As Darkest Dungeon 2 Hits Consoles, The Original Continues To Haunt My Backlog

2024 could be the year of my trusty Nintendo Switch’s retirement. It’s certainly earned it: I have an original Switch from 2017, and it’s been used almost every day. The unit itself has outlived a wide selection of Joy-Cons, both first- and third-party models, and has hosted some of my very favorite games ever.

Over the course of this year, I’ve been completing some of those titles on the system for what may be the very last time. Metal Gear Solid and Resident Evil 4 have been ticked off the list and now it’s the turn of Darkest Dungeon, a game that haunts me just as the cursed hamlet therein haunts the Ancestor.

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If you’re a die-hard gamer that loves unforgiving games, this list may be useful.

My purpose in doing all this is to ensure that my Switch continues to enjoy good eatin’ during its twilight months, but the problem I’ve now run into is this: I adore and utterly despise Darkest Dungeon in equal measure. I’m excited for the console edition of Darkest Dungeon 2 and also dreading it. Let me explain why. In time, dear reader, you will know the tragic extent of my failings.

Darkest Dungeon

Released: January 19, 2016

My Perfect Game, My Perfect Nightmare

Darkest Dungeon Ancestor writing the letter

Me writing this article, 2024, colorized.

As an enormous fan of horror, RPGs with inventive and tactical battle systems, striking 2D art and a good old-fashioned challenging experience, Darkest Dungeon really ticks every possible box for me. I was sold on it from the first screenshot and have bought it on multiple systems. On none of them, however, have I actually finished the campaign, despite a combined couple of hundred hours spent in its grim world.

Every few months, I return to the game and start up a fresh file (always naming my estate Yharnam in honor of my beloved Bloodborne), confident that things will be different this time. I make a solid start and begin building up my hero roster. As I’ve become more experienced with the game, I’ve made better use of Antiquarians to build up my Gold supply (certain lucrative items are only available with one of these heroes in the party and they offer greater gold-stacking) and developed a better knowledge of how best to make use of the various Curios found on expeditions. My issue arises when I try to optimize my party members, and when I get deeper into a campaign.

In Darkest Dungeon, naming heroes is a risky business. That’s how you become attached to them, and if you become attached, you open yourself up to some major pain when they’re killed by unfortunate critical hits, bad rolls, or pesky damage-over-time effects you weren’t prepared for.

The Graveyard screen in Darkest Dungeon showing dead heroes

Yes, these heroes all have default names, but I still loved them all and continue to hate the Fanatic from the Crimson Court DLC. And Blight effects.

It’s often advised to see your heroes as resources, as loot-gatherers that can simply be dismissed from your roster if they build up too much Stress (just as tricky to manage in Darkest Dungeon 2) or too many negative quirks, but that’s not the way I tend to play games. I like to build up a party, become familiar with them, and develop a backstory and narrative around them where one isn’t forthcoming in the game itself, as in this case.

Darkest Dungeon 2: 10 Best Starting Quirks

Quirks are a big part of Darkest Dungeon 2, and here’s where you should start.

The Quirk system (which randomly assigns ‘personality traits’ to heroes when they arrive in the Stagecoach or complete an expedition) gives some freedom to do this. For instance, in my current run, I have a Vestal (a crucial class that returns in the sequel) with the Witness negative quirk, which means that she cannot pray in the Hamlet’s Abbey to relieve stress. What did this religious character experience that resulted in her turning her back on her faith?

Why does an Arbalest, a character who has only Ranged attacks, have Lazy Eye, which gives her an accuracy reduction for such attacks? In my mind, she received an injury while fighting in the backlines of a war, which led her to take refuge in the Hamlet. These are the sorts of things that have zero impact on gameplay in any sense and are just my unnecessary headcanon, but they tend to impact my party composition more than actually putting together appropriate teams for the missions at hand. Failing to do this, particularly during boss missions, can be a recipe for costly losses, failure, and frustration.

A Fearful Challenge In More Ways Than One

Darkest Dungeon battle against the Wizened Hag

That is indeed one of my party members being slowly burnt to death in the Wizened Hag’s cooking pot. These boss battles aren’t for the faint-hearted.

Compounding that issue, of course, there’s the intentional difficulty of these encounters themselves. Red Hook has a unique talent for designing horrific bosses with equally monstrous powers to drain the HP and build the Stress of your party, and typically throw in gimmicks that limit your own damage potential or otherwise hold your heroes back. As you work your way to the Champion level expeditions, even standard enemies gain extra devious effects on their attacks and heightened resistance to your own, which means that Guild and Blacksmith upgrades to skills, weapons and armor are crucial to being effective.

Darkest Dungeon 2: Best Team Compositions

From character pros and cons to recommendations for newcomer and veteran players, here’s how to make great team compositions in Darkest Dungeon 2.

Harder difficulty modes ramp things up in countless ways, one particularly notable one being the time limit to complete the campaign. This forces the juggling of those limited upgrade resources, ensuring that your team composition and strategy are apt for the challenge at hand, choosing which expedition to take on each week, careful play to keep what may be a key hero alive, spending your gold in the most efficient ways, and hoping that the RNG will be kind to you at vital moments. The action, for somebody with heightened anxiety like myself, is as stress-inducing as a Madman’s Doomsay skill.

With the Stagecoach offering a selection of new heroes to recruit each week, it’s possible to recover from just about any setback (the time limit notwithstanding) in the long run, but big losses of favorite roster members are generally enough to prevent me from pushing on. I hate to have to abandon a quest in progress, even where this could save one of those very lives; a stubborn streak that truly hampers my ability to play the game optimally. The further I get into a playthrough, the more I find these issues piling up. As such, though I’ve reached the final Darkest Dungeon missions several times, I’ve never finished them and brought the campaign to a close. In my latest attempt, I’m hoping that I can finally do so and tick the game off my list.

Darkest Dungeon 2, which arrives on the Nintendo Switch (and other consoles) in July 2024, is a rather different prospect to the original. In this title, the player’s party rides a stagecoach across a similarly-stricken world, engaging in battles with ghastly foes, building relationships between heroes, and gradually powering up over failed runs in classic roguelike fashion. Buffs and debuffs for friends and foes alike work differently, with a complex ‘token’ system, and customization of heroes is more involved. How long will I be tinkering with hero paths and class compositions on the game’s Switch release? Far too long. Will I be individually naming and developing backstories for each hero? Against my better judgment, absolutely.