Titan Souls (PS4 Review)

You know what I love? Wendy’s. I unabashedly love it. I go there once a week and I always order the same thing: a double hot and juicy with no pickles. I love pickles too but that’s neither here nor there, folks. The fact of the matter is that it’s like a ritual for me. I love every aspect of it, including the drive there. Now what if there was some sort of horrid rule enforced on my weekly Wendy’s - say some type of obstacle. Let’s just say for the sake of this analogy I’m bumbling through here that I had to drive to Wendy’s while balancing a grain of rice on a tooth pick. For every time that I drop the grain of rice, my car is towed back at my house and my dashboard reads, “Fat chance, motherfucker! Do it again!” Eventually, I’d begin to question if the classic double was really worth it. Years later I would be found shambling around the parking lot of a Burger King, a shell of myself, talking to the french fry-laden bushes about bush stuff.

Titan Souls is sort of like this experience for me. It combines things that I love and does them in a way that feels like you’re part of some Soviet Union gymnastics team. Delineation to pattern is taboo, and while some of the one-shot-kill titans can allow a bit of mobility, the fights are either won in seconds or lost in seconds. Any fight that lasts longer than 10 seconds is just…no. It’s boring, you’re doing it wrong, you’ll probably die eventually, should I die? Should I just run into the boss and die? Sploot. Dead. Great.

Now instead of just letting you respawn outside the boss room or in the room itself, you have to run back to the boss room, which can take a few seconds but BELIEVE me when I say that this starts to feel like you’re slamming your dick into a car door repeatedly by the sixth fucking time, because the world is so vapid and bland that you hate, hate, HATE walking through it. It’s a critical problem with Titan Souls, because somewhere in between mixing Dark Souls, Shadow of the Colossus, and Zelda, the game stripped away not only the fun parts, but practically anything of praise. It’s woefully short, there’s no upgrade system or variety to the encounters, the world is more empty than Shadow of the Colossus (how the hell was this even possible?), and the fights are so short-lived that they leave no impression at all.

If this was maybe $5, I could possibly make some sort of case for trying it. It plays fine? It didn’t crash? The music is pretty? There’s clearly ideas in here worth exploring further but it’s just so far beyond dead in this iteration that I find it hard to give it any sort of praise, let alone recommendation. Just play Shovel Knight or Bastion or Axiom Verge. Do not pay $15 for this.

Grade: D

Bloodborne (PS4 Review)

After the mildly disappointing sequel to Dark Souls, it was seeming like maybe, just maybe, the Souls series could be heading into a slump. Combat was becoming a routine and players could easily best several of Dark Souls II's challenges by exercising a little bit of patience. While the sequel was admirable it lost a part of its appeal. It's great to see that director Hidetaka Miyazaki anticipated monotony. It's an increasingly difficult quality to find a developer that can embrace change while still working much of its core design into the fabric of what made a game laudable. Bloodborne adapts so well to a faster play style that it feels like a rebirth for the series.

Bloodborne is a big deal to Sony, which would worry anyone that’s a fan of Dark Souls and Demon’s Souls. While that might seem like it would be the kind of indication that the game would pull back the challenge and open the accessibility to new players in order to entice sales, the fact still stands that it's going to punish you until you decide to play it smart or play it well. The game still offers many ways to assist players with its challenges and it's always encouraged that new players play the game online so that they can take advantage of the messaging system which has been integral to the design of the Souls series. The community aspect to any of the Souls games is a large part of my reverence for it. A strong, simultaneous player base makes the world feel all the more accessible. You’ll always find players leaving helpful notes pertaining advice, emotions, humor, discoveries, warnings, and directions.

The combat is quicker than its predecessors and as a direct result far more enjoyable. By throwing out shields and adding better evasion, the encounters are frantic and fun. Still, even with the additional speed and focus shifted more toward the offensive, it feels comparable to the first Dark Souls in difficulty. Players will still make decisions based on enemy behavior and positioning is critical. You'll be faced with a few urgent choices that can make a great deal of difference.

The story and the environments remain consistently nebulous and macabre. NPC’s seldom speak clearly and even the more cryptic characters you’ll meet are voiced so exceptionally well that you’ll listen to whatever they have to say. Branchlike paths in the game are either hidden, requiring an undisclosed means to unlock them, or guarded by bosses. There’s blatant inspirations to classical horror, weaving effortlessly through the minds of Bram Stoker, HP Lovecraft, and Stephen King. It’s one of the most bizarre and fascinating aspects of Bloodborne how logical this nightmarish world feels as you progress through various locations, many of which feed into prior locations. In my first play through (which took roughly 27 hours) I missed two bosses, two regions of the world, and had barely scraped the surface of Bloodborne’s chalice dungeons. There’s genuine moments of trepidation, triumph, and discovery with each successive experience sinking its hooks in deeper. If you go in unspoiled, you’ll find small passages and items that access enormous optional areas. You’ll trigger strange, new events to occur by talking with NPC’s. The less you know about Bloodborne going in is directly proportionate to the quality of experience you’ll get out of it. I believe that all of the Souls game share one irrefutable quality: the more you persevere by your own merit the more you’ll fall in love with it.

The worst part about Bloodborne is its invasion feature. Paired with the faster gameplay and the amount of healing items that can be carried at a single time, invasions can go on for longer than they reasonably should and none of it is fun. It’s worth noting that being invaded is uncommon, as most areas appear to disable it. In my entire play through I was invaded only once. Subsequent experience being the invader proved that the system wasn’t something thought out as thoroughly as the rest of the game.

There’s a lot to say about Bloodborne but I feel it’s best left for players to dig into some of the more obscure yet deliberate design choices for themselves. It’s the most fun I’ve had with a Souls game. Despite its changes the series continues to be uncompromising in execution. The challenges that await veterans and newcomers are impressive feats in game design, providing constant memorable moments from start to finish. If there’s any question right now as to whether this console generation has anything that could be considered a worthwhile exclusive, Bloodborne is at the very top of that list.

Grade: A