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Building the Darkest Dungeon Website — A Unified Hub for Two Grim, Beautiful Games
Working on the joint website for Darkest Dungeon and Darkest Dungeon II was one of the most ambitious game web projects I’ve tackled — and easily one of the most atmospheric. Red Hook Studios has built an unforgettable world with these games: bleak, poetic, and visually stunning. The website needed to match that tone while serving as a central hub for both titles.
This wasn’t just a product page — it was a full-scale web experience, designed to support two games with massive followings, evolving content, and a deeply stylized identity.
The Mission
The goals for the site were clear — and big:
Provide a central home for both Darkest Dungeon and Darkest Dungeon II
Showcase trailers, platform info, and purchase links
Share ongoing news and content updates for both titles
Deliver a press-ready media section with screenshots, logos, and key art
Create a site that felt true to the world of Darkest Dungeon — moody, intense, and deeply immersive
The site needed to scale — both technically and visually — to support current and future content across both games.
Visual Direction
The aesthetic for Darkest Dungeon is unmistakable — gritty, inked art, bold reds and blacks, and a deep, oppressive mood. That needed to come through in the site without sacrificing usability or performance.
The visual design, once again by Mike Heald at Fully Illustrated, struck a balance between theatrical and functional. It let the art speak for itself while giving players and press a smooth experience.
The Build
Given the scale and longevity of this project, I used a robust, modular stack:
Nuxt 3 for a performant, SEO-optimized frontend
Storyblok for flexible content management — crucial for a site with this much info across multiple titles
Netlify for fast, stable deployment and easy rollouts
This combination gave Red Hook the ability to manage the site content without relying on devs for every update — while also keeping everything fast and secure.
Key Features
A shared homepage introducing both games in the series
Individual game pages with feature breakdowns, trailers, and lore
A robust Media & Press Kit with downloadables for each title
A News system covering updates, dev notes, and announcements
Modular components for expansions, DLC, platform availability, and roadmaps
Subtle animations and transitions that enhance the tone without slowing the experience
Every component was built to scale with future updates — whether that’s a new DLC, a patch, or a new platform release.
Why It Was Special
This was a big, complex site — and that’s exactly why it was so satisfying. The mood and aesthetic of Darkest Dungeon are iconic, and capturing that in a modern, flexible site build was an exciting challenge.
It was also incredibly rewarding to build something that serves the community: players looking for details, press looking for assets, and Red Hook’s team needing a CMS they could trust.
Final Thoughts
The Darkest Dungeon joint website project was all about scale, style, and staying true to a beloved series. It’s one of the most content-rich, detail-driven sites I’ve launched — and one of the most visually intense in the best way.
Check out the site here: darkestdungeon.com
If you’re building a large-scale game site with deep lore, multiple titles, or years of updates ahead — I’d love to help you build something that can grow with it.