[IGN ARTICLE] HOW AND WHY BLOODBORNE LOST ME - (This is not the review)

[Groundking]

arcaneguyver said:

His experienceece echoes mine, though I've only managed to put in a few hours thus far and haven't managed to reach the first boss yet. I'm not a patient sort, dislike it when games don't explain the basics, and outright hate antagonistic or obtuse design. I also have a tendency to want to save all the monies and do things perfect in one shot. Starting with no gear and a few instruction manual fragments just pissed me off. After that. I kept bashing my head against a wall for a bit there, usually dying to mobs or the big axe guy while trying to explore. The game never mentioned when the house in the dream had opened up or why. Is this actually an RPG? If so, I'm not gaining XP or otherwise leveling up. My weapons getting worse and worse, and I don't know where to repair it. How is everyone else getting anywhere in this mess? Have I devolved into a filthy casual and need to just leave the hobby entirely?

My second sit-down with the game went better, and I now feel as if I have a foothold in the game and can progress. Finding out basic shit like "repair weapons here" via the internet is frustrating, and having to unlock fundamental aspects of the game like leveling up (or apparently the dream house) seems like pure dickhead design choices. I am enjoying the gameplay and atmosphere / setting, though. My takeaway thus far is, Bloodborne is cool and challenging enough that the initial gauntlet will only limit its audience unnecessarily.

it's a game that brutally punishes piss poor exploration, yet massively rewards good exploration and thinking, the first thing you should do in the souls games in any new area is examine and explore every nook and crany, and I'm assuming that if you got you're weapon in the dreamworld bit then you should have explored and found the bottomless box, the alter and the crafting bench and whatnot, otherwise you're just playing stupidly, when you're playing a game renown for not telling you shit and you don't explore things to find out stuff. It's not bad game design, it's fantastic game design.

Articles like this just make me think that gaming has pussied out far far too much, to the point where people need everything explained to them in babies terms, the souls games aren't hard games, in fact I'd say for the most part they're fairly easy, as you can get ridiculously op shit in them, it's just the games are like a super strict headmaster, he will give you the world if you're good and not making mistakes, but you're going  to be harshly punished if you do make a mistake. Also, whilst I've not picked up the game yet, from what I've seen it looks no where near as punishing as Demons' or Dark 1.