Bloodborne (2015)

PS4 PRO 'BOOST MODE' = BLOODBORNE 60 FPS?

Since I've been working lots I had a little cash to spare so I bit the bullet and traded in my PS4, upgrading to the PS4-pro. The extremely poor framerate while playing The Last Guardian was the factor that pushed me over the edge, and surely enough the PRO delivered a night-and-day improvement, now running silky smooth.

The retailer also threw in a free game which I managed to exchange for Nioh, so I'll be excited to start playing that soon.. Nioh, that game I've been ranting and shrieking about for probably more than 12 months.

But perhaps the biggest bit of exciting news was the revelation of this new featured called "Boost Mode" which will be appearing in a PS4-pro update patch very soon. This basically just boosts the GPU within the pro up into full overdrive mode, meaning that older non-pro-compliant games (like Bloodborne) might be able to take advantage of the new power of the system. That is very very exciting. I'm praying for 60fps, but even a solid 30fps would be a vast improvement on the current situation. I remember in particular the Vicar Amelia fight always slowing my PS4 down to a crawl at around 10 or 15fps slow-motion, especially when trying to render her hair.

I'm even praying that From Software might release a fancy updated upgraded version, but somehow I doubt that Miyazaki would be interested in doing that.

More info on PS4 Pro Boost Mode here and here.

This was my first From Software souls/borne game and I was amazed at how fast it reeled me in. I can 100% see how some players might be very put off by Bloodborne and its Dark Souls counterparts but like many people have said before, overcoming the difficulty is insanely rewarding. The game is very very good at pacing and keeping it interesting. The level design, bosses and the score are insane. The weapons and their transformations are among some of the most inventive I've seen. Everything looks very masterfully created and handled with care. I was amazed at how quickly the game pulled me in and made me feel compelled to play. 2 months ago I had never played a Souls/borne game and now I feel like I could be a Bloodborne spokesperson. I have never played a game that made me all shaky and anxious during boss battles. During many of the later boss battles my heart was pounding for minutes after the boss fell and PREY SLAUGHTERED appeared on the screen. I found myself thinking of the game constantly and wanting to ditch all other responsibilities to sit down and play. Bloodborne is now easily in my top 5 games of all time.

I really am hoping for a Bloodborne 2 from the same team.

Bloodborne makes some changes to the Dark Souls gameplay which emphasize a style of play otherwise reserved for the more talented of Souls players.

You can play the Souls games with tons of different builds, mainly involving which attack methods you'll be using. One style focuses on timing a shield bash to parry the enemy, which I've never gotten around to mastering. Why? You can't easily practice them. The parry move in the Souls games requires you to be in melee range. In Bloodborne, you can do it at range. This lets you experiment and play around with timings with minimal risk, so you can actually get good while progressing normally (not having to dedicate separate time to practice it). Every(?) regular enemy can be parried, and many bosses can, too, so it's a worthwhile skill to learn.

Another not-so-fun element of the Souls games is resource (healing item) management. In Bloodborne, you have tons of healing (about 8 times your base health) and enemies will frequently drop more of them - I think they give them out at roughly the rate they think you'll use them, so if you're doing well you'll stay topped off. I never ran out of them during my playthroughs. They also give you another way to regain lost health. After you get hit, you can quickly attack the enemy and get a part or even all of your lost health back. So after being hit, you get two options: run away and heal, or stay in and get your health back. It's a nice way to remove the attrition that often comes up when traversing the map.

I think Dark Souls 3's a better game, but Bloodborne is different enough that it plays differently, much more aggressive than the others due to the above reasons.

Massive heart sink. :o(

Started a second character for a new play-through on Bloodborne, so I can access the DLC. Absolutely loving the game and my new character... mainly "skill" with saw spear / rifle spear and now blades of mercy / rifle spear, to the extent that I've intended to make her my "main" and do all zones and side quests etc. (she's a super quick dual knife wielding b****, who took down Vicar Amelia in a nano-sec). DLC, here I come!!!

...well actually not, despite having already purchased the Old Hunters DLC on my PSN account. Turns out my original Bloodborne physical game disc I bought from Amazon.co.uk, unbeknown to me, wasn't actually a UK disc but a Region-All disc, more specifically a USA Region-All disc, and my PSN account is strictly UK, so the DLC content is locked out and unplayable due to my main game being from a different region. Rubbish!!!

I don't think there's a lot I can do about this, I really only have 2 choices:

- break Sony's T&C's and setup a US account just to purchase and play US Bloodborne DLC, and probably never use the US account again. Although, unlikely, there is the possibility of an account ban for doing this.

- buy a brand new UK copy of Bloodborne (have the DLC already), and start completely from scratch, loosing all my previous data / saved games / characters.

What a rubbish situation to be in for such a specularly awesome game.

Afterthoughts on Bloodborne:

I've played Bloodborne twice now (once with a dex character, and again, same character NG+). My only complaint about this was was that it's too easy for the most part. Now entering my third playthrough, I'm realising that I might be wrong about that. I'm starting to think that my first character was just way overpowered. My original character was just a full DEX character using the threaded cane. With that setup I waltzed through the game without any obstacles, beating bosses on first try and skipping through the entire game like it was a tutorial level (except of course Ludwig, who killed me over and over again). This DEX character is similar to the sort of build I prefer for Dark Souls; in DS1 I favour a DEX build with a katana or long sword with the Dark Wood Grain Ring, heaping all my points into endurance so I can flip around like a ninja.

But now I've started a new character. It's a STR character, using mostly the Kirkhammer. This character hits hard but moves and strikes quite slowly which ramps up the difficulty for this fast-paced game. It's a lot more challenging and perhaps more enjoyable this way. This character requires more skill because he's slow moving; all of my hits need to be timed very carefully otherwise I'm left open to enemy attacks. So I would probably tell new players to start off with a DEX character. I haven't played around with the magic system in Bloodborne so I'm looking forward playing around with it this time.

Bloodborne is a really good game. It's hard to get bored of it and I find myself drawn back to it even though I've played it through multiple times. It's rare to find a game that's so much fun, so addictive. Each time I play through I've discovered new characters, new little secrets. It was definitely worth buying the PS4, though I think I'll end my PS+ membership and play offline from now on.