From Software : Demon’s Souls coming to Europe!

Sold 134,585 copies in Japan since December 2009, Demon’s Souls is an exclusive PS3 Role-Playing Game designed by one of the strange and weird yet delightful companies going by the name of From Software which is due to hit shelves on June 25th 2010 in Europe!

This RPG is a great game if you have played the NA or JP version of Demon’s Souls and gives you a great  learning curve instead of getting into game wondering what button does what and before you know it death is staring you in the face. You play as your own custom Designed character with up to 10 Classes to pick from which range from Knight to Hunter. Each specialise in their own stats and have various weaknesses and strengths between each other, which means you can’t become Godly at any means. Another thing to note would be the fact it is very tactical and you can’t just run in and do the preferred Hack ‘n’ Slash like some of our RPG games. This Brutal Action Combat RPG is a real treat.

Let’s get down to in game aspects..

When you have created your character you start with a nice explanation of a certain king who has awakened the “Old One”, The Old One is a very important aspect to our game play as it is the strongest enemy in the game and since it has been mentioned to you already, it’s told you “This is the main baddie, kill it” but it doesn’t work like that in games or it wouldn’t be fun right? So to stop you from running in and start whacking at it with Level 1 weapons. You have to clear a deep mist that has fell down on the area of Boletaria (We are set in the time of Med-evil Europe) and the only safe place is the Nexus..Interesting.

Because this is a RPG you get your obvious stats, not the same like most you would see and they are :

• Vitality – Raises Maximum HP and Maximum Carrying Weight
• Intelligence – (Intelligence) Raises Maximum MP and number of Magic memorization slots
• Endurance – Raises Maximum Stamina, Maximum Equipped Weight, and Fire, Poison, and Bleed Resistance
• Strength – Increases Physical Damage, required for many weapons and shields
• Dexterity – Increases Physical Damage, increases ‘safe landing’ (reduces falling damage), required for many weapons
• Magic – Increases Magic power, required for some weapons
• Faith – Increases Miracle power, and number of Miracle memorization slots, Magic Damage resistance, required for some weapons
• Luck – Increases Item drop rates and Disease Resistance

A very big pool of stats don’t you think, well not really but it’s a nice handful to deal with.

So you get these stats and 100s of weapons such as Swords, Maces, Staffs and Bows  and a nice big stock of Shields and Armours.

When you enter areas to fight Demons in you will collect souls and items, these items get better and better as you fight stronger enemies, this can be very rewarding if you go for the big baddies first and give you a well rounded character before you even did most things in this game.

Well since you’re killing you should be killed too! The only downside is, it happens A LOT and I mean A LOT. You will need to be careful with planning and choosing what comes with you on journeys because when you do die.. You end up losing your body and becoming a spirit with half health. Sure that’s nice you’re still there able to fight, but not when you’re face to face with some ugly boss monster and you have lower health than usual. However, there is a ring in the first world that allows you to get around 3/4 of your health back but i am not sure as of yet.

Being able to fight a wide variety of bosses make this game a little harder than you might have anticipated,  but it is quite doable with the variety of techniques you can use from spells to melee to ranged with bows you can never be bored of fighting bosses with a bunch of combos to pull off to keep the baddies off you, still you’ll feel Death is staring you in the fact when you get clobbered doing something wrong accidently. The flexibilities in this game truly stop it from feeling stale at most points which is a plus towards this game from me because you can just Skewer enemies with your Lance or Carve them out with your swords. Not to mention that but the graphic detail is pretty decent unlike some games I have seen on other platforms. It’s appearance seems to matter to people more than the game play i have discovered during my Gaming Career.

Precisely because the odds are so stacked against you, precisely because the game sometimes seems to hate you with every fibre of its being, when you end up killed that GARGANTUANT ANNOYING boss monster for the first time within half a minute is when you get the purest of any gaming thrill where you could stand up and jump in joy.

Ha-ha, even your friends can try and assassinate you at in point when you’re playing which is so sweet. Although online capabilities are pretty damn good, From Software included a nice online situation which can affect you in game on single player either helping or stopping you from getting your way. The way they’ve used this is by allowing someone in the same area to be seen as a ghost, in turn you can follow them and do as they do OR if they die you can see a blood trail which can tell you “Don’t come here, it’s dangerous!” or if they don’t die and they might know things you don’t they could leave messages for you to find and learn.

Online Playing

So playing online, you have been given a taste of PSN without even playing with them properly yet! But now you can play co-operatively with up to four players which integrates the single player mode into it, very very good.. except it can get frustrating because some of the monsters are powered up because of this help like they should be.

Sorry but I can’t give any other details of the multiplayer because I have not played this game properly and I have mainly investigated on the game.

As for my final thoughts

This seems like a great game with many interactions to do with your friends and a lot of fear rending goodness within. If you love Role-Play games with a lot of difficulty, a lot of planning require, a huge variety of combinations and a huge arsenal of weaponry then I really do recommend this for you.

Although it has many epic proportions, No game is without their negatives, examples of this are ; You can end up dying repeatedly becoming aggravated and smashing the hell out of your PS3 controller if you4 get angry easily. Or you could plain old find a few glitches that get you angry because they won’t be patched thanks to the lack of updates for this game. The glitches I don’t know of in detail but some are pretty annoying but that’s for you to decide.

I rate this game 4.5 stars because :

A) It is interesting and is a fun style of RPG

B) Some of the area’s may get repetitive if played through the same style

C) Large Varieties of Weaponry, Armours and Demons

D) Many classes to choose from and customisations to go with it

E) Little Graphic detail is employed to the surroundings.