bloodborne review game informer
Test: Bloodborne, born in the blood, died in the blood ...Bloodborne is a promise, a promise from From Software and more particularly its manager Hidetaka Miyazaki. A contract signed with a bloody imprint between the studio and players awaiting a spiritual sequel to the saga of the Souls. Merciless fights, technicality, mastery of level design and chiseled atmosphere form the pulsating heart of the experience offered by the Japanese studio for several years. And if the distance of Hidetaka Miyazaki on the Dark Souls 2 project was felt, the man returns here at the head of an exclusive title to the PlayStation 4. And casually, his influence is palpable from first hours of play. Bloodborne draws most of its mechanisms from the Souls licenses, dusting everything off and delivering a bloody and memorable adventure.
BORN IN THE BLOOD, DIE IN THE BLOOD ...
If you're used to the Souls gameplay, expect to rethink the way you play. Bloodborne adopts the bias of leaving in the closet the relative passivity induced by the defensive gameplay of its predecessors. Goodbye the punk behind his shield, to be effective, it will be necessary to play nervous and offensive. The game also rewards this risk-taking and makes it possible to recover a portion of life lost by carrying out an attack soon after having suffered damage. More than ever, it's all about timing in dodges and attack windows. Announced as more accessible for neophytes, Bloodborne remains quite technical enough to take in hand. Oh, you will eat claws, giant chopper attacks, mandals capable of you one shoot and health potions will flow in the first tests on many bosses. Farewell to Estus vials, From Software this time adopts a system of potions to recover from a lot of enemies or to buy against echoes of blood, the in-game currency similar to that of Souls souls. In the event of death, you will not recover your initial stock of this precious drink ... It will therefore be necessary to farm, sometimes for long hours, in order to build up a safety stock.A point on character creation
Yes, my character looks like Harry Potter ... The creation phase of the avatar of Bloodborne once again increases the number of customization parameters available. If Dark Souls 2 added facial hair, the game here opted for a much more advanced customization. From voice to build to face details, creating a male or female avatar lets your imagination run wild. We will choose a basic archetype from a list of builds favoring for some strength, for others agility or going on a class with balanced stats. Note that the magic disappears from the game, and if the enemies will not hesitate to throw you a fiddling with spells, you will tap into an arsenal of gadgets to compensate for this absence: molotov cocktails, poisoned daggers, flame throwers, etc.The farm mechanism is similar for the silver bullets on your pistol / blunderbuss / rifle. Because if the shields disappear (well not completely), they give way to firearms with multiple uses: to attract an adversary, to scrape some damage or, and there is all the utility of the thing, to carry out a cons good placed by shooting shortly before an opponent hits you. This results in the possibility of launching a devastating attack capable of calming the ardor of the most imposing creature. Particularly useful on certain bosses, the technique must be mastered as soon as possible in order to avoid some unpleasant surprises and to display your mastery of the art of combat. Bloodborne manages to brilliantly transcribe the bestial side of the clashes as much from the point of view of throttle sensations in hand as in the chara design of enemies. Imposing, agile, grotesque, disturbing, carefully animated, the panel of opponents also benefits from a frightening sound design at will. You only have to hear the bestial cry of some bosses to realize it. Too bad that the automatic lock still too often causes big problems with the camera stuck in the background or in the bodies of creatures.
On the weapons side, the catalog is less extensive than the arsenal of its elders. Bloodborne again decides to take a different route. We will start the adventure with a choice: a cleaver, an ax or a sword cane. All three have a different moveset, the first two are more for build force, the other for hunters promoting their skill (the name of the dexterity in play). A few hours later, other weapons will be added, such as the saw-thrower, the hammer sword or some unique trinkets. The great originality lies in the fact that each of these weapons has a second attack mode modifying the fighting style. If, for example, the saw blade deploys its blade to increase its range at the expense of its speed, the hammer sword changes shape radically, becoming a huge mass of stone capable of inflicting heavy blunt damage. This switch therefore opens many doors to combos during attacks. Added to this novelty is the whole aspect of customizing weapons via runes to find around the world. Your weapon will eventually have three places to set gems, capable of modifying certain damage or regeneration statistics. In fact, Bloodborne is rather stingy in equipment loot, the emphasis has been on improving and customizing each of the basic weapons or purchasing new models from the "merchant" of the central hub.
What about the difficulty?
Consider two categories of players here. On the one hand the regulars of the Souls saga and on the other the neophyte players intrigued by the Bloodborne experience. The first will take a few hours to get used to the speed of the entertainment and to lose some habits inherited from their liabilities. Bloodborne somewhat resembles a fast-advancing Dark Souls. Everything is more lively, more nervous, and ultimately more different. The lock is still there and allows you to dodge / dash with a certain class. Except for endurance, no statistics will influence this new way of fighting. Miyazaki promised a more accessible game, is it really the case? In a way, yes, because the loss of Darksoulian “heaviness” should convince many new players to be tempted by the experience. However, the fighting has always been just as tough and unforgiving when faced with the slightest timing error. Never frustrating, Bloodborne constantly pushes us to try our luck even in the face of the toughest of adversaries.FROM DOOR-TO-DOOR TO YARHNAM
Because in the manner of Demon Souls, the game revolves around a central area where we will return at regular intervals to improve our statistics, upgrade our weapons, and unlock the Chalice dungeons. And this haven of peace, the hunter's dream of his little name, is almost nebulous, an island floating in the middle of a sea of clouds interspersed with gigantic pillars where live a talking doll and a hyper mysterious old man in a wheelchair . In short, do not expect to understand all the ins and outs of the script as soon as you arrive in the world. All we know is that the hunt is on, that a mysterious church has developed blood-based therapy and that everyone seems to have more or less gone nuts in the city of Yarhnam. The game distills an oppressive atmosphere laden with religious symbols and muffled cries at night....We also maintain this level design consistency specific to From Software productions. Each area is full of nooks to explore, traps to avoid, and shortcuts to unlock. More than ever, the philosophy of the side road to unlock is the common thread in the progression. Campfires (Bonfire) are replaced here by lanterns acting as checkpoint and teleporter to the rest of the hunter. Finally, note that the enemies will reappear with each death or teleportation, this without repop limit, unlike Dark Souls 2, it is very useful for farming certain areas rich in xp and in potions for example. As usual, Hidetaka Miyazaki's team distilled scraps of the script into the decor, architecture, description of the objects and handwritten notes left here and there. It will therefore be necessary to make the effort to decipher the pieces of a nebulous puzzle scattered between dream and reality.
I was rather surprised by the large number of voices in the game. If the feeling of loneliness still weighs on our shoulders, the adventure is much more talkative than its predecessors. Many NPCs speak to us through the gates of the city, the enemies howl their desperation in the middle of a fight and we also find the whole panel of friendly NPCs to recruit or to kill coldly according to the mood of the moment. For the first time, a From Software game has been dubbed in French. Accustomed to the measured interpretation tinged with a strong - but classy - British accent of the Souls, the thing will have something to destabilize at first listen. Not that the work provided deserves, but the atmosphere given by the English dubbing retains more charm for my taste. Do not panic, the game has the good idea to offer to change its language via its menu, to you the joys of Bloodborne in Spanish so, olé!
THEN IS IT FLUID?
Technically now, the PlayStation 4 can handle the abundance of effects and elements displayed in the decor with a rather stable framerate at 30 frames per second. Falls are still felt at regular intervals. No, they will not ruin your gaming experience but will annoy performance enthusiasts. There are however more serious at the time of writing these few lines: the duration of loading times! Damn that they are long. Count between 40 seconds and 1 minute 15 to reload the game. The problem would be minimal if the latter were infrequent, but they are very numerous. Because if the card is in fact a torturous open world, die (and you will often perish let me tell you), return to the hub, reset an area for farming will rhyme with a beautiful black screen decorated with the logo of the game to admire during a time lapse quickly becoming annoying. The studio says it is aware of this major problem and announces that it is working on an upcoming patch which is not scheduled to be released day one. To all the players of tomorrow, you are warned, plan something to read between each fail…THE MULTIPLAYER BELLS
Bloodborne also maintains the multiplayer philosophy specific to the studio's productions. The base does not move an iota, you can always consult or leave on the ground help messages and the blood marks still allow to see the sad end of a player less fortunate than you. The cooperation is triggered this time by means of a small bell to ring in order to call for help a partner. The latter will express his wish to join you by ringing another bell in his part. Multiplayer mode will end if you die or the boss in the area is defeated. We therefore remain on familiar ground for Souls players. However, the multi experience gains somewhat in flexibility with the arrival of private rooms protected by a password to communicate to the person of their choice. No more trickery based on special rings or precise Dark Souls timing, Bloodborne opens the door to more flexibility in its online mode. The whole is certainly still complicated to understand for a beginner, but the effort deserves to be highlighted. PvP mode is also present but we could not rub it enough to deliver you a relevant opinion, the test will be updated soon with our impressions on the question.DOOR / MONSTER / TREASURE, ON THE ROAD FOR THE CHALICE Dungeons
Widely publicized before the release of the game, the Chalice mode appears as an attempt by From Software to extend the life of the title. These are actually randomly generated underground dungeons that the player can explore solo or multiplayer. Their structure turns out to be quite simple, even simplistic: a few rooms to clean, a lever to activate to open a door, then a boss to kill. This formality shipped, we then go to the next level and the difficulty increases. These optional dungeons with an assumed Rogue-like spirit introduce a random element on paper capable of upsetting our player benchmarks. But in fact, the level design of the places turns out to be disappointing on the whole, the rooms are linked without surprise and the ratio time / experience gained is not to the advantage of the places. Better to live them in cooperation to spend a nice moment killing chain bosses far from any script consideration.
What about the lifespan?
Is this a justified question on the part of the players, how long does it take for the game to end? The developers indicate 40 hours of lifespan. It’s actually pretty much the time it takes to finish the adventure without procrastinating on the farm or exploring. But let's be clear, this duration will ultimately depend on many parameters to take into account: your skill, your ability to find your way, your desire / need to farm, the time spent in dungeons optional Chalices, etc. All of these have a direct impact on the lifespan of Bloodborne. I personally spent many hours looking for my way after the fourth boss was defeated and farmed werewolves a good time to gain experience. As much as finishing Bloodborne does not mean putting away your blu-ray or reselling it, the first run opens the doors to the new game more considered by many players as the real start of the journey. In short, the title has everything you need to keep you busy for very long hours.The notes
+ Positive points
Simply sublime artistic direction
The design of creatures, bosses, their beastly and creepy animation
A lesson in level design!
A more nervous reinterpretation of the technical gameplay of From Software games
Quality soundtrack and dubbing, in English and French
The cooperation mode, still as intelligently integrated into the game
A good lifespan, embellished with new game + modes
Negative points
Load times that are far, far too long as is (the studio says it is working on a patch)
A camera still too often in cabbages in automatic lock mode
Framerate drops at regular intervals
Chalice dungeons uninspired in their mechanisms
The PlayStation 4 acquires with Bloodborne one of its major titles of the year 2015. Expected by many fans of the Souls saga, but also by many new players, the title draws its richness from all its own elements to the know-how of From Software. But Bloodborne manages to forge its own identity through a darker atmosphere, faster fighting and a more visceral general feeling. Everything is served by a level design of absolute coherence in the service of breathtaking artistic direction. We still regret a framerate sometimes picking up and horribly long loading times in the state. It would still be a shame to let yourself be cooled by these faults because Bloodborne proves to us that From Software masters its subject.
0 comments:
Post a Comment