Ask for the shape of the challenge.

The expansion where the series stops being polite: Master Rank monsters hit for most of your health bar and expect the matchup knowledge the base game let you skip.

Wirebugs give every weapon a get-out-of-jail move, which makes this the entry that will actually teach you the series rather than survive you learning it.

Sixty hours of systems the game never explains, hiding behind a weapon whose fourth input you have not found yet.

Enormous and completely indifferent — most of its walls are optional, and it will never tell you which ones.

Souls difficulty plus a fighting game’s input list plus a loot game’s spreadsheet, and none of the three is optional.

Souls stamina and checkpoints with a gun in your hands, so the dodge is still the answer but the aim decides whether the dodge was needed.

Its difficulty is crowd control, not duels: the game throws groups and ranged attackers at you constantly, and the second world doubles the population.

The gentlest soulslike on the shelf, largely because the AI companion it gives you will happily solo a boss you cannot beat.

Runs are fast and deaths are total. Boss cells stack modifiers until a loadout that felt comfortable dies to two hits, and there is no difficulty setting hiding under them.

A MOBA played from behind the character, so half your abilities have to be aimed and the other half have to be aimed while something is aiming at you.