Long-time Dark Souls and Elden Ring dev thinks Miyazaki stores the entire story in his head: 'The lore probably only exists in Miyazaki's imagination'

Fromsoftware's longtime translator, Ryan Morris, discusses the unique approach to storytelling in SoulsBorne games, where lore is scattered in item descriptions and players are encouraged to piece together the fragmented history.

Fromsoftware's long-time translator reckons the SoulsBorneRing director stores every lore tidbit in his head - item descriptions bouncing all over the place.

Lead translator Ryan Morris, from localization studio Frognation, is a name you might not have heard before but his fingerprints can be seen in the translated versions of almost every beloved Soulsborne game - Demon's Souls, the Dark Souls trilogy, Bloodborne, Elden Ring, Armored Core 6, and even the Demon's Souls remake. 

Morris recently sat down in Edge Magazine's 398th issue to discuss his one-of-a-kind insight into how Fromsoft creates worlds that get players to dig deep into the small details, the item descriptions, the seemingly throwaway lines. "One of the big ideas that has driven the design of these games is [to have] a seamless experience, and do the best you can to avoid it feeling like a game," Morris says, pointing to the studio's unconventional multiplayer, which lets you "roleplay more, it can be more immersive, and hopefully, it can be a more emotional experience."

"With FromSoftware games, there's this idea of not telling the whole story in linear fashion, or telling you every factual detail about the world. I feel like the lore probably only exists in Miyazaki's imagination - I don't think it's written down in a canon for reference," Morris laughs, though there’s a nugget of truth in there - Fromsoft's torn worlds have lost history, conflicting records, and knowledge that'll never be the player's to obtain.

"A lot of the information has to be gleaned from all of the extra material that you can sift through if you read the item descriptions. That feeling of self-discovery, if it's done well, can really work," he continues.

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