Topic: Demon Souls Remastered. Is it, isn't it?

@johncalmc thanks - I read last night that world and character tendency don't reset for ng+ so I should be able to do the last world tendency related trophy (world 4) with just one boss. I think I will also leave the character tendency stuff until next playthrough.

@woollypump I did it in 2, well 1 and a half, I followed the psn trophy guide pretty strictly and on my second playthrough I only needed certain spells from some bosses to complete the Platinum, it is a mind boggle at times to try and keep all the world tendency stuff into 1 playthrough but I really didn't want to have to go through 2 or 3 more playthroughs but I've read people who've got playthrough 3 and 4 down to about 6 to 8 hours for the plat.

I have a plan - I think I can get the Miracles trophy on NG+ with my first character (strength/faith) without too much work - the only one I am missing is the Recovery miracle which needs 3 colourless demon souls. I can get 3 colorless demon souls by 1) dying in bodyform in 1-1 to PBWT then get the CD soul behind the NPC black phantom there, beat phalanx then, 2) dying in bodyform in 2-1 and kill the primeval demon that's easily accessed in the early part of the area, then 3) trade my spare talisman of god with sparkly the crow . Then I need to beat Adjudicator and rescue St Urbain and I am done.

Then I can continue on my Royalty NG+ to get the sorcery and ring trophies then I am done!

I don't expect any of that to be particularly easy though - my first character is a bit low level so Adjudicator may be difficult (let alone the black phantoms), and I think I will have to do a few NPC black phantoms to get the pure white character tendency ring.

All done! Finished the miracles trophy on my first character, then did the spells and rings on my second character. So, 2 complete playthroughs, and two incomplete NG+ - I have the last two world 4 bosses, and the false king to do on one of the two.

@woollypump well done, I really enjoyed my time with it although it's not a Platinum I would like to try again, the amount of planning and thought it takes made it almost like a job 🤣

Do you have any plans for future From Software plats?

@MaulTsir I don't think so. I have the Bloodborne, Elden Ring and now DeS plats. I have most trophies for DS3, but I don't think I can be bothered doing all the covenant item farming required for a few of the remaining ones. I've tried on multiple attempts to get into DS2 and it's just not sticking for me. I think Sekiro may just be too difficult for me, although I loved it up until hitting a wall at Genichiro Ashina.

Maybe DS1 down the road if it happens naturally, because I am sure I will replay it many times in the future, but so far I've split my playthroughs between Switch and Playstation, so the trophies I am missing don't reflect what I've done in the game.

Perhaps AC6 when it releases?

@MaulTsir Case in point, started a pyromancy playthrough on the Switch while away on holiday, and now have all pyromancies - unlikely to do that again any time soon on the playstation!

@Th3solution I managed to get hold of a PS5 & DeS before Christmas actually. It's a great game, I've just cleared the first area and unlocked the door to the first boss, using the lever. I find it significantly easier than I found Dark Souls 3 and Bloodborne, but, as I feel my gaming abilities have significantly declined in recent years I feel it and perhaps Jedi Survivor are about right for my level right now. I'll keep you posted on my progress, I get the impression most levels will be about the same level of difficulty, with different enemies requiring different weapons, and, in the worst case scenario, I could take a speed-runner's approach and just run past most of the enemies where possible to make it to each boss, the bosses, I hear, are allegedly all quite easy. So if the difficulty is the levels and I bypass the combat in the more difficult levels I could make the game reasonably easy for myself.

How are you? Gaming much these days?

@TheBrandedSwordsman Awesome to hear! I’m glad you have a PS5 and are able to enjoy Demon’s Souls. It is indeed a great game, made better by the really wonderful performance of the PS5 and the detailed graphical remake by BluePoint.

You’re right about the bosses, although there are a couple tough ones in there. Most bosses can be cheesed or just easily dispatched with magic from a safe distance, but I struggled with 2 or 3 of them that had arenas with no safe spaces and where the boss was really quick to pounce. In those cases I had to revert to traditional Souls style tactics. But otherwise playing as a mage was fairly easy, comparatively speaking. I followed some recommendations on Fextralife for the build.

One thing that you’ve probably discovered that is unique to this game compared to other FromSoft games is the World Tendency quirk. In order to keep the game easier, I played almost the entire game in soul form rather than physical form, because when you die in the world in soul form it doesn’t shift the world toward black. The blacker the world, the harder the enemies. The flip-side of course is that playing in soul form reduces your health by a certain percentage, but I found it better to just live with that restriction and know that I didn’t have to stress about dying. So each time I regained physical form after beating a boss then I’d suicide jump off the high ledges in the Nexus to get back to soul form before I went into the next world. Also, getting the world toward pure white can sometimes make interesting events or NPC’s show up in some cases. (The same is true for pure black too though)

Also, as with any Souls game, a good way to Hep make the game easier is just grinding for souls and leveling up. I can’t remember my early farming spots, and honestly some of the levels in Dark Souls are muddied in my mind with the Demon’s Souls levels.

Do you like the hub-world concept of having the Nexus where you can rest and regroup after each quest or do you like the interlaced contiguous map like in Dark Souls? Personally I like both, but the Demon’s Souls Nexus arrangement keeps things easier to navigate from one world to the next. But the map for Dark Souls is a masterclass in design, even though it requires a lot of backtracking.

Also, are you going with a traditional balanced build? Sword and board style?

I look forward to hearing more about your adventures!

@Th3solution I just beat the first boss this morning, I found pine resin to be very helpful. I think with regard to playing the game in Soul form, that's the best way to go, I suicided in the Nexus after leveling up and repairing my gear after Phalanx . Looking forward to getting PWWT. I'm planning more of a melee build but also intend to use the crescent falchion or sticky white slime on the dragon bone smasher if/when I can get it for when I need to resort to magic - just the way I play these games.

To answer your previous question about the Nexus compared to DS1. Well, Firelink Shrine is a bit like the Nexus isn't it? I think it's too early to say which design choice I prefer. On a side note ,I loved DS1 but wouldn't willingly attempt to finish it a third time, Sen's Fortress and Anor Londo are ridiculous levels of hardness. What did you make of those two?

@TheBrandedSwordsman Good job with beating the first boss. The first of many, I hope.

Regarding spoiler tags, just place (spoiler) at the beginning and (/spoiler) at the end, except just use brackets [ ] instead of the rounded parentheses.

As far as DS1, I thought Sen’s Fortress was quite hard, especially due to some of the traps. It has a great level design, but I’m not a fan of traps. I used some help from the internet and so it ended up being tolerable. Anor Londo actually wasn’t too difficult for me. By that point in the game I was overleveled, as I’m prone to do, and so not too many enemies game me trouble. In fact, I found the beginning of that area to be a great farming spot for souls with all those giant knights right close to a bonfire. So I spent hours there leveling up even more. By the end game I was so powerful that the end boss was anti-climactic. Because I had recruited Solaire (I think his name was) for NPC help, I killed that final boss in about 3 hits. I will admit the infamous archers at Anor Londo were a pain to deal with, but I cheesed the poison arrow strategy to clear them.

As far as e Nexus, I think you’re right about Firelink being a similar hub, but in the case of the Nexus it’s more straightforward without all the maze like connectivity to get there. Since I played as a mage, I often used a spell that would teleport me back to the Nexus (I forget what it was called) for when I just wanted to farm a world for a while and then quickly go back and level up and then progress the main campaign.

Speaking of — as with other From games, the areas in Demon’s Souls can be approached in a variety of sequences. If you’re wondering the best order to do them in, I’d recommend the arrangement guide and progress route outlined in the Fextralife wiki. I mostly followed that, although a couple instances I think I veered from it slightly. It seemed to keep things relatively orderly, although there is still a little inconsistency with difficulty progression.

@Th3solution Thanks for the tip man, I think that Fextralife will be an asset, later on in the game. I have already done a lot of Googling and my strategy at the moment is to use pine resin on my longsword on the early enemies in 4-1, and then grab the crescent falchion+1, then farm with it. Once I am suitably overleveled I will attempt to obtain the dragon bone smasher from world 2. I intend to use the crescent falchion +1 for regular enemies and the dbs for bosses, spending any souls I obtain from the boss fights on grass and weapon upgrades.

What do you think of my strategy?

@TheBrandedSwordsman Yes, that sounds good to me. I was a fan of the Crescent Falchion also and used it for most of my playthrough as my off-hand weapon with my catalyst due to the magic synergy.

Let me know how you continue to get along with the game. I’ll be especially interested in how the bosses are for you.

@Th3solution Thanks man, I'll keep you posted as I go along. Well, I got the Crescent Falchion+1 and have been farming the silver skeletons with it and leveling up. About what level should I raise my magic stat to, in order to be op against most enemies and bosses? Appreciate the info, if you can remember. FYI I've leveled it to 15 so far and so far I am killing the silver skeletons in 4-1 in three hits with the Crescent Falchion.

@Th3solution I just finished off Armor Spider on my first attempt, some of it's fire-based attacks really took loads off my health though, I'll be farming late and half moon grass for the next boss , Flamelurker ,which I hear is really tough. The Crescent Falchion+1 with magic leveled to 50 still made short work of the first boss of that area, though.

@colonelkilgore How you doing bud? I just beat Armor Spider and Flamelurker in DeS and have obtained the Dragon Bone Smasher as a result. I borderline cheesed the latter boss by luring him into a corner where he sort of got stuck and then wailed on him with my Crescent Falchion+1 with magic leveled up to 50. Got them both on the first attempt! Playing anything good yourself atm?

@Th3solution Tagging you too pal, as you said you wanted to be kept up to date with my progress.

@TheBrandedSwordsman hey buddy, good to hear that your making some solid progress with Demons Souls and hope that you’re enjoying it.

Been playing a few things from the ever-growing backlog… currently have Dragons Dogma and Rage. DD is great fun (if a massive grind for the plat) and Rage is decent too. Starting my run at the Resident Evil series next month (for halloween) so pretty excited to finally give that series a proper go.

@TheBrandedSwordsman Well done, Slayer of Demons! Flamelurker was one of the toughest bosses in the game for me. He was quite aggressive and could close in really quickly. I had to resort to some similar cheese methods to get him down but it took me a handful of tries.

It seems you’re really well equipped and powered for this stage of the game. There’s really only about 3 bosses in the remainder of the game that I struggled with as much as him, but people just find some bosses harder than others. Look forward to hearing more of your progress!

@Th3solution I am planning on taking on the Vanguard Demon next, as he stands in the way of me and my Adjudicator's Shield. Any tips? I know I could probably just run past him but it's probably more fun to kill him, haha.

I see that you succeeded already with Vanguard Demon. Nicely done. I was going to suggest trying to stay behind him, as I recall that to have been the best strategy. But it’s been a while so I can’t fully remember.

Which boss/level is your next target?