New images and gameplay mechanic reveals for Dark Souls fans! Make sure to read our Hands-On Impressions, of which you can see a video above, or enjoy the beautiful screenshots after soaking in the new knowledge from our behind-closed-doors demo. Also check out the new Controls page on the wiki!
The Dark Souls 3 Demonstration
Presided by Atsuo Yoshimura, Global Head of Marketing for Namco Japan, the demonstration followed a different build than the one available for play to both press and public. The first thing that we all noted was what seemed to be a “Mana Bar“, a blue colored demons-souls-like bar in between your health and stamina. No spells were cast and it was never used, so we asked “What is this”, and the answer… “This is a WIP and may be a place holder”
Now onto the demo, in simple, bullet-point form!
- This is the first time they go exclusively next-gen.
- Miyazaki has taken the lead and we all expect his vision to come through in the title.
- There are three focus points: sense of world scale and immersion, apocalyptic world and heroic lore, and evolution and deepening of the series concept
- The Story revolves around the Lord(s) of Cinder, the iconic hero role from the series: a lord killing dark hero image. The player is dark hero who tries to hunt the lords down in the game.
- Two Classes available in demo: Wandering Knight and Northern warrior (Depicted in the artwork below)
L2 is “Arts/Parry.” You have two stances with your shield, offensive and defensive. Selecting offensive will cause you to use a battle art, rather than parry. From the loading screen:
Arts are unique to a weapon held in right hand or both hands. equip a kite round shield or wield two handed to perform arts. Some arts can be followed up with a special attack
Parries are exclusive to small shields in left hand. Follow up with RB for riposte critical
- There is a sword symbol under health bar with a number – this is the number of times you can use Weapon Arts, and so is like bullets in Bloodborne (only much more powerful!) and possibly a replacement for the mana bar we saw.
- Gestures confirmed, see the Gestures page for details.
- Poise may determine the length you are staggered when hit, not IF you are staggered, but this has not been confirmed, it was audience observation from myself and those around me.
- First boss is called Dancer of the Frigid Valley , looks to be wearing a bride’s veil, unfolds sense from ceiling. Extremely tall
- Dancer boss is unique, not used before in series. The objective was a thin, distorted silhouette and movements hard to predict. She uses flame sword first, and in second part of battle she pulls a second, the “ash sword.”
- The second boss that looks like a wirey knight in silver armor that almost crawls like a beast on the ground, attacking with his sword (It is rumored you can find him in the Gamescom demo, but only one person has found the level hint)
- Matchmaking: Dedicated Servers, but no cross-platform. More details were not given.
- An intersting addition to the “Lords of Cinder” vs “Lord of Cinder” discussion, a loading screen reads:
I found a small grave/shrine and have the option to offer flame. It tells me the epitaph: “Grave of a nameless retainer. Raised his sword for the Lord of Cinder”
- Having a dragon in the opening stage is one of Miyazaki-san’s favorites. Near the start we see a dead dragon. The Dragon used to be a guardian of this castle, but a lot of dragons have died. Ashes are floating up from the corpse of the dragon.
- Torch – player can use as much as they want unlike previous versions
- Gravestones: In DKS 3 gravestones are in various locations. You can “add flame” – use as a marker, or as lighting. Epitaphs give more of the back story, maybe resembling the Lore Notes of Bloodborne.
- There is a “Ready stance” – it can launch a special attack that will allow player to break through enemy shield – one of the battle arts, seen in the screenshots below.
You can use the environment against enemy groups – for example, have the dragon burn a large group of enemies - Greatswords have their own battle arts – lunge dash, depicted below in the images.
- Miyazaki wants knights to be strong characters again, having got weaker earlier in series. Knights will move differently when equipped with different weapons.
- Barrels – will explode! Throw firebombs on them. Another way to use environment against enemy groups
- Player character moves faster than previous games
- Bow can be used in combination with rolling and steps, as depicted below in the screenshots
- Another weapon is the scimitar – which supports dual wielding. Its weapon art is “Spin”, shown below in the Screenshots
Gallery: All the names on this images come from Namco
We’ll add this and more to the Screenshots page if you need them later!
22 responses to “Dark Souls 3 New Screenshots & Mechanics Roundup”
Anyone have any info if blacksteel katana (or any katana with like move set) is making a comeback? god i hope they add some bad ass sword arts for curved swords and katana.
Poise seemed rather messy on the demo, so I’m hoping it’s just that it wasn’t enabled properly. Otherwise we’ll get stunlocked too often. Details here.
Also will being encumbered make a character more easily staggered, riposted
Could that mana bar actually be a meter for charging up weapon arts?
There’s the Japanese hands-on demo on the 12th and then Tokyo Game Show. We’ll see more gameplay footage (this time official b-roll) so I hope we will have some more questions answered soon!.
Also, referring to the stances and magic, I’m particularly curious about it and its relation to catalysts, talismans and staves. I wonder how it will all fit together, and whether that “mana bar” was related to it.
My question is how weighted you have to be before the movement slows down. It was 50% in Demon’s Souls, 25% inDark Souls, and 70% in Dark Souls 2 with Bloodborne’s being nonexistent. Since they want the game to be faster, I want to know how heavy I have to be before I start to slow down.
Also, I too want to know what stats they will have.
>
The first question that comes to mind is, is there an encumbered version of the stances where the attack is slowed down?
I’m also curious about the stats. We know that equipment load is returning (via this post: https://fextralife.com/miyazaki-dark-souls-3-magic-info-via-pcgames/) so that already brings some questions vs the effects and application of stances.
I’d love to know more about the stat system. With the improvement to items, I hope they have a way to make an item-focused character! Maybe have a ring, weapon, or piece of armor that increases item damage, or maybe it will scale with DEX?
It makes sense for the Weapon Arts to be the same button as Parry. It means Technically Parry is a Weapon Art.
Does that mean Parries are limited now?
My reaction to the sentence
>
[BBvideo 560,340]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKz4NxpFW5I[/BBvideo]
Backsab souls confirmed?
Im not complaining. I.. I just need to adjust myself *sweat*
Yes that is indeed beautiful. I’m somewhat tempted to use it as the new wiki background!
The Dark Knight concept art is amazing. It really goes to show that we really are the ‘Dark Hero’ of this iteration in the Souls series.
Looking forward to all the new lore! And maybe references to previous games. Can’t even say how hyped I am.
I can’t wait to explore this interconnected world and see how explorable these buildings and lost ruins are.
I also love the post apocalyptic theme, something not usually explored in fantasy games.
I hope this game will be the gem that the community wants it to be.
Just….just byoutiful….Truly brought a tear to my eye….I really hope they add fashon souls that don’t sacrifice defence and truly dark areas on par with the Tomb of the Stunlock Doges that require light. And hopefully the 30FPS lock stays true so there wont be a repeat Lagtown effect
So you can only parry or use Arts with a given setup? The thing about needing a kite shield as opposed to a buckler to use Arts with a onehanded weapon makes me wonder if ‘onehanded’ Arts are actually all shield-based attacks since it’d be weird that you need a shield in your left hand to do something fancy with your right hand. Perhaps they’ll make a left hand with nothing in it count as a kite shield for the purposes of determining what l2 does.
Also, what about having a weapon in each hand? I guess they could make it so you could only use the art while in powerstance (which I’m assuming is still in this.) And does this mean you can no longer parry with a twohanded weapon? On the one hand, I’d be glad to see less parries but on the other I’d kind of miss the option. Maybe they’ll add an Art that’s just a parry or something to make us happy.
Ah, that knight armor looks like demon soul’s fluted armor 2.0 … <3
Iron Flesh with those graphics… I’m going to shine so much.
this two-handed sword in the screenshots at the end of the post is SO GORGEOUS
Solaire confirmed.
I found a small grave/shrine and have the option to offer flame. It tells me the epitaph: “Grave of a nameless retainer. Raised his sword for the Lord of Cinder”
Okay I’m hyped
You win Fromsoft
Hi blitz, its akilles95. i got ban today i dont know why, i posted dk3 trailer 2 times. and i got ban, can u help me with it plz
OMG!
>
Glad to hear this. I was disappointed when the dark areas mentioned in the DkS2 preview were stripped out due to reviewer complaints. Hopefully now we’ll have to make a conscious choice whether to cower behind a shield, or boldly light the way ahead. I know which I’ll be choosing.
>
Am I the only one recalling the Sheikah Stones from Ocarina of Time? My guess was you would perform “Sacrifices”, such as sacrificial bonfires, using whatever DkS3 has instead of Humanity. This sounds like it’s something you can only do at specific spots, though. Maybe it’s both?
>
So movement is based on weapon class, and not just equip load? Or is this just a cosmetic distinction?
>
I expect explosive barrels will be just as effective on the player. Can’t tell you how many times I entered a chalice room filled with oil pots and heard the “boom” of cannonfire before my screen erupted in a frame-shattering screenfull of fire.
Man I am excited. It sounds like there’s going to be even more emphasis on build diversity than in DkS2, which in my opinion didn’t have enough actual combat variety to justify the lack of personality in the weapons. I’m very pleased at the idea of DkS3 bringing the best of both Souls’ and BB’s approaches to combat.
Log in to leave a Comment