Brutally challenging, fantastically unforgiving and utterly amazing, Demon's Souls is a game like no other.
Pros:
+Brutally challenging, but never unfair
+Novel uses of online components
+Riveting original score
+Smart level and monster design
+Addictive gameplay mechanics
+Lots of secrets to discover
Cons:
-The difficulty will drive off many a gamer
-A number of technical difficulties
-Definitely not a pick-up-and-play type of game
You lift up your bow, aiming towards the azure sky, waiting for your prey. You mount the arrow, wait, listen. Suddenly, a dragon of a sinister crimson swoops down, belching blistering flames in your direction. You let go of the arrow, hit the dragon's thigh, it roars, disappears from your sight. Once more, the bow is lifted, arrow mounted, you patiently wait for the dragon's next assault. Your hands are shaking, your face wet from perspiration, heart beating faster than you thought possible. It's in that moment that you learn that the one perspiring, shaking and stressed out is not the character in the game. It's you.
This kind of experience sums up what playing Demon's Souls feels like. It's mean, unforgiving and will work your nerves to the breaking point. However, that is also its charm. You are sucked into the game's atmosphere without a moment's notice and will find it difficult to leave again. Everything in the game is so meticulous, so epic in scale and feel, that it will change how you play games from that point on. Not everyone will love the brutality of the difficulty, or the bare-bones presentation, but have no doubt: Demon's Souls is a game to remember.
Your adventure is set in the magical world of Boletaria, a large land of endless natural beauties and impressive landmarks. One day, in a desperate attempt to gain more power, King Allant XII (king of Boletaria) performed a dark ritual that enabled him to harness the power of souls. For a time, the kingdom was in an unprecedented golden age. After a while, however, a dark fog started to float over Boletaria, eventually severing all contacts with other nations. It is revealed that the king's ritual had awakened the Old One, a terrifying demon that had been in slumber for centuries. The fog brought in soul-devouring demons that started to feast on the land's inhabitants. Many braved the fog either to try and save Boletaria or to harness the awesome power of the demon souls. You are one of those people, alone in the harsh world, a man amongst demons.
Though the background is very expansive, the story's involvement in the game is actually quite slim. Other than the first and last 10 or so minutes of the game, you won't encounter much in terms of either story or narrative. It's slightly disappointing that the developers didn't decide to go a bit deeper into the intriguing story that had been built up in the beginning.
Luckily, the game still manages to pull this off by creating a world that is absolutely enchanting. You will visit medieval castles, poisonous swamps, towering prisons, cavernous mines, ruins of a lost civilization and many other outlandish locales. The amount of detail in every area is astounding, showing remnants of what the place was like before the demons' arrival to Boletaria. Skeletons lay on the ground, blood is splattered on walls, decay is apparent in every structure. It's this sort of detail that makes the world of Demon's Souls so compelling. You will wish you could rewind time so that you can experience the world again for the first time. With this level of immersion, it is easy to forgive the lack of a concrete story.
Traversing these environments is not an easy task. This has been mentioned before, but Demon's Souls is hard. Not only is it hard, it's absolutely remorseless. It's safe to say that DS is the hardest game to come out on the PS3, bar none. Surviving isn't as simple as just being careful. You need true skill to persevere in the harsh world of Boletaria. At its core, the game is a typical hack and slash RPG, where the goal is to slay large enemies to finish each level. However, it isn't as simple as that when you look closer. When you start the game, and get through the character creator, you can choose a special cIass. This will determine what equipment you are given at the start, along with your base stats. From there, you are pretty much free to progress as you wish. You can focus on magic, brute strength, speed or ranged attacks. The variety of weapons, spells, miracles (similar to spells, though slightly more defense-based), armor and other equipment is staggering to say the least.
You'll need all this variety, since part of the adventure is working out how to get past the ghastly enemies of the game. Some enemies can kill you in as much as one hit, so you always have to be careful. Combat is mostly twofold: melee and ranged combat. In melee, you can attack normally or perform a strong attack. If you have a shield, even more options will be available to you. You can of course use it to shield yourself, but can also parry incoming blows and counter with a vicious riposte. All of these actions require stamina, and when it is depleted, you'll have to wait a moment for it to recover. This clever mechanic makes button mashing an impossible tactic. You have to use skill, timing and foresight in every one of your battles.
The tools of ranged combat are split in two: spells and ranged weapons. Spells require both MP and specific catalysts that enable spell use. There is a large variety of spells to choose from, and most players will have to have some sort of spell knowledge to best some of the tougher enemies. Ranged weapons are bows and crossbows, which both work very well and are simple to use. It is vital to learn how to attack from afar, so the fact that the ranged mechanics work so well is a very fortunate thing. Your character can also use miracles, which are more to boost certains stats or create shields of many sorts. They too require a special item to use.
The combat isn't the only thing that makes the game difficult, however. First thing that needs to be known is that the game is constantly online, unless you don't sign into the PSN network. This means that there is no real pause function in the game. Therfore, all rearrangement of inventory, use of healing items and change of equipment is done in real time. This is also the case offline, most likely to boost the difficulty. It adds a layer of tension to the already nerve-wracking experience.
The soul system is another factor of the game that provides a difficulty boost. Souls are both the currency and experience points of the game. All things are bought with demon souls, and levelling up various stats also requires them. Defeating demons will grant you the souls, but dying will cause you to lose all of them. You can go back to the point where you died and collect the souls, but if you die again on the way there, they will forever be lost.
The final component that makes Demon's Souls tougher than other games out there is how the game handles death. If you die, you go into soul form, which is basically a downgraded form of your living self. You have only half your normal health, and you can only go back to your former self by either beating a boss demon, using a certain very rare item or becoming a phantom and helping another player.
What is a phantom exactly? It's one of the three innovative online components of Demon's Souls. The game is very unique in its online approach. You don't interact with the other players as much as you simply see them. You are still pretty much alone for the major part of your adventure, but that doesn't mean you won't get any help.
The first component, and by far the most prominent, is the message system. Every player can write a message from a predetermined list of words that is then left on the ground for the world to see. You can be mean and write a misleading message or be helpful and give hints to what is ahead. If you feel a message is helpful, you can recommend it, which in turn heals the writer of the message. If a message isn't recommended much, it will eventually disappear, leaving only the ones that prove helpful. So as you can see, this is a win-win situation in every way.
The second online component is blood stains. Every player that dies in the game will leave one, and touching it will show exactly how the player died in a grisly pantomime. It's basically a simpler version of the message system, but it helps in quite a few situations.
The final online mechanic is the phantom system, which is in turn split into two separate systems. By using specific stones while in soul form, you can either become a blue or black phantom. Blue phantoms can be summoned by living players to help with boss demons, while black phantoms will invade other players' worlds. If blue phantoms manage to help beat the boss demon, they will regain their human form. In the same way, if a black phantom kills the unfortunate "host", he will get his human body again. It's truly a terrifying experience to see the dreaded message "A black phantom has invaded your world" pop up on the screen. It creates a sense of urgency that will stay with you for some time.
The blue phantoms' help is vital if you don't want to rip your hair out from frustration. The boss demons are almost all very difficult, and having a second or even third player with you will alleviate some of the challenge. The sense of scale these boss demons invoke is amazing, and the game boasts one of the best boss fights in gaming. They're all incredibly unique and fun to fight, and are fitting ends to each and every stage.
One thing that has scared many from playing the game is the question: "Is the game unfair?" The answer is simple: no. The game is all about skill and perseverance. If you at first don't succeed, try, try again. This proverb is very important to remember when playing the game. If you don't follow it, you probably won't experience all that Demon's Souls has to offer.
As mentioned earlier, the game's atmosphere and environments are amazingly crafted. However, the visual presentation is far from perfect. There is frequent texture pop-up, and many of the surroundings seem to bear an annoying shine to them, as if some kind of glaze has been splattered all over the place. Dead demons are also very twitchy post-mortem, often sticking to your character heels and flailing their lifeless limbs for no apparent reason. Finally, the game occasionally has a hard time keeping up with what is going on in the game, lagging in some odd moments. This doesn't happen often, but when the problem rears its ugly head, it can be very aggravating. However, for every negative thing, there is something positive. Weapons, armor and spells look amazing in-game, and monster animation is superb.
The sound aspects of the game are also fantastic. Demon's Souls has a completely original score, all fully orchestrated by real instruments. It only plays in key moments of the game, which accentuates the urgency of every moment. Everything else is in perpetual silence, giving you an ominous feeling of what is ahead. The voice acting is peculiar, to say the least. You have probably never heard anything quite like it. It feels surprisingly natural, there is no glamor or grace, only raw emotion and a believable performance. It's a breath of fresh air, to put it simply. It might come off as eccentric at times, especially when some characters inexplicably raise their voices when talking to you, but it's another aspect Demon's Souls manages to excel in.
Getting everything the game has to offer is definitely going to take more than one playthrough. There are two different endings, a myriad of hidden items, enemies and treasures and the simple ability to be able to play the game through again in a New Game + is always a fun bonus. This adds to the replayability of the game, though that definitely requires even more patience.
The bottom line is this: how much you like Demon's Souls is absolutely based on how much work you want to put into it. If you don't have the time to truly commit yourself to the game, or are just looking for a game to enjoy in short bursts, then DS is not the game for you. However, if you want a game that rewards patience, is utterly engrossing and offers a sense of accomplishment greater than any other game on the PS3, then you won't find a game more for you than DS. Brutal, challenging, hard, tough, difficult...whatever you choose to call it, the game is one of a kind.
Story: 8.4/10
Gameplay: 9.4/10
Graphics: 8.6/10
Sound: 9.5/10
Replayability: 9.1/10
Final score: 9.3/10
-Calvinsora