My Favourite Boss Battles Part 4: Ornstein and Smough (Dark Souls)

With a series so famed for the brutal difficulty of its bosses, it was impossible not to include a fight from Dark Souls on this list. There are a lot to choose from, and I am lucky in that I have only played the first game in the series to its fullest and so don’t have to pick out of a much wider pool of excellent monsters.

With that in mind, for this list I was tempted to pick Gwyn, Lord of Cinder, because it required a thorough knowledge of mechanics being used throughout the game. With the difficulty of the fight itself, Gwyn serves as a fitting final boss to conclude the adventure.

However, as I have already gushed about the use of boss mechanics to sum-up and test game mastery from the player in my entry about The End, I have decided to go with Ornstein and Smough. There’s not much else to say about this battle that hasn’t been said in other analyses of the fight, but I will certainly try.

What I enjoyed most about the fight was the flow of the gameplay itself. Constantly dodging attacks from both adversaries proves for a terrifying and exciting experience; Ornstein attacks with his speed and powerful lightning attacks, while Smough assaults you with a slower, but devastating barrage of attacks with a large range. This results in an intense fight that requires mastery of dodge-rolling or a hell of a lot of blocking power. I remember reading about this battle and thinking how screwed I would be when I got to this point in the game, but what I didn’t expect was how much I would enjoy the actual fight itself.

The intensity of the fight never lets up in true Dark Souls style, and this only serves to make one feel a massive sense of reward upon coming out the other side victorious. I remember the immense feeling of catharsis from the first time I beat Ornstein and Smough and it has rarely been topped to this day.

It helps with this boss battle that the gold armour of your adversaries makes for a cooler look that gives one a sense of intimidation when you first encounter them. On top of the grand aesthetic of their massive surroundings in Anor Londo, the sense of scale that you can get from this battle is particularly fitting and worthy of merit.

I wouldn’t recommend Dark Souls to anyone but the most experienced of gamers and those willing to trudge through adversity for great reward, but for those dedicated players, the game that serves up this boss battle is an artful and rewarding experience that most wouldn’t hesitate to say is worth the difficulty.