[Note: This is an interview with Dark Souls' director Hidetaka Miyazaki about the recently-released DLC content, and contains plot spoilers. Why haven't you played it yet?]

Dark Souls is an all-time masterpiece hall-of-famer, and one that's met with enough success to warrant an extension. The ' Artorias of the Abyss ' DLC, now available on all platforms, adds a series of substantial linked areas, plus some superb new bosses and equipment – and also manages that Miyazaki trick of filling in blanks while suggesting a few new ones. The DLC is set in Dark Souls' past, in a kingdom called Oolacile beset by the Abyss, all accessed through the minor detail of a pendant. “Oolacile is a kingdom of sorcery that had been ruined when the original story unfolded,” explains Miyazaki. “The additional content is set about a hundred years before Oolacile was ruined. In this kingdom, the sorceries are peculiar light spells that are different from the common ones in the original story.” Oolacile spells from the original game tended to be non-offensive and even charming magic – producing light, hiding things, disguising yourself. Tricks. But in this Oolacile you find ridiculously strong dark magic and pyromancies. Sorceries designed to kill in direct, high-damage ways. “As one of the main themes of Dark Souls is 'fire and dark', these light spells also include darkness that occurred from the gap between them,” says Miyazaki. “The darkness leads to the Abyss, which is a keyword this time.”

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“ As one of the main themes of Dark Souls is 'fire and dark', these light spells also include darkness that occurred from the gap between them.

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“ It was at the latter development stage of Demons Souls when I began to think that I would like to try creating a huge connected map, so it was not planned to be adopted for Demons Souls.

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“ I placed giant-sized women in the world since I am attracted by motherhood and 'huge women' as an expression of generous motherhood.

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The Abyss is your ultimate destination, but before that comes Knight Artorias the Abysswalker – a name that resonates throughout the original game's story. The DLC ties up the Artorias thread neatly, but introduces some seemingly contradictory details about his past. Or perhaps we're taking too much at face value.On that bombshell, perhaps it's time to move onto practical matters. The DLC adds several new weapons acquired in typical Souls fashion, such as the pimpin' sweet tracer set that can be acquired by killing the grieving lover of a guy you also killed. “It is hard to pick up one weapon for players to see but the tracers you point out are good ones I would like them to check,” says Miyazaki. “Since we did all the basic weapons in Dark Souls, these additional ones may look different. Most have a specific image of the user in them, so they tend to be peculiar according to that. I suppose the tracers strongly reflect an image of a particular user – they look like a rare set of weapons, both of which are different in the way they are handled.”One of the few cheerful faces in Dark Souls is a pyromancer, Laurentius, but it's kind of interesting that there are any at all. I ask Miyazaki why he puts jolly characters in such a grim world, and with such grim endings. “As the creator of them I am very happy with your description of 'jolly characters',” Miyazaki says. “I think of serious characters like seedlings scattered over waste lands, hiding sorrow in their minds. But if I try to draw such characters, sometimes the seeds bloom unexpectedly. Having said that, I believe that some of the endings were what the characters hoped.”The success of Dark Souls suggests a new entry in the series should be cooking away in From Software's wonder factory – we can only pray. I ask if the Artorias of the Abyss DLC finishes things for Dark Souls. “We are not planning to release more additional content so far,” says the gnomic Miyazaki, gnomically. Come on then, is the next game called Dragon's Souls or what? “This is also a very interesting thought,” says the probably uninterested Miyazaki. “But so far I can not say anything about sequels. I am sorry but it is uncertain whether I can get involved in the next sequel yet. I would also like to avoid giving confusion by saying something wrong at this stage.” Well, you can't say fairer than that. One does not really interview Hidetaka Miyazaki so much as temporarily observe him. The director of both Demon's and Dark Souls is that rarest of things in videogames – a creator that, like his works, remains something of a mystery. When you play them it all makes sense. Miyazaki's games do anything but give the player answers, slowly unfolding their few concrete details into even more questions. Straight talking from Miyazaki, in other words, would in some way betray his creations. And what creations they are.

Rich Stanton is a Terran freelancer who spends most of his free time in Lordran. Check him out on IGN or Twitter for all of your sun-praising and Zerg-smashing needs.