From Software Bloodborne. Discuss or die!

[sullynathan]

That would be impossible, this guy most likely read my old posts. It would be creepy if he was my roommate.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Bought a PS4 & Bloodborne, discovered the name field is too short to fit Spring-heeled Jack , died a few times exploring Central Yharnam, killed the Cleric Beast on my first try.

Level design so far reminds me of Demon's Souls. Combat is intentionally altered to be more offensive-minded, which I think results in it being even more dependent on player action-gaming skill than the Souls games. This makes Bloodborne further removed from being an RPG, compounded by fewer character options.

Lovecraftian Victoriana.

 

[Elwro]

Congrats on the Cleric Beast, it may be the easiest boss but it's managed to kill me a few times.

Please try to use a serrated weapon and play offensively for at least some time, to get the true Bloodborne experience

 

[sullynathan]

 

[Silva]

I heard Bloodborne character build variety and replayability is pretty shit. Is that true ? Did the DLC solved it in some way ?

Still thinking about getting a PS4 just for it.

 

[Silva]

Thanks. What other games are worthy getting a ps4 for, in your opinion ?

Any other interesting replayable non-Popamole title ?

 

[Elwro]

In a sense DLC solved it, but to be frank you need to be p. gud to really benefit from the addon. And you'd need to read exactly what the DLC items require to plan your build beforehand. Don't do it.

(And again, people will be telling you about the axe, but I say grab a serrated weapon )

 

[Talby]

Thanks. What other games are worthy getting a ps4 for, in your opinion ?

Any other interesting replayable non-Popamole title ?

There are no other games for the PS4 that are worth it. If Bloodborne isn't enough to justify buying a PS4, don't do it.

 

[praetor]

Thanks. What other games are worthy getting a ps4 for, in your opinion ?

Any other interesting replayable non-Popamole title ?

There are no other games for the PS4 that are worth it. If Bloodborne isn't enough to justify buying a PS4, don't do it.

but there might be in the future: new Nier, The Last Guardian, at least 2 more From exclusives (definitely not Souls and very likely not Bloodborne sequels), that Souls+Witcher game in medieval Japan whose name i forget might be cool, Deep Down if it ever gets finished... but yeah, right now imo it's not worth it unless you find a particularly great deal

 

[Silva]

Monster Hunters, Personas, Journey, Front Missions, Armored Cores, Madden, Virtua Fighter, Grand Turismo. Any of these available in interesting incarnations ?

How about UFC and WWE ? I used to love these games back on my PS2.

 

[---]

but there might be in the future: new Nier, The Last Guardian, at least 2 more From exclusives (definitely not Souls and very likely not Bloodborne sequels), that Souls+Witcher game in medieval Japan whose name i forget might be cool, Deep Down if it ever gets finished... but yeah, right now imo it's not worth it unless you find a particularly great deal

It's Ni-Oh.
And someone in Capcom said that they want to make Deep Down a free-to-play, so it will be shit anyway

 

[Silva]

What's the in-game explanation for the constant dying in BB ?

In Souls games you're an undead so it makes sense (kinda). But in BB you're a normal human, right?

 

[Mozg]

The gameworld is supervened by the hunter's dream

I covet a ps4 for BB

 

[dukeofwhales]

There will be a bunch of used ps4s going cheap at the end of the year when the ps4k releases; if you can avoid the temptation to buy the spec upgraded console just because.

Not a lot of great exclusives but I enjoyed The Last of Us, Uncharted 4 & Until Dawn in my more popamole moments.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Finished game along with DLC. It's really well-made, but the core premise of it is fundamentally flawed, and I think it would've been better off with a completely new combat system, unrelated to core Souls ideas. Of course, From is too cheap for that, so it is what it is.

More detailed impressions spoilered for tldr reasons.

Spoiler

What I mean by the core premise being flawed, is that the Souls combat system just doesn't lend itself to aggressive play. In an attempt to change this, From basically ended up making the player much more powerful without making any real adjustments to enemy capabilities or AI. Combined with the focus on combat and a relative lack of environmental hazards of any kind, this makes BB the easiest Souls game by far, save for situations where it employs very extreme or cheap enemy and boss design. For example, it has, by far, the most enemy attacks which hit for 80%+ of your max health (in fact, I think the majority of bosses have these, but I'll have to confirm on a replay), and also the most oneshot attacks consequently.

In terms of world and level design, the first half of the game is excellent, perhaps rivalling DS1's sense of open ended exploration. I would've liked the game to open up a bit earlier, but Central Yharnam is such a good level that it's hard to complain. The whole Central Yharnam - Cathedral Ward - Old Yharnam - first half of Forbidden Woods axis is really well made, fun to explore, and there's always multiple places to go, especially if you're like me and get abducted to Yahar'gul early. Unfortunately, about halfway through Forbidden Woods (just as you open the windmill shortcut and the snake area starts), the game seems to lose steam. Hemwick and Cainhurst are cool looking, but rather small and linear, Byrgenwerth and Lecture Building (so much potential in this idea and such boring execution) are even smaller. Post-Rom Yahar'gul is actually challenging, but the level design isn't that great and the boss is shit. Nightmare of Mensis is similarly linear with the sole exception of the Brain of Mensis side path, although at least it has some hazards other than just enemies in corridors. I was rather disappointed in the Nightmare areas aesthetically if nothing else - From has excellent artists and I would've loved to see their take on something like Unknown Kadath, but instead it's just a bunch of boring rocks and buildings with a different skybox.

I also have the same complaint about BB as I did about DS3 - that the focus seems to be on combat almost exclusively and all the other elements that made previous Souls games so varied are essentially streamlined away to make room for more cordoned-off corridors and arenas filled with enemies. There are precious few environmental hazards or enemies requiring tactics other than running at them while mashing R1 (and the ones there are, again, really over the top, like Winter Lanterns), and few of the areas really have any kind of gameplay-defining identity, they're just paths filled with different types of enemies. Bloodborne is a bit better at this than DS3, and while it's not, strictly speaking, less linear, it has a ton of optional content available quite early. The game also has some unnecessarily clumsy moments, like when killing Blood-Starved Beast inexplicaply opens a door in Oedon's Chapel, or when the player is teleported in front of the open Yahar'gul door after killing Rom. Is there really a need to do this? Why not show the door open in a cutscene, or better yet, drop a key with an interesting description for it? Like the DS3 teleport to Emma after killing all the Lords, this seems to be blatant hand-holding for idiots, which is anathema to everything Souls stands for. What's next, maps and quest compasses in the next game? Or maybe complete linearity even worse than in DS3?

Bosses were a big disappointment for me, their design feels regressive relative to previous Souls games, and just focused on aesthetics over gameplay. They all look very cool and are well animated, but are pretty boring to fight. Part of the problem is, of course, that the player character is extremely overpowered with his dodge and 20 super-fast healing items and ranged parries and ability to stagger huge monsters with a shitty cleaver, so they don't pose much of a challenge, but at the end of the day all of the "beast" type bosses play very similarly and are vulnerable to the same tactics. Gascoigne and Logarius are the only bossfights in the base game that I genuinely enjoyed, maybe Shades as well. What remains are ineffectual gimmicks like Witches of Hemwick or Micolash, outright shit like The One Reborn, and potentially cool designs let down by passive AI, like Ebrietas or Wet Nurse. In general, this game has really passive boss AI. I mean, I know they'd probably fail at stopping the player from healing with how fast the animation is, but they could at least try. To the contrary, most bosses seem content to just slowly walk towards the player and lack quick gap-closers seemingly by design. I mean, this is the studio that made Sanctuary Guardian, Kalameet and Manus. We're supposed to be fighting crazed, bloodthirsty beasts for the first half of the game, so why are they so slow and immobile? With how fast the dodge move is and how little Stamina it costs, they could've gotten away with having Champion Gundyr at like 2x the speed and it still would've been a fair fight.

Don't have a good enough grip on the character system and weapon variety after one playthrough, but it seemed to me that there weren't a whole lot of weapon choices in the base game, and a lot of them were simply quality weapons only somewhat tilted towards either stat, and weapon use was primarily gated by upgrade material availability (not even being able to buy chunks for echoes after killing Wet Nurse is just dumb). The weapons themselves have a good amount of variety and are fun to use, even though they're kinda just fusions of Souls weapon movesets, and I wish there was more reason to use transformation attacks in actual combat. They're a really cool idea, but completely unnecessary in most situations. The DLC helps A LOT here, I just wonder how early you can go there and maybe pick up everything up to Ludwig...

Perhaps this is the relative quality of the content colouring my view, but I feel like I would've preferred the game to stay as classical gothic horror and not go the Lovercraftian route. I don't think Lovecraftian themes are a very good fit for a game where you spend most of your time violently killing monsters, and this is also reflected in how irrelevant Insight is as a mechanic, given that it's supposed to represent our character's growing eldritch knowledge. BB does subvert Lovecraft majorly by casting the Great Ones as sympathetic figures and blaming humans for their own failings, but generally speaking, everything that happens after killing Rom (and the actual need to kill Rom is not communicated anywhere, or obvious, as far as I'm aware) is confusing more than anything else. I honestly do think the games were better off which the much simpler and easier to express themes of DeS and DS1 (the SotFS additions to DS2 help that game become less of a confusing mess, but it still has a lot of extraneous elements).

I do like Bloodborne more than DS3, as it at least tries to be its own thing and manages to build a distinct identity for itself, but as with DS3, I feel like these games are moving in directions I don't appreciate. I personally find the Souls combat system fun, but not nearly deep enough to carry a game by itself, and if From keeps focusing on it to the detriment of everything else, I think I'll just wait for a sale next time.

Oh, and the framerate is fucking bad to the point where it sometimes negatively impacts gameplay. If you really want to make twitchy action games, From, at the very least make sure they run at a consistent framerate.

Will write something about the DLC specifically later.

 

[Elwro]

A minor point: you know you can buy chunks for Insight, right? I thought it was a good move; it made be explore the chalice dungeons and I discovered the fixed ones actually have some cool bits.

For me the main difference between this and Souls, combat-wise, was the presence of quite a few very fast humanoid opponents, usually more difficult than the bosses.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Finished game along with DLC. It's really well-made, but the core premise of it is fundamentally flawed, and I think it would've been better off with a completely new combat system, unrelated to core Souls ideas.

The same could be said of all From Software games beyond the first Dark Souls. The formula has run itself dry for me. Bloodborne was a breath of fresh air, somewhat, as it twisted the combat a lot more than any of the Souls games did, but ultimately it's time for From to move on and do something completely new.

 

[Silva]

What Hobo elf said. Playing Bloodborne now for the first time (got a PS4 just for it) it's clear the real gems are Demon, Dark and Blood. The others really feel disposable from a creative point of view, and Miyazaki should feel bad for them.

About Cowboy review, I don't know of I agree. I think the game laser-focus on combat is a feature (not a bug) that, together with the other mechanics it employs (regain, trick-weapons, stun-shoots) makes it's design goals pretty clear, and give it a strong confidence in achieving them - something that cannot be said for the DkS sequels.

And about the trick weapons not adding much, I don't understand this. My treaded crane whip form is so different in use than the cane form (range, speed, movesets, damage) that's almost like I'm using two distinct weapons, each appropriate for distinct situations.

But then I'm midgame (just doing Hemwick Charnel Lane), so my opinion is subjected to change, of course. If there is one thing that I see as a huge flaw, is the inability to travel between lanterns directly. Having to go back to the dream each and every time is a fucking chore.

 

[praetor]

And about the trick weapons not adding much, I don't understand this. My treaded crane whip form is so different in use than the cane form (range, speed, movesets, damage) that's almost like I'm using two distinct weapons, each appropriate for distinct situations.

i thought his point was pretty clear: trick-weapons don't add much (if anything at all) because they're essentially 2 standard Souls weapons "fused" into one (except not really, as you "lose" the 2h/1h moveset of a "traditional" Souls weapon)... which is essentially achieved in Souls by equipping a second weapon. i agree they're a huge disappointment because all they achieve is that i now press L1 instead of "right" to change a weapon (and the transform attacks are underwhelming, as Cowboy noted, so there's not even that). i've enjoyed DaS2's take on the mixed-moves concept much much more (santier's spear being probably my favourite weapon in all of Souls)

i've only played briefly (way too hot over here so i'll resume when the weather gets shittier ), but i've watched a relatively in-depth LP back when the game came out (as well as a handful of PvP vids) and nothing so far suggests that the impression i got from watching it will change by playing it, so i have to agree with Cowboy for the most part (most notably i disagree about the Lovecraftian route, as i wish it was more prominent and started sooner and was more nightmarish, because the gothic horror feels too samey and boring). it's significantly better than DaS3, and i'll end up liking it more than DeS in the end because of the Lovecraftian thing and much much better bosses and more varied weapons, but i think DaS1 and especially DaS2 DLCs are miles ahead

 

[Cowboy Moment]

hating on micolash, pshh, a codexer is still a dexer, even when a weeb...

I'm not really hating, I don't think it's awful or anything, and I can kind of see what they were going for, but it remains an ineffective gimmick boss because they clearly couldn't figure out a way to make it engaging. It is possible to make this kind of concept work well - see Executioner's Chariot for an object lesson - but From either failed or didn't bother with Micolash. Kind of a pity, really, as he's a pivotal boss and important character in general.

A minor point: you know you can buy chunks for Insight, right? I thought it was a good move; it made be explore the chalice dungeons and I discovered the fixed ones actually have some cool bits.

For me the main difference between this and Souls, combat-wise, was the presence of quite a few very fast humanoid opponents, usually more difficult than the bosses.

I know you can buy chunks for insight, but with the prices in that shop, you effectively only want to buy Rocks ever, as a single Rock is much more valuable than 3 chunks.

As for the enemy hunters... They're challenging in the early-to-midgame when you do shit damage and have low stamina, as they're really tanky, can often heal, and you can't yet punch through half of their hp just by stunlocking them with R1 (which you can later in the game, rather easily). They also tend to lose out on a lot of their challenge if you can engage them in an open space, as it becomes rather easy to just parry them to death without any risk. I will agree that the trio of hunters in Yahar'gul Chapel is probably one of the toughest encounters in the base game. Individually, though, they're not so tough, which is why the DLC made them into normal enemies, and Maria is also the easiest of the proper DLC bosses.

I don't think there are *that* many enemy hunters in the game for it to make any noticable difference, though. Seems pretty average for post-DS1 From games.

The same could be said of all From Software games beyond the first Dark Souls. The formula has run itself dry for me. Bloodborne was a breath of fresh air, somewhat, as it twisted the combat a lot more than any of the Souls games did, but ultimately it's time for From to move on and do something completely new.

Not really. The problem isn't the formula running dry, but rather Miyazaki trying to fit a square peg into a round hole by attempting to make Souls combat more focused on aggression. Same basic system worked very well in DS2, which made it slower and more deliberate, as it's well suited to that. In a way, the changes in Bloodborne simply weren't radical enough, and they resulted primarily in making the player more powerful.

What Hobo elf said. Playing Bloodborne now for the first time (got a PS4 just for it) it's clear the real gems are Demon, Dark and Blood. The others really feel disposable from a creative point of view, and Miyazaki should feel bad for them.

About Cowboy review, I don't know of I agree. I think the game laser-focus on combat is a feature (not a bug) that, together with the other mechanics it employs (regain, trick-weapons, stun-shoots) makes it's design goals pretty clear, and give it a strong confidence in achieving them - something that cannot be said for the DkS sequels.

And about the trick weapons not adding much, I don't understand this. My treaded crane whip form is so different in use than the cane form (range, speed, movesets, damage) that's almost like I'm using two distinct weapons, each appropriate for distinct situations.

But then I'm midgame (just doing Hemwick Charnel Lane), so my opinion is subjected to change, of course. If there is one thing that I see as a huge flaw, is the inability to travel between lanterns directly. Having to go back to the dream each and every time is a fucking chore.

I think my opinion would've been quite similar to yours at that point in the game, so I'm interested what you think once you finish it.

And it's not like the design *goals* of BB aren't clear, they're just achieved at the expense of making the game easy, simplistic, and somewhat cheap. But, again, I think this will become clearer as you continue playing.

 

[Hobo Elf]

I finally bought the Bloodborne DLC because it's on sale and felt like replaying Bloodborne again. I just got the to DLC area and Jebus it is horrifying. Souped up NPC Hunters roaming around and even the normal mooks aren't much phased by me. I'm just a litte teeny tiny fish in a large ocean of nightmares. Being level 30 and having only a Threaded Cane +3 doesn't really help my situation much either. I guess I'll have to put it off for now until I get a few more levels and weapon upgrades. How soon can I get Simon's Bowblade from the DLC area? I'm going for a Skill + Blood build again and the Bowblade seems pretty cool. I wanna get that asap.

 

[Elwro]

The DLC is what finally taught me to 'parry'.

 

[Hobo Elf]

The DLC taught me the true meaning of horror. I kinda like the idea they were going with the NPC Hunters roaming the place killing everything they cross paths with, but I haven't gotten far enough to see if it's just a scripted gimmick (I'm guessing it is) or if it's an actual simulation.

 

[Elwro]

I think initial directions or the creatures are given (i.e. how they start moving when you enter their vicinity). But later many things can happen.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Finally got the Bowblade. Time to level up Bloodtinge since the arrows do pretty lame damage.