Correction: There was actually 88 bosses in the Dark Souls trilogy. I did still technically beat everything, but I realize I miscounted. Guess that'll show me for not double checking my sources.
83 bosses later, and I'm at the end of the Dark Souls trilogy. It feels great. And the Ringed City, even greater! An exciting barrage of phenomenal set pieces and one of the coolest dragon fights and an epic final boss that sends off this trilogy phenomenally well. I really can't think of much I hated about the Ringed City save for the Judicators and the Ringed Knights being a source of frustration, and the ending piece being a lil anticlimactic despite the great setup. Buckle up, cuz this is my longest writeup yet!
Ringed City is the main course after the appetizer of Ashes of Ariandel. And where do I begin? As soon as you make your way through the Dreg Heap, these monstrous crawling creatures are already trying to bite at your ankles for heavy damage, two are casting spells at you. But what's that? An item on a corpse? Seems suspicious. And it is, as you're sent falling into a church, and you don't take fall damage! They use this a few times before you make your way through, making sure to comb the land for that sweet +3 Ring of Steel Protection and the +3 Covetus Silver Serpent Ring, cuz you're gonna need em up ahead. With this angelic enemy blasting down at ya, and the host not being too far away, you'd best take it out before you make another plunge.
Going deeper past the Heap you end up in... Earthen Peak? That's right, a Dark Souls 2 area has appeared, and it. Is. Splendid! The DLC's inevitable swamp area happens to be particularly fun, given you're equipped to deal with Toxic. But it's a pretty safe run over to the next segment. Past that toxic bog is a hole that takes you down to the first boss, an extremely easy duo boss - Demon in Pain and Demon from Below. But they then transform into The Demon Prince! Who I finished with 3 estus to spare!
In between those areas, you can run into an NPC, an amnesiac by the name of Lapp. There's something off about the guy, the way he makes you delve through dangerous areas on his second and third appearances, but he seems nice enough.
After being whisked away by your gargoyle pals to the titular city, things start off crazy. A Judicator brings the pain immediately, summoning countless archers and requiring you to go around and climb a ladder to beat him down. If only they didn't respawn. Plowing your way through the area, that bonfire is a sign of relief, until you realize there's hollows that can curse ya! And you bump into more Ringed Knights, and those Harald Legion Knights that live in the DLC's other, non-poisonous swamp.
It's within the non-poisoned swamp, after chatting it up with a lady behind a door that tells me to put down a dragon that I run into another bonfire! The swamp has another dreaded Judicator, a few Ringed Knights on a tower, some clerics that are a pain in the arse sometimes with their circles that target you. There's even a Iron Dragonslayer, Diet Diet Diet Ornstein, to fight! After I spent some time walking around, I got to help Lapp out with finding this purging monument so he'll remember who he is! Or so I think.
Doing this puzzle was a bit frustrating, as you find a shortcut to open the door near that bonfire. Something behind that door is a puzzle asking you to show your humanity. You've to go into the swamp, hope you either have Chameleon or White Branches, and cross your fingers you transform into a humanity sprite. Then sloooooooowly move back to that shortcut. If you don't piss off the local walking locust creatures, you've done good! A ladder comes down, you deal with two Ringed Knights (one with a spear) and a Judicator, then make your way to a ladder to find the Purging Monument.
Moving towards the next area, a dragon swoops through and starts setting things ablaze! Heading into a cave, you think you're safe. You've exhausted Lapp's dialogue, you've picked up plenty of rings and other trinkets along the way, heading to the right within this tower you'll realize Lapp ain't exactly who he seems... what's that? Patches squat? And he wants me to go outside to check out some treasure down below? OH, PATCHES, YOU SON OF A-
How's that guy get around? Creighton showed up in DS3 as an invader, but Patches somehow has lived since the very beginning. Think I recall a buddy telling me he was even in Armored Core well before Demon's Souls. Getting trolled by Patches outta the way, I moved onto the next area where I'd a very important date with the dragon. Midir, Shira said his name was! After a brief exchange of steel to its tanky face and claws, Midir retreats and I run off into a between space that hosts an elevator to the first Ringed City bonfire, but more importantly, a place to go finish the job with Midir.
Midir's bar none the best of the dragons in any Souls game. Kalameet was exceptionally tanky and rough, Sinh was a pain in the ass, Midir is a pain but surprisingly fun to learn and master. The tankiness of Kalameet, the speed of Sinh thrown into a blender to make a surprisingly great dragon boss battle! He took the most attempts out of any boss in this DLC, but I could feel the progress with each attack, leading to that cathartic riposte and last few swings that sent Midir to his grave. And I get a Titanite Slab for my efforts!
Defeating Midir filled me with such excitement, I went to that church in the distance, picking up these wicked Ringed Knight dual greatswords after duking it out with their wielder. Despite a Judicator telling me not to go in, I open the doors and summon... Patches? Fuck it we ballin. Patches and I go through a fog wall and face Halflight, the Spear of the Church. She wasn't a superbly difficult battle, though she took a bit long due to the summoning buddy shtick. After getting some help from Patches, I move forward and wake the sleeping princess up at the top of the tower... only to be taken to a deserted land where I fought Gael.
Gael's great. He only took me two tries, but learning the fight was only half the fun. His moveset is insanely varied, he even pulls out a damned Avelyn and uses lightning discs that come back to him like boomerangs! I was at the edge of my seat on my second attempt, finishing at no estus and landing one of the most cathartic finishing blows of all. Then, with the Blood of the Dark Soul on hand, I made my way back to Firelink, made my final level ups, and headed to Ariandel to talk with that minor NPC who says she'll paint me a pretty land. I'll... make sure she doesn't know I duked it out with her uncle and won. The blood came from somewhere else, that's my excuse!
Dark Souls 3 divides me. Souls 2 was a great, if sometimes overly risky leap with some mechanics a lot of people didn't gel with. 3 is a mixed bag that was mostly enjoyable, if very stingy with Souls and Titanite, sometimes underwhelming in a few areas, and lacking in the buildcrafting that Souls 2 had plenty of. Despite the mixed feelings, Ringed City turned out to be the one true highlight of my nearly 60 hour romp, and it's well worth the price of admission for how much of a stunning, if slightly anticlimactic conclusion it is to the trilogy. To those that read these last 3 months of rambles, thanks. It's been a long journey, but I'm very content with long games for at least a few months now. Time to unwind, go back to thieving in Sly 2, knock out other games that aren't extremely long RPGs. I need it!
Ashes of Ariandel can be described in a sentence:
"I beat this lousy piece of fanservice and all I got is a cool scythe and a PvP arena"
There, those are my thoughts... Okaaaay, I'll go into detail! Getting into this DLC happens really early. An NPC happens to have a scrap of the painting and you get sucked into it ala the Painted World from Dark Souls 1. This area is messy, for lack of a better word. Heavy hitting Millwood Knights, these crazy clawed creatures, Corvians. Fuck Corvians! There's so much frustration packed into what is essentially a super linear DLC that involves you finding a crank to pull that opens up the main boss of the DLC. Unfortunately, said boss is a rough one.
Sister Friede is the eptiome of difficulty =/= fun. As nice as it was to learn her, the fight was ultimately dreadful. Getting hit with that third phase after you complete the chaotic second featuring Father Ariandel and his giant bowl of liquid cheese, you're thrust into panic when Friede begins standing up and dark flames sprout from her body! When I finished the fight all I could think was, "Oh thank GOD." unlike any other boss before it.
But the journey doesn't end there. After foreshadowing into the next DLC, taking a ladder up to see a painter at work, I hit the side of a bridge and slide down into the Depths of the Painting. While it seemed scary at first with the colossal confrontational cold crustaceans, the boss - or should I say- PvP arena keeper was off to the right, away from them. And said fight was pretty underwhelming. Slim guy with a cool shield, then a giant wolf to smack the crap out of after hitting his friend down to a certain pool of health. After slaying the big wolf and the guy, I get... Champion's Bones.
All this gets you is a PvP arena, if you want to do Dark Souls 3 PvP. Aside that, the only other thing I picked up in Firelink is Friede's Scythe with her soul, which'll be saved for a DEX character in another playthrough. After this, I set on to the Dreg Heap, and I'll fill ya all in on how that went once I finish!
Woof, what a journey, y'all. After 2 months, my time with the base game of Dark Souls 3 has finally reached its end. Let me tell ya all about what ol' Antihero encountered in his final few hours.
Heading on into Lothric Castle, the area was pretty straightforward. There were some heavy hitters, but at the end of it all, I got to take on the Dragonslayer for a third time. Whatever happened to that big lug of an Executioner? Guess he wasn't cool enough to make into a boss the way DS2 had the Old Dragonslayer and this one the Dragonslayer Armor. After a few attempts, he fell pretty quickly. After lighting a bonfire and walking a short way to another, fulfilling a few pieces of side content nearing their resolution, I headed into the Grand Archives.
Filled to the brim with those tiny Thralls, but they fell to a few swings of my trusty Wolf Knight's Greatsword. Climbing this place was a bit bothersome, the gargoyles didn't quite like me, and I got attacked by some really mean NPCs akin to the forest gank fellas in 1. But regardless, I powered through, finding an elevator back to the bonfire near the start of the area. Finally, I made my way to the top of the place where the penultimate boss awaited - two princes. Nay, not the infectious pop rock song from 1991. Rather, one kneels before you to swing a hulking sword, the other one piggybacking after his brother falls once - being some sorta crazy callback to the Throne Watcher and Defender. Nothing much to say here outside of making sure you beat the Younger Prince Lothric down so the Elder can't be revived.
With the Twin Lothrics beaten, I took back to Firelink, but not before resolving the Sirris and Leonhard questlines, the latter of which I needed to wait for the former to die to even continue. With the Black Eye Orb in my possession, I defeat Leonhard and end that quest line, bringing my time with DS3's base game to one more task: putting the ashes of Lothric upon his throne to bring me to endgame.
Finally, my journey is close to ending. Taking a kneel at the bonfire as per the Fire Keeper's request, I teleport to... The Kiln of the First Flame? Then use another bonfire to get to the main arena where it's time to face the Soul of Cinder.
Every other Lord of Cinder has sorta been a letdown. Usually a gimmick boss of some sort, or a pushover like Aldrich. Soul of Cinder? Now this guy ain't a joke. He took me an attempt, but went down rather easily once I got him. The real challenge comes from the critical feels strike of hearing that 'plin plin plon' as phase 2 kicks in. My older brother watching over me knew full well what to expect as I excitedly said, "I BEAT HIM ON MY FIRST TRY!" only to see him transform and hear those notes. A horrified, but determined Anti continued on, dodging some of the most intense flame-powered swings I'd ever seen. Even if I drank all my Estus, the fact I was able to knock 'em out in a go made me feel so proud of myself. But with that, the Age of Fire was about to come to an end.
After two games, I decided to let darkness come down upon the Kingdom of Lothric. And with that, my journey through the base game of the Souls trilogy comes to an end. But I'm not done yet. There's 2 DLCs remaining, and I'm determined to knock those out. I've come pretty far, and I'm just about ready to wrap up this long journey I started back in November with Dark Souls Remastered. I don't think 13 year old Antihero really expected himself to fall in love with the series after the efforts of playing the Xbox 360 release all these years ago, but with age comes patience and appreciation for the things you couldn't in your youth. And Dark Souls sure as hell means a lot to me, thinking about what games I've played before and after.