From Software Bloodborne. Discuss or die!

[Silva]

About Insight: a shame it doesn't produce more meaningful changes in the game world. A missed opportunity.

Also I don't think anybody claims [Bloodborne], or any, is flawless, really. It's just the most well put together of the bunch, along with Des and Sekiro.

 

[MajorMace]

About Insight: a shame it doesn't produce more meaningful changes in the game world. A missed opportunity.

My biggest disappointment by far.
Game feels like it lacks an extra step in its escalation towards True Clarity. Shame.

 

[Silva]

And the DLC exacerbates this thematic gap further, with it's two covenants that explore Insight x Beasthood: the beast one allows you to change into a werewolf and gain power from low Insight values, while the "Insight" one let's you change into a cosmic lumenwood being... that doesn't gain anything from high Insight.

(those forms are cool as fuck though)

 

[Skinwalker]

Had to start the game over because I fucked up too many sidequests playing this totally blind. As usual, FS has some of the most autistic and nonsensical hooks for their quest progressions, which are almost impossible to make sense of in advance, and also I advanced to the bloodmoon phase way too quickly.

This time I'll try to keep the game in the evening phase as long as I can, now that I now that touching the skull on the altar triggers transition into night (and fighting the eldritch spider triggers the bloodmoon).

 

[SharkClub]

Had to start the game over because I fucked up too many sidequests playing this totally blind. As usual, FS has some of the most autistic and nonsensical hooks for their quest progressions, which are almost impossible to make sense of in advance

Yep. It's classic souls quest design. They only finally almost unfucked it with Elden Ring, after all this time, though in that game you can still fail all the Volcano Manor quests before they even start by killing Rykard, the rest of the questlines are quite generous in comparison when it comes to being able to complete them (they probably realized they had to back down at least a bit on the incomprehensible quest design since the game is open world).

 

[Silva]

Had to start the game over because I fucked up too many sidequests playing this totally blind. As usual, FS has some of the most autistic and nonsensical hooks for their quest progressions, which are almost impossible to make sense of in advance, and also I advanced to the bloodmoon"phase way too quickly.

This time I'll try to keep the game in the evening phase as long as I can, now that I now that touching the skull on the altar triggers transition into night (and fighting the eldritch spider triggers the bloodmoon).

Bloodborne npc quests felt pretty logical and easy to follow. What quest in specific did you miss?

Also, starting all over just for one quest seems... over and possibly fatigue inducing. Why don't you keep going and try to do the quest on a new playthrough with a different build, weapon set etc and the DLC?

 

[Elttharion]

The bit about fights being designed to be completed at about the same pace you chug vials, given your weapon deals enough damage (which is always the case unless you gimp yourself, I assume), feels very true.
But doesn't the mechanic you talk about corroborate the idea that the game is designed with relentless assault in mind ? Ie. you're the wolf hunting the wolf kind of vibe ?
As you mention it yourself, Bloodborne is the only one specifically designed that way. It's fair to assume this is a deliberate decision rather than some artefact.side effect of its own systems.

Thematically I can see why it would make sense this way, but from a gameplay perspective I'd argue it does indeed encourage the exact opposite for people who actually know how it functions. The game clearly wants you to play fast and offensively, that is why they made shields a gimmick off-hand only useful for a select few encounters instead of a prominent tool like in Dark Souls. It punishes players twice as much for attempting to do what the game wants them to do, than it does punish players for standing still and taking a bitch slap to the face. The punishment for a failed roll in every other Souls game is taking the damage because... you failed the roll, which then results in having to find space and time to be able to recover from that damage before you can make a safe attempt at getting an attack at the boss again. Thanks to 2x instability damage in BB, it pretty much just removes this entire part of the equation, you either dodged the attack perfectly or more often than not you died instantly - unless you know that you can just survive by not even trying to dodge at all and just trading hits with the rally system, which makes the game easy mode.

It is quite obvious why they haven't done instability damage like this ever again since Bloodborne (and it's not because "Bloodborne is le only aggressive game in the series", I would argue DS3 and Elden Ring take up that mantle very well if you don't use spells or summons), it is not balanced around the players' health pool or the intended level or vitality of the player encountering a boss, it is hard to balance boss damage output for it and it incentivizes the wrong styles of gameplay.

I actually figured out I was taking 2x damage whenever I missed a roll fairly quickly because I have replayed every Souls game in the time since Elden Ring came out, before playing the first three King's Field games, Shadow Tower and finally ending up on Bloodborne a month ago. Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1, Dark Souls 2, Dark Souls 3 and Elden Ring are all very fresh in my mind upon coming into Bloodborne, so this mechanical difference was immediately noticeable. This recent amassing of Souls data in my brain is also why it is my opinion that I don't think the game really stands out all that much in a post DS3/Elden Ring world, it should be understood that I don't have any nostalgia for Bloodborne, nor do I have any Playstation paperweight buyer's remorse, because my brother handled that aspect of the ability to play Bloodborne for me. When compared to DeS/DS1/DS2 Bloodborne is certainly unique, and it probably would have stayed that way if FromSoft just suddenly stopped developing Souls games, but why would they do that when they can continue to iterate on a formula that works for players and for their wallets?

Also I don't think anybody claims this game, or any, is flawless, really.

I would argue that a certain someone began shitting his diapers and having a tantrum the second I gave my take that the game is an 8/10 as good as the others and that it was somehow haram to not blindly rate it an 11/10, this has now devolved into saying I never played the game to begin with or saying that I got filtered by some midgame boss, because I dared to stray from the mainstream (fanboy) opinion of everything to do with Bloodborne.

I don't think difficulty by itself, or the question of its legitimate integration in the game (by opposition to what some consider artificial difficulty or whatever), warrants the game's quality to any degree.
The only thing I really ask from these games is to resist us a bit, and I have yet to play a FS game which doesn't.

Absolutely agree.

I don't take FS games as certificates of my gamer status.

Unfortunately there are people who inhabit sites like these that do, hence the immediate questioning of my gamer credentials (at the same time as apparently not bothering to read my post to even have any idea of what my take is) the moment I dared to criticize some of Bloodborne's systems.

PS: I also don't think one needs to beat a game to have insight on it. You don't even need to play most of it when you're arguing about systems and game mechanics. And SharkClub post shows it, since he raises a good point.

Memes and extreme copium from others aside I have obviously beaten the game (including all Story Chalice dungeons and Queen Yharnam) and the only reason I'm even posting in this thread is because I beat it for the first time literally like a week and a half ago, I wouldn't be hanging around in a thread for a game in a genre I like from a developer I adore if I hadn't experienced it first without spoilers. I didn't plan some big conspiracy to come raid the Bloodborne thread while daring to criticize the game and upset fanboys or some shit. I was posting in the King's Field thread about my experiences with King's Field 1, 2, 3 and Shadow Tower and even said in there that I have the chance to play Bloodborne soon by borrowing a PS5, and that's what I did.

I really do like to discuss stuff related to these games in detail when I get the chance, I am also interested in how the mechanics function and have been since I first played Dark Souls 2 back when it came out. Unfortunately Bloodborne is the golden goose of sonybros everywhere so even if I call the game great and an 8/10, any perceived slight against it morphs into me calling it a 2/10 game on par with Rogue Warrior or something, even on the fucking Codex of all places.

Dont get too upset friend, I was mostly joking. Regarding your opinion I think an 8/10 is fair for someone who has no nostalgia towards the game. I personally would give it an 8/10 without the DLC and a 9/10 if you include. I still like the game more than DS3 and Elden Ring personally.

Regarding the dodge mechanic its obvious they tried to balance around the fact your character is much faster and the quicksteps and rolls are much more powerful than what we had before. As you said they had mixed results and much like adaptability they scraped the mechanic. You can see they tried to somewhat nerf rolling by introducing more and more faster bosses and roll catching attacks became more commom. Its interesting to see that From still somewhat struggles to balance dodge rolling and all the changes they did to the formula to try and shake it as meta, especially considering how aclaimed their games are and how many people consider then almost flawless masterpieces.

 

[D_X]

Extra damage taken during a roll, sprint or jump animation (probably others as well) is not something specific to BB. The mechanic has been around at least since DS1 where it was something like 40% extra damage. The 2x in BB was most likely done to discourage quick step spam. Now, dying instantly might happen, I suppose, however it was not something I remember having an issue with in multiple runs through the game. I guess if you roll spam, it becomes more noticeable, idk.

 

[Dadd]

Just don't get hit lmao
Bloodborne has many things that could've been improved and this isn't one of them

 

[Skinwalker]

Had to start the game over because I fucked up too many sidequests playing this totally blind. As usual, FS has some of the most autistic and nonsensical hooks for their quest progressions, which are almost impossible to make sense of in advance, and also I advanced to the bloodmoon"phase way too quickly.

This time I'll try to keep the game in the evening phase as long as I can, now that I now that touching the skull on the altar triggers transition into night (and fighting the eldritch spider triggers the bloodmoon).

Bloodborne npc quests felt pretty logical and easy to follow. What quest in specific did you miss?

Also, starting all over just for one quest seems... over and possibly fatigue inducing. Why don't you keep going and try to do the quest on a new playthrough with a different build, weapon set etc and the DLC?

Oh, it was way more than just one quest. I'm not going to do a new game plus any time soon after I finish the game, so I'd rather just start over. I'm already about halfway to where I had left off, the game goes very quickly once you remember the levels (and have learned how to parry).

 

[Silva]

Oh, cool.

What build you're doing? Strenght is easy, dex harder, quality gets the most weapon variety, and bloodtinge the coolest weapon in the game (Chikage).

But arcane is the only way to fly.

 

[SharkClub]

Extra damage taken during a roll, sprint or jump animation (probably others as well) is not something specific to BB. The mechanic has been around at least since DS1 where it was something like 40% extra damage. The 2x in BB was most likely done to discourage quick step spam. Now, dying instantly might happen, I suppose, however it was not something I remember having an issue with in multiple runs through the game. I guess if you roll spam, it becomes more noticeable, idk.

Instability damage in the other games was not triggered on roll animation frames, but on running and jumping, I already mentioned this at length. This is unique to Bloodborne, just like the 2x damage modifier. There is no bonus damage taken on being rollcatched in Dark Souls 3 for example. The 1.4x damage multiplier does not apply.

Also the "uhhh maybe don't roll spam " cope as if this being an issue is exclusive to people who roll spam when all it takes to get one shot from full hp is one slightly mistimed roll. No, you're not magically going to take more damage if you roll multiple times in a row. Maybe don't roll at all (something that actually does work if you want to take less damage consistently).

 

[D_X]

Instability damage in the other games was not triggered on roll animation frames, but on running and jumping, I already mentioned this at length.

Timestamped for your convenience.

one shot from full hp is one slightly mistimed roll

Again, you're the only person I have ever seen make this claim so insistently, that BB one shots you constantly which runs against my experience, at least. I'm not saying that 2x damage is a good decision, or that it isn't, just that you seem to stress the issue in vastly exaggerated manner.

edit: for DS3 it does appear they removed the instability damage for rolls, retaining it only for the quickstep weapon art and rolling at over 100% equip load.

 

[Jaedar]

Again, you're the only person I have ever seen make this claim so insistently, that BB one shots you constantly which runs against my experience, at least.

fwiw, I never had problems getting one-shot (although I did occasionally got combod down). But I also always went pretty hard for hp in BB, since vials always heal 30% of your max.

 

[SharkClub]

I do love the constant claims of "if it didn't happen to me that must mean it doesn't exist" in regards to the factual 2x damage multipilier that exists being capable of one shotting you, do you have any idea just how big those numbers get when you double them for every heavy hitting attack a boss has? Is everyone loaded up on Clockwise Metomorphosis III every time they play this game? I will admit I'm not "in tune" with the metagame aspects of this 9 year old game, I swapped my Caryll Runes around a lot. If I'm getting one shot on a missed roll versus chalice bosses between 30 and 40 vitality, what vitality are you guys playing this game at? Do you invest 60 points into it before going for your build's weapon softcaps? I can only assume most people just aren't paying any attention to how much health they have when they die, and just accept it because souls is le hard.

It is funny in the end that Dark Souls 1 does indeed have instability damage on rolls, guess it was completely unnoticeable because of how many more iframes you get and how slow the game is otherwise, but the fact stands that they scrapped the mechanic after Bloodborne because it obviously wasn't achieving what it was supposed to. Encouraging people to play fast and aggressively by punishing them twice as hard for trying and failing to do so than for not trying to participate at all is some objectively bad game design, which they recognized. This moment of lucidity with their mechanics for FromSoft between BB and DS3 has actually helped me appreciate DS3 as a necessary step in further polishing their formula more than I otherwise would, in the end for me it is genuinely surprising that it did exist in DS1 on rolls in its 1.4x form but you gotta wonder why everyone is coping about how successful a mechanic it is when right before they deleted it from their repertoire entirely they were experimenting with super high values to see if it had any positive effect on gameplay (which it obviously doesn't).

I beat Cursed Chalice Amygdala second try by standing in his face and drinking vials while smacking him over and over, I also did that to the second and third lava dogs, the third Bloodletting Beast and the second Abhorrent Beast. By this time in the game I had figured out what the game was up to and ignoring what you think the game wants you to do and instead actually doing what it wants you to do is what works, that is the lesson I learned from the mechanic that removes your entire hp bar and sends you back to the lamp every time you mistime a roll by a single frame, you simply don't get a chance to recover from a mistake and learn more of the moveset a boss has, I personally don't think that is as engaging as actually being able to stay in the fight like in every other Souls game.

Since everyone here apparently completes no-hit runs of this game on a regular basis, I'm wondering if you all wouldn't mind posting yours? No, not the autistic twitch eceleb that gets paid to sit in front of his screen grinding out no-hit runs for thousands of hours, I mean the troglodytes in this thread who refuse to engage in discussion but will keep claiming they've never been hit in the choppy 20FPS dodge R1 parry simulator. Let me guess, none of you died even once when going for the 2 on 1 Shark Giant fight in the well in the DLC, either? Easy mode, right?

 

[Ryzer]

While Bloodborne reinvented the wheel, Elden Ring changed nothing and reused everything. That's why Bloodborne is my preferred From Software game.
On DS3, It's an immense piece of shit that should be torched under the right condition, it's a terrible game all around, a game between between Bloodborne and Dark Souls with none of the qualities of both. DS3 improves nothing about the Souls formula and downgrade everything as a whole. Sadly Elden Ring picked DS3's combat.
Bloodborne is simply put a one-shot that hit right.

 

[D_X]

I do love the constant claims of "if it didn't happen to me that must mean it doesn't exist" in regards to the factual 2x damage multipilier that exists being capable of one shotting you,

Again, you are the only dude who has complained about this consistently as if it's something that happens every 2 minutes. Which is not. You can play through the whole game relying on dodging just fine. All this bitching makes it sound like it's a skill issue on your side. Pebkac and all that.

how many more iframes you get

BB roll has 11 iframes, Quickstep has 10. DS1 fast roll has 13 iframes, 15 with the ring and 11 iframes for medium. By what metric is this "many more"?

Not knowing the specific of every mechanic in a game is not an issue. Hell, who has time to test or lookup every little detail? Posturing as if you DO know every specific, now that's an entirely different bag. And more and more it seems like you don't know what you're talking about, at least not in this aspect.

Rest of your post is just listing your cool creds - "I beat..., I did" and finishes with a series of personal attacks. "Troglodytes" who "refuse to engage in discussion" even tho' this is exactly has happened for the past few pages and is exactly what I'm doing right now.

So, not only you do not know what exactly you're talking about, the moment someone points out this you immediately deflect with personal attacks.

Let me guess, none of you died even once when going for the 2 on 1 Shark Giant fight in the well in the DLC, either? Easy mode, right?

See? This bit right here, for example. How in the absolute fuck did the shark giants and how many times someone died to them enter this discussion at all?

 

[NJClaw]

I do love the constant claims of "if it didn't happen to me that must mean it doesn't exist" in regards to the factual 2x damage multipilier that exists being capable of one shotting you

Do you love them more than the constant claims that:

Instability damage in the other games was not triggered on roll animation frames,

?

On a more serious note, I think you took a bit too seriously this single post:

Bro, if you think DS3 and Elden Ring have something on BB combat, you're nuts and should go play AssCreed which must be more to your shitty tastes. Only Sekiro reaches the beauty of BB combat among the modern entries, and even so through a tweaked formula.

After which you decided to go on this weird "you're all BB fanboys, you're mad 'cause I rated it 8/10" crusade.

 

[SharkClub]

If you think anything Silva has said counts as worthwhile discussion and not just retarded lashing out then I'm afraid you're blind. Bloodborne is PERFECT, how dare you not see the grandeur of the combat's exquisite beauty (translator's note for anyone who isn't actually a nostalgia-addled fanboy: it's the same but with double damage on a missed roll and a ranged parry, wow, absolutely revolutionary).

And no, I'm not about to be gaslit into thinking that I was the one who brought up le epic gamer credentials bragging first and that what I posted was somehow irrelevant when it seems that half of the people here are for some fucking reason deeply interested in said le epic gamer credentials, unless a whole page of this thread magically got deleted in the interim I think you'll find multiple posts accusing me of having not played the game and having not finished the game.

 

[NJClaw]

Oh no no no no no, I'm not getting sucked in yet another pointless discussion about nothing. My contract with the Porkster is strictly exclusive.

The fact that you simply dismissed D_X calmly proving you wrong TWO times with a "meh" and a "tl;dr" isn't the best incentive to jump into this mess.

Now, if you'll allow it, I think I'll just roll away (apparently still risking instability damage even if I'm playing DS1, regardless of what you've been saying for the last two pages).

 

[Dadd]

If you think anything Silva has said counts as worthwhile discussion and not just retarded lashing out then I'm afraid you're blind. Bloodborne is PERFECT, how dare you not see the grandeur of the combat's exquisite beauty (translator's note for anyone who isn't actually a nostalgia-addled fanboy: it's the same but with double damage on a missed roll and a ranged parry, wow, absolutely revolutionary).

And no, I'm not about to be gaslit into thinking that I was the one who brought up le epic gamer credentials bragging first and that what I posted was somehow irrelevant when it seems that half of the people here are for some fucking reason deeply interested in said le epic gamer credentials, unless a whole page of this thread magically got deleted in the interim I think you'll find multiple posts accusing me of having not played the game and having not finished the game.

Dodging properly in Bloodborne like Miyazaki intended doesen't give you "le epic gamer credentials"
It's not a difficult game

 

[Skinwalker]

Oh, cool.

What build you're doing? Strenght is easy, dex harder, quality gets the most weapon variety, and bloodtinge the coolest weapon in the game (Chikage).

But arcane is the only way to fly.

Skill and bloodtinge, with the cane and regular pistol. Surprisingly effective, when upgraded and outfitted with blood gems. Will switch to the crow woman's twin daggers when I get to them.

I was right, the second playthrough is considerably more enjoyable, now that the levels aren't fully dark, and I am not over-leveled from attempting the nighthmare levels prematurely. The Witch(es) actually gave me some trouble this time around, even though my Insight was lower.

 

[D_X]

All this talk about BB got me in the mood for a replay, it's been quite a while since the last one anyway. I actually started it about a couple of weeks ago, but paused it so I could focus on Nioh 2 and switching between the 2 was counterproductive to say the least. Nothing like trying to ki pulse in BB or tapping the shoulder button in Nioh to attack only for your character to sit around like a dumbass.

Punched the werewolf in the clinic to death (yes, I am hardcore, how could you tell), then picked up the cleaver, did horrible, unspeakable things to Cleric Beast and picked up the saw spear which is my go to weapon until Amelia. Since both forms are serrated and with a trip to Hemwick you can get it to +6, combined with flame paper, it melts both Paarl and Amelia.

Surprisingly, witches actually gave me some trouble this time 'round which doubled my total death count to them. Hell, I hadn't previously died in that fight except in ng+.

Paar remains the absolute shittiest non-chalice boss fight of the game. Now, everybody says don't lock on to him, but I find it easier to quickstep through his bullshit and it helps keeping track of where the fucker actually is even if it means the camera acts like it has a seizure.

I got my vit up to 15 before BSB and 22 before Amelia, and with these numbers I'm quite tanky with most deaths coming from doing stupid shit like running head forward into Djura's gatling gun.

Now comes the hard part. I made a run for the Beasthunter Saif and I'm considering making another for the Saw as well so I need to decide which one to use. Previously I've used the Saif mostly for pvp and the Saw, well, pretty much not at all. I would need 4 more levels to use the Saw as well. Decisions, decisions. Think I'll go pay Yosefka an unfriendly visit before and pick one after.

 

[NJClaw]

If you want to play with the Blade of Mercy (my favorite weapon), you can get it early by killing the crow woman as soon as you encounter her in the first area. Don't let the deceptively low damage discourage you, once you get used to its moveset it's a great weapon.

 

[Skinwalker]

Fucking Cthulhu on a bike, does Old Yharnam look and play better in daytime than at night. It's so much easier to navigate this maze, and there are actually plenty of nice details on the textures that aren't visible in darkness.

If only the Forbidden Forest was accessible during daytime.