Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition (PC) Review

Still Challenging
Even though From Software tweaked some of the bosses, that doesn’t mean that the game is suddenly easy either. Actually, the difficulty is pretty much unchanged. No matter how many times I have played Dark Souls, I still kept dying. For newcomers, make sure that you have a lot of patience, as you will need it in this game. At first, it may seem impossible to kill a boss, but with proper planning, you’ll find the bosses to be more realistic. As mentioned earlier, every boss that you take down will make you feel like you’re accomplishing something big.

NOT

Looks Ugly Right Out of the Box
One of the things I’m surprised to see when I first downloaded and played Dark Souls, was how muddy the textures were and how blurry the environments looked. Since we knew prior that it would be a straight port of the Xbox 360 version, I wasn’t expecting that it would look worse than its console counterpart. Knowing that I would have to settle with the ugly visuals, a modder by the name of Duran released a patch that fixes the resolution issues, thus making the resolution much better and making the visuals what they should have been. If you downloaded Duran’s mod, you can expect to see vivid visuals that looks a lot better than the original console versions. If you are waiting for From Software’s fix to the problem, don’t be as they do not intend to release a patch for the resolution issues.

Controller is Needed to Play the Game
If you are used to playing games with a keyboard and mouse, you will have a hard time playing the game. Since what you will be playing is a port from the Xbox 360 version, you will realize that the buttons shown in tutorials and menus are from a controller’s standpoint. To fully enjoy the game and avoid the hassle of dying to poor controls, get a controller to fully enjoy the game.

VERDICT

At the end of the day, you will either curse Dark Souls for its difficulty or love it for the feeling of satisfaction. The fact is, the challenge will cater to more hardcore gamers, which makes it hard to recommend to casual gamers, though it’s not a bad thing since the ‘challenging’ aspect of Dark Souls, is really the main entree of the game. For PC gamers who are longing to play Dark Souls, you not be disappointed as you’ll experience one of the most challenging games this generation has to offer, plus they will also get the exclusivity of playing the new content that console owners don’t currently have. Just don’t forget to download the Duran’s mod and a controller to use to fully enjoy this fantastic game.

[Editor’s Note: Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition was reviewed on the PC using the Xbox 360 wired controller. The game was provided to us by the publisher for review purposes.]