Dark Souls
Dark Souls is mainly a game about exploration. It’s also an extremely punishing game with mechanics that initially feel cheap and not fully fleshed out. It demands thoughtfulness in your approach and an ability to learn from your mistakes.
However, when you do come to terms with how the game wants you play and experience its world, it becomes nothing short of a masterpiece.
On paper, the similarities between Dark Souls and Game of Thrones are quite plentiful.
Things such as the presence of dragons, undead foes to dispatch, mysterious NPCs that will confuse and surprise you, and the focus on knights and medieval mythology all make up a thrilling yet somber experience.
The game also has a boss called the Great Grey Wolf Sif (a giant wolf found in the Darkroot Garden) which reminds me a lot of Ghost the direwolf from Game of Thrones.
What makes Dark Souls stand out from its contemporaries, however, is its emphasis on discovery. In Dark Souls you don’t have a map to refer to and the game doesn’t explicitly say where you need to go.
This can be very troubling at the beginning when you aren’t sure what the game is asking of you and when it’s punishing you left and right during its combat.
Dark Souls also doesn’t really let on as to what’s happening within its world. In order to fully understand what’s happening, many will have to look elsewhere, such as online forums in order to piece together snippets of information that all add to the lore of this universe.
Like Game of Thrones, players dedicated to learning all the intricacies of the story will find much to love in Dark Souls as its world is as equally fascinating as it is terrifying.
