All of you lovely readers should know by now that I’m a massive FromSoftware fanboy. Can’t talk about action games, RPGs, or action RPGs without me mentioning their highly acclaimed masterpieces. Just say the words Dark Souls, Bloodborne, Sekiro, or Elden Ring and I’ll be yapping on for more than half an hour. These games are fantastic and have played an important role in my life. Not only getting me to change how I viewed the world and what lies in the future, but also nurturing my love for video games. Getting me to try out genres and series I wasn’t even thinking of playing. FromSoftware is a masterclass studio and everything they have made over the last decade has been gold. Sure their games aren’t perfect and it can be easy to nitpick at annoying sections, but it seems with each release the team made another strive forward.
The interconnected world and challenging encounters of the original Dark Souls paved the basic foundation for future titles. Bloodborne improved the combat design and presented a horrifying universe far beyond our comprehension. Dark Souls 3 served to be the most accessible entry and brought an end to the Dark Souls storyline. Sekiro tested our reflexes and ability to master its rhythmic encounters. Finally there was Elden Ring which converted the Souls formula into an open world format and made it work perfectly for the most part. FromSoftware don’t miss and have become examples of what the Triple A industry can achieve when you remain focused and dedicated to your work. Hidetaki Miyazaki truly deserves the recognition for what he and the studio has achieved. Soulsborne is fantastic, but there’s one game I never got around to.
You know how I just said “Dark Souls paved the basic foundation for future titles.” Well that was a lie. There existed a Souls entry before Dark Souls came out and it serves as the grandfather to the entire franchise. Released back on the Playstation 3 as a partnership between FromSoftware and Sony, the first Souls title ever made was Demon’s Souls. An epic adventure about fighting your way through a land infested with demons and trying to restore order to a broken world. When Demon’s Souls first released it received a lot of backlash from critics. It was the first of its kind and at the time video games were beginning to offer options to change the difficulty of the experience. Critics disliked how challenging and unforgiving Demon’s Souls was and how it had no way to ease the difficulty. They either dropped the game quickly or discouraged players from purchasing the game saying it failed to be entertaining in any form. Demon’s Souls flopped at launch and it could have killed FromSoftware entirely.
That was until a small group of Japanese decided to ban together and help form guides to help other players get into the game easier. These players knew how to enjoy the game and wanted others to realize what made it so great. They told them how each mechanic worked, how to form specialized builds, what order to do each level in, and how to survive the many encounters and surprises lying around each corner. This is what started the Soulsborne community and it remains active to this day. I’m not ashamed to say the Soulsborne community is my favorite community. They are willing to help one through troubling times, and they are dedicated to showcasing their love of these games. I’m proud to be a member of this community. Anyways, it was the help of these guides and rising player numbers that critics started to open up to Demon’s Souls. They began to enjoy the game and realize how masterful it all was. Demon’s Souls quickly became a cult classic and one of the best RPGs of the Playstation 3 era. Then Dark Souls came along and it showed FromSoftware that these challenging games had a place in the market. That’s how we got the entire Soulsborne franchise.
However, Demon’s Souls isn’t talked about as much as future Souls titles. It’s a cult classic, but compared to Bloodborne or Dark Souls it’s not really referenced for what it did right. On top of that playing the original Demon’s Souls now is near impossible or at least really hard to play at all. It’s not that the game was broken, but certain areas lacked the polish future Dark Souls titles would implement. Plus it was exclusive to Playstation 3 and the Playstation 4 wasn’t built with backwards compatibility in mind. Demon’s Souls remained on the PS3 as FromSoftware moved forward with Dark Souls and Bloodborne. It slowly became forgotten with time and no one at FromSoftware was willing to give it the modern port or remaster it needed. They remastered the first Dark Souls before they got to Demon’s Souls, and Dark Souls was only eight years old at the time! Then out of nowhere another studio came to revitalize this classic. Bluepoint Games, a studio working under Sony and well known for remastering the first three Uncharted games and remaking Shadow of The Colossus with modern hardware. They seemed fit for remaking Demon’s Souls and that’s exactly what they did.
They first teased the Demon’s Souls remake through a tweet, but didn’t give away completely on what they were working on. Then during a Playstation 5 showcase they unveiled a teaser trailer and by god the Soulsborne community blew up when the iconic bird carrying a dangling corpse popped on screen. Demon’s Souls was coming back and was being made for next generation tech. Fans were pumped, but the caveat was that you needed a Playstation 5 to play it. That was a major downside, but Demon’s Souls much like Bloodborne served as a selling point for the new Playstation. When it finally came out critics praised it for how it not only redeemed the original, but demonstrated what next generation of consoles could achieve. The remake received better reception than the original and for some outlets it was being deemed one of the best games of 2020. Even being nominated for Player’s Choice at The Game Awards.
There was some criticism around the changes in art direction and how problems the original had weren’t completely fixed. Yet, Demon’s Souls was there and it shined brilliantly. I’ve been meaning to play Demon’s Souls for the longest time, but have been unable to since I don’t have a Playstation 5. It was a luxury waiting at the end of a rainbow, but then a family friend gifted me one during the summer. I just want to thank them for giving me such a gift and allowing me to experience what others are. The first game I got for this system was Demon’s Souls and I booted it up immediately. I can see how future Soulsborne titles succeeded Demon’s Souls and it was a rocky start at first, but I eventually grew to love this game. Today we’ll be talking about why I love Demon’s Souls and why it deserves your attention. Let’s journey to the land of Boletaria.
Story
During the medieval ages, mankind discovered a source of magic and bended it into a form they called Souls Arts. They were able to channel the magic into power, shoot fireballs out their hand, perform miracles to aid one another, and by harvesting the souls energy off of stronger beings they were able to grow in strength. Peace and prosperity then followed with the discovery of Souls Arts, and with the Kingdom of Boletaria led by King Allant this peace continued for a while. That was until a monstrous being known as the Old One came. The Old One was angered by the magic mankind had created and covered the land in a thick fog. From the fog came demons and they ravaged the land of anyone who had a bit of soul energy. Sucking the life straight out of them and even transforming those with too much soul energy into demons as well. Chaos spread like wildfire, but then someone managed to put the Old One into slumber. Saving what was left of Boletaria. However, demons and monsters still lurked about and those who managed to survive the soul energy scourge went insane.
This leads us to you. A traveling warrior who managed to brave the fog created by the Old One and make their way to Boletaria. They navigate their way through an abandoned fortress and try to stop whatever powerful demon lies within it. Even if the player manages to kill the first demon they are eventually smashed to a pulp and their body is reduced to ashes. They soon awaken in a paranormal plain known as the Nexus, a realm separated from reality. There they encounter refugees trying to survive the chaos happening in Boletaria and a woman wrapped in silk by the name of The Maiden in Black. She reveals that the Old One is awakening from slumber and only she and the traveling warrior can put it back to sleep. By using the five Archstones in the Nexus, the warrior can teleport themselves to five major regions in the land. Slay powerful demons, obtain their power, and hopefully build up enough strength to face the Old One and King Allant who is preventing anyone from seeing the Old One.
Gameplay
Demon’s Souls is the challenging action role-playing experience you have come to expect from this studio. You explore, pick up new equipment, fight baddies, and try not to die as you explore the mazes which are the levels. Where Demon’s Souls sets itself apart from future Souls entries is that rather than have a sprawling interconnected world it instead has five individual worlds you load into. Imagine a level structuring like Super Mario for a second. Each world focuses around a certain theme and aesthetic, and you progress through them in a linear fashion. World 1 is the castle level, World 2 are the mines, World 3 is this peculiar tower, World 4 is a stormy cliff area, and World 5 is the poisonous marshes. Demon’s Souls has probably the most linear level design in the entire franchise, but it still manages to offer some choice. Once you beat World 1-1 you are given access to all the other worlds. You can hop in and out of them whenever you like and tackle them in any order. If the burning bridge and Tower Knight is too much of a hassle at the moment then maybe start going through the mines and face the Armored Spider. You decide what route is the easiest and what to do later.
The combat is still easy to understand yet hard to master. Everytime you roll, attack, block, parry, or run will use up a bit of stamina. When stamina is low then you must wait for it to refill. Don’t get too greedy and try to mash away the attack button, and don’t get too panicked and try to spam roll away. Demon’s Souls rewards those who take their time to understand how the play the game, but still wants them to fight efficiently as anything can kill them at any moment. Not just the monsters roaming about, but traps and environmental hazards. I should bring up that once you press a button to perform an action you can’t cancel out into another. Meaning you have to dedicate yourself to what you do during combat or moments of reaction.
There is a butt ton of weapons and equipment to choose from, and circulating yourself around specific gear will help you form the build you design. Otherwise a playstyle. You can wear a heavy set of armor with tons of defense, wield a massive greatsword which deals tons of damage, a sturdy shield, and become a takny knight. You could aim for a faster playstyle and choose weapons focused on speed like the katana. Be a wizard, pyromancer, etc. Any playstyle is viable as long as you know how to use the tools. However, some weapons and armor sets may not be usable immediately once you pick them up. They have stat requirements and the only way to meet said stat requirements is to level up. How do you level up you may ask? By defeating enemies and powerful bosses you gain Souls which are experience points. Bring them to the Maiden in Black and she can transform it into power which resonates in your body. You pull up a stat chart and decide what to put points into. Stats like strength, dexterity, intelligence, faith, and much more. There are some stats like vitality and endurance which affect your maximum health and stamina. You can improve the efficiency of your weapons beyond their stat requirement as weapons scale upwards with certain stats.
Now it’s impossible to traverse through levels without taking a bit of damage. Okay, technically that's a lie as there are some players who know how to beat these games without taking a hit, but I digress. You will have to restore your health, because if you die you are sent back to the last checkpoint and lose all your Souls. There is a way to get them back by backtracking to the area you died in, but die again and they are gone forever. Your main method of healing is consuming the various forms of grass the game offers. Stronger versions of grass will restore more health, but either be more expensive or harder to come by. Grass works sort of like how Blood Vials worked in Bloodborne. Once you consume a shred of grass it’s gone for good, but you can loot it off enemies or purchase more from merchants. This allows the player to keep exploring and not have to run back to a checkpoint when their healing resources are low. Other consumables include spices to refill mana spells. Physical Souls which can be smashed to earn more Souls. Even items to defend yourself like throwables like the firebombs and kunai knives, or resine to apply elemental effects to your weapons.
At the end of each level there is a boss fight, the demons of the realm, and they’ll be what stands between you and progression. Some bosses will test your reflexes and ability to comprehend their attack pattern. Other bosses will focus around a gimmick which you’ll have to work around to land hits on them. Demon’s Souls has the most gimmick bosses out of the entire series and we’ll address more on why they can be good and bad later. Once you beat them the fog wall which separates you from the next level opens, you gain a ton of Souls, and even a Boss Soul which can be used to gain more Souls or forge boss weapons. You can level up your weapons by talking to one of two blacksmiths and exchanging materials. You can even apply permanent effects to them. Besides that there really isn’t much else to say about Demon’s Souls. Hopefully you can slay the demons who are running amuck and put the Old One back to slumber.
Thoughts
Demon’s Souls remains to be a wonderful classic, but to be honest it’s a really flawed one. I had more problems with this than any other Souls game, even Dark Souls 2. However, it’s still a fantastic game which I can easily recommend to anyone who is either a Souls fan or just wants another challenging experience. First thing I want to bring up is that this is my first Playstation 5 game and it serves as my impression of next generation hardware. Even though this is a remake of a 2009 release, I think Demon’s Souls perfectly showcases what next generation hardware can do. The lightning, detailing of the world, and the effects of smashable objects and flashy magic. Demon’s Souls graphically is breathtaking and I think my enjoyment playing it was increased with the Dualsense controller. With how I can feel the vibration of my weapon hitting the wall or slicing through the enemy’s skin inside the controller, or hear the sound of my magic attacks or an arrow flying by being echoed through the controller’s speaker. I especially appreciate the faster loading times as it only takes three seconds to boot up Demon’s Souls and hop between worlds. The Playstation 5 is incredible, but I do it’s still overpriced and still worth waiting until they produce more units or go down to three hundred dollars like the Playstation 4.
Let’s move onto criticizing the game itself. While Demon’s Souls may lack the interconnected world of Dark Souls and future entries it doesn’t mean it’s an extremely linear game. I love how you can approach any world in any order you desire. It has a sense of creating your own level of difficulty and for some reason it reminded me of Mega Man. Going for the easiest boss first, so you may obtain their power and use that strength against the second weakest opponent. I love going back to a world I completed to see if I missed anything important or if I can find more upgrade materials for my weapon. I love this freedom of direction, but it does come with a downside. Compared to the other Souls game where you naturally faced easiest foe to hardest and knew you were being paced well enough here in Demon’s Souls it’s harder to tell what area is easier or harder. Sure you could just naturally flip between worlds until you found the easier choice, but this can lead to the player wasting a lot of time. I had to use a guide to see what was the best order for approaching each level. Which is fine, because I’ve done this a couple of times in the past for previous Souls titles, but I was using it more often for Demon’s Souls surprisingly.
The combat is still good to me, but it was difficult adjusting back into the slower combat of older Souls games. Ever since Bloodborne I’ve been trying to play these games with an aggressive playstyle, because that’s the most fun way to experience these games to me. Focusing less around defense and backing away, and more on how much damage I can deal and finding open points to strike. Learning the attack patterns of enemies, when to dodge roll through an attack, and hitting them straight afterwards. Demon’s Souls isn’t exactly that and more often places you in tight spaces where it’s hard to dodge around. My aggressive and agile approach was limited, but then I realized Demon’s Souls focused more around playing carefully. Taking your time and being ready for what lies around the next corner. Same can go with the original Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2. I felt rewarded for when I finally braved a level and the many obstacles that stood in my way. Rushing through them meant I either missed out on more stuff or ran into a trap that could have been easily seen if I took the time.
Every weapon feels great to wield and as mentioned earlier the vibration and sounds made by the Dualsense help add to the impact of each weapon. Knowing the swing time of your blade, lodging it deep into enemy skin, and pulling it back to swing it yet again. Backstabbing enemies has this heavy pound to it and it just feels so good. However, Demon’s Souls much like all three Dark Souls titles still has the problem of having a wide arsenal but not doing enough to make each weapon feel different. Why are there so many greatswords? Who knows. Yet, there’s less of that here in Demon’s Souls and you can quickly familiarize yourself with the arsenal available. I also think Demon’s Souls does a better job signaling to the player what scales with what. Magic will always scale with intelligence. Heavy weapons scale with strength, and lighter weapons will scale with dexterity. Demon’s Souls also goes for an upgrade system similar to Dark Souls where different elemental effects can be applied. In Dark Souls it was hard to understand as you had to upgrade weapons to a certain point to apply the effect, and there was this hidden upgrade tree which oftentimes required a guide to understand. Here in Demon’s Souls you can apply effects at any time in exchange for sacrificing all the current upgrades your weapon has, so that’s nice.
There’s a few more aspects I love about Demon’s Souls, but they can be problematic depending on who you are and how you look at it from a design perspective. I like the concept of grass. A finite healing resource which can be bought from merchants or looted off enemies. It’s similar to Bloodborne and how you can keep going through a level and not have to constantly run back to a checkpoint to refill a flask that is infinite but has a limited amount of uses. Grass is great, but it’s extremely broken. There’s a wide variety of grass and you can carry bundles of each type. Meaning if you can master the flow of combat and know when to use resources you have an infinite supply of healing sh*t. Unlike Bloodborne which limits you down to twenty. Just enough to go through an entire area or beat a boss.
The game does balance this out, but it’s in a terrible way. There’s a mechanic called item burden and it limits how much you can have in your inventory. Items that affect item burden include armor, weapons, upgrade materials, and every single consumable including grass. It can be really annoying at times and in the original version sometimes you’d have to drop stuff to carry a rare item you found or abandon it entirely. In the remake they fixed this so that items that can’t fit are sent automatically to Stockpile Thomas, but this doesn’t fix the issue of having an infinite pocket of healing sh*t. Players are more likely to gravitate to having high healing supplies and keeping the weapons they mainly use, because that’s what will carry them forward and it’s a hassle to upgrade and learn how to use other weapons. I can see why they got rid of item burden entirely and changed the way healing resources worked in future entries.
The level design can be out of whack at times. You have great levels like the entirety of World 1 and exploring the Boletarian grounds and palace, or World 4-1 where you navigate the ruins of a destroyed fortress. Then you have levels like World 3-1 where you navigate a multi-floored prison, each floor looks the same with minor differences, and there are these cthulhu looking sons of bitches who can stun you and run up to wipe out half of your health bar. World 5-1 where you navigate a bunch of wooden buildings leading down, you can fall off, get easily ganged up on since you don’t have much space to maneuver around, and you have to do the entire level in one go as there are no checkpoints. World 5-2 which is just a giant poisonous bog which limits your mobility, actually all of World 5 is just bad. Then there’s the final levels for each world besides World 1 which aren’t levels at all and are instead giant arenas. The level design is good when it wants to be, but when it’s bad it’s really bad.
The bosses of Demon’s Souls are a mixed bag to me. Dark Souls 2 had some horrendous bosses at times, but they don’t compare to some of the ones in Demon’s Souls. You have a boss who summons clones of herself, but it’s easy to tell which is the real one. Then you figure out you can’t kill this boss unless you kill an NPC hiding above the arena. The Dragon God who is basically the Bed of Chaos, but somewhat better as it focuses around hiding behind pillars but it’s still annoying to go through. A boss who is literally just an NPC with spells and can be killed really quickly as they stun with each hit. The worst boss is probably the Maneater fight. Imagine the Bell Gargoyles, but you have less terrain to balance on and the second one spawns with full health. There are some cool bosses to be found. The Tower Knight is one I actually enjoyed. Having to eliminate the archers around you and then focus on him. Knock him down from his feet and then deal damage to his head. The Old Hero is this colossal warrior who deals heavy damage, but you learn that he’s blind and so what you have to do is try not to make too much sound and keep a distance. There’s the Flamelurker who was a good challenge, and my two most favorite fights have to be the Penetrator and King Allant. I will always enjoy fighting foes of equal size and strength.
My complaints don’t end there though. There’s some really bad sh*t in this game. The upgrade system, while I enjoy it more than Dark Souls, is really annoying to go through. In Dark Souls you move on from weaker titanite to stronger titanite, but here when you move onto stronger forms of a weapon you use both weaker and stronger forms of upgrade material. I can see the benefit in this as in the early stages of Dark Souls it’s hard to come by weaker forms of titanite, but later on you’re stacked on weaker forms as you stumble upon stronger titanite. However, in Demon’s Souls it’s annoying as upgrade materials can be harder to come. Half the time you’ll either be farming for Souls to purchase it from merchants or be farming Crystal Lizards, which thankfully they respawn in this game even after death. It was still annoying to have to spend minutes farming for upgrade materials though or having to look up where to get it.
My final complaint is with World Tendency, a mechanic that sounds great on paper but is both poorly executed and a pain in the ass. The way it works is that when you die you are put into Soul form. Your maximum health is reduced to fifty percent and the only way to return to human form is either killing a boss or using this one rare consumable. You are placed at a massive disadvantage, but in the first world you can pick up a ring that reduces your health only by seventy-five percent. You what sucks though. More than half the playerbase for this game uses this ring. How does this connect back to World Tendency? Great question reader. When you die in human form this affects World Tendency. Die more often in human form and the tendency goes to black. Slay more bosses and this tendency will go to white. There are changes to be found between White and Black World Tendency like certain pathways now being open or red phantom versions of enemies now appearing. Basically the game gets harder the more you die, and this is really discouraging since these games are about learning from failure. That is if this mechanic actually had an effect, because it turns out it won’t be affected unless you are in human form. You can kill yourself in the Nexus and this will have no effect on World Tendency. Half the playerbase has does this as well.
I know these problems sound really harsh and they should be preventing me from recommending this game, but I want to remind you that I still really enjoy Demon’s Souls. It’s still fun to overcome the many challenges that block your way, and even though the lows are lows the highs on the other hand are extremely high. The lore isn’t as great as Bloodborne or Dark Souls, but it’s still fantastic. Learning about the characters, history, and what this kingdom tried to do to preserve knowledge and power. How some humans ended up siding with demons because they found them to be much smarter. How there’s this one boss that is really sad, because you realize what she is doing isn’t bad and you may be the monster in this scenario. You are later deemed the Slayer of Demons. Someone who kills sinful creators and harvests their power. You are driven by bloodlust and there’s a choice near the end to prevent the world from being healed. The state of it currently isn’t even capable of being fixed, and you have to ask yourself if the next age will possibly be better. Smarter than the one that mankind created. An age full of corruption. This theme is what carried on to later Soulsborne entries and I appreciate how Demon’s Souls did this. In the end I’m going to give Demon’s Souls a 9/10 for excellence at best. Everything I just said may not match this review score. It ranks really low compared to other Soulsborne entries. There are dozens of other RPGs and 2020 releases I’d recommend over this, and it’s hard to justify the seventy dollar price tag for a game that came out in 2009. However, I’d prefer it over a lot of other action RPGs. That’s my standpoint with this game and I hope that more people can check out this landmark title in gaming history.
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