Souls games aren’t just intense and brutal slogs where players must endure hardship to survive long enough to crawl battered and bruised over the finish line. They are also generally games filled to the brim with content, set in huge worlds with sprawling landscapes, hidden paths, and optional bosses aplenty. This means that suffering and hardship won’t be a short-lived thing. But that’s how we like it, right?
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What I’m getting at here is that it would be pretty gauche of us to have expected more content fromFromSoftwareduring the period after any of their marquee Souls releases down the years. Yet, despite knocking it out of the park time and time again, with nothing left to prove, they have tacked on amazing DLC campaigns that almost feel like new games in their own right to their successful Souls outings. However, we want to take stock of all the Soulsborne DLC out there and decide once and for all which of these expansions stands as the best Soulsborne DLC of all time.
9Refections and Remnants Update
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
DLC Release Date
20th October 2020
Metacritic Score
Let’s get this show on the road with a DLC that isn’t really a DLC at all, but deserves a little honorary mention because it’s an update that offers changes that vastly improve the overallSekiroexperience.Sekirowould sadly never get more additional content on the same scale as the entries that come after this one. However, the game did receive an update that introduced a few new cosmetic items, along with some much-appreciated gameplay features.
The update added Reflections and Gauntlets, which are modes that allow you to replay against heightened versions of bosses and replay boss fights whenever you like, or fight against these bosses with the added challenge of only being able to die once, respectively.
Plus, it also adds Remnants, which are basicallySekiro’sanswer to the messages you find on the ground in most other Souls games. It’s not the most ground-breaking addition, but being able to replay bosses as and when you choose is a feature I would love to see in other Souls titles, butSekiroremains the only one where this is possible.
8Crown Of The Ivory King
Dark Souls 2
30th September 2014
OpenCritic Score
Okay, let’s move on to the actual DLC campaigns, beginning with the runt of the litter in the form of Crown of the Ivory King. I imagine everyone expects us to simply list all ofDark Souls 2’sDLC back-to-back to get them out of the way, mainly because it’s a game that divides opinion, to say the least. Mild spoilers, we won’t be doing that, but this particularDark Souls 2 DLCdefinitely serves as the weakest DLC FromSoft have ever put their name to.
It’s not a terrible experience, don’t get me wrong, but it’s one that feels frustrating for all the wrong reasons. The enemies within this DLC aren’t tough, but they have gimmicks that make them a chore to deal with. The world suffers from the same issues a lot of snow/ice-covered areas do, as all that white makes the place feel really dull at times.
Then, the bosses, aside from perhaps the Ivory Knight who achieves mediocre status, are all huge letdowns. It’s just a DLC with more lows than highs, but there are still some fun times to be had here.
7Ashes Of Ariandel
Dark Souls 3
25th October 2016
When it comes to fan service, being able to return to the painted world and relive our time spent in the originalDark Soulsexploring Ariamis is the kind of stuff fans dream of, so really,Ashes of Ariandelhad a leg up on the other DLC right from the get-go. However, due to the fact that this DLC is a bit of a mixed bag, it fails to capitalize on this as much as it could have.
On the positive side, this DLC is dripping in interesting lore that connects DS1 and DS3 beautifully for those willing to dig around for it. Not to mention, this DLC has one of the finest Souls bosses of all time, Sister Friede.
However, it takes a while to get going, with everything before you get to the cathedral offering a pretty lukewarm experience, making this one easy to drop off if you’re not patient. Plus, the DLC is densely packed with amazing environmental design, but the areas are very short, with loads of bonfires, meaning there’s never any fear or jeopardy when exploring; you rush through these areas without the appropriate time to appreciate them, and generally, it’s not quite as content-rich as the other DLC due to the partial focus on PvP content.
6The Ringed City
28th March 2017
This may be a bit of a controversial take here, but despite The Ringed City having some of the coolest Souls bosses on record, and some beautiful areas, I feel that it doesn’t quite deserve the acclaim that it gets, and that’s mainly down to the fact that the difficulty of this DLC feels very artificial at times, leading to a lot of areas within the DLC where you’re all but forced to run through the area avoiding enemies and giving up the option to explore in a bid to merely survive.
Not to mention, even if you do stop to smell the roses, the design feels like a smorgasbord of tropes and gimmicks that don’t always seem to fit the tone and structure of the DLC.
This makes the vast majority of the time spent in this DLC rather irritating to deal with and, simply put, not fun. There is a way to make something brutally hard without doing so to the point that enjoyment goes out the window, and The Ringed City sadly crosses that line.
That being said, there are some lofty high points like the fights against Gael and Midir, not to mention visually, you couldn’t really ask for more here. But, unless you really buzz off Souls experiences that are hard for the sake of being hard, this one may fail to meet expectations.
5Crown Of The Sunken King
22nd July 2014
We jump back toDark Souls 2for our next entry. In all honesty, theCrown of the Sunken Kingis a real Marmite DLC, mainly due to the environmental changes caused by the ungodly number of interactive pillars dotted around the place.
Many may not enjoy the rather labyrinthian quality this DLC has, but in my humble opinion, this feels like a lovingly made FromSoft interpretation of a traditionalZeldadungeon in a lot of ways, and I’ve always had a lot of time for the world design in this DLC.
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It’s an approach that makes the environment feel much more dynamic and alive than many Souls areas that have come before and after this one, and that alone deserves praise. But it’s also a DLC with interesting forgotten cities to explore, and bosses that serve as fitting tests to punctuate this DLC’s runtime.
The standout issues here tend to be the DLC’s reliance on poison enemies, meaning a lot of your time will be spent menuing to cure status effects, and the fact that it’s very easy to get lost amongst the sea of grey and earth tones, but all in all, it’s a great DLC worth playing.
4Crown Of The Old Iron King
26th August 2014
If there’s anyone out there who still has a poor opinion ofDark Souls 2, and is willing to give it another shot via some of its DLC content, then I implore you to try Crown of the Old Iron King, because it just might win you over, and make you aDark Souls 2sympathiser like myself.
It’s a DLC that has it all: an interesting area to explore in the form of Brume Tower, incredible boss fights that pretty much all hit the mark and offer something unique to the series, and optional content within the DLC that doesn’t feel like a tacked on aside.
Fume Knight is the obvious standout, serving as many DS fans’ all-time favorite boss, and for good reason, but it also has a wealth of interesting mob enemies to take on and tight, narrow pathways to ramp up the tension in group fights.
This DLC is marred slightly by the fact that there never feels like a good time to take it on, as the steep difficulty can’t be overcome simply by over-leveling, and the outer areas of the tower feel visually jarring due to the blurry, barren, molten landscape that surrounds you. But all in all, it’s the finest jewel in the Crown Trilogy by a distance.
3Artorias Of The Abyss
Dark Souls
23rd October 2012
The originalDark Soulsmay have only given us one DLC expansion to devour ravenously like the hungry Souls savages we are. But, it has to be said, it’s a bloody amazing DLC.
Considering that at this point, FromSoftware didn’t have a DLC blueprint to go off, the fact that this DLC was able to be sewn into the fabric of the DS1 vanilla game so seamlessly and expand on the lore, the existing narratives between NPCs and so much more is nothing short of phenomenal. But even if we look at it on merit without the caveat that it was the first of its kind, it still holds up.
The bosses added felt like an apology for the lackluster nature of the four lords in the main game, as the four present in this DLC put them to shame in terms of difficulty and design, with Artorias serving as a fitting grand finale.
It’s a punishing, lore-intensive, and captivating expansion that adds so many neat new items, build options, and inevitable deaths, making it a brilliant DLC even decades after release. A fair warning, though: you might want to look up a guide on how to access the DLC because it’s pretty tough to decipher otherwise.
2Shadow Of The Erdtree
Elden Ring
21st June 2024
Oh, would you look at that? I seem to have opened up a can of worms. Look at them all wriggling around. Yes, that’s right,Shadow of the Erdtree, despite offering mountains of content and an expansion to the open-world setting ofElden Ring, is not my pick of the bunch as far as Soulsborne DLC is concerned.
To giveShadow of the Erdtreeits flowers, it offers a sprawling and interesting setting, a wealth of lore, and subtle storylines to sift through,over 70 bosses, with some serving as the toughest and most interesting encounters in Souls historyand lots ofcool new goodiesto collect. But, here’s why it’s not our number one.
Our top pick is something I consider to be flawless DLC with next to no low points, and that cannot be said ofShadow of the Erdtree. This DLC relies on quite a lot of repeat bosses and reskins, with even some unique bosses serving as lukewarm encounters.
Some locations are just plain terrible, with the Abyssal Woods being a standout low point that kills the pace of the DLC, and the DLC spends so much time asking ‘how hard can we make this experience?’ that it fails to ask ‘should we be making it this hard?’ Which led to the game being patched to make the experience easier after release. It’s a staggering achievement and a brilliant DLC, but to call it perfect would be a bald-faced lie.
1The Old Hunters
Bloodborne
24th November 2015
If you want Soulsborne DLC perfection, then you need to playThe Old HuntersDLC, as this is a DLC that starts strong and maintains this high standard right to the bitter end. The DLC builds on the strong framework of the base game in terms of the dark, twisted atmosphere, the focus on fast-paced, risk-and-reward combat, and the slew of kick-ass bosses and somehow manages to top the base game in every single department.
The combat feels elevated with new enemies and fallen hunters that make every tiny bit of progress feel like a huge win. The Hunter’s Nightmare is somehow even more unsettling than than anything Yharnam could cook up, and the boss battles present in the DLC are nothing short of epic, with the Orphan of Kos still serving as my favorite Souls boss ever.
Not to mention, it’s a huge DLC by all accounts with about 10-12 hours of content, but it’s not big for the sake of being big like Shadow of the Erdtree. It has perfect pacing, with an all-killer, no-filler approach to level design, which makes each moment feel special and exploration feel rewarding almost every time you go off the beaten path.
It may be a controversial take, especially with every corner of the internet still loudly singing Shadow of the Erdtree’s praises, but for me, it would take something just as flawless to usurp The Old Hunters as the Soulsborne DLC champ.
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