Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin Previews, Interviews

We have rounded up a number of previews and interviews for Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin, a sort of remaster and director’s cut for From Software’s action-RPG sequel, mostly aimed at PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC owners that have DX11-compatible hardware (there’s also a release for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, but it’s essentially a compilation of the content released so far). In total, about an hour and a half worth of footage for the title has been made available since we last checked, thanks to some particularly meaty video previews that showcase the changes in terms of visuals and enemy and item placement.

First, a look at PlayStation Access’ video preview, split between Heide’s Tower of Flame and No-Man’s Wharf:

Then, I’m going to embed GameSpot’s own video, in which Kevin VanOrd and Mary Kish spend most of their time in No-Man’s Wharf:

GameZone also has a short preview, in write-up form this time:

However, it won’t necessarily be the graphics dropping your jaw in this new version of Dark Souls II. The best comparison I can make here is to compare Scholar of the First Sin to the Resident Evil: Director’s Cut. The Director’s Cut took the same characters, same level design, same enemies — basically the same game — and swapped around item locations and completion paths. THIS is essentially what Scholar of the First Sin is about. It allows those who know Dark Souls II like the back of their hand to play what appears to be the same game they know while not playing the same game they know at all. In this case, appearances are quite deceiving.

There is nothing like a personal story to back this claim. During my experience playing, I was handed the controller right at the entrance of Heide’s Tower from Majula. First off, the stone giant’s aggro is much larger. It attacked me at the bonfire unexpectedly. Secondly, there are Heide Knights everywhere. If you kill them they even respawn which is totally foreign to how they normally function. Some even stand up and attack you as you get close which is ALSO not how they normally behave. Wanting to explore more of this new content, I just started to run; my goal to check out the Old Dragonslayer fight. Nope! On that platform before the drawbridge was a giant red dragon. So yea, I died. It was run into the fire breath attack (which I chose) or fall to the army dudes chasing me. So yea, there’s looooots different in this version.

Gamasutra’s Christian Nutt chatted with global producer Atsuo Yoshimura, who didn’t even attempt to dodge the controversy stemmed by the change in direction and team from the original game before talking about the Scholar of the First Sin additions and changes:

People really liked the original game, and it’s clear that Dark Souls II is in some ways a response to what people like about the franchise. Can you tell me how you’ve interpreted feedback from the fans?

Atsuo Yoshimura: We know that some fans are saying that this is not the real Dark Souls because Miyazaki-san is not involved in the actual development, blah, blah, blah. The answer is — to me, it’s no. It’s sharing the same DNA. It’s from the same franchise.

And although Miyazaki-san is not the director of the game, his title — when you see it in the credits, his title is “supervisor,” but I believe he’s more than that. Because every time we make changes to the game, we always ask him not for his approval, but his comments, and we try to maintain the time the core element, sticking with the original idea that Miyazaki-has come up with, for Dark Souls II.

I didn’t necessarily expect you to answer the question that way! Is that something that stuck out in your mind when you heard people reacting? How do you take it, when you hear these kinds of things?

AY: As expected! It always happens. It’s not the case only for the Dark Souls franchise.

You put out the first version of Dark Souls II, and people seem to like it. It’s been embraced. Now, you’re moving into Scholar of the First Sin. How do you feel about how the community feels about the game, and how you’re doing now?

AY: It’s been awhile. They’re enjoying it. We really keep an eye on all those online forums out there, and we keep an eye on all the suggestions and questions from the fans. I know there are certain demands about the game features, and we try to reflect all of those suggestions — as long as they’re not against our philosophy of development on the Dark Souls franchise.

The Scholar of the First Sin, we believe this is the answers to their questions and suggestions, at least at this moment. Even the team is not 100 percent satisfied with what they have created previously. That’s why we’ve created this game from the director’s cut perspective. Because in the past there were some restrictions, from the various perspectives. And this answers to all the questions and suggestions from fans.

Finally, Miguel Concepcion posted around 15 minutes of gameplay footage captured from the PlayStation 4 version of the game on his YouTube channel. The footage dates back to the first press event for the title, but it’s still well worth watching: