Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin

Available on: Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC
Played it on: PC and PS4
Played it for: 400+ hours (that's not a joke, please send help)

RATING: 10/10

DARK SOULS II: SCHOLAR OF THE FIRST SIN FIXES EVERYTHING.

Not really, the game still does have a few minor issues that are simply inherent to the engine. However, this was the product that Yui Tanimura wanted to deliver after his co-director was kicked off the Dark Souls II project. Some of the AI has been improved, many of the enemies were re-positioned, all DLC content has been included, the netcode has been updated, basically everything that could have been fixed, was fixed.

So, where to begin? Scholar is so much more than a standard Game of the Year edition of a game. So much has been changed for the better. In many ways, it almost feels like a new game entirely, even if one has already played the original Dark Souls II. The vast majority of enemy placements in the game have been changed, with some enemies not even appearing in same areas at all. It does a fantastic job at keeping players on their toes, especially when they've already played the first iteration and have certain expectations of where enemies are.

The graphics are much more polished than the original game as well. Scholar runs at a buttery-smooth 60 fps, and the texturing has been highly polished in a lot of areas that give the game a new dimension of beauty. The simplicity of the overall models lends itself well to this improvement too, there are rarely, if any, framerate dips across the entire experience. It just looks good. It feels good.

The whole Crowns DLC trilogy has also been included and similarly revamped. They have been more properly integrated into the larger game, as the in-game keys used to access these areas have been hidden in the world rather than given directly to players at the start. As a whole, the experience has a much better flow. The world does a fantastic job of feeling organic. Areas are layered on top of each other in a way that is not necessarily logical, but is conducive to player progress. While this was also true of the original game, the enemies reflect this even better this time around. No longer will you find an enemy that makes no sense for the area, the game has been redesigned to reflect both a logical world coherence and a difficulty curve that better suits a gradual increase in player skill. The trademark hardship is still present, but the difficulty spikes are a bit more rounded in this version.

And speaking of the Crowns trilogy, the background lore added by this content is fantastic and deep. They connect the world of Scholar to that of the first Dark Souls in a way that is not too overt, but is extremely meaningful. The Crown of the Ivory King does this especially well, directly addressing the fate of the Chaos of Izalith in between the games. The Majestic Greatsword found at the bottom of a side tower in the Crown of the Iron King is, for veterans, the blade of Knight Artorias, referencing him indirectly in its description. And even on a base level, the content added in each DLC is some of the best that any Souls-borne game has to offer. Each area has three bosses, a huge amount of land to explore that is populated by unique, tough, interesting enemies, and of course teeming with unique loot that enhances the total experience.

This iteration of Dark Souls II also improved the netcode enough to make PvP a viable passtime. This doesn't account for simple poor internet connections between players, but when the internet is good, I hardly had any of the frontstabbing or other bizarre lag problems that were ever-present in the PvP of the original game. On the whole, every component of the game has been tuned as well as it could have been. To break the facade of impartiality, as a Souls-borne player, Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin is, in my thousand-odd hours of total series play, the best that the games have to offer. Hands down.

Now with that being said, the game still isn't flawless. There are still annoying aspects of area and enemy design that stayed over between iterations. Hitboxes are not always entirely accurate, for one, and that includes the PvP environment. Certain PvE enemy triggers are very strange and will put players into awkward situations that will absolutely cost estus uses or even a life if the player doesn't know what to expect. And, you know, Brightstone Cove Tseldora and The Gutter still exist, so... take that for what you will.

And as much as I love the Crowns trilogy as a whole, I can't get over certain deeply flawed parts of those areas. The optional boss fight of the Crown of the Sunken King's Sunken City of Shulva is a truly horrific exercise in frustration, as is the entire optional Frozen Outskirts area of the Crown of the Ivory King. The former features a grueling endurance contest against three tuned up NPC's, one with a full Havel build from the first Dark Souls game, one with a blacksteel katana build, and one with a greatbow who harasses players from the back of the arena. Certainly a boss that requires skill, but even the arena itself hardly works in the player's favor, and the boss still almost always takes me five or more tries despite the hundreds of hours I've put into the game, depending on how the enemy AI configures. And the latter is just... poor. Low visibility, bad enemies, it's a mess. And on top of it all, there's the entirety of the Crown of the Iron King's Brume Tower, which is designed with an extreme amount of verticality. Definitely rare in the Souls games... but for a reason. The games are not platformers, and forcing those mechanics has historically always resulted in garbage areas. Blighttown is the easiest example, but the Crystal Cave, The Great Hollow, and The Gutter are all examples of where verticality has been done before, and all those areas are universally disliked. Brume Tower is now another place on that list.

But despite all those criticisms, for me the game is still a 10. I adore Scholar, and it was the first Souls-borne game I played where I finally internalized the mechanics and learned how to play the games well. And I partially attribute that experience to how varied and well-crafted this game is. It's the most balanced that the series ever got, with the most diverse areas, enemy designs, and viable builds to enjoy in one place. I still play it to this day, and will likely continue doing so for the entire foreseeable future. So please, give Scholar a shot. Because it needs more love.