Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin

2015 · FromSoftware · ~50h to finish

The one that attacks your resources rather than your reflexes — your maximum health falls every time you die, and the ambushes are designed around you not knowing they are there.

soulslikeactionrpgPCPlayStation 5Xbox SeriesSteam DeckMetacritic 79

Global—UNRATED

Baseline difficulty6.6PUNISHING

Sustained pressure. Progress is earned.

Price on Steam

$39.99

USD · United States · checked 1h ago

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Part of

FromSoftware, Demon’s Souls to Nightreign7 of 8 to play

The outlier, made by a different team. Second in the story and last but one here on purpose: its differences are interesting once you have the other two to measure them against, and merely confusing before.

Before it: Demon’s SoulsAfter it: Elden Ring NightreignStart with Dark Souls or Bloodborne or Elden Ring

The fingerprint

12.55.07.510

Obscurity

7.6

Punishment

7.4

Learning Curve

6.6

Grind

6.0

Reaction

5.8

Execution

5.3

Strategy

4.8

Puzzle

1.6

PUBLISHEDHARDEST DEMAND FIRST

Assist options shave roughly 0.6 points off, if you use them.

These are generic numbers. Calibrate and this whole page re-scores around you.

Calibrate

Screenshots

IGDB

Where it bites

SPOILER-SAFE BY DEFAULT

START25%HALFWAY75%CREDITS

10% · ~3hObscurity
the stat nobody finds on their own, which decides whether your dodge works at all
▲ 16
25% · ~10hPunishment
the room with three of the same heavy enemy and no space to fight them
▲ 15
75% · ~35hPunishment
the late area where casters snipe you from across water you cannot move quickly in
▲ 26

Assists & accessibility

0/2 SOURCED

MOTOR & INPUT

Fully remappable controls [unsourced]

HEARING

Full subtitles [unsourced]

Claims marked unsourced have not been checked against a published accessibility review. Nothing here is inferred from genre — where we do not know, we say nothing.

What it is

The middle entry, rebuilt for later hardware: a wider, flatter world reached from one hub, with more build freedom, more bosses and far more enemies per room than its neighbours.

Where to go from here

Argue with these asks

Its own neighbourhood, ordered by how close the difficulty actually sits.

Demon’s Souls

2020 · Bluepoint Games · ~30h

6.7PUNISHING

The combat is the gentlest in the family and the systems are the cruellest — dying moves you to soul form at half health, and the game never says so.

UnratedOBS 8.4PUN 7.4CRV 6.8Not on your platforms

PUZ 1.5PUN 7.4CRV 6.8OBS 8.4GRD 4.8 — you asked for demanding

Salt and Sanctuary

2016 · Ska Studios · ~25h

6.4PUNISHING

Everything the 3D games do, minus a camera and plus a pit — the second axis of movement is gone, so a mistimed roll usually means falling somewhere worse.

UnratedOBS 7.8PUN 6.6REA 6.2

Dark Souls

2011 · FromSoftware · ~45h

6.5PUNISHING

The difficulty is mostly geography — knowing which door to take is worth more than any weapon in the game.

UnratedOBS 7.8CRV 7.5PUN 6.8

1.8

Its own neighbourhood, ordered by how close the difficulty actually sits.

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