This week’s issue of Dengeki has new details on Dark Souls, the upcoming spiritual successor to the hit PlayStation 3 role-playing game Demon’s Souls. They interview director Hidetaka Miyazaki, who sheds light on development, story, a new system, game design, and more.
Development on Dark Souls is nearing its final stage, according to Miyazaki. FromSoftware has received plenty of fan feedback from players of the first game, and he’s very excited to be working on a game so eagerly expected by so many. Though, he does feel under a lot of pressure.
Since its announcement, we’ve only seen a trickle or two of updates. Miyazaki told the magazine that this is a very difficult game to market and that they’re trying to do it properly. Since Dark Souls is a game meant to surprise the player, they’re trying to keep a lot of things under wraps. At the same time, he doesn’t want fans to feel as if they’re not communicating, so he’s trying to find a balance between the two.
On story, Miyazaki said that even though Dark Souls has a plot, it is not driven by it. The main character is an undying hero who will come back to life no matter how many times he’s killed. He’s been cast out of regular society.
A new system, the Oath system, has been revealed. This allows players to make an oath to a person regarding something on their journey. Making an oath determines the player’s position on a certain topic, impacting interactions with other players online. Depending on the oaths players choose to make, players can end up allies or enemies with another player.
As Dark Souls is no doubt a difficult game, Miyazaki spoke a bit on world design and where to place healing items. They want to make sure they put these items in the right places so the player has to search a little to find them. That way, the player gets a genuine feeling of satisfaction after they’re found. Though, for those who’re completely stuck, the Campfire system will be used in part to create healing items.
Speaking of hard, Miyazaki feels that the game’s intense difficulty is good because it adds the value of challenge to a game.It gives the player opportunity to discover, learn and overcome their mistakes, making for a more satisfactory game. He wants Dark Souls to be considered an “intriguing game” by players.
While we’ve heard a lot on Dark Souls already, Miyazaki says that the information we know of is only about one-fifth of the total amount of details they plan on revealing before the game’s release.
Thanks, NeoGAF.