Dark Souls 3 is coming. That should be accompanied by an ominous, Inception-like BWAAH noise. The finale to the beloved trilogy is surely going to take no prisoners, capping a fine series with the grandest, most challenging outing yet. Expect screen-filling bosses, obtuse design, and enemies placed exactly where you'd least expect. Damn you Miyazaki, you swine. 

The game itself is pretty much a known quantity then - more of what we know and love. But what of the PC hardware needed to run Dark Souls III? Well have no fear because we've got you covered, like the warm glow of a bonfire, with official Dark Souls 3 minimum (and predicted recommended) system requirements. Onwards, brave soldiers. 

Dark Souls 3 Minimum System Requirements

• OS: Windows 7 64-bit
• CPU: Intel Core i5-2500 3.1 GHz or AMD APU A8 3870K 3.6 GHz
• RAM: 8 GB System Memory
• GPU RAM: 1 GB Video Memory
• GPU: GeForce GTX 465 or Radeon HD 6870
• HDD: 50 GB Available Space
• DX: DirectX 11

Dark Souls 3 Predicted Recommended System Requirements

• OS: Windows 7 64-bit
• CPU: Intel Core i5-3570 3.1 GHz or AMD FX-8320 3.5 GHz
• RAM: 8 GB System Memory
• GPU RAM: 2GB Video Memory
• GPU: GeForce GTX 950 or Radeon R7 370
• HDD: 50 GB Available Space
• DX: DirectX 11

The automatic assumption with Dark Souls III was that it would largely look the same graphically as Dark Souls II and the original before it. And that assumption would be pretty much bang on, with Dark Souls 3 adopting almost identical minimum system requirements as the DX11-enabled Dark Souls 2: Scholar of the First Sin. 

That means fairly low-end graphics cards are needed, with both the GeForce GTX 465 and the Radeon HD 6870 hitting four generations old now. I can't envision any modern rigs having any problems here, provided you've got a $100+ graphics card of some sort from the last four or five years. Likewise with the processor demands. We're really not seeing many games take advantage of additional CPU performance, and Dark Souls III will still run just fine on the ageing Intel Core i5-2500. While that's the minimum, I also think the CPU isn't going to significantly bottleneck performance even when the graphics options are cranked up. 

The two aspects that do stick out for Dark Souls 3's minimum system requirements however are the RAM and installation size. 8GB seems a little extreme as a minimum for a game of this scope, so perhaps you can get away with 6GB or maybe even 4GB. The 50 gig installation is following in the footsteps of numerous other console ports, with the switch away from Xbox 360's DVD format allowing for much higher quality, higher resolution textures. It means a bigger download, but it should be the best looking Souls (or Bloodborne) game yet. 

While Bandai Namco has only provided the minimum system requirements, that does provide a very reliable base for us to take a stab at the recommended requirements for Dark Souls 3. Expect them to fall in line with Scholar of the First Sin, so a modern, low-end GPU like a GeForce GTX 950 or the Radeon R7 370 to be capable of maxing DS3 out at 1080p. The difference between minimum and recommended CPU meanwhile is probably going to be totally negligible.

Remember, you can always check out how well your PC can run the Dark Souls III System Requirements here, where you can check benchmarking and performance from other users. Compare your graphics card to the Dark Souls 3 benchmark chart.