Would Further Interactivity with the Environment Make or Break the Game?

After playing games like Battlefield, where you can influence severe changes by destroying buildings, and Fallout, where you can survive on scraps by pressing ammo and making your own weapons, I feel thirsty for some interactivity in Dark Souls II. 

For example, how cool would it be to forge your own weapons, or change how they look or perform? To increase the quality of your armor by taking certain parts of an armor and replacing a piece on another armor? Now we're getting into MMO, casual RPG territory. But, this would be a sound change. An RPG is all about being who you want within a limit, and allowing further customization would bring Dark Souls II into a greater light. 

Here's the situation. You want to play a stealthy rogue, but you only have heavy armor and a basic shortsword. With forging and such, you could take the surcoat and pauldrons from the armor and rework them for a medium armor. You strip the leggings of the majority of platework and they become lofty pants. You remove the lengthy chainmail from the gauntlets and you have gauntlets with plated steel. Turn the helmet into a cloak and, there you have it! Looking like a rogue in no time. This of course would take multiple armors, would be irreversible, cost many souls, and wouldn't work with all armors. But how many times in Dark Souls have you loved an armor piece but the weight was too light or too heavy? This would allow for some leeway. 

Now with the sword, this part is simple. You reforge the sword to become a small curved sword. But every time you re-forge or re-work armor, the durability and the damage or protection is slightly reduced. So this could also be done for larger weapons. What you could do with these systems are endless. However it has MANY risks and things that hold it back.

Sounds very, very, very complicated and I'm not sure it fits thematically with the sense of isolation the Souls games try to provide.  I hate bringing these two games up at the same time, but it's a great example of what I mean in that this is the fundamental difference between Skyrim and Dark Souls.  In Skyrim, the world is your world.  You can do whatever you want and be whoever you want to be.  The world around you waits for your input and shapes itself accordingly.

In Dark Souls however, the world is not your world.  It is not there to serve the player's whims, it is there to oppress you.  In Dark Souls, you are at Lordran's mercy, taking only what it gives you as a way to get by and your actions are primarily motivated by the chosen undead simply wanting to get the hell out of there and make it all end.

I'm personally against the idea of detailed interaction, because it takes away from this overarching theme of oppression.  Not to say a sense of control over the world is bad, as it's done to great effect in games like Skyrim or even things like Minecraft.  But so far from what I've experienced in all my years of playing Demon's and Dark Souls, I can't believe "control" is the kind of fantasy fulfillment these games have been trying to offer.  Give me a world I have too much control over, and it stops feeling like a Souls game to me.

On small scale I'd like interactivity. Like no invisible walls, I would like to climb, jump over, or otherwise destroy foot tall obstacles or think of my own ways around things other than predetermined game mechanics. I like the idea of Large scale in a way it makes me feel like my character is actually affecting the world, not just by content and condition or situation dialogue. Like destroying an entire castle or something. Maybe have large interactions tied in with raid/big party events.

I always liked the idea of whatever your weapon or shield was enchanted with would reflect that on the item.

So for instance we could have a Enchanted Balder Shield that would display magic runes/emblems on the item.

Or a Lightning Long Sword with electricity running along the blade (Think Gold Pine Resin but more subtle).

Getting to +5, +10 and +15 could change the look of the item as well. A +5 Silver Knight Sword could get a more elegant handle for instance.

I also think it would be cool if items showed wear. At 50% durability an item could show signs of wear; weapon chips out of shields and worn blades. At 25% the effect could be more prevalent.

On point: I'd like to see more hidden areas behind more diverse obstacles. The living tree in Darkroot was cool idea. Fake walls were cool, but became lackluster (boring) as the game progressed. I'd like to see what they have right now, like in the demo you could either trick a Firebomb thrower to blow up barrels to access a shortcut/hidden area or by blowing it up yourself. I think some hidden areas should have different ways to bypass them. Using a light source in AotA to access a hidden doorway was cool too.

I agree with Reaper. With the world, it should be what the world is. Both Demon's and Dark Souls leave you with the feeling that you may have done next to nothing to affect the world. Did we actually save anything? Or destroy anything? Or are we forever trapped in a cyclic hell?

We do a few things to advance the story, but overall the world should be the world.

With equipment, the devil is in the details. I might be in for some cosmetic things but overall you're scrounging to become strong. Even with several upgrade paths you're essentially just taking what you're given (I know you have control via farming but it's still just modifying what you're given slightly). With a Skyrim or moreso, Morrowind level of item creation you're vastly altering the concept of the player and journey. With Morrowind, I can make each pauldron do something different including making it help me become stealthy, stronger, lighter, better at magic, etc. etc. etc.

Just like Reaper said, by the end, it becomes our world. And additionally, we ascend to the Gods if we want. In Dark Souls and Demon's Souls, we can become incredibly strong. But we're always left with the feeling that we're really not all that. I actually wrote a long post once on why the Dragon God is a great boss for Demon's Souls. The gist of it is that the Dragon God shows you that at the mercy of the world and greater beings. How so? If it weren't for some heavy duty help (environment and weapons forged just to use against him) we stand zero chance in the fight. In Dark Souls, we fight epic battles. Against beings that are pitiful compared to their former state.

I'm not saying your suggestion will lead to us becoming a God like an Elder Scrolls game (I know we're not a literal God but trying convincing Vivec of that.....sorry you can't, I killed him and all the other existing Gods). But the worlds are on differing ends of the spectrum and I'm not sold on shifting Dark Souls even a little closer.

On a related note, From knows customization. Anyone who has an Armored Core game knows what I mean. I just don't think it's in their vision to bring Dark Souls to that extreme. While it has an incredible depth of customization, I'm not ready to start putting ballast on my right pauldron to counteract the weight of my shield as compared to my sword for instance. Custom decals and paint jobs might not fit too well either.

Interactivity is fun, but is it really necessary to increase it? I like a couple ideas they've had about torches, special stones etc. But to be honest unless there is an important gameplay reason to add something in, I'm not too bothered

I was seriously hoping when Dark Souls came out that there would be a bow or crossbow or something named Kurasawa.

I was sad. But the moonlight came back so it wasn't the end of the world.

I think fiddling with gear too much is just a bad idea. Being able to alter a weapons properties to an extent, such as moving it's scaling over to Int or Dex when it wasn't originally while giving it Magic damage or some other property like a bleed or poison effect (I had a big love for making a mercurial spiral rapier, one of the few DeS weapons that could simultaneously cause bleed and poison build up and being a rapier had nice crits as well (stop eating all that grass damnit!) But to over the course of several alterations Turn a claymore into a Scimitar and the Knight Set into something more like a mishmash of the chain and wanderer sets.... I think that's going too far for the souls games.

I agree and understand the appropriate themes for these games are helplessness and solitude. I don't think that should mean I can't forge my own paths forward more. I mean the DLC made me feel a bit more important being the mofo who killed artorias, kalameet, and manus and stopped the abyss. Like give my character the ability of unique legend status like all of the NPC's have. Other than us all being the Chosen Undead, different story arcs and endings for covenants and the like.
     I think weapons should have cosmetic change with their upgrade paths to better distinct them and make them look as bad *** as they feel, like a occult weapon should have cool dark effects or design and chaos like furysword effects respectively. Maybe even put custom covenant, guild or personal crests on shields. And color your own armor, naturally.