Players across the world celebrate the Soulsborne series for a plethora of reasons, and among them, we find its lore: the context that adds depth to a game’s story, characters, and setting.
The attention that FromSoftware dedicates to the narrative background of its titles is impressive, allowing the community to gather around some of the richest worlds the industry has witnessed.
As a result, it’s possible to classify the best experiences in the formula according to how well they’ve developed their story scenarios, and that’s exactly what we’ve done with our list of every Soulsborne game ranked by lore.
7 Dark Souls 3
Regular Excellence
Although it’s the most refined in the Dark Souls franchise, and it even deserved the GOTY Award of 2016, the lore of Dark Souls 3 is held back for a simple cause: it doesn’t take any risks.
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Of course, it’s an almost perfect conclusion for the trilogy, trying its best to tie up any loose ends, but that intention placed early barriers that limited its true potential from the start.
That outcome is just the side effect of a concept that was originally crafted to belong to only one game, per Miyazaki’s vision.
It doesn’t take away the quality of Lothric’s journey, but it’s so predictable that, even in its excellence, it feels like more of the same.
6 Demon’s Souls
The Start Of Something New
- Released
- October 6, 2009
- Publisher(s)
- Sony Computer Entertainment , Atlus , Namco Bandai
- Engine
- Proprietary Engine
- ESRB
- M For Mature 17+ Due To Blood, Violence
- How Long To Beat
- 29 Hours
- Metascore
- 89
- PS Plus Availability
- Premium
- OpenCritic Rating
- Mighty
While FromSoftare wasn’t new to creating fantasy worlds, the narrative trend they started with Demon’s Souls is still one of the most revolutionary changes the industry has experienced in this century.
However, that impact was feasible thanks to Boletaria’s compelling setting. Its aura of mystery effectively made players feel like abandoned heroes in an abandoned place, binding them emotionally to the game.
Despite having the less fleshed-out lore of the Soulsborne series, it’s also immersive and appropriate, using a dark and hostile tone we haven’t seen since Demon’s Souls’ original release.
5 Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
Loads of Blocking, But No Writer’s Block
Unlike the rest of the series, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice had a straightforward narrative and followed the usual directions of storytelling, but it worked perfectly for a title more focused on its challenges.
It has more cinematics and dialogues than FromSoftware is used to, but those elements were necessary to craft a more condensed campaign (although equally interesting) with engaging themes and fascinating cultural influences.
In fact, regarding potential, Sekiro is the company’s best prospect, because it perfectly closes its own story while also leaving many open paths to keep exploring its fantasy to the fullest.
4 Dark Souls
The Beginning Of The Cycle
What Demon’s Souls did, beyond a doubt, was ensure a more polished Dark Souls, a game with such a captivating, vast, and detailed mythology that it practically originated a cult of players devoted to understanding and explaining Lordran’s lore.
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Even if it merely perfected what its predecessor did, Dark Souls was the one to become a global phenomenon, an experience so carefully contextualized that what occurred in the background was more interesting than what was happening on the front.
The origins of its world, the lives of its people, the reasons for our arrival, together with the marks of our journey… Overall, a narrative masterpiece that will probably be studied forever.
3 Dark Souls 2
Bold And Refreshing
If Dark Souls 3 is considered the true successor to Dark Souls, it is because Dark Souls 2 dared to do what nobody expected it to do: deny and reject the roots of its existence.
Instead, the game risks everything by refusing to acknowledge nearly everything that happened in the past, taking a more personal approach to the story.
It lets us see and empathize with the victims of the Undead Curse, highlighting the small and human scale of things rather than the big picture of the other games.
Dark Souls 2 is bold and refreshing, with a deep lore that wants to be something by itself, not because of what came before. It doesn’t always nail it, but it’s a tale full of heart, meaning, and novelty.
2 Elden Ring
Perfected Storytelling
In almost every aspect, Elden Ring is the ultimate sophistication of the Soulsborne formula, and that inevitably includes everything related to the story and narrative.
Needless to say, Hidetaka Miyazaki’s assistance from George R. R. Martin helped a lot. Between the two, they created lore so divine, lush, and complex that it’s up there with the finest works in fiction’s history, but Elden Ring is more than just a success courtesy of some big names.
In terms of the best settings, the best characters, the best myths, the best side stories, the best historical background, the best rules and systems, and so on, Elden Ring will always be among the top.
1 Bloodborne
The Great One
- Released
- March 24, 2015
- Publisher(s)
- Sony
- Engine
- Havok
- ESRB
- M for Mature: Blood and Gore, Violence
- How Long To Beat
- 33 Hours
- X|S Optimized
- no
- PS Plus Availability
- Extra & Premium
- Steam Deck Compatibility
- no
- Cross Save
- yes
- Cross-Platform Play
- ps4,ps5
As it couldn’t be otherwise, this list with some of the greatest narrative jobs ever made in video games has to end with the one and only: Bloodborne.
No other context, setting, folklore, style, or aura, has reached this masterpiece’s lore transcendence.
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The weight of its worldbuilding can carry every technical problem, gameplay issue, and graphical flaw because it’s so inexplicably divine that nothing else really matters.
Unsurpassed in terms of the surrounding elements that nourish its intentions, feelings, and experiences, Bloodborne makes H.P. Lovecraft proud like no other artwork has accomplished. It is a proper ode to human culture.
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