Bloodborne’s Forgiving Nature Should Be Key to FromSoftware’s Future Games

Highlights

• Bloodborne stands out from Dark Souls with dynamic gameplay, aggression, and quick dashes. Trick weapons and firearm parries create unique playstyles.
• Bloodborne’s runbacks are made easier with lamps strategically placed near boss fights. Chalice Dungeons provide a wealth of optional content for farming.
• FromSoftware’s next Soulslike game should consider exhuming Bloodborne’s quality-of-life features like quick lamp warping and optional content in Chalice Dungeons.

Bloodborne is one of FromSoftware’s most unique games. Even though it still falls within the Soulslike category for all it adapts from Dark Souls, Bloodborne couldn’t be further from Dark Souls regarding gameplay. Trick weapons alone grant players with incredibly dynamic weapons and playstyles, while an emphasis on quick dashes and firearm parries alienate Bloodborne entirely from the more defensive or passive combat of Dark Souls. Aggression is key in most cases due to the rally mechanic Bloodborne also thrives on; however, Bloodborne has a couple of subtle quality-of-life features that FromSoftware’s next Soulslike should exhume instead.

Indeed, Bloodborne is known for being one of FromSoftware’s most difficult Soulslikes. Hardly any level or boss is a pushover, which is especially true as soon as players are whisked away to the Hunter’s Nightmare in Bloodborne’s Old Hunters DLC. Bloodborne isn’t often forgiving and yet it makes up for every grueling boss fight by way of two essential features: runbacks are rarely tedious with lamps often in sprinting distance of a forthcoming boss fight, and while farming/grinding can be time-consuming it’s also unbelievably advantageous and accessible at any point in the game.

Bloodborne’s Lamp Warping Makes Runbacks a Thing of the Past

Bloodborne isn’t the only FromSoftware game that allows players to warp between ‘bonfires’—Dark Souls 3 would later have bonfires scattered everywhere, for instance—but it was certainly one of the first that let them do it instantaneously. The big difference with lamps in Bloodborne is that players can’t simply warp from lamp to lamp; instead, they must warp back to the Hunter’s Dream and then warp from one of numerous headstones to arrive at their destination—not unlike Demon’s Souls.

This detour is great, though, because it always allows players to level up, upgrade a weapon, restock consumables, or purchase anything they’d like to.

But even lamps scattered throughout settings like Yharnam, the Nightmare of Mensis, or the Cathedral Ward are all placed meticulously and in a way where sprinting back to a boss is never arduous or more irritating than the boss itself. This is especially true in The Old Hunters, where FromSoftware’s signature shortcuts are even more frequent and some lamps are directly outside the fog wall to a boss, Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower and Orphan of Kos included.

Then, in one of the finest and most exemplary moments of runback ease, two of the possible final Bloodborne bosses—Gehrman, the First Hunter and Moon Presence, who are both optional—are fought within the Hunter’s Dream itself with their shared fog wall only a paved garden path away from the workshop and the plain doll. If FromSoftware’s next Soulslike following Elden Ring is a return to claustrophobic, linear level design, incorporating a forgivingly navigable runback to bosses again would be crucial, even if players need to cut through a ton of horrid enemies and earn their way to that lovely shortcut or ‘bonfire’ first.

Bloodborne’s Chalice Dungeons are an Ideal Outlet for Farming/Grinding

Bloodborne’s Chalice Dungeons are notoriously convoluted and certainly an optional feature many casual players either neglect, forget, or avoid like the curse of blood. The number of assorted materials and knowledge of optimal glyphs required is a science in and of itself and while they’re likely more impactful in NG+ runs anyhow they’re never a main focus of the game beyond farming, grinding, and seeking a wealth of endless optional content.

Bloodborne’s limited Blood Vials and Quicksilver Bullets can definitely encourage some light farming on their own, and hopping into an over-leveled Chalice can net players hundreds of thousands of Blood Echoes in no time at all. Chalices are also where players have a much better chance of finding incredible gems for their chosen weapon and choosing to scavenge from a dungeon’s layers early could be a huge boon if lucky.

The best part is that these dungeons are fully optional and if FromSoftware ever decided to revisit the concept it would mean players have another opportunity to experience new or recycled content freshly while also farming resources and currencies to their heart’s content. FromSoftware would do well to mitigate necessary grinds as much as possible and therefore a Blood Vial equivalent may not be ideal, but something akin to Chalices might be favorable if FromSoftware was able to redesign them to be more readily accessible and comprehensible from the get-go.