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15 Best Soulslike Games to Play While You Wait for The Duskbloods

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Ignacio Weil

Gaming - August 17th 2026, 15:30 GMT+2

1. Nioh Series

Team Ninja took the Souls framework, fed it a mountain of loot and asked players to master three combat stances before breakfast. *Nioh* and *Nioh 2* reward Ki Pulses, aggressive counters and obsessive build tinkering, with yokai turning feudal Japan into history’s worst sightseeing tour. *Nioh 3* widens the hunt through open fields and instant switching between Samurai and Ninja styles. Faster and busier than FromSoftware’s work, the trilogy still delivers that private little miracle of finally beating the monster that flattened you all evening. | © Team Ninja

Dark souls 3 — 2. Dark Souls Series

Putting *Dark Souls* on a Soulslike list feels like entering Dracula in a vampire contest, but leaving it out would be worse. Lordran supplies the unforgettable interlocking map, Drangleic brings the oddball experimentation and Lothric turns the combat speed several notches upward; together, they made bonfires into emotional support furniture and corpse runs into a worldwide ritual. The trilogy varies wildly in texture and temperament, yet stamina management, invasions and cryptic storytelling still explain how punishment became an entire gaming comfort zone. | © FromSoftware

Lords of the Fallen bodies — 3. Lords of the Fallen (2023 version)

*Lords of the Fallen* launched carrying more technical baggage than any pilgrim should. That version no longer tells the whole story: over 70 updates tightened performance, combat and co-op, with Version 2.5 further sharpening bosses and adding Veteran Mode. Its real magic remains the Umbral Lamp, used to peer into a parallel realm of the dead, uncover hidden routes and claw back one last chance after dying in Axiom. Mournstead remains vast, grim and shamelessly fond of ambushes—the current game simply makes that misery much easier to recommend. | © Hexworks

4. The Surge 1 & 2

A rusted exoskeleton replaces knightly armor, and suddenly every duel resembles a workplace accident awaiting an insurance investigation. *The Surge* traps Warren inside the industrial nightmare of CREO, while *The Surge 2* trades those corridors for a broader, more colorful Jericho City. Both games let players target and sever specific limbs to obtain weapons or manufacture matching armor, turning dismemberment into an equipment menu; the sequel’s directional parries and expanded builds improve the formula, but the original still owns the nastier atmosphere and stronger sense of corporate collapse. | © Deck13 Interactive

Mortal Shell Boss Fight — 5. Mortal Shell

*Mortal Shell* asks a practical question: why create one hero when several perfectly usable corpses are lying around? Its fallen warriors function as classes, each favoring a different balance of health, stamina and resolve. Then comes Harden, the signature ability that turns the protagonist to stone even midway through an attack. Once its timing clicks, combat develops a delicious stop-start rhythm. The journey is compact and occasionally cryptic to a fault, but its tar-black mood, weighty weapons and economical design make it ideal for a concentrated weekend of suffering. | © Cold Symmetry

Cropped Blasphemous — 6. Blasphemous 1 & 2

Religious guilt has rarely looked as spectacular in pixel art. *Blasphemous* marches the Penitent One through Cvstodia—a grotesque kingdom shaped by Spanish Catholic imagery, elaborate martyrdom and citizens who desperately need a less vindictive miracle—using deliberate swordplay and grisly executions; *Blasphemous 2* loosens movement, expands exploration and builds traversal into its weapon set. They sit on the Metroidvania side of the aisle, but severe bosses, corpse recovery and item descriptions seemingly written inside a confessional leave unmistakable Soulslike blood on both games. | © The Game Kitchen

Remnant from the ashes — 7. Remnant: From the Ashes & Remnant 2

Gunfire Games looked at the dodge roll and decided it needed a shotgun. *Remnant: From the Ashes* translates Soulslike tension into third-person gunplay, mixing limited healing, dangerous bosses and randomized worlds with three-player co-op. *Remnant II* is the confident sequel: its archetypes create sharper character identities, its procedural stories reward reruns and its bizarre locations range from ruined fantasy courts to cold alien machinery. Friends soften the loneliness, not the challenge; bosses remain perfectly willing to wipe the group while everyone argues about who forgot to revive whom. | © Gunfire Games

Jedi survivor — 8. Jedi: Fallen Order & Jedi: Survivor

Apparently, the Force also runs on stamina. *Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order* gives Cal Kestis meditation points, refillable healing, lost experience to reclaim and stormtroopers who respawn whenever he rests—familiar Soulslike rules dressed in Jedi robes. *Star Wars Jedi: Survivor* enlarges the playground and introduces five lightsaber stances, including blaster and crossguard styles that substantially alter combat rhythm. Difficulty settings keep both adventures more welcoming than their inspirations, though tougher modes turn every Purge Trooper into a persuasive argument for abandoning the Jedi path entirely. | © Respawn Entertainment

Cropped Hollow Knight Silksong — 9. Hollow Knight & Silksong

Hallownest and Pharloom prove insects can build civilizations, orchestras and boss fights capable of ruining lunch. *Hollow Knight* combines razor-clean combat with benches, charm builds and a Shade guarding the Geo dropped on death, all inside one of gaming’s finest interconnected worlds. *Hollow Knight: Silksong* hands control to the quicker, more acrobatic Hornet, then surrounds her with tools, quests and enemies designed around that extra mobility. Both sit closer to Metroidvania than pure Soulslike, but their lonely exploration, severe duels and corpse-run anxiety make the family resemblance impossible to miss. | © Team Cherry

Bloodborne ps exclusive — 10. Bloodborne

*Bloodborne* looks at defensive play, laughs quietly and hands the Hunter a firearm. Guns interrupt attacks, the Rally system rewards immediate retaliation and transforming Trick Weapons make even a basic combo feel gloriously theatrical; meanwhile, Yharnam begins as a plague-ridden Gothic hunt before twisting into something far stranger and more cosmic. Its frame rate and platform confinement have aged less gracefully than its design, but no other FromSoftware game matches this mixture of velocity, dread and aristocrats who appear to have bathed exclusively in bad decisions. | © FromSoftware

11. Lies of P

Pinocchio has survived countless adaptations, but only *Lies of P* makes missing a perfect guard feel like a moral failing. Krat’s Belle Époque boulevards are overrun by murderous puppets, giving the familiar fairy tale a polished mechanical cruelty of its own. The weapon assembly system lets players combine blades and handles for wonderfully odd movesets, while Legion Arms add flamethrowers, grappling hooks and other impolite solutions. Precise combat and lavish art carry it beyond imitation; even veterans expecting discount *Bloodborne* may leave wondering how Neowiz made lying this handsome. | © Round8 Studio

12. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

Forget build calculators and armor spreadsheets: *Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice* wants one swordsman, one katana and your undivided attention. Victory comes from breaking posture through sustained pressure, perfectly timed deflections and counters that turn boss battles into furious percussion exercises. The prosthetic arm provides clever tools, but it cannot rescue sloppy rhythm or a panic dodge inherited from *Dark Souls*. Resurrection offers a second chance when concentration slips; dignity is not included. Once its combat language becomes fluent, every clashing blade sounds less like danger and more like applause. | © FromSoftware

Wo long 12 — 13. Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty

*Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty* turns the collapse of the Han dynasty into an examination on parrying demons under pressure. Deflections feed a Spirit Gauge used for Martial Arts and magic, while the battlefield-specific Morale system makes flag hunting part of character progression rather than decorative tourism. Combat is more immediately forgiving than *Nioh*, yet its fastest bosses can still reduce confidence to powder in seconds; the avalanche of loot occasionally obscures its strengths, but when steel, Spirit and timing align, Team Ninja produces a wonderfully aggressive Three Kingdoms power fantasy. | © Team Ninja

Elden Ring Crossplay — 14. Elden Ring

The Lands Between are what happens when FromSoftware removes the corridor walls and lets curiosity become a health hazard. *Elden Ring* preserves precise combat, strange lore and spectacular bosses, then gives players a horse, a continent and enough build options to avoid admitting their first strategy was terrible. Spirit Ashes and open exploration provide escape valves, while Legacy Dungeons retain the intricate level design longtime fans expect. Add *Shadow of the Erdtree*, and this single recommendation can comfortably consume the entire remaining wait—and perhaps several neglected weekends afterward. | © FromSoftware

Black Myth Wukong — 15. Black Myth: Wukong

*Black Myth: Wukong* lives on the disputed border between Soulslike and straight action RPG, where genre arguments go to become comment sections. It drops corpse runs and traditional stat allocation, favoring staff stances, spells and transformations as the Destined One tears through creatures drawn from *Journey to the West*. The relentless boss schedule still demands close reading of animations, disciplined dodges and sensible gourd management. Classification aside, its sumptuous environments and kinetic duels satisfy the same appetite: confronting something enormous, dying badly and returning with a slightly less embarrassing plan. | © Game Science

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Waiting for FromSoftware’s next obsession is an endurance test of its own, except there is no stamina bar to blame. Until The Duskbloods arrives, these 15 best Soulslike games offer enough vicious bosses, ruined kingdoms and suspiciously placed checkpoints to keep your reflexes miserable and your evenings occupied. Some honor the Dark Souls formula; others drag it somewhere wonderfully strange. Every one of them makes dying repeatedly feel like time well spent.

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Waiting for FromSoftware’s next obsession is an endurance test of its own, except there is no stamina bar to blame. Until The Duskbloods arrives, these 15 best Soulslike games offer enough vicious bosses, ruined kingdoms and suspiciously placed checkpoints to keep your reflexes miserable and your evenings occupied. Some honor the Dark Souls formula; others drag it somewhere wonderfully strange. Every one of them makes dying repeatedly feel like time well spent.