‘Dark Souls’ Mistakes You’ll Never Be Able to Unsee

The first ‘Dark Souls’ still hides a bunch of quirks that stick out once you notice them. Some are technical hiccups that the original consoles struggled to handle. Others are odd bits of enemy behavior or mechanics that do not quite line up with how the rest of the game works. None of these break a playthrough, but they are easy to spot once you know where to look and they are hard to forget afterward.

Blighttown’s infamous frame drops

On the original PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions, the upper walkways and the swamp in Blighttown can slow to single digit frame rates. The issue shows up most clearly near the wheel lifts and around the bonfire by the water. Adding toxic blowdarts, fire effects, or multiple enemies on screen makes the slowdown worse. The remastered release improves performance, but anyone revisiting older hardware will still see the stutter in the same spots.

Bed of Chaos persistence and fall pits

The Bed of Chaos keeps its destroyed roots after you die and return to the arena. This persistence lets you break the left and right cores on separate attempts, but it also leaves huge gaps that can knock you into instant death. The sweeping arm hitboxes shove the player into those pits even when it looks like there is room to dodge. Dropping through the central hole to reach the core lines up only once the side roots are gone, which exposes how the arena rebuilds across deaths.

Ceaseless Discharge cliff dive behavior

After you pick up the Gold-Hemmed set at the altar, Ceaseless Discharge triggers a chase that can end with the boss leaping off the ledge. If you retreat toward the fog gate, the boss pathing sometimes commits to a long swipe that causes a fatal tumble. The death plays the full soul drop as if you won a normal fight. This behavior only starts after grabbing the clothes, which flips the boss from passive to aggressive and exposes the pathing edge case.

Taurus Demon bridge fall

The Taurus Demon can be baited near the battlements in the Undead Burg and then pushed into a fall during its charge or jump attacks. The arena layout places a narrow walkway with a low wall that does not fully contain the boss during certain animations. If the boss ends its leap with feet outside the collision, gravity takes over and the health bar disappears instantly. This is repeatable across runs and shows how enemy movement can outpace the arena boundaries.

Undead Parish boar doorway jam

The armored boar in the Undead Parish often wedges itself in the narrow gate near the bonfire side entrance. When it tries to turn or back up, its model catches on the door frame and the AI keeps cycling the same move. Luring it with Alluring Skulls exaggerates the effect because the item pulls the boar into the choke point. The behavior reveals how larger enemies struggle with tight navigation meshes in older areas.

Ragdoll cling after death

Fallen enemies sometimes attach to the player model and drag along the ground while you walk. The effect appears most in the Undead Burg and Depths where narrow hallways concentrate bodies. Touching a limb or stepping over a pile can wake up the ragdoll and it spins or stretches as the camera moves. The moment ends when you roll or change elevation, but it shows how loose the post death physics can get.

Crystal Lizard limited attempts

Crystal Lizards in zones like the Catacombs and Great Hollow only allow a set number of spawn attempts. If you scare one away or quit out at the wrong time, the counter can tick down and the lizard will not return for that playthrough. Resting at a bonfire without killing it may consume another attempt depending on the encounter. This quirk can lock you out of upgrade materials until New Game Plus and it surprises players who expect normal enemy respawns.

Anor Londo rotating bridge oddities

When the central elevator bridge rotates, enemies and dropped items can end up floating until the platform locks in place. If a Silver Knight is walking during the rotation, it may clip and fall or snap to the bridge once the animation finishes. Bloodstains can appear in midair while the bridge is between positions and then settle onto the surface at the end. The whole sequence shows how the level geometry shifts underneath active actors.

Lost Izalith dragon butt pathing stalls

The Boundaries of Lost Izalith contain several large dragon leg enemies that get stuck on tree roots and ruins when they chase the player. When they try to pivot, their long step animation collides with scenery and the AI pauses before resetting. Pulling two at once makes the hitching more obvious because they block each other at the choke points. This stall lets you see the limits of their movement range without any deliberate setup.

Early item and soul duplication exploits

Unpatched versions of the game allowed players to duplicate consumables and souls using inventory timing with the Bottomless Box or transformation items. The timing created unsynced counts that wrote extra copies into the inventory after a menu swap. Later updates closed the window and the remastered release removed the inputs that made it possible. Playing offline on old discs can still surface the behavior, which is why speedruns and challenge rules often specify a version.

Tell us which ‘Dark Souls’ mistakes jumped out at you the most and share your own hard to unsee finds in the comments.