I’m back to have more fun with baseless speculation about the FromSoft pirate game. Why? Because why not? On a tangent to that, but somewhat related, I’m including a video below of Luke Westaway interwiving the man who translates From games into English. Well, he’s one of two who does it, and he was the first one before his team hired another guy. The idea that it was just two men who did all the English for all the From games is wild–especially Elden Ring. His name is Ryan Morris, and he speaks fondly of Solaire, the NPC from the first Dark Souls game whom everyone loves. (Ok, I had asterisked this and everything starting with ‘Except me’ below was going to be a footnote. But then it turned into the post, so let’s just go with that.)
Except me. It’s not that I dislike him; it’s just that I think he’s overrated. Everyone has him as their favorite NPC in that game, igf not in all From games. I wouldn’t put him in my top five, and I might not even put him in my top ten. He is not even my favorite NPC from that game.
Who is? Darkmoon Knightess. She’s the Firekeeper of Anor Lando, and she has a tragic life. Well, that’s pretty much everyone in any From game, really. None of the NPCs have particularly good lives, mind. It’s one of the things that From is known for. Everything is tragic and horrible, which is one reason why I love Patches so much (as I talked about in yesterday’s post. He is one of my favorites beacuse he’s in almost every game. I know the saying is that familiarity breeds contempt, but in this case, the opposite is true because everything is so bleak. As I mentioned in the last post, when Patches shows up, I smile in glee. I know what is going to happen. He’s going to tell me that there’s some wondrous treasure down a pit, and when I go for it, he’s going to kick/push me in the pit.
We have a deal, Patches and I, and I’m always happy to do my part of it, knowing he will do his. He is in my top five favorite NPCs in Dark Souls and, indeed, in Elden Ring. And DS III. Some other favorites from the games are Lucatiel (DS II), Eileen (Bloodborne), Yuria (DS III), Karla (DS III), Blaidd (Elden Ring), D (Elden Ring), and Sellen (Elden Ring). These are several off the top of my head, and I like them all better than I like Solaire.
Look. Here’s the thing with Solaire. I get why people like him. He’s a lonely ray of sunshine in an otherwise bleak world. He’s on a noble quest that sounds so heroic. Which brings me to another point about Solaire. After the first game, people thought he was the first born of Gwn. There are a ton of reasons for thinking this–and a soupcon of wishful thinking.
When the third game came out, Miyazaki made it crystal clear that Solaire was not the first born son of Gwyn. People were mad, to say the least. Well, some of them. There were a few camps. The first were upset/miffed that it wasn’t Solaire. The second weren’t miffed, but they wanted it to be left open. The third were happy with who it turned out to be.