Finding Izalith, Part One.

In the end, Lost Izalith seemed like the best place to hit up first. Yeah, the way there was full of Taurus Demons and a Capra Demon, but I'd beaten these things before and now I was bigger, badder and less fucking terrified of everything; so I decided to set foot onto the blackened crust left underneath the poor, tragic Ceaseless Discharge.

It turns out, right, that the Demon Ruins are full of bosses, bonfires and very little else.

I have to say though, that first Capra is a revelation. You watch him run towards you like you did back in the Burg, but this time you can spot his tells and you dodge out of his way. You don't have the ledge to stun him anymore, but he doesn't have his dogs and in a one-on-one fight you can destroy him now. It's not trivial by any means, but do you remember ten to twenty hours ago when this fucker almost made you quit?

Of course, I felt like Billy Big Bollocks as I came down the stairs; I'd just wiped my arse with a Capra Demon. I was feeling confident and clever - I felt like I finally had mastered Dark Souls, and could deal with anything the game threw at me.

Yeah, I fell down the hole. Yeah, I felt the correct amount of shame for doing so - especially as on my second runthrough I noticed that the Soapstone message I'd skipped past the first time was warning me of it.

Seriously, that sudden rise and fall in confidence cannot be by accident - especially as it's not the only place in the game Dark Souls does it.

Time and time again the game gives you this intense feeling of power; it allows you to do something that makes you feel like a magnificent, throbbing monarch of achievement - before letting you do something completely and utterly embarrassing like walk into a bottomless hole, or find out that your new ultra effective weapon is worthless in this next section (see the lightning spear in Sen's, and your arrival in Anor Londo), before looking back at you, shrugging, and nonchalantly intoning "You Died" - the Sahara dry "how very silly of you"  is only implicit, but you hear it and feel it every time.

But anyway. This first section of the Ruins contains a bumload of Capra Demons - and the first time you manage to aggro two at once you'll once again be under no qualms as to who's on top in this player-game relationship - which I only recently found out that you can actually skip by jumping to the platform below (thanks to the guys at Bonfireside Chat for this little nugget of info, about a month after it would have been handy, but oh well).

Whether you go through or around the GoatFaced Killers, you'll end up staring at a giant maggot sticking out of a wall. This guy fucked my shit right up a couple of times (if he slams yo against the wall you're pretty much dead), but getting him dead is well worthwhile because he's obscuring a bonfire and doesn't respawn.

You're going to need that bonfire as well, because the next part of the game involves a load of firebreathing things, a Taurus Demon, and the Asylum Demon's bigger, more firey cousin.

Fucking hell, the Demon Firesage almost made me quit the fucking game. The arena is a pain in the arse (whether or not those branches break seems frustratingly arbitrary), his attacks require dodging later than you'd expect, and the fact that he doesn't do fucking fire damage is baffling for a thing called the Demon Firesage. He took me so very long to beat, and it was only through the help of the hairy knowledge God Gary Dutton that I actually managed to put the fucker down.

But yeah, he's a prick and there's something about his piggy little face and his stupid little wings that proper fucks me off.

What happened next? Oh that's right another fucking boss. And Solaire.

But that's for next time.

Lautrec, Anor Londo, and Conjecture.

So, here we are. Part two. The conclusion to the epic story.

The finale. 

The post where I finish what I started writing last night but then scheduled to post regardless of how finished it was because I needed to go to bed.

Lautrec the Embraced. The Firelink Shrine Murderer. That Gold Fucker. He's known by many names, but his involvement in the Dark Souls story is shrouded in mystery.

UNTIL NOW. 

I'm going to smash the doors off this gloomy corner of Dark Souls lore and fire a few truth arrows straight into the shield of unknowing. I'm going to raise my blade of insight above me, then cleave the stone of confusion that has cast a shadow over this land clean in twain.

Or, more likely, jabber on for a bit before saying "I don't know. Maybe it was aliens or something."

Lautrec, Anor Londo, and Questions.

Alright, I'm a little bit obsessed with Lautrec.

To be precise, I'm interested in a few things about what Lautrec is doing in Anor Londo, how he got there, and who he's with. I don't want to kiss him or anything.

In case you don't know, if you don't deal with (by which I mean brutally murder, of course) Lautrec before ringing both bells, he stabs Anastasia of Firelink right up then pisses off with her soul (thus extinguishing the bonfire) like the giant golden bellend that he is.

You'll find him in Anor Londo, just before you go to get turned into fine paste by Ornstein and Smough over and over and over and over again for hours - but there are an awful lot of questions that need answering about that.

YOU REVIVED

I am a shite, I know. I've not updated this squalid little corner of the internet in too long and I've made Dylan cry as a result.

Dylan, this is for you.

Since my last update on here, I've really very nearly almost completed Dark Souls. I've collected all four Lord Souls, opened the Kiln of the first flame, and collected bloody loads of Titanite chunks in all different colours - which may well give you an idea of the brick wall my character is currently running in to time and time (and time and time and time) again.

So, what follows is a quick chat about between Anor Londo and what you're supposed to do after Anor Londo - please remember that it's written in a way that reflects my thoughts at the time, and isn't necessarily representative of my thoughts now.

Ornstein and Smough: A Tribute.

I spent ten hours of my life playing Dark Souls with a huge shadow hanging over me.

I'd subdued the gaping dragon. I'd thrown the Iron Golem to his death from the top of Sen's Fortress. I'd even got past those fucking archers.

But Ornstein and Smough were a hard, cold wall - a wall I kept fruitlessly banging my head against.

I'd tried it on my own - and barely left a scratch on either of them.

I'd tried it with Solaire as a backup (using my last humanity) and got slaughtered by Smough's flying electric bum attack.

Fuck.

Anor Londo Revisited.

So, those archers.

Turns out, you can just kite them into walking off the ledges they're on, the stupid fucking idiots.

So I've moved on, met Solaire, got eaten by a Mimic, and tried to work out how the fuck that Prowler Demon got into that room.

Then I tried to fight Lautrec - I don't know why he's in Anor Londo or who his dickhead friends are (or why Anastasia left that Black Eye Orb thing), but I do know that running headlong into the three of them is a very bad idea - especially as it turns out you can't use Estus (which I didn't know until it was too late).

That's as far as I've got - meanwhile, I'm also trying to decide whether or not to enchant my longsword; I have a feeling that turning it into a lightning longsowrd is probably a good idea, but if I do that I'm going to have to spec another weapon for the inevitable future enemies who are immune to it - I'm thinking a Falchion, which I believe I can combine with Quelaag's soul to make something rather tasty.

Some Kind of Arch Joke

The Archers of Anor Londo.

Up until now, Anor Londo had been bearable. True, the game's decision that it had suddenly become Assassin's fucking Creed was a bit of an inconvenience, but the complete lack of swinging blades, narrow platforms full of enemies designed to stagger you but not be staggered or enormous firebombs was rather welcome.

But those fucking archers, man.

I can get past their arrows. I can reach the rightmost one. But I can't fucking do anything when I get there. kicking him doesn't move him, and all of his attacks send me flying (I'm usually low on stamina because of all the rolling I need to do to even reach melee range.

What do I do? I don't know if I can leave Anor Londo (The way you get there is pretty fucking spectacular, I'll say that) in order to find some ranged support, and I don't have many weapons that do any real pushback damage.

I have a horrible feeling I'm fucked.