A Latecomer’s Guide to Souls

Death, rebirth, and triumph.

enter the Painting, and see what lies beyond

I bought a PS4, my first ever console, in November of 2018. Along with it I got a Spider-Man game, which I didn’t care for, Horizon Zero Dawn, which I liked well enough (with some growing misgivings over time), and Bloodborne.

I bought Bloodborne because it was, according to friends and random people online, the “approachable” soulslike. It was the different one; the one without the baggage of an entire series of convoluted and intimidating entries, the one you could play by itself. I played it, and, after my fair share of frustration and a couple lengthy breaks, loved it. It’s a great game, and a decent place to start the series.

It is not, however, the only way to start the series. That should be obvious. But the Souls series, and its relatives, have a fearsome, even infamous reputation, one that prevented me from enjoying what is now probably my favorite game series for many years. Behind that reputation are stories about the decay of civilization, the cruelty of powerful institutions and those who lead them, the perseverance of people dedicated to carving out a better world, the festering rot of nationalism, and the end of the world, and it is all well-worth seeing. So, if you haven’t played any of the games, or have only dipped your toes in around the edges, but found your interest piqued by the new Elden Ring trailer or by the Demon’s Souls remake, this is for you.

I’ll start with some general tips, then move on to more specific recommendations and notes for each game, giving suggestions of where to start (and where not to start). As a note, I like every game listed here: I just like some more than others, and even ones I do like a lot I might recommend against as a starting place. However, if you don’t want to read a whole bullshit essay about the granularities of where or where not to start and what or what not to do, here’s my quick and dirty suggestion: Start with Dark Souls. The remastered edition works great (I played on PC with a PS4 controller, and it’s also available on consoles), holds up well, and gives you a great jumping-off point for the rest of the series.

Now that the “play things in release order, dumbass” people are somewhat mollified, let’s get to it.

Note: I really like Sekiro, but it’s separate enough from the Souls ethos such that I have decided not to include it here. Also, while I’m in the middle of a playthrough, I have not finished it recently. Please see the linked piece for my thoughts on it.

General Tips (for use when you’re actually playing the games)

1. Understand that dying is not failure. In fact, it’s progress. If you can identify what caused your death, and learn from the experience, you’re moving forward. The game will never stop you from coming back and trying again; it is built to be overcome, and balanced to seem overwhelming so that victory will taste sweet. Also, dying is often pretty funny, and if you can learn to laugh along with the game as it pushes you off a ledge into a pit of worms or crowns you with a giant boulder, you’ll make great progress.
2. Be willing to seek help. This comes in multiple forms. First, in all the below games, there is a cooperator mechanic that allows you to either summon in a friend or a stranger to aid you. But second, if you’re truly stuck on something and it’s beginning to suck the fun out of the experience — look it up! Maybe that’s controversial, but far better in my opinion to look up the mechanics of a frustrating boss or encounter than to quit because a certain thing just didn’t hit your brain right. Fextralife is there for a reason.
3. Don’t get greedy. You’ve probably heard this one. It’s pretty self-explanatory, but: Take what you can get, and be patient. This applies in two ways: First, don’t die one hit away from beating a tough boss because you went for an extra attack instead of backing off to heal. Second, when you have a ton of souls and are deciding between forging ahead or going back to a bonfire to level up and rest, you should almost always do the second, no matter how tempting it is to keep going.
4. You can mostly trust messages. There are lots of stories about Dark Souls players screwing each other over in various ways, but in my experience, other players are helpful more often than not. Read the messages they leave as you go along and you’ll learn about secret passageways, ambushes, friendly NPCs, and more.
5. Upgrade a weapon. You don’t need to find a single weapon and stick with it for the whole game, but it’s good to prioritize one that really seems to work for you and make sure it’s keeping up with the curve.
6. Use a controller. Sorry, PC players. These games are simply not built for mouse and keyboard. Any major company’s controller from this generation or last will probably do, but the new Xbox Core controller seems especially great for PC gaming at the moment.
7. Plan around shortcuts. The levels in most Souls games are interconnected and twisty, designed so that players must memorize the layout to navigate effectively. However, in many situations, areas can be accessed in multiple ways, and it is often the case that a level can be made much less arduous by looking carefully and finding a shortcut to ease your journey. Additionally, areas are often less complex than they appear, and most are laid out fairly simply once you understand their underlying logic.
8. If an area seems too hard, it probably is. Though the games will tend to guide you towards a certain progression, they’re not railroaded, and that means you can find yourself in places you are not at all prepared for. If you find the extra challenge fun, go for it — maybe you’ll get some nice items early — but if it seems overwhelming, you may have missed a path earlier that leads somewhere a bit more suited to where you’re at in the game.
9. Build simply. Character builds in Souls games may look complicated, but in reality they’re pretty straightforward. The stats that sound like they govern physical attributes do, and the ones that sound like they govern magic do as well. When you hover over an impending level you are about to buy, it will highlight which stats are being increased. I’d recommend a simple build focusing on decent physical damage, decent HP, and a decent amount of stamina for your first character.
10. Let go. Above all, these games want you to succeed. It sucks to lose all those souls you’ve worked so hard for; it sucks when you almost kill a boss that’s been giving you trouble. But you can get those souls back quicker than you’d think, quicker than the first time. You’ll get that boss next time; or, if you don’t, maybe a cooperator or a new strategy is all you need to move forward. Don’t feel bad if you have to whip out a bow or some other “cheap” strategy to overcome a challenge. Souls wants you to win, and it doesn’t really care how.

your new best friend

The following will be a quick breakdown of each game, whether or not it’s a good starting point for experiencing the series, and what to be aware of for each one. This will obviously include my own personal feelings on each game, and thus is entirely subjective, but I hope it can be useful all the same.

Note: All games are played with all available DLC and judged accordingly. Since most of the games are getting on the older side, complete editions are easily accessible and often affordable.

Demon’s Souls Remake (2020): First off, a disclaimer. I have not played the original Demon’s Souls. I do feel slightly bad about this, but there’s basically nothing else I’d want to play on the PS3, which is also kind of a pain to acquire at the moment. C’est la vie.

Should you start here? No. There are two main reasons for this. First, it’s a PS5 exclusive, and thus a pain in the ass to acquire. But even if that’s not a barrier for you, I would recommend against starting here. The Demon’s Souls remake suffers from a key issue: Feeling out of step with both modern game design and with the series it’s a part of. I’ll get into my reasoning below, but basically, it simultaneously reads as too old and out of touch with what the player would want and too pretty and shiny and generic fantasy-y to really feel like a Souls game. If I had to pick a least favorite from all of these, it would be this one. If you have a PS3, I could see an argument for going back and starting there, but without online support/multiplayer I probably still wouldn’t recommend it.

What I like: The startlingly good character creator, a couple very beautiful environments, a few really engaging and clever boss fights (such as the Storm King and the Old Hero), the straightforwardness of its story, and Latria. Latria is, to be clear, a miserable, cramped dungeon full of mindflayers and shrieking prisoners and the like, but it’s a brilliantly designed level that is genuinely harrowing to traverse. Also, the Maiden in Black is really cute.

What I dislike: Archaic or poorly implemented mechanics, such as the item load system (which limits how much you can carry) and the world tendency system (which tries to model how “good” and “bad” the outcomes in various areas are), as well as more general design and mechanics that have not benefited from years of Souls experience. Shortcuts are few and far between, bosses are often boring puzzles that become ludicrously easy once solved (I’m looking at you, Dragon God), and boss runs (the path you have to take to reach a boss fight) are often long and over-complicated, sometimes resulting in you having to retread an entire area in order to reach the boss. Weapon movesets are limited and not super interesting, and upgrading is needlessly complicated. Lastly, the remake leans heavily into a more generic fantasy aesthetic that is at odds with the unique style that FromSoftware has cultivated in its titles.

Oh, and farming for grass to regain HP is annoying.

In general: Overall, I enjoyed my time with the Demon’s Souls Remake, but I cannot recommend it as a good entry point into the series.

Dark Souls (2011, 2018): As a note, I played the 2018 remaster of Dark Souls, not the original 2011 release. However, my understanding is that the changes were mostly about performance/streamlining the multiplayer, so as far as I know the differences are pretty minimal.

Should you start here? Yes! As I said near the beginning, if you asked me for my best, easiest answer for where to start with the Souls series, it would be this. Dark Souls Remastered runs great, feels great, and gives new players a good on-ramp for enjoying the series as a whole. The core experience just works really well, and it’s also exciting to see what develops from here in the following games, both mechanically and narratively. If you’re a release order person, I probably don’t need to convince you, but having recently played the series from start to finish, I can say confidently that it works as an entry point. It’s not the only place to start, but it’s probably the top contender.

What I like: Dark Souls really is the Dark Souls of Dark Souls. The atmosphere is incredible, decaying and beautiful and suggesting of a once-burgeoning world made now into vestiges. Memorable characters like Lautrec and Solaire set a standard for the rest of the games, and the story of the Chosen Undead and the decrepit world of Lordran feels like classic dark fantasy in the best way. So many of the levels are a masterclass in game design, fluidly alternating between modes, evoking emotional response from players, frustrating just enough to make it feel like a challenge, encouraging fun duels and tense encounters. The weapons feel good, combat feels weighty and powerful but dangerous, and the bosses are tricky and challenging in a variety of fun ways. The DLC is tremendous, with a couple of my favorite boss fights in the series, period (Artorias…I love you). Also, Dark Sun Gwyndolin is major gender presentation goals.

What I dislike: Some mechanics, like dodging and the weight system, feel pretty clunky and will be improved upon in later games. Also, as many have said before, the last third of the game feels distinctly rushed, with lots of reskinned bosses and odd level design choices. The limitation on selling items is annoying, considering how many you get, and while I mostly like the aesthetic of the game, it does show its age in places and occasionally becomes dreary in a samey way, instead of a compelling one. The way bonfires and teleporting work in this one is also a bit limiting and silly. Lastly, the Tomb of Giants area is just legit unfun, and the Catacombs aren’t much better.

In general: Start with Dark Souls if you care about release order, don’t have any hang-ups about playing “older” games, or have a specific love for dark fantasy and the aesthetics and themes it’s drawing on. In general, you should probably just start with Dark Souls.

Dark Souls II (2014): I played the Scholar of the First Sin edition of this game, which adds an ending, remixes several of the areas and item locations, and includes all the DLC expansions. I can’t speak to the original version of the game, which is difficult to obtain in 2021.

Should you start here? No. It’s the second in the series, and it’s not even the most recent one. Why would you want to?

What I like: For better and for worse, Dark Souls II is the most anime Dark Souls game. It has the biggest swords, the goofiest outfits, the most bosses, the most melodramatic moments. It even has a cast of characters who genuinely care about you and try to support you, making Majula — the “home base” in Dark Souls II — genuinely feel like a welcome relief whenever you return there to craft, level up, or just chill out. Unlike Dark Souls, it knows what sunlight is. It also improves on the formula in some key ways: It changes the way your health recovery works, for the better, the way item repair works, for the better, the way traversal from area to area works, for the better, and makes the game a little less reliant on safe-shield play, encouraging a more aggressive approach. The DLC especially has a few incredible bosses, ones who raise the bar in terms of tension, complexity, and flavor for the series. This entry also marks the first time From has worked with Yuka Kitamura, who composes some incredible pieces for both this game and the upcoming Dark Souls III. It lets you wield two big, sick swords at the same time, something I’m sad the other games don’t let you do.

Also, it has an HRT coffin, which is neat.

What I dislike: Dark Souls II was maligned on its release, and unfortunately I can understand why. It’s obvious they didn’t have the time or the dev resources to make it the way they wanted to, but that doesn’t change the facts: The game feels sloppy in some very distinct ways, ways that detracted from my overall enjoyment on a regular basis. Animations are often stiff and awkward, inputs don’t work right sometimes, and graphically it’s barely a step up from a game that came out in 2011. It has an interesting story, but that story is marred by flashes of misogyny in odd and unexpected places, frequently distracting me from the parts I was enjoying. Most frustrating for me were a couple facts about the core design. First, there are way, way too many boss fights, many of them boring and forgettable in the extreme. Second, the level design is generally a significant step down: Not only does the world not feel interconnected and contiguous the way it does in Dark Souls, but it often feels like a hallway filled with an endless supply of dudes, padded to make the game feel bigger than it is. This is exemplified by a frustrating design choice: To make enemies stop respawning once you’ve killed them enough times. Like Demon’s Souls, this results in unnecessarily long and annoying boss runs. It also encourages extremely boring, safe play and makes the game far, far longer than it has to be, while making any grinding you want to do tedious and overly complicated. Of course, you would have to do something like this, to make forward progress possible given the levels they’ve designed, but it’s emblematic of a fundamental flaw in the way the game is laid out.

In general: Despite my frustrations, I really liked Dark Souls II. It has low lows, but it also has high highs, and despite the lack of Hidetaka Miyazaki’s involvement (the director of other Souls titles), it’s still an engaging game with interesting things to say. However, I truly see no reason why anyone would want to begin their Souls journey here.

Dark Souls III (2016): I have played Dark Souls III through twice, first on PS4 in 2019 and second in March/April 2021 on PC.

Should you start here? You can. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it, as the story takes pieces from the first two games and that context makes things much more impactful, but it is the “nicest” looking, most polished, most modern entry of the mainline Dark Souls games. Though I played Bloodborne first, it was my first actual Dark Souls game, and I really enjoyed it! That said, I wish my trepidation about older games had been lesser and that I’d just started with the original. Unless you truly are bouncing off of Dark Souls, or the aesthetic of the original is just too dreary for you, I’d recommend against starting here. I would still choose it over Dark Souls II or the Demon’s Souls Remake as an entry point, though.

What I like: You can read some of my thoughts on Dark Souls III here, but broadly, I think the game does a tremendous job of pulling the threads of the series together. Dark Souls has always been about class, and power, and the tragedy of never-ending institutional violence, and Dark Souls III brings that narrative in with aplomb. As you fight your way through fallen kings and champions, as you watch the world decay and shift before your eyes, you begin to question whether letting the Fire fade, letting this world and its trappings die, is such a bad thing after all. The game is also a cleaner, sharper version of Dark Souls, with subtle changes to make the game work better: Tightly designed areas with consistent intervals between bonfires and shortcuts, a challenging but rarely frustrating curve for bosses and other enemies, fully-fleshed weapon movesets complete with unique specialized attacks, a wide array of items and outfits with which to customize your character, and so forth. The DLC introduces the best big creature fight (spoiler: It’s a dragon) in the whole series, and the game also includes the Dancer of the Boreal Valley, who is one of my favorite boss fights as well as character designs in the series. It also has great music, and the Ringed City especially has some incredible atmospheric art and sound design.

What I dislike: It’s a little too safe. The changes, while welcome, are around the edges and don’t really set the game apart from its predecessors. Also, the first few areas are noticeably less interesting than those that follow, which makes for a bit of a slow start. More than anything else, though, I really hate those fucking swamp crabs.

In general: I really like Dark Souls III! Maybe it’s because I played it first, but it’s still probably my favorite. It’s good! It’s a great tragic capstone to a great series, and I’m glad they framed things the way they did.

I think this might be the warmest lighting in all of Bloodborne

Bloodborne (2015): Similar to Dark Souls III, I have played this game twice: Once in early 2019, then again in spring 2021. The only significant difference between playthroughs was that this time I used an exploit to get all three endings and that I actually did the Chalice Dungeons.

Should you start here? Depends. If you, like me, had a difficult time selling yourself on what seemed like a daunting and dreary series, and if you, like me, are too easily swayed by how pretty something looks, then Bloodborne may be the right starting point for you. Additionally, if you really, really like cosmic and gothic horror and are more middling on dark fantasy, then Bloodborne may be more your speed. Also, it does generally teach you good habits, such as how to dodge well, so in that regard it can actually make some of the other games easier, which is nice. I’d recommend Bloodborne as a starting point over any other game in the series save Dark Souls, but it comes in at a definite second place.

What I liked: Bloodborne is fast and frenetic in a way no other Souls-style game is. Combat is aggressive and vicious, balletic and precise, with quick movement and fury your only defenses against creatures far beyond your ken. This ethos is typified in the rallying mechanic, which gives you a brief window to regain HP by attacking after you take damage, but quick step dodges and other mechanical alterations also shift the combat style in a fundamental way. The creature and level designs are often legitimately harrowing in a way that Dark Souls designs are not, which adds to the sense of tension and the sense of release when you triumph. Oppressive, weird, and dreamlike atmosphere helps to create a sense of overwhelming, wondrous dread. Even after playing through all the other games, bosses such as Ludwig and Lady Maria remain standouts, and the Doll remains one of my favorite characters in any FromSoft game. The game’s interest in how powerful religious institutions can exert their influence over people in small and large ways, sometimes crushing them, sometimes twisting them, sometimes propelling them towards something strange and beyond anyone’s control, is a testament to Miyazaki’s consistent interest in class and the historical use of power. And, of course, who doesn’t love weird transforming weapons (Sword that’s also a giant hammer? Cane that’s also a whip? Sword that’s also another, bigger sword?) and faux-nineteenth century British horror garb.

What I disliked: I don’t actually think the core narrative thrust (which I won’t spoil, obviously) in Bloodborne is all that interesting. The story is rather simple, obscured in the fashion that Souls often is but not in a way that makes me want to speculate or dig deeper. Also, it runs exclusively at 30ish fps, even on PS5, which is a decidedly less pleasant experience than running all the others at 60 on my PC. And if farming for grass in Demon’s Souls was annoying, wait until you meet blood vials, which drop at a lesser rate in fewer places. Likewise, lanterns are distinctly inferior to bonfires: Whereas bonfires are individual entities that allow you to regain your health and reset an area, lanterns always return you to your home base, forcing you through tedious moments of walking and waiting through loading screens (it may sound minor, but you do it so regularly that it does get annoying). Lastly, Chalice Dungeons are weird and repetitive, and while I’m glad I have all the trophies now I’d probably avoid doing them again.

In general: Bloodborne is great, and a great entry point to Souls if the original just doesn’t work for you. Keep in mind, however, that if you start there, you’ll see some seemingly minor but truthfully pretty significant changes in style, tone, and mechanics once you start playing the other games.

Thanks for reading! Whether you’re completely new to Souls, a bit of a dabbler, or someone who just really likes the games and reads anything they can about them, I hope this rundown was informative and enjoyable to read. I am very excited for Elden Ring, and I hope folks looking at it with interest might find this useful. Good luck!