Y'know, it's bad enough to be a walking corpse having to feed off the souls of others in a terrifying realm of otherworldly beasts. There really is no need to be teased and laughed at by some smelly witches.

Nevertheless, it's a hint of calamities to come. These pungent crones know you will die, and die several times, for that is the way of Dark Souls and this, its successor.

Yep, it's tough, even more so given how vastly staggered the respawning points are. But this should mould one into the sort of hero who limits his demise at all costs. Learn from your many deaths or you will throw the disc onto the carpet and stand repeatedly on its shiny face.

It doesn't help that as soon as our wandering hero falls into Drangleic, he's not a well chap. In fact he's well and truly cursed, and only by collecting souls will the curse prevent him from turning 'hollow', which isn't a nice state of mind, so sayeth the gibbering harridans at the start.

Carefully belting (In DS2 fools most certainly rush in) foes apart will offer up a swag of souls, and because these things make sense in Happy Gaming Land, you can exchange them for useful things that will help you not to die so often, like a shiny weapon or leather nipple protectors.

And then you'll die again. And learn from it. And progress. And die again.

That's how Dark Souls II works: death is a way of life in Drangleic, and accepting this will open up a simply stunning fantasy RPG that will devour bushels of your spare time.

The unprepared, however, will find a world of pain and frustration.

Out on PC, PS3 and Xbox 360