I play it often, always choose knight, level it up to 1 or 2, run some drills around the castle. Very re-playable for an autist like me,

I didn’t finish Dark Souls 2 because of the weird controls and no support for controller remapping (a big deal for me). So, I jumped straight from Dark Souls 1 to 3, and found Dark Souls 3 to be a major step up from an already solid game.

The level design in Dark Souls 3 is much more refined compared to Dark Souls 1, where some areas felt utterly unfair. While the map is more linear in Dark Souls 3, it still offers great interconnectivity without being overly complicated. This makes exploration and navigation a lot more enjoyable. More importantly, though the map is not as sophisticated as Dark Souls 1, it gives players a clearer idea of where to start, helping them avoid accidentally stumbling into high-difficulty areas. Plus, the boss arenas are closer to bonfires, so no more long, annoying runs back after dying.

I wasn’t a fan of the final boss in the first DLC - I found the second phase unnecessary and a bit messy. However, Dark Souls 3 features very solid boss design, even surpassing Elden Ring in overall quality. While Dark Souls 1 undeniably has the best opening of any From Software game, I really enjoy the lore in Dark Souls 3, which expands the world and has tons of callbacks to the first game. These references either continue or conclude some of the original lore, making it my favorite part of the game.

In my opinion, Dark Souls 3 is nearly perfect, but the ridiculous enemy spam in the DLCs can ruin the experience. In DLC 1, it feels like the developer forgot about balance and just crammed enemies into every corner. DLC 2 is slightly better, but the enemy encounters from the Ringed Inner Wall to the next bonfire are frustrating and over the top. The camera tracking can also get messy and disorienting at times, and the short lock-on range can often disappear mid-fight, leading to serious frustration.

And why the hell doesn’t this game have cloud save?

Despite those issues, Dark Souls 3 is a must-play for anyone interested in the genre, blending challenging yet fair gameplay, refined level and map design, and captivating lore. It is the textbook example of a souls-like game, where the core features of the genre come into their own.

It’s criminal, they are asking 85 euros for the deluxe edition for a game from 2016