Artorias of the Abyss is a phenomenal DLC pack that is pretty much everything a DLC should be. It has 2 great levels, even compared to the phenomenal ones in the base game, and 4 awesome bosses that push the players skill beyond what the base game wanted from the player. As someone who's first souls game was DSR (and has it tied with TOTK as my favorite game OAT), I never actually played the dlc until I 100%ed the game, as I didn't even realize it was bundled in with the remastered collection. My character was like NG+6 and I made a very smart decision in having like 60 points in VIT and 30 in strength, making me extremely underpowered and not even being able to get past the second boss. However on subsequent playthroughs I went through the dlc in the intended ng cycle, and came back later once I learned the bosses' movesets to my knowledge of them in the base game and managed to finish it up on my original character. My only real gripes with the DLC is that the final area has one sorcerer in an annoying spot, making me take a hidden shortcut on subsequent runs to kill it as I attempt the final boss, and that of the 4 phenomenal bosses, the first intro boss (sanctuary guardian) is a bit of a let down, and I don't have much personal attachment to it or get much joy from besting it. Still a great DLC pack, but definitely some gripes which hold it back from being one of my favorites in the game.

I got gangbanged and dmc'd by Manus

rip in piss won't miss

Artorias is my idol (I killed his gf lmao)

Finished Dark Souls Remastered like a month ago, I even platinumed it.
In all my 50hs of the game I never came across any info on the dlc area.
There wasn't even trophies for it so I completly frogot it even had dlc.
But now after randomly watching a stream yesterday I remember it indeed had dlc. So I looked at a guide for how to enter it (imposible to know otherwise) and finally played it.
It took me less than 3 hours to fully complete it, so kind of dissaponitng.
There are some cool lore bits of information and the bosses are decent, but the areas are just reused areas from the main game and the finale after beating the final boss is a nothing burger.

expectations on this were high, and yeah, i get it, but it's definitely not perfect. the areas are generally well designed, though i think royal wood is kinda dumb to navigate. the bosses are where this dlc really shines anyway. 3/4 of them are basically the best bosses in the game. artorias is electrifyingly good, manus is fun as long as you have the pendent, and kalameet is the only dragon fight in the dark souls trilogy I don't absolutely despise! he's actually really fun to fight! fuck you midir! the one boss that's a miss, though... lord. I hate sanctuary guardian so fucking much. actual dogshit boss. anyways old hunters clears lol, but this was kickass.

Glad that I finally got around to beating this expansion. I originally gave up on it after getting stuck on Artorias, and it was only on my new game plus that I finished it. While I don't think it quite reaches the highs of the base game (Anor Londo & Undead Burg/Parish), I can't deny that this is a great expansion. The atmosphere is as strong as always, the NPCs were memorable (although a bit underdeveloped), the lore implications are very interesting, and the bosses were some of the best in the entire game. Sanctuary Guardian was solid, Artorias & Kalameet were great, and Manus was my favorite boss of the game. Although there was other parts I liked, these bosses for me were the standout part of Artorias of the Abyss. The only thing that really held this DLC back for me was the areas. As although the atmosphere is great, they are really annoying to traverse due to the amount of powerful enemies & the lack of bonfires. But even with these issues I still found Artorias of the Abyss really enjoyable, and it reminded me why I love this game as much as I do.