Is Demon's Souls the real "Hardcore" game of this gen so far?
After hearing all the debate about the merits of "Casual" games versus what would be considered "Hardcore" games, it made me wonder what, after the multitude of "Casual" games avalible, would be the most "Hardcore" of the hardcore. The game that defines the aspects of hardcore gaming this gen. From gameplay, to story, to visuals and maturaty level, what is the Hardcore game of this gen?
Here are some quotes from the English language reviews of Demon's Souls :
From RPGFan:
""Demon's Souls never had a chance.
I came to this epiphany sitting in an Akihabara café perusing Famitsu issue 1053's listing of the highest selling games in Japan for 2008. Aside from Monster Hunter Portable, the top ten are all Wii and DS games, and you can probably guess what they are. Mario Kart, Wii Fit, Wii Sports, and Pokémon all destroyed the likes of Metal Gear Solid 4 and Fallout 3. Mario and Sonic at the Beijing Olympics on DS crushed Persona 4 and Valkyria Chronicles.
Whatever conclusions you draw from all this, one thing is absolutely certain: accessibility and familiarity count for a lot in the market these days. Thus I cannot feel surprised when I consider how little Demon's Souls has been marketed. It may very well be a case of Sony not kidding themselves. Quietly selling out at a few game shops in downtown Tokyo, the game has gotten remarkably little attention for an original franchise PS3 RPG. Famitsu panned the game for being too hard, which should be your first clue. See, the cover art for the game box features a knight slumped in a corner, arrows embedded in his shield, head down, exhausted. It is only after you play the game that you realize just how appropriate this image is. Consider the kind of gamer you are. Are Wii Music and Nintendogs staples of your game library? Or does that top selling game list strike you as unjust? From Software's latest offering falls into the latter category, and is not for the faint of heart. This game will chew you up and spit you out"
""What I really like about Demon's Souls is the fact that it is one of the few games that manages to instill a genuine sense of dread and panic in the player. It's what Resident Evil games tried to do before RE4. You are not a 1st ****member of SOLDIER or a genetically engineered super soldier who can destroy tanks with hand grenades: You are just a guy with a sword and some armor. Other guys with swords and armor can kill you in one hit if you're slow. The difficulty is amazingly well integrated into the game's atmosphere and theme. Imagine if you yourself were actually facing down some giant monster in a dark cavern. You would be terrified and probably get killed in a few seconds, which is what usually happens in this game. It's amazingly consistent. When you see some armored knight with a spear, you have to stop and think about how you will approach; one wrong swing and he'll skewer you. You can't just hold down dash and run everywhere in a new environment; you have to walk carefully, because a pit trap could end your game, or an ambush could catch you with no stamina. Frankly, I love it. Not since my NES days of trying to beat Contra without the Konami code have I had this much fun. The learning curve is steep, but with time you really do learn and you feel like a badass. The combat physics are fantastic and realistic. A good parry and you can murder enemies with one strike. Whether you're headshotting ghouls from the shadows with a crossbow, duel wielding scimitars against enchanted skeletons or incinerating phantoms with fire magic � every kill is visceral and must be earned. After you die about fifty times or so, you'll be a killing machine. Unfortunately, not many gamers have that kind of patience these days. Demon's Souls is not a very accessible game. I predict numerous people buying the game, getting owned, and then running to their Internet forum of choice to complain about the "bad game design" or "cheap" enemies."" From the Eurogamer: ""Precisely because the odds are so stacked against you, precisely because the game sometimes seems to hate you with every fibre of its being, when you do finally kill the bastard f***-off enormous boss monster that ended you within half a minute the first time you approached it, the resulting heart-in-mouth euphoria is the purest kind of gaming thrill. Demon's Souls is about facing up to the impossible, and winning."" ""Demon's Souls is absolutely compelling; dark, detailed, unforgiving, creatively cruel. It gets under your skin and becomes a personal obsession, daring you to probe further into its worlds, fall for more of its traps and overcome more of its impossible challenges; it slaps you in the face with your own incompetence and dares you to overcome it. It's stoic, uncompromising, difficult to get to know, but also deep, intriguingly disturbed and perversely rewarding. You can learn to love Demon's Souls like few other games in the world. But only if you're prepared to give yourself over to it."" So, system bias aside, is this game what are "hardcore" game should be... inclosing story, gameplay, multiplayer, and atmosphere all into one unforgiving package? And would you as a gamer like to see more games like this on all gaming platforms? On Multiplayer : ""Integrated into all of this,there's a unique system of online play, the game's most forward-thinking feature - though like everything in Demon's Souls, it's a double-edged sword. Assuming you have your body, which is an achievement in itself, you can call upon other players to help you, and they can join your game as blue phantoms to fight alongside you."" ""The downside? Playing the game online opens you up to invasion from Black Phantoms, other players who force their way into your game in order to assassinate you for your souls. You've no control over when this happens."" ""The prospect of playing as a Black Phantom yourself, of course, is seductive, once you have the ability and skill. But you always run the risk of being defeated. Besides, everything that you do online affects the world around you; defeating boss monsters and invading players shifts the World Tendency of a level towards white, whereas becoming a Black Phantom yourself shifts it towards black. Black tendency makes a world's monsters more aggressive but increases the rewards for killing them, white tendency does the opposite, and both trigger events in the levels themselves, opening up previously locked doors or dropping in unique NPCs to help or hinder you. The tendency system is so complex that players haven't yet figured out all of its implications. Whichever way you choose to use Demon's Souls' online play, though, there are consequences in your own game.""
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