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A dragon circles the series of bridges that stretch between me and my goal. Each pass he breathes down fire, incinerating the demons lying in wait. I found an underground shortcut between the first and second span, but it seems like this last gauntlet has to be run directly. I wait a few minutes, watching the dragon swoop in, bathe the bridge in flames, and flit away. I only have a few seconds leeway. I need to start running the very second he begins his attack, chasing the trail of his flame to the safe spot on the other side.

He roars, swoops; I run. I make it. I know this area is safe from his flames, because there are three crossbow demons waiting for me. Behind them, a blue-eyed knight. Behind that knight, another. Crossbow bolts rain down from the two demons above. I gulp, and hold up my tiny shield. I don’t have a good feeling about it. I can’t dodge back too far or I’ll fall into the tail end of the dragon’s flame trail. I can’t barrel forward past the crossbow demons because they form a solid line; if I could, I’d roll face first into two blue-eyed bastards who can kill me in two shots. I am Royalty, a magic user, and I can’t counter-snipe the two snipers because I don’t have a bow, and at any rate I can’t take my attention off the three demons in front of me.

I lock on, and risk a bit of backpedaling. A flurry of bolts sing against my shield. I risk taking a shot at my closest ground target. It hits; he falls. But the attack leaves me vulnerable for a second, which is all the time it takes for two bolts to slip past my defenses and cut my health in half. Shit. I quickly swallow some grass – luck is on my side and no one attacks while I am vulnerable, but my constant pacing has lead me back into the path of the dragon’s flame, and just as I take aim at another of the demons in front of me I am roasted like so much marshmallow.

Dead. Again. This is my sixth death at this exact spot. I’ve given up trying to collect the parcel of souls left in my bloodstain. I just want to break through.

I am revived in Soul Form at the Archstone to this section of the castle – where I slayed the demon Phalanx. All the demons between me and my failure have come back. I am returned to the world at half-health.

I am beginning to get weary. Instead of pressing forward, I head back to the Nexus.

I look at my current build. I have a Soul Level of 10, but I don’t think I spread my points out right, and I’m pretty certain now that I’ve bought the wrong spell to compliment my Soul Arrow. The fire spell was cheap, and seemed like a good idea at the time, but there’s this cloaking spell I could have gotten for a few souls more that would enable me to sneak up on foes a bit better. Because each death puts my soul count back to zero, I can either try to figure out a way to get by this particular chokepoint with my current skills, or I can head back to the first section of the castle and farm souls, grind it out like an oldschooler.

I decide I’ve had enough for one night. Maybe two nights. There’s only so much failure one can take before it becomes personal.

Off goes the game; on comes the television. I flip around. Grinding seems like the smartest thing to do next. I get up to have a smoke. There’s a spiked shield in my inventory that my pampered Royal arms are too weak to carry. Also a winged spear that I can only wield with two hands. I snack on an apple. Maybe I should leave my magic alone for a bit and grind out some melee competency. I make tea. Maybe I should just try again with another build.

In about half an hour I’m back in Boletaria.

This is not a review. I’ve played maybe about 1/25th of what Demon’s Souls has to offer. Maybe 1/50th, or even 1/135th – who knows. I have no idea how deep and how far this adventure goes. No special edition with its fancy guidebook for me. I had a hard enough time tracking down a no-frills copy. I’ve bookmarked the English wiki so I’m not totally in the dark. I know there are at least four other Archstones in the Nexus I shouldn’t explore yet, and at least one NPC in the second section of the castle I accidentally murdered. She is not coming back. I cannot cheat out of that consequence without starting from scratch again.

It’s tempting. I would do things a bit differently – drop that stupid fire spell for one thing. I’ve put about six hours in already. If I’m going to start again, it has to be now. The longer I work on my first character the less interest I have in doing it all again. He has a ring that increases my health in Soul Form. I don’t remember where I got it. The whole journey to Phalanx is a bit of a blur. Lots of demons jumping out of nowhere. Traps. Firebombs. Moving like a snail with its shell up along tight corridors, the only sound my cautious steps and the roar of distant dragons.

I don’t think I’ve ever played a game as harsh as Demon’s Souls. Typically, I play most games on Easy if it’s an option. I used to be a native of the land of Game – now I’m a tourist. I come, I sightsee, I take the guided tour. Could be growing up; could be moving as the industry moves. Whichever the case, what little of my hardcore soul remains is trapped inside a cloying suburban minivan fatness. I want delivery. I want to order online. I want my food fast and my channels in the thousands; I want most of the work done for me so I can take the scenic route.

But here is Demon’s Souls, telling me no. No scenic route, no delivery. You move forward by inches, backwards by miles and if you can’t take it, it doesn’t want you. It doesn’t belong to you. You are not owed. You must earn.

I may not finish it. I may never get beyond the dragon-hemmed, enemy-laden choke on the bridge. I’ve dropped games for far less. But maybe that’s because those games didn’t ask anything of me. This one does. It is indifferent to my time, my mood, my money spent – it is a mountain, and I stand in a pile of my own corpses at its feet, looking up. At first that pile distressed me. I thought it meant something. But now I see it differently. Every time I add another body, I seem to be able to climb a bit higher.

 

[Author's Note: I wrote this in November '09 after playing through the first bit of what became my favourite game of the year. I'm posting it here because I nuked the blog it lived in but I'm vain and I like it. Also, I was thinking about Michael Rousseau's piece on the right to critique and the validity of snap judgements; this was my first impression of Demon's Souls, and at the end of the day my opinion didn't change.]