At long last, Dark Souls 3 Seamless Co-op is here

A pair of players challenge one of Dark Souls 3's hardest bosses in cooperative play. (Image credit: Bandai Namco)

It's time to head back to Lothric, Ashen One, because the best mod ever made for Elden Ring has now come to Dark Souls 3 — FromSoftware's critically acclaimed 2016 ARPG that concluded the studio's legendary Dark Souls trilogy.

That mod, as you might expect, is Seamless Co-op — an add-on that completely overhauls multiplayer by removing barriers between levels, allowing co-op in zones that didn't have it in vanilla, and letting jolly cooperators freely level and rest together at bonfires in the same instance. The mod also allows you to dodge the PvP invasions you'd normally have to deal with while co-oping, though you do have the option of enabling them if you want. You can download the Dark Souls 3 version of Seamless Co-op on Nexus Mods.

Seamless Co-op works by severing your connection to FromSoftware's matchmaking servers and instead connects you with up to five co-op buddies through peer-to-peer networking and separate character saves, ensuring that you won't get struck by a banhammer. It's hugely beneficial in Elden Ring since it has tons of barriers between its overworld and side zones to deal with, and now you can use it in Dark Souls 3, too.

Installing Seamless Co-op is easy, as all you have to do is drag the files from the mod download into the "Game" folder within your Dark Souls 3 installation, then launch the game with the mod's executable instead of the regular one. Using the included configuration file, you and your friends can then set a password that ensures you'll all connect together; this is effectively identical to how FromSoftware's password matchmaking works. You can also toggle invasions or tweak enemy scaling values in that same file.

Something important to note is that you can make regular Dark Souls 3 character saves compatible with Seamless Co-op by changing their file extension from ".sl2" to ".co2", but make sure you make a copy of them first; you won't be able to convert them back safely, as saves you made progress with in Seamless Co-op will get you flagged and banned by FromSoftware's systems if you try to make them work with vanilla Dark Souls 3 again.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the goal of Seamless Co-op is to make FromSoftware's ARPGs more accessible and enjoyable in multiplayer, not to make them easier. Dark Souls 3 Seamless Co-op scales enemy and boss health up when you have five or six party members (in vanilla, you can only have four) as a result, and also resets ongoing boss fights if a defeated player sits at a bonfire to respawn and attempt running back in.

For a full overview of everything you need to know, make sure you check out the mod's description. It goes over installation, Seamless Co-op's full suite of features, frequently asked questions, and more, so it's required reading.

It's awesome to see Seamless Co-op come to Dark Souls 3, and for me, it couldn't have arrived at a better time. My friends and I have been talking about doing a replay of the game soon, so we'll definitely be using this to do it.

Notably, this is the third FromSoftware game to get Seamless Co-op after Elden Ring and Armored Core 6. It's unclear if mod author Yui plans to also bring it to Dark Souls 2 or Dark Souls: Remastered, but I hope they do; Dark Souls 2 co-op is notorious for being extremely difficult to enjoy with friends because of Soul Memory, a mechanic that prevents players from playing together if one has collected significantly more souls (EXP) than the other during their journey.

Dark Souls 3 itself is one of FromSoftware's best games, arguably the best Dark Souls, and one of the best PC games to play if you enjoy challenging ARPGs with grandiose boss fights and rich combat systems. The PC version you can use the new Seamless Co-op mod with is normally $59.99, but thanks to this sweet deal, you can pick it up for just $24.69 at CDKeys. There's also the Deluxe Edition for $36.69 at CDKeys that includes all of Dark Souls 3's DLC.