Whenever it comes to remaking or remastering a game like Demon's Souls, the questions of what to remove and what to keep is always one of the hardest parts of development. While it may seem obvious that every little thing has to stay in order to maintain the integrity of the original game, sometimes developers like Bluepoint need to make changes, even to Demon's Souls.
One of these changes in particular has quickly elevated to meme status, as popular FromSoftware-related content creators like Iron Pineapple have begun sharing a UI change that appears to be universally disliked. While this change might not make or break the Demon's Souls remake for most players, it is something that many players believe shouldn't have been removed in the first place.
The change comes from an item called the Cat's Ring, which removes any fall damage as long as it isn't off a cliff or otherwise a far enough drop that it would be immediately lethal. What changed in the Demon's Souls remake is that in the original game, whenever the ring was equipped, an icon of a cat would appear under the player's status bars. However, this wasn't a drawing or another art asset that sat under the health bar. The icon was an actual photo of one of the developers' cats that had been cropped and inserted into the game.
Players have quickly begun to voice their disdain for this change, something that Bluepoint likely expected when it came to a number of artistic differences between the original and the remake. In the case of the cat picture however, it is interesting to note that the original image does still exist in the game, finding a new home on a tree in the opening credits instead of being attached to the Demon's Souls' Cat's Ring. So, while players will definitely still have problems with some of the changes in the new game's design, especially with the new HUD, Bluepoint did appreciate the image enough to preserve it.
Anytime a game is remade, or even simply remastered as graphical fidelity increases over time, there will inevitably be detractors to some of the changes that stray from the original games. Everything from the Final Fantasy 7 Remake to the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy have suffered from criticisms over changes that in some cases improved the experience, especially for new players. However, with Demon's Souls' stellar review scores following its launch, it would seem that the general feeling from fans and critics is that while there are some drawbacks, the remake is still a great experience for new players.
Demon's Souls is available now for PS5.