Pro's and Con's as far as can be seen

Okay after reading the interview with EDGE, i'm not particularly happy with anything that Shibuya has said. I'm now going to give an overview of pro's and con's so far from the interview.

These are the Pros and Cons as i see them so far, the confirmation of Dark Souls 2 came out over a week ago, so i make no claims that this is the almighty judgement forever of what is wrong with the game because its barely even been announced but this is what i gather so far.

Pros
- Increase in graphic quality and rendering.
If there was ever one thing i would have to say is that the graphics in dark souls and demon souls were above par for the most part but with characters facial expressions and equipment and things like that did lack. Rendering was also an issue which was fixed. Blighttown was bad for this. This a welcome improvement even if the Vista's in Dark Souls and Demon Souls were great.

- Covenant System made easier
The Covenant system was extremely hard to understand at the start. It is good that it is simplifying ever so slightly but i hope those hidden rewards and objective still remain otherwise their is no real reason to join a covenant.

- Streamlining the Beginning
This is important because it allows people to get a firmer grasp on controls and their importance in playing. It helps people in the controlling of the character when in battle. The game might see an increase in quality of gamers, that's not definite however. There is a con in the fact that part of the difficulty, meaning the game will be easier for any player down the line rather than the people who went to the effort of training with that weapon on that specific character build.

Cons
- Preset Main Character
The fact that the character is created before hand take a really important aspect of the game, being that you are not choosing what you want, rather you are being the told by the game what you are. This is probably one of the worst Con's about this game. They are taking away your right to choose the path you want to take you, trying to dictate the story of what you are doing in Dark Souls II. From the trailer its essentially showing you a "personal" tale about this character. If someone wants that, their are a number of other games to cater to that. Dark Souls was originally designed so people dictated rather than the Publisher.

- Shibuya's Approach
This has been an issue since Dark Souls 2 was announced and "EDGE" published the first snippet of the article it was publishing. Shibuya has said that "he" doesn't like sutilty and he likes things to be more straight forward. He says this is his personal approach. This doesn't cater to the current fans. Sutilty was Miyazaki's First, second and last name. He said that the story will be explained alot more. That's not in the interest of fans but rather in the interest of casual gamers, i say this because that is all that it is. I have yet to find a lorehead alive to say they wanted the story to be more accessible. Miyazaki's personal approach worked because its what fans wanted, Shibuya's personal approach as the same as that of a vast majority of AAA developers trying to get things off the shelves.

- Namco Bandai's Approach
The developer is dictating to us as fans what we want in this game and people are sitting by and leaving it happen "hoping" that the game will be good. That's not how it goes. We dictate what we want and they produce to satiate us. They don't produce games for them to buy, but for us to buy. So i think its only right that they listen to the Souls community and get someone more suited for Dark Souls. I'm not saying Miyazaki should get back on the series because he's already said that he doesn't know where to take the series but someone who can do the game justice rather than a developer that helped in a mecha game and has the polar opposite approach towards a game we love for its sutilty and its mystery.

I think it's far too early to have any solid opinions.

I dont think people should take this 'central character' thing too literally. Think about it.

If you have 1 fixed central character, that means no character build types or customisation, thus no multiplayer.

Thats not very likely is it.

DS and DeS both had 'central' characters that the lore revolved around, the chosen one etc etc but the central character is basically YOU, and whatever build you choose to engineer.

I agree I am worried about a 'Main' character aswell, but I agree that surely the development team knows not to mess about with that. I think there are a few possible explanations for the confusion/fear.
1. The 'main' hero is a hero important to the story, but is not necessarily the player character aka you and I, but rather an Oscar or Ostrava etc. In the initial Demons Souls trailer, we see Knight Ostrava, or at least someone in fluted armour for the majority of the cinematic.
2. Poor translation. There has only been one interview thus far, and you can guarantee that the new director was speaking Japanese with a translator present. Sometimes things get lost in these situations, and miscommunications can occur. Inflections are hard to read, and it can be difficult to know exactly what 'main hero' could mean to the new game.

I do, however, share your worries. My favorite thing about the souls series is the ability to create your own unique character and make each journey personal. I/we can only have faith in the souls development team that they would know how important this feature is to the DS community and to the core mechanics of the game.

Also, not to be picky, but I had trouble understanding your post due to the spelling of *subtlety*, maybe a quick edit could help other readers