You still kill monsters, collect souls, and use them to level up a short list of primary stats. Like it’s predecessors, Dark Souls 3 is an eerie Japanese spin on western fantasy that tells a surreal story in broad, vague strokes. Marred only by few performance hiccups, Dark Souls 3 is one of the most engrossing, cohesive games I’ve ever played, and the most focused, potent game in the series. Sure, the thrilling, punishing combat and notoriously difficult boss battles are its titanium skeleton, but the language and ambiguity of the world are its flesh and blood-the beating heart that imbues an excellent third-person action RPG with mythic authenticity. This is what makes Dark Souls 3 so profound. That might be reason enough to keep this rotten place together. But this giant is, and if he cares about a little white tree, then I should too.