"The Archthrones require a great many souls, so that the linking of the fire may comenceth..."
Dark Souls: Archthrones is a Total Conversion set in FromSoftware Dark Souls universe. It acts as an Interquel to Dark Souls II and Dark Souls III, being a very elaborate What If?, taking aspects from all the games, popular Fanon theories and even elements from FromSoftware other games. It features entirely new gameplay systems, enemies, bosses, NPC's (voiced with fully custom voices), cutscenes, and levels. Unlike other mod projects, it runs on a custom server, and has the Soulsborne style of multiplayer available and fully integrated.
In the land of Lothric, Prince Lothric's betrayal of his faith has caused ripples; now that the Linking of the First Flame cannot commence, the dark is slowly encroaching. Taking the task upon herself, a brave Firekeeper creates the Nexus of Embers: a place where emissaries from around the land can gather, and face the crisis head on. Gifted five archstones, the Firekeeper needs someone brave and skilled enough to seize the souls of powerful beings from across the Dark Souls Universe; taking the Emissary of Embers from Carthus of the Sands, all the way to Heide's Tower of Flame in an effort to power the dying fire a final time.
A demo was released on March 15, 2024. (downloadable here
). There is currently no set date for the release of the full game.
Trailers: Launch Trailer
Brave troper who fears not death.
- Ambiguous Time Period: Despite being billed as an Interquel, it's unclear exactly when on the timeline the mod is supposed to take place. The Lothric Civil War is still ongoing, placing it before III, and the Old Knights in Heide's Tower are far less old, placing it even before II. However, the Cathedral of the Deep appears to be much further along in its Deep corruption than in the base game, which would place it after III. Then again,
the flow of time is convoluted in the Dark Souls series. - Anti-Regeneration: One particularly tough boss makes extensive use of Undead Hunter Charms during the battle, preventing the player from healing with the Estus Flask.
- Ascended Extra: Some summonable NPC's (Like Knight Slayer Tsorig) and background lore characters (Such as Old Man Mcloyf) have been made fully voiced NPC's with sidequests.
- BFS: So many, and the greatsword and ultra greatsword classes return. Most notably, Necromancer Obediah wields one in his boss fight, and does so deftly.
- Bow and Sword in Accord: Bows have been heavily buffed, and arrows are very readily available, making having a bow as a secondary (or even primary) weapon a truly viable option for possibly the first time in the series.
- Dual Boss: The demo has three:
- Sir Florian and Warden Jessa, an elegant swordsman paired with a massive brute dual wielding crushing maces. Both have fairly simple movesets, but don’t like to separate from each other long enough for the player to deal much damage.
- Rimeblood Halti and Greatwolf Skoll: A lone Abyss Watcher who brings in an icy Greatwolf at roughly 2/3 health. From there, the two bosses take turns playing passive or aggressive, each diving in when the other takes too much damage.
- The Angels of Gertrude start out as a one-on-one duel, only for a second angel to appear at half health. Fortunately, while both are extremely aggressive, teleporting foes, they share a health bar, meaning the addition of a second angel gives twice as many opportunities for damage.
- Enemy Civil War:
- The Lothric Civil War is currently unfolding, between Royalists and followers loyal to the heretic Getrude: the aptly named "War-torn Village" is the location of her Church, and is filled with elements of the two armies clashing, a extensive militarization of the region, including a massive battle between a dozen knights at the very center of the map.
- Carthus has just been levelled by the Undead Legion, and a company of Farron Followers are still occupying an oasis, and will in-fight if they run across the High Lord's warriors.
- Evil Tainted the Place: The Cathedral of the Deep is in far worse shape than it's ever been. Instead of the Thralls and Hollows that used to populate the outside, there are only Murkmen. The inside, meanwhile, has been terraformed into a giant Isz Chalice Dungeon, complete with Brainsuckers, a new variant of Man-Grub standing in for Celestial Emissaries, and corrupted Milfanito standing in for Winter Lanterns. The rafters are now engulfed by swirling galaxies, and the Cathedral Knights have been reduced to skeletons rattling around in decayed suits of armor, animated only by dark energy.
- Genre Refugee: Certain enemies, like the Heide Knights and the Carthus Warriors, have their animations and movesets taken from Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, causing a few odd quirks in the combat system - for example, Heide Knights are capable of automatically blocking attacks instantly and without using a shield like most humanoid enemies in Sekiro, but you don't have the ability to counter that due to the far different combat system. They also tend to be much faster and aggressive than other enemies, due to the fact that most of their movesets were originally meant to be countered with deflections and not dodged.
- No-Sell: Trying to attack Old Man McLoyf will just result in your attack being repelled by a barrier and him mocking you for even trying.
- Recurring Element: Several bosses play on classic From Soft gimmicks:
- The Angelic Siege Golem is an update of the Tower Knight, being a towering foe with high damage resistances where the player must knock out its legs to attack its more vulnerable head.
- Necromancer Obediah is, as one might guess, the latest boss to summon hordes of skeletons to back him up, following in the footsteps of the Skeleton Lords and High Lord Wolnir. Though Obediah is much more of a formidable threat than either of them.
- Aldrich, Saint of the Deep is a play on the phalanx style boss fight, previously seen in the first boss fight from Demon's Souls and Rom, the Vacuous Spider. This fight is much more dynamic than either previous version, with the boss being able to bring its minions with it while teleporting around the room, and even being able to empower them with additional abilities. The minions are also less of a physical barrier to attacking the boss, but will still mob unsuspecting or overly greedy players.
- Silver Knight Captain Erdan is a highly aggressive boss with tricky attack timings fought in a very small circular room whose second phase involves lighting himself on fire; just like both Smelter Demons.
- Unseen No More: Many concepts, characters, and places that were mentioned only in the Flavor Text of the trilogy are fully featured here.
- Old Man Mcloyf, the long missing God of Medicine and Drink, can be found in a locked laboratory in the Nexus; doing a small sidequest unlocks his service of creating flasks and elixirs.
- Carthus of the Sands, is a Downplayed example of this. You visited its catacombs in 3 but in this you get to explore the kingdom proper.
- The Great Off Screen War Lothric Civil War is the centerpiece of the Lothric archthrone and is raging in full, in contrast to it's fizzled out remnants in 3 proper.
