A little dissappointed...

I recently convinced myself to purchase Dark Souls, knowing that the game is known for its intense difficulty. Overall, I am very happy with my decision. I must say, however, as much as I was enamored and absorbed with the first part of the game, as I draw closer to the games' conclusion I have been rather unsatisfied with the majority of areas and bosses. Does anyone else relate to this? Instead of intense combat and strategy, I am being shot at with arrows in pitch darkness, and being swarmed with enemies I can't see half the time. While in the Crystal cave, I stood on an invisible path, waiting for a crystal to land so I could see where I had to go. And I continued to stand there. For a while. I don't mean to complain, but its like in some of the later parts of the game From Software forgot how to make a game, well, fun. I am in the Tomb of Giants now, and literally I am at the point where I just cant wait to be done with it. I like Dark Souls, I really do, but I wish I enjoyed the latter areas of the game as much as the first parts. Oh well, I have come this far, I have almost beaten it, so that will be an accomplishment.

Yeah, everything after Anor Londo is pretty trash.

nah. i think a lot more could have been done with Izalith, giant dragon asses and consistent easy bosses make it kinda lame. but the level design was fun, i love the archives. like. i *** love the archives. tomb of the giants is horribly terrifying, yet able to be overcome if prepared. and the ruins are just fun. it may be slightly lacking, but i believe thats just due to the beauty of anor londo over shadowing it.

I can agree that the second half of the game isn't quite as strong as the first, but I wouldn't call it "bad" by any means. Izalith was kind of tedious and bland, but I enjoyed the other areas. As for bosses, Sif and Seath are a couple of my favorites.

Are you including the DLC? The area's themselves aren't that interesting (although chasm was pretty cool). However, Artorias, Kalameet + Manus are the 3 best bosses in the entire game IMO. O&S are pretty much the gargoyles on steroids.

I've always found the ToG to be a nasty place to play, one that I prefer to just get "over with" asap (unlike the Catacombs, which is an interesting journey).  The archives are better, but after playing them dozens (okay hundreds) of times, they get a bit tedious.

Honestly, I have thought about the final four areas, and the conclusion I come to most of the time is that the weapon combat, that part of DkS which is always the strong suit, takes a back seat in the second half of the game.  Most people aren't going to go toe-to-to with the giant skellies, or the Capras, or the Taurus demons.  Killing them usually relies on a lot of ranged or spell/pyro attacks that aren't entirely creative or strategic.  You still get a bit of combat in the Archives and on the way to the Kings, however.

No, the last four areas are so rushed and bland that I rarely finish a PvE playthrough because it's like:
"Oh great, I can either do the Tomb of the Giants, which has a darkness gimmick, I can do Izalith which has the lava gimmick and the worst boss fight since the goldfish in Earthworm Jim, or I can do Duke's, which has the invisible platforms/always dieing gimmick."

I think nearly every other part of the game is great. Those 3 areas are just slaughter to me.

The last areas in the game are too short and the enemies too unvaried. At least in my opinion maybe i the enemies in them had more survivability or the bosse had noncheap difficulty(nitos skeletons ruin my life on runs where i forget a divine weapon 4 kings are just extremely quick to overrun and BOC is the just angriest burning tree in existance.) the only fun boss in the 2nd part is sif the rest is just meh

Oh and seath hes really fun once you learn how to survive for more than 10 seconds

What no love for the Great Hollow?

Tomb of the giants is one of the better designed levels for me IMO. The use of the dark is genius, and the skellie dogs still haunt me.

To be honest a couple things later in the game are worse- izalith though atmospherically cool is generally empty (especially post patch 1.05 when the dragon legs never aggro), and some levels are really short like the kiln...

The game is fun in those bits, some of the levels like dukes archives and tomb of the giants are some of the most well made areas, I think that yeah there are some tough moments which can kill the fun a tad

Yeah, I haven't been able to afford the AOTA stuff yet, but I plan on getting it soon. I definietely don't want to make a discussion just complaining, but I admit I was venting. I really love the combat and atmosphere with most areas of the game, but when it becomes having to do something tedious, it gets kind of rough. I have survived this long though, so I know victory will be mine soon - at least for my first playthrough.

There are some disappointing things. I hate ToG and Blight Town and Izalith.

But, so many things are there that more than make up for it. From Arty and Manus as some of the most kick *** bosses to the Undead Burg at a low SL to Anor Londo to the Forest, it is great.

I think the later levels were intended to incorporate more PvP over difficult mobs. By then you should have PvE down and the pitch black/lava/invisible path gimmicks are overcome by items given to you in the games - getting invaded is the new obstacle to endure. 

Ever had a Darkmoon show up just as Kirk 'invades' in the Ruins? Adds a lot of flavor.

I liked every level. A lot. Each one had unique challenges. But every one had a way to prepare for it if you paid attention. I left ToG in search of light and found Dusk.

I got killed by ghosts I couldn't hurt until I found out what it meant to be cursed.

I fought the last remnants of a formidable army before dueling their general.

I already loved prism stones and arrows but found a new use for them in a haunting cave.

I think everyone has their favorite places to play in. Sometimes things do tend to get a bit easy in some later parts, especially if you level up too much. I quite despise blightown, specifically the descent into blightown. The look is really cool, but there are so many BS moments there that I cry any time I have to do it. Poison, moving planks, death drops everywhere, toxic dart blowers GOD DANGIT!... yea I hate blightown. But New Londo I rather enjoyed. The four kings bossfight wasn't much once you know the trick to it, but the rest was interesting and the atmosphere was fantastic (even though I don't like scary stuff).

A big part of the difficulty of dark souls is learning how to do things. In the beginning, you were learning how to fight and how combat works, so they could use enemies that would challenge that. As the game progressed, however, you become more experienced and fights that used to challenge you would become child's play. The developers had to think of other ways to challenge your skills, and one of them was dealing with the environment. Sure they might seem cheap, but it's the challenge of knowing that you need a light-source in ToG, and where the drops and platforms are, and where the archers and channelers are in Duke's archives using pillars and rocks as cover, that requires skill. The way the game creates difficulty, changes over time and I think it makes for a fantastic dynamic.