“Quest II: The Dire Pass, That Few Have Known as Sarnath” – Dungeons of Irithyll

Four years after the release of “A Journey Through the Dark”, Dungeons of Irithyll has embarked upon yet another jarring and dangerous raid of dungeons deep, this time carrying listeners to a fresh setting which emulates “a small DLC area that could potentially be found within the Dark Souls universe” called “The Dire Pass, That Few Have Known as Sarnath”.

A lot can change in a four-year span, and evidently this is true of Dungeons of Irithyll as well: the former three-piece dungeon synth act’s Bandcamp page now credits only one original member, Dregmyre of Carim, as the sole contributor of this release. Moreover, this album has strayed from straightforward lo-fi dungeon synth into a more complete dungeon experience. The dolorous chanting on opening track “The Ashen Weald” segues into foreboding spoken word on following track, “Wyrdlung Chapel” which overlays ominous sounds of shuffling feet, rattling chains, and the tolling of a bell in the distance. There are many nuanced sounds and effects at play here which give this album the feeling – a very accurate feeling- of playing through a Dark Souls or souls-like encounter.

Even the album art bears the ragged appearance of an old paperback fantasy novel, tattered and worn by the hands of too many readers over a course of too many more years. “Quest II” is a dark journey toward a spectacular climax, an epic black metal battle theme for the boss of this imagined DLC, “Lucan the Befouler”, and finally leaves us at journey’s end with “The Lord Soul”, a song which “paints the transition from an ‘accursed undead’ to that of a fully restored hero of a broken world”. This album is not just an exercise in Dungeon Synth, but in the building of a fully immersive world which captures the gloomy idiosyncrasies of both the Dark Souls series and dungeon synth expertly. I recommend it highly for fans of lo-fi dungeon synth, black metal, the Dark Souls series, and roleplaying games in general. Support Dungons of Irithyll and listen below: