How to Play Dark Souls III with a VPN

Dark Souls IIIThe Dark Souls franchise is a newer series of games that has grown in popularity. The developers are now coming out with Dark Souls III. Like in most games this will be an intense fighting game. It is available for Windows, PS4, and Xbox One. The special part about this version of Dark Souls is that it has an online multiplayer mode. While playing Dark Souls 3 online you might notice lag and slow connections. To fix these problems I would recommend a VPN. A VPN will change you IP address to any other location off your choosing. If you pick a VPN server located close to the server you play on then you will have less lag and faster connections. The more experienced players will also enjoy the extra protection against DDoS attacks.

RankVPN ServiceOur
Score
Server
Locations
Visit
1ExpressVPN9.8160Visit ExpressVPN
2NordVPN9.487Visit NordVPN
3Private Internet Access9.295Visit PIA
4CyberGhost9.0110Visit CyberGhost
5IPVanish8.873Visit IPVanish

Dark Souls III like every other Dark Souls game has you edit the appearance of your character. You are also able to pick your class. Each class has different abilities and fighting styles.

Main classes in Dark Souls 3 include:

  • Knight: Starts with a shield, leggings, gauntlets, chest plate, helmet, and one iron sword.
  • Mercenary: Starts with two swords, a wooden shield, and a Sellsword helmet, armor, and trousers.
  • Warrior: Starts with an axe, shield, and a Norther helmet, armor, gloves, and trousers.
  • Herald: Starts with a Spear, Heal Aid, a shield, a Tailsman, and a Herald’s helmet, armor, gloves, and trousers.
  • Thief: Starts with a knife, shield, bow, a Thief mask, and Deserter armor and trousers.
  • Assassin: Starts with an estoc, shield, Sorcerer’s staff, spook, and Assassin’s hood, armor, gloves, and trousers.
  • Sorcerer: Starts with a mail breaker, Sorcerer’s staff, shield, young dragon ring, soul arrow, heavy soul arrow, and Sorcerer’s hood, robe, gloves, and trousers.
  • Pyromancer: Starts with an axe, shield, Pyromancy flame, great swamp ring, fire ball, and Pyromancer crown, garb, wrap, and trousers.
  • Cleric: Start with a mace, Cleric’s sacred chime, shield, heal, force, and Cleric’s blue robe, gloves, and trousers.
  • Deprived: Starts with a club, Plank shield, and a Loincloth.

Dark Souls III is a hard strategical fighting game. This means that when you level you have to think of what equipment you need as you advance. You will also have to device when to use your skills and magic according to the situation.

The game has difficult bosses and some harder mobs. The items that drop from bosses and other mobs can be used to get to the online modes. The online modes can only be accessed through certain ways.

Online Modes include:

  • Co-op: You will need to use the item White Sign Soapstone and then you will be able to play with up to two others at a time.
  • PvP: You will use the Red Eye Orb or the Cracked Red Eye Orb. Then you will be sent to another player’s world and you can fight them in that world. You would be an invader while they would be a host. Up to two people at a time can invade one player, but you can use different signs to change that number.

Once again I recommend using a VPN to play Dark Souls 3.  A VPN will give you an IP address from the server location you choose. It will also improve performance by lowering your ping and protect you from DDoS attacks. It will help you get past geographical restrictions and the firewalls at school or work.

How to Use a VPN to Play Dark Souls 3 (PC)

I’ll use ExpressVPN for the example of how to use a VPN service to play Dark Souls 3 online. First you’ll want to download the VPN client. ExpressVPN offers free client software for Windows, Mac and Linux. In addition to free apps for iOS and Android.

Now that you’ve had a chance to download and install the software it’s time to connect. Launch the ExpressVPN client and select a server location. We’ll walk you through step by step using their Windows client.

ExpressVPN server locations

  • Since a lot of gamers like to connect to servers in the US, we used that country for our guide. ExpressVPN has a large network of servers located all over the world.
  • We recommend you select OpenVPN (TCP) or (UDP). For streaming videos from sites like YouTube, we use OpenVPN (UDP) because its faster than TCP. They also support PPTP, L2TP, and SSTP. We still recommend OpenVPN UDP for the best mix of speed and privacy protection.
  • Click the big round connect button. After a few seconds, you’ll see the shield around the button turn green. There will also be a message letting you know the “VPN is ON”
  • You now have an IP address in the USA, as far as anyone can tell online. As such, you can reach any site as if you were sitting there. The same would be true if you connected to a server in the UK or anywhere else in the world.

It is just that easy to do. Now that you have an IP address from an ExpressVPN server in the US, you can game, browse the Internet or watch shows as if you were actually there. Connecting to a server in the UK would give you full access to geo blocked sites there as well.  The same is true from any country.

As you can probably tell by now a good VPN opens access to content around the world. If you live outside the United States the service can help you access popular services like Netflix, Hulu and Pandora. You still need an account for services like Netflix but the VPN will help you watch US television shows and movies on Netflix as if you were sitting in the United States or any other region you would like to access.

How to Use a VPN to Play Dark Souls 3 (Xbox One and PS4)

Once again I’ll use ExpressVPN for the example of how to use a VPN service to play Dark Souls 3 on your game console. They are my favorite VPN for gaming because ExpressVPN manages a very large network which makes the service a great choice for gamers.

The first step to getting set up with ExpressVPN is normally to download the client software for your system. ExpressVPN offers free client software for Windows, Mac and Linux.  In addition to free apps for iOS and Android. Obviously that won’t work for PS4, Xbox One, or Nintendo since the game consoles lack the native support for VPN. Luckily, there is still a way to encrypt your gaming traffic and send it through a VPN. The answer is running the VPN through your router. Note: if you don’t need encryption you can use the ExpressVPN MediaStramer (Smart DNS) feature without the need to configure your router. It supports a wide range of gaming consoles.

ExpressVPN router app

Depending on what brand and model of router you use, it might support third party VPN services. If so you can get the necessary information from your VPN provider to set up a connection through your router. Otherwise I highly recommend FlashRouters. The FlashRouters team takes popular, brand name routers and flashes them with DD-WRT or Tomato firmware. That allows the devices to have far more features than they would with the factory firmware installed. All FlashRouters come pre-configured with support for VPN.

Enjoy all the excitement as you play Dark Souls III online.  Please share this post with your friends so they can enjoy gaming from anywhere in the world with a VPN.  Follow us @VPNFan for the latest deals and guides.

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