I've been playing a lot of Demon's Souls. Easily more than 25 hours in my first week with the game. That amount of time has allowed me to clear a grand total of three stages. 1-1, 2-1 and 3-1. I have found, in this limited time, that everything that has been said about the game's ruthless difficulty is completely true, and then some. And it's not because the game is cheap. Quite the opposite, actually. It's more honest and upfront that most other games around.

Enemies are always the same. They always appear at the exact same spots. They always attack you in their own predetermined patterns. If you do your homework, you'll soon find out their weaknesses and strenghts. The fact that after all of this the game still manages to challenge you at every single step of the way, punishing you with exceeding force and mopping the floor with you the second you let your guard down, is a testament to the solidness of what is probably one of the best and more polished features of the game: An impressive, complex and exceedingly well fleshed out combat system that puts many other RPGs to shame.

Couple that with a wide array of class selections, that can be further customized depending on your playstyle preferences; a robust selection of weapons to suit practically every need in regards to combat, whether that be melee in close quarters or long-range sniping, and everything in between, an equally impressive set of spells and miracles, and a variety of settings that ooze an oppressive atmosphere, and it's easy to understand why I'm hooked like this to a game that keeps kicking me in the teeth and spitting on my corpse.

16 I think, before the End Game event is available. After that, you get the chance to start a new playthrough on NG+, which ramps up the difficulty of all enemies by at least 50%.

gamingeek said:

Is there no cheat or easy mode?

I'm playing in the "easy" mode.

aspro said:

...which means any failure is on you, not on the game.

There has only been another game this generation that I can honestly say that about, besides DS. That game is Super Mario Galaxy.

With a few more levels under my belt, I have to say that even though the difficulty curve is steeper than in any other game I've tried before, it becomes much more manageable as you progress through the game.

Ah! I beat 5-1 last night. But 4-2 is now molesting me in unspeakable ways. I need to get better.

Foolz said:

you can dow the levels out of order, or is that a typo?

Actually, it is strongly recommended to do the levels in bizarre orders. You can get good loot and powerful weapons by hopping around worlds. It's pretty open once past the 1-1 level.

Foolz said:

Ah cool, thanks for clearing that up!

No problem. I actually cleared 4-2 as well. Tomorrow I'll give 4-3 a shot.

I'm thinking...if Steel can beat it maybe I have a chance. But then again Disgaea 3 owned me, and you were doing well in it last I heard!

During the weekend I leveled up some more, currently SL100+ (probably 103 or 104, can't remember anymore), and finally managed to clear that shithole called world 5. The last bit had some of the most annoying, gross and disturbing enemies I've seen in a long, long time. Plague babies are the stuff nightmares are made of.

So I have only 1-3 and 1-4 left to clear. I'll probably spend a few days soul grinding to reach the ideal INT/MAG stats for my current build, before tackling the last levels and the end game event. This game is so good, I am positive I'll be diving head-first into NG+ the minute I beat it.

Because there is no doubt in my mind I am going to beat it. Not anymore.