Miyazaki Turns Real-Life 'Weird' Execs Into Souls Enemies

Ever wonder where FromSoftware gets those bizarre, unsettling bosses you can't stop dying to? Turns out some of them might be based on real people. Specifically, real executives.

In a new interview, Dark Souls director and FromSoftware president Hidetaka Miyazaki opened up about how his career shift shaped his creative process. According to Miyazaki, stepping into the president role gave him "new experiences to draw from" — and not all of them were pleasant. He admitted he was always "fascinated" by the "weird" executives he encountered at other companies.

But Miyazaki being Miyazaki, he didn't just file those encounters away as awkward meeting-room memories. Instead, he turned them into fuel for his games. "I use some of them as enemy characters in our games," he said. That's right — somewhere in a FromSoftware title, there's a boss that's basically a thinly veiled version of a corporate suit who rubbed him the wrong way.

If you've played Dark Souls, Bloodborne, Sekiro, or Elden Ring, this probably makes a weird kind of sense. FromSoftware's enemies are famously grotesque, theatrical, and oddly human — even the ones with too many arms or a face made of teeth. Knowing that some of that energy came from real boardroom weirdos only makes the whole thing better.

It also tracks with what we know about Miyazaki's storytelling instincts. His games are built on ambiguity, dread, and the feeling that the world is slightly off. A parade of eccentric executives is basically a free horror bestiary if you're paying close enough attention.

There's something delightfully petty about the whole thing, too. Most of us just complain about our bosses or the people we meet in meetings. Miyazaki puts them in a game and lets millions of players kill them over and over. Honestly? Respect.

So the next time you're stuck on a boss that feels a little too smug, a little too self-important, maybe you're not just fighting a monster. Maybe you're fighting a memory. And maybe somewhere out there, an executive has no idea they've been immortalized as a health bar.

What do you think — is there a boss in a FromSoftware game that reminds you of someone from your own office? And will you be looking at those weird enemies a little differently now?