Dear Potaku readers,
Greetings from Firelink Shrine!

If you’re not familiar with this world you might be thinking ‘wow! He’s made progress!’ but if you are familiar with it, you’ll know that’s not true. Indeed, I thought a change of scenery was necessary and decided to head back to the Firelink Shrine.

It’s nice to be somewhere different but there’s this lingering feeling in the back of my head that this isn’t where I’m meant to be.

The good news is, I’ve made some more friends! It was nice to see the Crestfallen Warrior again, man, we go way back. This one time, I stabbed him as a joke, and he got so offended, he kept killing me until the end of time, so I had to be reborn. I talked with him again, no stabbing, but from the sounds of things he doesn’t really trust me yet.

Next, I decided to pay my respects to the dead in the graveyard. But some of the dead came back to life, or…they were undead…and started attacking me. For mere skeletons, their attacks were quite powerful! I died a few times.

I only got a glimpse of it, but I think I saw a chest or something special at the end of the graveyard. It was hard to tell, because a giant skeleton blocked my view, and a few seconds later I was running to keep my distance from him. He killed me anyway.

I wish some of these people were more welcoming.

It’s a change of scenery for sure, but the same things just keep on happening. You get tired of dying over and over again, you know? But I’m getting there, slowly but surely. Closer and closer to that chest, or whatever it is. And then I can go back to the Undead Burg.

I wonder how lonely the Taurus Demon is right now.

~Pants

Backtracking is difficult. Every fibre of my being is telling me this is a stupid idea. I’ve died quite a few times fighting the graveyard skeletons, and with every death I’m feeling more and more like this is a useless endeavour. So I’m torn between the two options. Do I give up and go back to the Undead Burg, or do I push on here?

The same friend who suggested I come back here also suggested making a suicide run for the items in the graveyard, which does make a bit of sense. If I spend all my souls at the bonfire, I don’t have to worry about losing them, and any items you find remain with you after death. It’s a weird tactic, for sure, but if it works I’m willing to try it.

Dying is taking its toll on me. I’m finding that the time I’m spending playing the game is shorter, but I’ll keep coming back. This week, I don’t think I managed anything longer than a half hour session before giving up. That’s impatience for you. If I’m not making progress I get annoyed and turn the console off. But I keep coming back, so that’s something.

If nothing else, it’s fun writing about this. I like being able to examine how I play games, and how I react when something a little different is thrown at me. Even if some of my reactions aren’t the best.

I’m starting to wonder what the rest of the game will be like. I don’t really expect it to get easier, so concern is growing that this same sort of thing is going to happen in every region of the world.

But we’ll cross those bridges when we reach them. It’s probably best to keep focus on one thing right now, the Taurus Demon.

Next week, he’s dead.