Dark Souls II: The Lowest Beginning?

Dark Souls begins with the Player, the Chosen Undead, left to rot in a dungeon, unawares of their call to greatness yet to come. They’re rescued and escape a demon to make it to the peaceful Firelink Shrine, aided only by whatever starting gear they’re dropped and some broken weapons, a longbow, and a dagger. The Undead Asylum is a powerful starting point for the series, foreshadowing the lunacy that the Player will experience as they dive into the rabbit-hole. Oddly enough, though, I feel that Dark Souls II provides the lowest beginning for the players.

Dark Souls II opens in a rather daunting way: the Undead Curse has spread beyond control and is starting global calamaties. We don’t know the full backstory of Drangleic just yet, but we know that the place isn’t in the best of times. At least with the rest of the world we slowly discovered it. We saw the Undead Burg and thought “well this isn’t good,” and then, if you went this route, saw the true state of things in Anor Londo and thought, “well this isn’t good at all.”

But really, what kind of moron would kill that image of Gwynevere?

While I do think the opening cinematic of Dark Souls is better, if only because it’s shorter, it paints a picture of the world as a whole and doesn’t really inform the Player specifically of what they have to do. It’s really only when we ring the second Bell of Awakening and meet Frampt/ Kaathe that we realize our role: linking or turning away from the Flame.

In Dark Souls II, we’re the last thread of hope for stopping the Undead Curse. As an Undead ourselves, we’re not meant to be too fond of it. Drangleic, in for Players, has replaced Lordran as the big kingdom. A once proud kingdom now stricken by war and curses, Dragleic is now basically a steaming pile of rubble. And guess who the lucky soul is that gets to go in there?

Narratively, this is a pretty low place to start. For one, we literally just drop into the situation with no real sense of where to go other than to get to Drangleic and, as the Emerald Herald tells us, take out King Vendrick, the one who could stop all of this (although we know that the real perpetrator here is Lord Gwyn for restarting the cycle and linking the flame, thus creating Undeath).

From a gameplay perspective, we’re stuck with our fists until we meet the gang of Fire Keepers. Interestingly, too, we can go off and fight a monster with just our fists to test our luck. This is basically the game’s way of telling you to go off and do something else until you’re actually worthy of taking these monsters on. Dark Souls and Dark Souls III at least equip you with some sort of weapon before having to take on any enemies. Though, I will admit that this monster is optional.

Still, we get back to a narrative and gameplay thing. The old Fire Keepers in particular seem pretty reluctant to call you the Chosen Undead, unlike the first game in which you just assumed the mantle since everyone else was either dead, dying, or a crestfallen knight. This time, they mock you. This sort of blindsided me playing through the game. The Shrine Handmaiden in Dark Souls III talks you up a good bit, and you have a solid support system there to get you through things. The Crestfallen Knight in Dark Souls doesn’t have upmost faith in you, but at least has some sort of hope that you sort this thing out fast, or that someone does, at least. Plus there’s still the fact that you don’t know what’s going on in Dark Souls quite yet based off of the opening cinematic.

In Dark Souls II, you’re thrust into a dying kingdom with nothing but your fists and the people who are supposed to be pumping you up are instead ridiculing you for your incompetence. Sure they give you your name and weapons but even then, they’re still calling you out. They even make fun of you for remembering your name, that’s how little faith they have in you!

This is also your first true test of morality, as the continually harass you with dialogue until you finally get to leave. You finally have your weapons, and since this is a Dark Souls game, everyone can die. Should you decide to kill the women, you may just be at the lowest starting point of the series. You’ve already shed innocent blood, knowingly, and killed the people who tried to help you. The path to darkness has already started.

But not killing them doesn’t help you any as they continually pester you and try to put you down. The first test of strength you get is in the little tutorial tunnels on the path up to Majula, and even then, those monsters become aggressive to you incredibly fast.

One could see this as a way of the game not believing in your skills. In Dark Souls and Dark Souls III, the first enemies you encounter have their back turned to you. Perhaps this is the game thinking you’re unworthy, or perhaps it setting the Hollows up as target practice for you to test your weapon, whatever it may be. In Dark Souls II the enemies have none of that, they jump at you from the shadows and put you on your toes immediately. You have to be ready to go, because the game doesn’t think you’ve got what it takes to rise up to the challenge.

When you finally reach Majula, the Player reaches some sort of peace. There’s just something about the golden sun and the long, stretch of ocean, the small, peaceful village that strikes odd in a Dark Souls game, and yet it makes sense here. After so much doubt, one needs a place to regain their confidence. A woman on the shore, staring out, hopeful that one will come to save everyone, awaits you.

The Emerald Herald is a beautiful, literally, symbol of your confidence. Standing on the precipice of Majula, awaiting the Player to arrive, she reminds you that you are the Chosen Undead. Much as others will attack you and ridicule you, they weren’t the ones that were chosen and are taking up this path. If anyone, she believes in you. It’s why she helps you. What’s interesting is that she defines you as the “bearer of the curse” yet knows you have what it takes to beat this curse.

Thematically, the introduction of Dark Souls II is incredibly insightful. You, an Undead, must destroy the Undead Curse. The game is about relief in death. Things have been prolonged for so long that they have to come an end sometime, because so many are suffering for it. The Player can’t die. The only way they were “killed” in Dark Souls was through linking the fire. We don’t know what happened to them if they didn’t link the flame, but knowledge from Dark Souls III makes it evident that the flame was strong enough to continue on to Dark Souls II however many centuries later. And the Curse continued, becoming stronger. The Age of Dark is on the way, but it’s not here and that means the Undead Curse has become even stronger.

Essentially, you have to kill the thing that gives you life. It’s the acknowledgement that the Undead are a virus on the world, and you, as one of them, must put a stop to it.

The constant theme of Dark Souls is that of cycles; the cyclical nature of life, the world, the universe. Linking the flame is an unnatural cycle. The First Flame was meant to a burst of energy that was used to end an age and introduce a new one. However, it’s gone on too long, and we’re seeing the dangers of what happens when a cycle actually becomes a spiral. The only thing that can break this, then, is the continuing of a cycle. The Undead are symbolic of a spiral long gone out of control, but it is only the Undead that have the power to truly put an end to this.

While many will argue the merit of the game as a whole, I still feel that the beginning of Dark Souls II carries with it a great emotional weight and sense of scale, even if we aren’t affecting things on a global scale. We’ve arrived in Drangleic  at our lowest point: no weapons (even then, the weapons I got in my play-through were broken versions of swords), no confidence, no real method of getting to our goal, and an entire curse to stop that will lead to the Player’s death. The only way to win is to lose. It’s not the strongest place to start from a Player perspective, and that’s why it’s the lowest beginning of the game: Undead cannot live for humanity to survive. And you’re the Chosen of the Undead. 

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