Salt and Sanctuary

saidinmilamber

Something to keep Dark Souls fans going til next month when DS3 drops. 2D Souls came out in the last day and it's amazing! Been playing it non-stop on PS4 for hours now running a mage build. A bit less flexible than souls in that you have to commit to weapon classes, but the same lack of easy exposition, non-linear paths, and death punishment. I literally have no idea what my character is driven by, but I'm enjoying the heck out of the gameplay!

2smiggy

downloaded it last night, but only played for a short time, just leveled up , went with the first class , a knight or warrior i think.

the class tree is a little overwhelming :eek: , any thing i should concentrate on ? just got to the first boss, and nearly killed him first go. will have another crack at it after work for a while before the champions league

saidinmilamber

Not sure about melee classes as I'm far away on the class tree! A good tip though for mage builds though is:

After the first boss, go back down the ladder and open the door with your new key. Keep heading down til you meet a vendor. A little bit to the left of him there's a drop which you should go down. Don't go too far as there's a wraith that's a little bit of a pain because of the death pit he's near. Face the wall of the drop you just came down and press O to open a secret path. In there is a lightning bolt spell and a if you go the whole way down, there's a really tough enemy that you can roll past to find a Stone Mage item that you can use back at the first Sanctuary to call a mage vendor and by an amazing staff

Outside any specific spoiler, make sure to click O at any suspicious walls

Icaras

Went with Axe guy as I call him. Got the basic greatsword (Kureimoa), upgraded my tree and hammering everyone now. Bet the first boss and Queen of Smiles, really enjoying it, not much story yet but only starting.

Xenji

This is my favourite game so far this year, I have been rushing through it on my first playthrough, but if you are interested in grinding, playing the loot lottery and fully exploring everything, you can easily put over 40 hours into it.

YouSavedMyLife

Picked the Paladin for my starter class and i have to say its pretty rough. The shield is almost useless because so much stamina drains from blocking. I have a terrible roll because im wearing heavy armour and my weapon can only attack 3 times before im totally out of stamina. Am i missing something here or are shields genuinely bad? Might start over as a more nimble character...

Icaras

YouSavedMyLife wrote: »

Picked the Paladin for my starter class and i have to say its pretty rough. The shield is almost useless because so much stamina drains from blocking. I have a terrible roll because im wearing heavy armour and my weapon can only attack 3 times before im totally out of stamina. Am i missing something here or are shields genuinely bad? Might start over as a more nimble character...

Get lighter armour or a better sheild? If you havea stone statue you can get merchants or blacksmiths in your sanctuary.

Digital Solitude

Or lose greaves or a helmet until you can dodge faster?

Armor is useless if you can dodge enough to not get hit

Presuming its separate armor items anyways :pac: I'm awaiting the PC release

YouSavedMyLife

Played a bit more last night and I'm getting a feel for it. Shield went from being useless to being OP. Last few bosses where pushovers with me being able to block massive hits from them.

It really is Dark Souls 2D and would recommend to anyone who's a fan of Metrovania, Side scrolling platformers and Souls

J. Marston

I'm amazed at just how Souls-y it is considering it's in 2D. Parrying, one-handed and two-handed weapon combos, very detailed levelling up system and skill tree, level design and of course punishing but fun gameplay.

Early in the year but this'll probably be in the running for my GOTY.

Mr E

Watched it on twitch for a half an hour this morning. I'll definitely get it on PC when it comes out.

saidinmilamber

I started raining unholy death on everything with lightning bolts so decided to focus a little more on the melee side of things and level up my light armor, daggers, and dex. Daggers combined with the magic weapon buff is obsurd amounts of fun!! Still can't really use shields, as dodging is enough I think.

saidinmilamber

A glitch that's probably going to be patched soon for those who don't care about taking advantage of those things. Attain Devotion of 4 in Houses of Splendor and you can buy 99 Diamond Clusters for free off their merchant. Incidentally, at Devotion 2, you can buy Amber Idols off him, which I was killing myself grinding Sorcerers in the Castle of Storms trying to just get one.

F1ngers

Another big fat +1 from me.

Spent over 5 hours the other night doing jolly co-operation with my son - finished at 5am.

Working the last few days but the son has stepped away from his PC and has been playing on his own.

Can't wait until I'm off and can continue the co-op play through.

Will also do a different build for a solo run.

Best $18 I've spent this year.

Early contender for GOTY.

J. Marston

Wish you could upvote the bottle notes left by other players, been helped out by quite a few of them.

Also just discovered last night that the directional buttons have little combos of their own. With the Soldier's Spear; square + up, square results in a spear thrust followed by an overhead spear spin attack.

Icaras

Really struggling with the Kraekan Wyrm - anyone got any tips?

Xenji

Icaras wrote: »

Really struggling with the Kraekan Wyrm - anyone got any tips?

I used the Phoenix Rondache shield, it have 100% fire resistance and kept staying under it when it became airborne.

YouSavedMyLife

Icaras wrote: »

Really struggling with the Kraekan Wyrm - anyone got any tips?

All his attacks can be dodged by jumping and you can perform an aerial combo while in the air. I also had the blacksmith set on which provides substantial fire resist. When he goes airborne follow him in the same direction rather than run away. I also jumped when he did the standing fire breath and it seemed to do less damage

saidinmilamber

J. Marston wrote: »

Wish you could upvote the bottle notes left by other players, been helped out by quite a few of them.

Also just discovered last night that the directional buttons have little combos of their own. With the Soldier's Spear; square + up, square results in a spear thrust followed by an overhead spear spin attack.

I've been playing offline this whole time and didn't know about this!! Also I had no idea about the combos! Thanks kindly!

Icaras

YouSavedMyLife wrote: »

All his attacks can be dodged by jumping and you can perform an aerial combo while in the air. I also had the blacksmith set on which provides substantial fire resist. When he goes airborne follow him in the same direction rather than run away. I also jumped when he did the standing fire breath and it seemed to do less damage

Defeated by a bug. He seemed to go off over the edge but was doing well, had him down to less than 1/3rd healt the last few times fighting him. Really enjoying the game.

Video of it happening to someone else - seems to be sort of common: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgipO8l4uHw&feature=youtu.be

Zapp Brannigan

Loving this. Keeping me away from The Division and SF V.

A Neurotic

saidinmilamber wrote: »

Not sure about melee classes as I'm far away on the class tree! A good tip though for mage builds though is:

After the first boss, go back down the ladder and open the door with your new key. Keep heading down til you meet a vendor. A little bit to the left of him there's a drop which you should go down. Don't go too far as there's a wraith that's a little bit of a pain because of the death pit he's near. Face the wall of the drop you just came down and press O to open a secret path. In there is a lightning bolt spell and a if you go the whole way down, there's a really tough enemy that you can roll past to find a Stone Mage item that you can use back at the first Sanctuary to call a mage vendor and by an amazing staff

Outside any specific spoiler, make sure to click O at any suspicious walls

I am really struggling with this game. Running a mage.

Picked up lightning bolt but can't use it yet. Lv 8. How exactly do I get to use class II magic? The skill tree is really difficult to navigate. How do you unlock the yellow nodes?

Xenji

Played as a Rogue/Assassin on my first playthrough and it was tough going at times, doing a Paladin run this time and it's been a breeze so far.

Icaras

F**k that path to the boss in the crypt of dead gods!

tok9

Completed it last night. I've only 2 trophies left so might as well go for 100%

I love the game. I think it's a lot of fun, I like how it's a mix of Dark Souls and Metroidvania. I'll just mention a few issues I had with the game.

- Bosses felt a bit cheap at times
- The map can be a little confusing, would have been nice to have a basic map in your inventory as there were a few times I thought I was going to the right area only to realise I went above or under it.
- Sometimes the artstyle and colour palette make it really difficult to actually see things in the foreground.
- The bosses aren't that memorable.

On the last point, I'm not sure if that's just an issue with 2-D. I just never thought, wow this is a great fight. Maybe I'll feel different after this 2nd playthrough.

It's a fantastic game though, I hope cross save works on vita. Having a souls game on vita is something I've wanted for some time!

Links234

When's this getting a PC release?

Xenji

Links234 wrote: »

When's this getting a PC release?

It is meant to be coming out in the Summer, they are still working on the Vita version as well.

Icaras

Finished it yesterday, one of the best games Ive played since the original Dark Souls.

Towards the end the

blind jump going down to the Forgotten King and having to take damage dropping into final boss

really annoyed me as they are easily fixable.

I really liked the Sodden knight and Queen of smiles boss fight, thought the tree of men was enjoyable but tough, I thought the Coveted was a good idea and the witch of the lake drove me mad - luckily she was so close to the sanctuary.

As said above a rough map would have been good as I think the area was a big too wide and high to try and work out roughly where you are, DS done it very well with the undead berg being a central point without it specifically saying it was a central point.
Going into NG+ now and going to play with different weapons and magic and generally dick around.

sweetie

Tree of men is a bitch. Can eliminate all the men but the final phase with only a couple of health vials left is too much. Aggghh.

tok9

Ya it can be a bit of a slog. I'd just recommend leveling up your weapons and level so you can do more damage.

I tend to jump to the platforms on the left. It's pretty easy to avoid it's attacks, just the flames you need to worry about.

Also when it does it's own flame attack. Grab a ledge when it's about to hit and that way you'll avoid being damaged

Icaras

sweetie wrote: »

Tree of men is a bitch. Can eliminate all the men but the final phase with only a couple of health vials left is too much. Aggghh.

There is a sheild with 100% fire damage too(Phoenix Rondache), I stood on the ledges to the left. With that sheild when the fire sprays just hold it up and no damage - watch out for the tree's punches though, bait him into a punch on the second highest ledge then jump to the top and hit his head.