Demon's Souls: What are Soul Form and Human Form?

What is Soul Form? What about Human Form? There's a lot going on in Demon's Souls that it doesn't really care to explain to you, but that's precisely where we come in! We're here with our Demon's Souls guide to bring you up to speed on how Human and Soul Form work and why they're important.

Demon's Souls: Soul Form

After finishing the game's opening tutorial section where you inevitably die, you'll begin your Demon's Souls journey in Soul Form. You can tell you're in Soul Form due to the fact that your health bar's maximum is being cut roughly in half. You health bar is the easiest way to tell what form you're currently in – if it's being limited, you're in Soul Form.

Being in Soul Form has its advantages and disadvantages. Not only is your health cut in half, but you also won't be able to summon help from human players while you're in Soul Form. On the other hand, you have to be in Soul Form in order to be summoned by someone else. The same goes for invading another player – you won't be able to join another player's game without being in Soul Form first. For more info on how the online functionality works in Demon's Souls, check out our guide on the subject: Demon's Souls: How do Multiplayer and Online Play Work? Also note that you can minimize the amount of maximum health you lose in Soul Form by equipping the Cling Ring found in the game's first main stage.

The primary advantage that comes with being in Soul Form while playing solo centers around World Tendency. The benefit here is, if you die in a stage while in Soul Form, there will be no change to that Archstone's World Tendency. That's not the case if you die in a stage while in Human Form. Tendency is a whole can of worms that you can learn more about in our Demon's Souls: World Tendency guide, but know that you might want to spend most of your time in Soul Form to prevent from changing World Tendency if you're going for completion. If you'd like to go from Human Form to Soul Form without changing World Tendency, just purposely die somewhere in The Nexus.

Demon's Souls: Human Form

Dying while in Human Form is the only way to attain Soul Form, but there are a couple of ways you can regain Human Form. The one you'll likely run into most often is killing a boss – after dealing the finishing blow to a Demon boss, your full health will be restored and you'll be back in Human Form again. The same will happen if you kill a boss in another player's world, invade and successfully defeat another player, or use a Stone of Ephemeral Eyes consumable item.

While being in Human Form gives you your full health bar back, it does require some extra caution. While in Human Form, you're open to invaders who are human players that can be randomly matched with you and placed in your session to hunt you down. Fights against these Black Phantom players can be a ton of fun, but they can also get frustrating if someone invades at the last minute and defeats you – wiping away the progress you made in a stage.

It's also important to note that dying in a stage while in Human Form will drop the World Tendency of that Archstone towards Pure Black. These changes won't take effect until after you've left an Archstone and returned to The Nexus, but when you do return to that Archstone it'll be slightly harder. As mentioned in Soul Form section, check out our Demon's Souls: World Tendency guide for more details and a couple other reasons why you might not want to bring a world's Tendency toward black right away.

Is there anything about Human Form and Soul Form that we might have missed? We'll get back to Human Form so you can invade us in the comments section below. Do have a look at the rest of our Demon's Souls guide for more assistance on surviving through Demon's Souls.