Dark Souls II First Gameplay Footage

IGN has an exclusive 12-minute demo of Dark Souls II with commentary from director Yui Tanimura and global producer from Namco Bandai Tak Miyazoe. While much is still under wrap, one thing this footage makes clear is that Dark Souls II won’t be a massive overhaul of the series, but rather tries to improve on the original’s extremely solid foundation. The lighting engine in particular looks much improved, and the location shown was very reminiscent of Anor Londo in parts and the Undead Asylum in others.

A lot of the design is still under wraps, but so far it doesn’t look like the streamlined “accessible” experience many were fearing, which is really good for fans of the series.

Update: The folks at IGN have also uploaded a Q&A with the director of the game. A short summary:

• elements will be carried from Dark Souls so old players should feel comfortable
• dragons are a key element to the story of the game
• storytelling will be handled in a way similar to the original (cryptic and with much left to the imagination)
• graphics have been improved to help the players “dive deep into the world”
• the “satisfaction” in overcoming challenges will be preserved, the focus is to emphasize the game’s core concepts rather than adding features for new players
• they’re attempting to incorporate feedback on the UI to make it better in terms of usability
• the combat system will be similar to Dark Souls, the devs are focusing on expressing natural motion and are using motion capture to accomplish this goal

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