Ranking All Soulsborne Games From Worst To Best

The main entry point for several fans of the series; this game turned a lot of heads when arriving on release as it prided itself with merciless difficulty that harkened back to ‘old school’ challenge. Add to that a rich RPG system, thrilling action, and a dense and demanding lore - the results were something really special.

The player is given a simple task of ringing two bells - easy right? Not really, as the journey is fraught with all forms of monstrosities attempting to murder you on almost every corner. The player wasn't the super-powered hero of its game world, more like a very small fish in an epic pool of sharks. Still, every victory was a small smidgen of hope and encouragement to move forward against the impossible odds.

The rough-edges of Demon Souls were smoothed out for this follow-up as it did away with elements that grated (e.g. world tendency), helping create a streamlined experience that honed on teeth-gritting challenge and jaw-dropping level design - with the latter, an aspect the series has still yet to better.

Certainly, there are some flaws; the last third is an anti-climatic slog, movement can be unreliable, and Blighttown’s frame-rate is infamous (thankfully Dark Souls: Remastered fixes this!). In the big picture though, those are minor peeves in an milestone gaming experience.