Thought you meant the whirligig saw.  You get the wheel from Cainhurst or murdering an NPC iirc.  It's big, blunt and impractically slow so it ticks a lot of my boxes.

Dubs wrote:

Thought you meant the whirligig saw.  You get the wheel from Cainhurst or murdering an NPC iirc.  It's big, blunt and impractically slow so it ticks a lot of my boxes.

oh, i did mean the whirler

Don't listen to Dubs, he's always been a hipster.

I think the game has the best lore alongside DkS1, don't forget that was indecipherable at first too. It probably helps that I'm a big Lovecraft fan.

I had no idea what was going on first time through. But the plot is there and it is a masterpiece, it takes effort to understand it though.

The plot is far too vague. I found it all aimless on the first run too, then read some stuff about it and got into it much more second time round. It's very good then, but I don't think it helps making it that obscure.

Dark Souls has all that hidden depth as well, but it also makes it clear what you're actually doing at any point. You have direction at least.

Djornson wrote:

Story/Plot/Lore is genuine genius mensa level. Admittedly i had to watch lots of long YouTube videos to understand it but hey

Me too.

@stonechalice: maybe have a break for a bit and come back, fatigue can really turn you off some really enjoyable experiences.
Too much of a good thing and that.

The boss in spoiler were a badger for me too.
I had quite a few sticking points but well worth it.

That's a good way to play, but I don't have the patience for the run backs and retries these days. If the game is giving me the means to heal, then I'm gonna take advantage, especially on my virgin run. The no heal challenge stuff can come later, should the game tickle me enough for multiple runs.

I've beaten It's all about patience with him. The run back is a doddle too. He was not much of an issue if I'm honest. I'm just predicting I'll have to farm vials again for the next area and it's put me off wanting to explore the game. I'm also not getting that sense of achievement from beating bosses that I got from Dark Souls for some reason. It's like I've just beaten this boss, but I've no idea why, or what it has to do with the rest of the game. This is especially evident when you realise so many are just optional. The environment is packed with detail, but you never really pick up any shinies with much lore tied to them - it's mostly souls - sorry - blood of some sort, armour, or the odd weapon.

The combat is decent, but deeply flawed IMO. The whole regain system is designed around the fact that you will take unavoidable damage at regular intervals, and the best way to counter that is to spam attack as fast as you can to get some health back. That, to me, nullifies any kind of plan or tactic to an encounter, and boils it down to just get the first attack in as quick as possible, regardless of what it is, and don't let up until it's dead. The charged R2 also seems way overpowered for many of the enemies. It's fun, but it's perfectly possible to play Dark Souls in exactly the same way as you play this really. I don't see an extra layer to the combat anywhere in this game.

Item and inventory creep is also a thing in this, like all souls games. I haven't needed even half the consumables I've been picking up along the way. Some are useful, some are pointless. Some of the items I've collected are deliberately obscure, but the game hasn't intrigued me enough to find out what they are or what they do, therefore they've been ignored.

I've been trying this game on and off for well over a year now. I had a moment where I thought it finally had me, but it faded quickly. The Lovecraft themes aren't really to my taste, and it just plays so like a Souls game but not quite as fun for me. I can't imagine ever wanting to replay this, yet I think I could replay Dark Souls 1 forever.

Some fair points chalice, I get what you're saying. It was really hard to understand what the fuck is going on but once you do oh my god it's insanely clever. I prefer Dark Souls combat (without using shields, shields ruin Dark Souls) especially the huge varity of cool  looking weapons and armour. Also in general i also like the whole dragon knights etc stuff over lovecraftian. Having said all that, the world created in Bloodborne was just unbelievably real to me. 

I played it very cautiously and only used the saw cleaver thing you start with. Maybe that halped. Apparently the axe thing is a bit spin2win? Anyway fair play for keeping trying. I must admit i am much much more inclined to replay Dark Souls than Bloodborne. That reminds me, i haven't done Bloodborne DLC yet...

I never farmed vials and I rarely if ever used the regain attack (too much of the DS turtle in me) and I made it through. Maybe I'm just better than I thought.

I hope you find the will to go back and play it Chalice. Or maybe just watch the EnB lore playthrough.

I forgot, parry. Bloodborne forced me to learn to parry, there was no way of beating bosses without spamming blood vials if I didn't parry. Spamming dodge doesn't work like it does in Dark Souls. It's terrifying standing in front of a huge boss letting them swing at you and hoping you get the parry timing right, but it's fucking amazing when you get it. 

When i went back to Dark Souls after Bloodborne i enjoyed Dark Souls so much more because i didn't use a shield and i parried. There is a great YouTube vid with a theory about how that was a deliberate tactic by FROM.

I bet I could get through Forbidden Woods without taking damage, not counting the boss.

But yeah, a lot of the bosses are too big.

Oh wait Patches is in it and Moonlight Greatsword as well. Still the second best game I've played this gen by far.

In Bloodborne you have to go on the offensive? Best form of defense is offense etc. I dunno. You don't like it, that's cool, you tried.

Dark Soldier wrote:

And tbf the majority of Souls bosses were utter dreck. O&S rightly praised at the time because its not one but two bosses. Even that looks dated as all fuck now.

You've lost your mind.

You as well.