Bjorn

More like inventory mismanagement! Weapons are grouped by type, and buying from merchants or pulling items from your chest is atrocious, if you have an interest in know what the actual stats of an item are or how they compare to your currently equipped items.

Shorthand left over from Demon's Souls, used to refer to weapons that scale evenly in both Dex and Str (usually both at C). Useful for builds that are balanced in Str and Dex. If you find that you still want a bigger weapon than most Dex weapons, but that's not as cumbersome, some of the Halberds and other pole weapons can be very nice.

If you find the big weapons cumbersome, then looking at Dex and Quality (things that scale evenly C/C) may be the better fit for you. The Zweihander is very representative of what all the big weapons are like.

On international shipping, I know it sucks, but I ship hundreds of packages internationally every month for my business. The only "cheap" option is traditional First Class International, which can be terrible, and the last I knew there were limited choices to even be able to print First Class Labels online. I've had packages take up to 2 months arrive, never arrive, etc. If you've bought from other places and got much better prices, they are almost certainly eating some of the shipping charge to make it more attractive, which just means that that the purchase price is inflated to cover that.

Nice guide! I wonder if the much faster load times on the PC version will result in much faster loads into other peoples games (PvP and co-op), or if that is more governed by the net code?

I beat it with two characters, one STR big weapon build and one Mage. The big weapons can get challenging in late game, you have to be pretty patient against faster enemies to find openings, but it's so much fun crushing things. I don't have a lot of experience with DEX weapons in DS1, so can't really speak to those. My first playthrough I got about 70 percent of the way through the game and restarted, as I just felt my character was a mess. I had leveled up willy-nilly and was completely dissatisfied. I could have finished it with that character (he wasn't that broken), but by that point I understood how I wanted to play and what equipment I wanted to use. I also knew that I wanted to do some more PvP, and needed a more focused build for that. So I didn't have to look up where to get weapons, I already had a good idea about what I wanted and where it was. Surprisingly, some of the best STR weapons in the game are available quite early, within the first few hours if you know what you are doing. If you want to maintain the sense of wonder and discovery, rather than looking up weapons first, I would just keep playing and then if you find something interesting, look up to see if it upgrades well or ask here if it is something that's worth the stat investment. If you reach Anor Londo and you haven't found something you love, then I'd suggest maybe looking up a list of weapons and seeing if something appeals to you more. Taking your STR to 16 and your DEX to 12 early on will let you play with a huge range of weapons and give you the minimum for some all around good pieces of gear (Eagle Shield, Compound Bow and 2-handing 24 STR weapons like the Zweinhander). The biggest decision around what weapon you like is the speed and moveset. Regular titanite is unlimited from early on, so knock yourself out upgrading things to +5. Did you know you can cut the tails off some bosses (pretty much any boss with a tail)? Two of my favorite weapons require cutting tails off things. This is one of those things that if you miss it, they are gone forever on that playthrough. My favorite axe comes from a tail, though thankfully it is one of the easier ones to get. I've intentionally killed myself against a boss rather than risk killing it and losing the tail for a weapon I really wanted. USE A BOW! Doing well in Dark Souls is often about understanding which tool you need for a particular area. You can be a pure melee, or pure mage, or pure anything. But mixing and matching various skills and items gives you more utility, and having a variety of tools will make your life a lot easier.

Huh, I wonder if this is one of the problems I had with it. I just found it atrocious to play because of the dark/flashlight mechanics. Never got past the first hour or so of it.

I don't ever remember seeing that before, and I don't think I've killed any in boarding yet. If they do damage on death, with a cloning machine you could make little glowing suicide bombers your boarders. I was disappointed that the pre-igniter only fills up the first charge of the weapons that can hold multiple shots before firing. Since those weapons tend to have comparatively short charge times for each individual shot, it's not terrible valuable on them compared to other weapons. But yeah, for those weapons whose charge time decreases every time you fire, pre-igniter is killer. Skipping the 16 second first charge on those double shots gets you to the max firing rate pretty quickly.

To add to Sno's comments, the other advantage to a STR build is that you get to use a bigger, better shield, if you're interested in that route. It's not strictly necessary, some of the smaller shields are superb, and even after the Eagle Greatshield got nerfed, it still has excellent stability for its weight.

Oh, I'm sorry, but I couldn't help laughing so hard reading the summoning bit. I had one similar bit with the Skeleton Lords after I burned a bonfire ascetic to respawn them. Felt soooo bad the 4th time I summoned the same person. So you have you reached Black Gulch? That area is, well, it's not pleasant, but you can probably handle it no matter what your level is. Bring your longest spear with you. I'd say it is overall its a bit easier than the Shaded Ruins. So I'd suggest it and then on to the scorpion. Also, yes, owning the Ring of Whispers before going through the Shaded Ruins is a good idea.

The treasure levels and the level they guarded are all some of my favorite content from the game. The could be frustrating since they required near perfection to get through, but that sense of flow, joy and relief once you nailed one of them was perfect.

The silly thing about the Crystal Cruiser is that it really just needed to guarantee that if the first step spawned, then you were guaranteed to get the rest of the steps. There could still be a fail condition in there (dying, or something), but at least let the player find all the steps. That said, I got stupid lucky and got it pretty quickly after unlocking all the B variants. Has anyone played around with the new weapon the Vulcan Cannon? That thing is nuts. Got it with Pre-Ignitor and 2 of the double shot charging lasers, so all three got to skip their first and longest charge up. Even the Flagship melted to that setup.

So did I, and I kind of hated myself for it, but then I was for some reason super compelled to see how far I could push the capabilities of my characters. That's the rare game where I felt super conflicted about it from start to finish. I was sure that I didn't really like it, and yet I kept having fun screwing around with the systems.

I adored every single moment of Rayman Origins, played it all in co-op and it was simply fabulous from start to finish. Been waiting to pick up Legends once the price drops some. I'm not sure I had ever played a Rayman game before, but my wife remembered really liking the early games so that's why we got Origins.

Didn't double fine make some super hero management game for iOS? Answered my own question, Middle Manager of Justice! I had completely forgotten about it. I think it and Happy Action Theater are the ony two DoubleFine games I've never played.

Salvage prices for certain metals have skyrocketed in the last few years. I used to go to this freight salvage auction, and I've seen people buy pallets of old CRT monitors for a few bucks to disassemble and pull the copper and whatnot out of them. When the city workers would do their free pickup day (take anything, any size), some salvagers would drive around and just cut the power cords off every appliance to strip the copper out of it. It's an interesting culture of people. When I remodeled my house, I made a couple of trips to the bulk recycler to sell the old wiring and plumbing we pulled out. The regulars waiting around in line were just fascinating to listen to. The laws around selling scrap had changed a few years previously, and they were all still complaining about it, clearly repeating a conversation they had had dozens of times.

To be fair, I've only fought it once as a melee character with some minor pyromancy to back me up. Other builds may not struggle at all. It really wasn't the boss itself, it's the design of the opening 10 seconds of the fight that felt imbalanced to me. You either get through the opening shot fine, or you get killed. I didn't really start messing around with the higher level pyromancy until after beating the final boss. Oh, and I've since read a strategy that I could have used that apparently makes it the easiest fight in the game for a Faith build, which I alternated between being faith and strength.

I treat Elder Scroll games like they are toys waiting to be broken. I can't say I've ever really gotten super deep into one in terms of the main story, I just faff about until I figure out how to make my character a god, then I'm done with it. I really only play around with them because it's guaranteed to be around my house. My wife is a giant fan, she'll sink hundreds of hours over the course of a year into the newest one. I've felt that way about them since Morrowind, so nothing different for me.

Nice! If you ever look at adding more shirts, something with just the thumb/typewriter logo on the breast would be fantastic. I very rarely wear t-shirts with big prints on the front of them anymore. Also, refrigerator magnets. I have a deep seated aversion to putting stickers on anything. But I do like a nice looking magnet.

I only have the Mantis C and the Lanius A unlocked so far. My favorite ship is probably the Stealth B, though I have had terrible success with it. I tend to like Glass Cannons though. The Mantis A and B have been my most successful ships.

I've done that with a ton of video games, stuff that I have a passing interest in, but very little interest in playing.

Additional items have been added to the 1.03 patch notes on the Japanese site. I'm a little conflicted on these, some are good, some are meh. I really want a chance to try the OP version of Wrath of the Gods before it gets nerfed, but don't really feel like playing most of the way through NG++ to get it. Soul Greatsword getting nerfed is a good thing, it's so hard to see coming in PvP on someone with maxed casting speed. I'm fine with mages being powerful (now that I understand how to counter them), but having highly effective, high damage options at every range imaginable is still bullshit. The RRA needed toned down. But I'm bummed about nerfs to the LS, that's such a good fight as it is. Increased defense for some NPCs is really good, as some of them are so freaking hard to keep alive to get through their storyline. It sounds like this may be dropping today or tomorrow, but the translation is spotty and its not clear that it will go worldwide today.

Yep, I'm loving it and pre-ordered on Steam about halfway through my playthrough. On the video, dem load times! That's fantastic, I didn't even get all the way through reading a tip. Can't wait to see SSD load times. Of course watching a 720p YouTube video isn't going to be as good as native, but some of the areas and particularly some of the character models look much better. Other areas looked pretty much the same. For those interested, I posted something over in the Bioshock Infinite thread about comparisons between the Souls games and Bioshock games, after hearing a comment about their similarities on a podcast. It had never occurred to me that the two series are exploring the same themes in very different ways.

So I was listening to Bonfireside Chat (a Dark Souls focused podcast), and one of the hosts made an interesting comment about how the Souls games do Bioshock better than the Bioshock games do. They didn't really chase the thought down, just a casual aside. But thinking about it, there's definitely something there. Ultimately the Souls games are exploring many of the same themes as the Bioshock games, and the Souls do it better in many ways. I think it's an interesting comparison for two games that I hadn't initially considered similar. Infinite Worlds - This is baked into the essence of the Souls games with multiplayer, signs, co-op, invasions, story, world, everything. The multiverse of cursed chasing a cure is one of the most gripping elements of the game, and rather than being delivered as a twist, it's a facet you have to deal with from step one. Power Corrupts - Some of the bosses you face are not presented as being inherently evil, at least some of them wanted to do good, to make the world a better place, but ultimately succumbed to power, to the curse, or to crushing despair. At least some of them view stopping you as being the unquestionably "Good" act. In Bioshock, power just makes you an evil sociopath. Power corrupts the player - Something that BI left untouched, and Bioshock only examined through harvesting little sisters. Dark Souls lets the player do whatever. Want to slaughter the innocents, deliver the world to dark, destroy other players' attempts to finish the game? Knock yourself out, you have the power to do so. Or you can help others, shepherd NPCs through possible pitfalls and save their lives and sanity. For all the Bioshock games really want to explore power, they really don't want an empowered player. Ambiguity of good/evil - Bioshock felt like a world where there could have been an outcome that didn't result in total disaster, there were good people working towards the goal of a better society. BI just throws that out the window. In Dark Souls, the forces of light, fire, the dark, gods, man and the abyss are not so clear. There are legitimate cases to be made that for average humans, embracing the dark is the true "good" path, while embracing light is in fact continuing the oppression of the powerful over the weak. Environmental Storytelling - Mostly audio logs and cutscenes versus item descriptions, NPC dialogue, the environment, item location, enemy/boss location, and enemy armor/weapons. There are few games that embrace the environmental part of story telling more than the first Dark Souls. Combat vs pacifism - Other than having to kill certain bosses, the Souls games can be played in surprisingly pacifist and/or stealthy ways (DeS and DkS1 supported stealth better than DkS2), which was one of the perennial complaints about Bioshock and the lack of diversity in how to approach combat. It's not something a beginner is going to pull off in a Souls game, but the option is certainly there.

I generally want to do the same, but with Dark Souls I do feel like there are a couple of brick walls that can be hit that are worth seeking a bit of help.