that the game gets so much flak for not living up to the Legend That is Dark Souls" This is an unfair statement to make. There is enough wrong with at least SotFS (only version I have played) to warrant the flak it gets.

@@Nuvizzle Yeah, I noticed this too. I didn't have a particularly hard problem fighting multiples in ds2 as much as I did in the first game even despite keeping the lock on for most of the game. Also some parts in SOTFS actually have even less enemies, like the staircase up to the dragon shrine.

Whoever upvoted, thank you for the reminder to watch this series again.

​@@MinecraftNerd1985here's your three year reminder again

Thank you so much for saying this. I'm learning as I go with making these things and I'm flat-out ignorant about much of it still. I'm guessing what you're describing is most prevalent in the Gary section? I'll mess about with settings some more.

+Joseph Anderson Yeah the background noise (baby) is highest around Elena, and the clipping/high gain is worst in the Gary section. I think having a more directional mic may help with this, depending on your setup, and reducing the gain as Xendran mentioned should help too. Regardless, amazing analysis video, I found myself enjoying this one the most out of the series, and I find myself agreeing with most of your comments! Looking forward to hearing your game design thoughts re: having to change up your build for specific bosses too :)

Same with Fume Knight and I think Mythra was trying to do that.

EDIT: this comment was a mess, so I deleted it. Now I'm regretting it because I had a like for it, lol. I'll try to remake my statement. So, I thought that your comment was great because of how much you can differ about how good the boss is, and for very different reasons. Now I think the same, also, anyone should be entitled to choose why they like what they like. Thanks for your comment.

I actually think it becomes way more interesting with Veltsadt.

Thats a true and thats probably he said that she is the boss that should be last in main game which is also true :-(

The inconsistency of Elana's design made me really dislike the fight because I only got 2 runs at the boss. The first time, she threw Velstadt at me and I was so surprised I died pretty quickly trying to panic-heal. The second time I was more prepared and entirely ready to take on both bosses simultaneously, had a plan in mind, mentally hyped myself up when she went into the summoning animation, and then she just threw a few skeletons at me that I smacked down in one hit and the rest of the fight was trivial. I think the fight would've greatly benefited from having three phases - Elana alone, Elana summoning skeletons, and Elana with Velstadt. During the second phase she could be more defensive and keep teleporting away from you while sending skeletons at you - the skeletons aren't very threatening but they keep you occupied while she pegs you with spells from a distance, and the phase would train you to watch for her spells while fighting something else and trying to close the distance, so that when Velstadt popped out you'd be more prepared to avoid magic and Velstadt at the same time while finishing Elana off.

+marsgreekgod Damn I never saw it that way, good call. That explains the cancer that is the Iron Passage, and the multiple-enemy bosses in Cave of the Dead and Frigid Outskirts.

+simongolddrone Yeah it's all build to punish single player actions and reward multiplayer. now if only they told you that in game

It's implied with the summoning rooms (with the weird stone sarcophagus things) but I agree that it's far from optimal.

+simongolddrone are there NPC summons available when the playerbase gets low? DS 2 will not have a lot of available players forever i imagine.... :

+Algirdas Šalomskas Yes a matter of fact there is

+Juli This was a wonderful comment. Thank you so much.

'souls/borne fans are the most intelligent gamers' ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-lhckuhUxcgA.html

sentient oven Sorry to ruin this but >Nameless King >Optional Boss >best boss in DS3

Are you serious?! It is riddled with bad camera and often inconsistent moves! It is the most challenging, but not fun and it stops being interesting because so hard to kill solo.

Did I stutter?

Kevin Gracey D-don't tell me what t-to do!

Kevin Gracey there's nothing "wrong" with it, I merely did not enjoy the fight ('mechanics' and hitboxes, boss design and overall mood. )

tehCostHD Because the greatwolf was already a common enemy in the SAME DLC, not an exclusively boss type of enemy, where as Velsdadt is an already implemented boss enemy and not a common enemy

In my opinion difficulty might be one of the biggest reasons people play these. But it's not because how difficult they are, it's because how well these games (usually) implement the difficulty into the level, combat and boss design. Maybe that's what he meant.

So I agree with you after reading your comment again it seems :)

It is interesting. Back in the days, when I first saw the Demon's Souls trailer on Gametrailers website, I was sooo intrigued (aside from the weird name). It seemed like it had the gothic atmosphere that I craved in any RPG. Then the game came out (I didn't have a PS3 but wanted to get one to play it), people reviewed kept saying it was very difficult. As a person who sucks as "challenging" games I hated the idea. I hate repeating things in games, I get bored quickly because I thought it was going to be hard just for the sake of it, I thought it was going to be unfair. Years later, Dark Souls comes out on PC, I buy the game, it is riddled with technical problems but then fixed by the community. I discover that these games are something else, and the challenge is most of the time is very fair. Something clicks and it is all because of the things you listed. Amazing level design, the lore, the atmosphere, the way you are challenged but at the same time feel empowered because you can learn to deal with every encounter. Dark Souls games are not difficult they are challenges that you learn to overcome which all tie to the bigger picture.

"Challenging" is probably the more suitable word, and I do think the games' challenge is one of its main draws, and for most people probably the singular thing that makes it a great series. It's easy to make something difficult, but it's a rare and excellent game that manages to test you in a way that is both challenging and fair. I believe JA said as much himself. The level design, enemy design, more or less everything else you talk about, is all part of that carefully designed challenge. But so is the damage and health of everything in the world and the availability and function of healing. If the game was exactly the same but everything did a third of the damage it does and your healing was instant I don't think anyone would consider the game very good or memorable.

+arralich baby

IT SCARED THE SHIT OUT OF ME LMAO

It his attempt to take over his channel and make reviews

@@Superschokokeks "helo evybody, am here to rivioo drank sulz too for teh pc, furst of hole, combaet is haaaarrd !"

Same, I didn't notice you could hit the switches til my second playthrough and that was after watching a speedrun where the guy hit them, I didn't figure it out for myself. It made the very first section of the dlc very hard and kinda tainted the rest of it for me.

I never tried, but I'm willing to bet if you use Guidance you'll find a developer message near the pillar.

same thing for me but with the soul statues in Drangleic Castle. At first I thought that certain stone enemies corresponded to statues/doors, but then I realized that you could actually lure any stone enemy to the ruin sentinel doors to open them, and then i realized that they don't have to be made of stone. it was a really confusing experience

The way they're set on fire doesn't change much of anything though. They explode in the room at the bottom and set each other on fire, so I knew the mechanic existed, but I didn't think anything of it because... not much of anything does come of it. They still explode and are killed as easily as ever. I think I said in the first video that tracked attacks are in a way necessary because of how easily the first game could be conquered with circlestrafing and backstabbing. The problem lies in when the tracking ends. I don't know how I would do it--I'd have to think about it for a while and see--but a frame-by-frame breakdown to see how frame-perfect your dodges have to be in order to avoid an attack would prove where it's used well and where it isn't. Dark Souls 1 has a lot of this too but fewer attacks that track you until the very end. At least it feels that way looking back at both games.

Joseph Anderson The fire doesn't change how they explode, the fire makes the start sprinting to close the gaps (as much as what they do can be called 'sprinting') and tracking attacks are timing tests. To avoid some moves you have to be at the right place, but to avoid tracked moves you have to have the right timing, I get that it might be a little frustrating, especially considering it's lack of realism, but it's akin to getting annoyed by ranged people because they're far away - and it's not like you don't have any tracking, you can control some swings right up to the last second.

@@Oathkeeperclash Yep. Tracking attacks *force* you to line up your s with the when the enemy executes damage. You're avoiding damage entirely in the dimension of time instead of 3d space + time. It's a great feeling to nail it, one you can get come to your own, but tracking attacks kind of lead you to it. Needless to say it helps if you have leveled some agility... which any non-shield build should be doing.

@@bsh819 The dimension of space is still there, it lies in range and whether or not you're in reach of the attack, furthermore this mechanic itself creates even more complexities in combat as multiple opponents line up - since they force a roll they're a higher priority target or require more attention.

​@@Oathkeeperclash At least against single enemies (usually a boss), the dimension of space can disappear entirely. If every roll is timed right it makes no difference where you are, only that your iFrames happen at the right time. It becomes guitar hero lol.

+Rod VonBoche Your analysis is absolutely spot on.

Yeah I agree. When people say that the DS2 DLC is the best content in the series, I really don't understand it at all. None of the areas hold a candle to say, Tower of Latria from DeS.

yeah velstdt being summoned is very annoying especially as new game + happens giving him great damage along with heath and elana being somewhat of a sponge. Sinh stays in the air to long sometimes but he could also stay on the ground a lot enough said. raime has tons of broken hitboxes also smelter clone. eleum loyce is fine it has 2 amazing bosses avaa and the king. but that reskin gank of avaas really sucks as well as those reindeer and porcupines. the main problem with ds2 for me is that in most areas you will be ganked by 5 to 10 enemies constantly

Nick3111997 Nah, the Frigid Wastes is something that's worthy of being compared to the original Demon's Souls.