From Software Bloodborne. Discuss or die!

[Silva]

Finally got the beast claw. Ailing Loran dungeon is really atmospheric. Sadly, I'm pretty tired after the slog that was hintertombs. I think they should have discarded hintertombs altogether, or else make it radically distinct aesthetically. I hope Isz is also distinct. If it ends being almost identical to Loran, I will be fucking pissed.

Yeah, I must agree with Cowboy here. Chalice dungeons were a missed opportunity. They are interesting at first but are ultimately repetitive, formulaic and not rewarding enough (come on, who thought ritual materials was an interesting treasure ?).

P.S: man, Whirlgig Saw hits like a truck.

 

[nomask7]

Yeah, I must agree with Cowboy here. Chalice dungeons were a missed opportunity. They are interesting at first but are ultimately repetitive, formulaic and not rewarding enough (come on, who thought ritual materials was an interesting treasure ?).

Maybe if you leave them all for end-game like some sort of retard. Otherwise they're rewarding right from the start, and get challenging so fast that it's hard not to see them as interesting. I mean, come on, you get to play through the whole Pthumeru and Hintertomb dungeons, as well as their random variants, in early game. It doesn't take long for you to get to depth level 3 if you want to challenge yourself, and then there's depth level 4, 5, and so on if you're good enough - never having to progress in the main story futher than Blood-starved Beast.

The deeper you go the more rewarding they are. Even if you stay on depth level 2, you can get something like three gems for all the three slots of your weapon, each giving you over 10% more damage. How is that not "rewarding" for early game? Not to mention if you're having trouble with Shadow of Yharnam like a normal person, these chalice dungeons are a gift from God. They're also a decent way to farm for blood-echoes for an early-mid game characters, much more interesting than redoing areas from the main-game.

I mean, you guys write like this game was designed and balanced by retards, but the impression I get is that it is you who are the retards. Sorry. That is the impression I get.

 

[nomask7]

P.S. The lore for the chalice dungeons says that they are places where hunters train so they can increase their powers and kill the more terrifying beasts. If you are top 1% in terms of your skills in these games, then you probably don't have to touch chalice dungeons. But games can't be balanced for the 1%. They must be balanced for the majority of fans. It is pure idiocy to say that a popular game like this - which sold over 2 million copies - must be balanced for a couple of nerds from the Codex, leaving 99.99% of fans scratching their heads with regards to how to advance in the game.

That's not to say there can't be optional super challenges for these people - and surprise surprise, there are. It doesn't get harder than Hunter's Nightmare for an early-mid game character.

The game also gives you the opportunity to go through the main story fast, so there is something for everyone here. But yes, I guess you can't please absolutely everyone with the optional content like the chalice dungeons as I said. That is just how it is and implies nothing with respect to competence or lack of on the part of From.

 

[Karellen]

The problem with the chalice dungeons isn't whether they're challenging or not. They do eventually get decently challenging, particularly some of the bosses - I remember deriving some entertainment out of fighting Rom in Lower Pthumeru, because while it was a banal bossfight that I got through on my first try in the normal game, it's actually a halfway interesting fight when basically everything can one- or twoshot you, forcing you to make fast hit-and-run attacks on the spiders while hiding from the meteors. Unfortunately, the actual dungeons are still formulaic as all Hell, which wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that you have to play through the exact same kind of formulaic dungeon like a dozen times before you actually get to the point where they might be kind of fun, by which time you'll be bored to death of the basic structure already. You might get a kick out of them the first time you have infinitely spawning spiders coming at you, but even that gets old fast. Combat just isn't enough to sustain a Souls game, you also need good exploration, and the chalice dungeons don't have it.

They don't have the kind of appeal that procedural Roguelike dungeons have, either - in Roguelikes you have vastly more variety, attrition can be a genuine issue and the stuff you find is more interesting. The way health vials work makes attrition completely irrelevant in Bloodborne, though, and Bloodborne has the least variety in terms of loot and equipment among all of the Souls games. You get barely anything interesting or unique in chalice dungeons - the only piece of equipment from a chalice dungeon I even remember is the awesome skull witch hat that I wore for the rest of the game. It might be more interesting if they had, say, decently powerful one-use consumables exclusive to them or something, which might actually impact the base game without breaking it entirely, but that's not really the case. And there are places in the normal game where you can get bloodstones and gems much more efficiently, save for the very top-tier PvP gems, except to get to those you need access to the most exclusive chalice dungeons, which means that you need to have spelunked your way through all the earlier ones for the ritual materials. Chalice dungeons aren't very fun, but beyond that, they're not even successful as a skinner box. "Despicable ritual material" indeed.

 

[nomask7]

The problem with the chalice dungeons isn't whether they're challenging or not. They do eventually get decently challenging, particularly some of the bosses - I remember deriving some entertainment out of fighting Rom in Lower Pthumeru, because while it was a banal bossfight that I got through on my first try in the normal game, it's actually a halfway interesting fight when basically everything can one- or twoshot you, forcing you to make fast hit-and-run attacks on the spiders while hiding from the meteors. Unfortunately, the actual dungeons are still formulaic as all Hell, which wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that you have to play through the exact same kind of formulaic dungeon like a dozen times before you actually get to the point where they might be kind of fun, by which time you'll be bored to death of the basic structure already. You might get a kick out of them the first time you have infinitely spawning spiders coming at you, but even that gets old fast. Combat just isn't enough to sustain a Souls game, you also need good exploration, and the chalice dungeons don't have it.

They don't have the kind of appeal that procedural Roguelike dungeons have, either - in Roguelikes you have vastly more variety, attrition can be a genuine issue and the stuff you find is more interesting. The way health vials work makes attrition completely irrelevant in Bloodborne, though, and Bloodborne has the least variety in terms of loot and equipment among all of the Souls games. You get barely anything interesting or unique in chalice dungeons - the only piece of equipment from a chalice dungeon I even remember is the awesome skull witch hat that I wore for the rest of the game. It might be more interesting if they had, say, decently powerful one-use consumables exclusive to them or something, which might actually impact the base game without breaking it entirely, but that's not really the case. And there are places in the normal game where you can get bloodstones and gems much more efficiently, save for the very top-tier PvP gems, except to get to those you need access to the most exclusive chalice dungeons, which means that you need to have spelunked your way through all the earlier ones for the ritual materials. Chalice dungeons aren't very fun, but beyond that, they're not even successful as a skinner box. "Despicable ritual material" indeed.

That's a lot of statements made very confidently that boil down to "just my opinion, man".

Chalice dungeons are like the only significant change from Demon's Souls all the way through Dark Souls 1 and 2 to Bloodborne. The only really big change in game design. And it's a change that adds a lot to the game whether you want a game-within-game challenge or a way of bettering your character by doing optional content. The other Souls games have nothing like this. If you are stuck at a boss, you can only grind through the same levels or same monsters over and over again. And if you're looking for an optional mega challenge, there's like one area and one or two bosses for that in those games.

Any reasonable person would see that, yes, while chalice dungeons could be better (what couldn't?), they are even in their present form an improvement over the previous Souls games.

I hope From aren't as retarded as some of you, and that Bloodborne 2 will have some sort of chalice dungeons as well. If not, then Bloodborne 1 will remain a special game in the series and is unlikely to be bettered in this genre with regards to the nature & amount of content.

 

[Karellen]

Chalice dungeons are like the only significant change from Demon's Souls all the way through Dark Souls 1 and 2 to Bloodborne. The only really big change in game design. And it's a change that adds a lot to the game whether you want a game-within-game challenge or a way of bettering your character by doing optional content. The other Souls games have nothing like this. If you are stuck at a boss, you can only grind through the same levels or same monsters over and over again. And if you're looking for an optional mega challenge, there's like one area and one or two bosses for that in those games.

I realise that I may be wasting my breath, but I do so love to talk about Souls games, so might as well. What you're saying about other Souls games isn't entirely true; sure, it happens that you get stuck on a boss, but in other Souls games (except maybe DaS3), after the very beginning, it's certainly not your only option to just keep on banging on the wall with your head until you get through. Instead, you could explore. Sure, in Dark Souls 1, the Catacombs and the New Londo Ruins are too tough when you first arrive at Firelink Shrine; but the game really opens up once you've cleared the Undead Parish, at which point you have a fair chance of at least dipping your toes in a number of areas. Sure, you might not be able to beat those areas (Pinwheel might be a pushover, but getting to him on a weak character isn't exactly easy unless you know where to go), but because those areas are part of the main game, they contain genuinely useful stuff like the Elite Knight Set in Darkroot Garden, or the Fire Keeper Soul in New Londo and so on. Same thing goes for Demon's Souls - you have five whole areas you could be exploring at any given time, and there's stuff like the godlike Crescent Falchion in 4-1 to be found. It is not simply my opinion that there is no loot of similar caliber in most chalice dungeons. And since leveling up doesn't actually make much of a difference in Souls games compared to getting better gear, if you need to improve your character to get through a boss, exploring optional areas in a Souls game is better for that. More fun too, of course.

Of course, you could say that they're optional, so of course there wouldn't be much important loot there precisely so that people can skip them. Fair enough, I suppose, but in that case, it's sending a bit of a mixed message that there are extra bosses there that you never get to see unless you bother to flounder through, essentially, the whole lot of them. I do like that chalice dungeons make it possible to do boss fights solo again, but really, for something like that, the actual dungeons are quite superfluous. I just don't see why it's a good idea to encourage players to go through, over and over again, large swathes of content that is not up to the same standard as the rest of the game. Honestly, I have a lot more fun repeating the same old areas in the other Souls games. One of the most memorable bits of Dark Souls 1 for me was climbing back out of the Tomb of the Giants before I had the Lordvessel - doing the level backwards feels pretty much like playing a whole new level. Co-op, or online play in general, is also a nice way to re-experience the same area again.

Ultimately, I'm not really sure what the chalice dungeons are for; with some relatively small changes, they could fill several of the roles that have been discussed here better and with less tedium. Still, they can be skipped without really hurting the game, so I guess it's fine? And I guess it's alright that the players have the option, if they're stuck, to play through some remixed content that they're quite certain to beat, though I'm of the belief that you're more likely to grow tired of blunting your weapon on mindless corpse-men, and that the sweet taste of victory will turn to ashes in your mouth.

I hope From aren't as retarded as some of you, and that Bloodborne 2 will have some sort of chalice dungeons as well. If not, then Bloodborne 1 will remain a special game in the series and is unlikely to be bettered in this genre with regards to the nature & amount of content.

I think it would be fine if From puts something similar to chalice dungeons in a future game. I do hope, though, that they'll be better designed, better thought out and much, much, much better integrated with the rest of the game.

 

[nomask7]

And since leveling up doesn't actually make much of a difference in Souls games compared to getting better gear

Eh? Each level up gives you an automatic boost to defense in all but DS2. Twenty level ups gives you a huge boost to defense. That's in addition to damage or HP or whatever else you may choose to boost.

Getting better gear? Gimme a break. Getting a better weapon boils down to upgrading....whichever weapon you want to use. Which involves, yes, grinding the same exact monsters standing in the same exact places in the same exact levels near the same exact bonfire. That is an aspect of early Souls games I don't have any nostalgia for.

Dark Souls isn't Final Fantasy. There are no uber weapons waiting to be discovered. There are some good armor sets, but in Das1 you get Havel's before Ornstein & Smough during normal course of exploring that level and its secret room, and you need to be high level to even consider using the set. And it's worthless in that boss fight anyway. So what do you do if you get stuck?

Or what if you get stuck on final boss or optional super boss? You can't even upgrade your weapon further at that point. In Bloodborne, with gems you can.

The only thing, really, that you can do in DaS1 is you might grind some area over and over again, but who wants to do that, especially when soft caps start kicking in? I'd recall that game is pretty brutal with caps of that sort. If you're only going to play through an optional area once at that point or any point really, you're not going to get much in terms of level ups, especially compared with doing chalice dungeons, which again I find much more interesting to do and you'd have to be in some manner retarded to prefer the former.

Demon's Souls - you have five whole areas you could be exploring at any given time

Or you could do them in the order in which they are presented - from the easiest to the hardest. Or is "doing something even harder" your idea of preparing for hard levels?

I realise that I may be wasting my breath, but I do so love to talk about Souls games, so might as well. What you're saying about other Souls games isn't entirely true; sure, it happens that you get stuck on a boss, but in other Souls games (except maybe DaS3), after the very beginning, it's certainly not your only option to just keep on banging on the wall with your head until you get through. Instead, you could explore. Sure, in Dark Souls 1, the Catacombs and the New Londo Ruins are too tough when you first arrive at Firelink Shrine; but the game really opens up once you've cleared the Undead Parish, at which point you have a fair chance of at least dipping your toes in a number of areas. Sure, you might not be able to beat those areas (Pinwheel might be a pushover, but getting to him on a weak character isn't exactly easy unless you know where to go), but because those areas are part of the main game, they contain genuinely useful stuff like the Elite Knight Set in Darkroot Garden, or the Fire Keeper Soul in New Londo and so on. Same thing goes for Demon's Souls - you have five whole areas you could be exploring at any given time, and there's stuff like the godlike Crescent Falchion in 4-1 to be found. It is not simply my opinion that there is no loot of similar caliber in most chalice dungeons. And since leveling up doesn't actually make much of a difference in Souls games compared to getting better gear, if you need to improve your character to get through a boss, exploring optional areas in a Souls game is better for that. More fun too, of course.

Of course, you could say that they're optional, so of course there wouldn't be much important loot there precisely so that people can skip them. Fair enough, I suppose, but in that case, it's sending a bit of a mixed message that there are extra bosses there that you never get to see unless you bother to flounder through, essentially, the whole lot of them. I do like that chalice dungeons make it possible to do boss fights solo again, but really, for something like that, the actual dungeons are quite superfluous. I just don't see why it's a good idea to encourage players to go through, over and over again, large swathes of content that is not up to the same standard as the rest of the game. Honestly, I have a lot more fun repeating the same old areas in the other Souls games. One of the most memorable bits of Dark Souls 1 for me was climbing back out of the Tomb of the Giants before I had the Lordvessel - doing the level backwards feels pretty much like playing a whole new level. Co-op, or online play in general, is also a nice way to re-experience the same area again.

Ultimately, I'm not really sure what the chalice dungeons are for; with some relatively small changes, they could fill several of the roles that have been discussed here better and with less tedium. Still, they can be skipped without really hurting the game, so I guess it's fine? And I guess it's alright that the players have the option, if they're stuck, to play through some remixed content that they're quite certain to beat, though I'm of the belief that you're more likely to grow tired of blunting your weapon on mindless corpse-men, and that the sweet taste of victory will turn to ashes in your mouth.

I think it would be fine if From puts something similar to chalice dungeons in a future game. I do hope, though, that they'll be better designed, better thought out and much, much, much better integrated with the rest of the game.

Basically, you're a moron.

 

[Karellen]

And since leveling up doesn't actually make much of a difference in Souls games compared to getting better gear

Eh? Each level up gives you an automatic boost to defense in all but DS2. Twenty level ups gives you a huge boost to defense. That's in addition to damage or HP or whatever else you may choose to boost.

True. However, in the earlier Souls games especially, health and defense only make a big difference to a point. Every boss fight in a Souls game is vastly more difficult when it's capable of one-shotting you with an attack; but once you're safely past that margin, your total health doesn't matter that much. This is because, once you're past the very early game (or have the Rite of Kindling in DS1), it's pretty rare to actually survive long enough to have actually ran out of Estus - the way you mostly die in a boss fight in a Souls game is when you screw up the timing when you try to heal. At that point, the thing that will really make the fight easier is being able to do more damage, because it reduces the length of the boss fight and, consequently, the amount of time you have to hold on without screwing up. This goes double for the fights in which you fight multiple opponents, which usually the most difficult Souls boss fights anyway.

Bloodborne, I should point out, has a somewhat different dynamic in this regard. Some of the harder bosses (mainly the ones from The Old Hunters) have a lot of health, while you're never really prevented from healing, so it's entirely possible to lose a fight because you run out of health vials. In that case, increasing your defenses, and more to the point, Vitality is actually genuinely helpful - particularly so since vials heal a percentage of HP. This being the case, leveling up does gradually make boss fights easier in a substantial way. That doesn't apply to the other Souls games, though, which is pretty much exactly as intended - you're not meant to get a big power boost by grinding for souls, the stat system is there to allow for different character builds and to let you gimp yourself if you want a challenge. To improve your character, you're meant to go explore areas you haven't been to yet.

Getting better gear? Gimme a break. Getting a better weapon boils down to upgrading....whichever weapon you want to use. Which involves, yes, grinding the same exact monsters standing in the same exact places in the same exact levels near the same exact bonfire. That is an aspect of early Souls games I don't have any nostalgia for.

Dark Souls isn't Final Fantasy. There are no uber weapons waiting to be discovered. There are some good armor sets, but in Das1 you get Havel's before Ornstein & Smough during normal course of exploring that level and its secret room, and you need to be high level to even consider using the set. And it's worthless in that boss fight anyway. So what do you do if you get stuck?

Or what if you get stuck on final boss or optional super boss? You can't even upgrade your weapon further at that point. In Bloodborne, with gems you can.

This would be a better point if the chalice dungeons were a good place to acquire gems or materials, but they're not. Near the endgame, you'd be far better off farming Winter Lanterns in the Fishing Hamlet or in the Nightmare of Mensis. To get gems better than those in the chalice dungeons, you'd have to have gotten through bosses that are vastly stronger than the final boss, so I fail to see how that helps the average player who is stuck, particularly since those gems are such rare drops that trying to get them is a far more tedious alternative than finding them in the normal game. The best use I can see for chalice dungeons is that they're an OK way to scrape together some blood echoes if you need to buy vials or something, though even for that, I think doing co-op is generally more fun and gets you some Insight as well.

Having said that, the difference between Bloodborne and Dark Souls is that in the latter, while getting better equipment still mostly requires upgrading your weapons, you have a much bigger and more varied arsenal to build a strategy, which, of course, you build up by exploring the game. In the early game especially, getting your first really good shield, getting armor with poise, getting the Wolf Ring, getting spells, getting a decent bow - these are all things that allow you to approach problems in entirely new ways. The Drake Sword and the Astora Straight Sword are really great in the early game too, and the Lighting Spear from Sen's Fortress is quite sufficient for Ornstein and Smough. Of course, it's still a difficult fight, but at least you can improve your odds by trying out different strategies (if all else fails, use Pyromancy). And hey, if you still can't get through, you can get a co-op partner. It's nothing to be ashamed of. Well, maybe a little. Not much, anyway. But even if it was, exactly how would it be worse than getting through by grossly outleveling the content?

 

[Hyperion]

There are some good armor sets, but in Das1 you get Havel's before Ornstein & Smough during normal course of exploring that level and its secret room, and you need to be high level to even consider using the set. And it's worthless in that boss fight anyway. So what do you do if you get stuck?

This couldn't be further from the truth. Surely you're aware of the concept of GiantDad?

With a Black Knight Sword +5 and the minimal stats to wield it (you can get it to +2 before the Gargoyles with minimal exploration), you have a weapon with roughly 400 attack available from the FIRST STAGE OF THE GAME, which allows you to put EVERY single point after the requirements into Endurance if you so choose. Throw in Havel's Ring and the Ring of Favor and Protection and you can wear something like Black Iron, Giant's or even some of Havel's with ease by SL 65 - 70, which is not out of the question if you explore thoroughly or spend 10 minutes killing Anor Londo knights.

Furthermore, if you played early in the release, once your endurance hit 35 - 40 you didn't even need Havel's Ring because you had the Dark Wood Grain Ring that allowed you to wear the stuff and have more rolling iframes than a naked dude. If you don't get the BKS through starting over and over until you do, all you need is a little preparation for when you hit Anor Londo and making / leveling Quelaag's Furysword and you have a potent 1h weapon with even less stat investment than the BKS that's further augmented by any humanity you have, up to a cap of 10.

With that setup, if you die to O&S you're hopeless at video games. It's the closest thing to facerolling a Souls game can get. I know because I tried it and it didn't work too well in DS2 lol.

Edit - "You disagree with me, you're dumb." Solid argument, Suzy.

 

[Silva]

Being fair, nomask7 has a point about the chalice dungeons giving more paths to follow on any given moment. This is a good idea. I remember my first play through when I passed the initial (linear) Yharnam section and then it opened up. I got dazzled by so many parallel paths to follow, and the chalices are definitely a part of this.

 

[nomask7]

You're so full of shit I don't even want to bother arguing with you. I mean, you've probably just been trolling noobs all along. It is a Souls tradition after all. Fortunately, you don't need me for it. Ciao.

 

[Silva]

?

I was agreeing with you, bro.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

 

[nomask7]

?

I was agreeing with you, bro.

I wasn't responding to you, duh.

 

[nomask7]

You half-wits can't even follow a conversation, so what makes you think you can figure out From Software games enough to critique them properly?

So far I've seen so many half-truths, misguided ideas, and just plain nonsense I pity the person who takes you people seriously. Jesus fuck what a waste of time you are.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Why isn't nomask a (((mod))) yet?

 

[Hyperion]

Quite possibly the weakest, most pitiful capitulation I've seen here yet. And I wasn't even condescending or argumentative.

Edit - Hahahahahaha, the ever dreaded dumb rated post. Be careful, your asshole is leaving behind a trail of blood, tears, and shame everywhere you go.

 

[nomask7]

Quite possibly the weakest, most pitiful capitulation I've seen here yet. And I wasn't even condescending.

You sound butthurt.

 

[nomask7]

Quite possibly the weakest, most pitiful capitulation I've seen here yet. And I wasn't even condescending or argumentative.

Edit - Hahahahahaha, the ever dreaded dumb rated post. Be careful, your asshole is leaving behind a trail of blood, tears, and shame everywhere you go.

Right. That edit half an hour later sure makes you sound like a detached observer.

You are right. I'm butthurt. Retards make me butthurt. I can't help it. I only wish I could put them all in a gigantic blender and sell them to other retards as ice cream. It would be much needed action therapy for me.

 

[nomask7]

One great thing about this game is that if you're not super good, you can play it with different characters and still feel like there's more to be done, like you haven't managed to beat the DLC or you want to try getting further in the chalice dungeons. Even if you never manage to do better, it's fun just having that potential there.

Also, I'd like to revise my estimation of Father Gascoigne's difficulty: beat it in a few tries with my second character, and in one try with my third character. Shadow of Yharnam also fell in a couple of tries with my second character, as did Rom, both in the chalice dungeon and in main story. Now that I'm getting better at this game, the progression of difficulty seems more consistent and there are no absurd difficulty spikes. I'm liking this game more and more, and it seems very replayable.

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

Fuck. Watching pvp videos with the Moonlight Greatsword makes me wanna buy a PS4.

Fucking Sony.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Fuck. Watching pvp videos with the Moonlight Greatsword makes me wanna buy a PS4.

Fucking Sony.

Do it nigga. Bloodborne, NIOH and then the other sony exclusive From games.

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

Fuck. Watching pvp videos with the Moonlight Greatsword makes me wanna buy a PS4.

Fucking Sony.

Do it nigga. Bloodborne, NIOH and then the other sony exclusive From games.

Nope. Not gonna give sony any money.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Nope. Not gonna give sony any money.

Your loss.

 

[Silva]

Finally came to understand fully the game plot.

https://m.reddit.com/r/bloodborne/comments/4iaft5/moon_presence_and_the_doll_a_final_explanation/

TL;DR: Everything is a ploy from (Red) Moon Presence to raise a child of its own. Gehrman is your father, Doll your lovely mother, and the workshop a comfy house for you to grow healthy and happy. And the quest it sends you to accomplish is just a test to see if you're the strongest child possible (not different from Dark Souls 1 ploy by Gwyn to find a strong undead to kiln the flame).