--Blood Minister, Bloodborne
Bloodborne's most distinctive quality is that it is one of the absolutely most atmospheric games one could play. The Victorian-style town, forested regions, and underground caverns fit together in a way that provides diversity of environment without ever breaking the aesthetic connections between one place and another, and the enemies of each location are right at home in this world of danger. The lore fits the game and only enhances the superb visual atmosphere, but the story is so very vague that only a fool would think there is really much storytelling done here at all, as even the "visual storytelling" that has helped people appreciate games like some of the Metroid entries is minimal--over the years, I have actually seen many people talk about the storytelling in Bloodborne as if it is so clear in one sense, but it is utterly ambiguous beyond things like the premise of a "Hunt" and activities involving blood that went horribly wrong. Bloodborne is masterful in some areas while unfortunately being vague enough to not necessarily prompt player's in the right direction without being gratuitously cryptic at times because of this.
Production Values
Much of this highly atmospheric game is grounded in the way it looks, from the graphics to the art style and creatures. The Hunter's weapon sticking through gates or doors as you near the boundaries of an enclosed area is one of the few graphical issues that mar the game's very strong visual presentation. For a 2015 PS4 game, and yes, the PS4 is indeed outdated in a sense now, Bloodborne looks great. The creature design in particular is spectacular in ways few games can rival. From the corrupted citizens of Yarnham to giant wolves and crows in the beginning to the sometimes massive bosses, the aesthetics of the game are incredibly well-realized for both thematic and visual purposes. This quality extends to the sound. The groans, growls, mutterings, and footsteps of nearby enemies and of, I'll just say, initially unseen entities are common and give clues as to where certain creatures are even if they are concealed by environmental protrusions until they lunge out at you. A far greater emphasis on noises like this rather than voice acting leaves the condition of the world more vague in terms of how it reached this state.
Gameplay
The similarities of the mechanics to those of the Souls games are clear from the start, which reflects how From Software has primarily relied on this gameplay style, along with the ambiguous storytelling, for quite some time now in their most recent releases. Like in Dark Souls, you cannot pause the game, which adds another layer of difficulty to an already challenging game because pulling up a menu to freeze the screen is not a usable safety tactic to buy time to think. Dying also makes you drop your blood echo currency, and dying a second time makes those blood echoes vanish. Unlike in Dark Souls, the lamps that are lit like the bonfires of the Souls games are not points where you rest your character and level up or reset the enemies in an area. Using the lanterns takes one to the Hunter's Dream, a mysterious location where you can purchase new character levels, consumable items like Molotov cocktails, look at one's storage area, and more. There is also a mechanic where striking any enemy after taking damage from any enemy restores up to a certain amount of health before a few seconds pass that was not present in Dark Souls.
To restore health, you drink blood vials, of which you can carry a maximum of 20 at a time without runes that expand this capacity--much more effective than Estus flasks! Extra blood vials, as well as bullet pickups that you do not have room for, are automatically taken to a storage area in Hunter's Dream until the massive storage space is full, and you can always remove the surplus from storage and sell them to easily obtain blood echoes, revisiting regions like Central Yarnham to find more by killing enemies. Actually fighting the enemies is a matter of luck, skill, or patience, with careful dodges and rapid strikes being necessary to defeat them on purpose. However, as one levels up, the enemies do not. Returning to older areas to farm items or gain more souls is something that gets easier and easier. Since the stat increases for leveling up are very limited and come to require a great number of blood echoes, this is the best way to see how far one's character has actually come. Beasts that could have killed you with only a strike or two at first might do almost no damage later on and can be killed with minimal effort. This is partly because leveling up any stat enhances physical defense, so withstanding many attacks gets easier by default as you level up.
Story
Some spoilers are below.
The city of Yarnham has fallen into a rather bleak condition. A Hunter rids the streets of monsters, Old Yarnham has burned, and there are hints of eldritch presences centered around the area. This Hunter must traverse various landscapes to supposedly stop the blood-carried plague that has helped bring Yarnham into this state of destruction and danger. As they continue in their quest, they find connections to beings of far greater metaphysical power than the legions of beasts they have fought against in much of the land. The threat posed goes beyond that of fallen Hunters, witchcraft, and an infestation of monstrous wolves or crows.
Intellectual Content
Bloodborne does not actually try to explore any truths or philosophical possibilities or ideologies except as a means to drive its very ambiguous plot and its atmosphere forward. At the same time, this very ambiguity, the references to how the Hunter seems to be dreaming in Hunter's Dream and awakening to different places in the world of matter by choice, and the later reveal of the Great Ones with their cosmic horror context (in this case, they were specifically inspired by Lovecraft's eldritch pantheon) all could provoke explicitly philosophical reflection or feelings in players who are open to it. Regarding the Great Ones, the use of the Insight mechanic as a way to eventually see these eldritch beings once enough is obtained is a very clever way to reveal the scope and epistemological secrecy of the game as one approaches the end. Bloodborne just, as I mentioned, is not actually presenting any sort of truth claims or dialogue that is probably meant to spark or reward separate philosophical discoveries and thought. All of these elements have their metaphysical or epistemological depth without actually being used as more than a framework for the gameplay itself.
Conclusion
What Bloodborne does right is downright masterful. Video games and movies always benefit from a strong visual identity, and even when they do not really do much with their themes, they are always elevated when they at least casually brush up against some of the subject matter in Bloodborne. Even the abnormal difficulty in either combat or environmental navigation to the next story objective (in some parts) can be overcome with attentiveness and lots of patience, but this is a more accessible use of the Dark Souls gameplay style. The health recovery mechanic tied to attacking enemies after being hit and the plentiful refills of healing blood vials from enemies alone make Bloodborne an easier game. For these reasons, anyone who appreciates the unusually strategic, cautious combat of Dark Souls and its extreme narrative vagueness but wants an easier time handling enemies might end up loving this title that evolves some From Software conventions while honoring others. The Lovecraftian cosmic horror elements that are woven in only add layers of lore depth to this story of disease and monsters. The PS4 was blessed by the Great Ones indeed with this release.
Content:
1. Violence: Blood appears when the Hunter and various enemies attack each other.
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