Yes the other games are PC only. There is nothing wrong for you or anybody to enjoy the combat of Witcher more. But in terms of how advanced, polished and responisive DS combat is, there is just no comparison. You mentioned special moves. What special moves, whirl? DS2 and bloodborne offer MORE than 10 different attacks on every weapon, in all of which you have 100% control. That's the basic low point of TW combat. I love as quick thrusting attack Geralt does some times after dodging. Well, if only i could do that MANUALLY, and he did not do it randomly. You mention signs. DS has tons of spells that you can use as a battle mage. There is no comparison there. Alchemy yeah, is something that DS does not have. But also every weapon class have different moveset, while on TW every swords weilds the same. Also there is far more advanced system on how your stats interact with weapons.The last point of enemies that rarely defend themselves is the most absurd. Sorry. Have you seen the AI on DS2 invaders? Like Maldron the assasin? Enemies there block you, dodge you, parry you, guard break you, backstab you among others, while bandits on TW3 just stand there looking at you like fools.
I prefer TW3 over DS generally, all things considered, but the combat, objectively speaking is vastly superior on DS, or any other ARPG for that matter. And again, nothing wrong with enjoying TW3's combat more.
Stop, dude. Or you'll make me regret not getting DS 2.
I suppose I don't value the different move sets of weapons so much, because their effect in many cases don't change much, except for bigger lunges.
As for spells, this is probably the keypoint for me. You can have a bunch of spells as a battlemage, but do they offer CC? Besides, these spells can be very unnaccessible. I remember killing a guy who sold some DoT spells on DS, by accident, because he looks exactly like a monster. Then I couldn't find the damn spell anywhere else. It seems that spells and bows are only there to shorten the amount of work you need to do in melee, just fire balls, soul arrows and stuff, basic ranged attacks logic.
I haven't played DS2, so I really didn't get to see the eneies with awesome defense. Most of what I saw in Demon Souls and Darks Souls were enemies that didn't defend and that could be pulled one at a time, lacking the AI to behave in groups, whivch I find more bothersome than the tethers we have in TW3.
As for the stats and their interaction with the wepons I agree the Souls system is awesome. I like their block systems most. I think it's really genius. The way they have spell uses instead of mana is also genius. I think they have great rules, a great form, but dont fill well in good content. Most of the proggression feels merely quantitave. I didn't feel like I could pick a "build", adopt a style from the beginning and keep improving that style, both quantitatively and qualitatively. The proggression felt very much out of my hands (without checking wikis). One thing that made me surprisingly prefer Skyrim over Dark Souls was how Skyrim's proggression is at the player's control, even though I hated the grind and the combat was silly.
Anyways... good discussion. Funny thing is that I dreamed of DS last night. Odd. I dreamed of the blacksmith I missed in the beginning of the game and only found mucch later on (part of the problem with my control over my proggression). Open world is a b!tch.
TW3 doesn't offer nearly as much depth or challenge in combat as any Souls game, especially challenge part, the game is just too easy with very little variety in monsters and pretty bad AI.
Do you think AI that is pulled one at a time is worse than the tethers in TW3?
I think the Souls game rely a lot on the i-frames gimmick. For those who don't mind it I can see how the attack variety and range of enemies can be fascinating. But all I see is the devs exploiting a gimmick. The dodges in TW3 are real. I think they're much better.
TW3 isn't as hard, but it's difficulty feels fair to me, whereas DS tends to simply troll people, as the Devs themselves admit.
As I answered the guy above, I do love many things about Souls, though. The blocking and healing mechanics are great.