20 Most Intense Video Game Moments Of The Decade

11. Dark Souls - Ornstein & Smough Healing Themselves

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FromSoftware

This one can just go and jump in a lake.

Like Cuphead, Dark Souls is in some ways consistently intense. It requires constant concentration, methodical understanding of boss routines and one tiny mistake can be the death of you. In terms of specific moments though, Ornstein & Smough are Dark Souls distilled, bottled and ready to be sold.

Like all bosses in the Dark Souls canon, they’re pretty tough to beat. It’s par for the course with this game, and a twofer boss battle already means it’ll be twice as hard even without the nonsense Ornstein & Smough pull.

Not only do you have to fight them both at once, but as soon as you kill one, the other recovers to full health and gets even stronger. Nowadays, it’s one of those little quirks of Dark Souls that make us love it for all the wrong reasons.

The first time though? Controllers were broken.

Assuming you weren’t using a guide, you’d have absolutely no idea the first time you fought them. You could have been trying for an hour, whittling them both down, only for your efforts to go up in smoke once you put on to the sword.

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