Eurogamer has a new preview about how undead players can still be invaded.
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The Official Playstation Magazine has a new interview with Tanimura & Shibuya.Dark Souls 2 is going to change one of the cardinal rules in From's Souls series: undead players will be susceptible to invasion.
For the uninitiated, Demon's & Dark Souls players typically spend 95 per cent of their play time as a dead person. Achieving a "human form" is a sort of special power-up that requires rare items or other infrequent criteria to be met. Being human makes you more powerful and able to summon other players, but it also makes you susceptible to being invaded by other players set on slaying you. Thus it's always been a method of making people feel uneasy after victory, but the PvP angle could largely be ignored if you'd rather not bother.
Despite this crucial shift there are new systems in place so players aren't constantly getting griefed by pros looking for fresh blood to spill. "Before, the matchmaking was based upon player level," Namco Bandai producer Takeshi Miyazoe explained in an interview with OPM. "That will remain, but we also want to focus on how much time you've played the game. Also, there will be penalties for players who invade, but still lose. There are risks. And there will be 'policemen' against invaders and a ransom system where if you constantly invade or kill NPCs there will be motivation for summoned players to go after you."
I aslo have a new video showing more gameplay footage.“Our main intent is not to foster a greater frequency of multiplayer, but more to give players the opportunity to interact even within the ‘loose’ parameters allowed,” From Software’s Yui Tanimura, Dark Souls 2 co-director (along with Tomohiro Shibuya), tells OPM. The franchise has always made innovative use of online features – and then evolved them for future titles. In Demon’s Souls, players could choose to leave messages with hints for the road ahead. In Dark Souls, players who used Humanity to take on a living form could be invaded via PvP or summon some additional help, and in Dark Souls 2 a new server-based network will bear the load as even players in a Hollow (undead) state are vulnerable to invasion from other human adventurers.
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