Difficulty, accessibility, and the balance between those two has been a hot topic of discussion in the industry for a while now, and FromSoftware’s games have been at the forefront of that discussion. While many feel that the games are specifically designed to be challenging and thus should not have a difficulty option, others argue that simply having an option for a lower difficulty wouldn’t harm the core design in any way, and would make the game more accessible to wider audiences.
Thus far, the Souls games haven’t had any difficulty options whatsoever- and the upcoming Demon’s Souls remake won’t either. Speaking with Game Informer in an interview (which you can view below), creative director Gavin Moore said that the Demon’s Souls remake won’t have any difficulty options.
“There are no difficulty options in Demon’s Souls, and there shouldn’t be,” Moore said. “I think the original challenge is fair. It’s all about learning enemy patterns and learning your environment, and then knowing when to move forward in combat with that risk/reward system. When to attack, when to back off.”
“A lot of people tell me, ‘Oh, Demon’s Souls is such a hard game,'” he continued. “I actually don’t believe it is as hard as people imagine it was. I think the difficulty levels of subsequent games in the genre have got harder.”
Demon’s Souls is out for the PS5 on November 12. Plenty of new details on the game were recently revealed, which you can check out through here. You can also watch a new gameplay video featuring two bosses fans of the original will instantly recognize.