Bloodborne - First Impressions

@xantufrog:

In all games..... I hate them in Underground 2..... I hate them when I'm playing Be a Pro Mode in FIFA. I hate them in President Evil 5.... and you know how much I like President Evil 5 :(

You can sympathise with that right ?

@Lulu_Lulu: yeah I do. Bloodborne and the Souls series just happen to be among such games for me. If that breaks your heart, good.

@Buckhannah:

It kinda is...... think of it like this..... your presented with an option between a PS4 with Backwards Compatibility and a PS3.

Now just replace The PS3 with a broken sword and the PS4 with everysingle weapon that does everything better than the Broken Sword......

Why deliberately use something thats inferior......

Literally almost every other sword other has an advantage over the broken sword in Reach, Power, Speed and Weight....

@mastermetal777:

Since when did you become deliberately hurtful ? :(

Besides I think you have a case of Consumer Goggles....... or Sunk Costs Fallacy.

@Lulu_Lulu: and you're a clear cut case of strong cognitive bias.

@mastermetal777:

I have no vested interest in the success ot faillure of this game...... you do.....

Theres no bias on my part.

@Lulu_Lulu: if the game sucked I'd say so. I've played at least 12 hours so far and I'm loving every minute. I thought The Order: 1886 and Watch Dogs would be good, but they ended up colossal disappointments. I thought Heavy Rain would be bad, but I ended up loving it. I don't simply assume a game will be fantastic or terrible just from whatever mechanics are in it. If they work, they work. Disappointment only comes if I'm not having fun when I thought I would. Simple as that.

@mastermetal777:

I believe you.... the problem is you wouldn't know if it actually did suck..... you and your logic

@Lulu_Lulu: it's all subjective either way.

This game is very, very good. It has an intriguing lore that's reminiscent of older games such as Castlevania and delivers a genuinely creepy atmosphere much like the original Resident Evil. It also sports beautiful graphics and a very challenging (but motivating) level of difficulty. I've tried numerous times to traverse the first alleyway in which the towns "people" crowd around a fire, yet despite my numerous attempts, I want to keep trying. I should also mention that the character designs for the creatures, especially the heavily-armored and ax-wielding beast, are pretty cool. I like this game...a lot.

@mastermetal777:

Sure..... if you you have low standards.

@Lulu_Lulu: I have different standards. And you have an ego problem. You can never just let let people enjoy what you don't like. It's either they agree with you or they're idiots with poor standards. There's no in between with you.

@mastermetal777:

Its people's deluded opinions that led me to buy Dark Souls...... its objectively nothing like people said it is.... so yeah..... I'm alil annoyed..... perhaps you should think about that before you blindly praise a game.....

@Lulu_Lulu: it's not blind if A) I've played it to completion, and B) I enjoyed every moment. You just had a bad opinion of it before you played it, and with that in mind couldn't make yourself enjoy it even if you tried. That's called being blind.

@mastermetal777:

I wouldn't have wasted my money if I wasn't willing to change my oppinion if the game actually delivered..... I mean thats just stupid.... why buy a shitty game if you never ever plan to change your mind ?

Anyway..... it is blind if you played it to completion and for some reason just didn't acknowledge theres something wrong......

are you even capable of looking at a game and wondering how someone else might feel if they encountered some of the annoying design choices or is it just "ME ME ME" with you ?

@Lulu_Lulu: I can see issues just fine. But if they're not enough to limit my experience, I won't really talk about them unless it's a full review. I'm not gonna be like Zero Punctuation, always looking at the negative and being insanely cynical of everything.

@mastermetal777:

I've seen your "Full Reviews" they're less informative then a game trailer......

Its just lines upon lines about how much you like this and that.

@Lulu_Lulu: you saw one review. Of a game I happen to love. Try my reviews of The Order or Half-Life 2.

@mastermetal777:

I have no interest in either of those..... never played them either so it would be very easy for them to mislead me......

I need a proper baseline Review of a game we both played.

@Lulu_Lulu: then forget it. Because no matter what, you'll find something wrong. And with reviews being opinions, all it says about you is that you just wanna complain like always. But if you care that much, go to my reviews and read them. Lot of them are old, but whatever. And don't reply on here. Send a comment to my page.

@mastermetal777:

Nothing is perfect my love...... where I choose to point out the flaws you choose to praise them...... or ignore them..... or whatever it is you do

@Lulu_Lulu: I just give my opinion. No more or less

@mastermetal777:

you could try giving the facts next time.... just a suggestion.

Aggressive much?

@Pedro:

We have "history".....

@MirkoS77: My big issue with the difficulty with many of FROM's games stems from their hit-box detection and lack of feedback in enemy animations. Many times it seems my attacks only register with sound fx and blood spatter while the enemy animation continues unabated. Enemies don't seem to be stunned by anything but my pistol shots landed at the precise frame windows to stagger them, and that comes off as a contrived mechanic inconsistent with the remainder of combat. Normal counter hits I land after a dodge/roll don't seem to stun so that doesn't give me any feeling that I have a short window of opportunity to follow up. Then I get hit hard in return. This is why I struggle with combat.

yeah, kinda feels like this:

I enjoy the games, but gamers and reviewers alike need to demand more from them, because they really haven't improved. These are the sort of things we'd expect from just about any game, but the DS series and now Bloodborne are always getting let off the hook.

Anyway, finished it. I got the secret the ending (and it made no sense to me) and I think I finished all the campaign bosses except for one. He was just irritating and I wanted to finish the game. Pretty much used the same weapons and armor from start to finish...that was odd.

Never figured out how to join a faction, unfortunately. I suppose it's fun discovering things, but you could play the entire game not even knowing any factions existed. How many players even know to look for them? Again, this franchise being so obtuse with basic play mechanics.

@Ish_basic said:

@MirkoS77: My big issue with the difficulty with many of FROM's games stems from their hit-box detection and lack of feedback in enemy animations. Many times it seems my attacks only register with sound fx and blood spatter while the enemy animation continues unabated. Enemies don't seem to be stunned by anything but my pistol shots landed at the precise frame windows to stagger them, and that comes off as a contrived mechanic inconsistent with the remainder of combat. Normal counter hits I land after a dodge/roll don't seem to stun so that doesn't give me any feeling that I have a short window of opportunity to follow up. Then I get hit hard in return. This is why I struggle with combat.

yeah, kinda feels like this:

I enjoy the games, but gamers and reviewers alike need to demand more from them, because they really haven't improved. These are the sort of things we'd expect from just about any game, but the DS series and now Bloodborne are always getting let off the hook.

Flawless victory.

Haha, yea. After playing it a bit more I see there is some knockback for the weaker enemies, but for anything slightly larger there's not much affect. I can understand with things like bosses there wouldn't be very much impact but others it's unbalanced.

yeah I really don't like the lack of armor in this game, then again in Dark Souls 2 there was almost too much armor... Hard to find a middle ground. I'm barely done with Old City yet

@Expane: the clothes give good defense either way. Besides, who wears armor in a gothic setting? Your defense is basically your quick feet and your gun. Takes some getting used to though

Yeah but I could do the same in Dark Souls, I think what bothers me is the lack of choice. in the souls games you could do armor OR clothes. in this game, it's just "outfits". Yes it's more classic JRPG but I miss leveling up armor and the look/feel of it.

Gothic could be a great setting for Knight armor.

There is knight armor. The cainhurst set is all metal plates, but there's also a set called knight armor that looks like 16th century lordly finery.

shame that there really is very little difference between specs. I liked being able to play DS as a warrior, then switch things up with a mage. Whether you focus on strength, skill, bloodtinge or arcane, the only real difference is the weapons you're using. The experience feels largely the same. There are hunter tools that work as items using your QS total as a mana pool and scaling off of arcane, but you're far better off using that pool to trigger viscerals than wasting it on these on items that do very minimal damage for their investment. The one exception might be the choir bell that lets you heal everyone. I'd also use them more if it didn't mean burning through my silver and having to farm more...i miss the estus flask concept of refilling at bonfires.

I think I give up on chalice dungeons. They bore me to tears. I hate randomly generated dungeons in any game. Would rather just play through the game again a third time. Man, I blazed through my second run. Str/Skill the first time, Skill/Arcane the second, so now Skill/Bloodtinge....my weapons of choice for this one shall be the rifle spear and the katana. But by far, the greatest challenge will be making a decent looking character.

Yeah the customization kinda bums me out. I"m using the shovel spike and saw cleaver (early in game) and despite being "Next Gen" upgrading changes nothing in appearance.

Why Rifle Spear? I have one but haven't used it much,

Katana or the Holy Sword sound nice, I was a claymore fan.

Apparently there is a glitch that can make like easier in the land of Bloodborne.

@Pedro: that glitch was just fixed today

Apparently so. Well its still applicable if you uninstall and reinstall.

Yeah, I'm done. Deleted it just now. Honestly, I think this is the absolute worst game in the "Souls like" category.

- Health system is awful. The need to go back after a failed boss attempt and grind for healing items is outdated. Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2 moved away from this to the Estus system. You couldn't beat Sif? It's cool. You're back at the bonfire not too far away and your Estus flasks are refilled, run back over and try again. You failed to beat a boss in Bloodborne after a protracted battle? Respawn at the lamp after a loading screen. Go back to Hunters Dream. Loading screen.

Choose to go to another area where Blood Vials can be easily farmed. (like Central Yarnham) Longer loading screen. Farm for several minutes. Back to lamp and choose Hunters Dream. LOADING SCREEN. Go back to the place you were at before. LOADING SCREEN. This is your fifth time doing this, so you don't wanna do it again. Ring the damn bell, go make a sandwich and check back in thirty minutes or so. You might have one cooperator, two if you are extremely lucky. Whoops, boss has a mega attack thats a one hit kill on second phase.

Go do all of that again.

- Busted online. Summoning others is tied into a resource you must farm for. Then when you do summon, you either get someone right away, or wait upwards of a half hour for a summon, sometimes not even then. Takes just as long to find someone to invade, or someone to co-op with to farm insight. What was simple and easy, and enhanced the experience significantly, is now a hassle and a source of stress and frustration. Why?

- No variety. (nitpicky personal negatives here) Small handful of weapons and "attire", most of the attire small variations on others or butt ugly. HORRIBLE amounts of clipping on a good chunk of them, with layers of the same outfit going through each other and weapons. Unacceptable visual distraction in the year 2015. This isn't PS2.

- Lack of different viable builds. Some small differences aside, everyone plays the same.

- Character creator is still a bad joke. Character models are mid range PS2 quality.

I'm not sure why the game gets praise for it's massive play time when so much of that time is spent with redundant activities and loading screens. Take all that out and it might be a twenty hour or less game in reality, and not a terribly good one.

@PopeAnonymous

All I have to say is that you are crazy for speaking so much truth. :P I can't disagree with your the points you have made with the exception of the clothing clipping which is not that much a of big deal. Physics on clothing is still problematic so its realistically acceptable. The game has several good things about but the things that are not in its favor are pretty substantial for some people.

I am at the point where I am not sure if I am enjoy it or if I just want to get it done with. I love the interconnecting of the level design and thats about it with regards to the things I love. I wanted to like the story but its a mess and is very similar to the traditional souls game where there is not much to it. The bulk of the difficulty in the game comes from two things, not knowing where to go and enemies dealing massive damage upon contact. I was forced to level up my vitality because I didn't see it as that important but when I was being oneshot killed so frequently I was forced to level it up. All the praise on the game needing skill is nothing but meaningless banter. You can level up and you can button mash your way through the vast majority of enemies.

@Expane:

Why Rifle Spear? I have one but haven't used it much,

Katana or the Holy Sword sound nice, I was a claymore fan.

The rifle spear just for something different. But, also, playing as Skill/Bloodtinge, you can't get those kinds of weapons until deeper in the game and the rifle spear is fairly early. Still, the spear does have a great R2 charge when transformed. There's a video of someone chain-locking Paarl for viscerals with that move. In general, having an R2 charge that covers lots of range is very useful against enemies with bigger health bars. That is another complaint I have with the game that bloodtinge, arcane and skill based weapons are mostly scattered towards the middle and end of the game.

Holy Sword is probably my favorite overall weapon. It's not as powerful per hit as the axe, but it attacks so fast it can stagger-lock most smaller enemies. It also has a shorter recovery, allowing you to dodge out on bosses easier. Transformed, the R2 is pretty great with a lunge followed up by an optional slash.

@popeanonymousxv:

I can't argue with any of that. Instead, I would add to it by saying the elimination of the estus flask concept is probably this game's worst offense. It introduces pointless grind that is certainly made worse by the horrible load times.

The collision detection is awful, the visceral attacks frequently fail (i'm talking the follow up R1 when you have the guy on his knees), they're still using some kind of command queue that really causes issues because of the sensitivity of the controller buttons - single presses of buttons being read by the game as two. It also sucks when you attack, but you get clobbered trying to deliver the hit and knocked down...because you hit the attack button though, the first thing your character does when he/she gets up is try to attack again as per your previous command Ignoring everything else you might try to do....which of course gets you hit again. Camera is terrible and loses lock-on way too easy. Lock-on switches targets with the same button that manually controls the camera, which is hugely problematic when multiple foes are on the screen and you're trying to get a decent view of the fight while maintaining focus on a certain enemy.

There are also some little glitches like status effects being applied to your corpse and then affecting you when you resurrect...i literally died to frenzy, revived and got hit by frenzy again standing next to the lantern. We know about the item dupe and the game breaking key fail. Both of those were fixed but they were still in the game when it got such high scores. As far as I know there is still some NPC glitches with the optional quests as well.

I enjoy BB very much, but reviewers giving it 9s and such just sends a horrible message to devs out there. You can both enjoy/love something AND be critical of it. And where necessary, we should be critical because that's the only way the things we enjoy/love will get better.

@Ish_basic:

Wait..... they still haven't fixed the button thing..... this was an issues since Dark Souls......

Or maybe they deliberately left it in because thry know ut kills people.

@mastermetal777: Just ignore that person. Look at the time it registered the account, and then look at the post count. Tells you everything you need to know about what you're dealing with.

Yeah I finally got the Holy Sword upgraded to +4 and it reminds me of Souls a bit, although I miss the overhead slash, this one has a sideways slash for the range.

I guess arcane/skill is mostly for NG+. In general I feel like the balance is way off, in terms of gear/mobs/bosses. The term you use "scattered" describes it perfectly

Still having fun, but I'm basically a Dark Souls cloth armor w/ 2Handed... a type of build from the DS games that you can swap armor to change. But in BLoodborne, there is no changing much. Everyone is a doge/roll stick and move type. Its nice but I don't like being forced into not being able to tank

And yes, this is not a 9/10 game for me at all. 7.5 is more realistic, it's a very good game, with obvious balance issues and the replay value is the lowest of the Souls series.

It's amazing how ego can affect one's opinion so much. That's why the game is getting 9's and high praise. Reading all of this makes the game sound horrible. I would never get it cause I knew what it was but this is worse than I thought. Queued up attack commands? Lol.

@firefox59: or maybe they didn't find any of these supposed issues...well, actual issues. Is it ego to enjoy a game so completely that any perceived problems you may have found didn't affect them? That's why reviews should be taken at face value, even mine (this being my post after all).

Maybe all of you have played games that featured different mechanics you liked better. That's fine. But if someone else doesn't feel it's a problem, does it really matter? Let them enjoy the game. I've had very few issues with the game. Do your complaints apply if I never encountered them? Just putting that out there

Well there is a decent amount of issues with the game that is never mentioned but its actually there. The most obvious being the loading times which is terrible for a next gen system. The fact that they are reloading the level every time you die is asinine. However there are more problematic elements in the game outside of loading times and its not present in any of the reviews I have read.

• The lock on requires you to be in direct line of sight relative to the character. It doesn't matter if you can see them, cause it only matters if your character is facing them head on. This mechanic is not optimal regardless of opinion. The fact that gamers use the camera to view the surroundings and not the eyes of the character is what makes it truly problematic.
• The lock on is unable to effectively track enemies that are overly active.
• The camera is too slow for faster enemies forcing players to spam dodge or run around aimlessly until you can see the enemy
• The hit boxes for weapons are inconsistent. There are moments where your weapons ricochet on the environment and other times it goes right through. For all the bosses except one, their weapons always go through solid objects. This is another issue that is not based on opinion or gaming experience it just is part of the game.
• Lanterns cannot be set to be the new active checkpoint. Players are force to bare two loading screens in order to set a lantern as active. This is tedious especially when exploring.
• Attacks are queued and the queue is not reset when you receive damage. This become problematic when your attack fails and you are hit but your character will continue to the previously unfinished attacks upon recovering instead of reacting to the new input from the player wanting to dodge.
• Vial farming becomes more prevalent latter in the game especially since enemies deal 50%+ per hit.
• There are no convenient checkpoints prior to boss fights. This create nothing but tedium especially for a game that prides itself on the frequent deaths of the player. The very least they can do is remove the 30 second + run to the boss. It adds nothing to the game.
• Enemies reacting to your attacks is inconsistent. I have heavy attack enemies only to be grabbed in the middle of the attack. We are talking about a sword descending at deadly speeds but the enemy casually continues its grab as if I am standing still.
• The game lacks clear objectives. Some argue that this is hand holding but its not. Players play games for purpose and the game does not give any real purpose besides telling the player go kill stuff. The player is not presented with a basic reason as why you are killing things.

Outside of these issues the game excels in its level design which is still great all the way to the end. The game rewards players for exploring every nook an cranny. The atmosphere is strong and well executed. Its one of the strongest driving factor in the game for me personally. You want to see more and find everything you can as you explore the world. Some of the side quest are very interesting, I wish it had a little more to it in the sense of having closure. The combat is functional and generally gets the job done. One of the problems that has been absent in most reviews for From Software games is the pretense that there isn't any real issues with the game when other games would be slaughtered for the same problems. We all have our favorite games and even those games has their share of issues. It just peculiar that this game is given the pass.

@Expane:

Yeah I finally got the Holy Sword upgraded to +4 and it reminds me of Souls a bit, although I miss the overhead slash, this one has a sideways slash for the range.

Is the L2 attack when transformed not an overhead slash? don't remember. Pretty sure the follow up R2 to an R2 charge is an overhead. Towards the end of the game, that combo was killing the heavier enemies for me in one go and it allowed me to start the attack from a safe distance. I know for a fact the L2 scythe is overhead. The scythe gives you a dash and slash and an overhead chop. that is a skill/arcane weapon, but you get it at the very end of the game for 2 of the 3 endings. I use the scythe and blades of mercy (also skill/arcane) on my skill/arcane character.

I just started using the gun rapier (i can't spell its official name) on my skill/bloodtinge character. I like it so far. Not sure how these skill/tinge weapons scale as putting points into tinge at level up doesn't seem to affect the damage totals. Maybe it only applies to the gun part of the weapon. Pretty sure that's not true for the katana which is skill/bloodtinge though it has no gun at all. So confusing. Not sure how to spend points on this character right now.

@mastermetal777: Maybe all of you have played games that featured different mechanics you liked better. That's fine. But if someone else doesn't feel it's a problem, does it really matter? Let them enjoy the game. I've had very few issues with the game. Do your complaints apply if I never encountered them? Just putting that out there.

we were talking about reviewers. All that is fine with respect to the average gamer sitting down to enjoy him or herself. But a reviewer has a job and it does not involve shaking his pom-poms for a game he may particularly like. Reviewers need to find a way to speak to a wide variety of interests and that involves noticing even those things that maybe he or she doesn't have a problem with and bringing them to light so that the people reading can make an informed decision. For some gamers, precision of control is important, particularly in these kinds of games, so the shoddy collision, poor frame rate, command queue and input lag (hit the dodge button and watch the delay) all need to be mentioned even if they didn't bother the reviewer. And it is absolutely impossible to not notice these things...certainly a reviewer should.

@Ish_basic:

Does Blood Borne also have that problem where if you're running forward and immediately dodge backwards.... your character has to complete the turning animation first before they actually dodge ?

I've died a bunch of times like that In Dark Souls..... hope they Fixed it.

@Lulu_Lulu: no there's no problem like that, whatever that is.

@mastermetal777:

I remain skeptical. :(