Bloodborne

**Fierce_LiNk** · May 14, 2016

AUTOMERGE SEQUENCE SHUTDOWN

(A.S.S)

Eenuh · May 14, 2016

IT HAS BEEN DONE!

Platinum Get!

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Went through the Ihyll dungeon earlier today. Got a co-op partner to join me during the first boss, the guy with two swords (after trying to beat him a few times, but I just couldn't get enough hits in, kept getting cornered). The fight was a lot more fun with a partner actually.

Decided to try finding a co-op partner to go through layer 2 as I hadn't tried doing that yet, only ever co-oped for bosses. Someone joined me and we started clearing the dungeon, then strangely enough another person joined as well! Didn't know more than one could join! We basically just ran through the dungeon, killing everything in our path haha. Made it to the second boss (some massive beast, forgot what it was called) and we slaughtered it. Very fun to play with others.

Did the 3rd layer by myself again, but then found some NPC partners (2 of them). Decided to have them tag along. Got to the queen and didn't think the fight was that difficult... until she did a one-hit kill with a blood spear or something. :P

Did the fight on the second try though, whooooo!

Happy this was finally done, so I could continue with the last parts of the main story. Met the Queen again in the main game (though she just stands there and weeps) and got to Mergo's Wet Nurse. What an ugly looking nurse this is!

The fight wasn't too bad at all, just keep dodging the arms and get some hits in. Got it done on my first try (but I guess I have become way over-leveled now after doing the Chalices heh).

After this it was just a case of getting the end fight done. Saved my game file to USB to get all 3 endings before starting. First ending is easy as you don't have to do anything, then reloaded the save for the second ending. Fighting Gherman wasn't too bad, managed to get him on my first try, yay!

Then reloaded my save file again and did the last fight. I managed to get to the Moon Essence easily, but during the fight it does one of those moves where it completely depletes your vitality... and I ran out of vials, oops! So redid the fight and luckily you don't have to do the Gherman bit again, so it was a lot easier. Using fire paper did a lot of damage too. Easy!

So now the Platinum was in sight as I just needed to buy one more weapon in NG+... the only thing is, to get this trophy you need all the weapons, and early on in the game I had sold my wooden shield and normal torch, as they were useless (before I realised there was a trophy for this and these were included in that)... So now I was worried I wouldn't get the trophy! There were conflicting reports online with people saying you needed to have all items in your inventory to get the trophy, so I thought I had fucked up and would have to get them again. Jim and I were holding our breath while I bought the last weapon, waiting to see if the trophy would pop up...

It took a second, but then the satisfying sound of the trophy message resounded through the room, and we both just cheered and threw our arms in the air haha!

Good game, so fricking weird though. I've tried reading up on some of the lore but there is just so much of it. Definitely want to try Dark Souls 3 at some point, but might need a break for a bit before I try that. :P

Goron_3 · May 16, 2016

Eenuh said:
IT HAS BEEN DONE!

Platinum Get!

Reveal hidden contents

Went through the Ihyll dungeon earlier today. Got a co-op partner to join me during the first boss, the guy with two swords (after trying to beat him a few times, but I just couldn't get enough hits in, kept getting cornered). The fight was a lot more fun with a partner actually.

Decided to try finding a co-op partner to go through layer 2 as I hadn't tried doing that yet, only ever co-oped for bosses. Someone joined me and we started clearing the dungeon, then strangely enough another person joined as well! Didn't know more than one could join! We basically just ran through the dungeon, killing everything in our path haha. Made it to the second boss (some massive beast, forgot what it was called) and we slaughtered it. Very fun to play with others.

Did the 3rd layer by myself again, but then found some NPC partners (2 of them). Decided to have them tag along. Got to the queen and didn't think the fight was that difficult... until she did a one-hit kill with a blood spear or something. :P

Did the fight on the second try though, whooooo!

Happy this was finally done, so I could continue with the last parts of the main story. Met the Queen again in the main game (though she just stands there and weeps) and got to Mergo's Wet Nurse. What an ugly looking nurse this is!

The fight wasn't too bad at all, just keep dodging the arms and get some hits in. Got it done on my first try (but I guess I have become way over-leveled now after doing the Chalices heh).

After this it was just a case of getting the end fight done. Saved my game file to USB to get all 3 endings before starting. First ending is easy as you don't have to do anything, then reloaded the save for the second ending. Fighting Gherman wasn't too bad, managed to get him on my first try, yay!

Then reloaded my save file again and did the last fight. I managed to get to the Moon Essence easily, but during the fight it does one of those moves where it completely depletes your vitality... and I ran out of vials, oops! So redid the fight and luckily you don't have to do the Gherman bit again, so it was a lot easier. Using fire paper did a lot of damage too. Easy!

So now the Platinum was in sight as I just needed to buy one more weapon in NG+... the only thing is, to get this trophy you need all the weapons, and early on in the game I had sold my wooden shield and normal torch, as they were useless (before I realised there was a trophy for this and these were included in that)... So now I was worried I wouldn't get the trophy! There were conflicting reports online with people saying you needed to have all items in your inventory to get the trophy, so I thought I had fucked up and would have to get them again. Jim and I were holding our breath while I bought the last weapon, waiting to see if the trophy would pop up...

It took a second, but then the satisfying sound of the trophy message resounded through the room, and we both just cheered and threw our arms in the air haha!

Good game, so fricking weird though. I've tried reading up on some of the lore but there is just so much of it. Definitely want to try Dark Souls 3 at some point, but might need a break for a bit before I try that. :P

Highly recommend Salt and Sanctuary which is a 2D Souls game Well done btw!

Julius · February 9, 2021

Over the last week or two some streamers have been sharing more gameplay from Lance McDonald's homebrew 60fps patch, and it has just been released.

Digital Foundry put out a great video on it last year:

Goron_3 · February 9, 2021

On 2/9/2021 at 3:38 PM, Julius said:

Over the last week or two some streamers have been sharing more gameplay from Lance McDonald's homebrew 60fps patch, and it has just been released.

Digital Foundry put out a great video on it last year:

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This actually looks amazing.

The 30FPS didn't bother me too much until I played Dark Souls Remastered, at which point I was immediately spoiled by 60 FPS.

Julius · February 10, 2023

Almost two years to the day I last bumped this thread and well...

...and have actually started tackling Bloodborne.

And it. IS. AWESOME.

Been having a weird time these past few weeks, a bunch of ups and downs, but rather than do what I typically do in such a time - play FIFA or GT7 mindlessly - I wanted something which could be all-consuming in the way it grabs me, and obviously a From Software game would fit that billing perfectly. And, well, Bloodborne seemed to be the one calling to me most - just a massive shake-up in terms of appearance after I've played three dark fantasy From titles (Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and Elden Ring) and a new type of combat to learn.

Anyways, from the top - the character creator in this game kind of blows took me a good 40 minutes or so to come up with something I'd be okay spending more than 5 minutes at a time with!

The opening to this game is very ambiguous, and very attention-grabbing as a result. Sprinted by the wolf beast guy chilling out in the other room where I woke up after realising I didn't have a weapon to hand, sprinted through to th lamp, and went to the Hunter's Dream. Grabbed the Saw Cleaver and Blunderbuss - because those are the cool looking weapons on the cover, right? - and then returned to Central Yharnam. I've seen clips here and there of Bloodborne over the years, and my main takeaways were how much faster it looked compared to Demon's Souls and Dark Souls, as well as the parry/visceral system, which I thought was fascinating and looked anime as hell.

So, naturally, first guy I actually fight in the game I get a shot parry/visceral off on :laughing:

Also did the same the first time I faced this horizontally challenged fella:

The shot parry and visceral feel SO DAMN GOOD! Give me monkey lizard brain all that dopamine please love how aggressive this game invites you to play, losing health but being able to gain some of it back just slicing and dicing dudes with a vengeance has clicked really quickly for me (thankfully!), I love the speed of fights, the dodging...I'm a bit over two hours in so far, but if this is any sign of things to come, I think this is going to have my favourite combat in any From Soft game I've played. Sorry Elden Ring

I died a couple of times in this area to the bunch of dudes walking the streets, so in the end adopted the age-old approach I first adopted in these games at New Londo at sprinted through after taking out my fair share of the guys here, and haven't died since. Basically felt like I was constantly circling downwards, found some cool Hunter attire which I've since donned down in the sewers, came out to a bridge at a point but then just kept going down, ended up surrounded by gravestones after not diving deeper into the sewers (was starting to get hit hard!)...and felt like I'd gone maybe a bit too far down and like the bridge was probably the true way forwards, so headed back on up and crossed the bridge where I faced the Cleric Beast. For whatever reason the fight didn't click for me until about halfway through when I realised I could tank a few of his sweeping attacks, and so long as I didn't grabbed (which I did once, and it almost killed me getting bounced off the ground!), I could tank these hits while I was dealing damage and just get a bunch of health back; so long as I kept an eye on it, things would be alright. Tried to shot parry but it never paid off, unfortunately, but did get a visceral after bonking the hairy guy on the head at one point left him reeling! And the fight ended pretty shortly after that :peace:

After that, with the door behind the beast locked, I wasn't too sure where to go, so just decided to risk it and go deeper and deeper into the sewers after a bit of levelling up, and thankfully this paid off with working my way around a bridge some guys were playing catch on...with a huge flaming boulder? took care of the remaining folks and headed up to another boss fight, against Father Gascoigne. This one got hairy at points, especially seeing as he kept hitting me through gravestones while I kept getting stuck trying dodge around them, and similar to my fight against the Cleric Beast, it didn't really click until the end of his second (awesome) phase that I should probably have been trying to shot parry/visceral the whole time! D'oh! Finished him off with two consecutive parry/viscerals once I remembered those were a thing! Anyways, Gascoigne was taken care of first try too, and that capped off my first Bloodborne session. Picked up the Saw Spear to try out tomorrow - looks like it scales with Skill, and I think that's the direction I might go in if I'm right in thinking that that stat's responsible for my visceral attack damage?

Besides the combat being awesome, the exploration so far feels like Dark Souls on crack, in large part thanks to how vertically designed this part of the game has been: ladders galore, hidden elevators, and plenty of shortcuts looping around to! Combine that with the awesomely exhilarating combat, and well, the game's sound and visual design...

...and, while only two hours in, yeah, I can sense that this game is going to be very special - even by From's own stupidly high standards. Shame about the framerate though, definitely been a couple of times where it's noticeably nosedived, including during the boss fights I've encountered so far. It's actually the first From game I'm playing targeting anything but 60 fps, so I'm pleasantly surprised by how quickly it all clicked despite that!

Really wish I could tell Gehrman to cool it, though...

Anyways, that's it for now! Don't think I'll go crazy in-depth in here during my playthrough, but I'll be back for boss fight thoughts for sure, as well as anything interesting otherwise :peace:

Oh, and to update my Death Tally vs Bosses counter! It's something I toyed with in my notebook while I played Elden Ring and is really fun to look back on, so figure I'll slip it in here to give you an idea of just how bad and good I can be at video games

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...really feel like I'm jinxing that third boss fight, huh?

Edited February 10, 2023 by Julius

drahkon · February 10, 2023

YEEES!
I saw you play this yesterday and was thinking to myself: "Hope he does the occasional write-up of his experience". AND YOU DID IT

*sees your death tally vs bosses*

Impressive. I need some captures of future boss fights, pretty please

On 2/10/2023 at 3:52 AM, Julius said:

the game's sound and visual design...

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It's stupidly good, isn't it?

As is the entire game. There's a reason people want a remaster and sequel so badly

Julius · February 11, 2023

Spent a few more hours with the game just, and I'll probably get back to it later, just got a few errands to run (woo).

Started off by climbing on up to and opening the Oedon Chapel, meeting some creepy-looking but seemingly kind-souled dude who wants me to send people there if they're looking for a place to stay. Prepping mentally for a classic From betrayal at some point but sure, I'll send people over.

Walked around a bit, got to the elevated area overlooking the bridge where I faced the Cleric Beast, wandered around some more and found a sealed gate with a huge cathedral behind it – I'm guessing that's unlocked by the item costing 10,000 Blood Echoes in the Hunter's Dream. Whatever, can't afford it right now, mentally noted it and went another way and started a rather elaborate descent through Old Yharnham which saw some dude threaten me and then try to gun me down, probably the closest thing I've experienced to a cinematic setpiece in one of these games so far? Bunch of beasts about, always fun, guys scaring the crap out of me jumping through and breaking doors, wooden boards, etc. Not a fun time. Nice to be playing a From Soft game where I'm fast enough to attack and use a torch, though, whereas in Dark Souls it feels like I'm putting my entire guard down when I swap a shield out for a torch (speaking of, did find a wooden shield...which I found very amusing :laughing: ).

Anyways, eventually got to the bottom of the area and came to what obviously looked like a boss arena, a huge cathedral-looking thing. I spotted what I thought was a spectre by the staircase on my way down, so I ran over and activated it before the text popped up (couldn't see anyone around so was curious how they died)...and accidentally summoned Alfred, some dude I met a little while back. Okay, definitely a boss arena then, and kind of sucks that I accidentally summoned someone before I knew what was going on, but whatever ::shrug: I'm not one of those that thinks summoning is wrong in these games (I love the challenge of bosses solo, sure, but it's nice to have the option for particularly challenging bosses – I'm sure I would've used Solaire against O&S in Dark Souls if I'd done what I needed to for him to turn up!), I think I'm more irked at myself that I activated it before I knew what was going on!

Anyways, approached the doorway, could see some sort of beast chilling in the back, so walked in with my new buddy Alf and we had a whole back and forth for 5 minutes with the thing before the Blood-starved Beast was down. Feel a little robbed that I accidentally invited Alfred along with me to the fight (I continued because I figured I'd die and could just use this attempt to scope the fight out to take it on solo, as I unlocked a bunch of shortcuts that I'd never get to use now!), but whatever, the guy died when it had about a third of its health left and I regretted it a little less when I saw how much it was poisoning me – thankfully, the area leading up to this was filled with Antidote-giving enemies, and so they were already in my Quick Items ready to be used (also nice to be able to have Quick Items and be able to heal separate to that!). I found and tested a Beast Blood Pellet not long before this fight and it seemed helpful, so had that in my Quick Menu, as well as the Fire Paper that Alfred gave me earlier, and both came in very handy during the fight. As someone who hasn't used stat-boosting items specifically for fights in other From games before this (lack of them being around and just not knowing what to do with them), I'm really enjoying how they're pretty plentiful on Bloodborne (if you fully explore), reading the item descriptions for everything I get has been a great way to figure out what's helpful and what's not so far, and so I'm going to save them for bosses and the like moving forwards (and try to remember to use them). Oh, and finished the thing off with a visceral because, once again, completely forgot to parry until the very end, but it was a fun and cool way to finish it off!

Anyways, after that, back to the Hunter's Dream, where I acquired the item I figured I needed to access the Grand Cathedral. Got back to the gate and unlocked it, ran around the area, bunch of loops and shortcuts to love, found a summon close to the Cathedral for someone called Henriett (who I don't think I've met?) which I knew meant a boss was bound to be in the area but I actively chose not to bring her along – not after the whole fiasco with Alfred.

Eventually made my way to the entrance of the Grand Cathedral (after finally figuring out how to parry the guys with three-pronged wooden spears outside, man the window is super early on those dudes!), ascended, and came out to a huge room with a woman praying. Cutscene played out and, hey, wouldn't you know it, there's the boss fight! Vicar Amelia totally didn't give me flashbacks to Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood or anything threw an oil urn at her (I finally hit someone with one! I'd whiffed all my other attempts to this point) and followed up with some molotovs (if the game has taught me anything so far I think it's fire is bad for beasts, or at least that's the logic I've chosen to roll with!) before we had a bit of back and forth, I backed up a few times to heal, eventually got my Fire Paper and Beast Blood Pellet equipped and went to town. Love that Amelia has moves to make sure I don't just hide behind her legs (what I normally do after my experience with bigger enemies in other From games, probably starting with those big ass knights in Dark Souls?) and it was a bit of a pain that she had a heal, but whatever. Finished her off with a visceral too! Think I bonked her on the head or something to open that up, I'm not too sure, similar to my experience with Cleric Beast tbh and not knowing how I triggered the visceral opening...but I'll take it! Got a cool cutscene after by grabbing the item at the altar...interesting.

So yeah, a solid two hours or so with the game, another two bosses down, and 0 deaths my entire session. I'm sure my luck will run out against a boss soon, but it's not something I care about retaining too much, because dying in these games is inevitable; love how much I didn't care when I died during my first session getting swamped by dudes or when trying to learn parry windows, such a stark contrast to my days with Demon's Souls a couple of years ago. Really feel like Artorias of the Abyss was a decent warm-up for this game, if only to contrast how slow Dark Souls is compared to Bloodborne! Only allowing myself to hit Gwyn with parry and ripostes to see credits again definitely came in handy.

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Not really sure where I'm going to head next. There's an area to the left of the Grand Cathedral, an area to the right of the Grand Cathedral, there's that door I didn't go back to at the bottom of Old Yharnham near the Blood-starved Beast, and there was a tower and a short bridge I decided against climbing to explore other parts of Cathedral Ward. Curious to see which direction I'll choose!

Oh, and also – there's 1000% something weird going on in this game. I'm not quite sure what, but reading the Chalice I got after beating BSB and learning about the existence of Pthumerians (what a Lovecraftian name that is! And Byrgenwerth), and then that time some portal or something turned up by Cathedral Ward when I grabbed that dead guy's top hat...

...or how about the fact that these statue dudes have very alien-looking heads on the staircase leading up Vicar Amelia?

Curious. Love it. Also have no idea what Insight is/does, but seeing that there's a way to increase it with items (Mad Man's Knowledge)...there's definitely something going on that it links into design-wise or mechanic-wise, I just don't know what ::shrug: and I love not knowing what, but based on the mentions of Pthumerians in some loading screens (also - finally a From game which loads slowly enough for me to read item descriptions!) being some superhuman being (or something to that effect)...this is 100% rhetorical, but in my head I'm questioning: are we doing some Eldritch horror stuff or something? Because I both love and hate that stuff, it creeps the hell out of me, I thought I was just signing up for werewolves and other Gothic horror crap :laughing: think I also saw some tentacle-bearded kind of dude with a crow out of reach in Cathedral Ward too...

Anywho, some more pics because I didn't know where to put these, but just...vibes. urgh. I love it.

Lastly! Got to shout out just how overtly heavy on lore this game has been so far, from actual notes in the game filling in blanks, to cutscenes giving context, it's a lot more direct with giving you an idea about the different characters and factions that have been at play in this world and I'm all for it.

I'm loving it so far, long may that feeling continue :peace:

On 2/10/2023 at 8:02 AM, drahkon said:

I need some captures of future boss fights, pretty please

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Would love to! Any suggestions on what I could use outside Twitter? I don't beat the bosses fast enough to keep it within the 2 mins 20 secs or whatever that's the limit for non-paying accounts

Edited February 11, 2023 by Julius

Julius · February 11, 2023

Hemwick Charnel Lane kind of sucks, and the Witches of Hemwick boss fight really sucks. That might be one of the weakest boss fights in a From game that I've played, right down there with Pinwheel?

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That's all, think I'll leave it there for today I went up and down the tower I mentioned before and came to a locked door at the top (with some cagey platforming to get to the bottom!), and similarly, it turns out the door I was trying to open by BSB is just straight up not accessible from that side. Mentally noted those for later before I went to the left of the Grand Cathedral and did the Hemwick stuff.

That means my next port of call tomorrow will be whatever's to the right of the Grand Cathedral!

drahkon · February 12, 2023

On 2/11/2023 at 5:15 PM, Julius said:

Would love to! Any suggestions on what I could use outside Twitter? I don't beat the bosses fast enough to keep it within the 2 mins 20 secs or whatever that's the limit for non-paying accounts

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copy your capture to an USB drive
slap it on your PC
upload it to any kind of video service (I prefer gfycat, but I think there's a 60 second limit)

Julius · February 14, 2023

I've seen things. A whole lot of things.

I've taken lengthy notes for a meaty update, but as I don't have time to sit down for that just yet, for now, I'll just say: I'm 12 hours in, and I think this might be my favourite From Soft game, and an instant favourite of all time. Everything about this game is speaking to me.

Sorry, Elden Ring, your reign was short-lived

For anyone wondering where I'm up to without me giving a meaty update on bosses (I finally died to one! – well, actually two!) and areas...

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Freaking loving this game man

Edited February 15, 2023 by Julius

Julius · February 24, 2023

Right, seeing as I've seen one of the endings and credits roll as of Tuesday (and have been putting off the game to savour it a little bit ), this is going to be a pretty meaty update! I'm going to try to avoid posting too many clips in this update if I can help it (we'll see how that ages I guess!), but @drahkon I'll try to get some boss clips prepped and dump them all when I'm finished with the game in here for you

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Right, so to start off, as I spoke about before, the right of the Grand Cathedral was the next spot I wanted to check out...and that was short-lived because there dudes in hoods with spears and shotguns kind of owned me for a solid 20-30 minutes, enough so that I got the feeling that maybe I wasn't supposed to go that way yet! The human enemies in From games always give me the hardest time of any of the enemy types (save for a select few bosses), so while I could parry these guys with my shotgun and get a visceral off, I just wasn't doing enough damage and it quickly became a war of attrition.

Anyways, I went back to the Grand Cathedral and headed off down the steps towards Cathedral Ward, as I think I dodged the massive courtyard before in favour of looping around to the Grand Cathedral instead and did a little grinding. This place was different - enemy layout in the area was slightly changed, but also the guys in white coats with lanterns, well, their lanterns were covered in eyes. I probably did a bit of grinding for 5 mins or so before I went to the Hunter's Dream, levelled up a bit, and found an area where I could spend Insight that I hadn't spotted before. I spent some on Fire Paper (because, hey, it's proved useful so far, so why not?), returned to the Grand Cathedral, back towards the courtyard to snoop around and the eyes on the lanterns were gone, as were the new attacks that came with it.

Oh yeah, holy damn, Insight is of course related to the Eldritch truth! It's absolute genius to have it factor into enemy composition and difficulty in that way too, blew my mind once I realised what they were doing here.

Anyways, back in the courtyard, I spotted a giant off to the side that I didn't notice before, took him down, and followed the path down behind him...which eventually led me to giving some guy (who was already dead, mind you) a password and gaining access to the Forbidden Woods.

This area is a bit of a pain, with dogs and guys with guns littered about the place, as well as the big dudes like the guy I met at the start of the game, it feels never-ending and it's all very maze-like...which gives rise to a stratospheric number of shortcuts to unlock as you progress through the level, which I absolutey ADORED. After a little while I came to a settlement, which I tried to loop around to check for secrets, and found myself in a cave with a poisonous swamp...ah, there's the From we all know and love!

That giant on the left there killed me my first time through, and there are giant leech worm things which are pretty horrifying, so I lured all of the giants to the door where I entered and cheesed the hell out of them - got to use what you can, ay? Once I cleared the area of enemies and loot, I carried on, this time coming across a set of very long ladders that could compete with Snake Eater's (yes, I sang the song while climbing up the long ladder, as you must!), which took me up, and up, and up, until my head started to poke over the surface...

...and into a courtyard, with a familiar-looking locked gate, as well as a another squid-faced dude. But yes, holy hell, I realised immediately - I was on the other side of the locked gate from the very start of the game, some 10 hours removed!

I absolutely adore this stuff in From games, and this shortcut for me is right up there with the first time you descend back down to Firelink Shrine in Dark Souls from the Undead Burg, as well as the ascent all the way from Demon Ruins that you make after defeating Quelaag. It's just a level of, well, level design and world cohesion which wipes the floor with most other games I've played, and yep, this was instantly a favourite.

Anyways, I carried on, up the ladder and across a couple of roofs until eventually I found myself in what I quickly figured out was the area on the other side of the locked door in the clinic where you start the game, up the stairs. And something weird was going on, with this almost classically designed alien-like creatures littered about the place (who I will from now on refer to as the "blue goober dudes"):

So yeah...Iosefka is a bad egg and I don't regret trying to tell people to go to Oedon Chapel after all, even if that guy was creepier I didn't trust not seeing her face. I can only conclude that she's been turning people into these blue goober dudes for some reason, maybe relating to the Church or some of the weird stuff which has been going on around here? Pretty sure that guy who didn't believe me might have ended up here when I tried to convince him to go to Oedon Chapel though...

Eventually I weaseled my way around enough of the place to run into Iosefka herself in a room up some stairs, and so I coaxed her into coming into a wider arena down the atirs, which was a big mistake given the range of her weapon and her damn void arm tentacle attack thing. We exchanged blows for a good while, and I got a lot of parry and viscerals off, but I wasn't aggressive enough and hadn't rested, meaning I was low on Blood Vials, which is all to say...that yeah, she beat me.

Naturally, I ran back there after using the lamp from the start of ther game and running up the stairs from there, keen to get my Blood Echoes back and exact some vengeance. I couldn't coax her out to the wider area, lest I be subject to her ranged attacks, and so I just decided to go in aggressive - Beast Blood Pellet down my gullet, and Fire Paper on my Saw Cleaver. And then I just stuck her up against the corner and hacked away...like a savage. Like an animal. Like a beast.

What an absolutely incredible detour that proved to be!

After clearing Iosefka's Clinic, I returned to the Forbidden Woods, and carried on snaking me way around (heh). So yeah, as you get deeper and things start to get weirder - snakes everywhere and the generic guys with guns having snakes erupt from their faces - it all just intensifies this area in an amazing way. I ran into more blue goober dudes down one path (Iosefka's subjects, perhaps?), and just lunged at them with my torch which seemed to dish enough damage to be my go-to way of taking them on. Curiously there were also a bunch of the alien statues that I'd noticed before in the Grand Cathedral, which is...interesting.

Eventually I made my way to an opening which screamed boss room, and stepping forwards confirmed that: I came face-to-face with three Shadows of Yharnham. And well, my first attempt didn't go so well, and I died for the first time against a boss in the game (I was trying to test the parry/visceral on them and maybe committed a little too hard considering as they were crowding me!)

The second attempt went a bit better, but I made the mistake of taking out the ranged fire ball dude first, which left two melee sword chumps to charge around at a similar gait and make taking them on one-on-one really awkward.

The third attempt went much better though, first taking out the sword-only dude, then the ranged fire ball dingus, and finally focusing on the guy who had a bit of both as he summonded giant snake heads to fill the arena, which was fun to just randomly roll around with and heal from. Eventually pinned him back against the giant headstone-thing and went ham with BBP + Fire Paper like I did with Iosefka

After that, I walked up to the next lamp, coming across a terrifying fly-headed alien dude on the way...

I rested up at the lamp and hopped back to the Hunter's Dream (also, interesting that you can't do anything at the lamp other than return to the Hunter's Dream, feels much more Demon's Souls than Dark Souls in that respect!), and learned that the area I was coming up against next was Byrgenwerth, a name I'd heard of a few times on my journey so far, and so I finished the session on the high of beating the Shadows but, with Byrgenwerth and the fly-headed alien-thing being a tease of what was to come, felt like there was much, much more about this game that I was about to uncover.

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Man, Byrgenwerth.

What a short but haunting experience this place is, huh? Still managed to squeeze in some shortcuts to despite the brevity of this area, which is awesome, but man it's filled with all manner of ugly-ass things: the fly-headed alien-dudes, the return of the squid-faced dudes (one of which sucked my brain out and drained some Insight from me? wtf)...

...and this ugly-ass centipede-looking alien guy (who was easy to take down once you got in close and circled, but shot lasers because yeah, sure, this game was missing lasers!)

Anyways, eventually made my way through the solitary building in Byrgenwerth safe and sound - well, save for this terrifying confrontation with fly-face over here

Did eventually make it out to the balcony where some old guy violated me with magic to make me kneel, and I kneel to no-one, so I killed him. After he kind of pointed towards the moon and the lake, that is. And so after slaying him I jumped down into the lake, ready to lose all my Blood Echoes but sure something was about to happen...and came up against Rom, the Vacuous Spider, and all his creepy little underlings. That was...fun.

My first attempt I got to a point where I was one hit away, just got unlucky with one of the little spider dudes spitting gunk at me as I ran past and knocking me so I got caught in Rom's ranged attack...

My second attempt went worse, actually, I just seemed a little impatient and got carried away.

Third time was the charm though! Well, kinda...

...yeah, it ended in a draw, which was pretty epic! But it meant I had to run back to trigger whatever happened next and collect my Blood Echoes, which was, well, a jaw-dropping experience...

Some woman with a miscarriage (or maybe a child ripped from her? It's From so it could be darker than a miscarriage I suppose), which relates to something I think I read in Byrgenwerth (maybe it was in Yahar'gul?) about the spider, the descending Blood Moon, and something to do with children/birth?

But then I respawned in Yahar-gul face-to-face with a giant cthulhu-looking dude and hadn't picked up my Blood Echoes, tried to use a Blood Hunter Mark to get out, couldn't, so sprinted through to the lamp and then back to the Hunter's Dream to run to the balcony to jump into the lake and claim my winnings from defeating Rom...which was a bit of a pain to put it lightly!

That was all for that quick session, but I did come back to it later that day...

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Yahar'gul is a straight-up nightmare of a place, both visually and in terms of gameplay - you go from seeing hints of aliens or something more before being dragged into a cocktail of that and the horrors of man. Bell-ringing women capable of respawning enemies, the hags from Hemwick Charnel Lane, these monstrosities of men piled up and merged into one giant and speedy...thing...and then the giant cthulhu-looking dudes shooting lasers and grabbing you. Fun times. I mean, just look at the place:

Oh and speaking of the Amygdalas, I spotted one trying to grab me with the portal-type thing, one similar to what I'd seen in Cathedral Ward (I've since gone back and confirmed that, yes, the Eldritch truth and all that showed me that there was an Amygdala trying to grab me there the entire time - absolute wizardry to tease that so early!). I let it grab me, and not only did it cause Frenzy (from raising my Insight and showing me more of the Eldritch truth I guess?), but it killed me and teleported me elsewhere, which was just funny to watch

Anyways, it's kind of hard for me to talk about my experience in Yahar'gul because it was one of the more stressful parts of the game. I mean, look what happened when I got caught on something trying to just sprint through, for crying out loud...

Anyways, shedload of shortcuts, horrifying and hidden hallways, spiralling staircases, all that fun jazz. Some hantingly beautiful decor around the place too!

Eventually I came face-to-face with Darkbeast Paarl, which I mentioned in my last post, and took him out on my first try - just stayed close to his legs and hacked away, nothing too crazy with a BBP and some Fire Paper in hand.

More interesting than the fight to me, though, was the locked door behind him. It looks so familar. Wait, isn't that the door I saw the other side to in...

...yep, Old Yharnham. My goodness is this game striving to be one of my favourites will all of this stuff!

There did come a point where I just ran through the area with all the giant amalgamations of twisted, contorted and bloody bodies and loot what felt like the hallway leading up to a boss arena before skipping town with a BHM, and even that was a close call!

Anyways, after levelling up, headed back and came face-to-face with what is, for me, the creepiest design of a boss in tihs game (at least that I've seen so far): The One Reborn.

Yeah, BBP + Fire Paper worked fine for me here too, downed first time. Just took it nice and slow after beating the bell-ringing bxtches to a pulp on the balconies, hacking away at its hind legs (well, when it would decide which were its hind legs!). This fight really reminded me a lot of Tower Knight in its set-up from Demon's Souls, anyone else?

After downing The One Reborn I felt my session was coming to an end as the path forward became obvious, but I skipped town after lighting the lamp, instead wanting to nose around Cathedral Ward's adjacent tower after getting the key to Upper Cathedral Ward, but also wanting to see if there was anything else below the tower - it just seemed like there must be, either a door or items I'd missed. Back at Oedon Chapel, though, Arianna was not feeling great...

...which definitely had me concerned seeing as she's the only NPC I had in here! And the kind but creepy-looking guy didn't even mention her being in pain, what a melonhead! Maybe it was related to the passage I read about the Blood Moon and the spider? Idk, but anyways, next up I heard the squeals of a baby...

which was fun.

Anyways, started my attempts at descending the tower, spent about 10 minutes doing that before dying and then spinning the camera showed me a door about halfway down to aim for. If anyone wants a chuckle though, I did forget to send the lift back down to meet me on the lower floor of Cathedral Ward one time, and well...

:laughing:

Anyways, eventually, after about 30 minutes (!) I did finally make it to that door without dying (seriously what a pain), opened it up and came to the Abandoned Workshop. They done did it again! Also found an umbilicard cord...wtf (and this is what I said when I found the others, too).

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This session was a weird one, where I basically unlocked every path I could think of, backtracked to places I couldn't progress through before, and planned to figure out where I wanted to go from there.

To start with, I entered and fully explored Byrgenwerth Lecture Hall - weird place, wouldn't want to study there! I unlocked the Nightmare Frontier and Nightmare of Mensis and lit their respective lamps, and also ran into Spider-Patches (that ol' creep). I then went back to the Grand Cathedral and headed right, beat those hooded chumps from before with ease, and trotted over in a surprisingly short trip to Yahar'gul...yeah, makes sense why I had trouble getting there before, makes a lot of sense to try to get people away from there! I also went back to Hemwick Charnel Lane as the fork in the road there with the two giant guys and a bunch of dogs had a path to an item by the cliff I know I died trying to grab before, so I planned to just sprint through and grab that item.

And well, that didn't exactly go to plan, as I completely unknowingly triggered a cutscene...

...which took me to the Forsaken Castle Cainhurst, and hot damn, what a place! Probably my favourite location in the entire game alongside Cathedral Ward/Grand Cathedral just in terms of appearance and atmosphere. I mean it's basically the Painted World of Ariamis on absolute crack, with a gothic, vampire-type horror element (those freaky blood-sucking dudes? The screaming ghosts of women who try to shank you? The gargoyle-type dudes? The poison dart critters?) that just won me over entirely. I mean, just look at it!

Incredible. Loved the shortcuts as always, really felt like Ariamis in that it was its own fully fleshed out mini-level, tangential but very important to the lore (at least from what I could glean about the Vilebloods and the Church). Eventually ended up on a rooftop which for one I was comfortable navigating looking for secret paths (Bloodborne really pushes this more compared to Demon's and Dark Souls I feel?), and came face-to-face with the legendary Martyr Logarius, whom I'd heard bits and pieces about throughout the game.

What a pain this fight was for me. The homing skull attack? The power-up? The giant scythe which I thought I figured out but then, well, quickly realised I didn't? How about him flying over the camera and ruining your lock-on? Oh, and the swords attack where they just fly through the air at you, that was fun.

Yeah, spoiler alert: I died. First attempt I got him to his second phase with a bunch of parries, and I did get awfully close to taking him out on my second attempt, mind you, just completely whiffed a chance to step back or heal and instead tried to dodge for some silly reason. On my third attempt I fell to a flying sword as I was running from him to hide behind cover.

Anyways, on the fourth attempt I handled things differently. I spotted he planted something to get his sword spell thing going, so I looked around and he actually planted a sword or something in the ground - cracked that and the attacks from that stopped. When he powered up - or tried to - in his first phase I figured I might be able to land a heavy attack from behind to backstab and stop his power-up...and it actually worked. I took all this knowledge into my fifth attempt at him and well...we drew

Whatever, doesn't need to be clean, it just needs to be done! He dropped a glimmering item, a Crown of Illusions, which I checked the description for and then donned before walking around and...

...damn, this game just keeps on giving, huh?! Met the Queen of the Vilebloods, swore my allegiance so now I was playing three different sides, super cool place and vibe which I totally didn't forget to upload a screenshot of for the purpose of this post.

Anyways, Alfred, my good bud from the Blood-starved Beast fight, wouldn't shut up about Vilebloods, so I went back and found him in Cathedral Ward to let him know I might've found what he was looking for - he's the last NPC I think I have in my world that I'd found at this point willing to talk to me, so why not? Hahaha, yeah so he went mad, butchered the Queen (but she didn't die..?), and then killed himself. Mad bastard...

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The Nightmare Frontier sucks.

I thought I'd already dealt with the obligatory From Soft poison swamp under the Forbidden Woods, but nope! Here's more poison swamps with ranged enemies throwing boulders at you, a bunch of headstones to get caught on (which happened twice!), these creepy ass brain-eyed things which sing and give you frenzy, a couple of hunters. This place sucks. There's not much to say. It sucks. It really sucks. I was constantly swapping between the White Church Set and the Ashen Hunter set depending on where I was in the level, which is never a good sign. It was suicide runs and looking for the shortcut which clearly led to a boss fight so I could just crit path the place. Did beat Amygdala first time though, so...yay?

On the other side of the spectrum, Nightmare of Mensis was one final hurrah of brilliant level design.

Excellent build-up with the glowing tower causing frenzy to you and enemies (I always love that stuff, where enemies get hit by other enemies), plenty of brilliantly placed shorcuts and lifts, so much built into the lore of this place, just hnnnnnng, it was everything I loved about this game in one final level (minus, well, the occasional singing brain-eyed thing getting frenzy off on me). Bloodborne has so many levers to play with, even as far back as Cathedral Ward! It's also just got such a unique colour palette compared to the other places in the game, which is so rare with final levels a lot of the time, so I really appreciated it!

This room did suck a bit though, and I'm not even an arachnophobe...

Eventually I came to Micolash, who I died to first time but beat on my second attempt - what a weird fight this was. First time I cornered him in a room, dodged him fine, wailed on him with Fire Paper + BBP but a skeleton came up behind me and nudged me before he used the squid arm attack thing that Iosefka had on me (also his ranged attack hurts a lot!). The second attempt I beat him, but interestingly, there was a whole section in here which was kind of just another part of the level? Super cool!

Lastly, on my way upwards, I did eventually find a lever which dropped whatever was causing frenzy from miles out on my way into this place. Took me a good while to figure out how to get down there, but once I did...

...is this another Great One? It's crazy how much emotion there kind of is just behind this hoard of eyes, it looked pretty sad...so I put it out of its misery (after checking if Make Contact did anything with it, which I tried on a bunch of aliens and it did nothing. It didn't so I looked it up - I had to stay still for a whole minute to do something with it!).

Eventually made my way to the top of this entire structure, after taking out some Shadows of Yharnham and weird alien-eyed pigs and dog/crow hybrids, where I found that woman in the white dress with blood on her from when I beat Rom - and once again heard the crying of a baby. I'd heard it a bunch of places, actually. Took a lift up, sent it down because there was clearly a boss coming up, and came to find an empty bassinet before being confronted by Mergo's Wet Nurse (the baby is Mergo I guess?), an invisible thing wrapped in cloths with a ton of swords.

First attempt, BBP + Fire Paper, went smoothly but for the second time it unlocked what I'll call its 'Nightmare Mode' with a double, where I just got unlucky with the timing of my rolls as I looked for an opening to heal. Nearly beat it first time, though!

Second time I kind of rushed, and well. got this menacing shot from that...

Third time I accidentally equipped Bolt Paper instead of Fire Paper, but this actually was more effective than Fire Paper! If I knew that first time I probably would've beat it anyways, beat it on my third attempt, which I was chuffed with. Not too bad a fight, just got to stay directly behind it where you can to get your attacks in as its swords can't reach back there, and time dodges well in 'Nightmare Mode' . Once it fell, the baby cries continued and then stopped before 'NIGHTMARE SLAIN' came up. Was this whole thing Mergo's nightmare?

Anyways back at the Hunter's Dream things had literally caught fire...

The one thing I looked up before this game was how to recognise the point of no return, and well, I read that the Hunter's Dream changes in a way you can't miss. Yep, this would be that!

Wanted to do a quick visit of Cathedral Ward just to see if anything changed after clearing the Nightmare of Mensis, and well, Arianna had left a trail of blood leading to the sewers where she was crying hysterically with this ugly baby, which looked like some of the things I slaughtered in Upper Cathedral Ward. Tried to kill it and Arianna died too, which gave me another umbilical cord (the third, after the one in the Abandoned Workshop and the one from Mergo).

Anyways, headed back to the Hunter's Dream, made a back-up save, and headed out to meet Gherman, to whom I submitted my life... (also my character's gold eyes and white/silver hair looks so cool in that first shot!)

...and that was the bad ending, kind of? Seemed a bit straightforward but not necessarily bad, kind of good that Yharnham finally got clear of its mess!

So, that's been Bloodborne!

Nah, who am I kidding, I know there's DLC to head off and complete, as well at these Chalice Dungeons I read so much about in the loading screens I've then got to look up how I'm going to hunt for that Platinum and how to obtain the other endings (I'm guessing one is from refusing?).

Here's my final death tally vs bosses in the main game:

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And my stats and playtime at this point (sub-20 hours, which I'm super happy with!):

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I'll be back with plenty more to say about the DLC, the Chalice Dungeons, and the Platinum as I get through the rest of what this game has to offer, but to just summarise my final thoughts on my experience with the main game of Bloodborne: this is my favourite From Software game that I've played to date (again, sorry Elden Ring), and I think immediately enters my Top 5 games of all-time. I'll take some time to think about where exactly it lands, but it's in great company for me with Chrono Trigger, Dragon Quest XI and The Last of Us!

So that's my mega update for now...

...but the hunt goes on!

Edited February 24, 2023 by Julius

Julius · February 25, 2023

Started The Old Hunters DLC a couple of hours ago.

(that second screenshot might be my favourite that I've taken in the game so far, looks so badass!)

Really takes a while to get to that first lamp, huh? yeah, bunch of Hunters around which are plenty of fun to deal with, all sorts of ugliness to encounter in the river of blood and with those squid-faced hulk guys...but man is this some really fun DLC (so far).

I'm early and to be honest so far it's a surprising amount of reused assets in terms of environments/structures, but the way they've shifted things around and changed up the colour palette makes areas kind of dragged and dropped from the early main game feel so fresh. It feels like such an efficiently designed piece of DLC at this stage.

Anyways, I made it to the first boss and beat him on my second attempt, and it wasn't too long so I've uploaded my failed first attempt and my successful second attempt (albeit split into two halves!).

@drahkon, this is for you :grin:

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Man, this boss fight! I kind of wish I got to spend longer with it. The music (oh my word THE MUSIC!!), that introduction cutscene, the transition to the second phase, the boss design, the way it speaks to the core of the tale of Bloodborne and the balance between man and beast, the way it contextualises the river of blood you've just spent so long walking through...just, hot damn, bravo From, that boss hit EVERYTHING I want from a boss fight :bowdown: and that's the first one in this DLC?!

I just...there are simultaneously no words and so, so many words that come to mind. That's honestly and genuinely an immediate favourite boss fight – hell, in the second half, it feels more like a dance than it does a fight.

I also just need to highlight how efficiently impactful From's cutscenes are in general, but especially here in Bloodborne, and especially with this boss. I can't remember any of their cutscenes running longer than 30 seconds to a minute in length, and yet time after time, it delivers on raising the stakes of a boss fight or bringing attention to a change in the scenery.

This game is a freaking masterpiece. And there's still more for me to see!

:bouncy:

Edited February 25, 2023 by Julius

drahkon · February 28, 2023

Thanks for the writeups and videos

Had to laugh out loud at the elevator mishap. I think every Souls-player gets at least one of those :laughing:

On 2/25/2023 at 6:31 PM, Julius said:

This game is a freaking masterpiece. And there's still more for me to see!

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Indeed

The world needs Bloodborne 2

Julius · June 12, 2024

So, Future Press have announced a limited 25th anniversary reprint of their Bloodborne Complete Edition Guide...which I might need to look into picking up.

Unrelated, but I never did finish putting my death counter together in here, did I? Well, I've still got the notes -- so I guess it's better later than never! All bosses in bold, like before, are bosses I hadn't previously listed.

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• Cleric Beast - 0 / first time (09.02.23)
• Father Gascoigne - 0 / first time (09.02.23)
• Blood-starved Beast - 0 / first time (11.02.23) - did use Alfred by accident (activated bell before I knew what was going on!) :/
• Vicar Amelia - 0 / first time (11.02.23) - found a summon (Henriett) and didn't use her!
• Witches of Hemwick - 0 / first time (11.02.23)
• Shadows of Yharnham - 2 / beat third time (13.02.23)
• Rom, the Vacuous Spider - 2 / beat third time (14.02.23) [draw]
• Darkbeast Paarl - 0 / beat first time (14.02.23)
• The One Reborn - 0 / beat first time (14.02.23)
• Martyr Logarius - 4 / beat fifth time (18.02.23) [draw]
• Celestial Emissary - 0 / beat first time (19.02.23)
• Ebrietas, Daughter of the Cosmos - 0 / beat first time (19.02.23)
• Amygdala - 0 / beat first time (21.02.23)
• Micolash, Host of the Nightmare - 1 / beat second time (21.02.23)
• Mergo's Wet Nurse - 2 / beat third time (21.02.23)

~ Sunrise Over Yharnam ending ~

*The Old Hunters DLC*
• Ludwig the Accursed / Holy Blade - 1 / beat second time (25.02.23)
• Living Failures - 2 / beat third time (26.02.23)
• Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower - 8 / beat ninth time (27.02.23)
• Orphan of Kos - 3 / beat fourth time (27.02.23)
• Laurence, the First Vicar - 3 / beat fourth time (27.02.23)

*Chalice Dungeons*

~ Pthumerian Labyrinth ~
• Undead Giant - 0 / beat first time (02.03.23)
• Merciless Watcher x2, Watcher Chieftain - 0 / beat first time (02.03.23)
• Watchdog of the Old Lords - 0 / beat first time (02.03.23)

~Central Pthumeru~
• Beast-possessed Soul - 0 / beat first time (03.03.23)
• Keeper of the Old Lords - 0 / beat first time (03.03.23)
• Pthumerian Descendant - 0 / beat first time (03.03.23)

~Lower Pthumeru~
• Merciless Watcher x2, Watcher Chieftain - 0 / beat first time (03.03.23)
• Undead Giant - 1 / beat second time (03.03.23)
• Rom, the Vacuous Spider - 3 / beat fourth time (03.03.23)
• Bloodletting Beast - 0 / beat first time (07.03.23)

~Ailing Loran~
• Beast-possessed Soul - 0 / beat first time (16.04.23)
• Blood-starved Beast - 1 / beat second time (17.04.23)
• Abhorrent Beast - 2 / beat third time (17.04.23)

~Cursed and Defiled Chalice~
• Keeper of the Old Lords - 1 / beat second time (17.04.23)
• Watchdog of the Old Lords - 2 / beat third time (18.04.23)
• Amygdala - 1 / beat second time (18.04.23)

~Great Isz~
• Brainsucker - 0 / beat first time (18.04.23)
• Celestial Emissary - 0 / beat first time (18.04.23)
• Ebrietas, Daughter of the Cosmos - 0 / beat first time (18.04.23)

~Pthumeru Ihyll~
• Pthumerian Descendant - 7 / beat eighth time (19.04.23)
• Bloodletting Beast - 0 / beat first time (19.04.23)
• Yharnam, Pthumerian Queen - 0 / beat first time (19.04.23)

BACK TO MAIN GAME AFTER CHALICE DUNGEONS

• Gehrman, the First Hunter - 0 / beat first time (19.04.23)

~ Honoring Wishes ending ~

• Gehrman, the First Hunter - 0 / beat first time [again] (19.04.23)
• Moon Presence - 0 / beat first time (19.04.23)

~ Childhood's Beginning ending ~

And that, my friends, has been Bloodborne!

Kind of finding myself wanting to return to Yharnam for another round just seeing all those boss names again :laughing:

Edited June 12, 2024 by Julius

Julius · August 27, 2024

It's being rumoured that, once again, a new Bloodborne gaming project is in the works:

If PlayStation are doing something with the IP, you can't convince me that it'll be anything other than a remake – it just seems to be the way they like to do things these days ::shrug:

drahkon · August 27, 2024

Every time a Bloodborne rumour surfaces I think "nothing will ever happen"

Julius · January 31

So, there's an interesting update on Lance McDonald's 60fps patch for the game~

On 2/9/2021 at 3:38 PM, Julius said:

Over the last week or two some streamers have been sharing more gameplay from Lance McDonald's homebrew 60fps patch, and it has just been released.

Digital Foundry put out a great video on it last year:

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Yeah, so SIE have DMCA'd it and Lance has taken it down...nearly 4 years after it was released, with the game's 10th anniversary in March.

I'm not saying anything, I'm just saying.

drahkon · January 31

On 8/27/2024 at 9:41 AM, drahkon said:

Every time a Bloodborne ~~rumour~~ something surfaces I think "nothing will ever happen"

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Julius · January 31

On 1/31/2025 at 4:33 PM, drahkon said:

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Nolan · February 8

That is an interesting update. Would love to see them actually do something with this game/series

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