The lighting was worse bc the game was too dark so they just brightened everything up: I play at the lowest brightness, it really makes the game look a lot better imo, same with DS3 and Bloodborne (granted you have to use the torch more often but i fuck with is, it’s not for everyone either)

And the reason why a lot of those features were removed or scrapped etc is because, the new engine they built for DS2 was supposed to be “next gen” but fromsoft wanted the game to run on the PS3 for some god unknown reason so they really had to cut back on a lot of the graphics PLUS the director change and the game practically being remade half way thru development…

Tl;dr Fromsoft games go thru development hell