I think the actual PvP / Co-op in DeS is all P2P, i.e. it happens on someone’s console. All the server is really doing is matchmaking and hosting the data files for the bloodstains / phantoms. I bet there were loads of peeps dumping traffic before the official servers went offline so they could emulate it.
Hopefully there are lots of good servers running within a few months. Didn’t have time to do a playthrough before servers went offline, but I should have plenty of time later this year!
I tried Demon’s Souls for a few hours and I know there’s quite a few people who love that game; but it never really gripped me. Dark Souls 1 was a struggle as well, although I enjoyed that game once I got the hang of it. The main souls game I go back to though is Bloodborne. It’s the only one I feel that has an incredible combat system.
As for games I wish I could have experienced…nothing specific comes to mind but I do wish I got into fighting games as a child. I see these fighting games coming out, used to have fighting games friends that would talk about this and that, and I desperately want to enjoy it. But I just can’t. I’ve tried so many fighting games that are meant to be “the best first fighting game” and yet nothing. I really wish I did though, because I think they’re an incredibly interesting genre and community. At this point I believe I’ll never get into fighting games and that’s that. It’s somewhat the same with MOBAs but I don’t think there’s enough variety in MOBAs for me to actually care about missing a genre of games.
Whaaaaaaa? That’s what that’s from?! I dug up a couple of my DS2 controllers the other day and and they were covered with some weird slimy…stuff. Thought maybe someone spilled something on it or something.
As far as multiplayer games that I miss, they’re not particularly games I “missed out on”, but games that I enjoyed and can’t go back to anymore. Taking the top spot for me is DJ Hero 2. Didn’t think playing a rhythm game online would be anything too revolutionary, but I loved the crap out of it and sunk so many hours into it! I think the servers are still technically up, but it’s near impossible to find a game now.
I was initially sad about the servers going down, but it’s lead to me actually wanting to play it. I always summon people in Souls games, every single one. I almost never beat a boss on my own. It’s easy to justify summoning people when it’s in the game, but now that Demon’s Souls doesn’t have it, I’m curious how good I will actually be since I can’t have much help.
For what it’s worth (and it’s still totally cool if Rob doesn’t go back to this!), Demon’s Souls is still a fantastic game in offline mode and doesn’t lose too much. I only got an actual online Old Monk once in my four playthroughs and the vast majority of bosses don’t benefit as much from summoning as some of the later bosses in the series.
I will miss the ghosts and goofy messages, but the level design and mechanics of Demon’s Souls totally hold up without servers.
Doesn’t Tendency stuff actually become more sensible (and… cooler, from what I’ve read?) in offline mode, since it’s based more directly on your actions and not a nebulous global variable?
Multiplayer in a Souls game didn’t get good for me until DS3 let me easily and accurately play with my friend, especially since I was super late on the Bloodborne train and was the only person in my friend group with a PS4. Not to mention that you need to pay real-ass money to PS+ to get online functionality.
The idea of going back to other Souls games and working with those multiplayer systems makes me want to chew glass.
It does but it’s still a mess. Even I won’t argue that a game should get harder as you fail more and that’s the way it tends to go if you don’t Know what you are doing.
That seems to be a lot of DeS’ deal and probably why i keep… not fully bouncing off of it but just not having the motivation to return? Dark Souls’ pacing of failure is so perfectly tuned (once you know how Kindling works) that I can get kinda bitter about even Bloodborne, whereas DeS can feel like From’s straight-up kowtowing to the git-gud audience before they actually had the git-gud audience.
Honestly it’s not even that hard of a game it’s just demoralizing as all hell which if you go in know how to get around the systems isn’t really that big a deal and the game for all it’s lows hits some real highs for sure and it’s a game worth playing. I might even say it’s all around better than Dark Souls but that has more to do with Dark Souls Transphobia getting harder for me to overlook even as I know I will play the hell out of the remaster
This is getting me really excited at the idea of a private server where the world tendency could change to extremes at given dates or times. In the early days of DeS, they would have scheduled special events where world tendency would be placed at an extreme. This was long before I got into the series so any world tendency events I’ve encountered have been pretty annoying to get to.
The possibility of seeing some of that content without essentially grinding for it and knowing where it is ahead of time is very appealing. Umbasa.
World tendency is simply a global status that lowers or raises in brightness, black tendency generally makes it harder and spawns in special enemies, while white makes it easier, and both will have special events like open pathways or new npc’s tied to them.
It’s certainly easier to manipulate offline, because online it’ll change with the average online user base, while offline you can brighten the tendency by defeating bosses or avoid dying in body form, or vise versa for black tendency; which, yeah, is kind of a big ask especially for new players if they’re having trouble with a boss, but I wouldn’t call it confusing.
I kind of wish FromSoft kept some of those global systems in following games; they later instead tied similar events to player stats like Humanity or Insight. I was playing Bloodborne yesterday and wondered why in the world Hemwick Charnel Lane was clear of Stalkers (lanky sickle dudes) and they won’t appear until you have at least 15 Insight, things like that.
That said these systems also allow for that player discovery that comes with an obscure modifier, so it’s not like that magic is all lost.
You can use the Dualshock 4 to play Demon’s Souls on the PS3.
Because the start button is used so heavily in DeS and the Options button is so tiny and weird to reach, I honestly think the Dualshock 3 still makes way more sense. What I would want the Dualshock 4 for, besides just the more comfortable form factor and meatier triggers, would be using the touchpad instead of the start button and the headphone jack (so I didn’t have to stretch a pair of studio cans across my living room to play with headphones). Neither of those things work on the PS3.
Do people really hate the Dualshock 3 that much?
While it’s a bit OT, I’d say a big “yes”. I felt the 360 got a big upswing in support for the controller as the best feel for most players (even from many who had been long term DS fans). The DS4 basically takes those parameters and imports them into the Sony ecosystem (trigger pull, stick resistance - it’s not identical to the 360 but it’s so much closer than to the DS3 as to be pretty clearly designed for people who preferred that experience).
I, along with quite a few friends, got after-market clip-on extensions for the DS3 triggers as they were so far behind the 360 (so even not fixing the pull feel, just improving the shape, was a basic upgrade many felt necessary). It’s very hard to go back to a DS3.
It feels cheap overall and lacks in terms of ergonomics compared to the subsequent DS4 or Xbox pads. Particularly the (greasy) joysticks which require just a tiny bit of subconscious effort to avoid having your thumbs slip off them since their shape doesn’t have any natural resistance.
In any case, I’d like to see Dark Souls Remastered be successful enough to justify the same treatment for Demon’s Souls, since the latter needs it way, way more.
It’s really the loose sticks for me, it feels uncanny after playing with the DS4 and Xbox controller for years. Frankly I never had a huge issue with the triggers, but the form factor does feel flimsy and cheap after being used to DS4, and xbox controllers have always felt really robust, if a bit too chunky for my tastes.
I don’t really mind not having no touchpad support or functioning ps-button, in favour of the form factor and tightness of the DS4.
FromSoftware actually make their games well for offline play, you don’t get it seen talked about a lot, in some ways it can be preferable to some people as you’re not getting constantly ganked by invaders if you’re exploring a place for the first time. I actually did this with Bloodbourne and it was Very Pleasant.
It’s not completely on topic, but since a number of people are talking about the DS3 and its triggers, it reminded me of something funny-not-funny I read in an article a while ago about what went into designing the DS4.
“We’ve heard horror stories from Dark Souls players who have made huge mistakes in the unforgiving action role-playing world simply by setting the PS3 controller down. Because the L2 and R2 buttons are just so exposed and out there, resting them on the table or on your lap can depress them, causing, for example, your hero to take a huge swing of his sword and permanently kill an innocent but vital nonplayer character.” --from VentureBeat
I swear I’ve almost taken out Stockpile Thomas a number of times for this exact reason lol.
I get sad about all the post-Demon Souls games whenever I think about DeS’ world and character tendency systems. It makes me wish the multiplayer hadn’t caught on the way it did, so From wouldn’t have focused in on that so acutely and maybe would have been more likely to keep the tendencies.
I despise how players suicide their characters in Bloodborne’s Hunter’s Dream, but in the Nexus, it actually had a point! In MY day, intentionally dying in the safe zone meant something, dagnabbitt. You had a goal, you weren’t just doing it for the lulz. Lousy teenagers.
And while I can understand the frustration of the world getting harder the more you struggled, the loot also got better. The rarest crafting materials were only available at the darkest tendencies. So, while it was punishing you, at the same time it was offering you a way to dig yourself out.
Anyway, Demon’s Souls is unquestionably a better game offline (except during Halloween when they would force the global world tendency pure black), so losing the servers is no excuse not to play it.
