I recently heard it was a brutal experience and have been thinking of trying it as a challenge.
Here is a list of the changes that were made in one of the balancing updates: https://pastebin.com/HxMjdaBx
Some of the notable changes were:
- Upgrade scaling buffed 5-20%
- Overall increase in souls gained (~2-2.5 times more)
- Damage reduced on some mobs?
- HP lowered on some mobs?
- Reduced acquisition range on normal enemies.
- Supposedly reduced poise on some enemies.
- Bosses drop Humanity and Homeward Bones
- Ghosts and Skeletons give souls now.
- Twinkling Titanite drop rate improved.
- Pyromancers in Catacombs drop Skull Lanterns.
- Darkwraiths in New Londo drop Dark Hand.
- Male Undead Merchant: Also sells bottomless box
- Female Undead Merchant: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts
- Andrei: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts
- Domnhal of Xena: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts, Master Key (5000)
- Giant Blacksmith: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts, Small Titanite Shards, Large Tit Shards, Twinkling (8000 per, inf amount), Green Shards, Repair box, upgrade boxes
- Vamos: Arrows / Crossbolts, Small Tit, Large tit, Repair box / upgrade boxes
- Inglwood: Sells Transient Curses
How is it different from the patched version?
Updated the post with the change log I was able to find, seems like they were translated so may not be 100% accurate