Demon's Souls Impressions and Review

Atlus' Demon's Souls is the subject of a new set of impressions at 1UP, as well as a glowing 9/10 review at GameOn.

From the former:
Basically, Demon's Souls is a fancy PS3 spiritual heir to the King's Field dungeon crawler series. But to me, even though I recognize titles like Wizardry and King's Field as the old-school dungeon crawler, my reference for games about going down into a dungeon to beat the crap and money out of monsters, and then spend that money to make myself cooler in order to beat even more money out of the monsters, is Diablo. And while Demon's Souls doesn't feature Diablo's randomly-generated dungeons, it does feature a central hub (with a blacksmith no less!), lots of fast-paced-yet-deep combat (for example, the game actually detects collisions between weapons and the environment -- so a spear that you thrust forward might be more effective in tight spaces than a two-handed axe that gets stuck in walls), multiplayer hooks, and all sorts of loot. It also features some of the quirkiest perspectives on traditional action-RPGs.

And from the latter:
Demon's Souls is simple game, bundled with lots of complexities. With this it becomes an immensely enjoyable game, even despite its initially frustrating difficulty level. Nothing beats the sense of satisfaction this game can provide, especially at later levels. The only problem is that it leaves you wanting more. It has to be said this isn't a game for loot-aholics. There is a very limited selection of weaponry and particularly armour, and whilst you need to do some grinding to upgrade to the most powerful weapons, there is still that desire to seek out new worlds and explore a little more of the unknown. Nonetheless, Demon's Souls is an addicting and enjoyable game that most should at least consider, just be wary that its extreme difficulty may put people off.