Demon's Soul Review over at Mighty Ape

So my Demon's Soul review is up at Mighty Ape. The game is about 4 years old now and there are already a shit load of reviews up for it so I didn't bother getting to extensive. Check out the page here.

Otherwise you can just read it below :D

Brutal and challenging as heck, Demon's Souls is a gaming experience you won't be forgetting soon.

From the awesome environments filled with so much detail and atmosphere, to the hardcore bosses and enemies that will test your gaming skills like very few other games can. Mastering Demon's Souls gets very addictive.

If you're coming into Demon's Souls out of Dark Souls like I am, you'll find that a lot of the mechanics work pretty much the same way.

The combat is tight and responsive, the builds for your character are highly customizable and upgrades work pretty much the same way except with different items to collect.

I found Demon's Soul to be a lot more engaging compared to Dark Souls, because there's more story to it, told through the different people you meet. The game makes you interact with a lot more people too, with items to gain or side quests to do.

What also blew me away was the graphics for the game. You can't tell that this thing is 4 years old now.

I knew going into it that it would be a better than average game, but no amount of online searches could have prepared me for how awesome the game turned out to be.

This was truly the start of something amazing in gaming and you have to check it out.

Nameing the next Dark Souls

So over at Game Informer they're asking what a possible Dark Souls sequel could be called. Not that there's any announcements for a sequel... but it's just that both Dark Souls and Demons Souls before that performed so well in terms of sales that another game in the series is almost a no brainer.

There's a few mock titles and covers over at this page and they even asked readers to submit possible titles and mock game covers.

Well here's mine :D


I was originally gonna go with "Fallen Souls" because that's what scares me the most about the game... when you drop souls. But what hurts more? ...when you loose them.

Aimless: Scare me

Fear; one our most primitive of emotions. I remember reading somewhere once that Fear is meant to be a sort of defense mechanism that prevents us from placing ourselves in danger.


You know what else fear is good for? Thrills. From a simple horror story back in the day, to real life events where we jump off planes and plunge from bridges with our legs tied, being scared can be a lot of fun.

Horror movies are a good fix for this. Watching with a pacing heart beat as some cute chick walks into a room to get her head chopped off, or staring at some guy tied to a chair for 20mins while a psychopath takes his time slicing and dicing him for his own pleasure.

Or is it... for our pleasure?

There's a reason why there are so many horror movies out every other day. Not only because they can be pretty cheap to make, but mostly because we love subjecting ourselves to them. God knows what any of us would ever do if we were caught in a situation like those in horror movies, but the thing is, we don't have to know. Through horror movies we are allowed to explore these things at the expense of the characters on screen.

Now days though horror in movies is relatively tame compared to the real life things some people have to live through. All you need to do is smack a quick search over the inter-webs to find all kinds of stories about all kinds of depraved individuals and the scary stuff they get up to.

Nothing scares like real life.

But when was the last time you were scared playing a game? I think if done properly, games would have an even greater potential to scare use compared to movies, because unlike a movie where you simply sit back and watch; in a game were are allowed some control over what plays out.

Silent Hill

You have your obvious horror titles like Resident Evil, which is leaning towards a more action orientated style now, and you have the likes of Silent Hill which made it's name on a more psychological style of horror. Thing is these are games you go into expecting to be scared, or expecting to be see some disturbing stuff. Even Dead Space which is one of my favorite games of all time, is more of a thrill ride to me then a genuine scare.

One of my favorite accounts of scary gaming is my friend Micheal John telling me about his time spent in STALKER. His not much of a horror game fan, nor does he watch a lot of horror movies, but he loves to shoot things in the face with guns.

Stalker is an open world game set in the aftermath of a nuclear disaster. You play a mercenary who gets to muck around the world doing odd jobs here and there. All was going well for Mike in the game until this one bit where he had to go into an underground tunnel at night. A tunnel crawling with reanimated corpses. I remember him telling me how freaky it was to be in the tunnel with no light and the sound of the zombies moaning and shuffling about. It got to him so bad that he actually waited till day light in game before he went back into the tunnel.


How cool is that? This wasn't real life, it wasn't a fear reaction to preserve his well being. But the whole thing creeped my friend out so much that he wouldn't risk his own emotions going back into this zombie infested tunnel. He could have loaded his save had his character died, but this wasn't about his character, this was about him.

And that's awesome.

The last game that gave me nightmares was Silent Hill back on the PS1, but as far as not wanting to go on while playing it - that never happened.

The other night though I was mucking around in Demon's Souls, and I had gotten to this place called the Tower of Latria. As I entered it didn't feel much different from the other places I've become accustomed to in the game. As I made my way through this level however it started really weighing one me.

The Tower of Latria is a sort of Asylum prison. Its halls a full of inmates behind bars, In the dull light and against the dark shadows you see their hands reaching out to you; some begging to be released ...others yelling out to you in contempt.

When you happen to open one of these cells some of the inmates try to attack you, but most of them beg you to get them out of there. They plead and cry as you try to push past them. Some of them are even strapped to torture machines and the only way to get them out is to kill them.

And then... in the middle of all this I hear a sound. Like tiny bells ringing... or a wind chime caught on a breeze somewhere.

For some reason I was compelled to go towards this sound. Not because some game mechanic was pushing me towards it automatically... but because in the face of all this horror around me... I wanted to see where this beautiful sound was coming from.

On the edge of my seat, late at night... slowly my Knight sir Issac made his way through the dark towards this sound. I even dropped my shield and lowered my guard ...against all I had learned in the game so far. As I turned the corner I honestly farken swore out load as I found what was making the sound.

Mind Flayer

This thing, which I later came to know as a mind-flayer moved so fast that as soon as I saw it, the nasty tentacles that hung around its head quickly grabbed me. Lifting me up it began to drain the life out of me, then it tossed me aside. As I got up... shield raised... heart still pumping... the creature let out some sort of energy blast which quickly finished off what was left of me.

I actually sat there in awe staring at the screen. I had been so engrossed in the game that when this happened it really messed me up for a bit. As my toon came back from the loading screen I thought to myself "Do I want to carry on tonight?" ... I decided to get some rest and visit the tower again later.

The Tower of Latria scares me man. In fact... the whole set up of Demon's Souls scares me more than any game I've played. I actually fear for my toon and don't want him to die. Hats of to the Dev crew for putting together something truly amazing.

When was the last time a game scared you?

Heavenly Sword: First impressions

So yesterday I picked up Heavenly Sword for the PS3.

I've always been intrigued by this game because all the promotional materiel for it has a scantly clad woman with a giant sword. If there's two things I like it's Pringles and Coke.


When I loaded the game up the first thing that struck me was the amazing graphics. This game came out back in 2007, but it looks and plays like something a lot more current.

Everything from the cinematic cut scenes to the actual in game animations and graphics look like a moving piece of art.

You play as Nariko, a young woman whose entire clan hates her cause she wasn't born a boy. If she were born a boy she would have been destined to carry the Heavenly Sword, a powerful ancient weapon which is foretold to lead the clan against an unspeakable evil.

But as the armies of a ruthless Raven lord named Bohan (played by Andy Serkis) descends on their village, Nariko proves very capable of dishing out the hurt. So her reluctant father gives her the sword to look after during the battle.


But then shit gets stirred even harder and she is forced to take up the blade, that we find out drains the user of their life essence.

What follows is some of the maddest fighting I've come to play in a 'beat em up.'

Nariko fights like a cross between a pretty bird and a farkin hurricane. She flips and dances around enemies before smashing them to peices with furious attacks that make the game a joy to watch.

It's actually very easy to pick up but it takes a bit of time to learn all the combo moves and counters that Nariko has at her disposal.


There's a lot of reviews for the game out there, like this one from Gamespot, so I'm not gonna go into much details in relations to that, but even after reading all the praise for it I wasn't expecting such a spectacular game.

The disk I got was pretty awesome too as it came with a complete making of for the game as well as all the episodes for the Heavenly Sword animated series.

I didn't get to play too much of it last night as I'm currently suffering/ enjoying Demon Souls, but it is defiantly an awesome addition to my collection.

Check out the very cool video below that show's off the games combat as well as awesome style and graphics.

Demon Souls: VERY first impressions

Last night I got home after an evening of drinks, chow and cup cakes celebrating my girl friends Birthday, to a package sitting on my desk.

Like a mad animal I tore that thing open and inside it was my import copy of Demon's Souls :D


Demon's Souls is the spiritual prequel to Dark Souls, the game that has had me firmly in its grasp since I first put into my ps3 tray.

Even though Demon's Soul came out back in 2009 in Japan, the game looks amazing. From the opening video to the first time you step into the world of Boletaria, the game is rich with details and polish that would put some of the current games to shame. The only thing to me that sort of threw me of at first was the very slightly stiff animations for the main character. In Dark Souls your toon moves with such fluidity. This does nothing to hinder the game in any way though, and after a while you don't even notice it.

Right off the bat it was clear that Demon's Soul had more of a precise narrative to it as well. Where as the beginnings of Dark Souls are a bit of an enigma that you have to work out, Demon's Soul tells you about a Mad king and his meddling with dark rituals beyond his control to gain power, which leads to the world being plunged into sort of evil fog. From this fog we get these mad ass demons that have come to eat our souls!

There's a slight Lovecrat element to the story (At least to me) as we hear of old ones and their servants seeping into our world, looking to claim what is ours as theirs.


As you begin your journey you're guided through a tutorial by an unknown voice, this again was a lot more extensive than the one from Dark Souls. At the end though you come face to face with this massive demon that quickly crushes you.

As you die this unknown guide brings you back to 'life' and you wake up in this thing called the Nexus.

This is where the first big difference from Dark Souls pops. Where as in the Dark Souls you have a sort of open world where all the ares are linked and you make your way between them without loading times (unless you port), in Demons Souls you have the Nexus that has portals that warp you to the different areas.


This place is also filled with refugees that range from Black smiths, merchants and this one guy who offers to hold all your shit if your inventory is full.

Also now I was in my 'undead' form, but unlike Dark Souls where being undead means you look like shit and can't hurt things as much... in Demon's Souls you still look pretty, but you're life bar is slashed in half. To get the rest of it back you must acquire a demon soul and the first one can be found through the nearest warp gate.

After I made my rounds meeting and greeting I entered the first warp gate and was taken to a massive fortress. When I say massive... I mean massive. The sense of scale grabbed me right away. Looking up at the giant walls that stood before, thinking about what horrors might be waiting inside... a feeling of both fear and joy crept over me. Joy because I love exploring new places, fear because the place looked farkin creepy and I knew there were any number of things in there that are just waiting to tear the shit out of me.


The combat in the game actually handles just like Dark Souls, with controls that are very responsive. The mechanics are pretty much the same, with counters, shield bashes and everything else I've gotten used to.

But the baddies, the baddies were are lot more aggressive. I also felt it played up the horror element a bit more too, from the blood curdling cries of the shambling zombies to the eerie music (or sometimes lack of) that haunted your journey.

Making my way through the dark halls of this menacing fortress, I was truly tensed out of my mind. I had gotten so used to Dark Souls as it forced you to learn every nook and cranny of it. But now I was up against a new area, with new traps and new baddies.

That's what Demon's Souls is... more Dark Souls. Or Dark Souls is more Demon's Souls.


I didn't get to play much of Demons Souls last night though as it was my girl friends birthday and I really wanted to spend some time with her, so after I died a few times on this one red eyed spear knight, I decided to call it.

But I know that this game will be another addiction. I want to say that it's sort of an early version of Dark Souls, but that doesn't sound nice and takes away from the games greatness, but it definitely feels like a more raw Dark Souls. Darker, more in your face and out to get you, with some indication of a story that it wants to tell. Plus like I mentioned it feels even eerier.

I love it, and am really glad that I got it.

Tonight we have a family dinner, but as soon as that's done I'm so hitting this game with a vengeance!