I cant get into Demons Souls after 1,000+ hours on Dark.

Hi all,

ive now put in around 20 hours in Demons Souls and i just can't warm to it. I keep wanting to return to Dark Souls which seems to me superior in almost every way.

Demons Souls seems to me like a very primitive prototype of Dark Souls and in spite of my best efforts, 20 hours into Demons i still feel like i am playing a solid - but ultimately much inferior game.

To me Dark Souls has much more personality and much more depth. It has better combat mechanics, better weapons and more imaginative locations, enemies and bosses. I cant get into the idea of the Nexus either. It just seems a bit pretentious and disconnected from the main world - compared to Firelink Shrine - which is a much more seamless way of having a hub. Demons Souls also seems really hard to get the knack of weapon/item progression and i just cannot get my head around character builds. (Although Dark Souls was also not particularly intuitive either).

Also, the mood is just too dark for me. I have not discovered any areas in the game where i feel i want to explore particularly. Everything seems too dense and decaying. I wonder if there is a natural tendency for Souls devotees to favour the game that got them into the series, obviously Dark was my introduction. But can anyone help me dig Demons a little better because i certainly dont want to give up on it. I just keep wanting to head back to Anor Londo.....

Mike, I have very much the same feelings towards demons, in many ways it's then inferior game- lack of poise, abusable magic system, easy bosses (mostly), easy mode (thief ring and bow), lack of open world, the much more random upgrade system... It is a good game, but you really can tell it's the prequel.

However, I think it beats dark in some ways too. The story is actually much more solid, NPC interactions are more interesting in genenral, boss souls are more useful (magic trading, amazing.), and for me the most striking thing was the atmosphere.

I really enjoy dark, twisted fiction, whether it's realistic or in a fantasy genre. Something that makes my skin crawl, my hairs stand on end and fear for my life is something I enjoy.

I think you should just stick with it, if you don't like weapons upgrades, try sticking to normal first time through or get yourself a boss weapon you like. To be honest you only need something in the range of a +8 (it''s out of 10) weapon to complete NG if you're an experienced souls player.

The atmosphere i can't help you with. I guess it's generally a darker game. Obviously the world you'll enjoy more is world 1, and then maybe world 4..

I've recently been playing Demon's Souls too, as I picked up my first PS3 a few days back. I honestly am liking it just as much as I liked Dark Souls, while the lack of poise does suck I enjoy the atmosphere and level structure more than I do Dark Souls. It feels like there's a lot more to explore and find in Demon's.

EDIT: While they may be easier, I'm also really liking the boss fights. The Tower Knight in particular was neat, as I was so used to avoid-attack-avoid-attack that being able to target different points on the boss such as his heels to get to his weak spot were very entertaining to me.

Got the game last week and I cant get into it either. I have put about 25 hours into it so far. At this point I just want to beat it and not really mess with it anymore. When I first started it, in the first 5 hours or so , it wasn't bad, but everything after that has been a chore. As I have been trying to kill a bad habit of leaving games unfinished, I told myself I can not touch dark souls again until demon souls is finished. I want it done so bad that earlier I gave myself 20 free Thomas glitch levels, which is something Im not proud of. I really dont know what it is, but Im just not feeling this game.

Thanks Serious Much. I will stick with it. But it's so dingy and moody I will have to play in small bursts at a time. The atmosphere is so palpable it's not great for my mental health to play as many hours as I put into Dark Souls!

Good on ya man, I'm sure it will grow on you.

Honestly, the only thing I dislike about Demon's Souls is the fact that I completely missed the party since I haven't been able to play it until now. Everyone is talking about Dark Souls/2 and I wish to talk about Demon's Souls.

I too have 1000+ hours in Dark Souls and after playing Demon's, I don't want to go back. I've been playing Demon's exclusively for about 3 months now and I don't see myself ever getting tired of it.

I was lucky enough to get invited to the "DeS Throw Back" psn chat and since I mainly pvp it was a dream come true! There are always people on so hosting or joining a match is never an issue.

When I think back to the poise stabs, dark magic, flipping tanks, estus chugging and all the other f*cked up sh*t Dark Souls pvp has to offer it makes me wonder why more people haven't gone back to Demon's.

Also, Demon's has better combat mechanics in my opinion. Rolling is better overall and being able to roll out of a backstab to negate damage in pvp is among my favorite mechanics in a game, EVER!

When I think back to the shield pokes, rhinos, roll spam, grass munching and all the other f*cked up sh*t Demon's Souls pvp has to offer it makes me wonder why more people haven't moved on to Dark Souls.

Saturday-Saint wrote:When I think back to the shield pokes, rhinos, roll spam, grass munching and all the other f*cked up sh*t Demon's Souls pvp has to offer it makes me wonder why more people haven't moved on to Dark Souls.

I guess I should have started by saying I played Dark Souls first, so I haven't really experienced a lot of that in Demon's since I've been having duels with people on the chat and my friends mostly. =/

People are mostly less tryhard now that the game is dead.

Saturday-Saint wrote:People are mostly less tryhard now that the game is dead.

I gotta disagree. Anyone still into Demon's Souls PvP basically has to be extremely dedicated. Because the community is so small now, it's narrowed down to where the people who enjoy it do so because of the specifics involved with Demon's Souls mechanics. If they just wanted alot of PvP, they'd go to Dark Souls. It means they understand what makes Demon's different from Dark, which requires a certain amount of strategic knowledge and understanding of depth in PvP, and that those differences are entertaining enough to them offset the fact that they aren't getting as much PvP. You can't just jump into Demon's Souls PvP anymore because anybody still doing it really, really likes it.

I don't know. I had a very difficult time with Demon's Souls until I came across the DBS. I have been blowing through every area rather quickly thanks to that weapon. Sure it is kind of cheesy that I am using a giant iron slab, but whatever, it gets the job done.

I do, however, realize...I suck at Demon's Souls pvp on a nuclear level.

Reaperfan wrote:

Saturday-Saint wrote:People are mostly less tryhard now that the game is dead.

I gotta disagree. Anyone still into Demon's Souls PvP basically has to be extremely dedicated. Because the community is so small now, it's narrowed down to where the people who enjoy it do so because of the specifics involved with Demon's Souls mechanics. If they just wanted alot of PvP, they'd go to Dark Souls. It means they understand what makes Demon's different from Dark, which requires a certain amount of strategic knowledge and understanding of depth in PvP, and that those differences are entertaining enough to them offset the fact that they aren't getting as much PvP. You can't just jump into Demon's Souls PvP anymore because anybody still doing it really, really likes it.

Besides the people who like the PvP there's also some trolls still hanging around, invading with the Scraping Spear and other annoying things like that.

EDIT: Has Demon's Souls PvP always been this dumb? The only two times I've been invaded was by a troll who broke all my stuff and poisoned me, and a guy with what I assume was the Northern Regalia that just killed me (WITH MY SHIELD UP) in 3 hits.

I might just stay in Soul Form 24/7.

The only reason to why i never played DeS as much as DkS is that you need to farm soooo much more in DeS. I just don't have the time or the patience to farm for 10 hours trying to get 1 item.

Dubscythe wrote:Besides the people who like the PvP there's also some trolls still hanging around, invading with the Scraping Spear and other annoying things like that.

EDIT: Has Demon's Souls PvP always been this dumb? The only two times I've been invaded was by a troll who broke all my stuff and poisoned me, and a guy with what I assume was the Northern Regalia that just killed me (WITH MY SHIELD UP) in 3 hits.

I might just stay in Soul Form 24/7.

In terms of random invasions, trolls are about all you'll expect to find anymore unfortunately :|

Because of the small size of the current community, each facet has kind of been focused down to it's raw essence. In the same way that PvPer's are only the really dedicated ones, the only random invaders are the ones who are really just looking to screw someone over. You shouldn't expect honorable fights outside of 4-1 PvP anymore.

As for the Northern Regalia guy, was he seemingly ignoring your shield and connecting full hits when you were blocking or was he just doing lots of chip damage? Also if you can remember specifics, what level were you and what shield were you using (and even more specifically, how much had you upgraded the shield)?

Reaperfan wrote:I gotta disagree. Anyone still into Demon's Souls PvP basically has to be extremely dedicated. Because the community is so small now, it's narrowed down to where the people who enjoy it do so because of the specifics involved with Demon's Souls mechanics. If they just wanted alot of PvP, they'd go to Dark Souls. It means they understand what makes Demon's different from Dark, which requires a certain amount of strategic knowledge and understanding of depth in PvP, and that those differences are entertaining enough to them offset the fact that they aren't getting as much PvP. You can't just jump into Demon's Souls PvP anymore because anybody still doing it really, really likes it.

I player SL 125 4-1 PvP very actively and with much consistency from early 2010 up until Dark Souls's release, and then on-and-off since then. Here are my observations:

-Etiquette tends towards a more casual nature. There is less Curse Weapon, almost no grass, people tend to shy away from turtling and BS'ing.
-Playing styles lean towards exciting play, rather than the most optimal play. Sort of a EU attitude, I think.
-It seems more rare that people take full advantage of their build or weapons' strengths. I almost never see Faith builds running circles around 4-1 for a minute every time you land a hit on them. Estoc players use moves other than shieldpoke. Etc.
-Builds often pass up powerful options that would take nearly no investment simply because the player doesn't really want to use it. E.G., I almost never see people cast warding after SC these days.
-Rhino is a troll build.
-More honor jumping. People jumping you if you grass, if you cast CW too many times, if you whatever dumb **** they don't like.

Obviously a generalization. This isn't 100% of PvP in 4-1. But compared to how it was before Dark Souls's release, it's very much changed. And obviously some of the people who have stuck around are very dedicated to the game (though to be fair, many are newer players who I suspect came from Dark Souls). But their attitudes are mostly not the same as were the attitudes of most players pre-DkS. There is less squeezing optimization out of a stone, so to speak. People are more loose about the game and how they play.

So yes, Demon's Souls today is very definitely less tryhard than it used to be.

As a tangent, I'd like to focus on what you said, "You can't just jump into Demon's Souls PvP anymore because anybody still doing it really, really likes it."

It is kind of funny for me to look back at when I started Demon's Souls PvP and how much more accessible it was back then compared to now, or how Dark Souls PvP is now. There are so many weird esoteric things people have figured out that you need to drill down and learn nowadays just to be 'okay' at the game that weren't known when I started playing. Stunlock escape, cross-up/dead angle, set-up parries, pivot casting... so many other things I'm not thinking of right now, probably. Actually probably anything in EWGF's PvP videos.

Basically the game was super easy when I get into it, it creates this weird disconnect when I talk to newer players. They have to learn all this stuff that's considered 'basic knowledge,' I just can't relate to all that, because I learned it slowly over time. Like when I learned cross-up it was, "Wow! This is cool, I'm totally going to wreck the next tournament with this!" It wasn't so much reading a PvP guide or watching a video and thinking, "Oh okay I guess that's another thing I have to practice I guess."

I don't know, personally when I find any PvP in Demon's outside of 4-1 the person I'm against generally has no idea what they are doing. Whether that is as an invader, or as a host. They'll usually have strong builds, they'll hit hard or have good gear. On the skill level though generally they'll just rush, spam R1, and go for a lagstab. Usually I just parry people then kill them. And I'll say, I suck at Demon's Souls PvP. Because my experience has mostly been against crappy players which I faced often, whenever I did find someone good they definitely wrecked me.

I just don't see the idea of these people who are really good at it outside of the designated dueling area.

as dark souls is a huge improvement on demons souls, omg I have to say i lov ethte long sword move set in demons souls better than dark souls..but the BBS IS MOFOING OP. btw, as a greatsword user in Dark souls (mostly the claymore) i have to say, the clymore type weaapons are so boring to use. just swipe swipe slam, no pokes or anything

Reaperfan wrote:

Dubscythe wrote:Besides the people who like the PvP there's also some trolls still hanging around, invading with the Scraping Spear and other annoying things like that.

EDIT: Has Demon's Souls PvP always been this dumb? The only two times I've been invaded was by a troll who broke all my stuff and poisoned me, and a guy with what I assume was the Northern Regalia that just killed me (WITH MY SHIELD UP) in 3 hits.

I might just stay in Soul Form 24/7.

In terms of random invasions, trolls are about all you'll expect to find anymore unfortunately :|

Because of the small size of the current community, each facet has kind of been focused down to it's raw essence. In the same way that PvPer's are only the really dedicated ones, the only random invaders are the ones who are really just looking to screw someone over. You shouldn't expect honorable fights outside of 4-1 PvP anymore.

As for the Northern Regalia guy, was he seemingly ignoring your shield and connecting full hits when you were blocking or was he just doing lots of chip damage? Also if you can remember specifics, what level were you and what shield were you using (and even more specifically, how much had you upgraded the shield)?

I was using an unupgraded Heater Shield and my soul level was around 35. My shield was up because I wasn't staggered at all. But yeah, if trolls are all that are left as standard invaders then I'm kindof sad, I feel like I've missed out on all of the fun.

On another note, the Valley of Defilement bosses were extremely disappointing. They were all just pincushions for my Lava Bow.

I think the main reason I can't get into DeS anymore is because it's not on PC. I love being able to alt tab to look something up or post on the forums or put on music at any given moment. It sure is a shame though, I may try to dust off my PS3 and make some time for it soon.

On the other hand, I love not having to alt-tab in order to look something up or post on the forums or put on music at any given moment, which the PS3 allows me.

But having my PC and PS3 on at the same time heats my room up fast.