Things I love and hate about… Dark Souls 3

Hate – Fragmented World

I touched on this area briefly and it’s a rather small complaint but while the hub areas presented in the game are often fantastic showcases of interconnected level design I can’t help but miss the true all-encompassing connectivity of the first game. In Dark Souls literally the whole map was connected, while warping between bonfires was unlocked in the later stages you never needed to do so. From Firelink Shrine you could pick a destination and walk there, this is not the case in Dark Souls 3.

Taking a leaf out of Dark Souls 2’s design we are afforded the ability to warp immediately upon reaching the central safe haven. This is not to aid travel but rather to fragment and separate the areas from the get go. You cannot walk from Firelink Shrine to any other destination other than the tutorial area in this instalment and I find that a shame. From Software displays the same ability to have connected sprawling areas in this very game so why the choice was made to break it up into self-contained areas is somewhat baffling to me.