BLOODBORNE given Feb '15 Euro/NA release date, deemed worthy of own thread by ilxor

Giv dit blud!
I would do this in a second

i don't actually want to know anything more before i play, but i can't look away:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GtcEBBs4rE

i want a positive critical consensus and two freaked out ILXor reviews
and then i'm buying the fucking system god help me

i can't remember the last time i was so hyped for a game, honestly

argh i refuse to watch videos!

Downloading now, it's gonna take days. No more videos or links for me until Thursday (the first chance I'll get to dig in).

http://www.thejimquisition.com/2015/03/bloodborne-review-die-die-again/

glowing reviews so far

Yeah, it's looking good. Common complaint seems to be loading times. 40 seconds after dying? Jeez.

Anyway, psyched.

early reviews obsessively positive:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/playstation-4/bloodborne/critic-reviews
i'm hoping the long loading time complaint is addressed by the patch?
Jordan, you are gonna be the guy who determines how my bank account looks in April.

downloading now!

so ready for this

Jordan, you are gonna be the guy who determines how my bank account looks in April.

ha, that's a big responsibility but i will let you know.

it took massive willpower not to start this before work today, there should be some sort of award.

i'm hoping the long loading time complaint is addressed by the patch?

apparently not yet, but soon:

http://www.justpushstart.com/2015/03/bloodborne-long-load-times-will-be-addressed-in-the-next-patch/

hm, will def wait for that to come to fruition

played the first hour. as good as I hoped. one of the character classes is "waste of skin" and has terrible stats haha.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-03-24-is-bloodborne-the-best-game-ever-or-just-the-second-best

my local gamestop has closed! and amazon is sold out...

i am going to have to go *out of my way* to buy this :(

gross

I DIED

it's 2015! digital never sells out :)

lol, i had dismissed that option because i am fastidiously husbanding my HDD space but of course that is precisely what i will do in the circumstances. of course, now i am going to have to WAIT for this to download. ugh could this be any more inconvenient.

played the first hour. as good as I hoped. one of the character classes is "waste of skin" and has terrible stats haha.
― ( X '____' )/ (zappi), Tuesday, March 24, 2015 2:20 PM

i almost went with that but chose "a violent past" i think lol. game is awesome so far

"you're better off dead!!!"

have not played dark souls. have not played dark souls 2. think i might buy this today.

will i hate it/myself/you all? are DS/DS2 required playing before?

dark souls in some ways will give you bad habits because the controls are different. i'd say dive straight in.

agreed. the general approach of these games is similar enough that some skills transfer over, but they're different enough that each one has a learning curve. i sucked at all of them in the early stages.

Amazon and/or UPS fucked up my delivery and it got pushed back to the end of the week. Decided to just go to Gamestop and pick it up and that reminded me why i never go to Gamestop. Dude tried to get me to sign up for or buy like four other things at the register and then I get some smug ass response after I politely turn them all down. Gonna load this up and try to forget about how badly I hate everything right now.

im so tempted to go out and buy a ps4 right now

are DS/DS2 required playing before?
― GGGOAT: greatest goat game of all time (Will M.), Tuesday, 24 March 2015 21:21

no this one is different enough to be its own thing, mostly just shares the control scheme.

couldn't get the summoning to work. is password required or is that just if you want to limit it to specific ppl

I thought it was just to limit (or prioritize?) but who knows at this point.

well goddammit i think i may have bought this

played for about an hour last night, fell instantly into the familiar souls rhythm of nervously moving forward, dying, inching a little bit past the point where i died before, dying, repeat infinitely. those mobs can really fuck you up quickly!

it's impressive how familar it feels but how different too - i played exclusively nimble melee characters in DeS/DaS but not having a shield is taking a bit of getting used to, as is the altered parry/riposte mechanic.

these games have the most amazing atmosphere of mystery and tension which i don't think you could achieve in any other medium.

Which weapons did you guys pick? I went with the rod and the pistol.

I DIED a few times before work this morning. :)

went with the axe + pistol, kinda regretting not taking the cane. i got as far as the two werewolves, while also managing to (i'm sure) miss every shortcut. and i definitely keep trying to two-hand and accidentally healing. loving it so far.

went with axe and blunderbuss. the merchant will start selling the other weapons for not unreasonable prices after a certain point early on. might need an item for that to happen?

i played through and beat what i thought was the first boss last night. looking around online today though, it looks like i missed an optional one.

game's great so far. can't wait to get back to it.

will say that FROM really ain’t so hot at graphics optimization though, huh? the game looks good, but not so good it should stutter like it does on PS4 hardware. and the character creation tool is still comically antiquated. minor quibbles though. these things are basically trademarks of the series at this point.

ha, my girlfriend tried to help make a character that looks like me and it went horribly awry. basically the more parameters you start to change, the more you look like hideous mutant. i find it endearing though.

the stuttering sucks, how do you not iron that shit out of a console exclusive before release? i don't even usually notice that kind of shit. i just haven't played any games on ps4 that have had this issue. well except ac:unity

also saw lag during co-op which can hopefully be fixed in the network/server? the online stuff seems really buggy across the board

i went with axe/pistol and my char came out looking like 70 yr old kyle maclachlan

http://media.kotaku.foxtrot.future.net.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/52/2015/03/PitifulMagnificentAsiansmallclawedotter.gif

havent seen any lolfedora messengers yet, did see a top hat one

http://i.imgur.com/lxMCS50.gifv

eh

http://i.imgur.com/lxMCS50.gifv

NEXT GEN

praise the buns

sack

so far i seem to be an order worse at this than the souls games. i played a couple hours total and have literally got nowhere. i have the axe and pistol and my guy looks like the british librarian from buffy

was there an ilx password decided for co-op??

YALLDIED

What level are you? Read something saying that being within 10 levels helps.

currently hitting demons on the ps3 and we really didn't need the graphical arms race post-ps3. We peaked. Everything since has been churn+burn for $$$ /w minimal benefit.

Remakes suck, It's incredibly easy to play something old. You can typically buy the original hardware for the price of the flashy new game.

Yes, but would I have, is the question. I didn't come back to games until midway through the PS4 cycle, so I missed the PS1-3 generations entirely. Much as I enjoy the Souls games I'm not sure I'd have gone the lengths to buy a secondhand PS3 and trawl the internet for an accessible copy of Demon's Souls.

That said, whether a remake is necessary or not, I do think it would be great if most games were available as backwards compatible on the newest generations.

But yes, I'm glad I got to experience Demon's Souls Remake, especially as it looked so glorious on the PS5 when it came out and almost justified its existence as a console

Heh I still haven't played the remake, but at some point before it existed I did borrow a friend's old PS3 (and copy of Demon's Souls, unless I tracked that down myself).

I never had a problem with 30 fps, but would play a BB remake if it existed.

I don't mind 30fps either, it just seems like the first update anyone gives older games.

I don't recall Bloodborne being particularly cluttered, and even if, it feels very much a part of the design (which is awesome). And even as far as farming goes, that's pretty much part and parcel of From games. Souls, items, whatever, you're likely going to be farming at some point. For whatever reason I find it much less onerous in From games than I did shard-farming in Silksong.

Dark Souls has already had a PS4-era remaster and rerelease, not sure it really needs another one?

If we're talking something visually on par with nu Demon's Souls, then sure, why not?

because it's a huge waste of resources to remake a game thats already on current systems? make a new game or port/remake something else from ps2/ps3

Idk, one thing I like about From games is you don't really have to farm/grind. If I find myself doing that it's usually because I should really just be learning the boss and I'm trying to brute force it.

My memory of the vials is that it wasn't a big deal when I was really playing the game for the first time, but was very annoying on a replay when I was rushing through and not worrying about killing everything (then would hit a boss and run out of vials).

xp PS3 isn't a current systemm and as far as I know, DeS original was a cult game that didn't sell brilliantly, so it made sense to remake it. Or did you mean Bloodborne?

I agree that these remakes/remasters can get ridiculous. Remastering TLOU2 after what felt like a year rrally was pushing things into unnecessary territory. But yo, I do think they did a great job on the DeS Remake - it feels so opulent, and there's the haptic feedback and immersive sound too

one thing I like about From games is you don't really have to farm/grind

Well, that's the thing about From games: you don't *have* to do anything. You can fight and win with no weapons or armor if you want, playing on a set of bongos with your eyes closed, as people have done. But as someone that hasn't replayed one of these games or DLCs yet, I want to get the most out of my first and possibly only playthrough, which in my case has always meant grinding for souls: to level up, to buy shit, to level up enough to use the thing I bought, and so on. It's the closest thing to an easy mode for casuals like me. The games are always stacked against you, so hell yeah I'm going to take advantage of every, er, advantage, since it's still going to be challenging. Brute force can only get you so far, at least in my experience.

Gem farming in Bloodborne proved to be more addictive than nicotine ime

It's been wonderful coming back to this game recently. Especially after so much time away and now having played through so many of the other Souls games.

Coming to BB a few years ago as a novice gamer, no wonder I struggled so much with the basics. I was baffled by the mechanics and frustrated by the difficulty.

I struggled so much with the admittedly very tough first section with the multiple roaming enemies and the burning pyre. It took time to learn that the best course of action was to make several necessary runs and then to rush past all the enemies once I'd collected all the items.

On my first run through I ended up following a YouTube guide, getting as far as Micolash before putting it down to pick up Elden Ring which had just come out.

Since then I've platinumed ER, completed DS1, fought through the majority of DS2 & 3, and given Sekiro a bloody good go too. Every one is the same, every one is different.

Bloodborne is notable in its differences. In retrospect I wouldn't recommend it for beginners. The variables differ significantly enough from the other Souls games that I missed a number of essential lessons and mechanics which I wouldn't pick up until a good way through Elden Ring.

And while on booting up BB for the first time in years more recently filled me with trepidation, I feel a lot more in control.

For one, I'm seeing a LOT fewer You Died screens. That's to be expected. But "gitting gud" is a real thing.

Central Yharnam feels more like a playground full of fun things to do than this big intimidating trek into the unknown. In the tradition of great From opening areas, it is fiendishly labyrinthine. Full of hidden little nooks and shortcuts and parts you might miss on first, second, even third pass.

The thing about the From games is that they have an internal language. And part of the appeal and challenge of these games comes from learning the vernacular.

Being able to spot, say, a ladder down to a shortcut or a place to roll off to a platform below comes only with experience. On my first playthrough I was left wondering how ANYONE might be able to spot these.

Knowing to carefully survey the environment is a learnt skill in itself. And while BB encourages a more offensive playstyle compared to the other games, that doesn't mean it rewards rushing through. Far from it. You have to be inching your way along. Constantly using your camera and using the lock on feature to spot enemies before they spot you.

Taking time to look out on distant vistas and observing the faraway architecture also helps. In Old Yharnam I was able to spot a werewolf crawling up a wall ready to jump down and surprise me.

And once you learn to analyse your environment, that's where the storytelling comes into play. I played most of Bloodborne the first time round as an arcade action game. I didn't have a scooby about what was going on, just that I was moving through a bunch of creepy environments and fighting different bosses.

There are far fewer unique items in Bloodborne, and with that a lot less emphasis on reading item descriptions to fill in the gaps in the story.

In fact it wasn't until I got to Volcano Manor in Elden Ring that it all clicked into place: That I was meant to be reading item descriptions at the soonest opportunity, observing where those items had been left, taking-in the details of the environment around me.

This is a small gripe I have with Bloodborne: There is a lot of visual clutter. Coffins, crates, cadavers - they're littered throughout the environment and so the signal-to-noise ratio is pretty low. Is a dead body in the ground meant to signify something important, or is it just there for show? In BB it can be hard to tell, so I might forgive myself for not really grasping the concept of environmental storytelling in this game.

Still, it does exist. It does occur, but perhaps in even subtler ways than ever before. And let's not forget FromSoft's incredibly easy to break NPC quests too. Nothing new here.

But yeah. Wow. This game. I'm in Old Yharnam and having such a laugh m. If anything Bloodborne is the most undiluted Spuls experience. And while I'm enjoying getting to wield more control over the thing, it's still challenging and scary!

nice write up!

I forget where I was looking recently, but some post managed to sum up the story in basically three sentences, and it blew me away. I'd never really delved into the lore of these From games, cuz it takes too much work/reading, so to see someone do so so efficiently was very impressive.

Since Elden Ring it's become a big part of the fun for me. It goes so deep in that game that I'd be tempted to say it challenges Tolkien. And there's a whole cottage industry of YouTubers (some good, some bad) who are into (over)analysing these things.

But yeah, it's just as easy to play these games and enjoy them without doing all that archaeology / detective work. For me it is satisfying to pick up an item and realise the body you picked it up from belongs to the person described in the item description etc...

In a lot of ways the ambiguity of it all adds to the sense of loneliness coursing though all the games.