Home Gaming It’s not just you – Dark Souls 3 summoning is a bit broken at the moment

It’s not just you – Dark Souls 3 summoning is a bit broken at the moment

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22

DS3 sunbro

Dark Souls has always been a game filled with glitches. There’s a reason that speed runners are divided into glitch-users and glitch-free play throughs. Glitches can be used to beat bosses more easily, maneuver environments or generally make life easier. However, sometimes the glitches are just a sign of problems in the game that need fixing, and summoning issues fall into that category.

I noticed some bad summoning issues with my other half was playing Dark Souls 3 on PS4 this weekend. Sometimes it would work the way it’s supposed to – he could get summoned into other players’ worlds to help with a boss battle, or summon in the help of a Sun Bro if he wanted. Other times, it simply didn’t work. He would put down his summon sign and the animation would show but the summon sign wouldn’t appear. Or it would appear but he couldn’t be summoned. Or he would try to summon and it kept saying unable to summon phantom. Sometimes, the game would crash while attempting to summon or be summoned.

As usual for South Africans, I assumed it was an issue with our internet. That is, until I went looking to see if other people were having the issue. There were a bunch of reddit threads and steam community posts with similar issues, but my favorite was this YouTube video. I’m not embedding it because of game spoilers, but if you aren’t avoiding spoilers it shows off a bunch of issues experienced with summoning. From bosses not showing animations, thereby making players invincible, to being unable to access boss arenas, to simply being unable to summon anyone, it seems that summoning is rather broken at the moment.

I have faith in From Software that this will be fixed soon. The unique approach to multiplayer and coop is a hallmark of these games, and adds so much to the experience. I’m sure they are working on a fix as I write this, but for now, don’t stress – it’s not you, it’s Dark Souls.

Last Updated: April 18, 2016

22 Comments

  1. Umar

    April 18, 2016 at 10:34

    Ran into a few issues as well, but I spent most of Saturday playing online without much trouble either. I got like 10 Sunlight medals already, and did some exploring of levels with other people.

    Reply

    • Captain JJ vs ..............

      April 18, 2016 at 10:56

      Sunlight medals? I bet your armour is shiny af

      Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      April 18, 2016 at 10:58

      huehuehue…

      Reply

      • Hammersteyn_hates_Raid0

        April 18, 2016 at 11:03

        XD

        Reply

  2. Captain JJ vs ..............

    April 18, 2016 at 10:56

    If you instantly died when summoning then it wouldn’t seem broken at all.

    Reply

  3. Hammersteyn_hates_Raid0

    April 18, 2016 at 10:56

  4. D4RKL1NG

    April 18, 2016 at 12:34

    There’s a patch releasing today afaik. Hopefully it’ll address the issue

    Reply

    • WitWolfy

      April 18, 2016 at 17:22

      Didnt do anything…

      Reply

  5. WitWolfy

    April 18, 2016 at 12:43

    could barely grind this weekend. Couldnt summon or be summoned. Drove me crazy. seemed to work again (sort of) late yesterday afternoon.

    Reply

  6. WitWolfy

    April 18, 2016 at 17:21

    What a hunk of shit. At home and still the same shit. Been staring at the calibration menu forever. I dunno if its just an Xbox One thing but this game’s server is probably run on a potato.

    Reply

  7. Gideon Jacobs

    April 19, 2016 at 09:57

    Thanks for the follow on “Dark Souls & Bloodborne South Africa” Facebook page Queen Zoe!

    Nice article. We held a 48hr LAN this weekend and boy are you on the money. Eventually stabilised on Saturday evening followed by hours of Jolly Cooperation!

    *Gideon Jacobs (Sunbro)
    *PSN GT Manjuices_ZA

    Reply

  8. Alt+Tab Souls

    April 19, 2016 at 11:56

    For some reason, at least in the last few situations, alt+tabbing out and back into the game makes summoning work again. I know, it sounds idiotic, but as far as I can see, it works.

    Reply

    • slap

      April 26, 2016 at 21:14

      coincidence. Does not work. Tested it many times, no difference. It’s broken and not just on PC, it’s all platforms

      Reply

  9. slap

    April 20, 2016 at 18:05

    it really needs fixing. Sometimes it works but most of the time I summon people and they can’t traverse the fog. I’m really struggling with the Pontif . Have to alt-f4 after summoning some sunbros then finding out they can’t even help me 🙁

    Reply

  10. Emily

    April 21, 2016 at 23:56

    since April 18th I have not been able to be summoned, I will put my son in the same down okay and everything seems fine, then it will say I’m being summoned to another world, so I will wait and nothing will happen then it will give me a message saying I was failed to be summoned as a phantom, nothing I do seems to help, I spend hours online looking for a solution but have not found one, PS my network connection is just fine also I can see messages and leave them it’s just the summoning that’s got a bug

    Reply

    • Emily

      April 22, 2016 at 00:57

      I did not mean son and the same I meant “sign down”

      Reply

  11. OpinionsAreFrownedUpon

    April 26, 2016 at 13:57

    Sunlight covenant is the cancer of the souls series.

    Reply

    • slap

      April 26, 2016 at 21:15

      err no. Hardly. Not sure why you’d think this. What’s cancer is the PvPers who hack, cheat and lagstab. Oh and idiots with opinions 😛

      Reply

  12. Kevin

    May 1, 2016 at 19:53

    I’ve been having an issue for almost a whole week now where a ton of summon signs would appear, but the prompt “Press X to summon” wouldn’t appear. Hence, not allowing me to summon. Yet it allowed me to summon invaders for some reason.

    Reply

  13. Antonio Amigon

    May 10, 2016 at 05:21

    I can summon and get summoned just fine, Its when I want to get summon through the covenant system that it seems to fail for me, Saturday I spent 4 hours sitting in 2 different places wishing to get summoned to an invaded world to help but nothing. I spent 4 hours just sitting without anything happening, I didn’t even get invaded in those 4 hours when I was just standing still. I honestly hope that they do fix it but its not taking away from the experience that much.

    Reply

  14. Sven

    May 10, 2016 at 20:32

    Definitely not fixed yet.

    Reply

  15. Nozzie

    May 29, 2016 at 16:27

    It’s May 29th and I’m still experiencing the problem….can’t summon or be summoned, can’t invade and haven’t been invaded and also only about a third of NPC’s have generated. Ds3 is broken and it sucks. I’m DUNN wit it.

    Reply

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