Yeah, I noticed this too. It's an unpopular opinion to think that dark souls is not hard but just frustratingly clunky in order to make it appear hard.

It's just not satisfying. Reminds me of certain old games that were made artificially hard by dumb mechanics only to make them last longer.

I've played hard games that were satisfying to beat, then I tried several dark souls games (included elden ring and a myriad of soulslikes) and found them obnoxiously clunky and unfun.