The gaming world erupted with excitement in August 2025 when FromSoftware and Crunchyroll unveiled "Sekiro: No Defeat," an anime adaptation set to premiere in 2026. While fans celebrated the news, a more intriguing question emerged: could this anime announcement signal the arrival of a Sekiro sequel, potentially under a completely different name? Based on FromSoftware's historical patterns and director Hidetaka Miyazaki's well-documented philosophy against direct sequels, the evidence suggests this isn't just wishful thinking—it's a strategic likelihood rooted in the studio's creative DNA.
The Sekiro Anime: More Than Just an Adaptation
The announcement of "Sekiro: No Defeat" represents far more than a simple cash-in on a successful gaming franchise. The anime, produced by Qzil.la studio and featuring hand-drawn animation, demonstrates FromSoftware parent company Kadokawa's commitment to expanding the Sekiro universe beyond gaming. This multimedia approach mirrors strategies employed with other major gaming franchises, where anime adaptations often precede or coincide with game sequels.
Historical precedents support this theory. When Ghost of Tsushima received its anime announcement, the gaming community correctly interpreted it as Sony's signal of continued investment in the IP. Similarly, the timing of Sekiro's anime—premiering in 2026—aligns suspiciously well with typical FromSoftware development cycles, which span four to six years between major releases. With Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice launching in March 2019, a 2026-2027 sequel announcement would fit perfectly within this timeline.
The anime's focus on expanding the game's narrative also suggests FromSoftware is testing audience appetite for more Sekiro content. By gauging reception to the anime before committing to a full game sequel, the studio can measure whether the IP has sufficient staying power to justify another major development investment.
Miyazaki's Sequel Philosophy: The Dark Souls Lesson
To understand why a potential Sekiro sequel would likely bear a different name, we must examine Hidetaka Miyazaki's candid statements about sequels throughout his career. His philosophy was crystallized in a revealing 2013 interview where he stated, "I [wouldn't] really care for Dark Souls VIII to come out. That's not the point". This single quote encapsulates his resistance to franchise fatigue—a concern born from his experience with the Dark Souls trilogy.
By 2015, as Dark Souls 3 approached release, Miyazaki's position had solidified further. He told Gamespot: "I don't think it'd be the right choice to continue indefinitely creating Souls and Bloodborne games. I'm considering Dark Souls 3 to be the big closure on the series". He emphasized that "From Software has to create new things" and that the studio wanted to "aggressively make new things in the future".
This wasn't merely public relations speak. Miyazaki's actions matched his words. When Dark Souls 2 entered development, he deliberately stepped away from the director's chair, taking only a supervisory role. He later expressed some regret about this decision, but his reasoning revealed his creative priorities: "I wanted to see what kind of possibilities awaited when the base concept of Dark Souls was unshackled from myself".
Most recently, in December 2024, Miyazaki reaffirmed this philosophy regarding Elden Ring. Speaking at the PlayStation Partner Awards 2024, he stated bluntly: "We're not really considering developments such as an Elden Ring 2". While he left the door open for future development of the IP "in some form," the message was clear: direct numbered sequels are not FromSoftware's style under his leadership.
The Spiritual Successor Strategy: FromSoftware's Proven Playbook
FromSoftware's history demonstrates a clear preference for spiritual successors over direct sequels. This strategy allows the studio to iterate on successful mechanics and themes while avoiding the creative constraints of continuing established narratives. The pattern is remarkably consistent across Miyazaki's career.
Demon's Souls to Dark Souls: When Sony owned the Demon's Souls IP and showed limited interest in a sequel, Miyazaki created Dark Souls as a spiritual successor. The games shared core mechanics—stamina-based combat, death penalties, interconnected world design—but Dark Souls established its own mythology, aesthetic, and lore entirely separate from Demon's Souls.
Dark Souls to Bloodborne: Rather than create Dark Souls 4, Miyazaki developed Bloodborne, which transformed the medieval fantasy of Souls into Victorian Gothic horror. The game accelerated combat, removed shields as primary defense options, and introduced aggressive rally mechanics that rewarded offense over the defensive playstyle of Dark Souls. Yet Bloodborne was unmistakably a spiritual successor, sharing the underlying DNA while presenting an entirely fresh experience.
Bloodborne to Sekiro: Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice represented another evolution. Initially conceived as a potential Tenchu sequel, the project quickly outgrew that concept. Miyazaki and his team created a game that maintained FromSoftware's commitment to challenging combat and environmental storytelling while introducing revolutionary posture-based sword dueling, vertical traversal, and stealth mechanics. Notably, Sekiro is the only modern FromSoftware game with a subtitle after the main title—a detail that hasn't gone unnoticed.
Sekiro to Elden Ring: Elden Ring essentially functions as Dark Souls IV in all but name. The game returns to medieval European fantasy settings after Sekiro's Japanese locale, implements open-world design, and refines the Souls formula while collaborating with George R.R. Martin on worldbuilding. Multiple commentators have observed that Elden Ring is effectively a Souls sequel without carrying that burden in its title.
Why "Sekiro 2" Won't Happen—But Its Successor Will
The evidence strongly suggests FromSoftware will create another game utilizing Sekiro's combat innovations and thematic elements, but under a different name. Several factors support this conclusion:
The Trademark Structure: Legal observers noted that Sekiro's trademark places the mark after "Sekiro" but before "Shadows Die Twice". This structure technically makes "Sekiro" the series name and "Shadows Die Twice" the subtitle for the first entry. The subtitle itself refers to multiple narrative and mechanical elements—Wolf's resurrection ability, the game's Buddhist themes of reincarnation, and the literal two deaths players can experience before returning to a checkpoint. This structure theoretically allows for "Sekiro: [New Subtitle]" as a sequel naming convention.
However, FromSoftware's track record suggests they'll avoid even this approach. The studio has consistently demonstrated that creative freedom matters more than brand recognition. Miyazaki himself stated he doesn't want to be restricted by insisting only he can work on specific titles, and that fresh perspectives help franchises evolve.
The Combat System Investment: One of the strongest arguments for a Sekiro-style successor comes from the sheer development investment in its combat system. Miyazaki didn't conceive Sekiro's posture system from the start—it evolved during Dark Souls 3's development when he pondered whether enemies could be defeated without depleting health bars. The team spent three years developing this revolutionary deflection-based combat before revealing the game.
This represents enormous creative and financial investment that would be wasteful to use only once. As one Reddit user astutely observed: "There's no chance they would discard such a brilliant combat system as the one found in Sekiro". However, rather than creating "Sekiro 2," FromSoftware is more likely to transplant this combat philosophy into a new setting with a new name, just as they've done previously.
The Setting Limitation Problem: Sekiro faces a unique challenge among FromSoftware games: it's tethered to real-world Japanese history. The game adapts 16th-century Sengoku period Japan, featuring architecture, clans, and cultural elements from that specific era. Unlike Dark Souls, which uses ambiguous dark fantasy settings that can radically change between entries, a direct Sekiro sequel would struggle to maintain visual and thematic freshness within the same historical period.
Moving the setting forward or backward in time creates narrative complications, as it must contend with actual Japanese history. The solution? Follow the game's "Return" ending, which establishes Wolf and the Divine Child journeying west to return the Divine Dragon to its birthplace—heavily implied to be China or Korea. This narrative thread provides perfect justification for a spiritual successor set in a different Asian country, with new architecture, mythology, and cultural elements, all while maintaining the core combat philosophy.
The New IP Mandate: Since becoming FromSoftware president, Miyazaki has made creating new intellectual properties a company priority. He explicitly stated that Dark Souls 3 marked "the last game where the development project began before I became president" and that "the next title will be a game that was conceived while I was president". This presidential mandate extends to the entire studio culture.
Recent statements reinforce this direction. When discussing FromSoftware's current projects in 2024, Miyazaki revealed the studio is "working on multiple projects across various genres". He emphasized that while multiplayer experiments like Elden Ring: Nightreign and The Duskbloods are being explored, the studio "still intend[s] to actively develop single-player focused games". This suggests at least one major single-player action game is in development—potentially the Sekiro spiritual successor.
What a Sekiro Successor Might Look Like
Based on FromSoftware's patterns and the narrative threads left by Sekiro, we can make educated predictions about this hypothetical successor:
Setting and Theme: The most logical direction follows the Return ending's westward journey. A game set in Tang Dynasty China or Joseon Dynasty Korea would provide rich new environments while maintaining thematic consistency. The game could explore different philosophical traditions—Confucianism, Taoism, or Korean Buddhism—providing narrative depth distinct from Sekiro's Japanese Buddhist themes.
Combat Evolution: Just as Bloodborne accelerated Dark Souls combat and Sekiro perfected deflection mechanics, the successor would likely introduce new combat innovations while maintaining the posture-break foundation. Potential additions could include:
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Dual-wielding weapons with distinct left/right hand mechanics
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Horseback combat integration (lessons learned from Elden Ring)
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Multiple fighting styles tied to different martial arts traditions
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Environmental combat integration (weather, terrain effects)
Prosthetic/Tool System: Sekiro's prosthetic arm provided combat variety within its focused weapon system. A successor could evolve this concept—perhaps magical artifacts, mystical scrolls, or cultivator abilities drawn from Chinese mythology and wuxia literature.
Narrative Structure: While maintaining FromSoftware's oblique storytelling approach, the game could explore themes of exile, cultural exchange, and the clash between different warrior philosophies. The protagonist could be a ronin-equivalent from Japan navigating foreign lands, providing natural fish-out-of-water narrative hooks.
Multiplayer Elements: While Sekiro was strictly single-player, FromSoftware has shown renewed interest in online components. A successor might include optional cooperative elements or asynchronous multiplayer (like messages and phantoms) without compromising the single-player focus.
Timeline and Development Reality
If this spiritual successor exists, when might we see it? FromSoftware's development pipeline provides clues. Miyazaki confirmed multiple unannounced projects in various stages of development. Elden Ring: Nightreign releases in 2025-2026, and The Duskbloods (the Switch 2 exclusive) is confirmed. These multiplayer-focused experiments likely represent smaller teams while a major single-player project develops simultaneously.
Typical FromSoftware development cycles span four to six years for major releases. If pre-production on a Sekiro successor began after Sekiro's 2019 release or during Elden Ring's final development in 2020-2021, we could realistically see an announcement in 2026-2027 with release in 2027-2028. The anime's 2026 premiere would strategically precede this announcement by 6-12 months, building audience interest in the IP.
Miyazaki's recent comments suggest he won't direct every FromSoftware project. A Sekiro successor could be helmed by another director with Miyazaki in a supervisory role—the same structure used for Dark Souls 2. This would free Miyazaki to pursue other creative interests (he's mentioned interest in traditional JRPGs) while ensuring the project maintains FromSoftware quality standards.
The Broader Pattern: Why Different Names Matter
FromSoftware's spiritual successor strategy serves multiple purposes beyond Miyazaki's creative preferences. Different names provide:
Marketing Fresh Start: Each new title generates its own hype cycle without carrying baggage from previous entries. Elden Ring benefited enormously from being perceived as a new IP despite being mechanically similar to Dark Souls.
Creative Flexibility: Teams can make bold changes without fan expectations constraining them. Sekiro's removal of character stats, equipment variety, and multiplayer would have been controversial in a game called "Dark Souls: Shadows Die Twice".
Critical Reception Reset: Review scores and player reception start fresh. Elden Ring's near-universal acclaim partly stemmed from not being "just another Souls sequel".
Lower Risk Profile: If a spiritual successor underperforms, it doesn't damage the original IP's reputation. The risk is distributed across multiple brands rather than concentrated in one franchise.
IP Ownership Flexibility: Creating new IPs gives FromSoftware negotiating leverage with publishers. Sekiro's Activision publishing deal was possible because it was a new IP. A game called "Dark Souls: Shadows Die Twice" would have required Bandai Namco's involvement due to IP ownership.
The Future of Sekiro—Without Sekiro
The anime announcement proves FromSoftware and Kadokawa believe the Sekiro universe has continued value. However, that value will most likely manifest through a spiritual successor rather than "Sekiro 2: [Subtitle]." This approach honors Miyazaki's creative philosophy, provides the development team maximum freedom, and follows the proven strategic pattern that's made FromSoftware one of gaming's most respected developers.
For fans desperately wanting more of Sekiro's combat, the message is clear: you'll likely get it, but not in the package you expect. Just as Dark Souls delivered on Demon's Souls' promise with a new name, and Bloodborne refined Souls combat in a new setting, FromSoftware's next major single-player game will probably capture what made Sekiro special while establishing its own identity.
The question isn't whether FromSoftware will make another Sekiro-style game—the studio has invested too much in perfecting that combat system to use it only once. The question is what they'll call it, where they'll set it, and how they'll evolve the formula to surprise us once again. Based on everything we know about Miyazaki and FromSoftware's creative philosophy, that surprise will come with a brand new name and a fresh start, unshackled from sequel expectations but carrying forward the soul of what made Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice a masterpiece.
