The current game being played in my house is Dark Souls (DaS)
Dark Souls Official Website
For those who didn't click the link, the site's URL is "prepare to die" dot com. That couldn't be truer for this game. The game begins, and you literally have nothing. Okay, you have a broken sword hilt as a weapon, but that's it. Not to give any details away from the game, but you die quickly. And often. Like, all the time.
Anyway, defeating enemies in this game rewards you with "souls". These souls are the monetary system for the game. Unfortunately, giving you money for every enemy would apparently be to easy for DaS. Souls function as what you use to buy items from the handful of shopkeepers hidden throughout the game, your expenses for repairing and upgrading your equipment, and, most importantly, the cost to increase your stats and level. Every single point you put into a stat costs a certain amount of souls, and this costs quickly becomes very large for just a single point. The other difficult part of the game is that when you die (which can happen at pretty much anytime), you lose all the souls you had, plus all "humanities" you've acquired, which are another form of rare but important item you find. Once dead, you have one chance to find your body and recover the souls and humanities you lost. If you die before reaching your body, those souls are lost. You had 20,000 souls because you were working towards getting a new level, but died against the enemy there? And he killed you again? Sorry, sucks to be you, start at zero souls.
The game also takes place in two states of being. You are either Undead (Which is the game's version of being alive) or Hollow (Dead, in spirit form). You probably spend a large amount of time being Hollow, but if you do spend a humanity to become "alive" again, you get another perk for not being Hollow. You can summon other players to help you in your game, both NPC and PC, and they can make your life monumentally easier. Also, your resistance to damage goes up. Being alive is great! Right? That would make the game too easy. So DaS throws another thing at you. As long as you're alive and in an area that you haven't beat the boss in, other PLAYERS can invade your game as evil spirits. Like someone who has varied strategies, good equipment, and a boiling anger that develops from playing the game. Their sole purpose for invading your game? Killing you and stealing your souls. These evil phantoms are immune to all game enemies and environment hazards, and can wait to attack you until you are already fighting a giant rat/black knight/room full of archers/etc. If you kill the invading phantom, they get sent back into their own game. No drawbacks. The only downside to invading people's games is that a certain item lets you report invaders to an in-game group of hunters to eventually attack the invader.
Between the ridiculous cost for levels, the massive drawbacks of dying, the constant threat of an area turning into a PvP manhunt, and the massive power that your enemies wield, Dark Souls is not a game for casual players, starting players, or anyone who doesn't ever want to throw their controller at their TV. But Dark Souls goes back to an older time in video games. The game doesn't hand you shiny new items and levels for simply playing. You earn everything in this game, and when you get enough souls for a level, or repel an invading phantom, or beat that boss who can kill you with one glancing hit, you feel awesome. Not many games now can give that feeling of accomplishment. All this said, Dark Souls is actually easier than it's predecessor, Demon's Souls. I won't get into that game, mouthful of a title that it is.
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