The first few times I attempted to play the game, I just couldn't understand what others saw in it. The combat to me seemed very clunky and imprecise. I felt I wasn't receiving the same level of feedback I would be getting from other games, action and otherwise. I felt frustrated that every weapon had such extreme windup and that the enemies could easily (and mercilessly) interrupt any of my actions. I even felt limited by the stamina system, because I kept running into situations where I'd wail on an enemy and then be completely unable to escape. Additionally, the aesthetic is grim and very dark, and the graphics are frequently blurry and poorly anti-aliased, which has often resulted in significant eye strain on my part.
It wasn't my first time playing a From Software game, either. I've also tried Dark Souls and Demons' Souls in the past, both of which presented similar problems for me. I struggled with navigation, with the punishing combat, and the high cost of failure.
But I keep trying because I do want to understand why so many people really love these games. Sure, maybe there are better things to be doing with my time, but it really does feel like there's this mysterious gaming nirvana that is just out of my reach. Dark Souls and its ilk have become so popular in recent years and I have to wonder if I've just not understood those games because I've never made a legitimate effort to immerse myself in them.
As of today, I'm about level 60 and 20 hours into Bloodborne. I'm much further in than any previous attempt and I feel like I'm starting to understand it better. It's definitely a more complex game than it seems at the surface level, but it is nonetheless an immensely frustrating game. In fact, it provokes an ugly rage in me that other games rarely do. Enemies mercilessly lash out at you, intent on robbing you of your hard-earned progress. When you fall, as you inevitably will, enemies will continue to swipe and bite at your freshly mangled corpse. Careful play means you can work around these aggressive foes, but doing so requires a level of focus that I don't often need for other games. It's more than that, too. It's about a mindset. I couldn't help but notice that as I progressed further, I became more aware of and comfortable with my character's limitations. That understanding makes certain enemies a lot easier to handle. If I understand how much damage I can deal with certain attacks as well as what kind of range they have and how long they take to play through their animations, then I put myself in a position where I feel much more comfortable tackling foes that at first seemed like significant challenges.
In a game like Bloodborne, it's very easy to let your emotions get the better of you. Frustration, anger, and even fear have caused me to make a lot of mistakes that made me think more negatively of the game. There is a stress inherent to many of the game's systems. Defeating the game's first major boss, Father Gascoigne, is a tremendous exercise in frustration because every enemy you encounter on the way is its own struggle. From the very beginning, the first plagued townspeople teach you that every enemy is a threat. I died to even these most simple of enemies dozens of times. It felt like the game wasn't prepared to let me feel powerful the way most games do. It wanted me to feel broken and defeated.
I began to feel like Bloodborne wasn't prepared to let me feel triumphant like other games do. It made me feel frustrated and distressed and even when I did fumble my way through encounters, I didn't feel accomplished. There was relief, to be sure, but little in the way of accomplishment. I didn't feel, for instance, that I was deftly avoiding enemies and crushing them with my athleticism and mastery of my chosen weapon. The only strategy that seemed to work for me against most enemies was to close the distance to enemies and mash the fastest attack possible repeatedly until they fell. There wasn't room for stringing unique attacks together into interesting combos or for strategic play in my mind. I was wrong about that, but because I wasn't accustomed to how these enemies worked and how the game itself worked, I felt pigeonholed in a very uncomfortable way.
After a time, I came to find that the regular plagued townspeople weren't very difficult to kill after all. Because I was so familiar with them from dying to them dozens of times, it gradually become second nature to anticipate their movements, to easily defeat them without taking damage. I discovered that the charged heavy attack with the starting axe was capable of taking down the starting enemies in one shot in most cases. I only needed to make sure that I spaced myself properly and was conscious of how they were moving so I could avoid being interrupted during the long windup time. Knowing this helped me to tackle a lot of other enemies, even when every new enemy I encountered became a new and intimidating obstacle to my progress.
I did a lot of research as I progressed through the game. The game gives you some basic instructions but doesn't go a long way toward tutorializing--which is not to suggest that I think it should. But there are some pretty core components of the combat that I simply wouldn't have known about had I not thought to look them up. I had to read a lot about what the gun is actually useful for--because it's certainly not there to help you kill enemies with its pitiful damage. It does briefly stun enemies, though, and opens them up for a Visceral Attack, a flashy parry that can't be interrupted and deals a lot of damage. This is a technique that was instrumental in defeating Father Gascoigne.
I've now defeated Father Gascoigne twice. After I beat him the first time, I quickly dropped off the game. This is surprising in retrospect because it's such an important milestone in making progress in that game. What prompted me to quit the first time was yet another frustrating stumbling block, the hunter manning a gatling gun in the tower in Old Yharnam. The number of times I died to his gun, the exploding barrels on the way to that tower, or even just standard enemies in my way was staggering. When I stopped playing this time, I had every intention of returning and soldering on, but it didn't happen until months later. At that point, I was so confused about where I was in the game that I was forced to restart.
So, I defeated Gascoigne again and found that it was a little easier this time. It wasn't a fight I was able to complete in one try, but after dying probably one hundred times in my initial run, the second time through went much more smoothly. And when I got to the gatling gun hunter this time, I didn't bother engaging. I ran past him, ignoring my stubborn desire to take revenge for his immensely frustrating potshots. And so I made progress, little by little. I continue to do so now, but it's very interesting just how the narrative changes as I get further. I start to feel powerful, and then the game firmly reminds me that I am but a frail mortal, destined to fall before ever more otherworldly foes. But I'm going to keep trying, because although it provokes a host of negative emotions in me, I know I can make it there.
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