Dark Souls 2 Critique

After finding myself let down by Dark Souls 2 I wanted to talk about many of the problems I had with it. This is a critique, not a full review. Some positive details are omitted, for instance I like the health reduction when hollowed. That said, my overall feeling is one of overwhelming disappointment.

I've played through the game three times:
Knight, melee only, latter half in Company of Champions.
Hexer, no shield, participated in all covenants.
Dex, poison build, Company of Champions.
I feel this has given me a good overview of the different possible builds/covenants. I never record my first playthrough of a game so there's no footage of the Knight.

Apologies to everyone I killed as a Rat, for what it's worth I didn't enjoy it either.