All the games made by FromSoftware are truly revolutionary in one sense or another. However, it takes more than just a few hundred hours of development time to be done with a title, and with a game like Dark Souls 2 that has such high-stakes riding on it, the problems become more unpredictable and harder than one can imagine.
When a game director calls their own project ‘arduous’, you know something went terribly wrong. Dark Souls 2 was the infamous middle child of FromSoftware’s legendary franchise that embraces the Souls formula and had one of the most turbulent development cycles in gaming history.
Dark Souls 2: And why the absence of Hidetaka Miyazaki was a big problem
The biggest red flag for Dark Souls 2’s development was the absence of Hidetaka Miyazaki, the genius behind Demon’s Souls and the first Dark Souls. While Miyazaki moved on to direct Bloodborne, FromSoftware then chose a new duo: Tomohiro Shibuya and Yui Tanimura, to direct the sequel.
Directing Dark Souls 2 was a big deal, mostly because it was supposed to live up to every fan’s hype and expectations that can usually only be fulfilled by Miyazaki and nobody else. Talking about what a challenge it was developing the game, Yui Tanimura revealed the following in an interview, translated via Barnard Translations.
We had to decide what to do with the designs and maps that had been created up to that point. Ideally we’d start again from scratch but of course we were under time constraints so instead, we had to figure out how to repurpose the designs in our newly reimagined game. This meant everything from deciding new roles for characters to finding ways to slot locations into the world map. This unusual development cycle faced us with an entirely different set of problems and looking back on the project as a whole it was at times, arduous
The director essentially talked about how there was a point in development from which the studio had to hit reset on the game but wasn’t able to start from scratch, as significant progress had already been made. This meant that they had to figure out what to do with the produced designs and characters, making the development feel very arduous and tiring.
Dark Souls 2 and its problems
One of the most bizarre differences in Dark Souls 2 was its world design. Unlike the masterfully interconnected map of the first Dark Souls, this sequel felt like a series of loosely connected levels connected together, breaking the franchise’s environmental continuity, something it was previously known for.
This was a direct result of the development team struggling to piece together a game that had already changed directors. The game was also built on an entirely new engine, which led to major difficulties in achieving the original vision.
Fortunately, the game over the years has developed a cult fanbase that highlights its more positive aspects. Dark Souls 2, after all, is proof that even when FromSoftware stumbles, they still create something worth talking about.
This post belongs to FandomWire and first appeared on FandomWire
