As with any gaming year, DLC becomes a major part of it in addition to new video game launches. The Game Awards even controversially made DLC eligible for Game of the Year. With new expansions, developers get to build the lore and story of their acclaimed works as well as to continue growing player numbers, and it’s oftentimes worth it.
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10 Best Video Game DLCs Of 2023
2023 wasn’t just a great year for new video game releases but also for DLC.
Some DLC can pleasantly surprise and live up to the experience of the original game, while other DLC can falter and bring down the whole experience. 2024 came with a mix of both, but the following are DLC you may want to consider, especially if these are the games you’re playing now or have on your wishlist.
10
Shattered Space
Starfield
Just over a year after Bethesda’s long-awaited sci-fi RPG was made available, Starfield’s first DLC, Shattered Space, launched at the end of September 2024. While it wasn’t the best start to Starfield’s journey in DLC, Shattered Space offered you plenty of new questlines and expanded the worldbuilding of an already enormous spacefaring adventure.
With Shattered Space, you must answer a distress signal on an abandoned space station called The Oracle, and from there, you’ll be taken to the moon known as Va’ruun’kai, where House Va’ruun, the theocratic governing faction worshiping the Great Serpent, resides. This new planet and House Va’ruun offer a mix of Lovecraftian horror and Dune’s political intrigue.
9
Khaos Reigns
Mortal Kombat 1
With all the initial hype surrounding Mortal Kombat 1, you wouldn’t expect Khaos Reigns to launch to lukewarm ratings, but that’s what ended up happening, so much so that any additional DLC seems to be in jeopardy. While the story expansion wasn’t fantastic, you still get plenty of exciting content, like the newly designed Cyrax, Sektor, and Noob Saibot as fighters, and new licensed guest fighters from Kombat Pack 2 – Ghostface, Conan the Barbarian, and T-1000.
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The campaign expansion was more about exploring the multiverse that was set up in the base game, which ended up being a big disappointment, even in our own review of the DLC. However, Ghostface is an excellent slasher guest with an iconic Fatality. And with Khaos Reigns also comes Animalities on top of Brutalities and Fatalities, which allow your fighters to shapeshift into deadly animals to unleash brutal finishers.
Conan the Barbarian will launch as a guest fighter in Early Access starting January 21, 2025.
8
Wild Card DLC
Star Wars Outlaws
Two months after its initial launch and to coincide with its debut on Steam, Star Wars Outlaws received its first story expansion DLC titled ‘Wild Card.’ Here, Kay Vess gets to have another Sabacc tournament encounter with Lando Calrissian, this time in a new area aboard the gambling cruiser Morenia, all while working for the Empire’s Governor Thorden.
As per how it usually goes in Star Wars, your game of Sabacc gets sabotaged and now Kay must escape from enemies. However, fleeing the Morenia along with you is Lando. That’s right, Lando will hitch a ride on Kay’s ship, the Trailblazer, and when you arrive back on Toshara, you’ll have some additional missions to complete for him to assist the Rebel cause in acquiring the map to Okala V.
7
NieR: Automata Collab DLC
Stellar Blade
- Released
-
April 26, 2024
- Developer(s)
-
Shift Up
- Publisher(s)
-
Sony Interactive Entertainment
- Engine
-
Unreal Engine 4
- ESRB
-
M for Mature
Stellar Blade’s NeiR: Automata DLC collaboration is a match made in heaven. After all, the developer behind Stellar Blade got inspiration from Yoko Taro’s masterpiece to create Eve and her sci-fi, hack-and-slash RPG world. This collection gives you new outfits for Eve directly inspired by the YoRHa military suits of NieR, including 2B’s and A2’s. Her companions Adam and Lilly can also get new costumes, including Adam donning an Emil’s head.
This DLC doesn’t provide much in terms of story expansion or a crossover level of NieR and Stellar Blade’s worlds colliding; just mainly the costumes now being canon in the Stellar Blade universe. However, you also get Emil’s Shop in the game, found in the Wastelands and Great Desert areas, which is where you can purchase all these outfits.
6
The Iron Rig
Dredge
- Released
-
March 31, 2023
- Developer(s)
-
Black Salt Games
- Engine
-
Unity
- ESRB
-
E10+ For Everyone 10+ Due To Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence, Mild Language, Use of Tobacco
Still Wakes the Deep wasn’t the only cosmic horror oil rig game that launched in 2024. Enter Lovecraftian fishing game Dredge’s The Iron Rig DLC. The story here is that the oil rig platform caused a spill that also unleashed over 50 new eldritch fish varieties, and you must take your boat through these new polluted waters.
However, instead of the DLC just being the same mechanics from the base game set around a different environment, you also get to build and upgrade the Iron Rig itself, which is owned by the Ironhaven Corporation. Therefore, there will be all-new NPCs to interact with and deliver your catches of the day, as well as more story content to play through.
5
The Rising Tide
Final Fantasy 16
Coming off of 2023’s Echoes of the Fallen, Final Fantasy 16’s second and final story expansion arrived in 2024. The Rising Tide starts with a boat ride to Mysidia to help a new companion named Shula in freeing the Eikon of Water, a serpent-like creature named Leviathan, who would also be the DLC’s most climactic and cinematic boss encounter.
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Fighting Leviathan’s water-based Eikon design through all five stages is certainly a giant highlight of The Rising Tide, as is exploring the expansive and gorgeous new areas of Mysidia. And if you thought Leviathan is all the boss fight action you’ll be getting, the DLC offers a variety of minibosses, including a showdown between Clive, Perykos, and Thalaos. Clive will also be able to wield Leviathan’s Eikonic powers.
4
Night Springs
Alan Wake 2
Alan Wake 2’s first planned DLC, Night Springs, launched right after its announcement at Summer Game Fest 2024. And this one is, of course, based on the fictional in-universe TV show that Alan wrote for prior to working on his best-selling novels. It comes with only three brief Night Springs episodes and a new banger of a song by Keira to accompany them.
In the first episode, you play as Rose Marigold fighting non-stop waves of Taken to rescue her writer, Alan Wake, who’s been kidnapped by his evil werewolf twin in one of the game’s most charming and comedic levels. Episode two puts you in control of Jesse Faden (here called The Sibling) dealing with coffee cultists in a more nightmarish Coffee World. Episode Three: Time Breaker puts you in the multiverse with Sheriff Tim Breaker, where you brilliantly go from 3D to 2D to text adventure level design.
3
The Lake House
Alan Wake 2
On the eve of its first anniversary, Alan Wake 2 launched its second and final expansion – The Lake House, which was a whole lot longer than Night Springs and a whole lot more terrifying than even some sections in the base game. Much of that was thanks to the creepy, art-inspired enemy called the Painted, which can’t be killed with your normal weapons and camouflages into painted walls, therefore emerging from anywhere.
In this DLC, you play as yet another new playable protagonist, FBC Agent Kiran Estevez, who was a side character in Saga and Alan’s story. You have a series of floors to investigate in The Lake House facility, where there’s lots of intriguing lore and mystery to uncover. It’s also amazing that the gameplay feels more like Control with Alan Wake’s mechanics and there’s a strong message against AI.
2
Vessel Of Hatred
Diablo 4
Diablo 4’s first story expansion arrived right in the Spooktober season of 2024. The Vessel of Hatred takes you to the new jungle region of Nahantu, where your search for Neyrelle continues as well as your mutual quest to put an end to Mephisto. This DLC also ushered in a new class for Diablo 4, the Spiritborn.
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This is one that definitely runs on the longer side of DLC, with lots of new characters, dialogue interactions, and cinematics in store. Vessel of Hatred’s story gives quite the change of scenery with more foliage and Shadow of the Tomb Raider-esque environments than the eerie Gothic areas around Sanctuary. The cutscenes are still as breathtaking and marvelous as ever.
1
Shadow Of The Erdtree
Elden Ring
The GOTY-nominated Shadow of the Erdtree ultimately takes the honor of being the Best DLC of 2024. FromSoftware’s highly anticipated expansion to Elden Ring ended up being like a separate game in itself with the amount of content and new bosses it had in store. The pain and challenge of the new boss variety also increased from the original game, if you can believe it.
In this new story expansion, the Tarnished will travel to the Realm of Shadow, where the art and design are as beautiful and captivating as any of the regions in the base game. The main enemy is the demigod Messmer the Impaler (though he’s not the final boss), and then you also have other memorable bosses, like Divine Beast Dancing Lion, Bayle the Dread, Golden Hippopotamus, and Furnace Golems.
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