System: Xbox 360, Playstatino 3
Title: Dark Souls
Publisher: From Software
Circa: 2011

Intro
There have been too few games in recent years that truly challenge the game. Not just pushing their skill but luck and manner of play as well. This is one of the few games that earns the title “Nintendo Hard” very easily. While there have been times the game felt somewhat cheap in getting the kill many were honest mistakes that anyone could have made. This is not a game for the casual player unless they happen to enjoy very hard games.

Story
You are one of the undead in a forsaken lands. Being among the undead you are fated to lose your mind and become a hollow. A stranger comes to the opening above your cell one day and gives you a small package, giving you a chance to leave the undead asylum.

Gameplay
This is a third person action RPG. You have an unlimited supply of lives but there is a lot to worry about just walking around. Even when you can kill many things with one hit they still have a good chance to hurt and kill you with some lucky blows or just mobbing you. While playing this game you want to keep wary of everything around you regardless of how powerful your character grows. Understand that you can easily look back at points and see just how much space you have covered throughout the game.

As you start you learn the basics of the game but very little else is explained to you. You need to figure out a lot about the more advanced combat features. This is also one of the few games where death is expected and part of the mechanics laid into the game. You will quickly learn that you must recover your body to maintain your present stock of humanity and souls. If you die failing to recover your power it is forever lost to you. Even with this brutal system you can find it is easy to use it to gain a huge stock of souls to help you in your quest to survive the vicious land that surround you.

While the game has an extensive land there are very few ways to get around until later in the game. Most of the game you will be traversing the distances on foot only able to use shortcuts that you can open up over the course of gameplay. Later in the game you can move around using the various bonfires that act as restoration points for the players. This are also the one place your character can use Humanity, a mysterious black sprite found in the undead lands, that restores your character to a semblance of life. It can also be offered to the bonfire to level them up, enabling you to have more healing items on hand.

While your character is human you will find more options open to you. This allows you to summon help through the various summon signs for other players and NPCs you find throughout the land. These can be a great assets in boss fights or when dealing with more difficult enemies.

Multiplayer
There are only a few ways to do multiplayer in this game. One is strictly player versus player where you are pursuing another player to collect the souls from them and gain more Humanity. The second is leaving a summon mark where another player can call you into their game to have you help them with a series of battles or a boss. You can potentially get a lot of rewards, depending on what set-up you have in the game. It has no chat function so all information must be conveyed through writing with a particular item and hoping it appears in your friend's game or through a simple gesture system. Much of the online mode is only available while your character is human and cannot be used to the same extent while they are in their hollowed state.

As long as your console is connected to the internet you have a chance to be invaded by another player. When they enter your world their goal is to hunt you down and kill you before you can do the same to them. There are times this can be very frustrating if you are dealing with several hard enemies when you see the message appear.

Controls
These are fairly easy to quickly grasp. You have your standard movement controls with the shoulder and bumper buttons for your attacking. You then have the d-pad used for weapon/shield/spell/item choice. They do feel somewhat laggy at times but it is very easy to keep up with combat when it matters the most. Within the set-up you are given you can find a solid combat system that is fairly easy to understand with some challenge to master it.

Graphics
As a modern title it has some solid graphics. They are very high quality, making it a pleasure to simply look around the areas that you can. The overall darker tone does make the game a bit harder to appreciate as some things are lost simply to the shading.

Sound Effects & Music
The classical style of music is very welcome and fits the game quite well. Nothing about it has a modern feel and it would be out of place for such instrumentation. The sounds are well done and fit well with the various dwellers of the domains throughout the undead land.

Summary/Author’s Take
It feels it has been forever since there was a game that was simply hard from the start. While it will kill you a lot you still feel a sense of accomplishment as you make your way through the game. There are some areas it feels like your deaths were cheap but it is easy to get revenge with some practice. There have been a number of times where hitting the wrong button cost me dearly. Immediately though I would grit my teeth and just come back at the game all the more determined.

Story: 80%                Sparse narrative offered through
Gameplay: 82%            Involved and fast paced
Multiplayer: 75%            It should be easier to opt of the online mode
Controls: 90%            Precise
Graphics: 90%            High quality
SFX & Music: 85%            Well done
Overall: 87%                Intense and difficult