Dark Souls (Demon's Souls 2)

[Syroc]

There's a new preview in this week's Dengeki Playstation, with another interview with the director/producer of the game. Here are some details they discussed:

- They received a lot of feedback from fans after the previous game, and he's really excited to be working on a game which is eagerly expected by so many people, but it also means he feels a lot of pressure on the project. After working for a long time on this game, they're finally nearing the final stage of development, and he's pretty happy about it.

- In regards to news updates about the game, he says that it's a very tricky thing to market this game properly, and the release of information is something that they're trying to get just right. Because the nature of the game is such that it is meant to surprise the player as he/she plays and discovers things, they don't want to give everything away. At the same time, if they don't reveal much at all, it feels like they're not communicating with the fanbase. So he's trying to find a balance.

- Dark Souls is not a story narrative driven RPG, even though it has a story. The game setting is one where the main character is an "Undying" who comes back to life even after being killed. He has cast himself out from normal society.

- There is a new Oath System that is being revealed. This is one of the elements of the mutual roleplaying system previously mentioned. Basically, as the player explores the world and plays the game, there will be certain discoveries which allows the player to make an oath to a person or regarding some subject. Some of these discoveries can be pretty rare.

- When an Oath is made, it determines the player's position on that topic, and that will impact the player's interactions with other players online. This could mean that making an Oath for something could make you allies with another player, or deadly enemies. The Oath System is not an all encompassing fixed alliance like a MMO Guild, instead it should be thought of as a system which serves as a guide for active roleplaying.

- The director also states that one of the most important things in terms of designing the game is emphasizing the importance of healing items and how useful they can be. Because of this, a lot of effort has been put into placing healing items around the world in the right places, so when the player works a little to look for stuff, there is a genuine feeling of satisfaction when such items are found.

- Because of how important healing items are, the Campfire System being used in part to create healing items is something they put in so that beginner players will not find themselves completely stuck when playing the game.

- Dark Souls is going to be a pretty hard game, but the director feels that it is a positive thing because the challenge gives the game value. To actually have challenging gameplay for the player to discover, learn, and overcome makes the game content much more satisfactory and worthwhile. He wants Dark Souls to be considered an "intriguing game", and they're keeping that in mind as they put on the final touches to the game.

- So far, the information released about the game constitutes about 1/5 of the total amount of details they plan on covering regarding the game before release.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=428494

[IAmChavez]

I can't wait for this to come out. I love demon's souls, looking forward to a new challenging game.

[MrFunctionality]

Think we'll see more of a story in this one?

[Thegide]

Pants = crapped

[Macnme]

That's one of the few things I don't really like about Demon's Souls - is the seeming lack of direction.

Now, I like exploring and sandboxing as much as the next person - but there did seem to be a total lack of direction in the 1st game... once you're past the tutorial your basically left to your own devices.
Not that there's anything wrong with that - but I just think they struck the balance wrong for guiding a player to their next goal.
In fact - aside from "Kill All The Demons".. the game didn't seem to have any goals

[RacingCreed]

I just picked up the first Demon Souls yesterday and i've defeated 3 bosses, now against the flame lurker or something.

The game itself is extremely diffiicult and how they can make a second one is beyond me. No doubt it will be twice as hard but never the less, some awesome features are expected from this growing series of challenging demon battles.

Can't wait for this game, but first, I must defeat all 20 bosses on the first. After three I feel like they can't get much harder, but I know i'm wrong.

[Burrich•]

Here's a good, off-screen gameplay vid from e3

[OCK]

Delicious new trailer featuring a whole lot of combat. I am still trying to decide whether I am more excited for this or Skyrim (I spent over 100 hours with Oblivion but close to 200 with Demon Souls so...)

[Littlebigdude805]

I found some HD videos of the prologues they are leaking out bit by bit. It seems Dark Souls may have a bit more story to it than it's predecessor.

Prologue I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Be-lPrtZoO8
Prologue II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2hF6hZFLdo
Prologue III
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=041LgvIbFs0

[OCK]

The game is almost upon us, our Japanese friends get it on the 22nd although some retailers have broken the street date. This made me lol:

According to Japanese site, Esuteru, some retailers have broken the street date of Dark Souls. Developer ‘From Software’ has decided to combat this in an unusually cruel way by invading the games of those playing early.

That’s right, they are sending maxed out Black Phantoms into the games, and they have some pretty terrifying stats such as level 145, 1900HP, and all abilities at the maximum 99.

It would have been nicer to simply pop round and just punch the player in the face!

http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2011/09/...omment-page-2/

For those that don't know Dark Souls has an exciting new weapons class: whips! Is anyone else going to make a "Belmont" build? I know I am

[majormel84]

The game is almost upon us, our Japanese friends get it on the 22nd although some retailers have broken the street date. This made me lol:



http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2011/09/...omment-page-2/

aww crap you got here first!
lol i wanna play it right now to get punished by phantoms!!

For those that don't know Dark Souls has an exciting new weapons class: whips! Is anyone else going to make a "Belmont" build? I know I am

aw man you got here first!i wanna try out the fight against those black phantoms.

[koolkat14]

I haven't played Demon Soul's yet but I've heard it's really hard. I'm thinking of whether I should just get the first one or wait for the second one to release.

[OCK]

BRING. ON. THE. PAIN. (CONTAINS SOME MINOR SPOILERS!):

This is Part One of our Dark Souls review diary, where we tell you how we're getting on with the game in the run-up to review. SPOILER WARNING: minor spoilers about the early stages of the game ahead!

I already know that reviewing Dark Souls is an experience I'm never, ever going to forget. Putting in 10+ hour daily shifts on huge games isn't an alien concept to most people in my profession – but a game that's this dark, this punishing, this emotionally demanding? And – of course – a game this fist-eatingly, heart-achingly, soul-crushingly difficult? This is a whole other thing. Having spent 12 hours of the last 24 immersing myself in its world, Dark Souls is actually starting to affect my mental health.

I'd love to say that things get off to a gentle start, but they really don't. Dark Souls' first proper boss is still the hardest of any I've faced so far – partly because you are, by necessity, so underpowered when you meet him. He's called the Taurus Demon, and he's utterly hateful. You stride out onto a bridge, and he drops down from nowhere, a bull-headed, winged, aggressive satyr ten times your size, sporting a club that can end you in two hits if you get unlucky. Run away from him, he chases you. Attack him, he crushes you. Get behind him, he steps back and spikes you with metal protrusions on his legs. He is proper hard, and he lives at the top of a tower that you have to climb every time you want to face him. He is, all told, a woefully obstinate introduction to the game – and one that seems to set the tone for the rest of this mammoth, psychotic endeavour.

I can't quite explain that special gamer's psychological process that enables you to fail at something over and over and over again and still maintain the will to go on. I think you have to be a certain type of thrill-seeking masochist to even entertain the notion of a game like Dark Souls. Every death at Taurus' hands brought me closer to sheer mental exhaustion. Time after time I'd get him to within a few hits of death, then feel my hands turn to jelly as the nerves ruined my reflexes and he caught me in a one-two attack loop, dispassionately ending my life over and over again on the end of that massive club.

I slayed Taurus – after more than three hours of continuous failure – with a final, desperate swipe, a death throe, milliseconds before he crushed me beneath his club for what felt like the 600th time. As "YOU ARE DEAD" flashed up on the screen, I was ready to give up games journalism and go become a lawyer like my school careers advisor always said I should – but then, in the background, just before the screen faded to black, I saw that bull-headed ******* fall to his knees, felt the head-spinning rush of triumphant adrenaline that only games have ever given me, and I knew that Dark Souls now owned me completely. Just like Demon's Souls did before it.

Things are so difficult in Dark Souls that, after the first fifteen hours, the question I keep asking myself is "have they gone too far?" Truth is, for Demon's Souls devotees, there's *almost* no such thing as too far. The bigger the challenge, the bigger the reward, and the more thrilling the final victory. For anyone who hasn't played through Demon's Souls before it, though, I'm not sure that Dark Souls does enough to tease you with that thrill before dropping you straight into the deep end. You have to fight tooth and claw here right from the off.

It's also huge. In the Chain of Pain – the little email support group that a collective of Dark Souls reviewers is currently relying upon for tips and moral support, in the absence of the online community that will grow up around the game when it actually launches – one of my fellows reckons he's about a quarter of the way through the game after 60 hours. This is something that people will spend months playing.

This a very different game from Demon's Souls, with a different rhythm and structure. The bonfires change the way you play entirely, removing the option to run back to a safe haven and regroup before heading back out into the fray. And without wanting to give too much away, its tone is different too; it's darker, more distressing, and more claustrophobic despite its open-world structure. It encroaches subtly on your mental well-being.

I'll be writing more about that in the next instalment of this review diary. For now, though, we can answer at least one question: is Dark Souls harder than Demon's Souls? Well, yes – much harder – but for some reason I've not quite put my finger on yet, it's not more dispiriting.

http://ps3.ign.com/articles/119/1195837p1.html

[Coconuts]

There's been reports of game freezes during online mode in Japan once game got released. I've heard one guy got game freezed 4 times during stream.
That doesn't sound good at all. I hope it's going to be patched soon as possible for those who have Dark Souls right now.

[OCK]

Finally some concrete info on some of the new mechanics (Bonfires, Humanity), no more World or Character Tendency. This article also reaffirms that the game is a lot harder then Demon's Souls:

I'm now 24 hours into Dark Souls, the successor to 2009's brilliant and challenging role-playing game Demon's Souls. I have, of course, died many times in my struggle to become un-undead. I have killed a half-dozen of its major demons, explored deeply its open world, but have just barely begun to scratch its hard surface.

You've likely heard again and again that Dark Souls, like its predecessor, is an unforgiving, uniquely challenging game. It requires patience, trial and error, experimentation and—unless played observantly and very carefully—many deaths. Its rules are sometimes obtuse, often esoteric. Rather than try to drill into you just how punishing Dark Souls can often be, let's explore why it's a more difficult game than Demon's Souls. And I'll try to help explain some of Dark Souls arcane systems—Humanity, Bonfires and Hollowing—along the way.
Your first minutes in Dark Souls, after choosing a starting character class and selecting your character's "gift" from a moderately helpful selection of items will be spent in an asylum that serves as the game's tutorial. After learning the basics of combat, which are precisely Demon's Souls save for a few new lunging attacks, you'll face the the massive Asylum Demon. He's the ultimate test of your novice combat abilities, easier to defeat than his Demon's Souls counterpart Vanguard, but still an immense challenge. He recently laid waste to my Kotaku colleagues at Tokyo Game Show an impressive nine times in a row, but I managed to dispatch him on a second attempt.

From there, players are escorted by a very large, seemingly friendly raven into Dark Souls' huge open world. They'll see their first Bonfire, a brief moment of respite and comfort, as beautifully morose music plays. At fires, players can rest, regaining their health, refilling their life-restoring Estus Flask and more. It's at these fires that players can also level up their character's abilities and regain their human forms. Later, they'll be able to repair and upgrade their weapons and armor, access the Bottomless Box and stoke the flames of their Bonfires.

While they may look like checkpoints of a sort, a place to regain one's strength and spend souls leveling up, it can be argued that Bonfires serve to make Dark Souls even more difficult. Visiting one of these camps resets the world, respawning its enemies. Players must consider whether the replenishment of one's health and the investment of whatever souls they're carrying is worth reviving everything they've just defeated.

A player's first Bonfire serves as something of a hub. Nearby are pathways to Dark Souls various threats. Below you, a graveyard and the Catacombs, both stalked by skeletal warriors who attack in pairs and offer no souls as reward when defeated. Directly beneath the camp, a cobblestone stairway to the New Londo Ruins. In this sunken city, your fellow undead have gone mad, apparently one of the consequences of suffering as a living dead. The Ruins are haunted by specters, cruel enemies who walk through walls and can attack the player from walkways above and below. Up above the camp, the Undead Burg, a fortified city that's perhaps the safest choice for new players.

The main camp is where Dark Souls' still human survivors gather. Clerics, sorcerers, smiths and tradesman wait nearby in this solace. Players will "collect" them as the game progresses, freeing them from captivity, much like the support characters of Demon's Souls. Like that game, it's difficult to know who trust, as the cracks in their sanity often show through verbal exchanges.

Players will be told by the first friendly face they meet that two bell towers must be visited, the first in the medieval town called Undead Burg. What lies in wait for them are brutally challenging enemies, from undead soldiers that attack in groups to the low-ranking (but still massive) demons that serve as mid-level bosses to the giant Belfry Gargoyles.

Like Demon's Souls, getting from point A (your main bonfire) to point B (bell tower) is viciously hard. Tread carefully, for the strength of your enemies do not align with your character's. A massive wyvern will have no qualms about burning you to a crisp as you head toward the church. Heavily armored knights wielding swords the size of your body will happily run you through for a one-hit kill. Expect to be poisoned, crushed, stabbed and set ablaze time and again.

Fortunately, Dark Souls' world is thick with shortcuts and secret passages, making successive runs through the Undead Burg slightly easier. With patience and perseverance comes progress.

Eventually, they'll make it to the Belfry Gargoyles, who attack in a pair in a fashion similar to Demon's Souls' Maneaters. Yes, From Software is throwing the equivalent of one of the most difficult encounters in its last game at players very early on. Players in human form will have the option to summon the friendly phantom version of a non-player character, sun worshiper Solaire of Astora, to the fight if they choose to do so.

It's a hard battle, but less so when fought carefully and with a friend. It's one of the rare moments when Dark Souls feels like it's doing players something resembling a favor.

Players likely won't feel that way after coming to grips with many of Dark Souls other gameplay components. The concept of Humanity, for example, is one of From Software's new challenges. Players start with zero Humanity, with an emaciated corpse-like body to reaffirm that status. Players can boost it by consuming black sprites known as, well, Humanity and Twin Humanities. Doing so will boost their attack, defense and resistances to afflictions like curses. If undead, or Hollowed, players can then cash in that Humanity to "reverse hollowing" and regain their human forms. Should they die while in living form or with some Humanity intact, they'll be able to reclaim it (along with whatever souls they dropped) by touching the bloodstain left at the scene of their previous death.

Humanity is also spent at Bonfires to "kindle" them, making the flames more powerful, boosting the count of your Estus Flask and, sometimes, boosting the flasks of other players online.

On Humanity, the Dark Souls manual, largely uninformative though it may be for a game of this scope, warns of Vagrants. These are born when players drop certain items or a large Humanity count upon death. Vagrants are sent to invade other players worlds.

Dark Souls is more challenging for another reason alluded to earlier. Some enemies simply do not drop souls, the currency used to level up or buy goods and services, upon death. The formidable skeletons and specters players can choose to face early on drop little to nothing of value. Players looking to farm souls and grind to a more powerful character will find themselves starving for souls.

There were moments in my first 24 hours that I thought From Software too cruel. I once found myself cursed by some beasts dwelling in The Depths beneath the Undead Burg, an affliction that not only killed my character instantly, but halved its maximum hit points. Then I was cursed again, stacking the damage. I fought for four hours at one-quarter of my health, desperately seeking a cure. Surely, I thought, there must be some mistake. How could they do this to me?

What's more, enemies now relentlessly pursue the player, seeing them from far away and never giving up chase.

There are, however, moments of forgiveness. Shortcuts and friendly blacksmiths who upgrade armor and weapon with the material Titanite; the option to forge and mend weapons without needing to visiting one of those smiths; the ability to sacrifice some humanity to boost a Bonfire, giving the player a stronger Estus Flask.

Despite the cruelty and harshness thrown at the player, Dark Souls is still wonderful to play. Hand-to-hand combat is smart, broad and deep. There is a much larger array of weaponry, suits of armor and mysterious items. It is still fascinating to peel away its layers, to discover how its many components weave together, for gone are concepts from the previous game that governed World Tendency, Character Tendency and the variance between body and soul forms.

Dark Souls is also a much more beautiful game to take in than its predecessor. Its environments are at times brightly colored and lush, at other dark, dank and revolting. Beautiful and fascinating though it may be, the first 24 hours have been horrific and adrenaline-fueled. I've suffered a lack of sleep from playing, in part due to the late night invigoration of fighting huge demons and dragons.

There's still much to do. Far beyond the Belfry Gargoyles, I'm still only a fraction of my way through this world. Intensely difficult though it may be, I'm ecstatic to further plumb its bleak and unforgiving depths, without the help of a Wiki or strategy guide. In fact, I think I'll get started on my 25th hour of hell right now. So far, it's been heaven.

http://kotaku.com/5842968/dark-souls...-hours-in-hell

Vagrants? Bottomless Box? Looks like there will be a lot more to discover in Dark Souls, this game will utterly consume me like Demon's Souls before it.

EDIT:

Watched a bit of a live stream out of Japan yesterday, the guy was using a scythe and was dressed in a dark hooded robe. In other words, Dark Souls lets you play as the Grim Reaper

[Ayneh]

Just a couple more weeks 'til EU release~

[ryryryan•]

The game is almost upon us, our Japanese friends get it on the 22nd although some retailers have broken the street date. This made me lol:
http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2011/09/...omment-page-2/

For those that don't know Dark Souls has an exciting new weapons class: whips! Is anyone else going to make a "Belmont" build? I know I am

Hahaha, this is actually amazing. I'm really tempted to buy this now, but I fear I won't have the time for it. I got through about 5 or 6 bosses on demon souls until I got to one where you fought 2 demon things at one on like walkways and towers... kinda lost the will to go on at that point and never got around to playing it again. But I really did love it, so I'm tempted indeed.... hmm.

Bah! There are genuinly too many good games coming out atm. BF3 alone would take up weeks of my time, let alone this, skyrim, good hd collections incoming, uncharted 3 and more. Not a good time to be a gamers wallet

[fullofwin]

Finally some concrete info on some of the new mechanics (Bonfires, Humanity), no more World or Character Tendency. This article also reaffirms that the game is a lot harder then Demon's Souls:

Changes sound pretty good...I have this pre-ordered and can't wait for the 4th, I'll probably take a day off work. I didn't like the World Tendency system much so I'm glad they are trying something new.

I sometimes think I played a different version of Demon's Souls than everyone else...it was just not that hard. The boss battles were certainly shorter and easier to solo than some in Monster Hunter (and you had the option to summon others to help!). If you didn't run wildly around blind corners the normal enemies didn't present a problem either. Basically it was open path to boss, go back to nexus so you don't lose progress, kill boss, repeat. The most difficult part of the game was killing the stupid lizards before they disappeared.

I wish every reviewer didn't go out of the way to comment on the alleged difficulty...it's getting tired. I don't know if it works to this game's favor or not. Do more people pick it up looking for a challenge than those that pass on it because they fear it will be too hard for them? I think it probably hurts sales...

[ryryryan•]

The difficulty is what it's known for really, I don't think it would get as much attention otherwise. I certainly wouldn't of picked it demon souls up if I hadn't heard about it being a challenge. I think this works in it's favour

[OCK]

Interesting discussion regarding difficulty, I actually agree with fullofwin in that I did not find it overly difficult and certainly nowhere near what the gaming press made it out to be. There were some moments though that really tested my mettle, not going to lie. Passing these areas were the most rewarding and always gave me an overwhelming sense of elation. I guess a lot of it has to do with how skilled you are as a gamer in general and in particular how much experience you have with action RPG's. I can easily imagine someone who primarily plays FPS' coming into DS and being completely overwhelmed lol. These previews are emphatically saying that this is MUCH harder then DS so it will be interesting to see how true that actually is.

@fullofwin

I wish every reviewer didn't go out of the way to comment on the alleged difficulty...it's getting tired. I don't know if it works to this game's favor or not

Well if we go by the sales and popularity of DS I guess we can say it's in the games favor. From Software just annonced (for the second time) that they will be extending server support into 2012 and dropping the price of DS to $20. It seems like the game is as popular as ever. Personally the difficulty was never a selling point for me (although I do appreciate a good challenge). I absolutely adore the action RPG genre and DS did so many unique things (particularly with the online) that it had my attention from the first time I had read about it. After spending 200 hours with the game it easily earned a spot on my prestigious all time top 10 list.

@ryryryan

I got through about 5 or 6 bosses on demon souls until I got to one where you fought 2 demon things at one on like walkways and towers... kinda lost the will to go on at that point and never got around to playing it again.

lol, most DS players consider the Maneaters to be the hardest bosses in the whole game (I am part of that club!). I can't remember how long it took me to bring them down but I do remember my reaction after I did: I literally sat there dumbfounded and began laughing with relief, it is a gaming memory I will forever cherish And in case you missed it in the preview above:

Eventually, they'll make it to the Belfry Gargoyles, who attack in a pair in a fashion similar to Demon's Souls' Maneaters. Yes, From Software is throwing the equivalent of one of the most difficult encounters in its last game at players very early on. Players in human form will have the option to summon the friendly phantom version of a non-player character, sun worshiper Solaire of Astora, to the fight if they choose to do so.

Based on the many games I have played this year (27 and counting) Dark Souls is the only game besides Skyrim that has a chance of dethroning DeusEx as my overall GOTY pick for 2011. Needless to say, I am beyond excited for it! Also, EU pre-orders get the limited edition at the standard price. This is one of those occasions when I am happy I am not living back home in Canada