Board 8 > I think Bloodborne is overrated.

(+) Yeah! (+)

6.5/10

This is the first FromSoft game I've played, and I gotta say, I'm pretty disappointed. The game's biggest strengths seem to be the combat and the world. I think both are done well, but neither wowed me. Here's some of my biggest grievances with the game:

I've always heard that FromSoft games are, "difficult but fair," and Bloodborne seems inconsistent at actually applying that idea. I remember one room had 3 enemy hunters in it that you had to fight at once. Only way I can even imagine getting through that room is by cheesing it. Can't forget the spider room near the end too - that was total bullshit. There's also situations where an enemy is just waiting to ambush you and take half your health off instantly unless you're already aware the ambush is ahead. None of these things felt fair to me. A majority of the time, I enjoyed playing Bloodborne, but these were some poor moments.

I wish the RPG elements were done differently. The level up and weapon upgrading systems are designed so that you are somewhat stuck playing with a certain weapon. The lack of a re-spec option means your build can't be changed, and the scarcity of blood stone chunks meant I could only upgrade one or two weapons to use against the tougher enemies. I barely even touched any weapons other than the Saw Cleaver and Hunter's Axe, even though I really wanted to try out the Chikage and Ludwig's Holy Blade, because nothing else was going to do enough damage without upgrades.

While the world was well made, I think the storytelling was criminally underdone. Yahtzee from Zero Punctuation described this as "subtle storytelling", but for me, it felt like there was almost no storytelling at all. I've looked up what the story was and who all the characters were, but I would've never known any of that from just playing the game. By the end of the game, I had an idea of only a few important things, and the endings were not satisfying (despite an awesome "final" boss) because I had nothing invested in the story up to that point. The game didn't seem like it cared to tell me anything, so I didn't care to be interested.

I almost feel like this is the kind of game that would benefit from a boss rush mode. Many of the bosses were the most fun aspects of the game with the greatest feeling of reward. I don't have any care to replay the game, but I do kinda want to go fight some of those bosses again, maybe with a different weapon this time around.

It's a good game, but I don't think it's great, and I'm surprised this got 9s and 10s on release.

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Solioxrz362 posted...

I remember one room had 3 enemy hunters in it that you had to fight at once.

lmao i know just the room. those damn guys.

Solioxrz362 posted...

The lack of a re-spec option means your build can't be changed

This was some BS though, yeah. Weird too because Soulsborne goes back and forth on this. DS1 - Nope, DS2 - Sure, Bloodborne - Nope, DS3 - Yeah. That said, I'd say it only really matters for your type of weapon. If you're going for a Skill build then switching to another Skill Weapon is fine. But if you want to switch to a Strength one... welp.

Solioxrz362 posted...

While the world was well made, I think the storytelling was criminally underdone. Yahtzee from Zero Punctuation described this as "subtle storytelling", but for me, it felt like there was almost no storytelling at all. I've looked up what the story was and who all the characters were, but I would've never known any of that from just playing the game.

It's pretty much all in item descriptions. Putting it all together is left to the player. I found it pretty neat, personally.

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I just can't get over the fact you can't pause the game

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Cavedweller2000 posted...

I just can't get over the fact you can't pause the game

This and the poor camera were two things I kinda wanted to mention but left out of the OP because they weren't quite as egregious. I'd usually just go back to the Hunter's Dream, or I'd clear a room and leave the game like that.

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The camera usually behaved for me. Definitely a few fights where it was not being a helper though. Usually that just meant fighting without lock-on which is actually advantageous at times depending on what you want to do.

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I do enjoy the metroid prime style of story progression forcing the player to piece it all together on thier own.

Of course there's also people who just do it as a service for others

https://youtu.be/wjWOy6ioVHI

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A lot of the bosses can be replayed in the chalice dungeons, and are scaled up so you don't beat them in just a few combos!

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Peace___Frog posted...

A lot of the bosses can be replayed in the chalice dungeons, and are scaled up so you don't beat them in just a few combos!

I had to run through 7 different Chalice Dungeons for the platinum, and I actually thought they were not really worth playing much. They introduce a ton of extra bosses that aren't as exciting (or, in the Defiled chalice dungeon, they're bullshit), reuse the same rooms over and over again, and you lose the cool world and boss arenas from the rest of the game.

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It is overrated but 6.5 is too low.

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Lack of a pause actually sounds pretty neat if the game gives you safe areas to not move in.

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My biggest issue in Bloodborne is blood vials. The estus system works fine in Dark Souls, why make the potions an actual item you need to buy/farm?

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pjbasis posted...

Lack of a pause actually sounds pretty neat if the game gives you safe areas to not move in.

It does, like every souls game. Once you kill the baddies in the immediate vicinity, you're never under threat - unless you're in a pvp zone.

Solioxrz362 posted...

I had to run through 7 different Chalice Dungeons for the platinum, and I actually thought they were not really worth playing much. They introduce a ton of extra bosses that aren't as exciting (or, in the Defiled chalice dungeon, they're bullshit), reuse the same rooms over and over again, and you lose the cool world and boss arenas from the rest of the game.

That's reasonable. The defiled chalice is legitimately bad, but I enjoy the combat enough to where I'll still go through the dungeons on some playthroughs.

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I couldn't quite wrap my head around a game based on exploiting a parry mechanic, but you only have a limited amount of items (bullets) to do that mechanic with and if you run out, you're required to grind for more. Who thought that was a good idea

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Parrying is not required to get to the credits so I'm unsure how you get to that conclusion, unless the person you heard that from is also unable to dodge (with very generous i-frames!) or stagger enemies. There are issues with bloodborne, but that complaint is rather silly.

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DeathChicken posted...

I couldn't quite wrap my head around a game based on exploiting a parry mechanic, but you only have a limited amount of items (bullets) to do that mechanic with and if you run out, you're required to grind for more. Who thought that was a good idea

I tended to try beating enemies with dodging and striking first, and if by far the easiest way was gonna be parrying, then I'd use my bullets. So basically, bullets were largely saved for enemy hunters and medium-sized monsters. I used them on some bosses too, like Logarius.

Wouldn't say the game was based around parrying, it was just an option in your arsenal.

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pjbasis posted...

Lack of a pause actually sounds pretty neat if the game gives you safe areas to not move in.

Try keeping that thought if you have to answer the door (or any other reason you may have to leave your PS4) whilst in the middle of fighting

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Bloodborne was a damn fun time. Frustrating at times, but also fun and cool. I died a ton of times, but managed to beat it other than the DLC I never got around to getting yet. I really sucked at dodging and parrying so if I can beat it anybody probably could.

Bloodborne is legitimately the perfect Souls game IMO but whether that means anything to you depends on how much you enjoy that flavor of game. I enjoy it quite a bit so the game lands somewhere in the upper 9s for me and is one of my favorite games of all time. Honestly the only complaint I have about it is its dogshit performance which god willing will be addressed on the PS5.

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Didn't enjoy it at all. Sad because I wanted to.

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metaIslug posted...

I don't know how anyone bothered to do the chalices offline. I don't know if this is just offline or something but getting the materials to do the next chalice seemed like a grind. I got to the 3rd chalice before saying fuck this

The worst one is Arcane Haze. But there's an item called the Haze Extractor that lets you turn all the tomb mold and ritual blood found around the chalice dungeons and turn them into a lot of Arcane Haze. I think it's on layer 2 or 3 of the third pthumerian chalice.

I only had to grind once for a part, and it was just one ritual blood (3). And there was a coldblood flower that I had to buy with 2 Insight. No big deal there either.

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There is one boss that I found to be unbelievably frustrating, but I managed to beat it. That boss being Bloodborne spoilers Martyr Logarius aka fuck if I ever replay that boss again

Cavedweller2000 posted...

Try keeping that thought if you have to answer the door (or any other reason you may have to leave your PS4) whilst in the middle of fighting

I mean you could just push the PS button on your controller right? Every game has pause built in with that nowadays

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As long as you're not being invaded, you can literally just quit out whenever you want in lieu of pausing.

The load times in 1.0 Bloodborne did make that suck, I'll admit, but now it's not really an issue.
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skullbone posted...

Cavedweller2000 posted...

Try keeping that thought if you have to answer the door (or any other reason you may have to leave your PS4) whilst in the middle of fighting

I mean you could just push the PS button on your controller right? Every game has pause built in with that nowadays

No, whether the game halts or not when you do that is up to the game. It would make literally no sense to halt an online game like that.
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Souls games get better the more you play them and get used to their unique style. They have a steep learning curve but it's worth taking the time to learn the deeper mechanics.

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kevwaffles posted...

No, whether the game halts or not when you do that is up to the game. It would make literally no sense to halt an online game like that.

Sorry I'm talking about holding the button down and going to the home menu, not just tapping the button. I've never seen a single player game not suspend if you do that, even in the middle of cutscenes. So if Bloodborne truly doesn't suspend even by going to the home screen of your PS4 that would be surprising.

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skullbone posted...

kevwaffles posted...

No, whether the game halts or not when you do that is up to the game. It would make literally no sense to halt an online game like that.

Sorry I'm talking about holding the button down and going to the home menu, not just tapping the button. I've never seen a single player game not suspend if you do that, even in the middle of cutscenes. So if Bloodborne truly doesn't suspend even by going to the home screen of your PS4 that would be surprising.

If it pauses one way it'll pause the other, there's no difference between those two. Bloodborne does not. Neither do any of the DS games.

At least I'm pretty sure. I'd test it, but I'm pretty sure I don't have any installed atm.

Now if you're talking full suspend for the game, that only happens when you suspend the console or open another app that let's you run concurrently, ie not another game. In that case yes it will pause, but it also knocks you offline and might make you reload the game anyway.
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Cavedweller2000 posted...

Try keeping that thought if you have to answer the door (or any other reason you may have to leave your PS4) whilst in the middle of fighting

How many times did that legitimately happen to you.

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Aecioo posted...

How many times did that legitimately happen to you.

Legitimately quite often. Not necessarily for the door, but I can get called away for other reasons. For this reason I barely got a couple of hours into it before putting it down. Which is a shame cos it looks like a game I'd enjoy. Difficulty curve or not.

But imo there is no legitimate reason not to have an offline only mode you can pause

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Yeah I really don't like the idea of not having a pause option. It's nice to get up and take a break from playing whenever you'd like, as opposed to waiting until there are no enemies in the area.

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CassandraCain posted...

Souls games get better the more you play them and get used to their unique style. They have a steep learning curve but it's worth taking the time to learn the deeper mechanics.

I'm genuinely interested in knowing what deeper mechanic I missed after getting the platinum trophy.

Bonus points if it's stuff I could've done without playing the game multiple times, because I don't have the time for that.

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Bloodborne is a 10/10 for me, but even I have to admit that the lack of a Pause button is a major problem. I havent been able to replay the game since having kids.

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It's hard to pause an always online game, but unless you are being invaded you can always just quit.

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metaIslug posted...

It's not an always-online game. In fact you can't even go online without PS Plus

I have PS+ and I still played the whole game offline. There's literally an option on title screen before you even get to the main menu that asks "Play offline" or "Play online"


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As someone who has played every "from soulsborne" made in the past ten years or so, i agree with all of your criticisms.

souls games are designed to reward players already in the know- they reward mastery and familiarity. that makes them vague, unfair, and frankly bullshit to new players. it's just a stylistic/game design choice that many people enjoy.

you're supposed to feel at a loss, and ask your friends (ideally. more realistically for some, the internet) what the hell you're supposed to do and what the tricks are.

if you really know your shit, blitzing through the sections between bosses will be no problem for you, and it'll be kind of like a boss rush mode. you might enjoy the randomly generated labyrinth mode, or whatever it's called.

the subtle lore is a crock of shit. it's not a plot or story. it's kind of an interesting backdrop, but i still think it's messed up to not even understand the basic motivations of the character you're playing as, other than 'i am in a video game and want to progress'. but that's not what the game's about, really

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this game was not made for people like you.

just stop thinking about it so much and go play something else.

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MariaTaylor posted...

this game was not made for people like you.

just stop thinking about it so much and go play something else.

Wtf? I didn't say I was gonna keep playing it. I thought it was okay to discuss a video game on a gaming website.

Sorry I wanted to share my thoughts on a popular game.

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banananor posted...

the subtle lore is a crock of shit. it's not a plot or story. it's kind of an interesting backdrop, but i still think it's messed up to not even understand the basic motivations of the character you're playing as, other than 'i am in a video game and want to progress'. but that's not what the game's about, really

The lore is so good though. it's incredible to see people picking up the pieces left and discovering the backstory. From what I've seen, Bloodborne's is ambiguous but well-devoloped--the devs at least put enough effort in crafting it so that there are complete theories you can create with evidence behind them, enough so that it doesn't necessarily matter if what you've come up with matches the exact intentions.

It's not a traditional story. It's still good. It's like getting super into a series that's only half-finished and using the hints and foreshadows the author scattered to figure out what hasn't been explicitly said and what hasn't happened yet. It's different then reading the complete series, of course, yet has its own unique joy in using your insight and creativity to fill the spaces intentionally left blank.

Who cares if the situation around the main character isn't the focus? That's like people whining that "Link doesn't even have any lines!". A million games, some with good stories, have an excuse protagonist impetus undeveloped beyond "save the world". Like you said. It's not what the game's about.

this post brought to you by Sanderson's Cosmere, where having only a fourth of the novels written is half the fun!


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NFUN posted...

The lore is so good though. it's incredible to see people picking up the pieces left and discovering the backstory. From what I've seen, Bloodborne's is ambiguous but well-devoloped--the devs at least put enough effort in crafting it so that there are complete theories you can create with evidence behind them, enough so that it doesn't necessarily matter if what you've come up with matches the exact intentions.

It's not a traditional story. It's still good. It's like getting super into a series that's only half-finished and using the hints and foreshadows the author scattered to figure out what hasn't been explicitly said and what hasn't happened yet. It's different then reading the complete series, of course, yet has its own unique joy in using your insight and creativity to fill the spaces intentionally left blank.

Who cares if the situation around the main character isn't the focus? That's like people whining that "Link doesn't even have any lines!". A million games, some with good stories, have an excuse protagonist impetus undeveloped beyond "save the world". Like you said. It's not what the game's about.

this post brought to you by Sanderson's Cosmere, where having only a fourth of the novels written is half the fun!

I think I would agree that the story doesn't have to be super meaningful or in-depth or anything like that. However, here's where I disagree: I knew so little at the end of Bloodborne that I just didn't care about anything. If the game assumes that I am so excited about the game that I want to go scrounge the world for little notes that are one sentence in length and piece together story through item desciptions while not actually telling me anything, then that's kinda pretentious.

I tend to believe a game's story is best told through both dialogue and gameplay, and the things the player needs to assemble themselves are the themes and meaning. Having to piece together the parts of the characters that they don't outright say tends to be pretty effective too (I think The Last of Us does this pretty well, you end up piecing together their true motivations yourself especially near the end).

If a game doesn't have a big meaning to it, then that's fine too, but at the same time, don't leave me to piece together something that means nothing. Cause that's a waste of my time. Bloodborne has great world building, but gives you no context for it, so I'm finding it easy to leave Yharnam behind. In a setting like Mass Effect had, by the end of ME3, I didn't want to stop experiencing that setting cause there was so much more that I actually cared about.

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NFUN posted...

The lore is so good though. it's incredible to see people picking up the pieces left and discovering the backstory. From what I've seen, Bloodborne's is ambiguous but well-devoloped--the devs at least put enough effort in crafting it so that there are complete theories you can create with evidence behind them, enough so that it doesn't necessarily matter if what you've come up with matches the exact intentions.

It's not a traditional story. It's still good. It's like getting super into a series that's only half-finished and using the hints and foreshadows the author scattered to figure out what hasn't been explicitly said and what hasn't happened yet. It's different then reading the complete series, of course, yet has its own unique joy in using your insight and creativity to fill the spaces intentionally left blank.

Who cares if the situation around the main character isn't the focus? That's like people whining that "Link doesn't even have any lines!". A million games, some with good stories, have an excuse protagonist impetus undeveloped beyond "save the world". Like you said. It's not what the game's about.

this post brought to you by Sanderson's Cosmere, where having only a fourth of the novels written is half the fun!

I 100% agree that it's a fun experience if you're in the mood for it! I used to read d&d setting books just to absorb the lore of those worlds, so I feel like I get it.

The entire story of a soulsborne is like reading the back of a fantasy novel- you get a sense of the world's backstory, and now you're primed for a story in said world. In some ways, grading bloodborne is like grading the Silmarillon, which is a giant lore dump.

I don't care if the main character isn't the focus- I actually like that. I just need to have my understanding of the world and the protagonist's understanding of the world align. If my character knows what he/she is doing, why don't I?

A convenient way that many games handle it is by having the protagonist be a newcomer as well, and not know what is going on- so the protagonist and player learn together

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Solioxrz362 posted...

Wtf? I didn't say I was gonna keep playing it.

right, you finished the game. now stop thinking about it and go play something else.

Solioxrz362 posted...

I thought it was okay to discuss a video game on a gaming website.

it is. and my response to those thoughts are: 'this game isn't made for you. just go play something else.'


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if that's your response to him giving his opinion on the game then this topic wasn't made for you, go read something else

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MariaTaylor posted...

right, you finished the game. now stop thinking about it and go play something else.

it is. and my response to those thoughts are: 'this game isn't made for you. just go play something else.'

you're awful

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You should have played Dark Souls first

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Shonen_Bat posted...

if that's your response to him giving his opinion on the game then this topic wasn't made for you, go read something else

I will!

Aecioo posted...

you're awful

if this is your idea of awful, you live a very sheltered life.


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MariaTaylor posted...

I will!

well you keep coming back so clearly you won't!

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HanOfTheNekos posted...

You should have played Dark Souls first

What about playing Dark Souls first makes Bloodborne better?

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