Image
  • Writing
    • Andy Gavin: Author
    • About my Novels & Writing
    • All Writing Posts
    • The Darkening Dream
      • Buy the Book Online
      • Sample Chapters
      • Reviews
      • Info for Reviewers
      • Press Coverage
      • Awards
      • Cast of Characters
    • Untimed
      • Buy Untimed Online
      • Book Trailer
      • Sample Chapters
      • Reviews
      • Info for Reviewers
      • Press Coverage
      • Awards
      • Cast of Characters
    • Scrivener – Writer’s Word Processor
    • iPad for Writers
    • Naughty Dark Contest
  • Books
    • Book Review Index
    • Favorite Fantasy Novels
    • Andy Gavin: Author
    • The Darkening Dream
      • Buy the Book Online
      • Sample Chapters
      • Short Story: Harvard Divinity
      • Reviews
      • Info for Reviewers
      • Press Coverage
      • Awards
      • Cast of Characters
    • Untimed
      • About the Book
      • Buy Untimed Online
      • Book Trailer
      • Sample Chapters
      • Reviews
      • Info for Reviewers
      • Press Coverage
      • Awards
      • Cast of Characters
    • Naughty Dark Contest
  • Games
    • My Video Game Career
    • Post Archive by Series
    • All Games Posts Inline
    • Making Crash Bandicoot
    • Crash 15th Anniversary Memories
    • World of Warcraft Endgames
    • Getting a Job Designing Video Games
    • Getting a Job Programming Video Games
    • Naughty Dark Contest
  • Movies
    • Movie Review Index
  • Television
    • TV Review Index
    • Buffy the Vampire Slayer
    • A Game of Thrones
  • Food
    • Food Review Index
    • Foodie Club
    • Hedonists
    • LA Sushi Index
    • Chinese Food Index
    • LA Peking Duck Guide
    • Eating Italy
    • Eating France
    • Eating Spain
    • Eating Türkiye
    • Eating Dutch
    • Eating Croatia
    • Eating Vietnam
    • Eating Australia
    • Eating Israel
    • Ultimate Pizza
    • ThanksGavin
    • Margarita Mix
    • Foodie Photography
    • Burgundy Vintage Chart
  • Other
    • All Posts, Magazine Style
    • Archive of all Posts
    • Fiction
    • Technology
    • History
    • Anything Else
  • Gallery
  • Bio
  • About
    • About me
    • About my Writing
    • About my Video Games
    • Ask Me Anything
  • Contact

Archive for Bloodborne

Dark Souls III vs. Bloodborne

Jun13

DS1-noscaleTitle: Dark Souls III

System: PS4 (also on Xbox / PC)

Genre: (A)RPG

Developer: From Software

Publisher: Bandai / Konami

Director: Hidetaka Miyazaki

Date Played: late April / early May 2016

Rating: Amazing

_

After the delicious time I had playing Bloodborne, Dark Souls III was a no brainer. Which understates the matter since I preordered it and was playing the day it was released.

Which leads me to both review this latest (and supposedly final) entry in From Software’s legendary Action Role Playing Game genre. But in the process, explore the small but important differences between Dark Souls III (DS3) and Bloodborne (BB) as a detailed exploration of the genre.

If you think of Bloodborne as a modern day Castlevania, then DS3 is a contemporary Ghouls ‘n Ghosts.

Bloodborne = Castlevania

Bloodborne = Castlevania

Both From Software games are born from the same DNA, but the biggest difference is:

Thematic (not gameplay) Genre. BB draws its roots from Lovecraftian horror while DS3 purports to derive from more traditional D&D-esque stock. But, not really. Both games are so dominated by Hidetaka Miyazaki’s specific auteur imprint that their differences are of a most subtle degree. And while Dark Souls is the older franchise, I’d actually argue that in BB the idiosyncrasy of his particular style more closer overlaps with the explicit genre. BB is so “perfectly” Japanese Lovecraftian, while all three Dark Souls pull fantasy much closer to horror. I don’t mean to imply any particular criticism in this observation. I adore both games, and both sub-styles. And while DS3 is more vaguely medieval and BB more vaguely gothic, they just share so much stylistically.

Dark Souls = Ghouls & Ghosts

Dark Souls = Ghouls & Ghosts

Style. BB is creepier, but DS3 is certainly creepy. The washed out colors and particular/peculiar shapes and forms are very similar, designed to vaguely discomfort. DS3 tends a little more toward matte while BB likes shiny. Certain textural material motifs are common and some are  different. BB likes cloth, leather, eyes, and fur more while DS3 likes metal, fire, stone, and dragons. BB has more 19th century architectural and costuming elements. But both are so dark, gothic, and “churchy”. Plenty of enemies or objects could almost be used in either game. Half the sound effects ARE used in both games.

dark_souls_3_hr_gundyr_battles_playerGraphics. Like BB, DS3 is a gorgeous stylized game. The art design is magnificent in its bleakly weird way. Giant vistas abound and strange unique shapes and distorted silhouettes. And although the engine (used by both games) seems perfectly competent, the art direction is more important than the tech. You just have to like dark and weird. Creatures with flowing forms, hidden eyes, and faces, weird mutations, and a generally ruined, graveyard, gothic sort of look. I’d give a slight nod to BB for uniform of graphical style and theme but a slight nod to DS3 for scale and awesome visual scope.

Sound Design. Fabulous music and minimalist but effective fx. The thud of sword on shield, or the grunt of blade on flesh are all fabulously telegraphed.

Dark-Souls-3-Siegward-Mission-04Gameplay. The broad strokes of the two games are nearly identical. You explore a interlinked world where levels fold back on each other. Monsters and death abounds. You fight through and die. And die. And die again. Eventually you may reach continue points (bonefires/lamps) or open up shortcuts that allow you to circumvent areas already explored. Item collection is persistent across death but experience (souls/blood) is lost on death, with a single chance at reclaiming it by fighting through to wherever you lost it. Souls/blood both serve has currency for leveling and item purchase. Weapons can be upgraded and fit with stones/gems.

Combat, controls, & mechanics. The combat in both games is masterful and varies slightly in important little ways. In DS3 it’s realistic, even typical to carry a shield and block attacks. In BB you can carry a gun, but it does low damage and is useful mostly to interrupt and stun. In both, weapons usually have a 1 and 2 handed mode, but in BB these vary more substantially (at the cost of far less weapons). BB has the “regain system” in which you have a few seconds after taking damage to “take back” some or all of your lost health by attacking again. This encourages a more aggressive style of fighting. In DS3 it is perfectly advantageous to play much slower and more defensively. And since in early levels, BB has 20 healing potions and DS3 only 3-4 until upgraded, the beginning DS3 game requires damage avoidance for survival. BB allows you to charge the big weapon strike and has a dedicated potion button. DS3 allows for much more magic use, opening up very different play styles. But for simplicity I stuck to melee.

I started the original Dark Souls as a caster and paid dearly for it. Only the most advanced players should consider investing in magic during their first playthrough. Melee combat is just so much easier at lower skill point investment. By a New Game+ playthrough, having acquired most of the spells and a lot more skill points, hybrid or caster roles are perfectly reasonable.

Subtle level design decisions also make for combat differences. In BB, you can easily be mobbed by groups of enemies and crowd control is simultaneously more difficult and more important. Same with AOE and sweeping attacks. In DS3 enemies are less clumped, usually only 1-2 at a time — unless you like dying.

Both combat systems are extraordinarily satisfying. The feel is generally excellent, with a slight edge to BB‘s faster, more nimble style. But blocking is highly gratifying as well.

dark-souls-3-screenshot-12.0Story. Both games offer minimal and extremely mysterious story. Yet BB actually has boss intro scenes, substantially more cinematics, and even a few vignettes with multiple characters talking. That’s not to say that this fleshes out a single character, or offers even the slightest clarity as to their motivations, just that you see them introduced and they therefore have more “personality.” Definitely I liked this in BB. And the weirdness all fit together more weirdly, lending to a sense of more odd and mysterious goings on. Yet DS3‘s plot is even “grander” and more unknowable. Perhaps mostly because nothing makes any sense at all. Listen to the above intro trailer to get a taste. That’s not to say that lines like “The fire fades. And the Lords go without thrones” or “And so it is that ash seeketh embers” don’t give me goosebumps — no, I love them — but they don’t exactly make a lot of sense. Except perhaps if you have eyes growing inside your skull. Anyway, slight nod to BB for “plot” and “character” — if you can call it that.

That said, DS3 has MORE NPCs and more complicated “questlines” (good luck actually understanding them or following them without online help as they are so much looser and less defined than in other RPGs). There is a veritable rat’s nest of guys you need to nudge weirdly along their stories in order to open up as much vending as possible. So a nod to DS3 for complexity (a good thing in this case). BB‘s equivalents feel undeveloped and there are only 1-2 of any magnitude.

Both games have multiple mysterious endings too. In both cases I used my internet prowess to achieve the “most difficult” ending. Yet I’m still not sure what being the Lord of Hollows really means :-).

Dark-Souls-3Gear. DS3 has a LOT more gear to collect than BB, but the emphasis is quite different. BB‘s armor is mostly leather or cloth and mostly cosmetic. Some have particular resists, but that’s about it. The weapons in that game are relatively few, but highly differentiated. There are two main types: trick weapon and firearm. In DS3 there is an enormous variety of both weapons and armor with four main weapon types: melee, talisman (for spell casting), bow, and shield. Supposedly all of the weapons are viable, but they aren’t necessarily highly differentiated as there are many similar ones. The armor tends to group into light, medium, and heavy. Unlike BB, weight is a meaningful factor in DS3. I personally went with fairly heavy armor, but it was unclear that the poise attribute (which is supposed to all for heavier armor to prevent you being staggered) was fully functional, or at least worth investing in. The weapons system does suffer from a touch of imbalance. Early on I got a Deep Axe which was fairly powerful, but not very upgradable. It took me a good while to find a weapon and upgrade it to a level where it surpassed this early stage find. It’s hard to know which gear to invest in. DS3 also has MUCH better boss gear rewards. Each boss gives you a soul which can be traded for a choice of two high power items, usually weapons. In DS3, there are a plethora of rings (you can wear 4 at once) that add additional powers. In BB these are replaced by runes (you can wear 3). They are fairly similar but the DS3 system is better in all ways. And overall, I’d give DS3 the win for gear, as it has more stuff and particularly more types of stuff with the shields and whatnot.

Gear Upgrading. BB‘s gear upgrade system is a little simpler than DS3‘s. They both have the same four tier currently +3,+3,+3,+1 normal upgrades, but DS3 has 2-3 additional side currencies for upgrading different gear. Boss gear, and other special types fall into at least 2 “non normal” upgrade paths. It also has a more generous supply of gear upgrade items, although split among all these types. BB only has 1-2 of the top upgrade per play-through, DS3 has at least 4-5. The different types are a little confusing. There are also gems that can be socketed on (most) weapons/shields that modify how the items scale. The use of these depends on your build and I only ended up trying 3 of the 15 or so types. In BB, each weapon has a couple sockets for different gems that can either tune the scaling or boost the damage output (a lot!). I liked this additional ability to pump up the power of even a level 10 weapon, so I give BB the edge here.

e9386bce455b00ad4380af046e247f1aOther collectables and upgrades. In my opinion, as far as RPGs go, the more you can upgrade the better. DS3 allows you to upgrade both the number of flasks and their potency, which BB doesn’t do at all, so this is a big point in DS3‘s favor. It also has more random items and consumables. However, they generally seemed less useful than those in BB. Maybe this is due to BB’s slightly higher overall difficulty level (or just the fact that I got better at this sort of game between). There are lots of spells and whatnot which I didn’t experiment with. DS3 has the whole “ember” system by which you can spend this limited but reasonably available currency to gain max health until you die. I mostly used it for bosses. You need it for multiplayer. There is also the whole hollowing thing, which even as the Lord of Hollows I didn’t totally understand. Somehow dying hollows you out more, and you have less multiplayer ability when hollowed. This is a change from the much more brutal hollowing of Dark Souls where the game just got harder the more often you died.

crystalsage1_tcClasses and leveling Mechanics. Being an RPG, both of these games have means by which you level up and improve your characters. These are extremely similar but differ in subtle ways. BB has two currencies, blood and insight. Insight is earned mostly from bosses. Often you can buy the same things with both. Insight subtly changes the game’s look and play, which is very weird but cool. DS3 really just has the souls, which are almost exactly like blood. In both cases, you collect them like XP and can spend them for gear or to level up your character. Their persistence is similar in both games in that you lose them on dying, and have a single life afterward to try to retrieve them from the spot (in DS3) or spot/monster (in BB) where you lost them. This means that if you die with a decent number of points you really need to focus on retrieving them conservatively. If you get cocky during one of these missions you will often lose the batch and end up howling at the TV.

Leveling is frequent, but a painfully small boost to your power. You have to chose which point to invest in. DS3 has more types of points, with higher differentiation, and far more defined character builds. In BB mostly you could go for strength or dexterity builds, with a few people investing in arcane for a weak kind of magic. In DS3, besides the basic stats shared by both games like health, endurance, and item discovery, there is a weight carrying stat and three different magic stats driving (in some combo) three different sorts of spell-casting abilities that can be mixed with melee. These “classes” are a bit odd and nebulous compared to something like World of Warcraft or Diablo, but they are definitely more interesting in DS3 and overall I really like the RPG mechanic.

For me, the leveling mechanic adds to the game on so many “levels,” (haha) which is one of the reasons I always like RPG mechanics. First of all, it gives you more things to progress, and therefore have that “sense of achievement.” Second, if an area gets too difficult, you can always grind somewhere and level up to make it easier. Overall nod is to DS3, but the systems are pretty similar.

Dark-Souls-3-2-980x551Level Design. DS3 has more levels, and somewhat larger than BB (particularly if you exclude the DLC). The levels are fabulous in both, but quality goes to DS3.

However, BB has the whole chalice dungeon thing which allows for A LOT of extra levels to help farm blood and with their own powerful gem upgrades. There is a lot of content here, but the problem is that it’s boring in comparison to the normal levels. Somehow the featureless dungeon levels, half randomly constructed, are both extremely difficult and very dull. I never really enjoyed playing them.

Creature design in both games is fabulous and while DS3 probably has more, the variety is very good in both cases. Each creature tends to have considerable differences in attack and defense styles, which interplays delightfully with the generally awesome combat mechanics.

frame_0000_large

This boss you kill by bursting the sacks hanging between its legs!

Boss Design. Both games focus a lot of energy on bosses. There are many. They look fabulous. They play well, and require significant investment to master. DS3 has more bosses (particularly without DLC), and both games have a lot of excellent dramatic bosses. The BB ones felt more differentiated, mostly had cool intros, and seemed harder. Maybe it’s because I often co-oped the DS3 bosses, maybe I got better between games, maybe not. BB bosses seemed to absolutely require reading strats and watching videos to conquer. Some, like the Orphan of Kos were so insanely hard I still get shivers. Nod to BB for bosses just for sheer evilness.

Hubs. BB has a dedicated “Hunter’s Dream” hub while DS3 has the hub located in the “regular” world. Both have continue points that allow for teleportation, but DS3 allows you to teleport straight from one to the other without returning to the hub. Given the lengthy load times this is a significant plus. In addition, DS3 lets you reset a level at the bonfire without a load.

Co-op Multiplayer. I don’t really do much PVP (if I can avoid it), so I’ll discuss co-op. The system is very odd in both games, and not well “explained.” But it was much easier to summon co-op help in DS3 and I used it extensively to get past bosses. Actually I didn’t even discover it until about 7-8 bosses in, but I used it on most times after that. DS3 bosses are WAY easier with 2 players. More people seems to increase the hit points of the boss more than its worth. Neither of these games bother to explain their odd mechanics. You pretty much have to read about them online. But anyway, DS3 wins here. It also has more bizarre multiplayer factions than BB. In both cases the why you should join them and what they do is vague. You have to read the wiki online for a full explanation. I don’t focus on this kind of thing, but on regular leveling, bosses, gear, etc.

Ascended Winged KnightBalance. The sort of vague mysterious quality to both games makes for a somewhat diffuse balance. But that being said, the gameplay itself is intense and spectacular. Even though the bosses are huge and terrifying, or maybe because of it, I tend to prefer the levels. These are just awesome sauce and I also like the high level of challenge and the collecting and “upgrading.” These are just very satisfying games if you invest the time. BB felt a little tighter and more focused, but the increased scope of DS3 is fabulous too.

Mystery. I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again. These games are oddly mysterious, ambiguous, and “ill documented.” In that, they don’t explicitly teach the player about what’s available through clear tutorials, and they don’t even telegraph the availability and consequences of major branches, mechanics, decisions and whatnot. For example, if you were playing a spell-caster, opening up the vendors that sell most of the spells requires an odd sequences of dialogs and encounters, none of which is clear. You could easily goof or miss out on these. That’s just the way this game is. I happen to like this vague quality and find it highly immersive. But I also love David Lynch films. If you like everything very neat and well telegraphed, or don’t enjoy pouring over the online wiki descriptions, these games might be extra super hardcore frustrating. If, like me, you embrace it, they have a flavor, complexity, and immersive quality much different from a more explicit game.

dark_souls_3_boss_how_to_beat_dancer_of_the_boreal_valleyOverall, these are just some of my favorite games in recent years — true masterpieces. If you don’t mind your games hard (very very hard), and you like fantasy combat and aren’t easily creeped out, you must play them.

For more video game posts, click here.

If you liked this post, follow me at:

My novels: The Darkening Dream and Untimed
or the
video game post depot
or win Crash & Jak giveaways!

Latest hot post: War Stories: Crash Bandicoot

annalise-in-game

Related posts:

  1. Dark Souls
  2. Bloodborne – Early Impressions
  3. Bloodborne – Complete
  4. Diablo 3 – from Good to Great
  5. Witcher 3 – Middle Impressions
By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Games
Tagged as: APRG, Bloodborne, Dark Souls 3, Fantasy, Hidetaka Miyazaki, RPG, Video game

Bloodborne – Complete

Feb12

71AEYuMzSUL._SL1248_Title: Bloodborne

System: PS4

Genre: ARPG

Developer: FromSoftware

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Date Played: January/February 2016

Rating: A Masterpiece

_

I few weeks ago I wrote a short article on my initial impressions of Bloodborne, and I’d like to come back to it now that I’ve defeated the game. Every boss. Every area. The whole DLC. All the side quests I could manage. The secret special double probation third ending. Now that’s on the “first play-through” (known as NG), I’m only a third through NG+ (a second harder go at it). But still, I think I know the game pretty well.

Let me put it out there, Bloodborne is the best console game I’ve played since The Last of Us, one of the best console games I’ve played in a long time, and one of the best games I’ve played since Diablo 3. It’s a masterpiece.

Perhaps my favorite thing about this game — and there a lot to love — is the setting, mythos, and lore. If you can handle it, this video gives a bit of a taste (SPOILERS ABOUND):

Besides being a great game, Bloodborne is a masterpiece of Lovecraftian horror. Many of you have probably never heard of H.P. Lovecraft, but along with Edgar Allan Poe, he is surely the most influential writer in the entire genre of horror. Enthroned in the genre not unlike J.R. Tolkien is for fantasy. Stephen King, no slouch himself, cites Lovecraft as his own greatest influence.

Bloodborne is like a love-letter to Lovecraft, reveling in a blend of “classic” (vaguely 19th and very early 20th century) influences, including in no small part Bram Stoker’s Dracula and the like. Every element of the game backs up this stylistic choice: The superb art design of world and characters both. The esoteric, cryptic, and complex mythology. The themes of forbidden knowledge explored and perverted. The creepy gorgeous music and terrifying sound effects. The influence of horrific powers from above/below/beyond. The moral ambiguity. Insanity. Dreams. Transformation and metamorphosis.

This is a dark dark game.

Art-bloodborne-screen-03It’s just so deliciously creepy and mythological. Really. Dark Souls has a cool world feel and mythology, and there is significant overlap, but Bloodborne really takes it all to the next level, elevating itself above mere video game (and it rocks in that department) to become a genuine work of art. Surely no chipper happy landscape painting, but a dark broody bloody 1911 horror novel of a game.

It’s quite twisted and disturbing too, in a very gothic fantastic way. There are a lot of awful reoccurring themes: nightmare worlds, bad births, transformations into beast-hood, sadness, tragedy. It’s often slightly Japanese in flavor, which blending with Lovecraft’s very Western horror lends it even more of a sentimental exotic twist.

The above video is a good example. The “Orphan of Kos” is a horrifically difficult boss born from the corpse of its parent — a great one, one of the Cthulhu-inspired demon-gods. It fights you with its placenta as a weapon. Yuck! This fight was so hard too. It took me probably 12 hours to master.

Bloodborne is a very boss centric game. There are a lot of them, 18 in the normal game, 5 in the DLC, and at least 15 in the Chalice dungeons. They are all hard. All different.

Nothing about this game is very obvious. There is little hand holding and there are countless secret and optional areas, bosses, weapons, etc. However, taking the time to explore them is both satisfying and makes it easier — as you’ll need their powerups. Coming late to it, the DLC served as an extra optional area to mix in with the main game. It’s extremely well done, and perhaps even harder than the primary plot. It fits in seamlessly from a style point of view.

bloodborne_the_old_hunters_V2Which brings us to more fantastic points about Bloodborne, the gameplay. The sneaking around and the combat is really quite excellent. It’s extremely difficult, and very skill oriented, particularly the many many varied bosses. But the mechanics are intensely visceral and satisfying. The combinations of feel, exceptional animation, physics/collision driven hand to hand, and amazing art and sound design all serve to enhance the effect. Every strike is satisfying.

The controls are very deep and nuanced, with a ton of variety in weapons. As a control programmer I can really appreciate the effect and tuning that went into them. At times the game appears to read your mind, allowing you to combine combos and hit multiple opponents in the same strike — but really it reads subtle indications from your joystick movements during the long attacks to guide and influence the results.

It’s difficult, and I’m not that great at the highly precise art of parrying with the guns — catching the enemy at exactly the right moment as to stun them — but subtle mechanic changes have made the combat “easier” or at least less frustrating than that in the Souls games. Probably nothing as much as the “regain system” in which you can recover lost hit points by rapid retaliation.

Image-bloodborne-c20The meta game is excellent too. At first I though it cryptic and the investments of blood echoes into levels of little apparent goal. However, I found that Bloodborne is actually a satisfyingly easy game to grind. Having trouble with a boss? Well, there are two options: read up on strategy and practice, or level up and practice — actually, you pretty much have to do both. The game doesn’t discourage a bit of grinding, and rarely makes it take that long. Plus the combat is so satisfying that even killing a room full of monsters over and over again is fun. 15 minutes of grinding will often earn you a level or two. Grinding up weapon upgrade “stones” and gems works pretty well too.

You have to choose how to invest in this game. There are only enough materials to upgrade a few weapons, so you need to choose which to use and spend both on them and on the appropriate character stats wisely.

There are always a lot of options to help you get past difficult spots. The first up being to watch some strategy videos, next are to tune your “runes”, weapons, outfit, and consumables for the fight. There is a lot of variety here. With weird powerups to exploit some vulnerability in most bosses. All challenging to learn and use. The “armor” is interesting. They aren’t radically different in power, and you can often wear what looks cool (and they do look cool — and different). For particular bosses and areas you can cobble together a set as best needed, for poison resistance, or fire, or frenzy.

I also love the way the world is so dense, but all twisted about on itself. Nearly every level has a door, gate, elevator, or ladder that cuts from the beginning to the end — after you sneak around and open it. It comes to feel progressively more accessible as you open up various connections. You learn it REALLY well too, because most areas require so many careful traversals in order to master. This is a game about learning the exact way to get through difficult challenges. It’s about mastery and careful progression.

A deliberate experience to be savored.

For more video game posts, click here.

If you liked this post, follow me at:

My novels: The Darkening Dream and Untimed
or the
video game post depot
or win Crash & Jak giveaways!

Latest hot post: War Stories: Crash Bandicoot

2FJlKu6

Related posts:

  1. Bloodborne – Early Impressions
  2. Dark Souls
  3. More Game of Thrones CGI
  4. Diablo 3 – Barbarian 1-60
  5. Diablo 3 – Beta Preview
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Games
Tagged as: ARPG, Bloodborne, Fantasy, FromSoftware, PS4, RPG, Sony Computer Entertainment, Video game

Bloodborne – Early Impressions

Jan20

71AEYuMzSUL._SL1248_Title: Bloodborne

System: PS4

Genre: ARPG

Developer: FromSoftware

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Date Played: January 2016

Rating: Awesome (although hard)

_

Many years back to played a couple days worth of Dark Souls, by this same developer. So when I was recently perusing some “best games of 2015” and came across the PS4 Bloodborne, a more updated take on the “mega-difficult action RPG genre” I decided to give it a try.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBGjx-4_R10

Although it might not be obvious, Bloodborne is really a spiritual descendant not only of those older “Souls” games (also by FromSoftware), but of Castlevania. It’s dark, gothic, and a creature hunting action roll playing game with lots of secrets.

Bloodborne-featuredLet’s talk about atmosphere. Bloodborne is Japanese Gothic, with a kind of vaguely european, vaguely 18th or 19th century vibe. Creepy cities, leather, top hats, blunderbusses, werwolves, and all that. It’s a gorgeous gorgeous kind of dark game. Excellent and moody visuals and soundscape.

At the mechanic level, Bloodborne is a sort of brawler. You fight usually two handed, with both a firearm in the left hand (generally a slow shooting blunderbuss or flintlock pistol) and a “trick weapon” in the right hand. The trick weapons switch between a smaller faster version and a bigger slower one. This switch can be done in the middle of combat. In fact, you can have two of each kind of weapon and switch those out too. Combat is careful and calculated, generally up close and personal, very visceral — not unlike a Final Fight style brawler. You dodge slow deadly blows, shoot guys to stun them, and then bash their faces in — combos abound. This refinement of the Souls hand-to-hand combat is faster and more furious. Different kinds of weapons and blows are satisfying. The monsters are varied, their animations clear and effective. A new mechanic where you can steal back lost hit points by attacking immediately after loosing them is very effective to encourage a more furious style of fight.

ss-detail17.0

But all that is this micro-mechanic. The macro mechanics (i.e. the RPG element) are brutal and different (although less evil that the Souls games). Blood echoes are xp earned by killing monsters, but you loose them all when you die. However, some nearby monster picks them up, and if you return to kill him (after killing everything up to him again), you can regain them — unless you die a second time on route. This mechanic, combined with a ridiculous scarcity of continue points means that you spend a LONG time killing the same guys over and over, learning every corner of the world. In fact, you have to kill one of the hideous bosses to get a continue, and it took me over a week to do that. Long before that I pretty much learned the ins and outs of the first area (which has a choice of two bosses).

And you can spend your blood echoes on leveling up, or weapons, or leveling your weapons, which are all great ways to get better at the game. Too bad you can’t actually spend anything until you at least see the first boss — and this is quite brutally challenging without leveling up.

Nor did the game bother to explain this, or much else about its rather oddball but well crafted macro-mechanics. Bloodborne, like the Souls games is virtually free of the burden of documentation, walk-thru, or any of those niceties for coddled modern player. Instead it relies on painful trial and error — and no small amount of walkthrough video viewing.

zca9fj0nkgrhgfrlecgp

It took me about a week to kill the first boss. By the time I even faced him seriously, he really wasn’t that hard, but my initial encounters at low level had been so punishing I took my time leveling and exploring. For while the monsters respawn every time you die or return to the leveling hub, rare items and “doors” are persistent. That is you can only collect an item once, and a door, once opened stays open. It is this last, since the level is folded around itself, that makes the long traversal through the level more manageable after awhile. For example, an initially locked gate near the checkpoint, when unlocked from the back allows “quick” (killing “only” 11 monster) access to the first boss.

And while one might think that slinking around killing the same monsters over and over again would be boring, the addictive rhythm to the combat and the slow progress in both leveling and skill makes it all quite rewarding — if dastardly difficult.

All ARPGs involve a grind. Diablo 3, one of my favorites, is nothing but grind. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. In Diablo, you just slay slay with abandon in order to earn xp and small changes at gear upgrades. In Bloodborne, you pick your way through carefully, for the consequences of death are much sharper. Still, fundamentally you kill monsters, collect XP, and improve your character for more more monster killing. Such is the name of the game.

More thoughts to come after I progress…

For more video game posts, click here.

If you liked this post, follow me at:

My novels: The Darkening Dream and Untimed
or the
video game post depot
or win Crash & Jak giveaways!

Latest hot post: War Stories: Crash Bandicoot

Bloodborne-3

Related posts:

  1. Dark Souls
  2. Naughty Dog – A Pedigree Breed
  3. Another Game of Thrones Peek
  4. Video Game Page & Book Status
  5. PS2 Memory Lane
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Games
Tagged as: ARPG, Bloodborne, Fantasy, FromSoftware, PS4, RPG, Sony Computer Entertainment, Video game
Watch the Trailer or

Buy it Online!

Buy it Online!

96 of 100 tickets!

Find Andy at:

Follow Me on Pinterest

Subscribe by email:

More posts on:



Complete Archives

Categories

  • Contests (7)
  • Fiction (404)
    • Books (113)
    • Movies (77)
    • Television (123)
    • Writing (115)
      • Darkening Dream (62)
      • Untimed (37)
  • Food (1,764)
  • Games (101)
  • History (13)
  • Technology (21)
  • Uncategorized (16)

Recent Posts

  • Eating Naples – Palazzo Petrucci
  • Eating San Foca – Aura
  • Eating Otranto – ArborVitae
  • Eating Lecce – Gimmi
  • Eating Lecce – Varius
  • Eating Lecce – Duo
  • Eating Lecce – Doppiozero
  • Eating Torre Canne – Autentico
  • Eating Torre Canne – Beach
  • Eating Monopoli – Orto

Favorite Posts

  • I, Author
  • My Novels
  • The Darkening Dream
  • Sample Chapters
  • Untimed
  • Making Crash Bandicoot
  • My Gaming Career
  • Getting a job designing video games
  • Getting a job programming video games
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer
  • A Game of Thrones
  • 27 Courses of Truffles
  • Ultimate Pizza
  • Eating Italy
  • LA Sushi
  • Foodie Club

Archives

  • May 2025 (3)
  • April 2025 (4)
  • February 2025 (5)
  • January 2025 (3)
  • December 2024 (13)
  • November 2024 (14)
  • October 2024 (14)
  • September 2024 (15)
  • August 2024 (13)
  • July 2024 (15)
  • June 2024 (14)
  • May 2024 (15)
  • April 2024 (13)
  • March 2024 (9)
  • February 2024 (7)
  • January 2024 (9)
  • December 2023 (8)
  • November 2023 (14)
  • October 2023 (13)
  • September 2023 (9)
  • August 2023 (15)
  • July 2023 (13)
  • June 2023 (14)
  • May 2023 (15)
  • April 2023 (14)
  • March 2023 (12)
  • February 2023 (11)
  • January 2023 (14)
  • December 2022 (11)
  • November 2022 (13)
  • October 2022 (14)
  • September 2022 (14)
  • August 2022 (12)
  • July 2022 (9)
  • June 2022 (6)
  • May 2022 (8)
  • April 2022 (5)
  • March 2022 (4)
  • February 2022 (2)
  • January 2022 (8)
  • December 2021 (6)
  • November 2021 (6)
  • October 2021 (8)
  • September 2021 (4)
  • August 2021 (5)
  • July 2021 (2)
  • June 2021 (3)
  • January 2021 (1)
  • December 2020 (1)
  • September 2020 (1)
  • August 2020 (1)
  • April 2020 (11)
  • March 2020 (15)
  • February 2020 (13)
  • January 2020 (14)
  • December 2019 (13)
  • November 2019 (12)
  • October 2019 (14)
  • September 2019 (14)
  • August 2019 (13)
  • July 2019 (13)
  • June 2019 (14)
  • May 2019 (13)
  • April 2019 (10)
  • March 2019 (10)
  • February 2019 (11)
  • January 2019 (13)
  • December 2018 (14)
  • November 2018 (11)
  • October 2018 (15)
  • September 2018 (15)
  • August 2018 (15)
  • July 2018 (11)
  • June 2018 (14)
  • May 2018 (13)
  • April 2018 (13)
  • March 2018 (17)
  • February 2018 (12)
  • January 2018 (15)
  • December 2017 (15)
  • November 2017 (13)
  • October 2017 (16)
  • September 2017 (16)
  • August 2017 (16)
  • July 2017 (11)
  • June 2017 (13)
  • May 2017 (6)
  • March 2017 (3)
  • February 2017 (4)
  • January 2017 (7)
  • December 2016 (14)
  • November 2016 (11)
  • October 2016 (11)
  • September 2016 (12)
  • August 2016 (15)
  • July 2016 (13)
  • June 2016 (13)
  • May 2016 (13)
  • April 2016 (12)
  • March 2016 (13)
  • February 2016 (12)
  • January 2016 (13)
  • December 2015 (14)
  • November 2015 (14)
  • October 2015 (13)
  • September 2015 (13)
  • August 2015 (18)
  • July 2015 (16)
  • June 2015 (13)
  • May 2015 (13)
  • April 2015 (14)
  • March 2015 (15)
  • February 2015 (13)
  • January 2015 (13)
  • December 2014 (14)
  • November 2014 (13)
  • October 2014 (13)
  • September 2014 (12)
  • August 2014 (15)
  • July 2014 (13)
  • June 2014 (13)
  • May 2014 (14)
  • April 2014 (14)
  • March 2014 (10)
  • February 2014 (11)
  • January 2014 (13)
  • December 2013 (14)
  • November 2013 (13)
  • October 2013 (14)
  • September 2013 (12)
  • August 2013 (14)
  • July 2013 (10)
  • June 2013 (14)
  • May 2013 (14)
  • April 2013 (14)
  • March 2013 (15)
  • February 2013 (14)
  • January 2013 (13)
  • December 2012 (14)
  • November 2012 (16)
  • October 2012 (13)
  • September 2012 (14)
  • August 2012 (16)
  • July 2012 (12)
  • June 2012 (16)
  • May 2012 (21)
  • April 2012 (18)
  • March 2012 (20)
  • February 2012 (23)
  • January 2012 (31)
  • December 2011 (35)
  • November 2011 (33)
  • October 2011 (32)
  • September 2011 (29)
  • August 2011 (35)
  • July 2011 (33)
  • June 2011 (25)
  • May 2011 (31)
  • April 2011 (30)
  • March 2011 (34)
  • February 2011 (31)
  • January 2011 (33)
  • December 2010 (33)
  • November 2010 (39)
  • October 2010 (26)
All Things Andy Gavin
Copyright © 2025 All Rights Reserved
Programmed by Andy Gavin