Topic: Demon Souls Remastered. Is it, isn't it?

He one-hits you regardless of armor or hp. I usually do the fight naked. Hardest part is destroying pillars fast enough in the first section.

@Th3solution I ended up using soul arrows to destroy some of the pillars as I couldn’t find a consistent way of doing so without getting smacked. It was a great one to try and suss out if going in blind though.

Beat Maneater and Old Hero today.

Maneater was a total pain in the derrière. Up there with Flamelurker as the toughest bosses so far. I was happy to be done with him.

Old Hero was actually a piece of cake, but the path to get to him was awful! I died so many times trying to get past those reaper phantom guys. The ones that shoot lasers from their faces were especially difficult. And I died by gravity most of all — dodge rolling off the narrow walkways when they shoot. Must have flushed 300,000 souls over the hours I spent trying to get to the boss. It was the first time since starting this game that I legitimately thought about quitting, or at least taking a break from the game because there was no fun being had.

In the end, I decided it was an exercise in futility to kill the phantom guys which just keep respawning, so after I learned where the reapers were hiding, I’d just put on the thief ring, cast a cloak spell, and run past the enemies as best as I could and run straight to the reaper guy and kill him quick. There was one of the reapers who’s hiding behind a turn in the tunnel and I couldn’t get to him quick enough to kill him before his ambush killed me, so I had to cheese him - after learning where he stays, I snuck up and cast poison from around the corner and waited until he died.

I was thankful that the boss Old Hero was easy and I could kill him on the first try, because I was about to lose my mind by that point! 😅

Tagging @colonelkilgore who was curious how my playthrough was going.

@Th3solution kudos on beating Flamelurker and the Maneaters dude, for my money they’re probably the toughest bosses in the game. There is an optional boss who is fairly difficult too… but ‘optional’ is the operative word there. Also, those Reaper summoners are an absolute pain as you mentioned, sounds like you came up with a decent plan though. When all else fails, I just bum-rush the reaper myself… those phantoms hit like a Mack truck. Hopefully it hasn’t soured you too much on the game?

I remember my first Demons Souls playthrough back in 2011, Flamelurker was a major road block for me. So much so, that when I replayed the game in around 2018 he was in my mind the whole time in the build up to his arena. Managed to beat him first time and all the anxiety just washed away. In between 2011 and 2018 I’d played the Dark Souls trilogy and Bloodborne and I guess I’d just improved a lot as a result.

@Th3solution I mentioned it one here fairly recently that if you equip the Thief Ring, it makes the run to Old Hero a lot more manageable. The mantra ray things don't shoot at you so much and you don't attract the attention of the other enemies as much.

Well done on beating the those bosses though! I know most people really struggled with Maneater due to the lack of space available and end up falling to their Doom.

@colonelkilgore Thanks, man. It was satisfying and good to know two of the toughest bosses are in the rear view mirror. And there is a certain skill set that carries over between these Soulsborne games. Mainly it has to do with patience and timing. As well as just knowing that death is a part of the experience. Like yesterday when I was dying so often on the trek to Old Hero, I had to just not worry about rushing to make it back to my bloodstain, and I just kept telling myself what @Gremio108 said about the real treasure of these repeated runs isn’t the items and the souls but rather the things you learn along the way and that was definitely true of that level. I got to where I knew every enemy placement, timing of when they strike, the tricks to get by them, the sound that cues you that one of flying manta ray projectile shards are coming, where the safe spots to stand are, etc., etc.

And many thanks to @JohnnyShoulder but I must have forgotten the advice or not paid attention since I wasn’t at that world yet, although I did eventually figure out the hard way about the Thief ring and it sure does make life easier. I eventually learned to use it but wished I would have seen and remembered that advice which would have saved me a couple hours of grief. I rarely died to the manta ray attacks but I had to heal every couple minutes because they would chip away at me, which often made me more susceptible to the bigger hits from the reapers and skeletons. After experimenting with the thief ring, I was pleasantly surprised to see they weren’t shooting at me anymore! 😄

And as far as being soured to the game, No - it’s just too excellent of a game to let one or two hard sections dissuade me. Also it’s encouraging to know that it’s unlikely to really get much harder. And I never would have quit, but sometimes when you bang your head against a brick wall you have to take a break from the game for a while and when you come back not so tired or tense then things all of a sudden go better.

Funny enough, I actually booted up Dirt 5 to cleanse my mind with such a break for my nerves, and after getting to the menu, all I could think about was Demon’s Souls and strategizing that run and so I just shut the racing game down and went back to it. 😅 There some kind of strange addictive self-punishment Stockholm syndrome type stuff going on with these games!

@Th3solution good to know that you’re still buzzing about the game (even when you’re at your wit’s end). In fact, I’m pretty sure that you’re now a fully-fledged souls-like fan… there or thereabouts anyway.

@Th3solution Those damn rays, they were such a torn in my side on that section. What made it worse was I died a handful of times to the old hero so getting back there each time felt like the biggest chore of the game. I didn’t even know about the thief ring until after I’d finished the game as I was determined to work it out for myself. That, I can imagine, would have made a big difference.

Still hopefully you’ve broken the back of it now and the rest will be easy compared to those two bosses.

@colonelkilgore I’m not sure I’ve quite earned the distinction of being a honorable Souls-fan, but I’m getting close. I’m really enjoying this one, but I think to join that club I might need to play to completion one or more of the Dark Souls “holy trinity” to be granted entrance to the Grand Order and Discipleship of Miyazaki. 😉

@render It was a strange emotion when you get to that part and there is the room full of dead Ray carcasses. Since they look so much like the earth sea creatures it was really disturbing, but then they are so annoying with their constant shooting at you that you grow to despise them. 😅
Definitely not the only disturbing imagery in the game (hanging bodies, dead rotting horses, those centipedes with human faces, ugh!), but it caught me off guard.

@Th3solution
Hi man. Good to see your still enjoying the game. That place bonfire just before you meet the very first reaper guy downstairs going past the merchant is the good farming spot I was talking about. It takes 10 seconds from the bonfire to get downstairs near the merchant and kill that reaper with long range weapons getting thousands souls. Then repeat.

Gah, Swamp of Sorrows may have supplanted Prison of Hope and The Ritual Path as “Most Frustrating Section of Demon’s Souls.” The blasted poison swamp not only, well… poisons you, but also slows you down and prevents dodge rolling. Getting past the large brute enemies without being able to run or dodge is an exercise in futility. Good grief!

I finally made it past them with a heavy amount of cheesing — thief ring, fire one fire spell, turn tail and immediately run out of aggro area until they walk back into position, rinse and repeat like 6-7 times until they die.

Then the end of the level is like a confounded maze with enemies jumping at you from every nook! Sheesh.

At least the short cut is a pretty good one; even if I only died to the boss once. It was good knowing I didn’t have to run that gauntlet again.

@Th3solution If you equip the Sodden Ring, that will help you move better in deep water. There is always a way to make even the most dire situation a bit more bearable in these games.

@JohnnyShoulder Oh, I don’t have that one. That might have been handy. Except I have one of my rings the Cling Ring pretty much permanently, and then I switch out the other depending on the situation and when I’m poisoned I found it good to put on the regenerator ring to counteract some of the HP losses from poison. I guess it would have been feasible to use the regeneration spell instead and then I could use the ring slot for the sodden ring.

Alas, I made it through with just a little difficulty strategizing instead.

@Th3solution I think there was an armour set in 4-2 which really helps in 5-2 also.

Finished off Old Monk, Storm King, and Maiden Astraea.

For the Old Monk it said that a player had invaded, apparently to become the boss, as per the recent article being Miyazaki’s favorite boss ideas, but shortly afterward the player left before I could get there. So I ended up fighting an AI.

So I think I’m down to the last bit here. Depending if I decide to go back and do optional world tendency stuff. I’ve done a lot of the white world tendency events just in passing because I’m trying to keep my worlds all white so the enemies are easier. But even then I haven’t gone back to every level yet and there are a few side quests that could be mopped up.

I’m assuming that after beating the final boss that one can still roam around and do the side quests after. Is there correct? Or are you forced into NG+ if you do the last boss?

@Indoorhero Awesome! I look forward to hearing how you get along with it.

Having just been playing through it, I can lend a little support with it being in my recent memory.

For starters, it’s usually best to rotate through the archstones after beating a boss to complete a level, rather than trying to finish a whole archstone all at once. There’s a game progress route through the game recommended by Fextralife if you’re not opposed to following a guide. But the gist of it is to mostly cycle through all five archstones in sequence. Or, if you like going in blind, you can just trial and error the archstones as long as you’re not too reluctant to abandon one and try another archstone if you feel it’s too hard.

Also, you may consider trying to be in soul form by choice, since dying in physical form will make the world you’re in more towards black and it does make the enemies a little harder the more black it gets. For me, I wanted it to be as easy as possible, so as soon as I figured that out, when I regained my human form I’d always jump off the high ledge in the Nexus to kill myself before going into an archstone. For me, giving up the extra health was worth it because I knew there was no way I’d make it all the way to the boss without dying. And with the cling ring on the health was enough for me to get used to playing in soul form.

What sort of class and build did you end up going with, if you don’t mind my asking?

@Indoorhero I love these kinda posts so much. I totally get why the uninitiated are reticent to actually try these games… but honestly, much more often than not people react just like you once they’ve given them a decent go. There will be loads of support here for you should you need it… but in all honesty, I’d suggest you try and make as blind a playthrough as possible on your first run through, as putting it all together can be extremely satisfying. Enjoy buddy!

As a massive souls-like fan, the more people who are drawn in the better as far as I’m concerned. Just means that even more new souls-likes will be green-lit in future.

@Indoorhero Yeah, I did the same — started with the royalty class with an emphasis on magic. For the most part, it’s served me well. A lot of the bosses can be taken down fairly easily from a distance with your spells, but not all of them. Flamelurker is one that gives the mage trouble, because he closes on on your fast and there’s little time to bring up your spells. He was probably the second toughest boss in the game for me (so far). The skeletons are tough and it’s one of the few times it might be worthwhile to use the shield and sword. Again, the issue with being a mage is with enemies that can close a distance quickly and are aggressive, and the skeletons are the worst at that. Soon you’ll be leveled up enough to take them down on a couple shots and can either get those shots off before they are on top of you, or you can just try the old fashioned way of shield block then slash at them, repeatedly until they’re down.

It’s a great game, and I’m sad to see my time with it coming to an end. I would possibly do another playthrough one day with a different build, as I’d like to try a Dex build and get good at bow and arrow.

@Indoorhero 😅 Oh no! What a catastrophic turn of events!

Haha, well the abrupt change gave me a chuckle, but it’s alright. It definitely can wear on you. Thankfully my moment of frustration came after several hours invested and I had already committed to it. But if you spend hours and hours and make no progress or can feel really frustrating.

The game is right brilliant, but not for everyone. Maybe give it a rest and who knows, it might invade your thoughts one day and you may want to try again. And if not, that’s okay too. But if so; I’m a fan of the guides and I feel it’s been a smoother experience using some online assistance and YouTube can be your friend with some of these sections.

@Indoorhero well I wasn’t expecting to wake up to that this morning. Hey, if you weren’t enjoying it… you’ve made the right decision. Out of interest, what section was causing all the frustration?