Demon's Souls

Developer: From Software
Publisher: Atlus
Release Date: Oct. 7, 2009
System: PS3
ESRB Rating: M
Official Web site

In a nutshell: I spent nearly half of the hour dead.

0:00 I was pretty unimpressed with a live Internet video demo of this game a few months ago -- it just looked like any other dungeon hack-and-slasher. But then the game came out and all sorts of critics started praising it for its design and punishing-but-fair difficulty, so I figured I had to see what all the fuss was about.

0:01 "On the first day man was granted a soul, and with it, clarity. On the second day upon Earth was planted an irrevocable poison, a soul-devouring Demon." Wow, so we only got one uninterrupted day with a soul? LAME!

0:02 A flying beast casts a huge shadow over land. A choir chants over timpani and trumpets as a lone armored hero takes out a bunch of shambling, possibly undead soldiers in slow-mo. He gets knocked back and rises to face a skeleton holding a huge scimitar. Organ music as a glowing ghost shoots an arrow at the skeleton. A giant dragon-ish beast rises up in the middle distance and roars. Fade to white as the choir fades out. Yeah ... that intro did nothing to convince me this isn't the same hack-and-slash crap I've played a million times.

0:05 The game can't connect to the Demon's Souls server, possibly because it's a trade demo and not a retail copy. Looks like I'm going it alone...

0:07 Time to "Create Profile." I name my character "?!," because I can. I can be a Soldier, Knight, Hunter, Priest, Magician, Wanderer, Barbarian, Thief, Temple Knight or Royalty. That's a lot of choices! I think I'll go with Royalty, just because it's so different. And regal!

***-->CONTINUE READING AT CRISPY GAMER<--***

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Armored Core 4

Developer: From Software
Publisher: Sega
Release date: March 20, 2007
System: PS3 (reviewed), Xbox 360

In a nutshell: Mech-on-mech violence.

0:01 Quick, straightforward tutorial that seems to be set inside Tron.
0:02 Tutorial #2 asks me to jump without telling me how. I figure it out eventually.
0:03 "Firing weapons expends ammunition." Really? How intriguing. Tell me more.
0:05 The weapons are mapped to the face buttons, meaning no aiming and shooting at the same time. Thank god for auto-aim.
0:08 The enemies blend in well with the background in the tutorial, which is annoying. It's lots of fun turboing around, though.
0:10 The story so far, as I hear it: "Blah blah blah blah Gryphon blah"
0:11 I like the zoomed in, picture-in-picture view that shows if you're actually hitting a far off enemy.
0:13 The "boss" of mission one kind of jumps up and down and stands in place. Good training, but not very convincing as an enemy.
0:14 "You did brilliantly. Emil is ecstatic." That's great. Who's Emil?
0:16 I like gliding on the water in mission 2. Much more fun than lumbering on land.
0:17 I'm all for realistic graphics and all, but it's near impossible to see enemies until you're right on top of them. Everything kind of melds into a dark, gray blob.
0:20 You know what's fun? Getting knocked back and damaged by a huge cannon from a far-off enemy and then getting hit again and again before I can recover. Fun!
0:23 The lighting on the water is really beautiful, but it makes it impossible to see what's happening. I don't even know where my aiming reticle is half the time.
0:28 Most of the time my main attack is a single shot. Occasionally it changes into a barrage of missiles. I haven't the foggiest idea why.
0:30 After being walloped by these freakin' death cannons five times straight, I try another mission.
0:31 I don't understand a good half the word's in the mission intro. Not because I have a small vocabulary. Because they are made up.
0:40 With the enemy jumping around the field like a Mexican bean, I can't tell if I've targeted him or not. Other things I can't tell: How much damage he has left, what weapon I'm about to fire, why I'm still playing.
0:50 I somehow win this time by staying in close. Still can't tell what's going on most of the time.
I get a C ranking... OK.
0:54 I finally figure out how to avoid the death cannon by getting in close. Still die though.
0:57 If the long range cannons don't get me the short range guns do. I'm at my wits end.

Would I buy this game based on the demo? No
Why? Beautiful graphics, but a mess of an interface and overly-complicated controls.