Welcome to the second part of my Darksiders II review coverage! Now that I’ve written about the main story, it’s time to ramble about the DLCs.
I didn’t think I was going to cover these because they’re not as deep in terms of story if you were to compare it to the DLCs from Mass Effect or Dragon Age, but those are different. This is a new approach. I reviewed nearly every single DLC from DAO, even the ones that didn’t have much story connection like the one where you can play as a darkspawn!
Anyway, there are three additional campaigns in Darksiders II which like the BioWare games, they become available as you progress through the main story. I’m going to talk about these DLCs not in the order of release, but in the order of which I played them, so here we go.
The Abyssal Forge
This DLC takes place in a realm in the Shadowlands which is described as a void between the Tree of Life and Death, part of the Abyss. The Abyss in the Darksiders universe is also described as like a graveyard where many worlds that become plagued and derived of life and many monstrous creatures dwell there. There’s no Corruption here, but it seems that there is something else lurking about. I thought that this was originally going to be a quest where we were going to get the Abyssal armor all at once but I was wrong.
I was challenged by this Mad Smith whose fight reminded me very much of fighting Thane again. After defeating him, he told Death that his forge needed to be destroyed, but the only way to reach it was to bring enough of this mineral to be granted immunity to this black gunk we need to cross to reach the forge. There’s Soul Splitting puzzles; some easier than others, but when I reached the forge I realized it was some kind of construct. The Mad Smith wanted Death to destroy it because it went out of control. It was supposed to harness the power of the Abyss, but it seems to have gone sideways. This boss fight had so much spurting lava that I couldn’t always see where I was going!
I expected the structure to collapse, but then I realized the forge was just the construct and not the building.
Argul’s Tomb
In this DLC, we return to the Icy Veil as the merchant Ostegoth says we should check it out. Earlier, we defeated Argul the Deposed King in his tomb after he was overthrown by the Lord of Bones. By then, you’d think we’ve seen enough of him, but clearly not. He still has a dragon called Frostbane which he controls. It is a creature from the Abyss that serves as part of Argul’s source of power. That is why where we fight Argul himself is totally separate (even though he still proved to be tough on his own), Ostegoth wants Death to eliminate Frostbane so the threat of Argul will be over for good.
This time instead of Soul-Splitting, I had to use the Voidwalker a lot, which continuously brings me memories of the Black Throne. Fighting Frostbane, oh man I really do NOT like any enemies or bosses in this game that use frost attacks, because if Death got frozen, I would have to mash the B button to free him; I play on PC yes, but for certain games like this, I use an Xbox controller. It would still do damage even after he thawed out. I don’t know what’s harder, Argul or Frostbane. So this DLC proved quite the challenge.
The Demon Lord Belial
I actually had to crop this image to get a good picture of him alone. This DLC is my favourite. In it, Death returns to Earth and learns from Uriel that human survivors have been spotted. You’d think how is that possible with all the collateral damage? But, I guess we could always bunker down like we would if there was a tornado
Death eventually finds a male human hunter who at first blames Death for driving his race to extinction and has somehow manage to survive by being like a boy scout, whatever that means. When Death finally is able to speak to him, the hunter says a demon lord named Belial has taken his soul and may now know the location of other survivors.
Upon meeting Belial; I’ve heard that name from somewhere before, I wasn’t expecting him to look like that. Where exactly are his eyes? He was a tough boss with his trident and where we had to shoot his shield. He never took the hunter’s soul after all. At the end, it was sad how the hunter felt he couldn’t live with endangering other humans and asked Death to kill him.
This reminds me of when they first met and Death told him who he was but then said it wasn’t his time. Then when the hunter wanted to die, Death is like; you wish to go now? Then he turns and slits his throat. I think this DLC had the most story to it, and there was more combat than puzzles to it.
Not saying I hate puzzles in these games, but still I’ll take a good short story over one puzzle that might take me half an hour to figure out without a guide!
And those are my DLC rambles for Darksiders II, I’ve done all I’ve can to catch up on other blogging stuff, now it’s time to really get the Darksiders III hype train rolling and get the game started. I’m eager for it and so is Fury on my shelf directly above me as I write this.
See you at the apocalypse.
👽Emily
Monsterlady's Diary 