Dark Souls Part 022: The Game Shows Its True Colors
0I could have killed the Parasitic Wall Hugger easily from the front using a Bow or Pyromancy, but I wanted to see what it was like to kill it from behind. I tried stabbing it, but I wasn't sure if it was doing anything. This game can be really inconvenient where the damage numbers show up, they sometimes appear out of view so you aren't sure you are hitting them. Some Pyromancy did kill it quickly in the end. The spot I point to on the way down was a stupid spot I died my first playthrough. Why can you go out there, and why can you not walk back? The world may never know.
The bottom swamp area of Blight Town isn't as bad as the upper area, but not by much. It's full of poisonous swamp water that slows your movements and quickly fills your Poison Meter when standing in it. This whole swamp is a stupidly pointless waste of your time. Even if you increase your Resistance stat through leveling or wear the Poisonbite Ring, it doesn't help much. You are going to get poisoned and there's nothing you can do about it. It's a good thing that getting poisoned is inconsequential. Yeah, that's right. Poison kills you so slowly that you can just get by with drinking Estus Flasks. It's even easier if you stock up on Purple Moss Clumps like I did. It's nothing but a huge annoyance that the player has to put up with and nothing more. It's stupid, and I think the developers are also stupid for doing it. Close to the Bonfire you will be invaded by Maneater Mildred! What a name! She doesn't wear clothes, either. Like Knight Kirk, she is also very easy. She uses a heavy cleaver weapon that is easy to strafe around and backstab her. The elevator made out of a water wheel is pretty cool too, I guess.
The next major thing to happen was the first part of my playthrough that I legitimately got frustrated and caused me to remember exactly why I hate this game. It all started with a jump attack that I did not want to do. As I explained in an earlier description, making button combinations do moves causes nothing but unresponsive controls. I ended up down where the Flame Dogs were before I wanted to be there. I was able to handle them for a while, but was eventually killed. Oh well, no big deal. However, on the way back up, after checking for an unaccounted for Dart Sniper I lost track of, my character slipped off a branch and fell to his death.
This sums up everything that is wrong with Dark Souls. It's so janky. A branch that you're supposed to be able to walk on, for some reason, temporarily behaved like a branch that you aren't supposed to walk on and it ended up costing me time and in-game resources. I've argued with people about this before with little success. Dark Souls came out in 2011. There was no excuse for a 7th Gen game to be on store shelve in this state when games from the 6th and 5th Gens did so much better already. It's clear that FromSoftware never really understood how to make good video games at least up until this point. Looking back at their catalogue, it clearly shows a lack of respect for the player. I dedicated the next part to getting back what the game stole from me.
DEATH COUNT: 13
Chapters:
00:00:00 Title & Character Select
00:00:28 Continuing in Blight Town
00:03:45 Parasitic Wall Hugger
00:07:58 Getting the Whip
00:13:25 Reaching the Swamp Bottom
00:15:10 Swamp Bonfire
00:17:20 Maneater Mildred
00:19:29 Waterwheel Elevator
00:26:22 Dart Sniper Alley
00:28:54 When the Crap Hits The Fan
00:31:23 When the Crap Hits Harder
00:34:39 Firekeeper Soul
00:38:15 Key to New Londo Ruins
00:40:36 New Londo Ruins Shortcut
00:42:03 Exiting the Game