Oh, I've not long read that the saves are under my documents (in relation to one of the mods mentioned earlier I think).
Well, I suffered that to play Batman I suppose...
...and cheers!

I played both on Xbox 360, DA:O Ultimate Edition and Dark Souls in the same year a couple of years ago. While DA:O was longer, more open, quite entertaining, great story and characters, diverse (world, enemies, decisions), with more ways to define your own character and the way to play it, and compared to Dark Souls, "conversations and voices"; Dark Souls was shorter, smaller, linear, repetitive, had absolutly no story and a poor array of sounds, punishing and not that great... Actually, I thought it was a little overrated...

Graphically, Dark Souls is not that detailed than DA:O (but it's close) and it's much darker than DA:O (some levels are pitch black), the levels are very linear and not much too see (they are big, but where you can walk is really 'claustrophobic', with invisible walls everywhere), and where it gets more open, there's not much to do than walk, walk, and walk until you find something to kill, and believe me, you'll do A LOT of backtracking just to get something. If you re-visit an area, you'll have to kill the same enemies in the same places again. Once you finish the game, you can re-start the game with the same character and levels, but it gets more difficult the next time (enemies are harder to kill -have more life- and do more damage). Although, the enemies get tougher, they are not more evolved, you kill them the same way as before. If you get killed, you return to the last place where you saved the game (a place with a bonfire where you can rest and recover HP), and are punished in some way like losing something, but I can't remember what was it... (:P)

The game is hard, but not really-really that 'impossible' hard that some say, you only have to think how to hit an enemy, use defense, shield, or avoid attacks a lot, and have patience. In others words, how to fight properly. People who only use the attack button have problems with the game.

I finished the game three times in a row, found everything -including all the secrets-, did and killed everything, and my character was a little overpowered by the end. I stopped playing it when I was close to end it for a fourth time, but that was just because I was really bored of the game and had better games to play... (:P)

If you plan to get both, that's great, but if you can get only one of those, I highly recommend Dragon Age: Origins over Dark Souls. The Ultimate Edition has all the DLC and extras, which are extra items, an extra character to meet during the main game, some backstory in others and extra post events to the main game. Get it if you can, because the Ultimate Edition on PC is not available in all regions (like mine... --_--), and because the DLCs for Leliana and Morrigan were great ^_^

I haven't played Dark Souls but you can get DA:O ultimate with $5 right now and it's a great game. I'm planning to replay it when I have the time :)

where the hell can you get it for $5?! O_o?

It's $5 on Amazon. Not sure if it's the same for the UK site. Origin only, but you don't need to load the client once you have the game setup.

Ah right. Not touching Amazon with a bargepole - I paid more UK tax last month than they have in the last five years! Heheh.


Edit: cheers though!

I personally found DAO rather dull. I'm sure it's a great game, but it seems like it tried to hard to keep things light even when they shouldn't be. Dark Souls on the other hand doesn't apply restrictions on itself. It doesn't try to be accessible. It goes about creating the experience it was meant to with no holding back.

However, if you choose DAO in the end, keep in mind that DAO:Ultimate is $5 on Amazon (though that one runs through Origin.)

Both are masterpieces. DAO is a highly polished and rich game in its genre, and DS offer a very unique experience that no other recent games can offer. There are a lot of reviews out there describing both games so I will not repeat here, but I'll suggest DS for the following reasons:

1, GFWL is closing next year, and at the moment I haven't heard news about patching yet. The online features are crucial to the game, so GFWL's closing will really hurt this game. As a result, this final half a year before GFWL's closing might be the very last chance to experience this great game fully and properly on PC. If you are really intrigued by this game, then you should take this last chance. If you are just mildly interested, then maybe you can wait for DS2, which brings my second point.

2, DS2 is coming next year. As I said, DS is a very unique game. As a result, if you want to prepare yourself for DS2, DS is the only PC game can provide you similar experience. Or if you want to make sure you do want DS2, DS is also the only PC game you can use as reference.

Now thats something thats really been ticking over in my head regarding this should I only get one - as in the end (particularly if i get it 75% off in a daily / flash deal) I'm spending about as much as I would for a cheap film on DVD and likely getting far more hours of enjoyment out of it - and as you say, should the GFWL thingy cause problems with the game later on, at least I'll have gotten to play it beforehand.

I'm not sure if this matters but what's your requirements regarding graphics and performance? The pro on DAO's side is that you can pause and that's a big part of the game hence performance will likely be much less important than Dark Souls.

Little update - decided to go against buying DA:O whilst the offer was on, and grabbed DS just about an hour ago, considered waiting for a better deal, but I wanted to play the game quite badly after rereading some of the comments on here, and reading up on it a bit more.

Cheers for the help guys, I'll no doubt pick up DA:O at some point anyways! :)

I really hope that you won't end up hating it.

Check the nexus for the ds fix and the mouse fix. Those two are mandatory. Check everything else, see what you like to add. The two fixes are under "Utilities and Tools" category.

Aye already found them thanks!

No doubt I'll love it - very much my hard as balls kind of game! :)
Besides, I've spent more on a crap DVD before, and far more on a crap or damaging night out...

Read about some successful builds, chose one that suits you best and stick to it. The available builds have also recommended weapons and armors, so make sure that you learn the locations from where to get them. Many of the most powerful weapons and armors can be easily missed.

Cheers. Think I'll likely get the dsfix etc running then have a quick hour to get used to it a little before delving deeper (im one of those that will often restart the game after the first hour for a proper run). :)