10 Ways Dark Souls Made All Video Games WORSE
6. A Resurgence In Elitism
“What, you played Doom on NORMAL difficulty? Pfft, I thought you were a REAL gamer”, said the worst person in the room.
There’s an old saying that my grandpa used to say: “some of the folk in the mob believe in the cause, some of them just came along for the ride, and the rest of them are just there to cause trouble”.
He wasn’t talking about Dark Souls meme culture (because that would’ve been a touch bizarre, seeing as he died about twenty years ago), but it’s definitely applicable.
Some of the meme-tastic Souls fans are definitely there to spread the meme around and have a good time. “Git gud, scrub”, they giggle, posting in the YouTube comments for a cake-making tutorial. But, for every person saying it with a tongue firmly planted in cheek, there’s another hiding in the shadows, believing these toxic, smug words.
It’s pervading into pretty much all of gaming now - this elitist nature that drives some of the Souls fanbase to deride and debase gamers in the name of smugness. To mewl “just get good, loser” to every poor player who couldn’t master the Sekiro parry system or get past Father Gascoigne in Bloodborne.
Everyone likes a laugh, and everyone likes a meme. But this particular subset of Souls fan? The one who claims personal superiority for playing a game real good?
Nobody likes those.