I’ve been playing Demon on and off for a long time, and after the final update to the game’s contents, and several playthroughs to complete it successfully, I thought I’d give feedback about my experience... Mostly about things that, in my opinion, were unbalanced or otherwise detrimental to the overall enjoyment of the game.
I’ll try to be as objective as possible. Of course, I’m no stranger to salt and raging, and Demon made me go: “Oh, that’s bu***hit!” more than once, but the following will hopefully be input of some value, and not just the ruminations of a malcontent. I hope that this will be of use to Herbie, though the big man is obviously free to manage his game however he wants!
And with that out of the way, let’s dive straight into it. The following points are in no particular order, though I’ve at least endeavored to go topic by topic, for the sake of a modicum of organization.
Titan’s Fist/Aux Upgrades Are Overpowered
The reason I’m starting with this is because I believe it’s the game’s most glaring imbalance.
Until recently, with Demon, I’d always gone with a Magic-oriented backliner build, making attempts with a variety of Relics—mostly the Eye and the Mask, to get the most out of every floor. Every time, I found it difficult to progress, as it was hard to keep a good frontline of Demons while making sure that I was not obliterated myself.
The idea of trying the Titan’s Fist came to me when I encountered a Titan Wraith by the name of Chills, which came close to decimating my entire party. The fight was an absolute slog, because every time I managed to chip at Chills’ health, it just recovered with Lucky Aid. It went on for a while, until Chills was… not so lucky with Lucky Aid, finally allowing me to make a dent in it, and that was how the Chilly cookie crumbled.
Anyway, I died on Floor 20-something to an unfortunate encounter with Corpse-summoned Demons, and I looked at Titan's Fist and thought: “Why the heck not?” At this point, I had been through multiple failed runs with my go-to build, and I thought a change of pace could be fun, if nothing else.
I got to the end of the Tower on my very first attempt.
The Aux Upgrades turn you and your Demons into such war machines that you’re half-indestructible. For most of the encounters, I didn’t even need to try, and when I found myself in a pinch, I just had to leisurely back away, letting an Aux’d Demon do the tanking while I got a comfortable distance away. Then I Dismissed, healed and went back to mete out punishment.
See, the thing is, in a “normal” playthrough, you have to manage a menagerie of half a dozen demons, if not more, which is expensive. And you have to manage them carefully in battle, Summoning and Dismissing them to avoid them dying and your party getting overwhelmed, which takes time (particularly with the Fast Summon/Dismiss Upgrades being so flippin’ expensive). This means that it’s hard to get a good rhythm, particularly against tough encounters, and especially against Heroes, who can easily tear through the HP of even a sturdy Demon.
With Titan’s Fist, you have no such issue, because any one of your party members (starting with you) is a powerhouse, and you can easily afford to make them even more powerful with Copy Abilities, Refined Brands, Fused Demons, and such, since you have less Demons to spend Credits on. I was running a Physical-heavy build that relied on Bloodthirst and Crusader for healing, Bloodlust to keep my SP up, and dual-type attacks (Storm Needle, Magma Force, Glacier Fall, etc.) to get around Resistances and Immunities. And all of my Demons were similarly outfitted, except usually one Magic user that I honestly didn’t get much use out of. Pretty much all of the encounters were a bloodbath, and even the final floors were a breeze. I was stunned. The only opponents I couldn’t crush were Perseus (but he’s purposefully busted anyway; more on that later) and Jeanne d’Arc (more on that later too).
So in my opinion, either Titan’s Fist needs a debuff, or the other Relics need a way to deal with hardships more smoothly. I would recommend making Summoning and Dismissing cost only half an action, and making Fast Summon/Dismiss less expensive to get, because they’re so vital, particularly when you’re in a bind. Even with my Titan’s Fist, I got the first Summon and Dismiss Upgrades, because spending an entire turn Summoning or Dismissing a Demon is really rough.
Speed Upgrades Are So Good
Being able to act faster is vital in a game like Demon, where staying in control of the battle is paramount, things can go downhill fast, and a single turn can make a big difference, particularly when your opponent has a very dangerous Ability with a cooldown. Therefore, being able to increase your Speed is highly valuable, and conversely, Demons with low Speed are easily dead weight.
I got Soul Armor just in time for Turdak, and managed to scrounge up just enough Credits to get its sweet sweet 120% Speed (not to mention the Body and Dark immunities, which are scrumptious). Turdak was later replaced with Anansi, since it had better Immunities/Resistances/Weaknesses, but here too, the delicious 120% Speed was the deciding factor. And to this 120% Speed, I also added a Brand that gave me more HP Regen and more Speed.
Meanwhile, for my Demons, I was lucky enough to stumble upon a Brand for Unmodified Demons that gave a Speed bonus. Toward the end of the game, the Speed bonus amounted to something like +33%, which was oh so good.
I honestly saw little reason to increase anything other than Speed. Sure, reduced SP Costs are cool, but they were already plenty reduced with Aux Power, and Bloodlust did the rest of the job. And Stat increases may be nice, but not as nice as multiple actions, particularly considering…
Running Away Is One Of The Best Strategies
As I alluded to, being able to run away from battles is a huge asset in Demon, since it can spare you and your Demons a grim fate. And you don’t want to leave your Demons behind to die. Sure, your Relic will save them, but they’ll be out of commission for a looong time, and you don’t want that. And sure, Items can get you out of a bind, but it’s easy to eat through those, and in the first place, Items like the Heal Gem that can really turn the tide of a battle are exceedingly rare.
So to be able to efficiently run away, you want Speed, of course, and you absolutely want the Mobility Ability, since it will give you a major edge toward such a purpose (and it will make you faster-moving to get from one enemy to another, too, which is a nice bonus). As soon as possible, in Demon, I try to get the lesser version of Mobility (whose name eludes me, I’m sorry to say), and of course Mobility, usually via the Stymphalides. And it honestly feels like kind of a shame that Mobility is such an obligatory Ability to have.
Some Abilities Seem To Exist Only To Make The Player Miserable
I’m thinking in particular about Abilities that drain Max HP, or those with a Miracle or Soul cooldown.
The common point of those Abilities is that they’re far less valuable for the player, and that enemies can give players a lot of trouble with them. When you’re attacked by a pack of enemies with Vigor Drain, it can be easy to lose half your Max HP, which is then a huge pain to recover. Meanwhile, sure, it’s nice to have temporary HP, but Vigor Drain (and similar Abilities) are super expensive, which make them not very viable to have, and thus not worth the previous Ability spot.
Similarly, enemies don’t care much about using a Miracle or Soul Ability, since they’re just a passing encounter here to hinder you anyway, whereas you’ll need a lot of time to recover them, making them next to useless.
I know that when I reached Floors 25-something, I hated encounters with enemies that had Miracle Abilities, particularly the one I forgot the name of that buffs all stats for everyone in a large radius. It made encounters so stupidly hard that my go-to strategy was to let the enemy use that Ability, run away, wait for it to end, and come back. And if there was another Demon with that Ability in the same group, well, rinse and repeat. It was just tedious and unfun.
I know that the icing on the cake was when I encountered Jeanne d’Arc. Oh my god, Jeanne d’Arc. She was one of the only enemies that even my mighty Titan’s Fist couldn’t defeat. Not because she was too tough, but because her Saint’s Slash (I believe that was the name?) enabled her to keep spamming Vitae, making her basically invulnerable. Even once I had dealt with all her Specters, I was unable to deal with her. I guess that she could conceivably be handled by permaStunning her (but good luck with that) or Silencing her, but I had no such recourse and was thus forced to throw the towel.
So ultimately, I would really recommend making such Abilities less penalizing for the player, because as it is, encountering enemies with them is so punishing.
“Protect For X Turns” Recruitment Conditions Can Be Unmanageable
Demon is a game where it’s next to impossible to protect an ally. There is no Ability or anything that can make you take hits for someone else, and it’s very hard to deny a line of fire to your enemies. So the best way to preserve a Demon’s life is to heal it or cast defensive buffs on it… And even then, if they’re getting focused or are Weak to enemy attacks, they’ll go down fast.
But at least, with your Demons, which you can order around to a degree and Dismiss, it's manageable. When you’re dealing with a Demon you can’t control, you’re up a creek. Sure, for Demons like Acteon or Pele, you can manage fine enough, since you’re attacked by wimpy Minions, for in the case of Medusa and Sati, the poor girls got absolutely obliterated. They barely lasted a few turns, and there was nothing I could do.
Of course, this may be due to me running fairly selfish builds, and therefore not being able to heal or support them, but even then, I don’t think there’s much I could have done. It would help if you could take the aggro better, or give instructions to the Demon you have to protect. Otherwise, the idiot will get themselves killed easily.
A Lot Of Items Are… Not Really Worth It?
Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve found that I’ve very rarely used Items, only doing it when it was my only recourse, when I was out of SP and couldn’t find anything better to do, or when I couldn’t be arsed to retreat and come back later to finish a battle.
Most Items (like Heal Stones, or Guardian Gems), I find, are not that valuable, since you have to dedicate an entire turn to using them, which is kind of a big ask. And Pure Stones are, in my experience, mostly good for curing Max HP loss (they can cure status ailments too, naturally, but more often than not, enemies will just reapply them immediately…), and even then, they give back so little Max HP that it’s miserable. Of course, Chakra Stones are great, but they’re very rare. And similarly, Peace Tokens (probably not the right name) and Offerings are great, but very rare… which makes sense. Same for Cards, which are good, but so uncommon that I was very hesitant about using them.
So yeah, aside from exceptional Items like Infusions (er, I think that was the name? The one that gives you +5 in a stat and 50% healing), I rarely found myself valuing Items, which I thought was kind of a shame. Maybe it would help if using them only cost half an action? And maybe there could be a Relic Upgrade to be able to do it for free once per turn?
Guilty Is Too Good
Initially, I thought that Guilty healed HP in proportion to the damage you deal to the target, but then, I found out that it heals 10% of your HP, which is... honestly busted. And what makes it even more cracked is that if you're using dual-type attacks (like Magma Force or Storm Needle), you get the healing twice. I don't know if it's a bug or a feature, but that sounds like something that needs to be fixed.
I really felt the effect of Guilty when I was dealing with... a Hero I forget the name of. The Knightess who can Parry up the wazoo and heals by making you Guilty. I've always found her an absolute ordeal to deal with, and even with my Titan's Fist, the best way I found to handle her was letting Python tank (since it's Resistant to Slashing) while I was taking potshots with Storm Needle.
The problem with Guilty is that you can easily find yourself in a situation where the weakest links among your enemies will be easily usable as HP sources. And when you're dealing with packs of enemies, if you can Guilt several at the same time (for example with Crusader, which is so good), you're pretty much invulnerable. It means that solo enemies like Heroes, which are a huge pain to fight in the first place, will be all the harder to deal with, particularly if they can Guilt you themselves.
By contrast, I found pretty much all the other Heroes easy to deal with. Even among all the Heroes at the top of the Tower, none except Jeanne d'Arc gave me any trouble.
Aaaand I’d say that’s pretty much it. It’s already long enough, after all ^^’
I’ve tried to focus on the more salient points I’ve noticed, but if further input is required, I’ll do my best to provide useful feedback.
I don’t know if balance and gameplay updates of such a caliber are in the stars. I believe they would help make the game feel more varied, fun, and balanced, but if they’re not to be, well, that’d be understandable! Herbie has already put an enormous amount of pro bono work in Demon, and I’d definitely understand wanting to lay this big project to rest.
Many thanks to Herbie for making such a neat game that I’ve sunk so many days of my life into, and best of luck to him in his future endeavors.
And of course, to all fellow Summoners, good luck in the Tower!
