This was actually my first Souls game and I loved every second of playing it. The graphics are absolutely stunning, the voice acting great, the gameplay satisfying and the bosses are just...so cool.
It was much less hard than I expected, to be honest. Especially as the royalty class which made this game much more accessible for me as a "souls noob"; and you could indeed outlevel certain areas in the sense that normal mobs were much easier to beat - with a bit of soul grinding.
The only small complaints I'd give are:
- relatively short (I was at 31hrs with 3 optional mini bosses missing)
- lack of armor & loot variety for my desire to customise
- no option to sell items, just store
- lack of integrated lore and cutscenes (even finding letters or similar would've been great)
- no warning that past the last boss the NG+ automatically starts, so I missed out on 3 optional encounters.
I know this is very true to the original, but addressing these points would've elevated my rating to a 10.
Die-hard fans might be outraged, but going back from this to now Dark Souls 3 really feels like a frustrating step backwards. The graphics and art of the game are just not great, especially considering it was released three years after the Witcher 3.
The combat feels clunky, and I have many many more deaths. Replaying and traversing of areas feels stale especially compared to Demon Souls by FromSoftware. I'm excited for their next game, an original IP & not a remake!
