I’ve played through most of the soulslikes I put my mind to but I still haven’t played/finished DS1/2.
I started a playthrough of DS1 and got to Quelaag but didn’t actually fight her because I was cursed and wanted to cleanse it first - couldn’t find my way back, unfortunately, and didn’t want to look up guides lol. And now the save is gone, so I’ll have to start over - ie. I probably won’t play anytime soon :D
Haven’t played DS2 yet because I wanted to play them in chronological order.
What about you?
There is some janky stuff that doesn’t really make sense, but overall exploration is one of the strongest parts of the game. A ton of branching paths and optional things to find, much better than DS3 as far as exploration goes.