Dark Souls: The Roleplaying Game First Details Revealed

Steamforged Games has revealed a first look at its upcoming tabletop roleplaying game adaptation of Dark Souls, along with a few other early details. Steamforged has announced that Dark Souls: The Roleplaying Game will use Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition rules with unique new Dark Souls mechanics. The game will be a standalone RPG featuring "bespoke" character classes, a new magic system, and a bestiary featuring creatures from the Dark Souls franchise. In addition, a first look at the cover art for Dark Souls: The Roleplaying Game was also revealed, which shows an armored adventurer lurking through one of the game's many desolate locales. 

Key art showing an adventurer resting in front of the franchise's signature bonfires was also released.

Dark Souls is a popular series of video games published by Bandai Namco and created by Hidetaka Miyazaki. The open world games focus on exploration and survival, with the player assuming the role of an undead warrior who must decide whether to extend his world's current Age of Fire or bring about an Age of Dark. Switching between human and undead forms are a critical part of the Dark Souls games, so we're guessing that this will play some role in the tabletop adaptation, especially as the bonfire is a key part of that process. 

This marks the third Dark Souls adaptation for Steamforged, following Dark Souls: The Board Game and Dark Souls: The Card Game. In a press release about the upcoming game, Steamforged creative director Mat Hart spoke about the importance of Dark Souls to the company and their goals with the new game."To say we're thrilled about the Dark Souls roleplaying game would be an understatement," Hart said. "Dark Souls has been a key IP for Steamforged from the beginning, and one very close to our hearts, so to finally bring Dark Souls to the tabletop as a roleplaying game is hugely exciting both for us and for the fans. 

"We wanted to capture the spark of the video games and deliver a roleplaying experience that would give players the real Dark Souls feel, whether they're rolling a unique character from one of the bespoke classes, creeping through the ruins of Lothric and encountering familiar characters, or engaging in tactical combat against an iconic video game enemy. "With the passion of our team and the writing of our lead RPG writer, ENNIE-nominee Richard August, we're confident we've done just that. We can't wait for players to get their hands on this game and experience roleplaying like never before. One thing's for sure: Prepare To Die."

Pre-orders for Dark Souls: The Roleplaying Game will begin in February 2022.