Not only Zack, Ben, and the others—even regular players who had cleared Dark Souls: Age of Fire, or veterans who had finished several cycles, or the hardcore ones who had done countless playthroughs and built perfect characters—
They all looked at the brand-new Death Mode. They knew it would be hard, but still thought they could handle it.
But after actually trying it, many of them realized…
The name really fit. It truly was Death Mode!
Bosses in their prime were terrifying beyond words!
They brought players back to the raw, original kind of fun.
Artorias at full strength, wielding his greatsword and his massive shield, was utterly terrifying.
Then there was Yhorm the Giant from the previous game. He still kept his gimmick—Storm Ruler could deal massive damage to him.
But there was a catch.
In multiplayer, only one Storm Ruler could be brought.
Why?
Haven't you watched the story?
There are only two Storm Rulers in total. One with Onion Knight, and the other by Yhorm's throne.
And in Death Mode, players faced Yhorm at his peak.
At this time, Yhorm hadn't lost his mind to the Abyss from seeing his people die.
So of course, along with his terrifying giant blade, he still had the massive shield that had been with him for ages.
Meaning—in Death Mode, Yhorm wasn't a mindless beast, but a giant king with both sword and shield.
Even Storm Ruler's blasts could be blocked by his shield.
So the only way to deal heavy damage was to find Yhorm's openings and strike around his shield.
The only bit of relief for players was that, because of his size, Yhorm's movements were slower compared to other bosses.
But then came the new version of Gwyn. In Death Mode, players finally saw what it meant for Gwyn—the First Lord—to be the strongest fighter in Dark Souls.
His Sunlight Spear—if it hit you, it was instant death.
It was the only true one-hit kill move in Death Mode.
(Of course, that doesn't count the cases where players strip naked and fight bosses like that.)
Still, while powerful, the wind-up for Sunlight Spear was obvious, so with enough attention it could be dodged.
What really broke countless players was that prime Gwyn was completely different from the hollowed Lord of Cinder Gwyn.
This time, players could not parry Gwyn's attacks at all.
In the older game, many mocked Lord Gwyn as the easiest boss—easier even than the first Taurus Demon.
The main reason was simple: the burned-out Gwyn could be parried.
And in Dark Souls 1, the parry window was much wider than in Dark Souls 3.
Even though Lucas had tweaked some of the numbers, the fact that Gwyn could be parried made his moves too easy to read.
That gave a lot of players the false impression that Lord Gwyn was weak.
But if players aren't allowed to parry Gwyn, the Lord of Cinder, the fight instantly becomes way harder.
And now in Death Mode, not only is Gwyn's AI stronger, but parries are also completely disabled. You could say the difficulty skyrockets.
...
For most regular players, their focus was still on Random Mode.
Although Random Mode already appeared in the previous game, with the new game's open and interconnected map design, the experience was clearly very different.
As for Death Mode?
Many casual players tried it once just to see what it was like, then quickly admitted it wasn't something they could handle.
Random Mode, being more fun and lighthearted, was really made for the average player.
Death Mode, on the other hand, was always meant for hardcore players who wanted the ultimate challenge.
It also served to fulfill some long-standing wishes.
On forums and community boards, many players had expressed regret that they never got to truly experience how strong Gwyn and the gods were at their peak.
Death Mode was made to give them exactly that.
Even though it was brutally hard, plenty of top-tier players were determined to push through and defeat its bosses.
After all, for many veterans, the series' difficulty that once felt overwhelming at first had turned into pure muscle memory after hundreds or even thousands of hours.
With all items and weapons in hand, unless they slipped up and got one-shot, bosses were basically just routine fights.
Some players even went to extremes—like doing a level 1 run against every boss.
Or beating every boss without weapons, just using a shield.
For those players, Death Mode brought back the feeling of what Dark Souls was like the first time: raw, punishing, and thrilling.
And it wasn't just players in one region—gamers overseas were also fired up for Death Mode.
Since it launched worldwide at the same time as Dark Souls: Age of Fire, both speed-kills and first-kills were tracked on global leaderboards.
With the lure of fame and bragging rights, top players everywhere started discussing strategies.
After countless deaths and retries, the best players from both inside and outside the country began to summarize Death Mode's key features and tricks.
For example, even though up to three players could team up to fight a boss, the difficulty varied depending on the boss.
Take Yhorm the Giant from the previous game—many thought he was easier with a three-player team, since one person could focus on charging the Storm Ruler. But it wasn't completely brainless, since the Storm Ruler needed time to charge, and the one using it would attract Yhorm's aggro.
But with the Abyss Watchers, co-op actually made the fight harder, because the number of Watchers scaled with the number of players. The more players in the team, the more Watchers spawned.
And the more people there were, the messier the fight got.
After all, players aren't AI. Even if everyone is skilled, things can go wrong in the chaos of battle.
AI bosses don't make those mistakes—they're programmed perfectly.
So ironically, fighting with more people could actually be tougher.
As players analyzed each boss, they slowly uncovered details about their mechanics and difficulty levels.
On livestream platforms both in and outside the country, progress updates became popular.
One day, an overseas player or team might get a boss down to a sliver of health.
The next day, a top domestic player would push the progress even further.
Both inside and outside the country, everyone was holding their breath, hoping to land the world's first kill.
After all, getting that honor would forever be recorded in Dark Souls history. Just imagine—every Undead who visited Firelink Shrine would see your ID engraved on a stone monument. How amazing would that be?
Of course, plenty of players were also begging Nebula Games on the official forums, communities, and even Lucas' personal blog for one feature:
The ability to change their character's name.
Since Dark Souls is mainly a single-player game with online features, lots of players had picked silly or joke names at the start without thinking twice.
Normally that didn't matter. But now, with Death Mode, if someone actually managed the world's first kill with a ridiculous name, it would be super embarrassing.
What about switching to another save file?
Who could bear to throw away a save file with over a thousand hours of playtime?
Similarly, many players were also asking for a way to redo their character's face.
After all, showing up on the leaderboard with a creepy "ancient god" face would be awkward too.
And it wasn't only hardcore players who felt this way—plenty of casual players shared the same regret.
At the beginning, lots of them just rushed through character creation, picking names like AAA, 123, or ABC, and making random silly faces like "silver twin-tailed old man."
But after playing for a while, they realized the name and look were actually pretty embarrassing—especially in online play.
Yet throwing away a long-played save file was just too hard to do.
So because of this, a lot of players started making petitions.
And their reasons were pretty solid—if in real life you can change your name or even get plastic surgery, why can't you do it in a game!?
For all these passionate requests, Lucas only met players halfway.
As for names, a new exchange item would be added to Firelink Shrine, but each save file could only use it once.
As for faces? What, five chances to adjust them still not enough?
Lucas gave his reply: "The world of Dark Souls doesn't have that kind of advanced technology."
Seeing Lucas's response, plenty of players were speechless.
What do you mean "not that advanced"? Whether it exists or not is totally up to you!
(End of The Chapter)
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