Dark Souls II: Crown of the Sunken King

Satisfying add-on to a great game, with interesting bosses. [Oct 2014]

Suitably self-contained and demonstrating some of the best level design in Dark Souls 2, Crown of the Sunken King suggests that FromSoft’s DLC team may well be up to the daunting task of creating three essential add-ons.

In a certain light The Crown of the Sunken King actually does it better, employing different constraints and driving new ways to explore and appreciate Dark Souls II's finer details.

Sunken King won’t do anything to convince you to play Dark Souls 2 if you don’t already love it, but stays consistently challenging for even veteran players.

The puzzles are a fun twist on the pre-existing formula, the temple backdrop is an interesting setting and the new monsters are a welcome challenge.

Don’t expect Dark Souls II: Crown of the Sunken King to match up to Artorias of the Abyss, but it still offers a surprisingly deep and gratifying experience.

A competent but unsurprising slice of downloadable content that features a solid challenge and plenty of content, but too little in the way of new ideas.

Much better than the first, so so good! Bosses are relatively easier than the first dlc's, but the items on offer for exploring dlc are excellent. Recommended.

Crown of the Sunken King is set in an underground city far below the Black Gulch, tainted by a toxic mist that killed almost all of its inhabitants except for the Sunken King's loyal warriors, who guard their kingdom's most sacred treasure with an otherworldly resolve. The player is tasked with traversing the Mayan-inspired architecture of Shulva, the Sanctum City, and uncover the secret that wiped out their civilization. Crown of the Iron King is a return to form in some ways, since its level design, enemy placement, and location of items closely resembles that of the first game. The Sanctum City is built like a maze, where platforms could go up and down, and an area could be reached from multiple entrances. Shulva is littered with valuable ores and rare treasures hidden in plain sight, where the only way to reach them is to navigate winding walkways and perilous paths; those familiar with the design of Oolacile Township will see the comparison with the city of Shulva. Compared to Brume Tower and Frozen Eleum Loyce, Shulva features more unique enemies who extend their roles beyond the grunt and the occasional caster: the Sanctum Soldiers has very high poise, uses longbows and poison arrows at long range, and could emit poison mist from their bodies; the spirit-like Sanctum Knights cannot be harmed by any form of attack, unless the player finds a statue associated with the knight and destroys it, rendering the invincible enemy vulnerable once again. There are also the Corrosive Egg Insects who could create a cloud of corrosive acid, and prefers to fight in a group - a common trait shared by all of the enemies in this DLC. Lore-wise, this DLC is my favorite of the Lost Crowns trilogy. Shulva, the Sanctum City is an interesting place, because the ancient people who resided there built the city around their sacred treasure. It shows us a glimpse of life before the kingdom of Drangleic, when people used to have all of these crazy ideas, and worship anything that is bigger than them. Overall, a good DLC that features a lot of content. And there you have it.

Far from perfect. It's a Souls sequel/clone with more boss battles. Based off of Dark Souls but rather lacking in the atmosphere/story dept, the fixes in the combat system makes up for it's shortfalls.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

One of the worst DLC's I've ever played... just no please stop "must be 150 characters long" fine ///////////////////////////////////////////////////