Note: I've corrected some formatting issues that appeared in the previous version of this blog post... I'm still kind of new at this. Just ignore the other version of this post, this is the correct one
A lot of people have talked about Dark Souls over the years. Some people have talked about how it's a metaphor for depression. One person discussed how it weaves the age old tale of the hero's journey directly into gameplay. Plenty of other people have talked at length about how the game tells a story without words, as well as many other explanations for why this game is so special. Well, it's a few years late, but I'm going to throw my hat in the ring. This is why playing through Dark Souls was one of the most uplifting experiences I've ever had, and why I keep going back to the game all these years later.
Of course, the game doesn't start out uplifting. Quite the contrary, from the moment you hit the New Game button, the game has only one thing to say to you: “You are not important”. The opening cutscene depicts what is essentially the creation myth of this setting, showing how the gods of this world, Gwyn, Nito, and The Witch of Izalith, came to be. It shows them obtaining lord souls and using their new found power to cast down the eternal dragons that ruled the world and create a new order. Then, it transitions to the situation at the moment. The world is dying, rotting, falling apart. This is where the narration starts talking about your character. You are an undead. One of millions, gathered, corralled, and sent north to the Undead Asylum, to keep you out of sight. You are vermin. You just happen to be vermin that can't be easily killed.
And this is where we meet the character we'll be controlling for the rest of the game. Locked in a cell, looking like a corpse that's been baking in the sun for too long. You don't even get out of the cell on your own. Oscar of Astora drops the key through a hole in the ceiling.
Once you have the key, you get to explore the Asylum for a little while and meet your fellow inmates. They have all been reduced to mindless beasts. They don't even react to you. You can kill them if you want, but there's really no point.
After a brief exploration, you light your first bonfire, and then you come face to face with the Asylum Demon. At this point, the notes left by the developers that have been explaining the controls just tell you to RUN, and you pretty much have to. Sure, if you took the Black Firebombs as your starting gift, or if you're really skilled at the combat, you can kill the beast, but let's face it, you're going to have to run away. The first real threat in the game, and you just ran, like a rat scurrying for a hole.
At this point, the game briefly starts being nice to you. You get your real weapon, you get a decent shield, and possibly a spell catalyst, depending on your class. You also get into a few real fights, with enemies you actually have a chance against. Then you meet Oscar again. He's fallen prey to a trap. One that probably killed you at least once too, and he's on his last legs. He tells you that he's losing his humanity, and soon he'll be hollow just like the enemies you've been fighting. This clears up any doubts the player might have had that yes, the enemies you've been fighting are undead just like you are, they're just further along. He also gives you this game's unique healing item, the Estus Flask.
Now, with a proper weapon, a shield, and the means to heal yourself, you return to the Asylum Demon's chamber and confront your tormentor. Now, you have a chance to defeat the beast. Still, if this is your first time playing the game, odds are that you'll die a couple of times before you put the demon down. You're going to have to learn its attack patterns and pay attention if you want to survive this fight.
Once you finally defeat the Asylum Demon though, you triumphantly leave the Northern Undead Asylum and make you way to Lordran. You arrive at Firelink Shrine carried by a giant bird and... nobody cares. To them, you're just another undead on some fool's errand. Even the guy who tells you what you're supposed to be doing here, Ringing the Bells of Awakening, can't be bothered to tell you where they are, and says to your face that he doesn't think you can do it.
What's more, if you were feeling like a badass after taking out the Asylum Demon, the nearby enemies will beat that out of you real quick. If you go to the graveyard or the New Londo Ruins, you'll be straight up murdered as the game's gentle way of telling you not to go that way yet. If you go to the Undead Burg, like a good little player though, you'll see mostly the same kinds of enemies that you saw in the Asylum, except more of them, better armed, and they're using tactics now.
What's most important about these enemies though, is that they seem to follow all the same rules that you do. Each of them has a weapon in one hand and a shield in the other, like you probably do, they attempt to bait you into depleting your stamina attacking their shield, and you can do the same thing to them, they even have Estus Flasks, and if you injure them, they'll back off for a moment and heal, just like you've been doing.
What's more, in order to survive this area, you have to embrace the idea that you aren't different from them. You have to realize that they don't just share all of your strengths, but your weaknesses as well. If you attack an enemy when they're blocking, you recoil and they retaliate, so you learn to bait them into attacking your shield so you can punish them. You have limited stamina that regenerates slower when your shield is raised, and so do they, so after attacking they have to lower their shield momentarily to recover, leaving them vulnerable.
Of course, there are dozens of them and only one of you, so in order to make it through the area, you have to be better than they are. Either you learn the combat, you fight smart, you prove that you're a better warrior than them, or you level grind, farm up enough souls to level up enough times to get an edge on the competition. Either way, you earned your victory. Through either skill or patience and determination (most probably a little of both) you are starting to stand out, just a little.
Your victory over this area earns you access to a larger part of the world, where the cycle repeats itself. With each new area, you encounter new foes and new obstacles, and need to develop new ways of dealing with them. Little by little, the game pushes you farther and farther out of your comfort zone. In order to ring the first Bell of Awakening you have to defeat the Bell Gargoyles on a roof with no walls, forcing you to pay attention to your surroundings and dodge carefully. You fight the extraordinarily fast and hard hitting Capra Demon in a tiny room with little space to move in, forcing you to evade attacks at close range and wait for openings to use your Estus Flask. The Gaping Dragon teaches you that even if a foe is unimaginably, impossibly large, you still can bring it down if you're cautious and patient.
During this process, you will stumble across the starting equipment from every class except the one that you chose, on corpses scattered throughout the world. This tells you that you are far from the first person to attempt this task. Every class you could have chosen represents another undead who tried to ring the bells of awakening but ultimately failed. You're not the first, or the best, just the latest.
After overcoming all of these challenges, you make your way to the base of Blighttown, and finally ring the second Bell of Awakening. After doing so, you're likely to venture briefly into the Demon Ruins to use the bonfire there to heal yourself before climbing back out of the ruins to return to Firelink Shrine. For me at least, the return from Blighttown felt entirely different from the journey downward. While climbing into the abyss, I felt constantly nervous, painfully aware that death could come from any angle at any second, with little understanding of where exactly I was headed or what I was doing. On the way back, the abyss held no fear for me anymore. I had conquered it.
And, once you return to Firelink Shrine, a new NPC will be waiting there, for you. Kingseeker Frampt was roused by your ringing of the Bells of Awakening and has a task for you. Yes, for you specifically. You've made it. At this point, you really have become the Chosen Undead, and there is now a mission that only you can perform. You matter, and you don't matter because you're the player, after all if Steam achievement statistics are anything to go by, many players never make it this far. Instead, you earned this. You fought your way past seemingly impossible odds, learned and grew, to become worthy of your importance. That moment is the most important moment in Dark Souls. It is important precisely because it wasn't given to you at the beginning of the game, but that you, the player, had to grow as a person in order to achieve it.
What makes the protagonist of Dark Souls special is that they are a nobody, but one who worked very hard and refused to give up until they had earned the right to become somebody. The central theme of Dark Souls is that really, anyone can be special. You just have to be willing to work very hard, keep trying after every failure, and to grow as a person along the way. If you keep working at it, you really can achieve your dreams, no matter how impossible they seem.
Regards,
Science Viking