Game Concepts

Soul Form

When you start the game, you are in Body form, your normal living self, but when you die your soul is bound to the Nexus. At this point, you will re-awaken there in Soul form; the downside of this is that you will only have at most 50% of your Body Form HP (with the "Cling Ring" equipped, you can have up to 70%). You do more damage while in soul form compared to body form. There is not much of a difference, but it is noticeable. If you nearly can kill an enemy in one hit but need two strike when in body form, most likely soul form will add the extra "umph" to push the damage to OHKO. You can notice that most of the other NPCs in the nexus are in Body form, and there is one you meet sitting in front of the first archstone who is in Soul form (characteristic slightly transparent look and blue color).

Each time you defeat a world boss, you will automatically be revived if you are in Soul Form, which means you are transformed back to Body form. There are items called "Stone of Ephemeral Eyes" which will also revive you to Body form and full health at any time, but they are not very common. Certain enemys drop this item see: stone-of-ephemeral-eyes-farming

In Soul Form, if you are online, you can invade another player's game as a Black Phantom and if you are victorious you will regain your body. A Soul Form character can also join a Body Form player's game as an ally and will be revived if you help the player defeat a boss in their world. See the section about online play for more.

Nexus

The Nexus is the town hub, so to speak, in this game. It is where you can use the archstones to access any of the five worlds (multiple access points in each, providing you have been to them at least once).
You can also buy equipment, repair/upgrade items, learn magic and miracles, and store items and equipment for later use. At the very top floor you can find the "Pantheon" / hall of fame, where the online portion of the game tracks world stats.

NPCs of Interest

"The Maiden in Black" - Use Souls here to increase main attributes.
"Boldwin" - Blacksmith, Buy Items/Equipment, Repair weapons/Armor, Upgrade Weapons/Shields
"Stockpile Thomas" - Store any item you do not wish to take with you. He will store up to 99 of each item except arrows (999 of them).
"Freke's Apprentice" - Purchase basic Magic and memorize spells you already have
"Disciple of God" - Purchase basic Miracles and memorize miracles you already have

Souls

Souls are the catch all in the game, they are both Currency and Experience. You will use these at shops to purchase and repair and upgrade equipment (also need an item to do upgrades — more later on that), and you need them to buy increases to your stats, which is how you level up.

When you die ALL of the souls you have are dropped in a blood stain, if you make it back to your blood stain you can get all of your souls back. If you die again before you recover a blood stain all souls in that stain are lost. Note that items/weapons/equipment/etc. (basically everything other than souls) are not lost when you die.

Don't look for your bloodstain at the exact point where you died, though. Just like everyone else's bloodstains you see, yours will be left at the place you were about 10 seconds before the instant you died, so if you were running and fell off a cliff to your death, your bloodstain won't be at the bottom, or even just where you fell off, but back in the direction you were running from some seconds before. For example, people who suicide in the Nexus by sprinting up the stairs and jumping off the upper ledge will find their bloodstain almost at the bottom of the stairs near the blacksmith. Your blood stain is easy to distinguish from those of others, since it is larger and more visible, and it has green wisps of soul mist swirling above it. Touching your bloodstain does not take any time, like picking up an item does, so you can even do it during a heated combat if it is in the middle of enemies. You do need to drop your shield for just a moment, click your bloodstain, and then you have to survive the annoying "You Regained Lost Soul" notice obscuring the screen.

Repairing Equipment-
This is done at the blacksmith. I’ve noticed for the most part that weapons are not very expensive to repair and last a long time, whereas armor is very expensive and needs it often.
Durability – When an item's durability degrades close to zero it may break at any time, at which point it loses most of it's effectiveness. Make sure to keep your equipment in good condition.

Experience- (used at the “Maiden in Black” in the nexus not accessible till after you defeat “Phalanx”)
You will use souls to upgrade your main attributes; this is a straight cost that increases every time you buy an upgrade to any stat.

The Five Worlds

World Tendencies

World tendency is a way the game adjusts the individual difficulty levels of each world. Worlds with lighter tendency (towards Pure White) will have enemies with less HP, and doing less damage, but also the experience and drops from enemies are less. Darker tendency worlds (towards Pure Black) will be the opposite, with harder enemies and better loot and experience. You can get an idea of the light/dark state of each world by the shade of color of the archstone in the status menu screen (as above) when you are in the Nexus.

Changing World Tendency:

Towards Black:
- Die in the area while in Body form (that's right, when you die in a world in Body form the game makes it harder to play:)
- Use the Black Eye Stone to invade a game as Black Phantom and successfully defeat another player.

Towards White:
- Defeat Demon bosses, Black Phantom NPCs or Primeval Demons . (larger shift for killing Demon bosses)(Example image of Primeval Demon )
- Defeat Black Phantom players that invade the game.
- Assist a player as a Blue Phantom in coop and successfully kill a boss.

You no longer gain White character tendency by dying as a black phantom.

Note that the world does NOT show its change until you return to the Nexus. Kill (or die) as appropriate, then return to the Nexus to check the affinity map, until the world has reached the desired state.

+ Black World Tendency Events

Black
1-1 - The door on the left near the starting point will be unlocked. You will fight Executioner Miralda (phantom form, requires Pure Black World Tendency) and get Guillotine Axe as a drop. Inside her building, there will be a Colorless Demon's Soul on the plank, there are also Brushwood set items at the bottom (very heavy, make sure you have 58ish carrying weight left)
1-1 - 2x black phantoms near the red knight
1-2 - 2x black phantoms before the boss
1-3 - 2x black phantom mages on top of the walls
1-3 - Primeval demon (on flat platform with 2 crossbowmen, overlooking the end set of soldiers and knights)

2-1 - Primeval demon located at the bottom of the building where enemies were chucking boulders, use a lift to get there.
2-1 - 2 black phantoms with pickaxes behind and above the large lava lizard pit.
2-1 - 1 black phantom with flame brand near the entrance to the cave when entering from the lift, near the blacksmith.
2-2 - 2 small black phantom bugbears in the large lava area, one where the crystal geko can appear near the vendor, and the other at the mouth to the large cave entrance.
2-2 - Wanderer Scirvir (black phantom), drops Talisman of Beast. (Pure Black world only)

3-1 - Black Phantom Guard near Ballista
3-1 - Black Phantom Guard on the way to the first tower
3-1 - Black Phantom Guard in front of the first tower
3-1 - NPC Rydell/Rydyell on the second floor becomes a black phantom (Pure Black world only)
3-2 - Black phantom worms at the swamp
3-2 - Primeval demon at the swamp near the ring of disease resistance. You'll need to walk on the scaffolding to a ledge to get to it.

4-1 - Satsuki (phantom) shows up at the entrance, drops Gripless katana (Pure Black world only)
4-2 - Two black phantom gold skeletons and a black phantom dual-katana skeleton on the ledge before the third Reaper
4-2 - Primeval demon at the secret path (left staircase) near the first reaper

5-2 - Black phantom giant goblins added to various parts of the stage (one to island near first fog, two to island near second fog, one in the shacks area)
5-2 - Black Phantom NPC Selen Vinland (Pure Black world only)
5-2 - Primeval demon at the far end of the swamp, before going up the path that leads to the slug nest

*All Primeval Demons and extra black phantom creatures just require Black World Tendency to show up (close to the blackest it can get).
*All unique NPC Black Phantoms require Pure Black World Tendency to show up (the blackest possible).

+ White World Tendency Events

White, all the following require Pure White World tendency. There are no changes or special events for almost white, only for Pure White.
1-1 - Executioner Miralda in Body form will drop more items (Binded Set & Master's Ring, not Guillotine Axe).
1-1 - No dragons at their usual resting place

2-2 - Wanderer Scirvir, show him Keel Smasher from 2-3 for a Pure Greystone.
2-3 - The debris to the left path will be cleared, you will get an unique extra large sword, Keel Smasher

3-1 - 2F West NPC, Rydell can be rescued if you have the key (see 3-2 below). The reward is Dull Rat's Ring.
3-1 - Nearby, reviously blocked path by debris is accessible now, lots of items including Venerable Sage set and Three-Cornered Hat.
3-1 - 2F East also accessible now, Paring Dagger, Rogue set
3-2 - On top of the first (zombie servant) tower, there will be a bridge leading to the 3-1 2F key.

4-1 - Satsuki appears at the entrance looking for Magic Sword "Makoto"
4-2 - In the hole near Patches, the corpse that was stuck on the pillar will be on the ground now. The corpse will contain Magic Sword "Makoto"

5-1 - Near the first giant goblin, there will be a ladder leading upwards. Climb the ladder and watch out for a giant goblin half way through. Eventually the path leads to three giant goblins guarding the Istarelle spear.
5-2 - Selen in Body form will appear on a tiny island right after the first fog, talk to her to start a sidequest.
5-3 - Garl Vinland (black phantom) will drop Brand and Crest of Vinland sidequest item for Selen.

Read more about World Tendency.

Character Tendency

In addition to the alignment of each world, your character has his own personal tendency (shown by the color of the player avatar in the center of the world tendency screen)

White character tendency:
- Defeat Demon bosses, Black Phantom NPCs or Primeval Demons.
- Defeat Black Phantom players that invade the game.
- Resurrect ally Blue Phantom players with the resurrection miracle.

Note: The Black Phantom NPCs must be unique "named" Black Phantoms (Miralda, Satsuki, etc.). For example, killing (by any method) the two BPs in the Crystal Gecko nest tunnel in Stonefang (2-2) or the three BPs that appear just beyond the Penetrator's hall (1-4) won't adjust your character tendency (at least not after Patch 1.04). Also, you won't receive credit for killing these Black Phantoms with Poison Cloud or by letting them fall to their deaths. You have to beat them in real fights. -StefanieTN

Black character tendency:
- Kill friendly NPCs
- Use the Black Eye Stone to invade a game and successfully defeat another player.

Player Tendency affects the bonuses you get from certain unique equipment, along with other possible (unknown?) uses.

Read more about Character Tendency.