There was a board game called 'Sorcery,' which is one of my favorites, and I would often revisit the game. It's not a video game, but it definitely stands out in my mind as a game that impacted me.
The main concept of 'Dark Souls III' is the first flame and its successors; the world has been in this cycle of reigniting the flame since the first game, but now it seems to be disappearing, almost dying. We're trying to draw out the aspects of this withering flame.
I am conscious of that when I make these games: I try to make a game that has beautiful open spaces, gaps, room for players to enjoy it in ways that were not authored. I never want it to be where you have to follow the rules completely, where you have to do things exactly as the designers intended.
I'm not one to restrict the potential that 'Dark Souls' has by insisting that only I can work on the titles.
I don't think it'd be the right choice to continue indefinitely creating 'Souls' and 'Bloodborne' games.
First of all, I don't dislike direct storytelling - people seem to think that about my games! Actually, the truth is, I'm just not good at implementing direct narrative in my games.
