Visually, this game is stellar. It's probably one of the best-looking games ever made. Bluepoint already knocked it out of the park in the visual department with their Metal Gear remasters and the Shadow of the Colossus remake, but good god are they on another level with this one. It is phenomenally detailed and absolutely gorgeous. Did it necessarily need to be on PS5? No, I don't think so. Sekiro and Elden Ring run just fine on PS4 and have very similar graphic fidelity. Still, though, this is probably the best FromSoft's games have ever looked.
Gameplay-wise, though, it's still the same game from 2009, and so it has the same quirks and annoyances that would be ironed out in later SoulsBorne-Kiro-Ring titles. The bosses aren't anything to scoff at, as most of them are puzzle or gimmick-based. The true, no-holds-barred combat bosses are fun, but... I don't know. I feel like coming back to this game after thoroughly mastering Elden Ring and Dark Souls 1 kinda squandered the difficulty. Don't get me wrong, bosses like the Flamelurker are fun to fight and still a bit challenging, but I eventually got over it when I started dispatching it regularly as a common chore while assisting other players. The world tendency system does do a lot to make the bosses and regular enemies hit like a motherfucker, but not to the level of insanity of other titles. And the difficulty is completely quashed once you realize you can keep over a hundred healing items on you at once if you know how to farm well enough.
There are some QoL things that irk me, like the item burden system and having to kill myself in the Nexus to preserve World Tendency (thank god Sekiro has an item that just kills you instantly), and they're ultimately minor complaints, but they build up to an ultimately flawed experience. I can't even say in good confidence that the game is great, even though I want to love it as much as its antecedents. I hopped off of Demon's Souls faster than any of the soulsborne games thus far, which is sad! I usually come crawling back to beat them again and again, but I just can't see myself doing that with Demon's Souls. It's just... not all the way there for me.
Gameplay-wise, though, it's still the same game from 2009, and so it has the same quirks and annoyances that would be ironed out in later SoulsBorne-Kiro-Ring titles. The bosses aren't anything to scoff at, as most of them are puzzle or gimmick-based. The true, no-holds-barred combat bosses are fun, but... I don't know. I feel like coming back to this game after thoroughly mastering Elden Ring and Dark Souls 1 kinda squandered the difficulty. Don't get me wrong, bosses like the Flamelurker are fun to fight and still a bit challenging, but I eventually got over it when I started dispatching it regularly as a common chore while assisting other players. The world tendency system does do a lot to make the bosses and regular enemies hit like a motherfucker, but not to the level of insanity of other titles. And the difficulty is completely quashed once you realize you can keep over a hundred healing items on you at once if you know how to farm well enough.
There are some QoL things that irk me, like the item burden system and having to kill myself in the Nexus to preserve World Tendency (thank god Sekiro has an item that just kills you instantly), and they're ultimately minor complaints, but they build up to an ultimately flawed experience. I can't even say in good confidence that the game is great, even though I want to love it as much as its antecedents. I hopped off of Demon's Souls faster than any of the soulsborne games thus far, which is sad! I usually come crawling back to beat them again and again, but I just can't see myself doing that with Demon's Souls. It's just... not all the way there for me.