Demon’s Souls Demon’s Souls is an addicting, painful and greatly rewarding game. It is merciless in its approach to giving you access to areas if you go without caution. It can be a frustrating and difficult game but there is something magical about it that keeps you wanting more. The game is a masterpiece for old school gamers that remember their days of trial and error difficult games in the earlier era of games. Demon’s Souls is great and is the 2009 PS3 Role-Playing Game of the Year.
Presentation: You are a warrior that was killed on your way to the Kingdom of Boletaria to investigate the weird fog and rumors of monsters that have infested that area. You are awakened by a maiden who is also responsible for leveling your character. Before any of this you are given the choice to pick your class. The classes include (not mentioning all though) a magician, knight, thief, barbarian and priest just to name a few. Whoever is selected determines what stats, soul level and equipment you start off with. No matter the choice, you are able to modify the character however you want based on what you want to level up. The leveling system consists of soul collection. Destroying enemies grants you souls. You can use those souls to level up, purchase items and equipment or use them to make specialized weapons or magic. Here comes the hard part. If your character dies you lose all your souls. The player is given one chance to recover their souls and in order to do that they have to go back to the area they lost. A pool of souls will be waiting for you to be reclaimed. The part that can be frustrating for some is that if you get killed on the way to retrieve your souls you lose them forever. Patience is the key in this game.
Graphics: The Kingdom of Boletaria and the other surrounding worlds have a magical medieval and creepy look to them. The character and enemy models are phenomenal in terms of detail. Some stages could be a little too dark and depressing for some (Valley of Defilement) but other worlds like Boletaria and the Sky Ruins really showcase the aftermaths of war with broken wagons, dead warriors and detailed architecture which really makes you feel you are in a battlefield with impressive visuals. Lastly, the bosses are great to look at. The amount of detail that was placed on them is impressive.
Sound: There is no music in this game while you explore. The sounds of weapons, grunts of enemies and background environmental noises make up for it at a great rate. Music does play when you fight a boss though. The music scores for these battles are great ranging from creepy to somber melodies. The song against the Knight Tower is a perfect and memorable tune just to give one as an example.
Controls: Your character controls great and very fluid which is a huge plus. The only minus is that sometimes the camera might move if you are locked on and if the enemy moves around a corridor the camera moves with that enemy. This makes it a welcome challenge though because it makes you feel a sense of dread of the outcome of the fight and heightens your senses. The lock on system is great at the same time because you can quickly select who you want to target especially if there are a group of enemies. Using the L1 and R1 buttons for your left and right weapons feels so fluid, and was a great choice by the developer.
Demon’s Souls is a refreshing take on the RPG scene for the PS3. Up to this point it is the system’s best RPG, even dethroning Fallout 3 from last year. It is among the highest echelon of PS3 games.
Score: 9.5
2009 Game Awards
4th Place Overall Game of the Year (PS3/PS2)
Best RPG of the Year (PS3)
2nd Place Best PS Exclusive
2nd Place Best Multiplayer/Co-op (PS3)