In Defence of Bloodborne

The notion of Bloodborne needing defending is patently absurd; it's one of the ten highest rated games on this site, one of the most beloved games of the last ten years, and seems to be the most common answer when people are asked for their favourite FromSoft title. That said, whilst I really enjoyed the game first time round it was with considerable reservations (a 4 star rating and no more), and only on my recent New Game+ playthrough did the game flourish for me as all my former complaints, amounting more or less to a list of most of the common complaints held against the game, melted away. This review won't address any of the already widely praised strengths of the game (the stunning art direction, atmosphere and level design; FromSoft's best collection of weapons; the kinetic, fast-paced combat brought alive by the rally system; etc etc etc), but instead just seeks to talk through my change of perspective on those weaknesses.

The two most widely criticised aspects of Bloodborne are the blood vial system and the chalice dungeons, and these are both aspects that bothered me in my first playthrough too. Blood vials are very thematically effective, periodically putting you in this bloodthirsty place when you run low on them, desperately searching for sustenance by slaughtering early mobs over and over, truly making you the hunter, but they also necessitate grinding and are ultimately pace-breaking when you're forced to abandon a tough boss fight to go scavenge. Chalice dungeons stand in stark contrast to the tight, creative, intentional level design that FromSoft is known for to instead be more like a Souls roguelike with even the premade chalice dungeons feeling procedurally generated, and it's easy for them to be disappointing with this in mind.

Something widely commented upon about Elden Ring was how the various caves and catacombs allowed you to scale the game to your liking. If you're really experienced with these games already you only had to do a handful of these excursions to stock up on smithing stones, whilst those who are struggling, held up from making story progress by Margit or some other imposing boss, would have a lot of this optional side content to go grind through in order to gain a few extra levels, find a couple nice new pieces of equipment, and return to face The Fell Omen more prepared than before. I think this is how the chalice dungeons are actually meant to be treated. If you vibe with them then cool, go chalice it up to your heart's content; the level design might be a bit janky, but Bloodborne's combat is good enough that the chalice dungeons are still honestly more solidly fun to wander through than I originally gave credit. But if you're getting murdered by a boss so much that you have nary a blood vial left then it's possible what you need isn't just a vial refill, but also a couple extra levels or another good gem to plug into your weapon. People who find places in Souls games to go grind out souls and get those extra levels is already a well-recorded phenomenon, and chalices are honestly the perfect answer to that; near-endless content for people who do want to grind out those extra levels. The blood vial system is the one part of the game I still regard as Decidedly Not Perfect, but I've grown to appreciate the way it says "hey maybe stop just bashing your head against this clearly-too-difficult-for-you-right-now boss and go level up a bit first?", and think that actually listening to those cries and taking breaks from Orphan of Kos to go do chalice dungeons for a couple hours would have led to a better experience than thinking all I needed was to go grind enough blood vials in a mid-game area for a few more attempts at beating that very screamy child.

On a minor note, Bloodborne is the FromSoft game that most wants to support the existence of New Game+ with the last couple chalice dungeons, leading up to a super secret bonus boss, very clearly being content that is meant to be scaled to a New Game+ (or higher) character, and with progress on chalice dungeons being retained between New Game+ cycles. Whilst this might not excuse some of the frustration of running out of blood vials on your initial playthrough, the moment you enter New Game+ and proceed through the game for a second time you'll be earning enough echoes that it becomes trivially easy to have 100+ vials available to you at all times. These frustrations are unfortunate but are also only temporary.

The bosses of Bloodborne are also a point of contention, and I found them uneven initially with some standing out as all-time great boss fights whilst others end up being far less mechanically engaging and even a bit awkward at times. To circle back around to Elden Ring again, one strange thing that game did for me was make me appreciate the boss design of Demon's Souls a lot more. Elden Ring's boss designs follow a very consistent style, and that certainly suits what that game is, but with less than a handful of what could be referred to as puzzle bosses a lot of this content can blur together. Demon's Souls definitely has a bunch of bosses that are not very mechanically challenging or that read as gimmicky, but there are maybe only two or three bosses in that entire game that wouldn't count as memorable. I think the best bosses in these games being ones like Artorias, Gael and Lady Maria, combined with the SoulsBorne reputation of being challenging, has brain poisoned us to want every boss in these games to match that template. All of this is a long-winded way of saying that playing through Elden Ring has turned me into the kind of person that will die on the hill that Rom, One Reborn, The Witches of Hemwick and Micolash are all genuinely good bosses, despite not being that challenging nor testing your combat skills particularly, because they all stand as memorable experiences. A year after originally fighting Micolash I would still quote his lines, the visual design of the Rom encounter remained seared into my brain right up until the start of this New Game+ playthrough, and ultimately the fact that these bosses contrast against the rest of Bloodborne serves as a strength rather than a weakness as it stops the overall experience from homogenising.

Finally, the lore of Bloodborne stands out as the one part of the game I wasn't completely onboard with on my first playthrough that most everyone else seemed to love, but this is an aspect of the game that really comes alive with repeat visits. I don't want to go too deep into this, people have done this enough already and this review is long enough as it is, but two things to consider are; what initially seems like a fairly simple condemnation of the church and the power institutions can wield over people gains a lot more depth when you realise that Bloodborne is less about supernatural critters and madness than it is about eugenics, classism and the myth of intelligence; most of the supernatural critters in Bloodborne were initially harmless, just kind of vibing and doing their own thing, and only became so dangerous because people made them so in our lust for knowledge and power.

Anyways, Bloodborne kind of just whips.

Reviewed on Jul 02, 2022


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