Dark Souls Painfully Reminds Us How Hard Demon’s Souls Was

Demon’s Souls is one of those games that if you wander far enough, your character will either meet a grisly end at the hands of a sleeping dragon or a stationary Red Knight with an invisible sign that says: The programmers did what they had to do, so just don’t come near me. Nonetheless, Demon’s Souls is a powerful RPG that thrusts players in a world covered with darkness, which death knell is represented by Bolatarian grunts equipped with broken swords dipped in turpentine.

Demon’s Souls offers death in a multitude of ways. First, players may choose to die by accidentally encountering strong enemies (in fact, all enemies in Demon’s Souls are strong) aimlessly wandering corridors and compressed areas where the smell of death is imminent. Second, players may commit suicide by falling off ledges after happily striking enemies until they are reduced into lifeless rag dolls. Thirdly, Demon’s Souls wants you to die so bad that you thought that Vanguard was another obese abomination that can be subdued by stabbing it on the back.

In other words, you are PWNED…

Two years and Game of the Year honors later, From Software brings back the dark, chilling experience of gaming’s most worshiped action RPG. Dark Souls, the sequel to Demon’s Souls, updates the dungeon-crawling horror brought by corrupted minions of death itself. Unlike Demon’s Souls, Dark Souls makes things a bit easier with a bonfire checkpoint, which allows characters to recover hit points after trading strikes against the game’s familiar faces of dark knights garnished with evil’s aura.

The bonfire is a trick, a button waiting to be pushed, a concealed quicksand that will lure player to their deaths; Dark Souls is just as unforgiving, and the game’s parched attitude will leave players searching for answers on how to kill one single enemy who cannot be considered as a mini-boss.

How Dark Souls Compares With its Predecessor
Demon’s Souls discourages players from mashing the R1 and R2 button; the game’s mechanics is geared toward waiting for an opponent to expose its weakness, then strike while the iron is still hot. Easier said than done. Enemies are not generic. They have this kill or be killed instinct, a fight or flight response that left a few of us clenching our fists in disappointment and frustration. Will Dark Soul’s leave the same footprints and blood stains? Is the game going to get any easier from this point on?

Actually, Dark Soul’s does not wish to dampen the pre-set difficulty setting (which I’d like to call as Hard as Hell mode) and the setting will continue to antagonize the fairy tale concept that your character is not an invincible knight that can slash anything in sigh and look dashingly good after doing so. Dark Soul’s will try everything in its power to embargo your quest to become a legendary hero.

Are You Ready to Die?
The eerily familiar gameplay setting of Dark Soul’s will leave players challenged, and if you are thinking that the game has become soft as pin cushion, think again. You will die in this game. A lot. If you had experienced Demon’s Souls from start to finish, then you probably know by now how tough it is being bludgeoned to death after having accumulated a rich helping of Souls.

Dark Souls has your character’s epitaph that reads: October 4, 2011