Dark Souls camp fire, health recovery and NPC details

"Famitsu has shed some light on the beautiful but mysterious batch of Dark Souls screenshots released last week. From Software had already hinted that the bonfire seen in the screenshots has an important function, and according to Andriasang‘s translation of a recent info dump which accompanied a collection of screenshots and artworks, it serves as a combination checkpoint, vending machine, and multiplayer hub."

[DigitalAnalog]

I don't know.. The only reason From Software has "critical" acclaim is because Japan Studio teamed up with them to design Demon's Souls. Being independent again, nothing they made has lived up to the quality as Demon's Souls. Don't get me wrong, they make solid franchises like Armored Core and a follow up to the Tenchu series (King's Field maybe is something to look at, hopefully they would bring that to PSN. The HKPSN has only the Japanese versions)

The only reason why I see this game would succeed is that they already have the winning formula that existed in Demon's Souls.

-End statement

[Chubear]

but you already put up a reason why most are at ease with this game "..they already have the winning formula that existed in Demon's Souls."

I am outright giddy for this game.

I think I may have figured out what their "easy mode" could be. It could be kinda like traditional JRPGs where you can have a group accompany you on traveling through the game.

Every "safe area" may have NPCs that stay in your safe area and will group up with you when asked. This could mean you could also spend "souls" (or whatever currency Dark Souls is using) on their attributes or spend them on yours.

..or you could just go it solo a la Demon Souls and use all you Soul currency for yourself. So traveling with a group of NPCs may make the game a bit easier than if you go solo through the campaign.
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wait, health regen?... ou-oh.

[midgard227]

well considering the director is the same and most of the idea's were his i think we are safe, sure japan studio helped with the execution but now that they know what they are doing this game is safe.

i mean kings field games were awesome so i trust this game, and it may even replace demon's souls as my fav game this gen.

[Headquarters11]

Health Regeneration??? Well I guess they HAD to casualize the game at least a little bit to be able to sell some copies on the 360. SMH

Hopefully it wont be so bad though. I remember there was a ring to regenerate health in Demons Souls, or was it regenerating magic..... hmmm

[ComboBreaker]

A shelter. A place that is safe. A place for you to rest and heal. Where others can come to gather around the fire and socialize, talking about their journey, how they kill that fire breathing beast.

All before setting off into the darkness again, where unimaginable creatures lurks.

Reminds me of camping out in the wild with friends.

This game is going to be an amazing experience.

[Neckbear]

Perhaps, though you should remember than Demon's Souls was, in first place, a next-generation King's Field. I'm quite sure that Japan Studio helped with Demon's Souls, albeit I believe they weren't too critical in development, as I think they just helped with polish of the game.

Then again, polish was probably the reason why Demon's Souls saw critical success, though if I remember correctly it still had some bugs in the Asian versions. And, well, From is basically making a second Demon's Souls, just with new ideas and whatnot, so...I don't really see why one would doubt the game wouldn't be as good as the first. So far, it looks like a promising sequel.

Ah, well.

@ezcex and Chubear...nevermind, TO EVERYONE ABOUT TO TYPE SOME STUPID COMMENT BECAUSE OF THE "HEALTH RECOVERY":

Read the article.

"The fire can also be used to heal a character, and to refill his or her supply of Est, a substance used like a potion for mid-level health restoration. The monk class can use a healing spell, too."

This somewhat makes sense, considering the campfires are supposed to be bases. We don't know the details about that "Est" thing, but perhaps this means you can't chew on countless Grass like you could in Demon's Souls, instead having a limited supply on regeneration items until you arrive the next campfire, though I can see that healing spell being a "must have" to survive.

[ezcex]

health recovery as regen health?????

FUCKING BIG FAT FAILLLLL...

if true....

[UP]

I would be ok with it as long as you can turn it off.

[blahblah]

? why fail? it was recovered when you entered nexus too. except this is open world and nexus somehow wouldn't work here. i only expect campfire will not work during multiplayer, kinda like archsotones were dead during mp

also, i doubt campfire will be every 2m, probably they will be kinda like archstones.

and by the way... best thing ever. no one mentioned save at camp fire which makes me hope there won't be one. if there won't be save, i'll be the luckiest bastard ever. hello ds multiplayer again;)

[beavis4play]

i don't see it as negative, either.health regenerated when the player had the adjudicator shield equipped too! (in demon souls).

[DragonKnight]

I seriously hope there is no easy mode. Including that as an option at all would seriously destroy the game. The main selling point of this game, for those who played Demon's Souls, is difficulty. Making it "accessible" in any way will just crush the ambiance of it.

As for Health Regeneration, that's not too big a deal. In Demon's Souls there are Blessed Weapons that regen your health, Adjudicator's Shield and Regenerator's Ring, as well as the Regenerate Miracle. All of those will regen HP over time, but the point is that they are pretty much useless in heated situations like boss battles or PvP where someone's weapon can take off more HP than you can regenerate in time.

Here's an example. Say I have a +5 Blessed weapon, +5 Adjudicator's Shield, and Regen. Ring all equipped. I will restore 20HP per second. If I added the Regeneration miracle, that also regens. 1% of of my max HP per second for 100 seconds. So say my HP is 1000. That would mean that I would regenerate 30 HP per second. But does that make a difference against a +5 Crushing Great Sword with Curse Weapon applied? Hell no. A few hits and I'll still die just as fast as without the regen, and I won't be able to stand around waiting to regen health, I'll still need to munch on some grass or I'll die with the next hit.

So really, health regen is only useful if you're not battling at the moment and want to save your better grasses for when you really need them. It's really only useful when you're on the move in the stages and only have to deal with the pitiful PvE monsters.

For now, this game isn't looking like it has a hint of casual to it. But we'll see. I can see plenty of the 360 crowd bitching about the difficulty. Not all, and I'm not generalizing that way, but come on.. you know it's true.

[blahblah]

i really hope cursed weapon will be taken out or at least balanced. strength char with cursed weapon was cheapest n00b thing ever.

cursed was the only magic that had static effect, so everyone used ToB without even basic requirements to wield it. str+cursed had around 30sl advantage against any other build as you could have magic at lowest and only needed int 18 i think. it was always coupled with second chance miracle which was also static, but you only needed ToB equipped.

one of my chars that had this build simply had too cheap feeling so i simply deleted him. kinda like going trough NG+++ with sl1-10, getting all weapons and then invading low levels.

[DragonKnight]

Yeah, the cracked ToB glitch with cursed weapon did break the combat a lot. Only real defense was Warding, but even then that only helped by 25%. And if you had the misfortune of facing a character with either a Crushing Mirdan Hammer +5 or a Crushing Great Axe +5 and Curse weapon, they'd spam the R1 or rolling R1 over and over. It doesn't matter how good you are, eventually a spammer will beat you. And the Mirdan Hammer is the most annoying weapon.

I really hope they get rid of phantom reach, and vastly improve the online so that when your opponents weapon doesn't touch you, you don't get hit. I hated playing against someone who didn't come close to touching me with their weapon, and yet I took damage.

[blahblah]

phantom reach was more or less PSN fault. as it dictated 3-way communication instead of 2-way as in P2P.

darkS will be on both 360 and ps3, so one can only figure the only way to do this is with P2P. now if they also adopt some good session quality mechanism where you can't be pitted against someone across the world, that would solve everything. hopefully 0point hit too. as i suspect reason for that is that both consoles agreed you've been hit, but server didn't proclaim points. dbs zero hit for example did knock you down, person on the other side saw you knocked down, but points were never counted.

i'm in exactly the same boat as you with this wish;)

[DragonKnight]

I also hope that, if they implement the same BP invasion style, that they do something with being able to find a world to invade. I hated sitting there forever trying to invade a world and kept failing to find one. It's a pain in the ass when you're trying to use the dupe glitch, especially for Colorless Demon's Souls.

[blahblah]

lol

nr1) when you invade you only do that at common levels. you probably went to high. after sl120, there is a desert. after 140 you need literally hours to finally invade someone

nr2) if you wanted to glitch colorless souls, you went the wrong way. easiest done in 4-1, you just need a friend to help you. you get to crow tree (preset it so that crow left you colorless soul and be in soul mode) and set blue stone. when friend summons you... on last sign pick up soul. as soon as you get in his game, stone out. set blue stone again and since soul is back you can pick it again... rinse... repeat;) you can do literally hundreds of souls per hour this way

yea, invasions were the best. but i would not like to select whom to invade. there should be some kind of arena for that. invading or being invaded biggest suspense was not knowing, same as silence and lack of chat were not bad thing, but rather one of best things in ds;) i really hope they will count successful invasions instead of bp killed this time. whole lot of a spawn campers were there as pantheon wannabes. 7/10 invasions of mine were being hit from the back when i spawned and god forbid i'd have time to boost anything. if invasions would count, there would be no point in spawning. and more invasions=more fun

[DragonKnight]

1. I had problems at lower levels. I'm talking 60's here.

2. I was referring to the 4-1 Crow glitch. Too bad you can only get 99 and to get all weapons to +5 requires more than 99.

I agree with the not choosing whom to invade.