Demon's Souls Looks Like A SoTC/Oblivion Hybrid: Release Date Up

Stolen from neogaf, just found these babies, enjoy...Oh well I guess I should tell you what Demon's Souls is first,

Sony Computer Entertainment made the first announcement of Demon's Souls, a new "dark fantasy" action RPG under development by Armored Core makers From Software. The game, which will be playable at the Tokyo Game Show next week, is due out for the PlayStation 3 next year in Japan.

While details are still scant on Demon's Soul, SCE Japan producer Takeshi Kajii described the game to Famitsu as a spiritual successor to King's Field, the From-developed first-person RPG that first hit it big on the original PlayStation. "I am a fan of From Software, but naturally that also means there are parts of their games I'm not satisfied with, too," he said. "If this was a new King's Field game, there would be areas we wouldn't be able to touch since they're part of the series; working together like this, we can try to make something really new."

Demon's Souls takes place in the kingdom of Boletaria, currently enshrouded in a deep fog thanks to its king inadvertently unleashing an ancient monster from his slumber. You, a nameless hero who you're free to customize Elder Scrolls-**** must penetrate into Boletaria and save the kingdom -- but like many US RPGs these days, the game is slated to be extremely open-ended. "You get only the barest minimum of a goal, and there's nothing forcing you to do anything in the game," Kajii said. "People say to you 'Save the world,' but you can ignore them and keep going if you like."

The way Kajii and From Software director Hidetaka Miyazaki described it, Demon's Souls is a bit of a hybrid -- an RPG that uses the PS3's hardware to the hilt while still retaining the challenge and exploration of traditional role-players. Your hero can use a wide variety of weapons, each of which has different attacks and animations depending on how skillful you are or whether you're using one hand or two, and the game's physics system places natural limits on what's possible in any given tactical situation. "We gave a lot of thought to how to make the fun and charms of a ****c RPG interesting all over again with the latest technology at hand," Miyazaki noted. "We figured that doing the things that previous hardware ignored -- having long weapons bump into walls, lighting the area in realtime with the torch in your hand -- would make the game that much more fun. We're taking the things you did through menus in Wizardry and letting you carry them out in real life." (Miyazaki also hinted that while Demon's Souls won't have multiplayer, he would still like to "find a way to use the Internet to make the single-player mode more interesting.")

Okay now on to screenies:

LINK

An open ended Japanese RPG with incredible art design/graphics? Sign me up to the hype train.rragnaar

Same here. Those screen-shots are exceptional.

I dunno, it seems to have more of a Lair vibe to it.

Good to see them pushing the hardware a bit further though. More developers should be experimenting with new tricks and techniques so games can truly look mind-blowing.

An open ended Japanese RPG with incredible art design/graphics? Sign me up to the hype train.rragnaar

Sign me too. :)

I don't like the title.

Then again, Japanese games have funky titles. Like World Destruction, a RPG for the DS. Weird.

I don't like the title.

Then again, Japanese games have funky titles. Like World Destruction, a RPG for the DS. Weird.

ASK_Story

From the award winning developer that brought you Enchanted Arms! Oh man, this is gonna be real good. ;) At least the pictures are pretty, much like Enchanted Arms... then I played it. /cry

Well, I hope for the best, but I'm prepared for the worst.

From the award winning developer that brought you Enchanted Arms! Oh man, this is gonna be real good. ;) At least the pictures are pretty, much like Enchanted Arms... then I played it. /cry

Well, I hope for the best, but I'm prepared for the worst.

BioShockOwnz

Wait a minute! Did the article just say it's produced by Hayao Myazaki!? :shock:

Ah, nevermind. It's Hidetaka Miyazaki. Bummer.:P

Anyway, it's kind of refreshing to see Japanese RPG developers acknowledging western RPGs like Elder Scrolls. Maybe we'll see more quality hybrid west/east RPGs from now on. It may be a good way of taking RPGs to another step.

That could mean no more metrosexual whiny bleached teenagers from a J-pop band out to save the world empowered by magical crystals and their talking cat character sidekick or cute little mascots. This time, big swords will mean something because it will be swung by a dude who looks like he can actually swing it!

From the award winning developer that brought you Enchanted Arms! Oh man, this is gonna be real good. ;) At least the pictures are pretty, much like Enchanted Arms... then I played it. /cry

Well, I hope for the best, but I'm prepared for the worst.

BioShockOwnz

Echanted Arms had a pretty good battle system, dare I saw addictive, especially with the pokemon style collecting and training of things called golems...The rest of game was awful, however, especially the characters and plot.

so it will be like JWRPG ?

i dont think "hybrid" sounds bad but though its good Oblivion was really boring game...

i just hope "J" part adds more fun and fantasy into this JWRPG

New Gameplay Video (Looks Awesome, except for the horrid framerate)

Release Date Up: February 5th 2009 (Japan)

That is funny, I've been watching that video now in between interruptions at work.  I hope for two things:

1- The game is good.

2- It gets localized. 

I haven't made it all the way through the video, but it looks a little clunky.

That is funny, I've been watching that video now in between interruptions at work.  I hope for two things:

1- The game is good.

2- It gets localized. 

I haven't made it all the way through the video, but it looks a little clunky.

rragnaar

If they get this nearly 30fps it will be at least a decent King's Field update. 

[QUOTE="rragnaar"]

That is funny, I've been watching that video now in between interruptions at work.  I hope for two things:

1- The game is good.

2- It gets localized. 

I haven't made it all the way through the video, but it looks a little clunky.

HiResDes

If they get this nearly 30fpg it will be at least a decent King's Field update. 

I never played King's Field, is it worth hunting down? 

The screen shots look awesome but I can't say the same for the gameplay based on what is showing in the video. It looks generic and clunky. It's as if they took a Dynasty Warriors game from KOEI, lowered the steroid level and placed it in a medievel settting. Don't get me wrong, I really want this game to be good it's just not looking as cool as it could be from a gameplay point.juradai

That is my take on it as well.  I'd love to be wrong though. 

[QUOTE="HiResDes"][QUOTE="rragnaar"]

That is funny, I've been watching that video now in between interruptions at work.  I hope for two things:

1- The game is good.

2- It gets localized. 

I haven't made it all the way through the video, but it looks a little clunky.

rragnaar

If they get this nearly 30fpg it will be at least a decent King's Field update. 

I never played King's Field, is it worth hunting down? 

Its one of those games that only cult fans like, I played the second one on the original PS and thought it was decent...But reviews have always looked at its slow methodical gameplay as a negative, I don't think any of the games in the series have scored well.

[QUOTE="rragnaar"]An open ended Japanese RPG with incredible art design/graphics? Sign me up to the hype train.Dutch_Mix

Same here. Those screen-shots are exceptional.