This review is only about the DLC, the base game is awesome and I really enjoyed it I'd like to be clear on that.

Been playing their souls product as far as I can remember, most DLCs being memorable and well paced enough to get me hooked and I'd come back to them each playthrough. But what's wrong then with this DLC that is basically the only one that I cannot and many it seems can't recommend either ?

- There was still a promising start and everything was fine until reaching a certain part, and from there everything went south somehow. The difficulty spike became so absurd that I had to summon people to not roll on the floor or throw a pot of flower out of the window.

- A map that is certainly beautiful to explore but with no rewards whatsoever, extremely empty and cheap when it comes to loot and interest.

- An "artificial" difficulty that is way too unfair even for veterans. Enemies and bosses spam moves most of the time and it becomes the festival of the dodge ball with a very limited window / time to strike back or heal yourself. Most of the enemies are super fast and keep swining weapons like crazy as if they simply had kitchen knives, you have no balance whatsoever between strong and slow enemies and fast ones that could be dealt with and yet could still be challenging. HERE they are simply strong and fast and swining machine guns at the same time.

- A tedious system that relies on finding fragments through the entire map to deal more damage and receive less or bosses will simply one shot you or two shot you. This forces you to explore an empty world just to find all those fragments to help you dealing with bosses and enemies that will still remain way too strong and annoying for what it's worth. If you were expecting a variety of loot and fun, there is none, landscapes are pretty to see but I'm not here to simply play walking simulator just to find 40 fragments just to give me a chance to defeat bosses it simply RUINS the pace. You thought you were going for the next boss right and have some more fun to go to the next stage ? Think again as you'll have to look for other fragments to make the fights balanced enough for you to have a chance.

That is all that can be said on my side.

Too long to read ? I sum it up:

* Extremely tedious exploration.
* Feeling to be restrained and forced to explore the map just to find fragments that will balance bosses and enemies enough for you to have a chance. (which should have been the case from the beginning)
* Fragments are only a pretext to explore an empty world and seem to have been added last minute to justify exploring the map.
* Limited loot.
* Slow pace in a totally not enjoyable way.
* A few bosses are still good enough to get a pass, I guess but I could only say 2 or 3.