I've already explained how much I love Dark Souls. Recently, with Dark Souls 2 coming out in a week, I've been getting involved in a part of the game I rarely experienced my first few playthroughs- PVP. After getting knocked around by giant greatswords, instantly killed by overpowered black magic, and pulverized by teams of gang-killers, I learned quite a lot about the game hidden beneath the game. There's an incredible set of unwritten rules, often broken more than followed, that nevertheless give rise to an interesting phenomenon. At the agreed-upon level for honorable PVP, something called Fight Clubs occur in one of the starting areas of the game, the Undead Burg.
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| Two Red Phantoms fight each other in the Undead Burg, the most common place for Fight Clubs. |
To understand what's going on here, here's a bit of info you need to know:
-A host player in human form can be invaded by enemy red phantom players, and can be invaded by more than one.
-The host can also summon red phantoms if they leave a red summon sign.
-Red phantoms can fight each other, and are rewarded with souls for killing each other.
-Hosts can't be invaded if they've defeated the boss of that area.
-Hosts can pick up souls, basically experience, from dead red phantoms regardless of who kills them.
This means that invaders looking for some fun fights with other players of the same level can invade the host just to fight other invaders. The winner of the invader fight sticks around to challenge the next invader, and both them and the host gets souls for the kill. The invader, if they recollect their souls, doesn't lose anything either! It's a win-win-win! Fight Clubs are just one example of the ways the Dark Souls community has created a deep metagame.
The Game Within the Game
This metagame includes rules for fair dueling, which say the host in a duel isn't allowed to heal, because the game doesn't let the invading red phantom use their healing potions. If either player in a duel heals, usually this signals to the other that anything goes, and the encounter devolves from a gentleman's duel to a fantasy medieval street fight, complete with underhanded magical tactics and shady glitch exploiting. Of course some people, called gankers, completely disregard these rules and attack single enemies in groups of three, becoming hated throughout the community. I think the developer actually wanted to encourage these rules to develop. Dark Souls' player interaction was purposefully limited to actions and guessing at what your opponent, helper, or host is trying to tell you. This improvised communication is especially prevalent in fight club situations, where a player can bow to start a duel, raise a shield repeatedly at someone to tell them to back off, and even strike a taunting pose over an annoying opponents body.
But these rules only apply to this particular game. I'm sure Demon's Souls had a completely different set of unofficial rules and etiquette, and Dark Souls 2 will start this process all over again. What's most exciting is that everyone who plays the game soon after release will have a hand in creating the metagame of Dark Souls 2, willing or not. But before people begin to master the new challenges, I think there's going to be complete anarchy. The multiplayer aspects will play out only according to the rules of the game.
So if you come up against me in Dark Souls 2, you best be ready, because "fighting fair" will not exist yet.
P.S. If people want, I could write a bunch about the evolution of Dark Souls 2's metagame as it happens, because I'll definitely be playing the hell out of it.
