Dark Souls
A dark fantasy series known for its punishing difficulty.
Dark Souls is a series of dark fantasy action role-playing games made by FromSoftware and released by Bandai Namco Entertainment. Hidetaka Miyazaki created the series, which kicked off with the first *Dark Souls* in 2011. Two sequels followed: *Dark Souls II* in 2014 and *Dark Souls III* in 2016. Critics have praised the series heavily, and its notorious difficulty is one of its most talked-about features. Many consider the original *Dark Souls* one of the greatest games ever made. By 2025, the series had sold more than 39 million copies worldwide. Other FromSoftware titles—such as *Demon's Souls*, *Bloodborne*, *Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice*, and *Elden Ring*—share similar ideas and helped establish the "Soulslike" subgenre.
**Setting and Narrative**
Each game takes place in a haunted realm: Lordran, Drangleic, and Lothric, respectively. Players battle knights, dragons, phantoms, demons, and other monstrous or supernatural beings. The core of both story and gameplay revolves around fighting for souls and a cycle of gaining, losing, and recovering items. The worlds are consistently gloomy and decaying, with stories that loop around themes of fire and its extinguishment, as well as corruption and rebirth. Recurring plot elements include dealings with shady religious figures, banishing phantoms, and confronting demons in grim encounters. At the end of each game, the player character must decide whether to relight the "first flame" or let it go out—a world-altering choice that, oddly, has been made by others before.
**Gameplay**
Players see the action from a third-person perspective, exploring connected environments while using weapons and magic to fight enemies. Progressing the story requires defeating bosses, and players can interact with non-playable characters along the way. Each game lets players create a protagonist with a customizable gender, appearance, name, and starting class. Available classes include knights, barbarians, thieves, and mages, each with unique starting gear and stats that can be adjusted based on the player's choices and experience as they advance. Souls earned from combat serve both as experience points for leveling up and as currency for buying items. Tougher enemies yield more souls.
A key mechanic is how the series handles progress, death, and improvement. Bonfires act as checkpoints: resting at one fully restores health and othe
- First release
- 2011
- Developer
- FromSoftware
- Publisher
- Bandai Namco Entertainment
- Creator
- Hidetaka Miyazaki
- Genre
- Dark fantasy, action role-playing
- Number of main games
- 3
- Copies shipped as of 2025
- Over 39 million
Lore & Background
Set within the haunted lands of Lordran, Drangleic, and Lothric, respective to each game entry, the games place the player in fights against knights, dragons, phantoms, demons, and other monstrous or supernatural entities. Battling for souls and cycles of item accretion, loss, and recovery, are central to each's narrative and gameplay. Dark Souls games parallel one another in their often gloomy and decrepit environments, their overarching cyclic stories centering around fire and extinguishment, and common themes about corruption and rebirth. Recurring plot points include exchanges with suspect religious figures, casting off phantoms, and grave encounters with demons. At the end of each game, the character decides whether to reignite the 'first flame' or allow it to fade, a world-shaping choice that, mysteriously, others have made before.
Reader's Guide
The Dark Souls series is significant for its high level of difficulty and its influence on the creation of the Soulslike subgenre. Other FromSoftware games, including Demon's Souls, Bloodborne, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and Elden Ring, share several related concepts. The series' core mechanics include bonfires as checkpoints, soul-based leveling and currency, and a death system that encourages learning from mistakes. Online interaction is integrated into the single-player experience through ghost sightings, bloodstains, messages, and multiplayer covenants. The series has been critically acclaimed, with the first game often cited as one of the greatest of all time. Dark Souls III was both critically and commercially successful, with critics calling it a worthy and fitting conclusion to the series. In 2015, Miyazaki said that Dark Souls III would likely be the last of the series, with FromSoftware choosing to move onto new games of unrelated IPs in the future.
Did You Know?
- Dark Souls is considered a spiritual successor to Demon's Souls (2009).
- Dark Souls II is the only game in the series where director Hidetaka Miyazaki did not reprise his role, although he was still involved in supervision.
- The series had shipped over 39 million copies worldwide as of 2025.
- A comic book by Titan Comics based on the series debuted alongside the release of Dark Souls III in 2016.
More in Soulslike video games 1-24
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