Demon’s Souls is a PS3 exclusive action RPG from developer From Software and Published by Atlus. Demon’s Souls takes place in a world where Demons have gone Berserk, leaving your character the task of eradicating them and saving the world. Does your Hero have what it takes to save the world or are some things better left to die?
Upon firing up the game for the first time, you are greeted with an intro video and then a character creation page. You begin with the option of name and gender, then move onto the class and appearance. Their are 10 class choices in the game and they are Soldier, Knight, Hunter, Priest, Magician, Wanderer, Barbarian, Thief, Temple Knight and Royalty. Each class starts with different attributes points, for example the Soldier starts with 12 endurance while the Magician starts with 10. So each class gives you a very different feel on the game and how its played. Now you move to the appearance where you can choose to edit your characters Origin, Age, Hairstyle and Color. If you want to go deeper into this you can edit details such as forehead, eyes, Nose, Cheeks, etc. My guy just happened to be a male hunter with pink hair.
Once you have your character created you are thrown into a training world called “The Journey to Nexus” that teaches you the basic buttons that you will use to traverse the world. The button layout in Demon’s Souls is very accessible and makes a lot of sense for the game. If the button layout does not fit you very well then you are in a bind because the options to change them are very limited. You are given the ability to change the camera from normal to inverted, as well as its speed and that is it for controls. To attack in the game you will press R1, strong attack is R2. If you have a shield equipped then you will use L1 to block and L2 to parry. Circle is used to doge or roll, triangle two hands your weapon and square is used for items.
You can have 2 weapons equipped on both hands. For instance my character had a shield/sword combo with his left hand and an axe/bow combo on the right hand. Of course you can only hold one at a time per hand but this gives you options depending on what type of enemy you are currently fighting. You use the left and right D-pad buttons to switch between the weapons and you use the bottom D-pad button to switch between items, which you can have 5 assigned to that button.
As you finish your training you will arrive in the Nexus and find that souls act as the currency for everything in the game. You gain souls as you defeat enemies throughout the levels. You then use these souls to upgrade your armor, buy items, purchase arrows and improve your stats. Since souls are the currency for anything you will need in the game and everything is a bit expensive, you will need to do a lot of grinding in each level to make sure you are able to stayed supplied and leveled. Aside from souls you will also find items and weapons on the bodies of slain enemies. Oddly, there is no option to sell the weapons and items you find along the way so if you don’t need them you just discard.
The story follows a king who has awoken a great demon called the Old One. With the awakening of the Old One, a fog has covered the land causing Demon’s to appear and start devouring the souls of the humans. You are chosen as the one who will rid the world of these Demon’s and restore order to the world. It is a simple story told before but is effective.
