DS2

here's a few of the HUGE issues with DS2, all of which are downgrades from DS1 and DeS.
- Adaptation is a shit stat that shouldn't exist, because dodging is a core game mechanic that shouldn't be tied to any other stat than how much stamina you have to spend. The only purpose for it is to increase grind.
- It takes an agonizingly long time to drink estus, and to perform may similar basic animations.
- The healing item system is broken and allows the player to simply farm lifegems and never die without resetting at bonfires, which is directly contrary to the core design of bonfires from the first game.
- The poise system simply doesn't work. it is broken and they never fixed it, so armor is significantly less useful than in the original.
- Many if not most areas in the game are simply large, similarly-designed arenas filled to the brim with hordes of enemies, most of which are simply trash with the only threatening thing about them being their numbers. Enemies can also attack through each other, including ranged enemies who's shots go through their friends, which is fairly a problem that the first DS had as well.
- The soul memory system is COMPLETELY gamebreaking, and allows first-time, low-level players to be invaded by enemies decked out in max level gear and with end-game spells, simply because those players had game knowledge from previous playthroughs and used the ring that makes you never gain souls. Furthermore, Soul Memory punishes players who are playing for the first time, because it takes into account souls you LOST as well as those you spent. Why is this sysetm in the game in the first place? All they needed to do was tweak the soul level tiers from the first game.
- You can be invaded while in hollow form. Why? Why even keep the hollow/human system from DS1 in the game if you're not going to use it for its intended purpose.
- The Demon's Souls/Dark Souls combat system is designed for 1 on 1 combat, yet the grand majority of enemies in the game are in groups.
- Stamina regenerates incredibly fucking slowly, severely limiting your possible playstyles.
- The new jump mechanic is ridiculous, with your character leaping well over 10 meters distance from a sprint.
- There is an excess of boss fights in the game, with most of them being simply clones of bosses from DeS or DS1 (but worse), or being just re-dos of other bosses in the game, but with 2 big guys in armor instead of 1.
- There is an excess of NPC invasions in the game, especially with that one fucker that casts the vortex spells that oneshot you through walls.
- The graphics look like shit. Don't even try to bullshit me on this. Technically, the graphics are trash. Especially the lighting system, even in SotFS.
- Crossbows and ranged weapons are OP as hell, and at many points in the game, outright necessary, unlike in the previous Souls games where they were only tools.
- Magic is OP as hell too, with plenty of spells that simply 1-2 shot players in pvp.
- The game has many deathtrap encounters where you will only know to avoid them after having already died to them once. The only such thing in DS1 was the boulder that rolls down the stairs in the Undead Asylum, but that did not oneshot and kill you.
- Many if not most enemy animations are very janky and too sudden. Example: The Heide knights in the Heide's Tower of Flame area, which simply spasm around and hit you before you can even notice that they've begun their attack.
- Enemy attack hitboxes are questionable at best, with many (especially larger) enemies having sync-kill moves that will teleport you to back to them even if you dodged in time. For example: The ogres with their "grab you and eat you" attack. The Pursuer when he impales you on his sword. For some reason the player's hitbox seems to lag behind their character model. What even is this shit?
- The movement of your character is floaty and slippery. Your character feels like an empty glass vase when they move.
- Many areas around the game are designed around one core gimmick, which they milk  every last possible ounce of content from. Like the underground poison area with the statues that spit at you, or the dragon area with the suicide bomb enemies.
- Enemies respond unpredictably to being hit. Sometimes attacks will stagger them, other times they'll just attack you anyway.
- There's a boss that's literally just a room full of rats (come on).
- There's a boss that's literally just a room full of zombies with some casters that throw fireballs at you.
- Some of the bosses are basically prolonged QTEs, with only one strategy/method to beat them. Like the Old Iron King, the big fisty demon.
- Why was endurance split into 2 stats? What greater purpose does this serve other than to increase the amount you have to grind?
- Lots of difficulty spikes, with no clear direction as to where the player is supposed to go next given the number of different areas in the game.
- Too many fucking weapons and gear items. Most of them are just reskins. Lots of inventory management required.
- The movement analog stick has a very large dead zone when moving forward and you're expected to use the camera stick to slightly adjust the direction. But the camera and movement controls are imprecise even on minimum sensitivity. There also seems to be input delay, which is absolutely unacceptable in a character action game like Souls.
- Rings can get damaged. Why? For what purpose? Oh right, to increase grinding, evident by the massive price difference between repairing weapons and armor, and repairing rings.
- You can have up to 70% equip load and still move at max speed and not fatroll, completely destroying the balance between quick, low equip load characters, and slow but bulky high equip load characters.
- The lore is just a copy-paste of the lore from Dark Souls 1. Everything in the game is referential to Dark Souls 1. Almost none of the themes explored in DS2 are original.
- There is very little thematic consistency in the game with enemy and item placements.
- Jarring transitions between different areas of the game. Why is there a lava hell level above a poisonous windmill? Why is there a range of mountain peaks above the mansion with the dragon in the cage, when you couldn't see any mountains nearby from there? Why is there a giant underground cavern with a ship wharf in it... BELOW THE OCEAN?
- The ability to teleport between bonfires from the start of the game makes the world feel small and irrelevant, and like a series of linear levels instead of an interconnected world with realistic distances between locations. This also makes unlocking shortcuts much less useful and satisfying than in previous Souls games.
- The AI is garbage, with most enemies knowing how to do nothing but walk towards you and spam attacks. Many also have a very high aggro radius, which contributes massively to the "hordes of enemies" problem.
- The hollowing system. In Dark Souls, you reverse hollowed to be able to summon help for boss fights, at the risk of being invaded, or to engage in PVP. If you died, your punishment was losing unspent souls, but you could go back to where you died and attempt it again with no handicap until you learned the strategy or improved your skills. In DS2, every time you die you get progressively weaker, which leaves you even less able to learn and adapt to the encounter you had difficulty with.
- You get an achievement for dying the first time. WELCOME TO DARK SOULS XDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD what a fucking meme.
- They didn't improve the camera at all from the previous Souls games. It still get stucks on objects and reacts unpredictably in enclosed areas and corridoors, which most of Dark Souls 2 is set in, by the way.
- Weapons have very low durability and break extremely quickly. Some weapons will break in like 50 hits. Why?
- Most areas are very linear with few secrets or alternate pathways.
- There's a new bonfire like every 10 minutes of play.
- The path to some boss fights are harder than the bosses themselves. Executioner's Charior, Old Iron king, among others.
- Despawning enemies if you kill them too many times. Literally fucking why? So that it's harder to farm souls? Then why did they make the game so grindy and split up the stats that you're obliged to level, like adaptability and vigor? On top of the ridiculous repair and upgrade costs.