Reflections on Demon's Souls and its Remake

The original Japanese cover for Demon's Souls.

    Today I checked out the original Demon’s Souls from my local library and played it for about an hour. I had heard that the game's remake changed its art style significantly, and I wanted to experience the original beloved game for myself, so I did so in the most inexpensive legal way that I knew of. (The public library system sure is nice!) As part of my investigation, a portion of the time that I was playing the game, I compared it directly with some YouTube footage of the PS5 remake in the exact same location. I did this for portions of both the Nexus and the Boletarian Palace. And the sheer difference between these versions is staggering. Here I will offer my reflections on the remake and its treatment of the original game.

    The Demon’s Souls remake is extremely different in its visual aesthetics compared to the original game. The most striking change in the visuals is the dramatic change in lighting. Whereas the original game’s Boletarian Palace is dark and gloomy, the remake’s is bright and sunny. And this massive discrepancy in lighting is presumably true for the rest of the game’s environments, as well, and it most certainly is based on the screenshots and trailers I have seen of the remake. One could make an argument that the remake’s art style is superior to that of the original’s, and it’s true that the remake’s graphical fidelity is indeed vastly superior to the original game’s, but even if the remake's art style was superior, it would still be wrong for Bluepoint Games to have changed it so drastically. I believe that a requirement of all remakes is to be faithful to the original game, and clearly, in terms of visuals, this remake was not. The original game really looks completely different than the remake, in more ways than one. It doesn't merely look like the remake with poorer graphics. It looks like a different game set in a different world.

Above is a direct comparison of the PS3 original (on the left) to the PS5 remake (on the right). Image credit goes to Kotaku Australia.

    And that’s not the only way in which the remake differs from the original. The remake’s combat interface, while functionally the same as the original’s (except for the fact that it inexplicably eliminates the location description in the upper right hand corner), stands in stark contrast to the original game’s. The original game’s combat interface is clearly lovingly designed, with a deliberately old-fashioned, antiquated style, and really enhances the feeling of a medieval RPG that the game is attempting to convey. Having played some other Souls games, it clearly has all the hallmarks of a Souls game combat interface, albeit in a rather crude, unrefined form. The remake’s combat interface, by contrast, is beset with the overused minimalistic blight that pervades all of modern American graphic design. It reduces the size of the combat interface’s icons, eliminates the visual depth of the stamina, health, and MP bars, replaces the iconic Souls equipment slots with some cheap diamond, and looks as though it could be in use for any old game. It is entirely indistinctive and uninspired. The original game’s combat interface is soulful and uniquely suited to the Souls series, but the remake’s combat interface is simply generic and dull. That's not all, though. The game also modified the menu interface (at least for archstones, and very likely for the rest of the menus as well), renamed the Small King’s Archstone for no apparent reason to the “Covetous King’s Archstone,” made the Crestfallen Warrior black just because Americans need diversity in all of their entertainment, and even modified the description of the Boletarian Palace, which presumably would mean that other descriptions were modified as well (although I must confess that I think Bluepoint’s description is actually better written than the original game’s was). In addition to this, I have heard that several other character and monster designs were changed.

    All of this taken together indicates to me that Bluepoint really did not have respect for the original game when they made their remake, or at least not enough respect for it. A truly respectful remake would have kept all of the things that I mentioned intact, while simply updating the graphics for the ninth generation of video game consoles. It wouldn't have been hard. Everything that Bluepoint changed probably would have been easier to keep the same as in the original game. But Bluepoint apparently thought that it was too good for that, and that it had to impose its own vision of what the game should be over what Miyazaki originally intended it to be. It's nothing but an unforced error. I think that this remake was a missed opportunity, and it’s sad that so many people will play it (and have played it) oblivious to the needless changes that have marred the creator’s original vision for the game. I think that Demon's Souls Remake would have benefited from taking a page out of Dark Souls Remastered's book. That game, although failing to significantly improve Dark Souls' original graphics (at least to my eyes), kept virtually everything about the original game the same. It didn't change any of the interfaces, character designs, or monster designs, and in my opinion, was all the better for doing so. I think Demon's Souls Remake should have really just been an exercise in improving the original game's graphics and technical performance, and not a "re-imagining" of it.

   What's worse yet than Bluepoint taking so many liberties with creating its remake is the fact that there has been, as far as I know, no mainstream criticism of it for doing so. The only people I know who have criticized the remake for these qualities are 4chan users, primarily on the board /v/. /v/ is notorious for its negative tone regarding modern gaming, and so it is not very surprising that its users were so upset regarding this remake, even from the very day it was announced last year. And as far as I know, its criticisms are not taken seriously or even read by any gaming publication or developer anywhere in the world, so its message has not been spread very wide. But I must admit that having played some of the original game now, I believe that many of their criticisms are well-founded, if overblown. Regardless of whether or not Bluepoint Games improved the game's art direction, which one could plausibly argue, it still has radically changed the visual tone of the game, something which I do not believe it was Bluepoint's place to do. Fans of the original have a right to criticize Bluepoint for doing so, and Sony and Bluepoint ought to heed these criticisms in the future.

Key artwork for Demon's Souls Remake.

    I don't mean to be a Debbie Downer, however, and I must give credit where credit is due. Although I disagree with most of the changes Bluepoint made in the remake, I must admit that it is clearly a work of very high quality, especially by modern, AAA video game standards. The game's graphics, as I mentioned above, are obviously sterling, and leave very little to be desired. Even with this, though, the game manages to have excellent technical performance. Bluepoint Games had the good sense to include a 60 FPS "performance mode," and from what I've seen and read it works virtually flawlessly. This is actually a substantial improvement on the original game's 30 FPS, which it does not even maintain perfectly, and I will not fail to applaud Bluepoint's terrific efforts here. I greatly value stable framerates, and so if and when I get around to playing the remake, (which I will likely do at some point, notwithstanding my criticism of it) my experience will be all the better for the glorious smooth frames rolling like the smooth seas across my television screen. The game has no DLC or significant bugs that I know of, and as far as I know, the gameplay was kept virtually the same as in the original, a greatly commendable decision on Bluepoint's part, for based on the little that I've played of the original game, it has great gameplay. It's clear that Bluepoint's team worked very hard on making a complete, finished, polished product when developing this remake, and this achievement deserves to be recognized. 

    Now, if only Bloodborne could receive a 60 FPS patch on the PS5, then we'd be set for life! But I digress. In conclusion, though I have a bone to pick with Bluepoint's Demon's Souls Remake for PS5, and I regard it as a missed opportunity, its faithfulness to the original's gameplay, its technical accomplishments, and its overall high production quality deserve to be acknowledged as well as its shortcomings. And as a Soulsborne fan, I appreciate the team at Bluepoint making the game available (legally, at least) to be played at a crisp, sleek 60 FPS, and for giving the PS5 even the barest hints of a launch lineup. Let us hope that FromSoftware creates many more wonderful Soulsborne experiences for us in the years to come, starting with the ever-absent Elden Ring. Oh, Elden Ring...