As you adventure through Dark Souls 1 and 2, you'll routinely come across white fog gates which you must opt to pass through in order to progress. Doing so requires great determination; usually these gates lead out to a boss fight (although sometimes they don't) and you're literally venturing out into the unknown at this point. The very worst thing about passing through these gates is immediately afterwards seeing not one but two or more health bars pop up on the bottom of your screen. One boss on Dark Souls is hard enough; throw two or three into the mix and you're probably going to be reduced to a crying pound of manflesh within minutes. Perhaps the worst offender of this is the Belfry Gargoyles, which appear in both games. In Dark Souls 1, these nasty critters start off with one, then another leaps into the fray suddenly halfway through. It's annoying as hell. You'll need all of your wits about you to survive any multiple boss battle, which is why in Dark Souls 2 they return once more and it is possible to actually fight up to four of them simultaneously! What fun.
4. Choosing Your Path
Gaming morality has been around for a long time now. Many titles allow you to pick your path through a game based on a set selection of variables, allowing you to be a certified ruthless badass who kills everything in sight, or a princely Jedi-type figure who is sanguine with the universe and lives to help people. In Dark Souls, the choice between good and evil is much more personal. Those who are evil will become sinners, beings that live to invade the games of other players and slay them in the name of their evil covenant. Those who are good will become saints, living to leave summon signs in handy places and help struggling players defeat the bosses that pain them so. It is your decision whether you want to be the most annoying bane of gamers everywhere or a true friend to a complete stranger. Doing so is one of the most important decisions you'll make when playing these games.
Dan Curtis is approximately one-half videogame knowledge, and the other half inexplicable Geordie accent. He's also one quarter of the Factory Sealed Retro Gaming podcast.
