Bloodborne alpha invites are going out.

[Cletus]

So far all I've heard is a story of one bloke who bought the digital version and isn't enjoying it at all. This kind of honesty will probably see him branded as weaksauce by his Sony brethren.

But I too have at least 2 DD purchases I completely regret. Titanfail and MCC.

[t0mby]

Not weaksauce, just that it's known the Souls games were hard and not for the weak and Bloodborne was going to be no different. If someone preorders and knows nothing about it then.......

[t0mby]

Who wants to buy my digital license?

If I could I would but alas.

[flipswitch]

Bloodborne in a nutshell part two.
http://youtu.be/bw6jYau0uQA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Still not finished with it, the rage is slowly wearing off.

[t0mby]

Let us know when you've earned a trophy.

[flipswitch]

Not yet. Anyhow, I finally progressed and unlocked a shortcut so I don't have to fight my way through the hordes again! Managed to buy tons of vials and molotovs and made it to new undiscovered places. Really happy now. In all I've put in 6hrs today. The Celtic beast boss fight is next. Glad I came back to it. I was watching a YT video ( that I posted above) and I saw how he couldn't pass the dog beasts things, instead he just snuck past and avoided them, which is what I've done. I've gone from disliking it to can't wait to continue it tomorrow. Metacritic score of 93 .

[Madmya]

Is it harder than NG2?

[Gamma]

There is no pause in any of the Souls games.

True.

Enemies always respawn when you reenter an area or else you would hit a plateau levelling up.

False.

Someone's a n00b.

True.

No impressions from me tonight, I only have an hour spare and I'll probably spend double that naming my character. Hopefully a weekend session is on the horizon!

[t0mby]

Enemies always respawn when you reenter an area or else you would hit a plateau levelling up.

False.

Must've been thinking about Demon's then (until you beat the boss of the area? Been years since I played). I didn't make it far in Dark, as much as I loved the gameplay I wasn't a fan of the way the world was connected. Much preferred Demon's hub and Gate system.

I am contemplating going back to Dark 1, even had the hardback guide which I haven't bought a guide since Perfect Dark on the N64.

[Gamma]

I'm pretty sure in Demon's the enemies only respawn when you return to the hub or die. Clearing an area, continuing on and then returning to the earlier area on foot won't respawn anything. In Dark it's any time you rest at a bonfire or die. In Dark 2 it's the same, but individual enemies have a respawn counter and will sooner or later stop spawning. The only way to respawn them after that is to burn a bonfire ascetic, which resets the counters of the enemies in the immediate area but also sets them one NG+ harder than they already were. I was never game to try it myself, as it's cumulative across multiple New Games. Enjoy your extinction level event, Heide's Tower of Flame.

[guttermouth]

I wanna smash my controller. Fuck this game.......

[Pointy Cat]

I got two bosses down last night, the second one was quite tough, it really forces you to come to grips with playing without a shield. I'm liking the game quite a lot so far, I really like the setting and the changes to gameplay have made the Souls formula feel fresh again. Though the frame rate problems and awful load times really make me wish this was on PC.

[t0mby]

Those should be addressed in the next patch, it's their top priority atm.

[flipswitch]

I just noticed they stutter every now and then but the loading times are terrible.

[Pointy Cat]

I played Dark Souls 2 at a solid 60fps on PC. It's hard to go back.

[lestat]

Know dat feel.

[t0mby]

That's why I only buy 30fps games or set my pc to max 30 frames that way I don't whine when a game is 30.

[Ben]

Well unless you want the extra challenge you don't want to play Dark Souls 2 in 60fps anyways. Weapons degrade twice as fast (might just be qhen you hit walls/the ground. .. but with some weapons. .very easy) and the invincibility frames from dodge rolls are halved. From memory it's something to do with how the game clock speed was tied to animations.

I'd be interested to see if that glitch carries over to the PS4 and XBO versions. As far as I know it's not fixed still, but maybe scholar of the first sin may finally address it?

Pity really as it's very nice in 60fps.

[Pointy Cat]

Dark Souls 2 is the easiest Souls game there is so that was hardly a problem.

[lestat]

http://m.au.ign.com/articles/2015/03/26 ... ne-lost-me" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Press meltdowns.

[flipswitch]

Played 3 hrs last night, fought and defeated 2 bosses, one which took my like 10 times to defeat but man was I relieved when I completed it.

[MiNiStRy]

There is one wooden shield in the game that can help at times but really you need to focus on your dodging skills more. Had a play through yesterday and managed to get two bosses down. But damn this game is hard! Would really like to team up with a couple ranchers for some co op play so if you see me online shoot me a invite.

[GameHED]

I like hearing impressions about how people die. Seriously, today's games are so dumbed down. Let this one be for hardcore gamers and buy it to show support for good games. I think From Software should release a similar series to these games which is deep but everything moves slower. In the elder scrolls games I remember you could always set the speed of combat to give you enough time to think, then as you got better you could put combat speed up.

I think the key is using dodge to move your guy around as opposed to block everything then strike. (eurogamer impression mentions this so if you are playing this like DS, you are doing it wrong - you are pressing the attack more) In monster hunter I use the sword and shield weapon and dodge canceling is my way to move around a monsters vulnerable points since I have such short range and needing to take advantage of invincibility frames to go through a monster's wide sweeping attacks to maintain the combo. It seems like this game is more loose and the gun is your 'parry'. Just give it time, you will learn as you go. Think of a fencer with fancy footwork as opposed to a guy with a big sword. The parry in fencing requires more skill than blocking but lets you attack more often so you get the job done quick and can move to the next enemy rather than waste time. Does Batman use a shield? You are Batman not Captain America.

As for graphics: the From software games have never been about graphics. I wish these guys would make vita rpg like the old Kings Field games (I like the first person perspective because indoor areas are more suitable plus its more immersive. You can't just see monsters automatically you have to turn to face the direction first and at close range they look scary. You don't get that feeling when in third person view because you are zoomed out. Games that are dark need to scare the shit out of you and if they can't surprise you by appearing from out of nowhere you lose some of the fear you are supposed to feel if you encounter one)

[GameHED]

http://m.au.ign.com/articles/2015/03/26 ... ne-lost-me

Press meltdowns.

That is just a impression from a noob. The disclaimer at the start is preemptive damage control to prevent people who know what to expect from this game from refusing to go to ign anymore:

Keep in mind that if you already know how to play a Souls-style game, my experience as a new player probably won’t relate to you – and I have no intention of convincing you that you don’t actually like it as much as you think you do. You definitely like it exactly as much as you think you do.

This is why I hope the sales of the games are not too good. Why? it will fall under the "resident evil effect" where if a series gets too popular, the developers may try to dumb it down to get more sales instead of catering to the devoted smaller audience. Like when metal bands stop doing metal and try to go mainstream to get more money but its not as good. Remember the gaming press thinks "gamers are dead" because we are misogynistic and don't deserve attention from game developers and they hope 5 year old little girls become the main audience instead of adult man-children who are overweight and have no social life and eat pizza and coke and didn't like the Wii with waggle controller because it makes them too tired to play. Maybe the DS games with violence and dark themes are supposed to scare away the non-gamers and fake gamers who want gaming to be junk food entertainment with garbage shallow play mechanics so that your half blind grandmother and retard pc gamer can also play.

Perhaps they are designed to piss off ign since these guys are not even core gamers imo. (that does not mean we like shit graphics and unpolished visuals. We just think this is secondary to the gameplay and since this is a jrpg that doesn't have happy anime styled toon shaded cartoon environments it gets special attention) If IGN are going to write an article like that it says more about them than it does about the game. (ie gaming being too mainstream now and having to be relevent to non-gaming audience (eg feminists who have infiltrated our hobby to teach us men to use our tax money to give them jobs in the game industry so they can boss us around and put ugly women in fantasy games) to get attention from the press)
And yes I know its opinion from one guy at the site, but for that opinion to be let out on the site it shows they are aiming for non-gamers to click on articles and make money off that audience too. (making the whole site less focused and more generic in content. Instead of being gaming only website it wants to appease as many people as possible and becomes diluted)

In the old days when a game was hard you would not complain (unless it was unfair due to bugs/glitches and not actually intended by design to be that way due to poor play testing) but instead you'd just practice until you got good enough to see the next level, and then rewarded with new content.

Today if a game is not loaded with checkpoints everywhere we think that is not fair. It's made us softer and you can see it in games like gta 5 where you can skip the game after you fail a certain number of times. This is what happens when a series gets too mainstream. The non-gamers try to change things so that they always win even if they lack the skill or time to practice to develop the skill in order to progress.

My solution is they make a seperate series related to the DS games aimed at noobs on portables where speed is slow but maintain depth. These are like the training wheels on a bicycle for those who like the style of these games but aren't good enough yet. The money they make from the easy games funds the hardcore stuff. Instead of existing series games being dumbed down and suffering from the "resident evil efffect". Nintendo has the mario series for instance and those games require skill to progress if you wish to see it all. But they also have stuff like kirby for those who want an easy platform game experience which has different physics.

The last thing I want is to be told to do it again and again and again, until it loses all meaning. As a new, inexperienced player, that’s exactly what Bloodborne does: it takes the achievement of killing a big group of evil villagers or a couple of werewolves and reduces it to tedium by making me kill those exact same enemies so many times it becomes more chore than challenge.

every single game suffers from that. Any zombie shooter, jrpg that involves grinding, mmo (farming materials) even driving sims where you race around a track to earn points to progress and get better lap times. Dynasty Warrior games take that to an extreme. I've noticed western gamers think shooters are immune to repetition but not beat em ups or hack n slash games.

It's like they are racist cunts.
Call Of Duty - automatic 10/10 The best game ever.

God Hand 3 out of 10 "Awful".
http://au.ign.com/games/god-hand/ps2-822478" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I'm calling this site out for worst review site ever.
God Hand ign review killed clover studio
http://www.lesmocon.com/2013/11/the-wor ... -hand.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[t0mby]

This is why I hope the sales of the games are not too good. Why? it will fall under the "resident evil effect" where if a series gets too popular, the developers may try to dumb it down to get more sales instead of catering to the devoted smaller audience

I think publishers are starting to notice the decline in sales when they start making sequels more accessible to reach a wider audience. Look at Dead Space for example.