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.
I enchanted my longsword with electricity - I might as well have replaced it with a stick covered in dead bees.
In despair, I turned to my Soul Bro, the lovely James Carter.
@iwatttfodiwwfa MAKE THE FAT PRICK AND THE SPEAR WANKER GO AWAY
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
@cs87 Are you summoning Solaire?Ornstein first with a fire weapon, then Smough.
— James Carter (@iwatttfodiwwfa) April 6, 2013
@iwatttfodiwwfa It's farming the humanity to summon him I'm struggling with.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
@cs87 Hmm. Rats drop humanity. From the bonfire in The Depths you can take an immediate right then straight ahead to 10 or so rats.He was right - I knew he was right. I knew he was right, because I already knew I had to do what he'd said to do - but I really didn't want to. The Depths is about as far from Anor Londo as you can get - Anor Londo is a city of Gods and giants built on top of a mountain, while the Depths is... Well, it's called the Depths. It's a really long fucking way away.
— James Carter (@iwatttfodiwwfa) April 6, 2013
So, off I trudged to the Sewers, to hang around with rats. By which I mean "murder them". With the ring that boosts your item discovery it didn't take long to collect ten humanity orbs, so I popped back to Anor Londo, ready to summon Solaire to my side once more.
I stopped at the bonfire, became human, fought my way to the room with the giant statues in, and got ready.
If you're surprised at the fact that I got invaded and killed at exactly this point, you clearly haven't played Dark Souls. GAAAH.
I burned through another few humanity orbs bouncing off Anor Londo's finest, and in truth I was starting to despair - as anyone following my Twitter timeline might have noticed.
This is beyond Capra Demon levels of bullshit.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
Fuck off.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
So close.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
Fuck it.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
Me, Solaire and another random can't take down Ornstein and Smough.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
So. I think today's theme is "Fuck Dark Souls".What was making things worse was either the game or my internet connection was making it extremely difficult to summon other players - I spent so much time in the bonfire room rolling around jabbing the X button at symbols on the floor I was starting to think I'd never get this fight done - especially as every time I summoned people into my game, I'd get oneshotted by Ornstein when he goes all mental (seems other players are insistent on Smough dying frst).
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 6, 2013
Until I saw this video.
I had NO CLUE that my Estus healed phantoms - but armed with this information, I summoned two other players (Gotta be sure), and we went in mob handed.
Smough down, I adopted more of a support (Read: "cowardly") role, and hung back healing my two ghostly partners, jabbing as and when I could.
ORNSTEIN AND SMOUGH HAVE FALLEN. TIME FOR A CELEBRATION PEPPERMINT TEA.
— Chris Spann (@cs87) April 7, 2013
That felt good; I'll not lie.
Ornstein and Smough was the closest I have come to giving up on Dark Souls. For the longest time I simply couldn't see a way through, so I was delighted to finally see that obstacle fall. I sent messages to both of the players that helped me out on PSN, which is the first time I've ever used the message service for anything other than receiving poorly written invective following FIFA games or trying to organise FIFA games with work colleagues.
That Dark Souls engenders such an extreme range of emotions is one of its strongest points: For hours I was so, so close to kicking the game out of an open window, yet the moment this battle was over, I couldn't wait to continue exploring - for my quest to continue. I've never experienced anything like it before.
Dark Souls, you are a fucking majestic game. You are my Everest, and my true video gaming love.
6 comments:
Man... Chris, your blog is really starting to make me want to give Dark Souls another shot, even if the logical side of my brain knows I'll just immediately give up on it again after an hour or so of repeatedly dying every two minutes.
You should probably stream your playthrough (in many, many parts) so I can stare at the screen whilst holding my PS3 controller in my hands and virtually trick myself into believing that I'm the one who's determined enough to play through Dark Souls.
Anyway, I'm glad you're keeping this blog updated even if I've only ever played about an hour of Dark Souls. It's very well written and incredibly entertaining. ;)
Congrats Dude. You have been promoted to the next level of Dark Souls.
You will complete the game now. Pre-Ornstein and Smough, any player could drop out. Post-O&S, there's too much blood, swear and tears gone into it to drop out now.
You have the Lordvessel. Lordran is your oyster now. It's all change.
Um... Estus heals phantoms?!
That's news to me and I've beaten the game twice. And finished the DLC. Gaah!
:(
^ Imagine that is in capital letters, to add emphasis to my disappointment re: lack of updates to this blog.
Spann, I am reading your Dark Souls blog because I love Dark Souls now and I didn't read it last year because I didn't want to spoil Dark Souls.
I am sad that your blog doesn't go all the way to the end of the game. I want to read your speculations on stuff after the Firesage! (Who, incidentally, I found surprisingly easy... I think my character build just happened to be perfect for killing him. Plus I'd already done the other Asylum Demon, so I had had practice.)
Ornstein and Smough were utterly maddening, though. I eventually got to the point of just fighting them solo to get some practice, because I could never find any human players to join me (played on PC, summoning people in is apparently extremely difficult). On one such suicide practice run, I was a little surprised to find myself doing pretty well. And... and then I killed them both.
I was in a state of disbelief to be honest. First time I've done an actual non-ironic fist pump and yelled "yes!" whilst playing a single player game in... ever?
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