Recently got the game, haven't clocked in too many hours, but i'll work on that tonight.

So far the game played just how I thought it would. Combat will take some time to get used to(including rolls, weapon differences, etc).

The game is tricky with its difficulty. When everything goes well, you can plow through multiple enemies without a problem, leaving yourself unscathed at the same time.. but with that same group of enemies, if you slip up once or twice, you may die (at least with my character, he's more attack-oriented than defense)really quickly.

It is difficult because they throw new enemies at you as soon as you start getting used to the old, and they have different attacks/patterns. Unless you're going through the same level because you keep dying, the environments always seem kind of fresh, with the smell of death close by.

Great title. If anyone's curious, I can probably answer some questions. I'm not giving away spoilers though.

I'm passed the first area now and earned my first trophy Dying is just something one has to get used to early on.
This is one difficult and unforgiving game. Even seemingly small slip ups may lead to a serious cut in health or even death.
Somehow I got the feeling that "Body Mode" will be rare moments at least until one has gotten used to the combat system and the button mapping.

I also got the feeling though that this game may be just as great as people say it is.

Haha I recently got mine too. Didn't progress much after that.. the Boss of 1-2 killed me in one shot

Edit:
Beat 1-1, 1-2, 2-1

This message was edited by nn11x3 on Jun 11 2009.

I personally dislike the fact that when you die you have to repeat the ENTIRE level, as well as the fact that you can never pause the game. Not being able to pause means if I have to leave in the middle of a level, I lose ALL my progress.

Also, having online players attack you when you could already be having enough trouble getting through the level sounds like a real pain.

Tell me about all that and how it REALLY plays.

How long?
Seen 30-50 hours mentioned depending on how thoroughly you explore but that's what skilled players seem to need. This will be far longer for most depending on your skill level and on how high you'll need to level and how long you'll need to get friend with the controls and such.

Difficulty?
This game is hard enough to be challenge for almost everyone and hard enough that some players will just never get through it to the end.

Fun?
It's crack! (For one like me anyway )

Your character?
You can initially choose between several classes (Hunter, Knight, Thief, Priest, etc.) but these only gives your initial skills and gear. What you want to do later is totally up to you but it will be quite of waste to start as magic user and then decide you want to be soldier like. Every time you upgrade an ability the price goes up and it goes up pretty steep pretty soon so you really don't want to waste it.

A note.
After the first area and boss are done you are also free to explore the world as you see fit. Regardless of what some guides seem to say a straight-line kind of play-through with the occasional back check is for most NOT a good idea.
The difficulty of the different areas will differ somewhat depending on your own set of abilities and gear. Most areas are also relatively easy in the beginning and good gear/stuff is to be found.

A second note.
Gameplay is remarkably simple with two basic moves for each hand (L1, L2, R1, R2) plus some combo moves. Common is a shield and weapon setup but two-handed for more attack power or two different weapons work too with different effects depending on the weapons at hand.
The weight of weapons and armour NOTABLY changes attack speed and manoeuvrability. A heavy plate armour protect you good when hit but makes dodging rolls clumsy, slow and short even if you're fully strong enough to wear it.

@Red 9
The repeat factor can indeed be a bit tedious at times when you die at some far out places but many places offer short cuts or just simple dash through when you have worked your way through them thoroughly once.

The game has no in game pause button but if you press the PS button to temporarily leave the game you will in effect pause it.

I'm not sure about the multilayer features but as I understood it I don't think others can force themselves into your game but if you invite someone to help you with something they might just find it funnier to be a pain and try to kill you instead.

OPS! My mistake PS button DOES NOT in effect pause the game for you just makes you a prone target as I just learned the hard way
For pause one just have to find a quiet corner and hide out.

This message was edited by Master Ffamran on Jun 14 2009.

It was mentioned you could choose an offline mode if other players are not to your liking. Is this really a feature, and if so, shouldn't you be allowed a pause function in offline?

Cause essentially, leaving no pause feature kind of goes against the common warning of "only play for so long". If a certain level takes an inevitably long time, you can't pause it to take a break, and if you did, you'd never get pas that part because it doesn't save that progress.

You can play the game totally offline, you will miss out though on tips and warnings other people have left (but not all tips are that accurate or meaningful anyway quite a lot of spam imo.)

There is no pause feature in offline mode too. I usually play offline since there's some problem/glitch/feature? that tends to reset the world tendency to neutral when playing online and if your working to get it in one direction you really don't want that.

No part of the game really takes all that long as long as you manage to survive. If you die you have to start form the beginning (in a sense) anyway.
I have not had any problem so far in taking shorts brakes, if you have cleared an area of enemies you can safely just stand there for a while before moving on.

The game actually save all progress continuously in a sense as it lets you keep all items you have found before dying/leaving the game. All Key-Actions are also saved such as the opening of doors, gates and such and the killing of One-Time-Enemies. A lot of these actions also creates short cuts for use further on.
Some of these Key-Actions can lie a good 30min of successful playing from the respawn place but so far I have not encountered any place that takes a longer time just to get there asap playing reasonably safely.

Note. What you DO lose when dying is all your collected souls and souls are the games only valid currency for buying ANYTHING. Without souls you can't even repair your equipment. It's quite possible to end up in a situation where you managed to break your shield, all your 4 pieces of armour and both your main and secondary weapon before dying in a fight. So you have no souls, useless equipment and repairs that going to cost you thousands of souls a piece.
This game know how to punish the stupid, the careless and the plain lacking.

I just hope the game doesn't turn out to be work instead of entertainment. I don't want to find myself spending overly long periods of time to accomplish small portions of the game due to the difficulty. If I find myself having to treat the game like work, I'll return it.

No I can't say any of the parts felt like "work". Some parts will be harder than others depending on your type of character and skills but if some part is too hard just try another and come back later.
What can feel like work though is the collection of ores to make upgrades to your weapons this is not really necessary though unless you're a trophy whore (like me ) and there are 14 different ores you need to master to get all trophies but there are some short cuts even here if one pays attention. By the time this games comes to the states there probably will be extensive guides out there telling you where to easiest get what ore at what world tendency etc. I could probably write a decent guide for that myself by now

I got some more input on the multiplayer.
You CAN invade and kill others in their game as a black phantom when online but its rare and its only happened to me when in body-form at the very start of an area. After being killed I could just go back and pick up all my souls where I died just like after a normal death. The only thing it altered was the world tendency but I would not enter a world in body form unless I actually wanted to change the world tendency that way anyway. I think they can invade when you're in soul-form too but that's never happened to me which is kind of odd since I have WAAAAAAY more hours online in soul-form than in body-form. You can also summon other players as blue phantoms to help you.

This message was edited by Master Ffamran on Jun 29 2009.

When you're in soul form, don't you have a blue aura around you?

Also, when you die, can other invading players steal whatever was left on your corpse, or is that a privilege only for yourself?

Anyway, I've been watching gameplay videos on youtube, and I gotta say...I really lke this game! It doesn't seem that hard from what I've seen; nothing bone-crushingly difficult.

No. The blue aura is for friendly phantoms, other players online you can summon to help you in the game against bosses or against and an invading black phantom. The blue phantoms will get some of the souls you earn for helping you. Blue phantoms you can send away again as you please.

Now I have finally done all the "white character" stuff so now I've tried doing some invades and gotten myself mostly thoroughly killed and humiliated
At least half the people you invade summons blue phantoms to help them making it near hopeless to get into a meaningful fight. Of the rest some just run and quit the game, some are good players confident they can handle you or just looking for a good fight and some seem kind of confused just trying to do their best against you, these are the ones I could kill I guess at lower levels you'll find more of the last kind and fewer
of the others. At a soul level of ~150 most people you invade knows pretty well what they are doing.

Most people I invaded seemed to have East Asian nametags and I experienced some lag against some making good and fair fighting hard. At one point I even got hit hard and thrown to the ground before I even saw the opponent move and then killed before I could get up.

As far as I know the only thing you can lose being invaded are the souls you carry and that only if you can't get back and retrieve them. If you manage to invade and kill someone you get revived (you get your body form back) and you gain some dark character tendency. I did not gain any souls from the few ones I killed. Items are never lost nor gained as far as I know.
The only thing I lost invading where the souls I carried which where just about none. If you fall to death in an other world you will lose a level though.

If you ever get a Redeye Stone you can invite Black Phantoms to your own world and battle about a soul level, winner gains one, loser loses one. (Or more precisely the winner gains souls equal to the losers cost of its last soul level as combatants may not be of fully equal level.)

This is a very fun game and I might start a new character and build it more for PvP.

A note on negative stats that you might see in FAQs and Walkthroughs.
It seems in the first version of the game you could reduce stats you did not like/need to -99 by de-leveling yourself and thus gain 100 and some levels of more useful stats without increasing your soul level. Falling to death as Black Phantom will still make you lose a level and a random stat but I think you no longer can get values below your origin build, at least no negative ones. Anyhow this led people to reduce their Luck stat (which has no use other than help you find more ore/items) in favour of other ones. That glitch/feature has been removed in later versions of the game. I guess many players considered it plain glitch abuse. Older character with these negative stats may still be around, I've not heard of them being purged or reset or anything but I don´t know. Anyhow its no longer possible.

And one more thing. No trophies requires you to play anything online for a change. All can be done in solitude at whatever pace you wish. The online feature is there for fun and help if you need it.

This message was edited by Master Ffamran on Jun 30 2009.

Is there are appearance changes when you're in soul form? And how exactly do you go about getting your body back?

Also, when you die, do you go all the way back to the Nexus and have to replay the level? And when in soul form, is returning to the Nexus really necessary?

Is there any way to invite people on your friends like into your world as a blue phantom? Or is coop just random?

Like your answers, both of you; very thorough. If you don't mind, I've got an abundance of questions I'd like to throw out. Continuing on:

What occurs if you die while in soul form?