Review for Demon's Souls. Game for PlayStation 5, the video game was released on 12/11/2020
Version for PlayStation 5 from 19/11/2020
It's hard to express your feelings, really. It is never easy to be able to reveal what you really feel, although communication tools have evolved in a frightening way in recent years; and in over ten years, there has been evolution, and how! Ten years, or a little more, is the same lapse of time that separates the gaming world from what has been a product capable of subverting the laws of the video game, splitting them in two in a silent way, actually based on technical arguments and stylistic features. -tacticians in reality much more "simple" than expected. And it is complicated, as we said a little while ago, to go back to talking about how much Demon's Souls, the object of our discussion today, has been able to give to the gaming community, even indirectly.
For the most part, the game by FromSoftware and Japan Studio, which arrived in Europe completely on the sly and several years after the original release, has completely (or almost) escaped from their radar, taking on, even legitimately, in some ways , the reputation of an “elitist” product and for a few close friends. The difficulty, being cryptic at any cost, the brutal desire to punish the player for every single mistake: this was Demon's Souls, but also and above all much more, only that in "few" they really noticed. Fortunately, however, the arrival of the next-gen has fixed this big "problem" of our times: Demon's Souls, thanks to the mammoth work of Bluepoint Games, is back on the scene, but this time under the limelight, as deserved as it is necessary in some ways, thus giving the community the opportunity to (re) discover a real pearl, clearly under a decidedly different dress (and what one!). We spent many hours in Boletaria (over 70, Platinum in progress) and we are ready to tell you about our feelings, waiting to discover and rediscover also what is an immense narrative background, the result of a product that, as per tradition for the series, never ceases to amaze and always "teach" new things .
Ah, beware, this Demon's Souls Remake has flaws, and how, but let's talk about it calmly. Make yourself comfortable!
Narrative sector
Speaking of the narrative sector of Demon's Souls Remake we realized that, perhaps, it is useless to dwell too much on the lore and thematic structure of the title, we talked about it a few weeks ago (here) and we will come back to it again later. Compared to his "sons", the title in question is certainly clearer at the narrative level, offering a more crystalline and "linear" thematic line in which it is not necessary to speculate too much to get to the focal point: it does not seem obligatory to go looking the "nit in the egg", there is a specific villain who has committed precise actions, which led to a clear and overall "simple" ending to frame.
From our point of view, and we do not want to hide it, Demon's Souls is, in this respect, even superior to its "descendants" since we have always found it more "human": the various Dark Souls, Bloodborne and also Sekiro have that aura of ethereal, of supernatural, of narratively impossible to find in reality, something that the player feels very strongly from the very beginning, while in Demon's Souls this happens to a much lesser extent. The stories carried forward are somehow more realistic, more intimate: the son of a king who wanders within the kingdom in search of his father, the cleric Astrea who takes refuge in the swamp "cheating" the inhabitants offering them a fake salvation for then actually exploit them and feed on their souls, just to give a few examples, they are only the surface of what can be found by exploring the narrative of the eldest son of the From family.
This, undoubtedly, it generates a stronger emotional impact, in which the player is able to empathize and feel more part of the story of Demon's Souls, which happens relatively much in the other titles of the brand. The ending is also a case in point, without clearly making spoilers, in which it is possible to choose based on one's conscience, between a "good" and a "bad" ending, and even in this case it all seems more understandable and less wrapped up in mystery.
Also in Dark Souls and "sons" there are in truth a good and a bad ending, but in each of the two cases the world does not benefit much: either the condemnation to darkness or the condemnation to another cycle identical to the previous one, what that instead, in Demon's Souls, seems to escape this law, and the player has the feeling of having real control of things, with the possibility of making a choice that influences the fate of the world, condemning it or saving it.
gameplay
The "new" gameplay of Demon's Souls has not been revolutionized, indeed, rather it has been in some ways reproposed in 1: 1 scale, resulting, first of all, streamlined in its main mechanics. Pad in hand the title, exploiting the strong power of new hardware, manages to remove all that woodiness of the original version. This is particularly noticeable with agile and fast characters, those who use dodges and the so-called "fastroll", which now give the player a feeling of fluidity, freedom of movement and freedom in general greater than in the past. The original Demon's Souls was characterized by an obvious and in some ways characteristic sensation of "hardness" in the movements, which now - clearly - is felt in a different way, but not only thanks to the greater computing power of the machine but also to the work carried out by the guys of Bluepoint Games, who have been able to wisely put their hand to the structure of the title, without however distorting it, but perfecting it and streamlining some fundamental traits.
To stand out is obviously gameplay management, in particular that relating to the combat system, which, being that carried out with the Remake a work of repetition rather than evolution or revolution, keeps many strengths and weaknesses unchanged, such as the fact that the magic classes are clearly more effective than those hand to hand, especially in the early stages. Paradoxically, in this new guise given to Demon's Souls the whole is felt even more and it is a shame as you could try to balance everything better, just as the level of challenge brought by some areas could have been improved, which, precisely due to programming gaps of the time not reviewed to date, put the character in difficulty in an artificial way.
In the same way, you could insert the possibility of adding more "buffs", a mechanic present in some of the subsequent "Souls": it would have been appreciated, in fact, to be able to use together, for example, the "Regeneration" miracle and the "Veil d 'Water ”, or combine the first of them with“ Second Chance ”, just to mention some“ combinations ”able to facilitate the player in his already complex crossing.
Demon's Souls Remake is in any case very pleasant to play pad in hand, thanks to a strong identity and particular connotation compared to the other "Souls", which has maintained its great charm and "energy" compared to the other chapters in question, thanks to the uniqueness of its gameplay. The only discordant note according to our point of view is related to the bosses, who, without turning too much around, they disappointed us a bit, resulting in most cases too weak and excessively "blocked" in terms of practical possibilities: we would have expected, given that in the trailers there were various clips dedicated to the bosses and their movements, to see something more advanced, which knew more about next-gen, and perhaps with a general boost of the artificial intelligence.
Instead, they are practically identical to the past, with the same characteristics and movements, including the ease in bypassing them or in any case in putting them in difficulty by exploiting the information already in our possession regarding the weak points, thus showing a side that is excessively anchored to the old-gen nature of production.
In addition, we want to make a dutiful comment on the speech on equipment, which in Demon's Souls is almost entirely based on attack and, consequently, on weapons. The rings, for example, unlike the other soulslike ones, seem to have a different impact on the title than in the past and the other Souls titles, resulting less "decisive" and incisive than one might imagine. We refer in particular to those that affect resistances, as happens to everything related to defense, they are not very effective and even increasing the character's statistics it seems that the resistance to damage is affected less than it should, suggesting that it is not you are able to strengthen yourself a lot on a defensive level.
Conversely, a different speech for "offensive" equipment: every weapon, even with a simple up, becomes much stronger than before, pushing, in some way, the player to approach each fight in an aggressive way, especially one-on-one. This also happens for rings related to attack power, which have a more tangible incisiveness than those inherent to resistances. Final gloss dedicated to the healing system present in Demon's Souls and in his Remake: even today, you can only heal with herbs and consumable items, except for the use of miracles, and they also have a significant weight. Carrying numerous cures with you can be problematic, preventing the player from picking up some items during exploration: they will end up inside the deposit, but you could try to eliminate, or at least drastically reduce the weight of herbs and the like.
Boss
We don't want to hide behind a half-truth: from our point of view the bosses of Demon's Souls, and consequently of Demon's Souls Remake, are among the most beautiful seen in the history of souls-like: it's a shame that, as mentioned in precedence have been presented here in a "weak" guise in terms of gameplay.
None of them really worried us, except for the False King Allant and the False Idol (due to the fact that we weren't killing his clones, so we were at some point in the boss fight with shots coming from all directions). For the rest we almost always managed to get by in a few attempts, which happens very rarely with the other “soulslike” ones, even though we know them by heart. This highlights a controversial management of the bosses: from an aesthetic point of view they have been entirely reconstructed in a spectacular way, at a narrative level they are very solid (although there is the feeling in some cases that it makes no sense that they are in that place, returning a low contextualization with the area), but they are not unforgettable for the level of challenge they offer.
However, this is not a defect of Demon's Souls Remake, or rather not entirely, as the most serious flaw is the failure to exploit the new hardware to improve their artificial intelligence, which is transported in a practically identical way compared to the past. . The bosses of Demon's Souls Remake, but in general of Demon's Souls, are therefore not "incisive" from the point of view of the level of challenge, which remained excessively calibrated, as we said previously.
Always talking about the bosses, today more than yesterday, it is necessary to return to the discourse relating to the contextualization of them, sometimes controversial, but overall of great impact. It is a perfect example of this Astrea, final enemy of Valley of Putrefaction, which seems almost an apparition, a ghost, in a land afflicted by pestilence and terrible alterations of all sorts, showing itself as a sort of superior being, who has subjugated its inhabitants, "inferior" and blind beings, who obey a creature who never shows the same affection towards them. The same can be said for the Boletaria Palace, in which we find knights previously in the service of the king who rebel against our presence, trying to defend the place and their sovereign. Among these the figure of the Piercer, a boss to whom a little gem has been dedicated, clearly extended to the whole community. Overcoming a particular and arduous challenge, which we will explain later, it will be possible to find the armor of the boss in question, located on a hidden corpse, exploited by the software house both to reward the bravest players and to pay homage to one of their employees. it passed away during the development of the title.
Technology
From a technical point of view it is impossible not to give a huge applause to the guys at Bluepoint Games, albeit clearly with some reservations, linked to some “trivial” limitations and that, in our view, they could have worked differently. Technically and artistically speaking Demon's Souls Remake, which starts from a starting point, from a purely artistic point of view, means of great impact, thanks to the power of the new hardware, it is able, thanks to the power of the new hardware, to return to the players sensations at times indescribable, exciting. , especially for anyone who enjoyed the original title on PlayStation 3 at the time.
The new graphics, in fact, gives players an extraordinary sensation of immersion, thanks to some glances at times truly impressive. This is the case, for example, in the final area of the Crypt of Storms, where it is possible to admire the splendid and lethal moray eels flying high in the sky ready to throw their luminous darts at us, in a continuous chromatic contrast that lives of moments of out-of-scale art design, or the Torre di Latria, among the most beautiful and iconic maps that we remember not only for the brand, but more generally in the history of video games, which here is even more terrifying, controversial and horribly memorable.
Thanks to new technologies it is possible to make the players grasp the fundamental details, which play a key role both in the "simple" aesthetic impact and and above all in the conceptual understanding of its construction, distressing and terrifying, in which the only sounds are the cries of those who have been trapped there, whose reconstruction is, in some situations, nothing short of masterful.
E, although in the end Ray tracing was not implemented, which has unfairly shocked many fans, we bet that no one really misses it at the moment, as it is impossible not to praise and appreciate the general quality with which Bluepoint has rebuilt the Nordic, to quote, Boletaria kingdom. Starting from the management of lighting, reflections, or more specifically of particles, for example those of spells and flames, everything reveals the potential of the next-gen, in which only a few passages are "out of tune", obviously children the limits of the remake nature of a title belonging to two generations ago, on some occasions left almost unchanged or in any case not able to leave its mark. This can make you turn up your nose, of course, but these are details on which we feel to overlook, since overall the reconstruction performed with Demon's Souls Remake is definitely full of love and admiration.
The remake of Demon's Souls is a work of love that Bluepoint has done, both towards FromSoftware and towards the players themselves, who finally have the chance to recover one of the rarest but obscured pearls of the PlayStation 3 era. splendid technical and artistic reconstruction, however, collides with a gameplay that has remained very similar to its original version, in which the structural limits of time we have found them even today, a factor that has somehow ruined the general magic that, for heaven's sake, has known always remain at moderately high levels. Too bad, however, for a too "antiquated" management of some steps, such as spells and miracles, or as regards the treatment system, two aspects that have remained too tied to the past and which should have received a necessary updating but which instead have remained unchanged. These are, of course, details that only those who have examined the original on PS3 can understand, and it is precisely in this respect that Bluepoint has gone "on the safe side" trying to offer a product that is both accessible and faithful, but only half succeeding in the just intent. Overall, however, the general quality of this remake remains very high, and recommending its purchase is practically mandatory, as long as you already have in mind that you have to keep a nice calendar at hand ... You might need it!
► Demon's Souls is an RPG-Adventure game developed by Bluepoint Games Sony Interactive Entertainment and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment for PlayStation 5, the video game was released on 12/11/2020
Version for PlayStation 5 from 19/11/2020
