77% positive review is an absolute joke, this game should easily be at 85% or higher, I think the hate it’s getting is from the people whining that Miyazaki was the game designing lead. I had 0 issues. The levels, weapons, bosses… everything was excellent. The music at Majula! It’s one of my favorite games of all time. Sure the first few hours are tough as nails esp when your health bar is only half, but once you figure it all out and can d handle multiple enemies at once, you have such a great time. IMO I’d give this game a solid 9/10, base game 8/10, base game + DLC brings it up to a 9. I put over 150 hours or so on the steam deck and loved every second of it.

Dark souls 2: Scholar of the First Sin is a game that suffers immensely from bad enemy placement, boring, rushed, and sometimes immensely tedious boss design, and overall worse level design than the first of the series. That being said, when this game is good, it is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ good. Some of the environments you adventure through were truly breathtaking visually, and helped to hide how ungodly repetitive the enemies in each area were. This game is an experience you can have, if you so choose. I shall give this game a rating of wasted potential/10

EDIT: I will admit though, there's nothing quite like the rush of dopamine I'm getting knowing that I am satisfactorily done with the game

i will deliver a swift uppercut to every reindeer that enters my sight