Picking up from last week I haven’t progressed that much. This week my play time has mainly consisted of optimizing my own play style ready for further advancements in the game. Also I have lightly entered into a new area.
Last week I left with you with news that I had just defeated the twin gargoyle bosses before ringing the bell at the top of the Undead Parish. Following from this I decided to track back through the area which I had just cleared to gather souls for much needed attribute development. I really like the character progression in Dark Souls. When you gather souls you can use them to level up your character in various attributes such as strength and endurance. There are quite a few to choose from. However, as you continue to increase stats the price of souls for each upgrade increases. It’s not a sharp incline in price instead it’s well balanced. But it means as you upgrade your attributes more you will have to gather more souls to do so. So more grinding or “soul farming” is necessary. Every time you upgrade a attribute your souls level also increases.
Moving on from upgrading my characters attributes I decided it was time to improve my weaponry. I am using a Halberd and Battle Axe along with a Knight’s Shield as my main weapons. When progressing through Dark Souls many enemies drop stones. These stones can be used to upgrade weaponry in various ways. For example, in the prequel Demon’s Souls certain stones would add fire damage to weapons or even add poison to a weapon. So far I in Dark Souls I have only found one type of stone which just reinforces my weapon. This increased the damage of the weapon. As a result my Halberd is a very powerful weapon now. To make weapon upgrades you need to find Blacksmiths. These are dotted around the open world of Dark Souls and offer upgrades and items in exchange for souls. It is a great system and works well. Luckily the upgrades don’t cost that many souls.
Stronger weapons in Dark Souls don’t seem to mean anything though. Even with my new powerful weapons I have died many times. At the bottom of a large tower lies another huge demon which marks the entrance to a new level. It manages to fire spells at you from a long distance as well as using a large sword if you get too close. It is a formidable foe and one I have learnt lessons from. This lesson is to run! The demon has managed to kill me with ease every time I engage in combat with it so as I result I simply rush past it to a safe area.
After this demon lies a new world which is very gloomy to say the least. It is a dark forest. Within moments of entering this new area a tree looking enemy try’s to ambush me. It has to be said the variation to the enemies is so vast and on a scale that I have not seen in any another game apart from its prequel. As I progressed further into the new area I knew I wasn’t ready for it yet. The tree looking enemies were much tougher than they looked and caused me to quickly use up my health potions. Progressing through the Dark Souls world with no health potions in a risky tactic. When I walked through a fog barrier this became clear to me. A large stone knight met me as I walked through it. After a lengthy fight I edged victory – a victory short lasted. As it fell to the floor dead another stone knight appeared with back up from the tree enemies. Within seconds the most common words in Dark Souls popped up on my screen – You have died.
So there we are. This is how far I have managed to get this week and I can be honest in saying it is certainly not a lot of progress. But small progress is still progress. This is a key thing in Dark Souls as well as patience. Hopefully by next week I will have news about me defeating the stone knights and possibly further victories.
