What is Dark Souls III?

The last ringing of the bell: Miyazaki returns, the pace quickens, and the age of fire gets its funeral.

Dark Souls III was released in 2016 for PlayStation 4, Windows and Xbox One, with Miyazaki as lead director after supervising the second game. Its development began alongside a smaller parallel project and started, by the creative team’s own account, without clear direction; the result still became the fastest-selling game in Bandai Namco’s history to that point, passing ten million copies by 2020, a record it held until Elden Ring took it in 2022.

The world is Lothric, where the kingdoms of the old Lords of Cinder converge and the bell tolls for unkindled ash. Critics noted the pace: faster, more aggressive, openly marked by Bloodborne, which Miyazaki had directed in the gap. A year before release he had already said Dark Souls III would likely be the last Dark Souls game, a turning point, deliberately chosen.

Dark Souls III cover art — **DARK SOULS III · 2016** The cover of Dark Souls III (2016), the series’ closing chapter, with Miyazaki back in the director’s chair.

THE CLOSING GAME

Lothric · 2016

Dark Souls III cover art, the Champion of Ash kneeling in embers

Dark Souls III · 2016

The Champion of Ash, kneeling in the embers of everything. The one cover of the trilogy that is already a memorial.

Ashes of Ariandel · 2016

The first expansion returns to a painted world, snow, rot, and a painter waiting for a new one. It arrived on the game’s first anniversary season, half a year after launch.

The Ringed City · 2017

The second expansion goes to the end of the world itself: the dreg heap of all ages, and a city at the world’s edge. Production on Elden Ring began as this one finished, the trilogy’s last pages are the next game’s first.

The Fire Fades Edition · 2017

The compiled edition: base game and both expansions in one box, the shelf form of the trilogy’s end.

What is Dark Souls III?

THE CLOSING GAME

THE FIRST WORD