I’ve lost count of all the times I’ve walked into one of the living rooms and found one of my three roommates playing either Dark Souls or Bloodborne. Steve played through every Japanesy nook and cranny of Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice when it first came out. And for a while there he was giving Dark Souls II a fresh run through even though-and I can’t stress this enough-he HATES this game. I’ve seen the two words “YOU DIED” pop up on screen close to a hundred times it feels like. And yet, out of all those times, I only had the controller in my hand for a handful of them. But why?
From Software games are notorious for one thing: they’re fucking hard. You will die. A lot. They’re not power fantasies. Every protagonist in From Software games are-in some shape or form-diseased and weak, to outright crippled. It’s the player’s job to claw their way up out of the bottom of the food chain while fighting through monstrosity after monstrosity. From Software games do not hold your hand. The frustration is real. Sometimes the difference between a successful dodge and parry can come down to microseconds. The challenge is on a whole other level. I’ve never seen Steve angrier than when he’s struggling against a boss, only for his internal switch to flip to elation when he finally slays his prey. The euphoria is also real. I experienced it once.
There is no game on Earth that Steve wants to get me more into than Bloodborne. In Bloodborne you play as a Hunter who is searching through the gothic, monster-filled world of Yarnham for some mysterious cure to…something. You fight zombies and werewolves and zombie werewolves. On the first level, there’s this boss-nicknamed Papa G-who’s an infected werewolf hunter. The boss fight happens in stages. First he shoots you, slashes at you with his weapon. Once you do enough damage, he transforms into his werewolf form and will kill you in two-to-three hits with his claws if you’re not on the ball.
Well, I wasn’t on the ball. For a looooooooong time. I died. Again. And again. Steve has a whole video on it, showing every time Papa G killed me. I can’t stress how frustrated I became. I felt like I was only getting worse with each new attempt.
In the end, it all came down to a single bullet. I had Papa G down to a sliver of health, but there was no way I’d be able to get close to him in his wolf form without him slashing me to death…But then I remembered something.
I had a gun.
So I just shot him.
And I won.
“PREY SLAUGHTERED”
I remember staring at these two words on the screen for maybe a full minute. I vaguely recall Steve talking, probably congratulating me, telling me where to go next so that we could move on to the next stage of the game. And I remember just feeling…tired. Mildly relieved also, sure, but there was also a sense of dread. And sure enough, I ventured through the door that Papa G had been guarding and there it was: a new level of Yarnham to try and memorize, enemies to either avoid or farm for experience, items to search for so that I could upgrade my equipment and weapons so that I could go off and kill my next prey and…
And a week went by after I killed Papa G. I tried to kill the next boss (the Blood-starved Beast), kept failing, so I took a break. Another week passed. And then a month. As far as gaming goes, I’m terrible at retaining controls. If I go to long without playing my muscle memory will wither away to nothing, leaving me scratching my head as to what button does what. And From Software games absolutely necessitate muscle memory. To know what to do, how to counter an enemy, without thinking because in that split second you take to think: “YOU DIED”
It does make me a bit sad. I’m sure if my 10-year old self walked into my house right now, saw all the videogames and consoles we had, he’d absolutely lose his shit and likely’d never want to sleep. And maybe that’s what it is. The guys grew up with From Software games. All I had growing up was a beat up Gameboy with a couple of Pokémon games. It’s the kid in them that hungers for the challenge. And I’m not going to say that the games aren’t great. The graphics for Bloodborne and Sekiro are literal art, and every writer should take notes on the world building that exists in each and every one of these games. I know I’ve sat down to watch videos on Bloodborne’s lore more than once. These worlds are nihilistic and monstrous. And I’ve watched Steve venture through these worlds wearing countless different (usually ridiculous, Benjamin Franklin-looking) faces, wielding various different weapons and sometimes no weapons at all. The one thing I respect about Steve more than anything else is how he’s constantly looking to challenge himself. To inhibit himself with a ridiculous handicap and still win, all so that he can say that he did.
I’m not one of those gamers that complain about a game being too hard. People who do this just wanna place blame on others for their own limitations. Anybody can beat a From Software game. If you WANT it enough. If you put the time in. It’s said that you need to put at least a thousand hours into something so as to master it, and gaming’s no different. Steve and the guys breathe these worlds. To them they’ve become terrifying, fatalistic homes away from home, but homes nonetheless.
And, for now, I’m content to be that curious neighbor who pops his head into the living room whenever Steve’s angry-whispering at the TV, “FUCKING asshole-I call bullshit, I totally dodged that shit-Fuck you, Dark Souls II. You piece of shit game, nobody even likes you. Fuck you, Dennis!”
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