Dark Souls III

Here's a link to some info about the next installment. The combat is being somewhat overhauled and its stated in the article that the greatsword combat is directly inspired by Guts. Many people have talked about Berserk's influence on the series but this is pretty great to hear.
http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/17/8798005/dark-souls-3-e3-2015
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
To be more explicit, Miyazaki said one of the two greatsword "sword arts" is reminiscent of Guts. Fast and powerful blows. And what he was describing about the "ready state" reminded me of Guts' big swing against Zodd in Vol 5.
 
WOW. I guess all my recent practice with the greatsword will be useless!

However that beast is still great fun in Dark Souls 2. That's exactly what my first character centered around (her name was Casca, I'm lame). I only retired it to take up Dual Axe Power Stance which eventually led to the Vanquisher's Seal.

Really can't articulate how excited I am for this game, easily the best reveal at E3 for me. I've had my issues with From in the past and concerning Bloodborne but damn the games are too good! It'll be a welcome addition (i hope) with the new combat 'arts'.

Side note: I introduced my twin bro to the movies, told him the series may have inspired the Souls series. He was interested and watched them, now he's obsessed and owns more volumes than I. But I just linked him this article, maybe I'll post an update :)
 
I cant wait for this game! I wish Mitazaki and Miura would just collaborate and make a berserk game. If that happened I would just assume that I was dead and in haven.
 

Walter

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GiantSword Mufasa said:
I cant wait for this game! I wish Mitazaki and Miura would just collaborate and make a berserk game. If that happened I would just assume that I was dead and in haven.

I don't think the world of Berserk makes much sense for an action-RPG.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
GiantSword Mufasa said:
besides being like the old hack and slash dream cast and ps2 game, what do you see it as?

Berserk is story and character driven. The appeal of a Berserk game is to play as a known character, i.e. Guts. Yet because of the fact Berserk is story-driven, there is very little leeway in how a game can work while remaining respectful of the original material. In fact, the two possible ways to do it have already been done: have Miura write a side-story specifically for the game, or have the game retell the manga's events while adapting them to the game format.

The main interest of a game like Dark Souls is to explore and eventually conquer an unknown and lethal world as a weak but resourceful and versatile nobody, ending up as the ruler of all. It couldn't possibly work with Berserk because it would have to break the established rules of the Berserk world in order to exist. As for what a Berserk game could be? A number of things, if done intelligently, but the compromises necessary would probably not be worth it.

In my opinion, the Dreamcast game was actually really great for its time. Although its gameplay was somewhat unsatisfactory, it's a great example of how a game can really bring something to a series instead of being purely derivative.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
GiantSword Mufasa said:
besides being like the old hack and slash dream cast and ps2 game, what do you see it as?

It's actually something I've put a lot of thought into. With the introduction of Fantasia, I think it might be possible to create a Berserk RPG set on the fringes of the world as we've been shown it, focusing on humans surviving by fighting through astral creatures. But in a way that (somehow) doesn't upset the predefined balance of power in the main series. However, it absolutely wouldn't make sense as a Souls-type game.

The major problem with that notion is that eventually you would expect the combat to scale up in difficulty, and thus the player character would encounter apostles. And what then...? The nameless hero takes down 5-10 apostles in one-on-one combat? It'd be apocryphal. Who is this character? And how would they fit in the scope of the Berserk world?

Games are about empowerment, but there's a hard wall in Berserk's universe about how much a human can accomplish. It's the basic premise of the series.

Now, if you make the protagonist an APOSTLE, suddenly things get interesting :zodd: but then, presuming the game is reflecting the Berserk world properly, battles would become too easy.
 
Walter nailed it right on the head, though I doubt we get anything that well laid out in a game. I'm very interested to see if old whats his face eventually runs with the berserk option.
 
Walter said:
It's actually something I've put a lot of thought into. With the introduction of Fantasia, I think it might be possible to create a Berserk RPG set on the fringes of the world as we've been shown it, focusing on humans surviving by fighting through astral creatures. But in a way that (somehow) doesn't upset the predefined balance of power in the main series. However, it absolutely wouldn't make sense as a Souls-type game.

The major problem with that notion is that eventually you would expect the combat to scale up in difficulty, and thus the player character would encounter apostles. And what then...? The nameless hero takes down 5-10 apostles in one-on-one combat? It'd be apocryphal. Who is this character? And how would they fit in the scope of the Berserk world?

Games are about empowerment, but there's a hard wall in Berserk's universe about how much a human can accomplish. It's the basic premise of the series.

Now, if you make the protagonist an APOSTLE, suddenly things get interesting :zodd: but then, presuming the game is reflecting the Berserk world properly, battles would become too easy.

I defiantly agree with walter and az, what I see is more the graphical style of a souls game, like that dark gritty 3d world that we have come to love adapted to the berserk story.
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
I think a Berserk game in the same vein as Dark Souls could work, with a number of liberties taken. It would have to be extremely minimalistic and as Walter said, take place in far off locations within the Berserk world. You'd most likely want to avoid most things related to Berserks story and characters, including Apostles for the most part. It would have to be so far removed from so much of the Berserk world of the manga that it would hardly be recognized to be in the same universe at all. Which of course defeats the purpose for the most part. It would be a Berserk game in name only really.

Still though, it's fun to think about. In a post Fantasia world the player could assume a nameless protagonist and battle countless fantastic creatures in an array of interesting medieval settings. There's plenty of culture and diversity with magic and monsters to still retain that Berserk connection. Maybe a few subtle references to events and characters from the manga for the fans.

But again, with such restraint it pretty much ends up being another dark fantasy action rpg with a Berserk vibe. And we already have Dark Souls :guts:
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
Sorry for the double post but my Game Informer magazine that just came in has it's main story about Dark Souls 3 and I was delighted to see Berserk mentioned several times throughout. They also mention a Guts style of sword combat, like mentioned at the top of the thread. It's great seeing how the Berserk influence in the souls games has become knowledge. Can't help but think it's good publicity for my favorite manga.
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
Walter said:
Could you be more specific?

I was going to take some pics but I didn't have time this morning. I was mainly skimming through the article but when I have time I'll definitely read the whole thing and be more specific. There's an interview with Mitazaki and he mentions Berserk, ofourse. He also mentioned Legolas from The Lord of the Rings movies as a reference for something bow and arrow related. I get specifics later.
 
Is anyone here hoping for a berserker armor knight type boss?

I have made up a whole backstory pretty much in hopes that miyazaki has somehow read my mind and im sure everyone and anyone who plays DS and also enjoys Berserk. But seriously.. Sorry if this is dead now. I just want to hear opinions and what you'd like to see. It's all exciting.
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
Blkswrdsmn said:
Is anyone here hoping for a berserker armor knight type boss?

I have made up a whole backstory pretty much in hopes that miyazaki has somehow read my mind and im sure everyone and anyone who plays DS and also enjoys Berserk. But seriously.. Sorry if this is dead now. I just want to hear opinions and what you'd like to see. It's all exciting.

Shit man, I keep forgetting to update this based on the Gameinformer issue, but the front page for the Dark Souls 3 article has guy in full armor that's somewhat similar to Guts in full berserk armor rampage mode.

tufuF4T.jpg


A shot of it in action.

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Some stuff mentioning Berserk

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8vdl8Bs.jpg
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Thanks for sharing. Are there no references to Berserk beyond the battle arts thing? Because we knew that since E3.
 

MASTER-AMIR

Guts The Black Swordsman
In interview which has been published by Gamespot made by Hidetaka Miyazaki :

Q:You draw quite heavily on Berserk and have said repeatedly that you're a big fan of it. What else is in your well of inspiration?

A:The roots of my fantasy ideas are in Sorcery, by Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson, the adventure game books.

He is big fan of berserk :ubik: WoW

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/dark-souls-3-interview-it-wouldnt-be-right-to-cont/1100-6432425/
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Thanks for sharing! The most interesting part of the interview is the headline: "It Wouldn’t Be Right to Continue Creating Souls."

Furthermore:

"I just believe that [moving on] is necessary in order for players to continue enjoying our games. We have to keep creating quality games and be aggressive about doing new things."
Completely agree :void:

"Dark Souls 3 will mark the last game where the development project began before I became president."

That makes it sound like he wouldn't have greenlit this if he were president at the time.

MASTER-AMIR said:
In interview which has been published by Gamespot made by Hidetaka Miyazaki :

Q:You draw quite heavily on Berserk and have said repeatedly that you're a big fan of it. What else is in your well of inspiration?

A:The roots of my fantasy ideas are in Sorcery, by Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson, the adventure game books.

He is big fan of berserk :ubik: WoW

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/dark-souls-3-interview-it-wouldnt-be-right-to-cont/1100-6432425/

The interviewer inserted that as part of the question.

I know you aren't claiming so here, but hundreds of Berserk/DS fans have claimed for years that Miyazaki was "greatly influenced" by Berserk. But whenever I ask for a reference to an interview where he says so, I get silence in response. I know his interviews pretty well. He has expressed a familiarity with it, like thinking the Catarina Armor set reminded him of Bazuso, and the greatsword art reminds him of Guts -- but that's it. Those adventure game books are the ones he regularly points to as his influences.

I recognize this makes me sound a little crazy... But the reason for my objection to that line of reasoning is that too often people say the Souls series is "basically Berserk the video game" or any other variation of this hyperbole. But as much as I love Berserk, that discredits the Souls series. There's a lot more going on in those games than rote Berserk references. Instead, I can think of maybe 3-4 things that were probably influenced by Berserk. The entirety of the rest of the series' concepts come from other fantasy ideas or new ideas.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
I recognize this makes me sound a little crazy... But the reason for my objection to that line of reasoning is that too often people say the Souls series is "basically Berserk the video game" or any other variation of this hyperbole. But as much as I love Berserk, that discredits the Souls series. There's a lot more going on in those games than rote Berserk references. Instead, I can think of maybe 3-4 things that were probably influenced by Berserk. The entirety of the rest of the series' concepts come from other fantasy ideas or new ideas.

Plus, let's give the credit where it's really due: Final Fantasy VII is clearly the inspiration behind them both! :iva:

Yeah, I don't have a strong enough feeling about the Souls series to be concerned for its integrity, but as a more detached observer it doesn't look like much more than a few superficial references and coincidences or generalities you'd see in most dark fantasy series, some inspired by Berserk, but not necessarily directly (it's hard to think of a fantasy game that doesn't have a Dragon Slayer variant at this point, but that's because it's become iconic even for those that don't know where it originated). It just seems like typical Internet conventional wisdom proliferating a thin assertion as an obvious fact (knowledgeable Berserk fans know that pain all too well =).
 
As a huge fan of Miyazaki and his works, having spent hundreds of hours in every one of his games, I can't wait for Dark Souls III :)

Walter said:
Thanks for sharing! The most interesting part of the interview is the headline: "It Wouldn’t Be Right to Continue Creating Souls."

Furthermore:

Completely agree :void:

That makes it sound like he wouldn't have greenlit this if he were president at the time.

The interviewer inserted that as part of the question.

I know you aren't claiming so here, but hundreds of Berserk/DS fans have claimed for years that Miyazaki was "greatly influenced" by Berserk. But whenever I ask for a reference to an interview where he says so, I get silence in response. I know his interviews pretty well. He has expressed a familiarity with it, like thinking the Catarina Armor set reminded him of Bazuso, and the greatsword art reminds him of Guts -- but that's it. Those adventure game books are the ones he regularly points to as his influences.

I recognize this makes me sound a little crazy... But the reason for my objection to that line of reasoning is that too often people say the Souls series is "basically Berserk the video game" or any other variation of this hyperbole. But as much as I love Berserk, that discredits the Souls series. There's a lot more going on in those games than rote Berserk references. Instead, I can think of maybe 3-4 things that were probably influenced by Berserk. The entirety of the rest of the series' concepts come from other fantasy ideas or new ideas.

Well the interviewer did say that Miyazaki said that he was a big fan (I believe a similar question was also asked in another Gamespot interview), and the man didn't deny it. Of course, however, saying that Miyazaki is a fan of Berserk and saying that he borrowed heavily from it (or in other words that the Souls series is basically Berserk games) are two different things entirely. The latter is a hyperbole that is not only nonsensical, but also rude to Miyazaki and his team.
 
Did you see the last trailer? Some characters really made me think of Berserk!

If you haven't seen it yet, here it is : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5rljUBxfIE
 
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