Bloodborne

Is there any reason to keep the soul (whoops) containing items or can I use them and spend them safely?

I've spent most of mine to level up, so yep you can definitely spend em! Just make sure that you have enough to level up / buy items, so you don't lose em to some pitchfork wielding guy haha.

If you grew up playing video games, so you have developed controller skills and hand eye coordination, I'm beginning to believe bloodborne is mostly psychological. I'm on father gascoine and my first two battles were down to one hit---the second I had only used maybe two blood vials because I was nailing him with the firearm timing.

Then, the last 3-4 I've been missing all my spots, constantly getting snagged on the environment, etc and am blowing through all my ammo and vials. Barely getting him to his second form. It's all about how observant and patient I am, with father gascoine it probably isn't even that important to regular attack him, you just have to nail him with the pistol.

A lot of it really is psychological, that's an excellent point. I find that I do fairly well during initial encounters (especially with bosses) because I'm a bit more cautious and standoffish, seeing what patterns develop, but after I die a few times, I get frustrated and lose grasp of what I'm 'supposed' to be doing. Father G can be tricky at times... he has patterns, but he still surprises me sometimes with quick movements, and his bloody gun.

I am currently stuck at one boss in the next area... just can't seem to figure this one out, and I keep running out of blood vials. Might have to level up a bit before going back.

Also. TURN ON YOUR FUCKING TV GAME MODE FOR THIS GAME. That should be in huge letters every time you start the game again.

Pug wrote: A lot of it really is psychological, that's an excellent point. I find that I do fairly well during initial encounters (especially with bosses) because I'm a bit more cautious and standoffish, seeing what patterns develop, but after I die a few times, I get frustrated and lose grasp of what I'm 'supposed' to be doing. Father G can be tricky at times... he has patterns, but he still surprises me sometimes with quick movements, and his bloody gun.

I am currently stuck at one boss in the next area... just can't seem to figure this one out, and I keep running out of blood vials. Might have to level up a bit before going back.

Father G is a great battle and I love the game, but it still showcases why this is flawed game (like most of the bosses). The camera is completely fucked up and the environment is really difficult to navigate (and not in a good or logical way).

I'm using the spear now. Like it a lot better than the sawblade. I'm investing into skill weapons, so I'm hoping to run into a weapon with a solid bonus factor for skill that isn't the cane.

Bloodborne sunday. No better way to celebrate the lord's day than some extremely profane gross ass shit. I heart how fucked up the church in this game is, awesome shit.

Got farther. Fucked that dude up on the tower in Old Yarnham...



Fighting the other hunter was a lot of fun, challenging. The whole question of what hunters are for and what they're doing is intriguing as hell. I'm guessing that motherfucker in the wheelchair is the last boss or something and he'll turn on you in some crazy twist.

Finally, I got into the huge church. Had a question for anybody who has done it before---someone put a note on the floor along the lines of "summons other monsters" on the stairway before I got swamped by those little beast assholes and I just wanted to double check that there isn't a monster who will summon endless hordes or something. Is there anything like that? Because I'll go straight for that dude and not hang around like a dummy waiting to die while little beast dudes mob me.

I just got the rifle spear. Have any of you used that much? I'm using the saw spear right now and I'm bulking up on "skill." I'm not really tempted to change but it might be cool. Any thoughts? I'm hoping for some sort of badass rapier or long daggers thing eventually but I dunno. Right now I'm just putting some minor shards in the saw spear to get me through.

Also, INCREDIBLY cool easter egg/secret I stumbled on on reddit for the first boss when I was looking up something about what would have happened if I had done something else post-defeating Father G and a certain villager. I would never, ever have run into it but it is beyond cool:

Great post Gary!

Funny thing, I completely bypassed the guy on the tower. I just didn't find a way up there and just went about my business of slaying beasts and soon-to-be beasts. I will have to revisit the area and have a long talk with the guy on the tower.

In regards to the 'summons other monsters' I'm not sure if I've come across any enemies that do that yet... but it wouldn't surprise me if such a thing did exist.

I've not found the rifle spear yet, but it sounds pretty awesome, I'm hoping to procure one today. There's been some new weapon unlocks, but I'm focused on the cleaver and kirkhammer, as I'm more comfortable using them at this point.

The 'armour' in the game is pretty insignificant compared to the other games. Seems to be mostly cosmetic with a few stat boosts for things like poison res. I think this is pretty neat since you can really dress up your guy as you like.

I had no idea about that easter egg, the game continues to surprise me... I love that there's little things like that in the game.

I made progress yesterday on a certain boss that frustrated me to no end. I ended up summoning someone to help me beat the bastard because I ran out of patience. Having a second person there really helped, and I didn't feel bad about it one bit. Like Barnes said previously, use what you can to help you. I'm going to revisit the Old Yarnham today and say hello to the rooftop guy.

Pug wrote: Great post Gary!
I've not found the rifle spear yet, but it sounds pretty awesome, I'm hoping to procure one today. There's been some new weapon unlocks, but I'm focused on the cleaver and kirkhammer, as I'm more comfortable using them at this point.

It's hidden in Old Yharnam, I won't give you much more than that. A helpful in-game hint placement got me to it.

I have two big picture theories about what is going on in the game. I'll spoiler them but they aren't specific spoilers for any events in the game like some of my previous spoiler tags so they're pretty safe to read. I'm curious what other people think is going on.

I managed to off the guy on the roof, I didn't see the access point, but after clearing the area I found it! Great stuff.

I don't know how to interpret what's going on yet... but here's my thoughts...



In other news I've made progress to a new area... a wooded area... it is truly a dreadful and dreary place. I have not felt so much anxiety playing in a new area since Tomb of the Giants in Dark Souls. Loving every second of it.

Any advice on the blood starved beast? I'm on try 6 or 7 and it is annoying the shit out of me to have to keep grinding for ammo and souls for antidotes every time... Combined with the shitty load times. FUCK.

BSB can be a pain, it took me several tries to get him down. I can't really offer too many tips other than quick strikes, and molotovs work quite well on it. If worse comes to worse, I'd be happy to help you take the sucker down CO-OP style. Just let me know on PSN (just shoot me a msg) and I can make my way to your area.

Well, y'all are now ahead of me. I still didn't beat Father G over the weekend. I made like four attempts Friday night but I just couldn't do it. Twice I got him down to almost zero, it looked like. ALMOST had a controller-throwing moment. The problem is that I'm approaching it like an evasion fight, which it is not. It's a countering fight. I took a break from it, but back to business tonight.

Miyazaki and those guys at From are absolute MASTERS of psychology, that is something that really goes under-noticed I think about these games as people fall over themselves to talk about how hard they are. I have never seen ANY game creators do a better job of using atmosphere, audiovisual cues and structure to generate anxiety. A lot of it is a big psych-out. Compared to a lot of other games, your mobility is limited. There are one-hit kills. The camera is pretty much never on your side. The loading screens between attempts are too long. You lose all of what you have accrued in terms of currency if you die. Monsters are either a) huge b) too fast c) impossible to damage or d) FUCKING HUGE. Or all of the above. That all creates this sense that the game is hostile toward the player- and that actually makes the difficulty seem more exaggerated than it actually is. Not saying the games aren't hard because they are. But it is very much like playing an old Mega Man game. You come to an area and you either perform the task there or you fail and come back to try it again with what you learned about patterns, positions and so forth from the last time. Think about how you get into a grinding loop like the "level one" area, circling down to the mob and then back up to the start. First time it's like "OH GOD", 20th time you're just strolling through like a killing machine.

Pay attention to how the game TRAINS you, how it nudges you into developing skills and learning its language. They will tell you how to play and how to survive if you'll pay attention. And then, suddenly, that giant hog in the mist that you said "oh hell no" to the first time you saw it becomes a routine kill on a grinding loop.

Watch how they guide your attention throughout the game...and how they exploit that to hide things from you. They know exactly where you are not going to look, but there is usually some hint- even if it's rough knowledge of the layout- that will tell you that there is something there. I love that feeling in their games where you see an area beyond a gate, down a cliff or whatever and you think "wait, I've been there" and the SHAPE of the place starts to come together.

As for what is going on in the game, I have no idea at this point. Obviously something to do with the blood ministrations and some kind of contamination or corruption.

Great post Barnes! You are absolutely right about how the game trains you as you play it. Each new area appears as a type of gauntlet, but once after the initial scare of horrible and hideous things, you are forced to confront and deal with the challenges presented to you, or you won't progress. Like you said, it's very much like an old Mega Man game, or Contra, anything with patterns really.

I'm thinking of changing weapons in this fight with the blood starved beast. Right now I'm using a saw spear but I am mostly invested in skill. Maybe I'll move to the cane. I wish I had more skill weapon options. I could use the rifle spear as well, I think.