Dark Souls III: The Ringed City
From Software – PS4, Windows, Xbox One
When loading up The Ringed City, an add-on for Dark Souls III that’s supposedly the final part of the series to ever be released, it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence when the game deposits you in an area actually called “The Dreg Heap”. You get the the idea that From Software, after three games and their attendant expansions, may have finally run out of steam.
And, in a certain way, the experience of running through the opening of The Ringed City does feel a bit like a half-hearted greatest hits compilation. Mobs of weak enemies precede a giant, void-faced creature ambushing you from above with an enormous sword, which then leads to some useful items nestled in a ruined castle’s ramparts. In fairness, some of the architectural designs seem to intentionally hark back to previous games, with the way they’re presented, twisted and broken, giving the impression that the series is collapsing in on itself. It’s a neat twist, but it works better visually than in play: there’s pretty much just a straight-line gauntlet, with little exploration.
After the scene-setting, though, things open up more in a variation on that classic Souls location type, the toxic swamp. It’s here that The Ringed City starts to assert its own identity a little more, with some indestructible sentry enemies that must be avoided until you can reach and kill the creatures controlling them. Dodging their fire mandates a quicker pace than is usual for Dark Souls, and helps counter the business-as-usual feeling.
It also sets up something of a theme, with several other instances requiring you to deal with enemies’ proxies before you can actually get to them. A memorable encounter with a horde of ghostly archers can draw forth some particularly colourful language from players (well, me, anyway). Indeed, the entire Ringed City itself is a series of ever-deepening layers, like the circles of hell, that are designed to keep you from a princess sitting at the bottom of the world, who is keeping existence intact.
The entire Dark Souls series has told the miserable story of generations trying to endlessly beat back entropy and prolong their decaying world. The Ringed City finally offers a vision for the endpoint of that struggle, one full of dust and despair. Oh, and cool swords and fights and stuff. In other words, a fitting end.
Dominique Pamplemousse 2 (Squinky – Linux, Mac, Windows)
Despite music games having gone through a surprisingly lengthy golden age of SingStars and Guitar Heroes, the video game musical is a surprisingly under-explored concept. Aside from PaRappa’s offbeat adventures twenty-odd years ago, and some exuberant jukebox efforts from the Ouendan cheerleaders, characters in games have had little occasion to articulate themselves through song. It’s because of this absence that Dominique Pamplemousse, a goggle-eyed private detective who clearly lacks any formal vocal training, has become an unlikely mascot for an entire genre.
Going by its full title, Dominique Pamplemousse and Dominique Pamplemousse in “Combinatorial Explosion!”, the game obviously doesn’t lack for ambition. The original 2013 Pamplemousse game used the old trick of having multiple endings determined by player choice, and now the follow-up seems determined to honour whatever choice players consider as being canonical. Uh, sort of. The two endings have now resulted in two Dominiques, and now both are locked in an argument over existential supremacy.
What this really means in practical terms is harmonisation! Excellent! While the last game mostly focused on solos, and the odd bit of conversation in verse, Combinatorial Explosion frequently has the Dominiques singing together, with some further timline trickery opening up opportunities for barbershop. It’s actually not surprising that it took until the sequel for group singing to feature, seeing as the entire game is a one-man project, with voices for every character performed by the same person. This may well be the most lo-fi musical around, but its amateurishness is more delightful than disappointing.
It is a slight let-down that the game leaves behind the point-and-click ideas of its predecessor for a more straightforward dialogue-driven story, but let’s face it: this is really just a pretense for a Broadway adaptation angling for some of that Hamilton dough!
Like a Boss
The Challenge – The Witness
The Witness is full of memorable puzzles, some notable for their difficulty, some for their inventiveness, but none are quite as impressive as the Challenge. Less a series of puzzles than a pure test of focus and concentration, the Challenge is a time trial that both summarises and subverts the entire game. Lots of good puzzles will stay with you because of their cleverness. The Challenge stays with you because its images are burned in to your retinas.
Words: Leo Devlin
