On February 28, the online servers for Demon’s Souls will be shut down. Though it is primarily a single-player game and can be fully completed without connecting online, a number of helpful features will cease to function. These include in-game messages and player death locations, as well as all multiplayer features. Not only will you no longer be able to invade another player’s game to kill them, but you won’t be able to get any outside help on difficult bosses. This could limit newcomers’ ability to finish the game, as its difficulty rivals anything From Software has developed thus far.
“The unforgiving nature of the game has provided countless enjoyable moments of frustration and anger, but also the elation felt from beating something so challenging,” said the game’s North American publisher Atlus in a blog post. “The difficulty and grit helped pave the way for even more punishing games such as its spiritual successor Dark Souls, the 2017 hit Nioh, and the landmark PS4 title, Bloodborne.”
As with the aforementioned games, Demon’s Souls introduced the “souls” concept we’ve seen in nearly all “Soulslikes” since. As players make their way through an area and defeat enemies, they acquire a currency that can be used to level up, but upon dying, it is dropped where they last stood. If they can’t return to the area to collect their souls before dying again, the souls are lost for good and they must start from scratch. It’s a punishing and demanding system, but From Software’s fantastic risk-reward gameplay system made it much less frustrating than it could have been in the hands of another developer.
Demon’s Souls is available exclusively for PlayStation 3. We’re crossing our fingers for a PlayStation 4 remaster, which could give new life to a game that is nearly 10 years old.
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