Fans of the Dark Souls game have been battling with petitions in order to get a PC version of the astounding game Dark Souls, which was previously only developed for consoles (PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, not the Wii). The largest of these petitions was able to round up well over 100,000 signatures in favor of bringing Dark Souls to the PC. The publisher, NamcoBandai, loved the idea. They urged the same initial developer, FromSoftware, to develop a port to the PC, and they did.

FromSoftware ported Dark Souls to PC and repackaged it as “Dark Souls – Prepare to Die Edition” which clearly takes its fitting name from the tagline on the back of the standard Dark Souls game cases for PS3 and Xbox 360. People just loved the idea of massive difficulty done in a fashion that made the game completely fair and beatable. In fact, dying was essential in Dark Souls to be used as education. Nobody wants to make the same mistake twice, but with the difficulty of this game, there’s no promises. NamcoBandai Games said that the difficulty would not be toned down, not even a little bit, for PC gamers. In fact, I have yet to see a game that is of Dark Souls own caliber of difficulty. No game has ever infuriated me more than dying from the same boss again and again, but no single game has ever given me more satisfaction when I beat that boss (on the sixth try). The game is so difficult and requires such precision that both FromSoftware and NamcoBandai Games recommend that PC gamers use some sort of a gamepad rather than a keyboard and a mouse. However, it is entirely playable with both a keyboard and mouse, but the developer and publisher prefer that the player uses a gamepad to get the full experience.

So is this “Prepare to Die Edition” JUST a port? Is it simply a repackaging of the exact same game to bring it to the PC? The answer is both partially “yes” and partially “no”.

The “Prepare to Die Edition” will have the exact same graphics as the PS3 and Xbox 360 experienced. There will be no flashy new graphical update, and the difficulty (as previously mentioned) will remain equal to that of the console versions. In that sense, the answer is “yes, just a port”. However, that’s not to say that it’s all the same. That’s right, there will be new content for the PC gamers to brag about. There will be four new bosses to fight, about 3 more areas to explore, and a few new NPCs here and there to mingle with. Not only that, but there will be more equipment, such as armor sets and weapons, to come across in your travels around these new areas. One of the new NPCs that we know about is a knight name Artorius. One of the new armor sets that we know of is the Ornate Black Armor, of which Artorius wears. There will even be a special area dedicated simply to PvP. So, what’s the catch? Well, unfortunately, this is currently PC-exclusive new content, and NamcoBandai has said that it will likely stay that way. Don’t cry yet though, you never know what these developers and publishers will do next.

It has not yet been said when the Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition will be released, but there is said to be more incoming news about it at E3 this year in June. All I can say is, “PC Gamers, Prepare to Die!”