I honestly can't fault anyone for disliking the game because it is frustrating, especially if this is your first experience having not played Demon's Souls which was my case. I went into it blind which some people have done and still enjoyed it, but I quickly found out that reading about the basics, like how the humanity system works, character classes and the items you choose from when you make your character helped me a good bit. The first character I made was a thief which I found was a mistake, I made it to the gargoyles (I should say I struggled my way to the gargoyles) and found that boss fight to be completely impossible. I pretty much rage quit, and didn't want to go back. But after doing the research I mentioned above, I made a class that's more for beginners because I think most of the difficulty of the game, at least in the beginning is grasping how the combat works. Getting down your characters swinging animations, the timing, and learning how to exploit the enemy AI. Exploiting is the key word here, because that's exactly what it all comes down to, discovering the easiest way to take shit down, including bosses. You can easily look all the boss fights up, but trying to figure it out for yourself is the real reward.
As for it being bad design... some would say it's intentional, I would almost believe that From Software is full of a bunch of fucking sadist assholes, I've had many stupid deaths from wonky camera angles and weird physics but those things weren't prominent or consistent. There's also shit that will set you up to die if you don't know its coming, not to mention some ridiculous boss fights. So yea, the odds are stacked against you. However, once you get through an areas bullshit, know where all the booby traps are, how to handle that spot that cluster fucks you with a bunch of mobs, you can pretty much get through it in like a fraction of the time it did the first time it took you, there's an easy way to get through nearly everything in this game. So don't be discouraged if you lose a shit ton of souls, that isn't the real progress, it's knowing the tricks of the levels. So as I said, I recommend looking up those basics, also how magic works because I had no idea how to use any of it through the whole game and it practically makes some parts a hell of a lot easier. Also weapon crafting... because I honestly don't know how a sane person would figure that out otherwise.
