Heeeere we go! After playing all of FS’s dark fantasy titles, it’s time to jump into the eldritch horror!
First thing I notice is… I’m hearing French? There’s a French dub!
That alone makes me stupidly excited, ha ha. Right away, I can feel a very different atmosphere, still dark but a lot more surreal and disturbing. It helps that we’re literally inside a nightmare (or something? I’m not sure how it works).
While they already felt really good in DeS and DSI, the controls feel even tighter and the hits heavier than they ever did, it’s glorious. Love the dash-dodge too, much snappier than the old school roll (actually I wonder why they didn’t keep that in later games…)
In ER I had a str-dex build, in DSI and II a mostly dex build, in DSIII a dex-faith build and in DeS an int build, so this time I’m going full-on unga-bunga, great axe and all.
Speaking of that, the starting weapons are also a lot meaner than those of the other games, I feel. Though I actually managed to beat the monster in the clinic and get to the first lamp with my bare hands.
As for the level design… It seems BB is closer to DeS’s "one check-point per boss" approach, but with a lot of shortcuts and sidepaths like in DSI. It was frustrating for my first few deaths, because finding where I had dropped my blood echoes wasn’t always easy in this maze of a level, but once I mostly memorized the area and found the shortcuts, wew, that was a relief.
When I died to my first boss, the Cleric Beast, I finally got to meet Mrs. living doll (whose French voice is just delightful). Very nice of the game to unlock the level-up function right after the player loses their blood echoes.
Oh well, I managed to pick them back up before I beat the Beast. Which had a ton of HP for a first boss, that was surprising.
I’ll keep exploring as much as I can, because honestly this is my favorite opening area in all of the FS games I played. Love the architecture, the atmosphere, even the fact that you can knock on people’s doors so that they can tell you to fuck off. One of them asked me if I had found a "safe place", probably a quest… There ain’t nowhere in this hellhole that looks safe though. >.>
So yeah, great first impression! I really have no complaint so far. Except the fact that you have to go back to the dream before you can teleport to another lamp (again, DeS style)… or that I keep pressing Δ to two-hand my axe and waste a blood vial in the process.
Defeated Father Gascoigne and found that "safe place" I was looking for. A bit odd to fight what’s basically a Mirror Boss this early in the game, but also significant. Seems like even Hunters aren’t immune to the ambient plague. =[ Though he seemd to have the tiniest bit of sanity left at the start of the fight.
Also found a brooch, apparently a present to one "Viola"… Gascoigne’s wife or daughter? I used it like the description said, but I have a terrible feeling that I shouldn’t have…
Speaking of that, I found the "workshop" item but still don’t get how I’m supposed to upgrade weapons. Upgrade items mention the basin messengers in the Dream, but they don’t give me that option.
…Also the Doll is a sweetheart, damn.
PS: I absolutely love this game’s parry mechanic, much more fun and satisfying than in the Souls games! Though I don’t think you can backstab enemies? I tried on basic mobs but it didn’t work…
Edited by Lyendith on Jul 15th 2025 at 6:51:20 AM
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Ooh, I had missed that, thanks.
I’m too used to having blacksmiths lol.
Took me a dozen attempts, I think? The real tough part was his beast form, when he’s really relentless and has a lot more range. I beat him when I decided to bring the fight onto the stairs, where there’s more room to dodge.
With a little help from an oil-boosted molotov cocktail (because yikes, the bombs sting in this game). The stairs were interesting atually, you don’t often see complications like that in boss arenas, that added a tactical layer. It’s like the Capra Demon arena done right.
It also helps that I’m still at the point where enemies drop blood vials like candy, which means I never run out. I doubt the game will keep being this generous later on. >.>
Edited by Lyendith on Jul 15th 2025 at 9:30:38 AM
The blood vial system is one of those decisions in Bloodborne that I find puzzling because it feels like two steps forward, one step back.
It feels like an attempt to both simplify and tune the healing system from demon's souls to make it more challenging, i.e there's only one healing item that you can hold a decently large amount of, but not nearly to the same extent as you did in demon's souls.
...the problem being, the system in Dark Souls was already better. In DS 1 it wasn't perfect by any means (upgrading both the amount of flasks and amount of healing they gave was unintuitive, if you understood how the system worked you had more estus than you'd really need but if you didn't you were heavily punished for it), but at the very least, it removed the tedium of farming healing items that was one of the problems in De S.
Farming healing items was tedium in De S? I remember the grass being stupid easy to drop. Moreso in the original with the Thomas glitch.
I don't remember being that much different in BB either as you can go in a loop in the first area with the werewolves and the wheelchair mob. It was great for bullet farming too.
Burning love!![]()
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at the risk of sounding like I'm bragging, I defeated Father Gascoigne on my first attempt. I honestly think I just got lucky. The blood vials being a actual consumable instead of something that can be refilled like the Estus Flask kind of caught me off guard.
Eh, we all have a case like that.
Like, I don’t think I ever died to Sif in DSI despite people saying she’s fairly hard…
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In DeS there were a couple specific spots that allowed you to farm truckloads of grass (namely the Tower Knight and Penetrator check points), but you could only fully use them after a certain point in the game…
In BB, pretty much every enemy you kill in Central Yarnham drops a vial or two from the get-go; and since any extras you pick up are transfered to the storage (and you’re bound to pick up a LOT of extras), in practice it functions exactly like the Estus Flasks, with your stock replenished after each death. Except you have the maximum amount right from the start. I find this more advantageous honestly.
I played a little more today and found another civilian I had missed… When I played DeS I lamented that there were never any child NPCs in Souls Games, well there’s a cute (albeit faceless) little girl.
She gives me a music box with the names Gascoigne and Viola… and she tells me she’s looking for a… pretty red… brooch… Oh. Oh no… that corpse with the brooch was her mother, wasn’t she…
Well, just as I thought, I fucked up.
At least I told her about the church. Next time I visited her she was gone… but she wasn’t at the church either. Or at the graveyard. Now I’m worried…
Oh, but thankfully the old crone made it there in one piece. Her gratitude warmed my heart.
Farming for grass wasn't particularly *difficult* but what I was saying is that it's dumb to have to farm for healing items period and estus was just a better system flatout.
Next step: the Cathedral Suburbs and Old Yarnham! First, it’s worrying that the safest place in the city has plagued hunters roaming around right next to the door but, better than nothing I guess?
So far I haven’t met many challenging enemies in the game, except maybe for the werewolves early on, but even those aren’t much of a threat with a few weapon upgrades. The giant hunters (?) are big and intimidating, but ultimately a joke because they’re so slow.
There’s one enemy that gave me hell though — the gatling guy. I swear this mf killed me more than any of the bosses so far, and would have killed me a few more times if I hadn’t found a way to push him off the ledge. He’s got a super fast grenade-launcher with infinite ammo, how is that fair?
With him out of the way, though, I didn’t have much trouble. Setting the giant beast corpse aflame in the cathedral to wreak havoc on the beastmen below was pretty funny.
The chalice boss fell rather easily too with Alfred’s help — I mean, it did take me a few tries, but that was it. I dunno, OY as a whole was a bit underwhelming compared to CY. There are a couple shortcuts and stuff, but I didn’t feel like there was much to explore this time. No NPCs either (or if there are I haven’t found them) or any items explaining a bit of the lore. I liked the suburbs though, they seem to give a foretaste of things to come with all their locked doors.
Apparently, the chalices give you access to bonus dungeons that kinda remind me of the ones in Elden Ring. I’ve beat the first two floors and… that’s not really the most exciting part of the game. Hopefully the reward is worth it. Not sure why there are two lamps roughly 20 meters apart from each other at the start of the level…
Well, the fire doggo was pretty tough.
And the reward is… another chalice…? What for? This whole thing is a bit confusing honestly, I keep picking up various chalice-related items that I… don’t really know what purpose they serve.
Moving on with the main game, I unlocked a whole bunch of shortcuts and doors around the Cathedral Suburbs, that’s very satisfying.
Fought yet another beast boss in yet another cathedral… but Vicar Amelia kept holding a pendent against her during the fight. The item’s description doesn’t tell us much though. Hopefully I can learn more about her, her presentation intrigued me. Though from now on I think I’ll refrain from summoning NPCs for the fights, it makes victory much less satisfying. =[ Unless it’s required to progress some quests like in DSII?
Went down to explore the side path near the cathedral, which ended with a… weird boss (the Witches of Hemwick). But interesting in concept. I’m not sure the execution was the best it could be, since the fight has a weirdly slow pacing, but it was certainly different. And I like that BB has these more creative boss arenas with environment that you can use, it was sorely missing in DSII and III.
Though maybe a bit too many cathedrals lol.
Now I’ve found the item that lets me equip runes apparently but, err… how do I do that? I haven’t found a menu for it…
PS: Do the messengers in the tree trunk serve any purpose or are they just weird dressing dolls?
Not that I mind…
PS2: The Doll telling us she loves us… because that’s what she was made for. Ugh, my heart…
I finally beat Father Gascoigne by going against all of my instincts and going all into his attacks and hacking away rather than trying to play defensively. This is something I gradually learned thanks to the rally system. You will do a lot better than most by simply going beserk rather than tactically.
I just managed to beat Maria and am almost through my first playthrough but it has been a fantastic experience from beginning to end. Uncovering the mystery of the Beast Plague, the Healing Church, and Church of Mnesis has been fantastic.
It also seems like there's layers of curses here.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
I still can’t quite let go of my old reflexes and often back away to heal instead of risking a fatal blow, especially against fast enemies… but taking advantage of rally does save you quite a few vials if you’re faster.
Today, I beat Bloodborne for the first time and may indeed take time to do a NG+ because the experience was so enjoyable. I got the New Childhood ending and am overall satisfied with everything I did the first time around but there were a few things that I left undone in my first playthrough.
- I did not defeat the Orphan of Kos.
- I did not defeat Lawrence.
- I did not finish the final Chalice Dungeon gravestone.
- Befriending Djura (I accidentally killed him)
- Never trying out Valtr's plot because I'm always offline
- That one NPC in the Research Hall's quest
I completed virtually everything else, though. That includes bringing back Queen Annalise after slaying the Daughter of the Cosmos, finishing Eileen's quest, and taking down Maria. I was hoping I wouldn't be taken immediately into NG+ after beating the game but I'd been putting off taking down the First Hunter for awhile and felt I was close enough to doing everything to satisfy myself.
Ironically, the biggest failure I had at the game was the realization I'd spent a huge chunk of the game operating at a handicap by using the wrong combination of Blood Gems that reduced my damage to something like +70 Arcane with no Bolt/Fire Paper when a different one gave me like +200. I'm pretty sure all of the late game grinding would have been unnecessary if I'd done that early on as once I switched up, Gehrman was trivial and the Moon Presence after them despite only 5 health potions. I also might have been able to beat Ludwig fairly when I finally glitched him (yes, I admit my crime of Rapid Poisoning Rolling)
Overall, as an HP Lovecraft, Ravenloft, Castlevania, and Gothic Horror fan, I absolutely loved the game and while I would have preferred a few changes here and there, I think it is one of the best games I ever played.
- Favorite Bosses: Vicar Amelia, Maria, Gasciogne, Beast Cleric
- Least Favorite: Living Failures, Ludwig
- Favorite NPC: Arianna, Doll, Maria, and Gehrman
- Favorite "Get Good" Bosses: Amygdala, Micolash, Maria
The Doll and my Squid shall live happily ever after.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jul 19th 2025 at 8:36:47 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.Not reading too much of the above to not get spoiled.
So, in the last couple days — my little treck through the Forbidden Woods was interrupted when I was killed by one of those big guys with a bag (dunno how they’re called), and I was transported to a cell in a city called "Yar’hagul"… And they didn’t bother to lock the cell for some reason.
Granted, what’s waiting outside the prison doesn’t really encourage prisonners to venture out. >.> Interestingly, that was the only non-hub level that had background music, and a pretty disturbing one. A bold but very effective choice! I then found my new favorite weapon in the game, the Tonitrus! It’s a bit annoying that the fully deployed form only lasts a few seconds at a time, but it has a neat balance of speed and damage.
A bit further down, I fought a giant electric skeletton, went back to explore the Forbidden Woods, met with Valtr (the closest thing to a covenant I’ve found in this game, I was a bit surprised), and fought a triple boss, which I… miraculously beat of my first try. So far so good, but after that things started to get increasingly weird(er).
First, there was the Byrgenwerth College, where I was assaulted by giant headed… fly-people, whose head was covered by either eyes or tumors, I’m not sure. Inside the building, other than what looked like dead fetuses on experiment tables, there was a memo mentioning a "low red moon" and a "newborn child"… the boss that followed seemingly had nothing to do with that, but then there was a woman with a bloody dress under a red moon and out of nowhere I was back to the Cathedral Ward, except there were giant eldritch alien creatures clinging to the ceiling, watching over me… and the sky has turned into a weird color… and the moon is red and ready to crash down on earth… and Yar’hagul is now swarming with giant walking tumors and there are seemingly children’s corpses burning all around, like someone performed a giant satanic ritual… Yeah, this really feels like I’m trapped in a nightmare, now.
That leads me to the One Reborn, which is a tough boss with or without NPC help (largely due to the bell ladies shooting fire at me). Couldn’t beat it yet. My blood vial stock completely ran out for the first time, so I went back to Yarnham to replenish it… and that took me to a strange detour. The little girl’s house was now occupied by someone else, who told me to go to the Great Cathedral. But for some reason I couldn’t teleport there. So I went there by foot and met with an off-her-rocker Eileen. And my god, she’s a boss in her own right…
Oh you probably missed a couple steps. Because if you missed a couple, she gets aggro'd. The two likely ones are her appearing after you open all the gates in the Cathedral Ward before it turns night and the other is the Henryk fight (Approval gesture and he drops a rune).
The cutoff is the Rom fight as, if you do all the steps in her line, you get to fight a different hunter (Bloody Crow of Cainhurst). Otherwise she goes insane and attacks you if you missed steps. You can still grab her badge (she drops it). You just miss out on the Hunter of Hunters Covenant for that run.
If I remember exactly, my very first run I aggro'd her the first time I saw her. Hard fight but I got the Bo M real early. Good thing too as I run DEX. That or I got her killed during Henryk.
Edited by terumokou on Jul 19th 2025 at 7:38:04 AM
Burning love!

Well, I've been playing the game nonstop and got stuck in several places but I have to admit that it's definitely been an experience worth it. I've just defeated the One Reborn and have to say that it and the Vacuous Spider were a lot easier bosses than I expected. I'd argue the lead up to the One Reborn in the Unseen Village was a far bigger challenge for me as everything kept coming back to life and dogpiling me.
Some observations on the game so far:
Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jul 9th 2025 at 3:43:32 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.