The first Souls game I played was Demon's Souls. I loved it and thought it was super well done, but I repeatedly had my behind handed to me. I could not even beat Phalanx (1st boss and one that is actually really easy). I was super stressed, so I took a break, returned months later, made sure I understood the mechanics better, and eventually beat Phalanx and the rest of the game. It was one of the most satisfying experiences ever, which is why I love this series and bought a ps4 solely for Bloodborne since no other exclusives are interesting to me (right now). Now, it is hard for me to play many other games because they are so easy and bogged down by excessive dialogue (something the Souls games avoid). Hopefully he feels somewhat ashamed and returns to the game sometime in the near future and becomes a man. 

What a seriously unnecessary article. What is his agenda with this article?

hah, it always breaks my heart to kill cute little Phalanx, it's so funny to let him follow you around with all his soldier-blobs dead

I killed him first try when I started Demon's Souls, largely because a note outside his fog gate read "weakness fire"

Exactly. They should just give the games to people who know how to play them so they can be scored fairly.

Its not really about the criticism. IGN needs to allow people who know how to play those games to play them. Allow the person who is the connisseur to explain what they like or dislike because they understand the nooks and crannies of the game. A person who isn't so good at it is going to have a bias. Its a filler article. They allowed Ryan McCaffrey to play Alien Isolation and he gave it a 6.0 because they game made him frustrated. Guess what? Its supposed to do that. They should just put him on Halo duty forever because it seems to be his cup of tea. I would trust Ryans words when it comes to Halo, but games like Aliens? No. He was blasted on IGN because of it by the fans. An article written out of frustration because you weren't so hot at a game can cause bitterness to be displayed in the score. This is where qualification per genre needs to become law in that business.

If you grind enough and upgrade your weapon, the cleric beast becomes a joke. Just make sure you budget your stamina. Don't dodge widely, I know he's huge and scary but his attacks are very predictable once you get the hang of it.

Most important: unlock the shortcut. It takes 2-3 minutes tops to go from lamp to boss.

I had so much fun exploring that I basically leveld my cane to +3 and unlocked all the way to the 2nd boss (went skill-based build cuz I dig walking around with a cane lol) and hit lvl 24 before making my 3rd attempt at the CLeric Beast. Apparently, at lvl 24, his hits aren't hard enough that you won't be able to recover most of the life you lost from one hit via a counterattack, just move away if he starts stringing a combo and string a combo counterattack if he does a one hit attack. Took me 5 hrs into the game IIRC.

One mistake I remember I made when I started playing the game was getting too used to using my peripheral vision to play and focused my eyes more on my char than my enemy. Too much WoW, i guess (always focused on my character to avoid standing on fire). DO NOT do this in BB. Alway always keep your eye squarely at your opponent and memorize the visual cues for each attack (raise arms up=dodge left/right, raise arms right/left=dodge backwards) and your peripheral vision at the surroundings (to avoid obstacles).

Keep trying. Believe me when I tell you that the game opens up when you kill 1st boss.

Aliens isolation aside this isn't a review. This is an article from someone new to the series and his experience with this game. It likely likely mirrors the experience of plenty of people playing right now and in past games. 

Unfortunately the souls series is practically perfect according to the internet, a sacred cow above criticism. As someone who enjoys the souls games now I can still say that they are overly obscure and could really do a little more to help out newer players. And no, they are also not perfect games. 

Articles like these are great as they allow from software to see areas that they could improve on for future games. 

i just bought this game! i should have read this "fact"!
oh the horror!
ok I'm going to sell this shit :P

If you still havent beat it try checking out this guide https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XD0kUBULEIM

I understand completely that its not a review. I was just giving an example of people who do not qualify for certain games writing about them. Souls is not perfect, not does it need to be but it serves its niche and gives some challenging combat that gamers have needed in a world full of QTE's and dumb Ai. The game is not meant for people like him nor should it be. 

He wants more checkpoints, he admitted he sucks and essentially doesn't want a game that stands in the way even if he gets one victory. Well sadly for him thats exactly what the game was created to do. to bring back the times when checkpoints were few and far between, when you faced hordes of enemies and had to make it to the end. 

He doesn't want improvement, he wants it to be like other games today, which is terribly wrong and not what the Souls series is about.

In short...as a journalist he should've known what he was getting into and did not do his homework. I have a friend who gave Dark Souls 2 to me for free because of how badly it frustrated him and I beat it. He told me I couldn't beat it in two weeks and I did. These games are just made for certain levels of players with a higher tolerance for difficulty and dying. 

I suggest he move along to Shadow of Mordor or Assassins Creed. Those games would probably be more his speed.

P.S.

IGN has been caught before by fans for reviewing games on easy and missing parts of their reviews by fans who called them out. I don't watch IGN reviews for skill (much like Angry Joe), but much rather for entertainment. Everyone has their place in the gaming world thats pretty much theirs.