At E3 2013, Namco Bandai showed off the latest iteration of their highly anticipated Dark Souls II behind doors to select members of the press.

Before the presentation began, a rep reminded everyone that, despite what some still might believe (possibly due to this interview), the second Dark Souls is just as grueling and unforgiving as the first one. Just like they’ve done countless times over the past number of weeks and months.

Afterwards, I asked co-director Yui Tanimura if people still believe that Dark Souls II has been made easier, even after all the assurances to the contrary. As well as if it continues to be a challenge to assure those who have been upset by such assumptions that such concerns are simply unfounded. He replied:

“Coming from Japan, it’s hard to fully comprehend why and how much the North American and European audience keeps thinking it’s going to be easier. With that being said, if you take a look at the demo, and also played the demo, it’s going to be pretty clear that the difficulty will be just as high as necessary as before. We have been constantly repeating this, because we did start off with a misleading comment earlier on. But at the same time, I’m not too worried about expressing the difficulty of the game. I’m sure players will see the footage, see the b-roll, and start to understand that it’s going to be just as challenging or even more so.”

This isn’t the first time Tanimura has said to us that he has no intention of making Dark Souls II easier. He said the exact same thing when I asked him about the game’s level of challenge back in April.

Dark Souls II is slated for release in March 2014 for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. You can read our recent hands-on impressions of the game here.