Combat

The highlight of the game. Love switching between the different classes and exploring new playstyles. Climbing enemies & exploiting their weaknesses is fun as always.

Difficulty

The game starts off challenging. However, later on it is very easy to become OP. There are some classes that are absolutely broken. Towards the end game I felt all the challenges were gone. There is no need to “git gud” in this game.

New Game Plus

Kinda useless because it doesn’t seem like enemies scale and you are so OP. Only good for exploring the other endings, quests you missed out on and grinding. Could have been thought out better.

Narrative

Weak as hell. An incoherent mess.

Side Quests

Some are great. Most are very forgetful and super janky/unpolished.

Performance

I played on PS5 and it was fine. Some slowdown in towns but it was not game breaking for me.

Microtransactions

Yeah they exist but they are useless and you can ignore them.

Enemy Variety

So weak. A damn shame.

Music

Highly forgetful. At least it is chill and ambient most of the time.

Exploration

I feel like it is not as good as hyped up to be. Like yeah there’s a lot to explore but its also very repetitive and gets dull after a while. Running through the same long routes over and over again gets boring real fast.

Pawn AI

Hate it. They always die for the most janky reasons. The inclinations are a nice touch tho.

UI

The equipment/inventory UI is very dated but passable. The map UI might be the worst I have ever seen. Good luck finding your cursor as it seems that the design department never learnt about color contrasts.

Art style.

The 3D animations are fine. It’s the colors I have a problem with. Color theory was never adhered to or understood.

Overall, a big step up from the first game. However it is still a bugged janky unpolished mess. Looking forward to seeing if they fix these issues in DD3 to create a true masterpiece.

The Good

- The tactical combat is amazing. It is a very deep micromanagement simulator and I am obsessed with it.

The Meh

- The story is pretty mid and cliche. If you are expecting 13 Sentinels level of narrative prepare to be disappointed. It's also quite mediocre compared to its influences (Ogre Battle, Fire Emblem, FFT).
It's not a terrible story, but its not particularly memorable either.

The Bad

- The art style. This may bother a lot of people but in my personal opinion the Vanillaware art style is dated and cringe.
Also, get ready to play a game in 2024 where some fem characters have 2D giant swaying breast physics.

- The voice acting. Ditto as the art style.

I was super excited to start playing this game after watching and reading all the discourse around it ✨
However, after after finishing it, have to say it is a major disappointment & just don’t get the hype 😢

Combat
- The highlight of this game but it doesn’t feel as great as what people say
it is.
- Feels really sluggish.
- The climbing mechanic is cool (minus the camera).
- Having different classes is cool and I’ve now tried them all. I didn't find one
that helped me have fun tho.

Aesthetics
- the open world is dead.
- Villages/cities are empty.
- Everything is super washed out or grey.
- Really ugly UI/menu which are not intuitive and poorly designed.

Story
- Super weak and generic.
- Very confusing with janky cutscenes and mid dialogue.
- Side quests are lacklustre and you better do them fast as there’s no
indication when the game will lock you out of them.

Other
- The pawn system is okay only. Nothing special.
- Music is forgettable.
- having limited fast travel is a major pain.
- One particular end game quest that doesn't respect the players time at all.

In general, this felt like a very unpolished and unfinished game. There is no seasoning 😭

I have heard ppl online saying it’s like a mix between Elder Scrolls and Dark Souls. No. Stop please.

Sad because I really really wanted to love this game.

Despite all my criticism, I do think that with some more care there could be something great here.
So I am excited for DD2 to see the evolution of this game.

Liked

- 10/10 story.
- Great combat as always with some nice improvements.
- Some really good fleshed out side quests (sadly there is a flipside to this).
- The combat differences between the 2 spider-men help keep things fresh.

Didn't Like

- A lot of bugs. Some were game breaking so I had to restart which was frustrating. I played 2.5 weeks after release for reference.
- A lot of Ubisoft type sidequests. "Do X number of the same activity over and over again".
Kinda sad that post BOTW & Elden Ring, triple A studios are still making this kind of side content.
Would have preferred a shorter game rather than this sort of padding.
To be fair, they did try to diversify them but I don't think it was enough to not make it feel like a chore.
- Fast travel is locked behind doing enough of the repetitive sidequests.
- Mary Jane stealth sequences (at least its less than the previous game).

What I liked

- The best 2D Mario I have ever played.
- Love the animations and the way the colours pop.
- The Wonderfruit mechanic and all the creative iterations of it.
- Accessibility settings to cater for all without ruining the experience.
- The badges mechanic to spice up play.
- The in-level secrets are so cool and fun to discover.
- The difficulty, especially in the latter stages of the game and post-game. Some stages really tested me and I love it.

What could have been done better

- Boss fights were seriously lacking.
- Music was a bit unmemorable.
- The world-map secrets were really lame and felt like an afterthought.

What I liked

- An revolutionary remaster from Bluepoint Games. Sets the bar for how classic games can be remastered while respecting the source material & original experience.
- My score factors in the impact of Demon's Souls. While it is far from the best Fromsoft game, it was groundbreaking when it came out in setting out the Soulsborne formula.
- The atmoshere in the remake is incredible. While exploring the prison of hope, my heart was beating like crazy as i was traversing slowly and fearing what was around every corner.
- The accessibility settings e.g. for colourblindness.
- NPC sidequests are some of the best in the Soulsborne games.
- The new graphics and lighting effects are amazing.

What could have been done better

- Weak bosses that can be easily cheesed.
- World tendency sucks, good thing it has never been done again.

What I liked

- The best story in the Souls series
- Combat feels good
- First 2 DLCs are amazing
- The satisfaction and feeling of accomplishment as per any of the Souls series
- Love the varied environments

What I didn't like

- The graphics are bad even by the standards of when it was released
- Gank squad placement of SOTFS is terrible
- The Frigid Outskirts is the lowest low in the Souls series
- Bosses are boring
- Having the adaptability stat for i-frames doesn't make sense

Other Comments

- I didn't mind the map being linear and not interconnected. With the ability to warp between bonfires it didn't really matter as much.
- I came straight from finishing DS3 and Bloodborne and for the first 4 hours the movement/combat felt really clunky. However, it later clicked and it felt very smooth and intuitive
- The lows of the game are the lowest in the Souls series and that's probably why it is considered the weakest entry.
- It's still a great game, just weaker than DS1 & DS3.

What I liked:

- The story and lore is suberb.
- Some of the level designs/locations are masterpieces (sadly there is a flipside to this).
- The mechanic of being able to regain health after blocking is really well thought out. I like it more than Bloodbornes rally system.
- Music & atmosphere.
- Sense of growth/progression.
- Love how there seems to be no OP weapon choice. Most of them are viable options and can employ differing playstyles.
- Difficulty feels just right.
- Boss design is suberb.
- Enemy variety is very good.

What stops it from being great:

- The parry (perfect block) system. I really respect how they tried to make a unique system from Fromsoft. You have to hold the parry button to get extra frames. The problem is that it feels janky and more luck based.

For reference, I memorised almost every boss pattern and am easily able to read their attacks. However, when ever I got a parry it always felt like I got lucky rather than my skills. Even on bosses I can beat without using a single health vial. In comparison, when playing Bloodborne or Sekiro my parries always felt like it was due to my skill.

I think this can be further polished in the sequel and I am really looking forward to seeing this system evolve.

- Dodging. I have no issues with the short dodge length and having not many iframes. The extra difficulty is fun. Its the animations themselves that suck and look/feel really unpolished.

- The game is 85% well polished but some things are kinda janky. For example, if you are in a tight area, the wall will block your weapon from killing enemies which means you get ganked easily.

I don't have an issue with this as it happens in other souls game. The thing is that unlike other souls games, the enemies weapons can go through the walls. Makes this seem like an oversight.

Another example is the requirement to solve one of the cryptic sidequests. This was obviously a major oversight. I can't say any more as it will be a spoiler, but when you encounter it, you will see what I mean.

- Some levels/locations are absolutely bland and boring. The last area is probably the best example of this. Sadly it drags on longer than it needs to. Sad that there's such a contrast between masterpiece level location/design and really bland generic ones.