The PC Version of Dark Souls 2 is lazy as hell

[OldNewNewOld]

BTW. You also play fighting games and sport games with a keyboard, just because it's more PC?

I do. You know why? Because those games aren't made by incompetent developer so they are actually playable with KB or KB&M.

In fact, KB is better for fighting games than a gamepad. Why do you play it with a gamepad on the console? Why not use a fighting stick? It's obviously better to play the game with a fighting stick than a gamepad.

I would be like saying I'm going to build a major bridge, and then make it out of wood. It can function, but is likely to break if stressed and the timing isn't right.

Don't forget that you are also asking a full budget for a huge high quality bridge while delivering a wooden bridge because that's exactly what From was doing.
They asked for a full AAA price, yet they delivered a indie dev tier port.

 

[lacktheknack]

I think you're now stretching things. They said they were going to do a port, its their responsibility to make sure the port is done at least adequately. Particularly something like controls and timing. I would expect it either way. Its not like they didn't make plenty of money last time and can't afford a couple extra specialised people on contract.

I would be like saying I'm going to build a major bridge, and then make it out of wood. It can function, but is likely to break if stressed and the timing isn't right.

I'm not trying to defend it, I'm just asking what was expected.

This is like a company that paves roads suddenly saying "We're going to build a huge bridge." It wouldn't be out of line to think "I'll stay away from their bridge, I think. The suckers will probably do something dumb, like make it out of wood or something."

And lo and behold, that's exactly what happened.

Now, it turns out that I'm willing to use their creaky little bridge, and I think it works fine. This thread is someone that came, looked at the bridge, and hollered "Christ, this bridge was built by total IDIOTS." To which I respond, "It's made by a road-paving company with no experience in bridges, I'm not sure who was expecting an excellent bridge." And indeed, the paving on top is excellent (that would be the game in this analogy), just the supports are scary, as one should expect (that's the bridge itself).

 

[ninja666]

BTW. You also play fighting games and sport games with a keyboard, just because it's more PC?

I do. You know why? Because those games aren't made by incompetent developer so they are actually playable with KB or KB&M.

Dark Souls is also playable with a mouse and a keyboard. I've never said it isn't. Does it mean it was designed with a keyboard and mouse in mind, and should be played with a keyboard? Nope. But, suit yourself people, I don't care, as I stated before. You are basically the ones who keep replying and dragging this pointless conversation.

 

[Trunkage]

That doesn't change the fact that the game plays better with a controller

Wrong. Im not even going to list the myriad of examples to prove that simply playing with a controller does not make the game magically better or easier. Also you keep using the word "elitist", i dont think it means what you think it means.

Dude, what you're trying to prove is that a console game that got a barebones PC port of its first release and a slightly-better-but-still-a-port of its sequel is better off played on a device that wasn't designed to control it in the first place - a keyboard. The devs did what they could, but the keyboard-mouse controls for those games aren't what I'd expect. That's why I just accepted the game has to be played with a controller, picked it up and started playing, like a normal, civilized person. What you do, is trying to force me to think that I'm wrong and basically whine all over the thread because the standards for PC quality weren't perfectly met. If that's not elitist, I don't know what it is.

BTW. You also play fighting games and sport games with a keyboard, just because it's more PC?

With all the issues of the port of DS1 to pc, I found kb+m much better. I could respond quickly and be more accurate. I only really struggled with bosses in NG+. I understand you might have a totally different feeling. Have you tried it with both, or are you just saying that because you only like controllers. Did you give it time as clearly you have a preference towards one input type

 

[ninja666]

Have you tried it with both, or are you just saying that because you only like controllers. Did you give it time as clearly you have a preference towards one input type

Yes, I've tried it with both K+M and a controller. I found the controller much better to play it with and sticked with it. The buttons aren't assigned weirdly and everything seems fitting and logical. Plus, the in-game prompts are for a controller, so I don't see a reason why shouldn't I have played with one.

 

[A-D.]

That doesn't change the fact that the game plays better with a controller

Wrong. Im not even going to list the myriad of examples to prove that simply playing with a controller does not make the game magically better or easier. Also you keep using the word "elitist", i dont think it means what you think it means.

Dude, what you're trying to prove is that a console game that got a barebones PC port of its first release and a slightly-better-but-still-a-port of its sequel is better off played on a device that wasn't designed to control it in the first place - a keyboard. The devs did what they could, but the keyboard-mouse controls for those games aren't what I'd expect. That's why I just accepted the game has to be played with a controller, picked it up and started playing, like a normal, civilized person. What you do, is trying to force me to think that I'm wrong and basically whine all over the thread because the standards for PC quality weren't perfectly met. If that's not elitist, I don't know what it is.

BTW. You also play fighting games and sport games with a keyboard, just because it's more PC?

Want me to go dig up essentially every bit where FROM stated they actually designed both versions independently and that they were making a bigger effort to make a good PC version of Dark Souls 2. Which they failed, at least in respect that its not perfect yet. The PC Version has 60 frames, better textures, higher resolutions than the console version. Clearly its exactly the same and just a port. As said, not perfect. I bought the game, started playing, like a normal, civilized person, with a keyboard and mouse once i rebound all the keys to my preference.

What im not doing is tell you that my input-method is superior to yours. Im not telling you that controllers are bad. Im telling you that you are wrong to imply that the game can only be played and enjoyed by using a controller, which as i've stated is blatantly false, not sure where you get whining from. I have also not sunk to lows to apply ad hominem yet. As to your other question, i dont play sports titles or fighting games. Im sure you have some witty, insightful retort how i am just elitist for not playing FIFA, NBA/Madden Yearly releases or Street Fighter.

 

[Trunkage]

I think you're now stretching things. They said they were going to do a port, its their responsibility to make sure the port is done at least adequately. Particularly something like controls and timing. I would expect it either way. Its not like they didn't make plenty of money last time and can't afford a couple extra specialised people on contract.

I would be like saying I'm going to build a major bridge, and then make it out of wood. It can function, but is likely to break if stressed and the timing isn't right.

I'm not trying to defend it, I'm just asking what was expected.

This is like a company that paves roads suddenly saying "We're going to build a huge bridge." It wouldn't be out of line to think "I'll stay away from their bridge, I think. The suckers will probably do something dumb, like make it out of wood or something."

And lo and behold, that's exactly what happened.

Now, it turns out that I'm willing to use their creaky little bridge, and I think it works fine. This thread is someone that came, looked at the bridge, and hollered "Christ, this bridge was built by total IDIOTS." To which I respond, "It's made by a road-paving company with no experience in bridges, I'm not sure who was expecting an excellent bridge." And indeed, the paving on top is excellent (that would be the game in this analogy), just the supports are scary, as one should expect (that's the bridge itself).

Sort of, but since there is now way of trying it beforehand, you can't get that 'its made by idiots' sensation. And you just dropped $60 on it. So you want to keep playing it because you it cost so much, and you gradually build up anger.

I personally chose not get it preorder as I thought there would be issues. I still haven't bought because of things like this. Unfortunately they lost lots of my money

 

[Trunkage]

Have you tried it with both, or are you just saying that because you only like controllers. Did you give it time as clearly you have a preference towards one input type

Yes, I've tried it with both K+M and a controller. I found the controller much better to play it with and sticked with it. The buttons aren't assigned weirdly and everything seems fitting and logical. Plus, the in-game prompts are for a controller, so I don't see a reason why shouldn't I have played with one.

Sorry you brought up fighting and sports which are generally better on controller to prove a point. It sounded like that was somehow important to the conversation. I was checking if the reason it was brought was only as a fanboy

 

[Troublesome Lagomorph]

You say its lazy as hell, and yet is pretty above average as far as ports go. Sure, the controls for the mouse don't work well, but there's almost no way to make Dark Souls work with a keyboard.
I really can't believe you can call them lazy when they went out of their way to make sure we had better framerate, textures, and anti-aliasing.

How is it above average? Please list ports that are worse.

I said this 100 times by now and I will say it again just for you: Dark Souls 1 worked PERFECTLY with KB+M so please stop trying to tell me it is impossible to make Dark Souls work well with KB+M.

I played DS1 with both KB+M and a 360 controller, and it absofuckinglutely was NOT perfect.

As for worse ports: GTA4 (horrible optimization), DarkSiders, Deadly Premonition, and COD: Ghosts leap to mind almost immediately.
Not to mention other games that while their ports were not horrible, were lazy as fuck like Overlord.

 

[Chris Tian]

You say its lazy as hell, and yet is pretty above average as far as ports go. Sure, the controls for the mouse don't work well, but there's almost no way to make Dark Souls work with a keyboard.
I really can't believe you can call them lazy when they went out of their way to make sure we had better framerate, textures, and anti-aliasing.

How is it above average? Please list ports that are worse.

I said this 100 times by now and I will say it again just for you: Dark Souls 1 worked PERFECTLY with KB+M so please stop trying to tell me it is impossible to make Dark Souls work well with KB+M.

I played DS1 with both KB+M and a 360 controller, and it absofuckinglutely was NOT perfect.

As for worse ports: GTA4 (horrible optimization), DarkSiders, Deadly Premonition, and COD: Ghosts leap to mind almost immediately.
Not to mention other games that while their ports were not horrible, were lazy as fuck like Overlord.

What I am trying to tell you is, that the preference of input device is a subjective one, and that there can not be a universally best one because of that.

Of those games I only played Darksiders and everything worked there, so I don't know how thats supposed to be a worse port.

DS2 is maybe not the worst of all times but its still below average, with average being everything works.

 

[Chris Tian]

No, I think it's obvious they didn't test it.
First of all, they locked almost everything to the framerate. This is a disaster on it's own. Anyone who has played the game on a console and then on the PC with 60 FPS will tell you that the PC version is much harder. Thanks to things being tied to the framerate and not to the system time, you literally have a 2 times smaller dodge and parry window than on consoles.
Adding to the smaller parry window the double click shit, parrying with the default settings is almost impossible. It's pure luck.

DaS1 port, while also being a disaster had at least a better button mapping options. You could map literally everything to the keyboard and emulate a consoler. That's impossible on DaS2 without mods.

I could totally live with it if they locked the framerate at 30fps. All the "the game was developed for console" escuses are alot more plausible here. I don't expect the game to work better on pc, just that it offers the same functionality than the console version. That is the least they have to do since they ask the same price vor pc and console versions.

The low weapon durability was a good decision going wrong. Weapon durability was a non-issue in DaS1. It took you 1-20 souls to repair and was more annoying than anything else.
They tried to make weapon durability a important factor, but then they overdid it. They balanced the weapon durability so badly that it's just stupid. Hitting a corps will take away 4 times more durability points than hitting a living enemy and 2 times more than hitting a wall. Yup, you read it right. Hitting a dead body will damage your weapon 2 times more than hitting a brickwall.

Oh, remember the things tied in to the framerate? Well, it's here as well. So if you have a solid 60 FPS, your weapon will melt like butter in Iron Keep because the game takes into account the amount of frames your weapon is inside a dead body! Awesome, right?


Remember how Wipes were useless in DaS1? Hey, From fixed them. They are now great. Except that you need 4 of them in order to mover from one bonfire to another.

You are right, its a non-issue in DS1 and now again ind DS2. I think its just a complete waste of recourses to completely redo an aspect of the game that has almost no impact on the game.

EDIT:
I don't see how "designed with controller in mind" is a excuse. It's not a excuse, it's bullshit.

Just the left side of the keyboard has over 47 keys plus shift, ctrl, alt and tab. That's 47*5 or 235 keys/key combination (just 2 keys combinations, adding 3 would drastically increase the number).
Now even the most basic mouse has 2 side buttons.

There is literally no excuse that From didn't allow to bind keys to all those buttons. It's literally inexcusable.
Dark Souls isn't some unique game with controlled deeper than any other game ever made. If a fucking MMO like WoW, with tons of different spells can have a playable control layout, there is no excuse that anyone game with less commands can't have good KB&M controls.
The bad KB&M control layout and inability to customize it is pure laziness on From's side. The fact that they didn't bother to change the tutorial signs based on your control scheme just proves it. The game already has memorized your controls, making it show the key binding is literally one line of code. The game only needs to read you the control layout, find the right key and show it on display rather than just displaying the 360 controller buttons.

This is some of the most basic things. If you buy a PC game, you expect a fucking PC game.

Exactly, if you buy a PC game you expect it to work on the pc and that includes functioning KB+M controls.

All the excuses. that ranged from "FROM is just to incompetent to make a game work on pc" to "its impossible to make a game playble with KB+M" are just bullshit.

If some game came out for the Xbox that wouldn't work with the Xbox controller people would go batshit crazy.

 

[Grape_Nuts]

They stated that they were going to investigate complaints about the PC controls in this thread: http://forums.bandainamcogames.com/showthread.php?295-Official-Dark-Souls-II-PC-Version-Issues-and-Updates&s=398d36df702cdffc6126aba083168fcc

But after a while, that part was mysteriously edited out with no explanation. I think that's a fair indication that the lazy bastards have no plans to fix this. All anyone asked for was the DS1 control scheme. Anyway, the only solutions right now are to configure AHK and map your mouse buttons to keyboard buttons, or use this mod (which essentially does the same thing, only it's somewhat easier to use for a newbie): http://www.nexusmods.com/darksouls2/mods/148/?

 

[Bombiz]

glad to see im not the only one who see's dark souls as a money stealing waste of time, the game should never been released on PC without proper port controls and ill never be buying any dark souls games again. Even the worst games have better keyboard ports than this console loving game.

It was still playable on PC. just that the controls on a gamepad where much better then the ones on the mouse and keyboard(or so i'm told, i never really used a gamepad to play it).

Even the worst games have better keyboard ports than this console loving game.

and people say Dark Souls fans are elitist.

glad to see im not the only one who see's dark souls as a money stealing waste of time

if you say so.

 

[Chris Tian]

They stated that they were going to investigate complaints about the PC controls in this thread: http://forums.bandainamcogames.com/showthread.php?295-Official-Dark-Souls-II-PC-Version-Issues-and-Updates&s=398d36df702cdffc6126aba083168fcc

But after a while, that part was mysteriously edited out with no explanation. I think that's a fair indication that the lazy bastards have no plans to fix this. All anyone asked for was the DS1 control scheme. Anyway, the only solutions right now are to configure AHK and map your mouse buttons to keyboard buttons, or use this mod (which essentially does the same thing, only it's somewhat easier to use for a newbie): http://www.nexusmods.com/darksouls2/mods/148/?

Yeah, just this. There is already a workaround out, two in fact. FROM should seriously get their act together with their pc releases or ask alot less for pc versions than the console versions.

 

[Diaconu Cristian]

Really now... you complain about this port... I know what bad ports mean, there were plenty when the xbox360 and ps3 where still new (only Capcom somehow managed to make some decent ports for Resident Evil 5 and Devil May Cry 4). Dark Souls 1 WAS a bad port, but this? No way. It is decent. Keyboard and Mouse controls... now don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of keyboard and mouse when they make sense: FPS, RTS and the like, but for Dark Souls a controller is more than adequate. Also let's say they screwed that one up, but everything else? Locked 60fps - that's great since everything is always smooth. Better resolution and filtering - also great. What should they have done to make it better? Redo the whole thing for the PC? This is not crysis, it was not designed for PC, it was ported! Really do yourself a favour, buy a damn controller, plug the sucker in and enjoy the game. If you don't than never buy a game without trying it at a friend or search online after a week for possible issues.

 

[Amnesiac Pigeon]

This game ran flawlessly on PC for me. Actually can't remember a single instance of it dropping from 60fps.

That is not the sign of a rubbish port in my eyes.

 

[Broderick]

This game ran flawlessly on PC for me. Actually can't remember a single instance of it dropping from 60fps.

That is not the sign of a rubbish port in my eyes.

I for the most part agree, but from what I understand, one of the major complaints is the 60fps. Many people are claiming that the 60fps actually makes the game harder than the console version, as many of the hitboxes, dodge, and parry timings are "off" thanks to the increased fps. There is even a problem with increased weapon degradation in 60 fps compared to 30. Other than that though, I think the port did alright(even if those are some glaring problems in comparison to the console versions). I believe someone above linked a video showing a couple differences between the two versions of the game, here is the video, in the spoiler if you are curious.

Spoiler

 

[Vigormortis]

Nothing brings out the hypocrisy in this forum like Dark Souls!

The controls for some other game; or even one on a console; prove to be awkward, unresponsive and buggy? Posters around here say things like, "What a shit game! What a terrible port! What a bad developer! They're hacks of their trade! There's no excuse for this!"

The controls for the PC version of Dark Souls are awkward, unresponsive, and buggy? Fans come back with, "But ports are HAAARD! At least you got a port! We should be grateful! It's not their fault!"

Seeing as the unpaid, unfunded, modding community can usually patch the issues with these games; primarily in the control department; within a day or so of the release of the game, I fail to see how anyone can excuse From Software for not being able to do it themselves over the course of months.

Mouse and keyboard are the standard control system on PCs. If you have additional control methods, like a gamepad or a joystick, then great! But if a port does a poor job of supporting the STANDARD CONTROL HARDWARE for a platform, it is a poor port. I wanted to get Dark Souls 2 on PC precisely because I don't like gamepads. Because the devs only provided half-arsed support for mouse and keyboard, I won't be getting it at all.

Shh! You're making sense. You're not supposed to be making sense on this forum. We only speak in nonsense and hyperbole.

Stop it before they crack out the torches and pitchforks!

 

[Vigormortis]

I like how you're complaining about terrible keyboard and mouse controls for a third person ARPG. I bet you complain about terrible controller controls for RTS games.

Stating an subjective opinion as fact and using a false equivalency fallacy as an example.

This post is starting well...

The DS2 port is objectively better than the DS1 port.

Except, as has been seen in some areas, it's not.

Go buy a controller and stop complaining about shit you can control and choose not to.

Ah. So we're expected to buy an input device that's NOT the default input device for our gaming platform, just because the developer was too lazy, stupid, or incompetent to create proper support for the default input device?

Makes sense. The OP is clearly being irrational.

You play with the objectively worse controls and you're going to have an objectively worse experience.

You like to throw the word "objectively" around a lot; in all the most improper places.

I believe Inigo Montoya had something to say on this..

I game on the PC and even I have a controller laying around for games that are just better with a controller. You have no excuse.

I too game on PC and I too have a controller or two to use on my rig. But that doesn't excuse bad game design or porting.

Using a different example: Let's say they ported the game to the Playstation but half-assed the controls. What you're essentially saying is that these people should just go buy an Xbox controller and find a way to use it on their Playstation.

You're telling people they're being childish and irrational for expecting a game ported to their platform to be optimized for use with their platforms default input device(s).

 

[Bombiz]

The DS2 port is objectively better than the DS1 port.

Except, as has been seen in some areas, it's not.

what areas might that be?

I game on the PC and even I have a controller laying around for games that are just better with a controller. You have no excuse.

I too game on PC and I too have a controller or two to use on my rig. But that doesn't excuse bad game design or porting.

and this is the fault of Porting how? I don't see how porting a game changes it's fundamental design.

Nothing brings out the hypocrisy in this forum like Dark Souls!

The controls for some other game; or even one on a console; prove to be awkward, unresponsive and buggy? Posters around here say things like, "What a shit game! What a terrible port! What a bad developer! They're hacks of their trade! There's no excuse for this!"

The controls for the PC version of Dark Souls are awkward, unresponsive, and buggy? Fans come back with, "But ports are HAAARD! At least you got a port! We should be grateful! It's not their fault!"

Seeing as the unpaid, unfunded, modding community can usually patch the issues with these games; primarily in the control department; within a day or so of the release of the game, I fail to see how anyone can excuse From Software for not being able to do it themselves over the course of months.

This I completely 100% agree with. It's not gonna stop me from playing it without a controller though. it's funny tough cause I remember when the Original came out for PC and people where saying that the fans where elitist's for asking for the port let alone for it to be PLAYABLE. Ah how times have changed