Many PlayStation 5 owners are currently having the time of their lives playing Bluepoint Games’ remake of FromSoftware’s classic 2009 RPG, Demon’s Souls. The original PS3 incarnation is notable for laying the foundation for the company’s future games, and influencing a host of other titles.
The remake takes almost every element of the original title and updates it with beautiful visuals. The developer was intent on changing little about the original vision, for better or for worse. While it is cool for gamers to experience the title as close as it was a decade ago, there are several things we wish they did change from the original.
10 Item Burden
Item burden is a completely useless gameplay feature. It is not like equipment burden which influences movement. Fortunately you can now transport items to storage while away from the Nexus. However, they should have just removed the feature altogether. The added step of returning to the Nexus to remove needed items from storage is unnecessary. Resource management is not really a hallmark of the genre and adds nothing to the journey.
9 More Shortcuts
More recent games from the studios utilize the same checkpoint system. However, the level design lends itself to shortcuts so the path to a boss becomes much easier once you reach it the first time. Demon’s Souls has too few of these, often making you trek through entire areas several times if you are having trouble with a boss. Some say it is a part of the design, but future games are more forgiving in this respect.
8 Easy Mode
Bluepoint Games pondered internally whether or not to add an easy mode before deciding against it. Some cannot play it on this level of difficulty, though, and not for lack of skill. Various medical conditions affect reflexes and coordination, making playing this game nearly impossible. While its absence prevents many from experiencing the game, many lesser skilled players can still easily make it through the game with the right build and a walkthrough detailing ways to make the game more manageable.
7 World Tendency
One major feature of the game is world tendency, which changes the health and damage of enemies based on your actions in the game. Mainly it is concerned with the amount of time you died in human form.
For the latter, increasing white world tendency only comes with beating bosses. This means having Black World tendency makes the level infinitely harder until you actually beat it. The idea is novel, but it would have been more forgiving to give players another way of earning white world tendency instead of bosses.
6 More Combat Challenges
Many will find themselves in positions where they have to grind in order to bypass a certain boss or area. While changing Archstones will usually do the trick of progressing while becoming stronger, you may find yourself repeating certain areas several times just to farm souls. With this in mind, it would have been nice if the game added more combat challenges, maybe something like the Chalice Dungeons from Bloodborne.
5 Not Having To Beat Phalanx Again In New Game Plus
After beating Demon’s Souls, you are immediately thrust into new game plus where you must travel through the first area of Boletaria and beat Phalanx before increasing the character’s soul level. They should let you just level up right away, especially since you now run the risk of losing many thousands of souls if you die twice without picking up your souls again. We’ve already done the intro, so just let us go into the game and level up.
4 More Transparency
Demon’s Souls is extremely enigmatic by design, making most players refer to guides for help on numerous things such as stat progression and making it through some levels.
The developer could have made things more transparent without sacrificing the sense of discovery and exploration. Understanding what certain stats do and clearly explaining how strength and dexterity determine attack power would change little about the core gameplay experience.
3 Accessibility Options
While an easy mode might be a catch all to make the game more accessible, there are some gamers who still could not play it if it simply made the combat more manageable. Accessibility options would make the game more open for all. Some fans might decry this, but we ask them this; how many times have you ever used a guide to make it through an area, a boss, or for a solid character build? All of these are things you did to make the game more accessible to you, so there is little difference then putting some accessibility options in the game.
2 Some Of The Bosses
FromSoftware is legendary for their boss battles. For as many great bouts there are in Demon’s Souls, a few of them are definitely lacking in certain areas. The Dragon God, for instance, is a boring puzzle where you simply hide behind pillars and slowly progress around the beast. While some may call it sacrilege, it would not have been the end of the world if Bluepoint changed and improved some of the less celebrated battles, or at least added a new way to kill them.
1 Sixth Archstone
One of the biggest things fans wanted from the remake was for the developer to complete the sixth Archstone. Unfortunately, it is still broken and inaccessible in the new version. They should have collaborated with FromSoftware and taken all their original ideas to complete it, giving fans something entirely new to experience in Demon’s Souls. While the current game is still a masterpiece, something new would have been mind-blowing.
