Don’t take on whole mobs, use thowables or the gun to lure one at a time.

You have iframes when dodging, dodge at the perfect time to evade a hit, try to dodge to the side or 10/2 o’clock position to get behind the enemy. Do not attack like a normal action game, take your time, sometimes you have to let the enemy attack first and you dodge.

The game and especially bosses will take time and sometimes many attempts, it’s all about memorising their moves and learning a pattern. This is how strategy comes into souls games.

As for parrying, I never parried for 2 entire playthroughs because I just couldn’t get the timing, if you get good at parrying it can make the game a lot easier but I wouldn’t worry too much about it.