Honestly I don't even know if it's worth trying to hype this series up for someone trying to play it. Not in a gatekeeping sort of way but in a you'll just have to try it yourself cause I cannot possibly coerce you to, type of way.

Black souls is a series thats either instantly a hit or a flop to the player based on their reaction to it being an H-game and past that, their opinion on the controversial "Content" of the games.

That being said while I honestly think BS1 is a rough entry into the series being incredibly chipped around the edges, BS2 is genuinely and unironically the best RPG maker game ever made narrative wise and carries through its sheer ludo narrative consistency.

I honestly was not sure what exactly to expect from this game after hearing/seeing so much of it from friends.
At the beginning of my exposure to it, I was being narrow-minded, not planning on playing it because the art is clearly amateurish and I'm also not a fan of Dark Souls.

Guess what, I'm glad I decided to try it! This is a fantastic game. It's admittedly quite rough around the edges and the translation ranges from iffy to plain bad (to the extent that it probably dampened my experience some), but it has lots of charm and heart to it.
A cool take on western fairy tales with some extra fucked-up sprinkled in. Playing the game itself is a blast, I always found it really hard to put down. It's fast-paced and doesn't waste your time at all.
This game is very underrated and will stay that way (unfortunately), but those of us who decided to play it know what a fun time it is.

If BS2 is better like I keep hearing, then I can't wait to try it in the near future.

Black Souls 1 - 9/10
Black Souls 2 - 10/10

I'm at a loss for words. A perfect execution of ludonarrative harmony that's also a love letter to fairy tales and what they mean to people. It examines how people use fairy tales as an extreme way of escapism, refusing to face reality head on. It's also a story of love that knows no bounds, even when one is put through hell. In the end though, no matter how much you try to run away to a land filled with dreams, only a brutal reality awaits.

The gameplay is surprisingly very stellar too with a lot of options given to you, and the level of freedom on display is remarkable. It's perfectly interwoven with the narrative and adds to it.

This game was something very special.

To begin, I mostly stumbled across Bloodborne because of its high rating and under that premise assumed that it has to be somewhat decent, which it is. On the whole though, it didn't strike me as spectacular as some people made it out to be for reasons I shall explain below.

The game handles woefully poorly, with often unresponsive controls particularly if you need to use a potion to heal yourself. It feels sluggish to play, which in a game that requires you to have fast reflexes just doesn't work well at all. This could be exacerbated by the awful framerate, which often can dip below the game's 30fps cap. 60fps would have been a much better framerate to aim for.
Bloodborne removes all magic/miracles and replaces them with hunter tools. These uninspired tools are completely useless. Instead of a mana bar or a usage amount, Bloodborne's hunter tools utilize your quicksilver (QS) bullet stock . The problem is, you also use your QS bullets to parry enemies. So you are faced with the choice of using either a completely weak and utterly useless tool, or use your bullets for parrying... I'll use them for parrying.
Instead of having dozens of weapons to choose from, From Software decided to go with a more stream-lined approach and decided to include 15 "trick" weapons. These trick weapons are pretty much just 2 weapon categories from the Souls series made into one weapon. For example, Bloodborne features the Hunter's Axe which is just a 1-hand axe and when transformed, is essentially a great axe (It's pretty overpowered). Some trick weapons don't even feature a transformation like the Tonitrus and the Chikage, they feature a buff making them nothing more than a mace and a katana (respectively) from Demon's Souls/Dark Souls. These weapons can be modified with blood gems which are dropped by enemies or found in chalice dungeons (more on that later). The effects of these gems vary from adding fire damage to your weapon, adding poison damage, increasing physical damage, etc. At the end of the day you'll end up using whichever gem you have in your inventory is the best, making this game mechanic essentially useless.
Chalice Dungeons are randomized dungeons that supposedly offer replayability... I found them to be a complete drag (Not to mention the framerate is consistently lower in chalice dungeons than it is during the course of the main game). You will receive a chalice from defeating a main game boss which you can then place on an altar in the hub world (Hunter's Dream). Your first set of chalice dungeons will not be procedurally generated, you can only access those through the use of what is called a root chalice. The dungeons will vary with different handicaps and difficulties, but ultimately they all look the same and play the same. I slogged my way through them to earn the platinum trophy.

Bloodborne's boss design is atrocious. The majority of the bosses are giants that have sweeping attacks, and there is 2 optional bosses that are nearly identical, on top of that adding the awful camera.
Writing, its the same type of story telling like other from software games - there is an absolute lack of it, its minimal lore, lack of interesting characters and development, NPCs are as shallow as they were in Dark Souls 2, they literally have no stories at all.
Such an overrated game, Bloodborne was a huge disappointment.