Demon's Souls (PS5)

It was a failure at release. It didn't pickup til Dark souls games came and started to become a cult classic and beloved.

That is very wrong. It didn't have AAA-level sales but it also didn't have a AAA budget nor AAA aspirations. It sold over a million copies, it was a Greatest Hits (over 500K) title in the US. Atlus initially expected only around 75K copies of the game to be sold and it massively surpassed their expectations. Calling it a failure is to completely ignore reality. Demon's Souls was a cult classic and is very much the reason Dark Souls got so much initial hype.
 
My Demon's Souls disk is a Greatest Hits title, so it must have sold at least pretty well. That said, I only knew a couple people who were really into it. Those folks tended to shout its merits from the highest mountain...hence Dark Souls sold well immediately.
 
That is very wrong. It didn't have AAA-level sales but it also didn't have a AAA budget nor AAA aspirations. It sold over a million copies, it was a Greatest Hits (over 500K) title in the US. Atlus initially expected only around 75K copies of the game to be sold and it massively surpassed their expectations. Calling it a failure is to completely ignore reality. Demon's Souls was a cult classic and is very much the reason Dark Souls got so much initial hype.
We're just talking about release - how life began for the game, and how Sony initially viewed it (poorly), and why it therefore didn't even have a US version until people started importing it and word spread and it became too big for Sony to ignore.

Excerpted from this article: https://www.theguardian.com/technol...ark-souls-creator-hidetaka-miyazaki-interview

Miyazaki started there as a coder in 2004. After working on the Armored Core robot-combat series, he heard about a game in development elsewhere in the studio. “Demon’s Souls wasn’t doing well,” he says. “The project had problems and the team had been unable to create a compelling prototype. But when I heard it was a fantasy-action role-playing game, I was excited. I figured if I could find a way to take control of the game, I could turn it into anything I wanted. Best of all, if my ideas failed, nobody would care – it was already a failure.”

Miyazaki was assigned to the game and “changed pretty much everything about it”. Demon’s Souls launched in Japan without fanfare. The game had a disastrous reception at the Tokyo Game Show a few months before its release; many players didn’t even make it past the character-creation screen. It sold around 20,000 copies in the week of its release, far fewer than the publisher, Sony, had hoped.

But then word spread...

Actually the whole article is worth a read, and explains why the Souls game worlds are so mysterious and only feed you information and lore in small, vague fragments.
 
My Demon's Souls disk is a Greatest Hits title, so it must have sold at least pretty well. That said, I only knew a couple people who were really into it. Those folks tended to shout its merits from the highest mountain...hence Dark Souls sold well immediately.
Yes and no. Demon's Souls relative success gave Dark Souls a boost at launch for sure, Dark Souls tipped into mainstream, and that being the first Souls game for many players compelled them to playing Demons Souls retroactively.

It's like a band that doesn't get their huge break until a few songs on their second album, and people suddenly realize their whole catalog is genius level, fundamentally changes multiple genres and begins to inspire copycats.
 
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We're just talking about release - how life began for the game, and how Sony initially viewed it (poorly), and why it therefore didn't even have a US version until people started importing it and word spread and it became too big for Sony to ignore.

Excerpted from this article: https://www.theguardian.com/technol...ark-souls-creator-hidetaka-miyazaki-interview



Actually the whole article is worth a read, and explains why the Souls game worlds are so mysterious and only feed you information and lore in small, vague fragments.

Yeah, it had a really slow start in Japan. However, it sold super well the moment it arrived outside of the country. I don't really blame Sony for being hesitant at first. Even when the game started picked up sales in Japan, it wasn't amazing. Even Atlus didn't expect a ton of copies. The cult success of the game surprised a lot of people.

Yes and no. Demon's Souls relative success gave Dark Souls a boost at launch for sure, Dark Souls tipped into mainstream, and that being the first Souls game for many players compelled them to playing Demons Souls retroactively.

It's like a band that doesn't get their huge break until a few songs on their second album, and people suddenly realize their whole catalog is genius level, fundamentally changes multiple genres and begins to inspire copycats.

The huge amount of hype and word of mouth from Demon's Souls players definitely gave Dark Souls it's early hype and attention. I'm sure it also influenced how Bamco marketed that game and just how much they were willing to spend promoting the game.
 
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Demon's Souls didn't sell greatly in Japan, initially (it did however, go on to respectable sales). But, it still had a dedicated little community. Western gamers starting hearing about how unique and good it is and importing the Asian and Japanese versions. Because, the game was region free and had full English voice over, if your console was set to English.

Atlus published it in North America. Atlus is a smart company, who themselves make niche games. They saw the quality and potential. Namco Bandai published it in Europe, several months later. Once it got its western releases, the critical acclaim and community praise rolled in. It went on to sell about 1.5 million. Which should be plenty for any game. And is plenty, for a game made with a smallish team and a small budget and zero marketing.

Bandai Namco made the deal for publishing rights to Dark Souls, when From Software decided they would go ahead with a successor. Bamco's marketing with "Prepare to Die" was brilliant. and now the Dark Souls series has sold 30 million.
 
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to me it seems Dark Souls 2 is what pushed the series into mainstream success...Dark Souls was great on console but it was still a niche title...the PC release was well received but it was a bare bones port where you needed to use the DSFix mod...DS2 is when mainstream fans started playing it and it took off in overall popularity
 
to me it seems Dark Souls 2 is what pushed the series into mainstream success...Dark Souls was great on console but it was still a niche title...the PC release was well received but it was a bare bones port where you needed to use the DSFix mod...DS2 is when mainstream fans started playing it and it took off in overall popularity
Dark Souls 1 sold 2.3 million in its first two years. Which is beyond niche sales. And over 5.5 million, by June 2015 (that's about 14 months after the PC release of Dark Souls 2).

DSfix has 649,598 unique downloads on nexus mods. Steam Spy projects Dark Souls PC to have sold 2 - 5 million.

Something really interesting about Dark Souls is that it seems each successive release has sold as well or better, than the previous. Not many brands enjoy that success. Often, Sequels sell worse. Or in the case of multiple sequels, one will clearly outsell the others. But with Dark Souls, it seems everyone keeps buying. As well as new players. Dark Souls 3 sold over 3 million, in its first month. and has sold 10 million in lifetime sales.
 
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Dark Souls 1 sold 2.3 million in its first two years. Which is beyond niche sales. And over 5.5 million, by June 2015 (that's about 14 months after the PC release of Dark Souls 2).

DSfix has 649,598 unique downloads on nexus mods. Steam Spy projects Dark Souls PC to have sold 2 - 5 million.

Something really interesting about Dark Souls is that it seems each successive release has sold as well or better, than the previous. Not many brands enjoy that success. Often, Sequels sell worse. Or in the case of multiple sequels, one will clearly outsell the others. But with Dark Souls, it seems everyone keeps buying. As well as new players.

if DS1 sales doubled after DS2 was released then it shows that the later Souls games caused more people to go back and revisit the 1st game
 
if DS1 sales doubled after DS2 was released then it shows that the later Souls games caused more people to go back and revisit the 1st game
Well, what I said there, it doubled in sales during a year before and after the release of Dark Souls 2. The point is, it had legitimately successful sales before Dark Souls 2. And was definitely a fixture in gaming culture, by that point. And yes, the sequels have not only enjoyed continuously stronger sales. But also seem to have reinforced the previous titles, as well.
 
I have no doubt we will see a PC port. I think we will see a PC port of the Demon's Souls remake, around April-ish. And they will also announce Demon's Souls 2.

I'm pretty sure a PC port is incoming as well...I say 8 months after the PS5...as far as Demon's Souls 2, I don't see it happening...I think if they were working on it then there would not really be a need for a Demon's 1 remake
 
I'm pretty sure a PC port is incoming as well...I say 8 months after the PS5...as far as Demon's Souls 2, I don't see it happening...I think if they were working on it then there would not really be a need for a Demon's 1 remake
I see it this way:

Sony doesn't really have a studio right now, whom has the talent and is also free, to do something which would do justice as a completely original souls game, Demon's Souls 2.

Bluepoint did an absolutely amazing job remaking Shadow of The Colossus. A game which many fans thought of as "untouchable".

Remaking Demon's Souls is certainly a gigantic task. However, still cheaper than making a whole new game from scratch.

I think Sony gave Demon's Souls to Bluepoint, to see how they would fair. And to guage interest from the community. It seems like they did an absolutely killer job. And now that they have reversed engineered an entire Souls game----should understand what it takes to make a whole new one. And I think Bluepoint otherwise has the core talent. And with the announcement earlier this year that Dark Souls 3 sold 10 million and the series sold 30 million ------ again I think Sony would be stupid to not get on that train. Especially now that "Dark" Souls is dormant. There won't be a new Dark Souls game by From Software, for years.
 
Especially now that "Dark" Souls is dormant. There won't be a new Dark Souls game by From Software, for years.

Bluepoint did an absolutely amazing job remaking Shadow of The Colossus. A game which many fans thought of as "untouchable".

no new Dark Souls game but From Software is working on Elden Ring which sounds even more epic...I don't see them dividing up their time with another game as Elden Ring sounds like the biggest game they've ever worked on

Bluepoint also deserves credit for the work they did on the Uncharted remasters...they are the absolute best studio when it comes to remakes/remasters
 
no new Dark Souls game but From Software is working on Elden Ring which sounds even more epic...I don't see them dividing up their time with another game as Elden Ring sounds like the biggest game they've ever worked on

Bluepoint also deserves credit for the work they did on the Uncharted remasters...they are the absolute best studio when it comes to remakes/remasters
Bluepoint also did the MGS HD collection. And that Snake Eater port in particular, great job on that.

and yeah, Miyazaki and From Software have said that Dark Souls 3 is the last game (for awhile) from that brand.
 
BluePoint also did the Uncharted remaster collection. They did a great job and even ported over the love/hate wonky aiming from Uncharted 3. I have faith in them based upon the games they have been involved with. Hopefully Target will get my system out the door and I can play this weekend.
 
Media embargo is lifted, journalists and others have been streaming it.

It looks absolutely lush. I watched a bit of 1-1 and dang, it looks jaw dropping. I also watched a bit of the 1-1 boss, Phalanx. The lighting is excellent.

I highly recommend that you DO NOT watch the streams, if you've never played Demon's Souls.
 
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even just in the trailers the most impressive thing to me is the lighting...looks stunning...best lighting implementation out of any of the Souls/Bloodborne/Sekiro games
 
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even just in the trailers the most impressive thing to me is the lighting...looks stunning...best lighting implementation out of any of the Souls/Bloodborne/Sekiro games
it has some variation of voxel based global illumination. And the devs said that every single light source can potentially cast real time shadows. Even stuff like sparks, player messages, etc.

and even though it doesn't have ray tracing, it looks like they hand tuned most objects to appear to reflect in water, even when off screen.
 


spoiler alert: performance mode takes one small dip, as the player runs up on several enemies, torches on the walls (all lights cast dynamic shadows), roles through some crates (physics), with like 4 enemies in close proximity. That's it.
 
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I am, been playing it too long and am currently stuck at the third part of the dragon bridge. I can almost do it, take care of the 3 crossbowmen, but I always seem to screw up my parry with the heavy armored guy then any tap kills me. IIRC this is the same spot I stopped playing the PS3 game and returned my rental lol.
 
I am, been playing it too long and am currently stuck at the third part of the dragon bridge. I can almost do it, take care of the 3 crossbowmen, but I always seem to screw up my parry with the heavy armored guy then any tap kills me. IIRC this is the same spot I stopped playing the PS3 game and returned my rental lol.
is the heavy armored guy a black phantom? (Completely glowing red).
 
Watching people on twitch get owned in Tower of Latria, is a beautiful thing, indeed.
Anb wow, Shrine of Storms looks amazing. Also fun to watch people get owned there!
 
Lots of people playing in "offline" mode, though. Shame, as Demon's Souls has the best PVP experience in the series.
 
is the heavy armored guy a black phantom? (Completely glowing red).
Not completely glowing red. Glowing blue down the center, then there is another one a bit deeper in, and behind that second one a fog doorway. They aren't hard to beat, if you parry and reposte them they are a one hit kill, but regular stirkes do little damage due to armor and shield. My biggest problem is getting there, by the time I get there being chased by the dragon blowing fire and start slicing up the crossbowmen, I am out of stamina. So while I can get rid of crossbowmen with minor injury, when the blue guy usually gets to me, I can't even dodge properly or block. I can't really run past the crossbowmen or the blue armor guy in the back will join in and it gets chaotic. I can't retreat too much or dragon fire will get me. What else can you say but it's a souls game. :LOL: It wouldn't be so bad if not for the tunnel back there has a pack of wolves and that slows me down. Rush that little section and 4-5 come at once and it's a stun lock death.
 
Not completely glowing red. Glowing blue down the center, then there is another one a bit deeper in, and behind that second one a fog doorway. They aren't hard to beat, if you parry and reposte them they are a one hit kill, but regular stirkes do little damage due to armor and shield. My biggest problem is getting there, by the time I get there being chased by the dragon blowing fire and start slicing up the crossbowmen, I am out of stamina. So while I can get rid of crossbowmen with minor injury, when the blue guy usually gets to me, I can't even dodge properly or block. I can't really run past the crossbowmen or the blue armor guy in the back will join in and it gets chaotic. I can't retreat too much or dragon fire will get me. What else can you say but it's a souls game. :LOL: It wouldn't be so bad if not for the tunnel back there has a pack of wolves and that slows me down. Rush that little section and 4-5 come at once and it's a stun lock death.
In pure black world tendency, it adds black phantom version of one of those heavy guys ; )

In the original Demon's Souls asian import versions: the first couple of game patches, your world tendency shifted to black with every single death. I ended up in pure black for that last bridge section!
 
Lots of people playing in "offline" mode, though. Shame, as Demon's Souls has the best PVP experience in the series.

too many people play the Souls games like this...terrible...accept the challenge and face your fellow gamers in an honorable duel to the death...

I'm seriously getting tempted to pick up a PS5...I was originally planning on building a new Zen 3 system first and waiting until early 2021 for the PS5 but with the CPU's and Ampere in such short supply I might have better luck picking up a PS5
 
I'm seriously getting tempted to pick up a PS5...I was originally planning on building a new Zen 3 system first and waiting until early 2021 for the PS5 but with the CPU's and Ampere in such short supply I might have better luck picking up a PS5

Similar boat. I've backburnered my 3080 pursuit until I've gotten my fill of Demon's Souls -- a new Souls game is an event where everything else ceases to exist for me in terms of time-wasting activities. 4 weeks until Cyberpunk should be plenty.

92 on Metacritic right now, Bluepoint knocked this fucker out of the park.
 
too many people play the Souls games like this...terrible...accept the challenge and face your fellow gamers in an honorable duel to the death...

I'm seriously getting tempted to pick up a PS5...I was originally planning on building a new Zen 3 system first and waiting until early 2021 for the PS5 but with the CPU's and Ampere in such short supply I might have better luck picking up a PS5
I dunno.. picking up a PS5 is proving to be a fucking nightmare
 
more PS5's in stock almost daily, at various etailers.

it's not great. But it could be worse.
 
too many people play the Souls games like this...terrible...accept the challenge and face your fellow gamers in an honorable duel to the death...

To hell with that. I like having fun in games and being invaded by high level characters constantly isn’t fun for me. I have no real interest in the co-op getting help portion of the games either. For me, they’re strictly single-player, offline, affairs. More power to the folks who like the online aspect of the games, but it’s not for me.
 
To hell with that. I like having fun in games and being invaded by high level characters constantly isn’t fun for me. I have no real interest in the co-op getting help portion of the games either. For me, they’re strictly single-player, offline, affairs. More power to the folks who like the online aspect of the games, but it’s not for me.

do you go on the internet to figure out where to go next, which weapon might be best to use against a certain enemy, how to defeat a boss?...so you are going online for help, just not in the way the game wants you to...maybe if you're not a Souls vet and for your first run I can see playing offline but the game should be experienced in all its glory for subsequent playthroughs
 
do you go on the internet to figure out where to go next, which weapon might be best to use against a certain enemy, how to defeat a boss?...so you are going online for help, just not in the way the game wants you to...maybe if you're not a Souls vet and for your first run I can see playing offline but the game should be experienced in all its glory for subsequent playthroughs

I do none of those things. Why do you assume I do? Also, not a Souls newbie. I just simply don’t enjoy those features. They are not for me. That’s all there is to it. Not everyone has to enjoy every single aspect of a game.
 
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