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As published in PC PowerPlay #229 and pcpowerplay.com.au Shinji Mikami, affectionately known to the video game world as the Father of Horror, has been extremely tight lipped about his new IP. Having initially bought the survival horror genre to the fore with Resident Evil, it seems any game he’s behind will be greeted with a greedy anticipation from fans the world over. Yet admittedly when the first load of footage surfaced I wasn’t drawn in. The Saw-like dungeons, swinging corpses and a chainsaw wielding maniac showcased a game that got its kicks from excessive gore as opposed to a tense atmosphere. But upon trying my hand at the game, I was surprised to find something very different. To keep things vague, I was assigned to play through chapters four and eight, with little to fill the blanks between. Each chapter took around an hour to complete, making up a mere one seventh of the total game. Chapter four opened up with main character Sebastian Castellanos and a gentleman in a white coat (who we’ll simply call “The Professor”) entering a small shanty village. The Professor, concerned about a missing patient, urged me toward an ominous wooden house that creaked in the distance, but this wasn’t my first walk in the park, so I decided to hug the walls and get a feel for the mechanics. My inventory was made up of a pistol, a shotgun, a crossbow (with a few homemade bolts), a box of matches and a syringe used to recover health. Despite playing on a PC, the demo required a controller to play, not yet being geared for keyboard and mouse, and as a result I was able to map only four of these to the D-pad to provide quick access. As I circled the house, it wasn’t long before I found a bloated mass of flesh wandering around outside. The fat mess, who had an axe protruding from his stomach, caught my scent and stumbled carelessly in my direction. A nuisance, more than anything, one that quickly fell to the rounds of my pistol before I set the sucker aflame with a single match.

“Scary, my butt.” I thought to myself, walking away from the burning corps like a cool dude walks away from explosions. “A common problem with horror games is the need to make the main character a super hero. Empowering the player takes the threat away from their aggressors, rendering things that go bump in the nigh-“ All of a sudden the door in front of me slammed open, cutting my pompous train of thought in two. A woman burst through screaming in agony as flames engulfed her body. My reaction was instinctive, but in vain. By the time I’d raised my pistol she was already gone, having disappeared without a trace. An illusion? A ghost? I break my eyes from the screen and look around the room at the few others engrossed in the game. My heart’s pounding, but it looks like no one saw me jump. I collect myself the same way a child who just grazed his knee might, the type who decides not to cry when he realises there’s no audience to turn on the waterworks for. “Gotcha scares don’t count” I think to myself. I guess there’s some truth to the words fear makes children of us all. As I worked my way through the two separate chapters it became clear that Mikami’s latest title takes inspiration form his previous works. Its over the shoulder viewpoint leans towards Resident Evil 4, yet the stripped back nature of combat, especially seen through the almost futile melee option, as well as Castellanos having the sprinting endurance of an overweight pensioner, help make things a bit more tense during action sequences.

While still living in gore city (a prime example being a sequence where you wade through a pool of blood, needing to destroy X amounts of undead bad guys before the fleshy mass that blocks your exit let’s you through) the storyline leans more towards the psychological, focusing on some severely disturbed characters. Things are not always what they seem, and some strange occurrences have left a bunch of questions I’m dying to find answers for. The Evil Within even goes so far as to play mind games with the player via some strategically placed items. Certain enemies can’t be damaged, and when you come up against one of these you need to push Castellanos’ underwhelming endurance to its limits by bolting as fast as you can in the opposite direction. During these scenes, there were some very tempting placements of certain items. Disarming traps yields gears that can be used to upgrade weapons later in the game, and these are placed heavily and pointedly during these sequences. As I was only glancing through the game, I didn’t bother trying my hand, as the risk/reward margin wasn’t worth it, but when it could mean the difference between having more fire power later on… the temptation might just be enough to risk some very close calls. Ammunition is scarce, even more so in higher difficulty modes, which encourages players to hide when possible, saving their ammo for future encounters. To avoid wastage, players can hide under beds and tables, inside cupboards, behind boxes etcetera, peeking out at enemies as they amble around in search of their prey. The closer enemies get, the more intense the heartbeat soundtrack becomes, building tension and coercing player’s hearts to fall in line.

Note: This is a comparison review regarding the nature of Dark Souls II on PC versus that of Dark Souls II on console. For a straight up review click here. Before we start things off let’s get one thing straight. Dark Souls II is a damn good game. Well, it’s more than good. It’s great. The gaming community as a whole has generally been unified in this belief since the game’s inferior release on the console world, yet if you’re reading this magazine (PC PowerPlay #224), you’re already well aware of the restrictions that world implies. The real questions here are will Dark Souls II’s greatness transfer onto our beloved PCs? Or will we be left with some deformed monstrosity of an age long past, one trapped by the confines of its console origins? Before we can answer that there are a few things we need to go over. It’s no secret the Souls series has a troubled history with its PC iterations. Demon’s Souls has sadly never had a proper port, largely due to a combination of ownership, sales and FromSoftware’s lack of PC knowhow. Dark Souls, on the other hand, was free of this first constraint and its popular console reception helped push it over the edge, yet it soon became apparent that FromSoftware were still being hindered by that latter ball and chain. Despite this, the Japanese devs were always upfront about the demons that plagued their attempts to breach our golden shores. When initially asked how the Dark Souls port was coming along, producer Daisukle Uchiyama stated “To be completely honest, we’re having a tough time doing it due to our lack of experience and knowledge in terms of porting to PC. First we thought it would be a breeze, but it’s turned out not to be the case." He finished by revealing that it the final result would be "more strictly a port from the console version. We haven’t been able to step up into doing any specific optimisation for PC.” When the battle was over, the result was as unfortunate as one would expect from such an announcement: awkward controls, blurry visuals and a mediocre frame rate led to a game that was a mere shadow of its consolian brother. 

But the Souls series has always inspired a strange kinship amongst its players, one that has slowly formed from its obscure content, resulting in a strong sense of “jolly cooperation”. And so it was that, within days of release, Peter ‘Durante’ Thoman did wield his modding sword to cut through the main issues, releasing the celebrated DSFix to the public. The mod essentially made the game user friendly, inspiring other modders to work on textures, controls and so on and so forth to create a Dark Souls experience that left previous versions in the dust. Sure, it wasn’t perfect, especially considering the arduous process one had to go through to achieve the final result, but it did offer an experience that, in essence, is very much linked with the Souls series itself. FromSoftware were lucky. Thanks to some talented (and extremely efficient) fans, they were able to recover from a blunder that should have proved fatal... yet somehow the PC community were still on their side. Even so, one thing remained clear, FromSoftware had to lift their game if they wanted to avoid going hollow. So what did they do? The clever devs sent their best PC smiths to the forge to build an entirely new engine for Dark Souls II, going forward to use the PC as the lead test platform for both iterations of the title. Praise. The damn. Sun.

The final result is a game that is able to run and render at 1920 x 1080, providing a crisp and sharp experience. On top of this, the PC version runs at a tight 60 frames per second (as opposed to the console’s standard 30 frames) allowing for a more accurate execution of moves and abilities. Despite being aesthetically pleasing, this actually makes a world of difference to the gameplay itself. Dark Souls II’s combat, much like its predecessors, is entirely reaction based, with the slightest delay spelling the difference between gaining and losing an ungodly sum of souls. The smoother frame rate makes the timing of parrying, blocking and rolls all the more accurate, allowing highly skilled players to weave between attacks with anime-esque precision. Furthermore, the functions themselves appear to perform more accurately in the PC build. Those familiar with the console version may have noticed a slight button lag when sprinting or jumping - an upset that, while not entirely fixed, has been improved with the PC edition. But of all the improvements the PC world offers, by far the most important is the load times. One of the game’s new features is the ability to warp between bonfires, demanding that you travel back to the land of Majula (the games main hub) whenever you want to level up your character. Previously, this came as a tiresome inclusion, especially considering the first title allowed you to level up at any bonfire you wanted to rest your tush beside. In this version, players are able to warp between three bonfires in the time it would take the console version to load one, making Majula trips a breeze.

The keyboard and mouse controls are much more effective than the previous Dark Souls, with remappable buttons and keys allowing for a customisable experience. Yet for some reason FromSoftware left the tacky Xbox interface for action prompts, meaning you’ll need to stay on top of your key allocation as finding the green “A” button on your keyboard may prove futile. Generally, I found that the controller makes for a more comfortable fit (not really a surprise considering the game was designed with controller functionality in mind) but I have no doubt that purists will be able to make the keyboard and mouse work just as effectively… even if it does take a little bit longer. An upside for those who tread the purist path comes with the decision to make the mouse appear in menu screens, a small blessing, but one that leads to quicker item browsing and equipping without having to address every single item in the menu. For Souls veterans, gameplay follows in a very similar stream, only its mechanics have been tightened and tweaked to allow for greater variation in class configuration. One of the most notable aspects is the ability to effectively dual wield, as your left hand can now strike with both light and heavy attacks, while also allowing for special dual attacks when wielding two of the same weapon. There’s so much choice here, as the weapons list in Dark Souls II is incredibly large, providing a vast array of maces, sword, bows, staves, axes, shields and spears to sate whichever path you choose to roam, not to mention deciding whether you’ll fight one handed or two handed, weapon and shield or weapon and magic etc. There are even specialty weapons such as whips, catalysts and claws, all of which have their own unique combination of attacks, keeping combat fresh and exciting.

For those looking for something to sink your teeth into, Drangleic offers a huge world to explore so newcomers can expect to clock up at least 70 hours in their first playthrough, give or take a few depending on how much jolly cooperation and online PvP one decides to attempt. On top of this, FromSoftware have gone out of their way to add a bunch of new content to New Game+, inserting more boss fights, increased enemies and new items that simply aren’t accessible in a single playthrough. But by far the best part of any Souls game is the lore. FromSoftware have built their name around their epically derelict landscapes that speak of a bygone age. It's true that most of what lies within these landscapes may never be found by the player, but that’s where the brilliance of Dark Souls II’s design lies. Everything they create has a purpose, whether or not that purpose will be realised by the user matters not, for it only adds to the authenticity of their landscapes. It allows for the explorers among us to delve deep into the world, theorise and discuss their findings without a definitive answer lying a click away in some forum, a concept rarely found in games these days. At the same time, those who are content to simply play through the game, cutting down the monsters and men that cross their path, can still do so without heavy slabs of text or lengthy cut scenes getting in their way.