While I'm really excited to play Demon's Souls on PS5, the footage I've been watching on Youtube has further cemented my belief that Bluepoint don't really "get" the material they're reworking. This first occurred to me with the intro to the Shadow of the Colossus remake, where among other issues, they included diegetic audio instead of just the music like the original had. It distracts from what I consider one of the finest pieces of music in all of gaming and for me it dramatically alters the tone.

Now with Demon's Souls they seem to have overhauled a lot of the OST, and it sounds vastly inferior. Listen to the score in the original intro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jpD2VXe2cE,

vs the remake:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccZtt7v5Z3c

Not only does the new arrangement sound like some discount LOTR shit, the new sound mixing has the grunts of battle totally drowning out the music. The original has a nice buildup of knocking the protagonist backwards before revealing the skeleton, whereas in the remake he just pops out all "Braaah, chainsaw bear!!!" The reveal of the Dragon God in the original is also much more dramatic, really showcasing his awesome double set of teeth, while in the remake the interesting details of his design don't stand out nearly as much.

They also seem to have completely redone the theme for the Phalanx Demon fight. Original: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMnn5icPI6s Remake: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tJJfoA0Zdo. A decade ago Demon's Souls OST sounded unlike anything I'd ever heard before, and what they've replaced it with doesn't sound bad, but feels like some revamped version of a generic Game of Thrones theme.

The changes they made to the Fat Official are also truly bewildering.

I watched the interview Digital Foundry did with some of the devs at Bluepoint, during which they said a few different variations of "When it comes to changes we tried to make the game that From Soft would have made if they had the power of the PS5," and just... no? I'm pretty sure the creative choices From had for the music had nothing to do with the hardware limitations of the PS3.

This is early game stuff, and I'm not sure how much more of the game I want to spoil for myself on Youtube since again, I am genuinely looking forward to playing it. And these may seem like nitpicks, but it was the subtle touches in tone and atmosphere that went a long way to making Demon's Souls a hit, and the series it spawned a sensation. I truly don't want to shit too hard on Bluepoint since they overall seem to have made something really cool, but I am curious to see what their output will be if they ever start making their own original titles, because based on what we've seen so far, their art direction is rather lacking in the finer points.