The release day of Dark Souls: Age of Fire It was getting closer and closer.
Ads related to the ga had already started slowly rolling out across major websites.
At the sa ti, overseas Target Software had already begun warming up promotions.
Compared to the dostic market, the overseas push was even stronger.
Because in July, most ga companies still weren't ready to release new titles.
On one hand, they had only just announced news at expos earlier, so developnt ti wasn't enough.
On the other hand, Lucas had already announced early on that Dark Souls: Age of Fire It would launch in early July.
As a sequel to a big IP ga, and on top of that, the sequel to last year's Ga of the Year RPG, once they had clearly stated the release ti, basically no other studio dared to challenge it.
For players, though, the wait during this ti was torture.
The trailer shown at the expo was watched over and over again by players.
So hardcore Souls fans even pieced together details from the previous ga and made three-hour-long lore analysis videos just from that three-minute trailer.
Of course, aside from those die-hard fans, a lot of ordinary players were also worried that Lucas might suddenly post sothing on the official account, saying that in order to give players a better experience, they had decided to delay the release.
After all, delays are pretty common in the gaming industry, so players were worried Nebula Gas might do the sa, even though Nebula had never delayed a ga before.
But that was also because, up until now, Nebula Gas didn't really have many large-scale titles. If you had to na them, it was basically just Dark Souls and It Takes Two.
As June drew to a close, more and more Dark Souls ads went up, and the price of Dark Souls: Age of Fire It was finally announced. Especially on the Nebula Gas platform store, the preorder page had already appeared, giving players peace of mind.
This ti Dark Souls: Age of Fire It was cheaper at only 39.9 USD. Like before, there was also a 20% discount for purchases on the Nebula Gas platform.
The day of the unlock quickly approached.
Countless veteran players had already preordered early and pre-downloaded the ga, just waiting for the mont they could enter.
On community forums and in gaming chat groups, many Dark Souls players chatted with each other, full of excitent for the upcoming journey of fire.
In one group chat, a bunch of people were talking.
"Ben, Zack, have you guys finished downloading the ga yet?"
A player with the ID Ben replied, "Of course it's downloaded! Do you even have to ask?"
"Exactly, I can't wait anymore," answered another with the ID Zack.
Zack: "By the way, Ben, what starting class are you picking later?"
Ben: "Do you even need to ask? Obviously the Deprived! As a true firelinker, only the Deprived shows off our skill."
Zack: "Sa as then. How about we make it a race—see who makes progress faster?"
Ben: "No problem!"
As Ben and Zack chatted, their excitent also got the other firelinkers fired up.
"Almost ti, almost ti, just five more minutes and we can finally play!?"
"I wonder if the new Dark Souls will be harder?"
"Of course it'll be harder, but I don't think it's a problem for us. After all, we're all proper Fire-linkers now."
"Exactly!"
The chat group was full of jokes and laughter.
But five minutes later, it was like the whole group went offline at the sa ti—total silence.
In a neighborhood in the capital city—
Ben, the sa Ben from the chat group, clicked on Nebula Gas' platform and opened Dark Souls: Age of Fire It with a face full of excitent.
The opening CG was the sa one shown at the gaplay showcase.
Clearly, Lucas kept things simple here, following his usual style.
Cutscenes doubled as trailers, or trailers doubled as cutscenes.
Even though Ben had already watched it countless tis, he still sat through it again.
As for the race with Zack, skipping a short cutscene didn't matter.
When the cutscene ended and the ga's UI appeared, Ben felt a little nervous.
After all, this was Dark Souls. He had suffered plenty in past gas.
And from what Lucas had hinted earlier, the difficulty seed to be even higher this ti.
"It's just a sequel! No way it can stop the steps of a true Fire-linker like !"
He hyped himself up with a slogan, then entered the ga.
The opening was the sa as always—character creation and class selection.
At the character creation stage, Ben noticed a special prompt:
\\[Save data from Dark Souls detected. Would you like to use your previous character's appearance?]
"Oh, that's pretty nice! So the face I worked so hard on last ti can carry over!" Ben was pleasantly surprised, but decided to ignore it and made a new, more unique-looking face.
A Fire-linker's face isn't ugly—that's called character!
When it ca to choosing a class, even though he had bragged in the group chat that he would pick "Deprived," he quietly chose Knight instead.
After all, in the previous ga, Knight was the best all-around starter class.
Then ca the gifts section, and Ben noticed sothing different.
As before, there were things like Goddess's Blessing, Life Ring, and Black Firebomb.
But there were also new options replacing others, like Twin Humanity, Telescope, Old Witch's Ring, and Master Key—items that weren't in the previous ga.
For a mont, Ben had no idea what those things were for.
After thinking it over, he chose the Master Key.
Sure, Black Firebombs were great for fighting bosses early on, but since he had already beaten the previous ga, he felt confident in his own skills.
And there was another reason—he knew one of Dark Souls' trademarks: shortcuts hidden all over the map.
Normally they only opened later, but with this Master Key, maybe he could open them right away.
Or maybe it could open special rooms with treasures inside. Or maybe it was tied to rescuing NPCs trapped behind locked doors, like the thief from the first ga.
Either way, he figured the Master Key was the most useful choice.
After creating his character, Ben clicked to enter the ga, full of expectation.
His journey as a Fire-linker was about to begin.
(End of The Chapter)
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