Ranking All The Soulsbourne DLC Before Shadow of The Erdtree

Elden Ring’s expansion Shadow Of The Erdtree is finally here! And it’s HUGE! So that will take me some time. But fear not-I have decided to make this list in the meantime. It will serve as both a reminder and a summation of my own thoughts on all the FromSoftware Soulsbourne DLC’s that came before it. Because Shadow of The Erdtree is going to shake things up. But for now, let’s look back on old memories and cherished struggle.

Honorary Mention: Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice: Patch 1.05

So it’s debatable that this shouldn’t even be here. Is Sekiro a Soulsbourne game? Is this DLC? The answer to both is technically no. But goddamnit, I will consider it as such. Because I want to.

This is technically a patch. But this “patch” adds a lot to a pretty streamlined and barebones game. And by a lot, I mean, a whole ass boss mode. Which was and still is, completely unique in Souls games. The “Reflections of Strength”, as their called, allow you to refight any boss in the game. Pretty cool, especially since Sekiro has such great bosses.

But the real gem here is the “Gauntlets of Strength.” This shit is cool, even if it’s not really for me. It’s a boss horde mode, which lets you fight bosses in a sequence, one after another. And while this sounds a little pointless to the casual observer, for Sekiro fans, this is what the series is really about. Fighting and mastering bosses. And you get cool skins at the end, such as the Shura skin or the one shown in the image above.

It’s not really enough to justify being “ranked” with the other DLC and if it was, it would by default be the last place. So….yeah.

7: Dark Souls 2: The Ivory King

I don’t hate this DLC, but I do hate snow maps. I guess I hold a grudge about the fact that we have so many snow maps in FromSoft games, but no desert. Never a desert. Name one. My issue with this particular snow area is that it looks kinda bad. Maybe one of the worst looking areas in Souls. It’s a blizzard, which doesn’t look great with this graphical rendering, and then when you get the blizzard to clear, it just looks washed out.

The area itself is Anor Londo-esque. It maybe should get more credit for being only the second of these areas as opposed to like, the 5th. I mean, it’s a cool concept, but they might like it too much. And to be fair, Eleum-Loyce is more unique than Irythyll from Dark Souls 3. But I also think it’s not as well designed and doesn’t have as compelling of enemies. Once again we maintain the Dark Souls 2 pattern of “small casters who die in two hits” and “big knights who are a legitimate pain to deal with.” Then there’s of course a bunch of dogs. Always dogs.

As far as bosses go, there’s three, but really it’s basically two new models. The giant Snow Tiger, Aava, is an annoying, but reasonable fight. The thing is, it’s got a gimmick where you have to find an item that makes him visible. To discover this, you have to enter his arena and be blindsided by an invisible tiger. It’s a hell of a way to learn for first timers.

That all being said, this DLC does have a very cool final boss fight and some very unique mechanics attached to it that basically make the whole DLC. Similar to the first fight, the final boss doesn’t work first try. That’s because the real challenge of this DLC is exploring Eleum Loyce to find a bunch of knights who are still uncorrupted and loyal to the Ivory King and his queen Alsanna. And they’re just chilling all over the map. Find these guys and descend to the final boss and you end up in one of the earliest full out “battles” in the series. It’s awesome and was a perfect way to wrap up the Dark Souls 2 era.

A final note: the bonus boss in this DLC is just a rehash, which is disappointing. And the area to get there is pretty much the worst ever.

6: Dark Souls 3: Ashes of Ariandel

I told you I hated snow. I hate snow. But at least this DLC make snow more tolerable. I can deal with snowy wilderness. Especially with a twist, like the creepy rotting snow wilderness you see in Ashes of Ariandel. Grateful it’s not a snowy city. This is another Painted World, which means everything in here is sad and horrible. But that’s a little more interesting.

Gameplay wise, I don’t love this DLC, but I can respect what it’s trying to do. I think it’s more challenging and engaging than The Ivory King and it has more going for it in terms of ideas and creativity. I think it’s a really well designed DLC and the areas themselves are well thought out. I also love the diversity of sub-biomes. Snowy field. Snowy mountainside. Snowy forest. Snowy Ice Valley full of Flowers. There’s another fun broken bridge gimmick. You can see where they had some good ideas here and where they knew what worked and stuck with it.

The new enemies are good, sturdy FromSoft archetypes, but for the most part nothing we haven’t seen before. There’s a lot of Bloodborne influence in this DLC and a lot of the newer enemies are clearly inspired by that game. The creepy bloody swamp village is straight out of The Old Hunters from Bloodborne. The combat itself feels very much like that, with a lot of these new enemies being faster and more brutal than the main game. There’s a lot of shit I just avoid in this DLC because it’s scary to fight and probably not worth the effort.

The bosses are….okay. I don’t like the Sister Friede/Father Ariandel fight. It’s basically three medium fights line up one after the other and feels like a DPS check more than anything else. She’s not really that hard but getting to her last phase can be annoying. Thankfully they give us a stellar summon in Gael, who is OP (for lore reasons that are really cool.) It’s just a long fight that doesn’t bring anything new to the table except an extra phase that makes it a long fight.

The next fight, Champion Gravetender and Champion Wolf is fun. The giant wolf/armored foe combo is an interesting combo, familiar, but never used in conjunction. So that’s a nice challenge. And the gear you get is pretty good. The arena is beautiful. It would be a much more appreciated one if this was a major fight instead of an optional side-quest type thing. I don’t know…the area is one of the best in the DLC, but it also feels kind of thrown in because-

Frankly there’s not that much content in this DLC, certainly not anything groundbreaking. It’s well made, high quality content as far as gaming goes, but I have to admit that as a Souls fan it’s not my favorite. In fact…sometimes I find it to be a chore.

5: Dark Souls 2: The Sunken King

I used to find this area annoying, but now I really like this DLC. Shulva was a unique area and concept that was never really redone in Soulsborne, which is rare. Poison-Booby Trap City is still a very unique and fresh gaming concept. And this area is really well designed, making the most of vertical space to create layers within the world. The way you traverse this area is often unique, requiring a touch of puzzling and a touch of platforming, with a whole lot of dodging ridiculously strong enemies.

The enemies aren’t my favorite. They are very annoying and can feel a touch overtuned. But they are a challenge and they do change the way you play, because you can’t just run past them like in other areas of the game and if you want to, you’re gonna have to be somewhat efficient with your movement to make sure you actually achieve your goal of preserving Estus Flasks.

The bosses in this DLC….are solid. I mean, the Alana fight sucks, but in a “good fight that is challenging” way, not a tedious way like Sister Friede. The fact that she can summon another boss in phantom form to fight you is absurd and was very original at the time. It forces you to fight different ways second to second during the fight, which I appreciated. Tough boss, hard to cheese. But the summons are helpful and make this feel doable.

I like the Sinh dragon fight a lot. It’s just a completely different vibe. I feel like he’s not that difficult, but he forces you to play with one hand behind your back because he breaks all your gear and he’s always moving. It’s usually a war of attrition and the end (sometimes 20 minutes), you win. That’s a decent recipe for a fight if you ask me.

Then there’s the bonus boss, which is the best bonus boss of the three. They all have re-used assets, but at least these were new re-used assets that had not appeared in the game before, such as a Havel Knight. In general this DLC has more fun gameplay secrets like this than the other two (though the other two probably are more lore significant.)

4: Dark Souls 3: The Ringed City

This is a scorching hot take that no one will agree with. The Ringed City is often considered a top-2 Souls DLC. Well…maybe not anymore, but that’s besides the point.

This DLC is like the grand finale of the Dark Souls Trilogy. It’s the big showcase. And frankly, while I loved it, I didn’t love it as much as everyone else. I liked a lot of what it did. The Dreg Heap is super cool and is a great and much needed nod to Dark Souls 2. The boss fights are by and large some of the best in Dark Souls 3. The level design was great and introduced fun new concepts that kept us engaged in each area, such as the fall-damage negating runs and the Darklurkers in the Dreg Heap and the Phantom Archers in the Ringed City. There’s awesome callbacks to Dark Souls 1 and Dark Souls 2 throughout, which I appreciated. At this point Dark Souls 3 might as well have leaned fully into the nostalgia machine and it did so very well.

At the end of the day though, it’s just a little bit underwhelming to me. See, in Dark Souls, the apocalypse is always coming. It’s always right there. “Trust me bro” the series says. And finally, in The Ringed City, we get to see it…for an area that is comprised of Dark Souls 2 ruins before we are quickly whisked away to a perfectly preserved city that is also semi-abandoned. Which they always are in these games. Everyone’s always dead but the buildings are in pristine conditions. At least Shulva had some random tunnel collapses that made it feel like the place was worn down. That’s not to say there aren’t ruins in the Ringed City, but it’s certainly doing quite well for being so empty.

The bosses…I like the Demon Princes. It’s a fun fight, particularly with a summon. The entrance is obviously very metal, a thousand foot drop or whatever that is. The next fight, Halflight Spears of the Church is like a multiplayer fight, a loving reference to the Old Monk from Demon Souls where an enemy player is the boss. But it’s just a reference. It’s not close to as good. Honestly, Looking Glass Knight from Dark Souls 2 does this idea better.

The DLC dragon boss (because there has to be one in each game) is very hard. Very cool, but again, feels like a reference to Kalameet from Dark Souls 1. It’s also just another classic case of dragon fatigue. Dark Souls is set in a world where dragons are nearly extinct. Yet there’s like ten different “most powerful dragons” in the universe, including sub-races that are basically “dragon but different”, or “dragon but red” or “dragon but zombified.”

The final boss is awesome though. Slave Knight Gael. Let me say that again. SLAVE KNIGHT GAEL. There’s a thin line in Dark Souls between badass and buffoon. Some of this is because of FromSoftware’s humor. A character with a name like “Gideon the All-Knowing” is bound to be dumb, or not know some very obvious piece of information. Someone calling themselves “Juju the Slaughter Machine” will probably be a corpse found in a boss room.

This guy calls himself a “Slave Knight” and he’s very downtrodden and desperate. He’s a summon for several bossfights and it is established that he is actually a very powerful ancient badass who is once again, a SLAVE KNIGHT. That doesn’t sound good for anyone. And he’s the final boss and he’s batshit insane. Canonically, the end of the world is really just him killing everyone except for you and then you guys fight. It’s insane.

So yes, I do love this DLC, but I do not think it’s God’s gift to downloadable content.

3: Dark Souls: Artorias of The Abyss

If you know you know. This is some OG shit. This whole DLC is just goated. The bosses are the most consistent and least bullshit across all the Souls DLCs and the lore here is super relevant while also being somewhat self-contained. It remains one of the most respected DLCs in the series and for a good reason. You could convince me it’s better than the one I ranked above it honestly and it’s probably the only one I can say that about. I like it’s aesthetic, it’s use of new plot and gameplay elements and it’s overall vibe. It feels very complete as it’s own thing, but also fits well into Dark Souls 1 as a component.

There’s 4 bosses in this DLC and each one is increasingly awesome. In fact, they literally changed the course of the series. Before this DLC, there were shields. In fact shields were a soft requirement. Not because you needed them, but because everyone used one. It just made sense. What else are you gonna put in your left hand? Two hand a weapon? Not gonna do that. What if I get hit? So a lot of players went through the game with a certain level of dependence on shields. At the least, they were helpful as a last resort to taking damage. Some people just blocked everything and hit the enemy when they weren’t blocking.

But in this DLC you can’t really do that. It introduced speed to the series in a way that hasn’t left since. In the base game, something might hit hard, but it usually didn’t so very fast and vice versa. But in Artorias of The Abyss, every boss is just brutal. 5 hit combos that kill you by the 3rd or 4th hit. Big enemies moving very fast and covering distance alarmingly quickly. In the base game you fight a lot of things that are obviously very powerful in the lore, but seem a little slight. In the DLC, everything you fight feels ridiculously powerful and in all but one of these fights, the opponent is not at full strength.

And it results in the most rewarding fights in all of Dark Souls 1. I loved the change of pace this DLC brought when I first played and I attribute to it my early mastery of rolling that has kept me from being one of the “This is too hard” people who play every Souls game. Roll. Take your big ass armor off and ROLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL through it.

I also love the world design and the lore behind it. It gives us a place we can easily recognize (because we’re going back in time), but it looks and feels very different too, lusher, wilder and more full of life. Oolacile is one of the more inspired cities in the Souls franchise and it has aged well. I enjoy the exploration and gameplay here. The encounters are well designed feel fair despite being very challenging. The secrets are enticing and fun to uncover. This DLC generally feels fresher to me just because I know it was the first one to do all the DLC tropes. I was there…well, sort of. Teleportation to a new place-check. Mysterious and powerful character referenced in the main game, or equally powerful counterpart appear-check. SuperDragon-check. Very dark/hard to see places-check. Secret/optional bosses-check.

As I said-this DLC is the OG.

2: Dark Souls 2: The Old Iron King

This is controversial pick, though far from the craziest take. The Old Iron King is generally celebrated as the best Dark Souls 2 DLC, with Brume Tower being considered one of the best areas in the game. I’ll take it one step further. It probably IS the best area in that game. Dragon Aerie (my personal favorite) is too empty and pointless and what’s there is annoying. Shulva is too green. Drangleic Castle is too wet. The Last Bastille is cool but feels underwhelming compared to it’s concept. Eleum Loyce looks like an 80s first class airplane bathroom. In conclusion, this is probably the best area in terms of consensus. I said it.

Brume Tower combines the tricky trappy fun bullshit of The Sunken King with the innovative spirit and design that underlined FromSoft’s initial vision for the game. The level design is brilliant, sheer verticality and accessibility on a scale that had previously not been seen in Dark Souls II. There’s elevators on elevators. Stairs leading to more stairs that lead to elevators that stop at platforms that lead to a different elevator. Some of these elevators seem vaguely unsafe too and you might need to platform. There’s a part where you walk across a massive chain (pictured above) to another tower that you can also explore. It’s a brilliant example of the “If you see it you can go there” spirit that embodied their more recent design philosophy in Elden Ring. (Note: Bloodborne does not follow this at all. There are so many places in Bloodborne I look at and think “I want to know what’s in/over/up there” and I never will.”)

The enemies are cool here. They’re humanoids, but they move weirdly. In some ways it’s better than if they’d introduced non-humanoids because our glancing familiarity with these enemies make them harder. It seems like something we’ve fought, but they have some weird movement variation that makes them scary. There’s these floating puffs of smoke in armor (literally) that fucking flops around to try and hit you. Archers with Big-Ass Bows are back. It’s a good twist on the classic Dark Souls 2 “Armored Guys” cliche.

Two of the three bosses are all-timers. Fume Knight, brother of Velstadt (this whole DLC is a sibling fest), is one of the best fights in Dark Souls 2. It mixes slow and fast attacks that keep you on your toes the whole time. It’s got a full second phase, in an era when second phases were rare and often under-developed. It has some fun lore easter eggs. It’s a classic fight. The Sir Alonne fight is also a very cool fight, one that has a time travel component, a whole sidequest to get there and a tough boss run and encounter.

The third boss is a reskin, which is disappointing, but it doesn’t spoil the overall greatness of this DLC. I think it’s still one of the most focused and innovative DLCs in the whole franchise and has one of the best stories within it.

1: Bloodborne: The Old Hunters

The Old Hunters is just different. It feels like a long and powerful epilogue to the main game, what the “Burning of The Shire” segment was in the Lord of The Rings books. After looking to the cosmos in the main game, we’re looking back at humanity and how we got wrapped up in this cosmic horror story in the first place. And of course, like anything in Bloodborne, the whole thing is a nightmare. a

The level design in this DLC was/is the most dynamic of any up to this point and is more than just a location, at least in the traditional sense. You’re ascending (or descending?) planes/dimensions. You go from a nightmarish re-imagining of a main game area to a brand new area that noticeably wasn’t there in the main game. This new area is a freakish research lab full of bad vibes and horrifying discoveries. Then you enter a new dimension where you can look down and see the stuff from the previous dimension below you. The Fishing Hamlet. When you’re on the coastline of the Fishing Hamlet and look into the sea, you can see Yharnam from the previous dimension below. It’s one of the coolest visuals in the series.

The enemies are violent, brutal and bloody, often quite literally. There is no sense of “world” or “civilization” here. It is essentially a hell-scape that resembles the Yharnam of the main game only in appearance. There are crazy new trick weapons and intriguing new NPCs. It’s clear there is something going on here, more than meets the eye. And it’s true. The Old Hunters is a more story focused DLC than the other ones on this list. There is some very important information within this DLC that basically unlocks the riddle of the main game.

The bosses in this DLC are actually legendary. Ludwig, Lady Maria and The Orphan of Kos are regarded as some of the greatest bosses FromSoft has ever made. The Orphan of Kos especially is maddeningly difficult and the backstory behind him is horribly depressing, as is the case for literally every other boss or enemy you encounter here. It’s a real downer of a DLC and this cosmic dread is what makes it so powerful. When you enter the Fishing Hamlet, you know something is up. There’s a sense that something horrible is or has happened.

The Fishing Hamlet is one of the coolest areas in all of Soulsborne. It’s heavily inspired by Innsmouth from the H.P. Lovecraft story “The Shadows of Innsmouth.” There aren’t really any other prominent examples of “coastal villages” in Souls games and this one is aesthetically beautiful. It’s an area that somehow feels far more forsaken and removed than the other ones in the game, where you feel like you have a standing of some kind. Here, you are not welcome. In fact, no one is.

The Old Hunters gets just about everything right. It’s the epitome of FromSoft DLC and maybe DLC in general up to that point (though Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare would like a word.) It sets a high bar that is going to be very difficult to cross for Elden Ring’s DLC and I’m excited to see if it even can be surpassed. Because this expansion is just that good. But, FromSoft is gonna FromSoft, and I have a feeling (very strong feeling as I am 3/4ths of the way done) that Shadow of The Erdtree may yet deliver.