Dark Souls 2 is a Good Game, and Scholar RUINED It!

I swear to God this is my last Dark Souls 2 video.

0:00 I Have a Dream!
0:57 Trust No One
4:03 A Bite Sized Critique of Vanilla, Part 1
10:36 Vanilla has a Difficulty Curve
16:19 A Bite Sized Critique of Vanilla, Part 2
18:48 What's Good About Dark Souls 2?
21:58 Death Count!
23:40 Dark Souls 1 Over Dark Souls 2
26:56 Vanilla DLC Over Scholar DLC
30:06 Scholar is a Cash Grab
33:45 My "In Defense of Dark Souls 2" Video has Some Issues
37:20 The Skyrim Spectrum
38:30 The Last Dark Souls 2 Video

[feebleking]

Apparently the ps3 and xbox360 versions of Scholar did not change the enemy placement, so this video doesn't apply to those versions.

2 things to correct in the video:
1: Scholar did not get rid of the 1 million souls skip to get to Drangleic Castle. I thought that I had heard this from another Dark Souls 2 video essay, but I was wrong.
2: The dragon skeleton in Aldia's Keep can come alive in Scholar, but you have to light some torches so it's hidden away and I still prefer how Vanilla handled it to Scholar.

Also, the comments have told me that Shrine of Amana was nerfed into the ground after release, so that's probably part of the reason why I liked it in Vanilla while other people hated it.

I finally decided to make the "In Defense of Dark Souls 2 video" unlisted because it had too many mistakes. You can still watch it with this link.

[peanut]

Don't let this video distract you from the fact the bandit class has high dex and starts with a hand axe, a strength weapon.

[MundMoriginal]

You know what's weird? I've developed a guilty pleasure, where I once or twice a year, replay DS2 Scholar, while listening to DS2 critiques.

[nachos]

Scholar was like "we need to balance the game. Life gems were too op so let's crank up the enemies to make it more fair"

[soldierofkazus]

You know what I hate? Acronyms that are _almost_ words. Like Scholar of the First Sin. SOTFS. Just look at it. It wants to be SOFTS but it isn't.

[SilasSeiler]

Let us never forget when Dark Souls 2 first came out, you could magic infuse the moonlight greatsword and still buff it with crystal magic weapon for over 1k AR. It was beautiful.

[daniphrog]

What you don’t understand is that scholar is not a souls game, it’s a horror game and it’s one of the scariest in this field

[A-Dark-Soul]

Not having any I-frames going through a fog wall until 60% into the animation really sucked.

[TrentonG]

6:21 I played DS2 before (Scholar version) and I got to the first area only for those 20 enemies to be sleeping. This allowed me to fight each enemy one at a time. The only way all those enemies could ambush you at once is if you actively decided to wake all of them up and agro them all at once. I played all the souls games and I don't remember a single game that rewarded blindly running past every obstacle. Also, the Heide Knights in Heide's Tower of Flame as shown in the video are also all sleeping and optional to fight. The only 2 ways to wake them are to either attack them yourself or kill The Dragonrider boss in the same area, but by then you'll already be at the next location. Now I know you wouldn't lie about the game to make it look worse right?

[azure]

Heres some more fun PTSD stories about Shrine of Amana, this time featuring Console Launch Vanilla DS2.
The Priestesses used to have an aggro range so gigantic they could quite literally shoot you from outside their visual render distance, so you'd be getting sniped from across the map and couldnt even see what was sniping you, just magic phasing into existence once it enters render range and the piercing sound of it approaching.

[bivageyt]

Vanilla Shrine of Amana was infuriating at launch v1.0. The magic projectiles had insane tracking, enough that even if you dodge them they'd turn around and hit you from behind. They toned it down in a later patch. That's why it earned it's reputation.

[xHeigoux]

never played vanilla, but scholar iron keep broke me. I died so many times that most enemies had despawned by the point I finally made it to the boss.

[kentknightofcaelin]

Scholar of the First Sin was the first soulslike I ever played, and somehow I got through the fortress as a deprived. I only gave up at Heide's Tower of Flame, because I couldn't figure out how to beat the dragon and killing 20 Heide Knights and 5 Old Knights each time got annoying really quickly.

[Halvos]

I will never get over the joy of rushing to the gutter, grabbing the great club, and going unga bunga on every boss in this game.

[just-mees]

Correction: the undead dragon does come alive and kill you in scholar. It happens once you've lit all the scones in Aldias keep.

[brocksteele]

It's crazy, I remember back before Scholar that a lot of people were complaining about how many gank squads were in the game. One of the big celebrations that people had when the remake was announced was that they had "fixed the enemy placement". I walked into Forest of Fallen Giants in Scholar and quickly decided that by "fixed" they meant "made it so much worse".

[kered]

I just watched a couple videos comparing DS2 with Scholars, and it's interesting how different they are. In the other video the reviewer had more deaths and was a lower level on vanilla (despite playing it second), while in your video you had more deaths and a lower level on Scholars. I think this suggests that the difference really comes down to playstyle. In the other video he fought most of the new enemies, which gave him more experience and leveled him up faster, making bosses easier. On the other hand you chose to run past everything, missing out on experience and making bosses harder (also more vulnerable to ganks). I don't think either of these is wrong, just two very different perspectives.

[thewielder]

I swear the enemy placement for Scholar of the First Sin was lead by someone involved with the Vanilla DS2 who was mad that people criticised the ganks in the game. So they doubled or tripled the enemies throughout the entire game to get back at the fanbase, and completely screwed up the areas that actually felt balanced and well thought out in the process

[DuncanMcBride]

Oddly enough, if you were like me and played DS2 on the 360 or PS3, the version of SOTFS we got was literally just vanilla DS2 but with all the DLC goodies added, so the best of both worlds.

[VideoGameVillians]

I have to disagree about one point here. Vanilla did not cause me to level more and become stronger. I ALWAYS kill all enemies in any game I play so Scholar leveled me a lot more and as such the "harder" areas didn't actually feel very hard to me because I had tons of levels. Vanilla on the other hand, having less enemies and also in some places weaker enemies meant I had way less souls throughout my Vanilla playthrough and that made the bosses feel a lot more punishing which felt way worse.

Also you can absolutely still skip the lord soul bosses with enough souls in Scholar, I've opened the door early plenty of times.

And the big skeletal dragon also still comes to life and attacks, only it's got a different trigger. To do it in Scholar you need to light all the torches in the level and kill the invaders that lighting them spawns. I'll admit though that this trigger change is terrible, but it is still there unlike what you said.