Demon's Souls Compare-Through - Part 1: Journey to the Nexus 

16:41 IS THAT AN ON SCREEN TUTORIAL THAT PAUSES THE GAME? So they only started to actually do that in Sekiro, and then also did it in Elden Ring and Armored Core VI. But they had the functionality for it ever since Demon's souls? thats crazy

fun fact: in the dragon punch cinematic, if you wear a helmet, sparks fly up as you slide. without a helmet, your face explodes.

The architecture of this area in the original is really... nice. It's definitely simplistic by comparison but as you said, it feels ancient and looks distinct from anywhere else in these games despite essentially just being another medieval castle.

I'm a big fan of the way this sometimes sounds like you're reviewing a redesigned house. "The skeletons look basically the same. Overall, the space feels opened up!"

This is essentially a demons souls dissected - out of bounds and I'm so fucking happy for it

"Romanesque" architecture is actually medieval but based on Roman architecture.

39:47 Indeed, she does appear to be holding a child, but quite frankly I'm more interested in what appears to be the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch in her other hand.

As far as the interconnectivity goes, my guess would be that it was originally designed to be one world, but then they realised it wouldn't be feasible considering their time and/or budget, so they made it level-based through the archstones. I also think your Dragon's Lair theory has some merit to it because at the same time, FromSoft was developing Ninja Blade, which is basically a river of quick-time events.

Wow, I had no idea you could manipulate the offline ghosts like that! It feels almost like bullying, diverting him from his true calling of running up that stairway for eternity.

When you mentioned the vid being 55mins before release I presumed you’d just go through most of the game’s areas in one go. Having almost an hour of going into this much detail just on the tutorial area alone is honestly amazing and you’re totally spoiling us, thank you so much!

I think that is the main difference in the tutorial area. Bluepoint wanted to make the distinction that the level was near or adjacent to Boletaria Castle. Whereas in the original, the ambiguous architectural design meant it could have been anywhere. Perhaps the opposite side of Dragon God in Stonefang. Which is possible, as we never really see anything more of that area beyond the mines themselves.

DeS on RPCS3, upscaled to 4k and beyond with the frame rate unlock looks damn good, even today. You can really see the high quality detail in the armor sets that you just couldn't see at 720p on ps3

On Yoshida San’s reaction, I feel like given the time the game was made in that that is actually a really typical reaction. Given the climate of games that were open world or didn’t expect much from the player an immediate reaction if you couldn’t get through something is “Ugh this is awful” if it doesn’t immediately bend to your will. I had a similar reaction when I first picked up the game but I was poor at the time and I couldn’t return it so I was basically forced to go through it. Which I’m extremely glad I did.

You know your reptile nerd pickiness has reached the point of irredeemability when the intended reaction of delighted surprise at the reveal of the dead crocodile is overshadowed within the span of one second when he calls it an alligator. For real, though, the detail on that model is just the coolest thing. Even looking at it sidelong so you can't see the pointed shape of the snout, it's still instantly recognizable as a crocodile rather than an alligator for people who know what to look out for on the real animals because - for this piece of background fluff for a third-person fantasy game from _two generations ago_ - they went to the trouble of getting the bendy shape a real crocodile's jawline has right. I love you, FromSoftware.

An hour of episode just on the tutorial level. Man I can't wait for the archstones!

It’s a cliche at this point to see this in the comments, although I genuinely get excited when I see a new video from this dude. Seriously top notch content.

As someone who only played DeS once (and can't play the remake), I really appreciate the almost insane attention to detail here, since it's not as clear in my memory as other Souls games

God I'm so jealous of all the cut Demon's Souls content still being in the game as someone who is part of a group trying to discover stuff about Shadow of the Colossus' cut content but they removed almost everything cut from the files 😅 we have a massive $1000 bounty for an early build of SOTC too in hopes anyone has a build with some cut content

" I crashed my car & died you?" "Fisted by a dragon god"

I cannot wait to spend more hours chilling in the world of Boletaria, with relaxing narration, while also learning new things about my favorite game

the statue at 47:53 reminds me of the "digger king" we see on the 2nd archstone. it would give the dragon god at least some connection to this area, which i think is pretty neat

I came to Demon Souls after playing through Dark Souls and Sekiro. It has a charm to it that I can't explain. It felt like getting that magical first experience I had with Dark Souls I. This video just shows that the people who worked on these games put a lot of care into it. Great video as always!

You better be able to wrestle alligators in Elden Ring

honestly the most surprising thing about this video is how is how much better the base (emulated) demons soul looks than both the remastered dark souls 1 and dark souls 2

Yes, describing the original's architectural appearance as generally romanesque or Roman-derived would be accurate. There is an emphasis on broad surfaces, wide round arches, and big bold forms. I do think that the remake's obscuring or outright reorientation of this quality is a negative, in part because it muddies the visual relationship Demon's Souls had to the King's Field series, especially the fourth game, and rather attempts to associate it more with Dark Souls 3 or Bloodborne. I'm going to sidestep the critical comparison between the versions' soundtracks and just say that, to whoever is looking for more music like Shunsuke Kida's original score (perhaps to listen to while playing the remake), you could do no better than Igor Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex. There is a particularly good performance of it conducted by James Levine here on RU-vid. Kida's score is highly unusual even among orchestral or chamber music, and for a long while I struggled to find anything which resembled it. Anyway, thanks for this video!

52:53 I love this statement from Yoshida, I'm sure many players felt the same way with their first Souls game, I certainly did. The first one I played was Demon's Souls, I must have bought it when I got my PS3 from Gamestop because they had a sick promo for a brand new PS3 slim (first slim model) for $100 with your choice of two free used games priced at $19.99 or less. I played so little of the game I didn't even remember owning it or selling it until years later after beating Dark Souls 3 and it's DLC. I managed to snag a copy with the original case from ebay, loaded it up on my PS3 and to my surprise there was a save file already present with the default character and only a few minutes of playtime. I loaded it up and was at the nexus in soul form with zero souls. I'm almost certain I died to the Vanguard Demon and said "this game is shit" and traded it in without a second thought. If only I knew then how much I would come to love these games, I would have given it a proper chance and experienced every subsequent Souls game at launch with everybody else going in for the first time. Fromsoft really struck diamond with this series, you just had to be the one to cut it and make it look pretty. There's not one single franchise I can think of that does the same thing. (Sorry for the awful analogy lol)

The content is superb, the content is plenty. This truly is an illusory wall video.

The distant ruins at 14:57 appear to be of an aqueduct rather than a traditional bridge, which is consistent with your earlier comment about Roman-inspired architecture!

The balcony vista reveal hit me with that sense of grandeur/awe that my first playthroughs of these games always gives me. This video is really awesome! Thanks so much for doing this; it always feels like Demon's Souls gets the short end of the stick when it comes to coverage from people who are fans of FromSoft's work. Edit: One little thing I noticed is that the statue you show us at 39:48 is holding a globus cruciger, which is a Christian symbol that first got popular in the Middle Ages, mainly in Western Europe (some of you might recognize it as a piece of the Crown Jewels). The inclusion of the cruciger within a statue of a woman and a child draws obvious parallels to real-world Christian art, but I don't understand the inclusion of "God" in Demon's Souls well enough to make any grounded conclusions. Once again, fantastic video! I would never have spotted these sorts of things myself.

The fact that the Snowy Archstone of the Half-Giants contained Yetis with mouths on their stomachs really cements it for me. Fire Giant and the Mountaintops of the Giants in Elden Ring feels like From finally realizing the cut archstone from all the way back in Demon's Souls.

This really makes you appreciate how much work went into the details of both the OG and the remake. Thank you Illusory!

One thing I dont like is how they changed some of the weapons and shields aesthetically. In the OG many weapons were based on European historical ones but in a fantasy setting, and in the remake they clearly jazzed up some items WAY too much.

idk why i watch this stuff, even though i havent played demons, but i do, and u better keep making more Mr.Wall

Just something for you, the "walkable space" can be refered as the topology of the map/building (can be represented as a graph or diagram), like which room lead to which room, how the rooms are actually spaced is called the geometry . This terms are used in stuff like Google maps to not only render buildings in accurate 3d (geometry) , but to actually convey navigation information (topology) so you can use something like gps to go to a specific room in a large building . So you can say the remake radically changed the geometry of Demon Souls, while keeping the topology mostly unchanged.

22:50 is unbelievably cool! Thanks for showing us that, it's a beautiful vista. I can't believe the devs made such a cool asset and left it in a prototype. I've loved this game for years and seeing this landscape makes me feel rewarded for being a fan. I feel like i just found Ash Lake for the first time.

Watching this having not played Demon's Souls at all, it's really interesting to compare the styles and area design of each version, cause they seem to have very different tones. The remake is very Dark Souls-ish, but the original, through a combination of deliberate choices and janky graphics/lighting seems... alienating, even hostile. It's genuinely uncanny and feels like the environment itself is telling you, "You do not belong here."

Thanks everyone so much for watching! If you'd like to hear me discuss Souls stuff more-casually, I'll be with The Lore Hunter in his upcoming Elden Ring "Trailer Day 624" episode, releasing on Monday. We talk primarily about general expectations of the game and how From's mechanics iterate. And we also want a From Software Castlevania game! ru-vid.com

Even though i have never played Demon's Souls, seeing this side-by-side makes me appreciate how much work Blue Point put into the remake.

I adore that 8-bit version of the Maiden Astrea theme at the end!

This is ridiculously cool and I'm excited to see more.

Demons Souls has alot of art direction and assets that stem from Kings Field.

For me, the original give me a strange impression, like that whatever happened in the world, happened very recently, so that's why most building are intact... Meanwhile in the remake thanks to the fact that said building are mostly broken now it kinds of give a feeling of decaying, like it actually happened some time before you came

Great video as always. You never fail to inspire that sense of awe and wonder that initially got me into the souls games so many years ago.

This is a great dive into what makes Demon's Souls such a standout title. Can't wait for part 2! Keep up the good work.

Update on part 2 for anyone wondering: On the 3rd of June he said on Twitter "I hit a setback so it might be a little while still, but I'm really looking forward to it!".

Damn, that was crazy informative! I don't consider myself a purist, but there certainly is a nostalgic charm to the original that I wish they'd tapped into a little more. However, the remake's out of bounds details are very cool, and add a level of immersion despite their distance. A lot of care and effort went into it. Some other things that bugged me a bit (though only as far as what you covered here) were potential lore-related details in both the enemies and architecture. Firstly is Vanguard, whose almost hewn rock texture in the original was consistent with a pattern of associating demons with inorganic matter; in the remake, they seem to have overlooked these details in pursuit of gore and gratuity, particularly with Vanguard and Adjudicator. Secondly, one odd detail concerning Dragon God is the architecture associated with it. Originally, its lair bore reliefs much like those found in the Nexus, and the ballistae ammo were suspiciously similar to the golden instruments piercing the Old One's back. This all seemed to imply that the Dragon God was revered with equal fervor as the Old One, perhaps even as a denunciation. Some of those architectural motifs were still present in the original's first encounter with Dragon God, but Bluepoint inadvertently erased this subtext in both locations. In the end, the flamboyant architecture throughout its lair looks nice, if not painfully cliché in a high fantasy sort of way. The music was... whatever. I turned it down at some point so I could only hear the melodies, lol.

Me: Still waiting for him to come back for ep2.... Hope you safe and healthy

Future episodes? Yes please. Thank you for everything you've done for the Souls community, seriously.

I do prefer the mysterious "sort of classical, but also quite alien looking" architecture of the original tutorial area to the the remake's ruined outpost, looks too much like Dark Souls 3 to me.

Boy they really love their wine barrels in the remake

I had gotten demon souls for my PS3 on release. I played the game over and over beating it 5 or more times.. unfortunately I've yet to play this remake as I don't have a PS5 as they are too expensive right now. This game being such a huge part of my childhood I was surprised to learned a lot of things I never knew about the game from this video! I very much look forward to your future videos of each area, keep up the great work man you're awesome!

The Wall with the 3 "Angels behind the Dragon God" at 49:14 remind me of the 3 Angels in the Dark Souls 3 Ringed City DLC. Also the flying creatures from the Dragonslayer Armor Fight around Lothric... Especially later in the Game with the Orange Sky and Black Sun...

I think the peak of detail in the remake comes from the Storm Demon boss fight. The Storm Demon passing over you blocks the rain, and the air burst from the Stormruler makes the rain droplets disperse from all directions away from you. The rain is coming from an angle, because of the wind so the rain that's blocked by the Storm Demon is affected by this. The amount of work it must've taken to really flesh out all the systems only for them to be minor visuals at best must've meant this was in production for quite some time. Especially when they went through the burden of replicating 90% of the game, often to a fault. Also, look, I don't care if you're soul starved, but that ass was fat. I'd eat that on a full stomach.

25:30 Dark Souls 3 Firelink Shrine

The point on the architectural style of the original being Romanesque while the remake being more Gothic would be correct in a sense, but not fully. The Original, in my point of view, is more similar to the Early Norman Gothic Style of architecture, which is considered a transitionary period between Romanesque and Middle to Late Norman Gothic - so it had many of the traits of Romanesque Architecture while also having Norman Gothic traits as well. ENGS focused on the horizontality of a building while also having it lightly ornamented. They were squat and were fortresses first and foremost. They were simply made for defense and displays of power and not much else. The Tower of London (the original tower) is an example of this style. Later Norman Gothic Style buildings would start to focus on being more heavily ornamented as well and still focused on the horizontal somewhat: Salisbury Cathedral in Salisbury, England is an example of this (West Minister is another example, but its exterior was changed by one of the English Royals after a fire had consumed it). I also looked at the original Demon's Souls and saw almost no buttresses (which would make the walls thicker at the bottom and thinner at the top - and the taller the building the thicker the buttresses), so without many buttresses - it is not Romanesque (Romanesque Style uses buttressing extensively). As for the Remake, it follows a Late or High French Gothic Style. The stain glass, flying buttresses, the focus on verticality, trying to make the buildings appear brighter through the usage of glass while also having dark interiors simply due to the size of the buildings (Notre Dame de Amiens and Notre Dame de Paris are examples of French Gothic buildings so large that they simply cannot have the windows brighten them up as much as the architectural style intended for), and the HEAVY ornamentation on the buildings (Late and High French Gothic used HEAVY levels of ornamentation compared to early - Chartres Cathedral's Spires exemplify this [the larger cone is early gothic and the smaller one is late/high]), and finally - how the game portrays Boletaria overall (the game portrays Boletaria as being at its height prior to the scourge of demons and Late/High French Gothic is considered the pinnacle of architecture for many kingdoms - hence why there were revival efforts in places like England when the built structures like Big Ben). If there is more information I find, it will be added below here in edits.

Almost 1 hour of quality content - thank's for your work!

Just found ur channel six hours ago and I was bingeing the shit out of it ..... And thanks for the new upload

Nearly 1h on the smallest, simplest level in the game This series gon be good

amazing video! Can't wait for the next dark souls 2 cut content video, or that world design video you mentioned in the gutter video!

Great episode. I really appreciate all the side by side shots and weapon inserts that lined up perfectly, must have taken ages.

Oh how I wish a Dark Souls game got a remaster like this.

I love how chill and interesting these videos are, keep up the good work!

Halfway through this video, I gotta say that your content is fascinating. I really can't wait to see the rest of this series!

"Not everything is badly because the vibe changes a little." Very well said dude.

I'm really happy to see so many Demon's Souls videos recently; it's the game that has probably the most unique and interesting design choices and details in the series.

I love that your videos are so in depth. Must be pretty work heavy. Respect!

This is probably the best comparison video between the two games, your insight is super interesting and well thought out. Can't wait for the rest!

This is a fantastic breakdown and comparative analysis. Can't wait for the next episode to drop.

You blew my mind with the connected layout of the tutorial. I'm so excited for this series!

I hope this gets more traction. Really appreciate all the work you put into this video

I know it's been upscaled, but og demons souls looks better than I was expecting

This is such a great video. Thanks for putting in the work and making such interesting observations and comparisons that are so well presented. I love your analysis/dissection of these games, lol.

The dual soundtrack sounds bloody amazing. Fantastic video

This is what I love about your channel and From Software's games, the attention to detail. Thank you for making these videos.

Holy guacamole I never would've guessed DS started because of Elder Scrolls... This is strangely poetic because Oblivion was my favourite game, so my old favourite is the reason my new favourites exist at all.

I just love how thorough your video examinations are. It's always a good time to stare at some old ps3 era assets and theorize what was on developers minds when they first envisioned the game

I did NOT expect some music theory in an illusory wall video, I must say

incredible as always. I love the speculations on the lore and game development, it's fascinating!

Just dropping a comment to say all of your videos are truly legendary stuff, we are lucky to have someone taking this level of deep dive into our favorite pieces of art

Man, this vid was awesome. Hoping for part 2 to release!

I think a really amazing technique bluepoint uses that I actually found jarring upon returning to dark souls 3, is a complete mastery of lighting. All of fromsofts games have a (very nitpicky) problem where they just, don't justify a lot of light sources. Most of the time this isn't too noticeable, ambient light in an area that should be dark isn't a big deal, even when you're nitpicking like I am. But they also put a lot of *point* lights around the place with no sensible reason for them to be there. I don't disagree with fromsoft for doing this, usually those lights are positioned to help you find a doorway or a pathway, or highlight a lever or something you might miss, but they do stick out to me as a little ugly due to lack of explanation. Bluepoint on the other hand do an amazing job of justifying nearly every light source. Much like fromsoft the lighting is still used to illustrate areas and objects of interest, but it's always justified in some way. Maybe a torch is placed there, or more often a small gap in the level geometry allows a beam of sunlight to come through. Even pathways that would ordinarilty just have a random light source will have props and windows and broken masonry allowing the level to be lit realistically, while maintaining the functionality of the lighting for gameplay purposes. I think it's amazing the attention to detail and like I said when I went back to dark souls 3 I was shocked to see just how... bad dark souls is at this specific thing in comparison. That's not a strike against fromsoft, they have a huge list of stuff to do thats more important than justifying every light source. But I think it's a really admirable thing on bluepoints end that shows they aren't just replacing animations and textures, but are in fact taking painstaking efforts to add as much detail and polish to the game as possible, without harming the source material.

Very glad I subscribed to this channel. This content itches such a specific niche of behind the scenes Souls shit... It’s hard to explain, but this sort of stuff interests me to no end. Anyone else?

Have you gone hollow, old friend?

already my favorite demons souls series! please keep making them!

Beautiful work. I didn't know I wanted this comparison, but now that it's here, I am in awe at your efforts and your presentation. This type of content is probably often underrated, but I feel it's of vital importance to the community. We may otherwise never have gotten insight into so many behind the scenes details.

42:27 now that you mention it, it really does remind me of Doom

amazing, so much more insight than i was expecting. looking forward for the rest

Amazing video. I can't think of anything else that I could say, it's honestly perfect. The balcony view is extremely reminiscent of Berserk, and the castle Griffith longs for.

Honestly have been looking for a video exactly like this. Subbed, keep up the amazing work!

These graphics comparison vids are almost always a snoozefest, but your commentary is really interesting. Keep it up!

You put so much effort and devotion into this amazing video. Thank you so much!

Very cool. The amount of detail they put on the Remaster is astonishing even in places you can't really go to. Thanks for sharing

I did dislike Remake's artistic liberties in archtecture, but I think they missed a gold opportunity of making use all this unused level design. This is the sort of liberties they should have taken.

Watching these vids for a 2nd time. Hopefully after your Elden Ring work you can get to part 3 and onward. For someone who probably won't be able to play this anytime soon, its awesome to watch your work-thank you so much for what is obviously a labor of love that is very well done!

I have played neither version but I am still watching this because you make good videos. I'm a quarter of the way in and impressed by their additions.

I can't believe it's already been 3 years since this was uploaded - I rewatch it and the other episodes (and hold out for the next one) so regularly that it feels no older than a year, lol. Keep up the awesome work

Ooo I’m so excited! Thank you for making this, this will be very fun

The amount of details they added is really amazing and shows a lot of love for the product.

Great presentation and great commentary, thank you for amazing work as always.

That lost balcony really does remind me of an almost similar scene in Ico, where a lone balcony gives you a impressive view of the landscape surrounding the castle. In Ico, it's more about the contrast between the faraway greenery and with the barren stones you constantly see, giving you a sense of hope, you want to be over there and not trapped inside walls. I won't go as far as saying that it is a direct inspiration, but given that Miyazaki sometimes cites Ico, you never know ! Anyway, balcony scenes are also very common in videogames, and almost all of them reach into the feeling of "what lies beyond", so this can very well be a simple coincidence.