Dark Souls II

Dark Souls II
Developer(s)	FromSoftware
Publisher(s)	Bandai Namco Games JP: FromSoftware
Director(s)	Tomohiro Shibuya Yui Tanimura
Producer(s)	Masanori Takeuchi
Designer(s)	Naotoshi Zin
Programmer(s)	Yoshitaka Suzuki
Artist(s)	Keiichiro Ogawa
Writer(s)	Toshifumi Nabeshima
Composer(s)	Motoi Sakuraba Yuka Kitamura
Series	Dark Souls
Platform(s)	PlayStation 3 Xbox 360 Windows PlayStation 4 Xbox One
Release	March 11, 2014 PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 NA: March 11, 2014[1] JP: March 13, 2014[1] PAL: March 14, 2014[1][2] Windows WW: April 24, 2014[3] Scholar of the First Sin JP: February 5, 2015 (PS3, X360, PC) EU: April 2, 2015 NA: April 7, 2015 JP: April 9, 2015 (PS4, Xbox One)
Genre(s)	Action role-playing
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer

Dark Souls II^[a] is a 2014 action role-playing game developed by FromSoftware. The second installment of the Dark Souls series, it was published by FromSoftware in Japan and Bandai Namco Games internationally. A sequel to 2011's Dark Souls, is is notable for being the sole entry in FromSoftware spiritual "Soulsborne" series not directed by Hidetaka Miyazaki, who acted as supervisor on the game instead.

The game features completely different characters and locations from the original, although there are some ties in the story and lore. As with Dark Souls, the player character is a human cursed with undeath, who must navigate their way through a fallen kingdom; Dark Souls II takes place in Drangleic, a land of undeath where the protagonist must acquire the powers of its king and his "Throne of Want". The presentation and gameplay remain similar to Dark Souls's, with notable differences including further penalty for repeated deaths via a "hollowing" mechanic.

After initial delays, Dark Souls II was released worldwide on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in March 2014, with the Windows version released the following month. It was a commercial success and received critical acclaim, with reviewers praising its story, atmosphere, world design and visuals, although they were divided on its difficulty and deemed its boss battles and combat mechanics inferior to the original's. It is considered by some to be the black sheep of the "Soulsborne" series, although Miyazaki himself views the game favorably. A trilogy of DLCs was released over the rest of 2014, and an enhanced version, Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin, featuring the content of the DLCs along with various other upgrades and additions, was released in 2015 on the original softwares as well as on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. The game would be followed by the next "Soulsborne" entry, 2015's Bloodborne, and a sequel, 2016's Dark Souls III.

Dark Souls II is an entry in the Dark Souls series, known for its difficulty, as both bosses and standard enemies have the potential to defeat the player in only a few hits. Bad play is punished severely by most enemies, and opportunities for recovering health are limited. What's more, with each death the player's maximum health is reduced. This process, called hollowing, can continue until the HP bar reaches a set lower limit of 50%. The player's full HP bar is only recovered when they expend a rare item. The game uses a form of joint currency called "souls", which are used as both experience points for leveling up and also as currency for purchasing items from shops. Upon death, the player's entire collection of souls is dropped; the player can recover their dropped souls by returning to the spot where they died, but if they die before picking them up, the souls are permanently lost.

Multiplayer in Dark Souls II uses the same format as its predecessors; players have the choice between co-operative play in the form of being "summoned" into another player's game world either by soapstone or in-game covenant, or player-versus-player through "invading" other worlds or arena duels. Both forms of multiplayer occur pseudo-randomly, although matchmaking formulas are used to pair characters at similar levels together.

The game allows its difficulty to be adjusted by mechanics built into the game. The game designers placed certain items early in the game allowing newer players higher basic damage and defense than they would normally have at that point. For more experienced players, the designers placed higher skill cap items early that do more damage if executed correctly. Other penalties, such as the health reduction on death, can be significantly reduced with certain items. This allows the player to set the game's difficulty based on their experiences with the game, rather than through a menu option. Dark Souls II features a new game plus mode. With each replay, the player retains their levels, souls, and most items.^[4]

Like its predecessor, Dark Souls II employs minimalist storytelling to convey its plot and lore. Historical events in the world and their significance are often implicit or left to player interpretation rather than fully shown or explained. Most of the story is given to the player through dialogue from non-player characters, flavor text from items, and world design; how players progress through the story can vary heavily depending on their actions.

The player character of Dark Souls II is the "Bearer of the Curse", a human cursed with undeath, a condition causing them to return to life every time they die until they eventually become a mindless husk, or "hollow". They travel to Drangleic, a land itself cursed with undeath but rumored to contain a cure, where they encounter a mysterious woman, the Emerald Herald, who wishes for them to obtain the powerful souls of four "Great Ones" and eventually seek Vendrick, the king of Drangleic. The Bearer travels across the fallen kingdom, which was left ravaged by a war against powerful Giants and deserted after undeath started to spread.

When the Bearer fight their way to the top of the royal castle to reach Vendrick, they find only his wife, Queen Nashandra, who wishes for them to find and slay Vendrick, who has fled his own kingdom, and acquire his ring so that they can access the Throne of Want, the royal throne of Drangleic which hosts considerable power; she pretends to desire the Bearer to replace Vendrick as king.^[b] The Bearer follows the path Vendrick took during his escape, facing the many guards and obstacles that he left for his would-be pursuers and chasing him through otherwordly realms all the way to a distant Undead Crypt. When they finally face Vendrick, they find that he has gone hollow, wandering aimlessly in the room in which he locked himself, his ring left discarded on the ground. With it in their possession, the Bearer is able to reach a land of dragons, acquiring from one of them a magical item which allows the Bearer to visit the memories of the dead and obtain a magical bond with the Giants, finally granting them the full powers of the Throne of Want.

Optional story elements reveal the truth behind the history of Drangleic: the war had in fact been a counterinvasion, Vendrick having first attacked the Giants at the suggestion of Nashandra, a foreigner whom he fell in love with. In truth, Nashandra is a creature of Abyss and daughter to Manus,^[c] and had manipulated Vendrick into attacking the Giants so that their power would be added to the Throne of Want, which she aimed to take for herself so that she could acquire the First Flame.^[d] Vendrick, realizing the deception at last, had fled with his ring to ensure that she could never obtain the Throne's power, leading Nashandra to manipulate others into chasing Vendrick and retrieving his ring for her.

Having acquired the necessary power to make the Throne of Want theirs, the Bearer of the Curse slays Nashandra, who attempts to seize it for herself, and proceeds to the Throne of Want, to ascend as king; whether they will use this power to link the First Flame or bring about an Age of Dark is left unknown.

The three The Lost Crowns DLCs add side-stories each featuring another daughter of Manus and a quest to obtain the crown of a king whose rule has long ended. In Crown of the Sunken King, the Bearer of the Curse explores the underground city of Shulva, built by its people to protect the slumber of Sinh, a long-sleeping dragon they worshipped, before an invasion led to the king's death and the poisoning of the land. The Bearer can slay Sinh and the late Sunken King's wife, the daughter of Manus Elana, to retrieve the crown. In Crown of the Old Iron King, the Bearer can explore the Brume Tower, a giant, ash-dusted tower, and face the challenges set by the daughter of Manus Nadalia, to retrieve the crown of Old Iron King.^[e] Crown of the Ivory King takes place in Eleum Loyce, the frozen capital of a kingdom besieged by atrocious Chaos magic; knowing the land doomed, the daughter of Manus Alsanna, left as its leader, froze it so that Chaos would not expand to the rest of the world. The Bearer can explore the dead city and slay the Ivory King, who has been consumed by Chaos, to acquire his crown.

Scholars of the First Sin slightly changes the base game's story, notably adding Aldia, the titular "scholar of the first sin" who was banished by Vendrick, his younger brother, for his twisted experiments. Aldia alludes to a way for the Bearer to choose a third path for the world other than the linking of the flame or the Age of Dark; if the conditions are met, Aldia will fight the Bearer after they slay Nashandra as a final test, after which the player is offered a potential second ending that sees the Bearer of the Curse leave the Throne of Want behind, seemingly absconding kingship to follow this ambiguous third path for the world at Aldia's side.

Dark Souls II was announced at the Spike Video Game Awards on December 7, 2012.^[5][6] Hidetaka Miyazaki, who served as the director on Dark Souls,^[7] acted as a supervisor, while the game was directed by Tomohiro Shibuya and Yui Tanimura.^[7]

Dark Souls II features gameplay mechanics similar to its predecessor; Shibuya stated that he had no intention of changing the controls. The game features a whole new world, with many weapons that are used to fight the monsters in the game.^[8] Covenants, a feature in the original Dark Souls, that allowed the player to align with different factions, make a reappearance, though it is easier to understand and more accessible.^[8] The game world is roughly the same size as in Dark Souls, though content density is much richer, and gives players more freedom in how to progress, with the beginning of the game more accessible to newcomers.^[9] The game retains the challenging gameplay characteristic of the original, as Tanimura explained: "We do not plan on having an Easy Mode since we are creating this game with a thought that challenge and difficulty are core elements of the game."^[10]

The development team utilized a more powerful graphics engine for the sequel.^[11] New challenges, adding to the series' documented difficulty level, were also added.^[11][12] The game features a more advanced AI system, that allows enemies to react to a wider range of actions by the player.^[12] In September 2013, an announcement regarding the delay of the PC version was made by Tanimura who said it was necessary to ensure it was optimal.^[13]

Bandai Namco Games producer Takeshi Miyazoe originally stated in December 2013 that he did not expect there to be downloadable content (DLC) for Dark Souls II. Despite that, in an interview in January 2014, he said that there is definitely potential for DLC for the game and that fan feedback is key.^[14] On June 4, 2014, FromSoftware announced a trilogy of DLC collectively known as The Lost Crowns. The first of these, titled Crown of the Sunken King, was released on July 22, 2014.^[15] The second, Crown of the Old Iron King, was released on August 26, 2014. The final DLC, Crown of the Ivory King, was slated to be released on September 24, 2014, but was delayed until September 30, 2014.

On November 25, 2014, Bandai Namco Games announced an updated version of the game, Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin, which was released on April 1, 2015, for PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360, along with PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. On all platforms, the game is a compilation of Dark Souls II and its three DLC campaigns. On PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, Scholar of the First Sin also features remastered visuals with more advanced lighting effects, running at 1080p resolution at 60 frames per second. The remastered version also makes changes to the game itself; enemy positions and behaviors have been revised, and the game also supports up to six players in multiplayer scenarios.^[16] Its release coincided with patch version 1.10, which was also released for existing versions of the game on February 5, 2015. The update included improvements to online play, the addition of the titular Scholar of the First Sin NPC, performance improvements, and adjustments to items and covenants among other changes.^[17][18] Despite these improvements, the update did not fix the long-standing frame rate-dependent weapon degradation bug, which was later fixed in a patch released in April 2015.^[19][20]

The existing PC version of Dark Souls II received the 1.10 patch at no charge; the remastered Scholar of the First Sin edition must be purchased separately, but is available at a discount to existing Dark Souls II owners. The remastered version uses DirectX 11 instead of 9, and save data from the original version is incompatible with it.^{[17][21][22][23]}

Dark Souls II received universal acclaim, according to review aggregator Metacritic.^[52][51][50] Critics praised the game's story, atmosphere, visuals, and environmental design, though some were critical of the boss quality, combat mechanics, and increased difficulty, adding that, in these regards, it fared poorly in comparison to the previous games (Dark Souls and its spiritual predecessor, Demon's Souls). Famitsu reviewed the game with four reviewers giving their opinions, who gave it 9/10/9/9, bringing the total score to 37/40.^[30] IGN's critic Marty Sliva gave the game a score of 9/10: "Dark Souls II is a smart, massive, and incredibly rewarding sequel. It's crammed with deep systems, tense encounters, and enough clever multiplayer and New Game Plus elements to make me want to restart the second I saw the end credits. Not all of the tweaks and additions worked out for the best, the penalty for dying made the game almost unplayable but with such great enemies and levels to fight and explore, Dark Souls II made 60 hours of pain and agony so much fun they flew by in a heartbeat."^[36] Daniel Tack of Game Informer gave the game a 9.75 out of 10, stating: "Dark Souls II is an epic adventure from start to finish packed with wondrous environments, imaginative and terrifying foes, and the continual adrenaline-apprehension rush of passing through each fog gate makes this title a must-play."^[32] Polygon's Phil Kollar also gave it a 9/10, and similarly praised the ambition displayed by the team in creating such a vast RPG universe for the player to explore, the notorious difficulty, and the sense of triumph that comes with eventually defeating the game; he notes that his character died 235 times before completing it.^[41]

Dark Souls II won the "Game of the Year" award at the 2014 Golden Joystick Awards.^[43] At The Game Awards 2014, Dark Souls II received nominations for "Game of the Year", "Best Role Playing Game", and "Best Online Experience".^[53] However, Dark Souls II is considered by some to be the black sheep of the Dark Souls franchise.^[54]

A few weeks after release, the game had shipped over a million copies within the United States and Europe.^[55][56] A year after release, the game had sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide.^[57]

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