Death Stranding (2019): What We Were Meant To Be

"Once there was an explosion, a bang that gave birth to time and space. Once there was an explosion, a bang that sent a planet spinning in that space. Once there was an explosion, a bang that gave rise to life as we know it... And then came the next explosion. An explosion that will be our last"

Hideo Kojima is a man known for creating the Metal Gear Solid series. He usually has complex, amazing and convoluted/confusing stories, with great attention to detail, groundbreaking gameplay, and long movie-like cutscenes. If you look for almost every top game in a console, Metal Gear will come up at least once. Personally, I have played almost every game he has made since 2000, which means I have played his games for 20 years, most of them having as a main character Solid Snake, this larger-than-life spy/soldier/action hero who likes to smoke and hide in carton boxes. Solid Snake is an icon and Kojima has made his name resonate in the gaming and non-gaming community for creating videogames and his peculiar persona. Death Stranding is the last game developed by him, following his controversial departure from Konami Productions after the company cancelled a new Silent Hill game called Silent Hills in which he was working with film director Guillermo del Toro and The Walking Dead actor Norman Reedus.

Before working without Konami's involvement in his already existent Kojima Productions, Hideo Kojima still being part of Konami released Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes (2014), P.T. (2014) and Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (2015). The first one serving as the prologue chapter to The Phantom Pain. The Phantom Pain received critical acclaim for its gameplay and story, however many detractors felt that the game was not a finished product, because the second half of the game had re-used content from previous missions and the story left many loose ends that never got resolved. In addition, P.T. served as a demo for the cancelled horror game Silent Hills. P.T. also received critical acclaim and created high expectations for the potential upcoming Silent Hill, which we all know never came to light. Moreover, Konami after releasing an allegedly unfinished game (The Phantom Pain) and cancelling Silent Hills, plus the internal issues Hideo Kojima was having with some people inside the company made the designer to quit and focus on Kojima Productions. So, after all of that shitstorm he started working on his new game, Death Stranding. 

In DS you play as Sam Porter Bridges, a delivery man who is tasked with reconnecting a wireless communication network in the United States known as "Chiral Network" after an extinction event called Death Stranding, which decimated most of the world and ominous creatures from another dimension called BTs (Beached Things) started roaming the planet. You main goal is to deliver cargo and unite the country.

DS has a total 70 main missions/orders, while the side quests or standard orders are close to 500 (I think. I can't really confirm this). The game is divided in a prologue, and 15 episodes (number 15 not being a "real" chapter):

- Prologue: Porter

- Episode 1: Bridget

- Episode 2: Amelie

- Episode 3: Fragile

- Episode 4: Unger

- Episode 5: Mama

- Episode 6: Deadman

- Episode 7: Clifford

- Episode 8: Heartman

- Episode 9: Higgs

- Episode 10: Die-Hardman

- Episode 11: Clifford Unger

- Episode 12: Bridges

- Episode 13: Sam Strand

- Episode 14: Lou

- Episode 15: Tomorrow is in your hands

Before going deeper into the mechanics and plot I think I need to give some terminology for most of the things that are present in the game:

- Death Stranding: A cataclysmic event which created creatures known as BTs (Beached Things).

- Beached Things: Creatures that come from the Beach. BTs are invisible, but thanks to a special scanner they can be seen; they look like shadowy figures connected with an umbilical cord and consume life. After consuming people, the dead necrotize.

- Beach: A place that is between life and death and where BTs come from. Beaches are unique to every living person.

- Odradek: A scanner that helps you detect BTs, analyze the terrain and objects.

- Necrotization: Process that make the dead explode, creating voidouts.

- Voidouts: Explotions produced by the dead when they start to rot. Where a voidout takes place nothing survives and all that's left is just a big crater.

- Timefall: Rain produced by BTs. Whether it's rain or snow, Timefall ages and deteriorates whatever it touches.

- Bridges:  Company Sam works for.

- Knot Cities: Surviving colonies after the Death Stranding.

- United Cities of America (UCA.): Name the United States of America has now.

- Bridge Baby (BB): A premature baby that is a link between life and death. A BB is stored in a pod, and can help people to sense the presence of nearby BTs. 

- DOOMS: Supernatural abilities that allow people to sense, see or control BTs.

- Repatriate: People who can return from death. Our main character is a repatriate, therefore if he dies, he can come back to life.

- The Seam: Underwater world that is between the world of the living and the Beach.

- Chiral Network: A wireless communication system.

- MULEs: Terrorists who are obsessed with cargo, and steal what you carry.

- Extinction Entity (EE): Creatures who bring an extinction event.

- Cryptobiotes: Worm-like creatures that when consumed restore your blood levels. They usually appear in places where you pee (yes, peeing is a mechanic).

- Ka: Named given to the physical body in DS.

- Ha: Named given to the soul in DS.

So, what is Death Stranding? DS is defined by Kojima as the first "strand type game", and it might be a new video game genre since he was one of the founding fathers of the stealth game genre with the Metal Gear Solid series and it wasn't after a few years of being released that it received the "stealth" tag. But, what is a Strand Game?

First of all, the gameplay is pretty much like this:

- Hologram of a character tells you to deliver a certain cargo from point A to B and connect the Chiral Network.

- You order your cargo and objects before starting your travel.

- You start walking.

- You encounter BTs or MULEs and you fight or avoid them.

- You keep walking, climbing, and tripping over.

- You get to the destination.

- You deliver the cargo and connect the Chiral Network.

- Repeat.

As you advance, you access to new areas and produce new items with a Portable Chiral Constructor (PCC), this sort of 3D printer that allows you to construct structures likes bridges, generators, etc. The Chiral Nerwork is the basis for this new "asynchronous online multiplayer" which let other players help you by leaving supplies, structures and messages. Structures will eventually be destroyed thanks to the Timefall though. So, it is a single player video game and you never encounter other players directly, but you are never really alone. DS is a game based on kindness and being helpful to others.

When you finish an order you are evaluated, and your performance is rated by likes (similar to social networks likes). If you deliver a cargo in optimal conditions, the better, because you can level up, and in turn you improve your stability and weight capacity to carry more things. Remember that depending on how you order and pack your cargo, the way you move is greatly affected; if you have a messy order of your cargo, the easier will be for you to trip and fall.

DS has been mockingly called a "walking simulator game" or  "the first delivery game" (the last one labelled by myself), and it's not far from the reality. I have had a really frustrating and tedious time playing it. The fact that the landscape, despite being beautiful is hard to walk on, climb on or to do basically anything is challenging. Even if you walk you can trip over and your cargo falls and you fuck everything up. If you fall too much or fall from a really high place you can destroy the cargo and fail the order. If you have vehicles, then you encounter rocky places in which said vehicle doesn't work at all. The greatest enemy in the game is nature, since Timefall can destroy your cargo, or rocks make you trip over. Moreover, the encounters with BTs and MULEs are a nuisance and are not as epic as they should have been. Boss fights are really simple as well, which is weird for a Kojima game, since he often puts a lot of detail to enemies and their Artificial Intelligence. The bosses are these menacing tar-made Lovecraftian-like creatures, but they do not do much. You just throw them a hematic grenade (special grenade made of your own blood) or shoot until they are done for. Additionally, taking care of BB is really important since if BB is stressed it will eventually shut down and it won't detect nearby BTs. You have to handle it with care like a good dad takes cares of his baby.

Another big issue I had with the game is the really slow beginning, because the game really starts after like 10-15 hours of a 40-50 hours of total gameplay. I felt the same way with The Phantom Pain, which with DS are the two games I have less enjoyed from Hideo Kojima. I don't like them that much for different reasons. The Phantom Pain had amazing gameplay, epic movie-like moments, spectacular attention to detail, very good programming, but it lacked a focus on the story, the shocking and unnecessary twist and the fact that it was allegedly (I'd say literally) incomplete. DS has most of the time a really good attention to detail, specifically how Sam moves and reacts, the cutscenes, music, and insane plot, but the gameplay, which should be the main focus of a video game is not for everybody, it was not for me and I have played many, many games in my life. I literally bought a PS4 BECAUSE of DS, and waited three years for the release and it was not the game I thought it was going to be. Many loved it because of the same reason; because it was original, unique, different and it is... However, delivering stuff with relatively simple enemies in a boring walking simulator with frustrating environment did not make me have a good time. Kojima wanted to unite people through DS, and the only thing that happened is people praising Kojima and others calling him a hack. I am kind of in the middle, however what I really enjoyed of this game was the plot, which as crazy as it is, it tells a story of bonding and humanity.

The characters in DS are:

Sam Porter Bridges (Norman Reedus): He is our main character. Sam is a delivery man who suffers from haphephobia (fear of touching or being touched) and has a mysterious past. The only thing we know at the beginning is that he is the adoptive son of Bridget Strand and step-brother of Amelie Strand. Sam has DOOMS and can sense BTs and also a repatriate, which means he can come back from the land of the dead. He also likes to drink Monster Energy.

Fragile (Léa Seydoux): Woman whom Sam encounters and starts a friendship with. Fragile works in a company called Fragile Express. Her body looks really aged except for her face, due to Timefall. She can jump through space and has history with Higgs Monaghan, whom she despises. 

Deadman (Guillermo del Toro/Jesse Corti): A doctor from Bridges. He is really interested in BBs and becomes Sam's friend. He is surrounded by secrets until he reveals his origin. 

Heartman (Nicolas Winding Refn/Darren Jacobs): A man who dies every 21 minutes. When he dies, he visits the Beach to investigate and look for this dead wife and daughter and know more about the Death Stranding. He usually gives you thumbs up and likes. Since he dies a lot and has a short amount of time in our world, he has TV series, stories, and music that can be enjoyed in 21 minutes or less.

Bridget Strand (Lindsay Wagner/Emily O'Brien): Sam's adoptive mother and United Cities of America's president. She has cancer and dies at the beginning of the game, not before giving Sam the mission to unite the country to give humanity hope.

Samantha America Strand aka Amelie (Lindsay Wagner/Emily O'Brien): Sam's step-sister. After her mother Bridget dies, she becomes the new UCA president. She has been captured by the terrorist group Homo Demens, and as Sam reconnects the country, he also has to save her.

Die-Hardman (Tommie Earl Jenkins): Director of Bridges and Sam's former boss. He is the one who is in charge after Amelie's abduction and gives Sam orders and guides him. 

Mama aka Målingen (Margaret Qualley): Another member of Bridges. Mama is linked to her baby BT and has a twin sister called Lockne.

Lockne (Margaret Qualley): Mountain Knot City's overseer and Mama's twin sister.

Higgs Monaghan (Troy Baker): Leader of the terrorist group Homo Demens and one of the main antagonists of the game. He is a cruel and relentless man who wants to bring the end of everything. He has supernatural abilities such as chiralium, BT and weather control, teleportation, telekinesis, among many others. He wears a golden mask and has his own pod with an obscure creature resembling a BB. He calls himself  "The Particle of God that Permeates All Existence" and usually breaks the fourth wall and sees everything as a game.

Clifford Unger (Mads Mikkelsen): A mysterious soldier nicknamed "combat veteran" who has control of other BTs in a war-like Beach. He is another of the antagonists of the game and wants BB at all costs. He likes to smoke while commanding his forces against Sam.

DS offers almost a 12 hour movie, which I think should have worked better as an interactive movie than this new "strand type game". Perhaps going in the same line as David Cage's videogames like Beyond: Two Souls (2013) or Detroit: Become Human (2018) would have been better to explore in depth the themes DS tackles and enjoy the story even more.

Strand is defined by Merriam Webster as:

1. The land bordering a body of water.

2. To leave in a strange or an unfavorable place especially without funds or means to depart.

3. Fibers or filaments twisted, plaited, or laid parallel to form a unit for further twisting or plaiting into yarn, thread, rope, or cordage.

And the meaning of strand varies in the game as well. There are many themes throughout the story which I am going to write about in here, but first I want to talk about the bad aspects of the story. Is DS style-over-substance? First of all, I think Kojima needs an editor or someone to check on him, because he uses way too much exposition; every character explain things like three times, and talk way too much when there's no need to. Moreover, the dialogue can be wacky and outright ridiculous, and there's a lot of tears involved, but this also happened with the Metal Gear Solid series as well. It's part of the charm perhaps, but the over-the-top and unrealistic moments are many, and the plot can be polished, however, despite all of that I felt things while watching the plot unravel. If a video game makes me feel different emotions I believe it accomplished something.

Regarding the good aspects of the plot, it has many funny and sad moments, there are horror and action elements as well in this sci-fi post-apocalyptic tale about a broken man trying to reconnect with his own humanity. Sam is a man haunted by his past; he has no connections and is given the task to unite a country that he doesn't really care about. "Build bridges, not walls" is a phrase that I have read somewhere, and DS is all about bonding, about building thing to connect people, not divide them. Metal Gear Solid has themes about genes, DNA and leaving a legacy along with many father-son issues and he has said is it his way of coping with the loss of his father when he was young. While making DS his mother passed sadly passed away so the theme of connecting is important, since he wants to reconnect with the dead, the people he wishes were here with him, but cannot reach no matter how hard he tries. DS tells us that even after death, the ones we love are always with us. We create bonds with people we meet in our lives and those people will always be with us, no matter how much we grow up and change. Moreover, the themes of nihilism and pessimism are present as well, especially in characters like Higgs, who literally wants to bring an extinction event wiping out everything, because we are living in borrowed times and Apocalypse will reach us sooner or later, so he prefers sooner. 

In addition, DS questions us about themes that games likes NieR: Automata (2017) have done before: How do we live after the world ended? Trying to find meaning in a world after it ended always lead to this unnerving feeling of hopelessness and sorrow. After the Death Stranding lives changed for the worse and many people suffered, including our main character Sam, who becomes this bitter, misanthropic, angry, sad person whom, by meeting new people and having new experiences, starts to see life in another light.

How do we keep going after we've lost everything? Sam has to suffer through a rain that ages, monsters, dying over and over again, terrorists, and many other perils while being haunted by his memories throughout this 40-something hour gameplay. It is a very long walk externally, but also internally, since the more he keeps delivering things, the more he changes. Why? Because he gets to interact with other people, and despite suffering haphephobia he tries his best to bond with others and establish relationships. 

Is this 12 hour movie perfect? No, but it offers many great characters, with amazing backstories like Cliff Unger. Mads Mikkelsen offers another one of his great villains to his long list of stellar characters with this mysterious supernatural soldier. My favorite moments are with him on the screen. I love Mama as well and her tragic backstory, and to be fair there aren't characters I despised. All of them offer something nice to enrich the plot.

Also, the beautiful landscape offers a nice view. Some of the places you visit are very green, others look like Mars, or totally buried in snow, among the futuristic facilities you visit in each delivery. You are alone, but never lonely in these breathtaking terrains. Additionally, the score and OST are really good and my only real complaint about it is that you can't listen to the songs by choice as you did in The Phantom Pain. At the end I'll leave a link to the song Ludens by the British band Bring Me The Horizon.

"From Sapiens to Ludens" is the moto of Kojima Productions. The word Ludens is taken from the 1938 book called Homo Ludens written by Johan Huizinga. We are humans that think and feel, but playing is also part of us. Perhaps we, Homo Sapiens (people with wisdom), are becoming Homo Ludens (people who play) and with this are creating connections. People tend to believe that entertainment divides us, specifically video games, but being on your own in a game with people you have never met can also create good memories. DS tries to unite us with its absolutely batshit crazy story, in which the final scene will be in my memory for years to come.

Is Death Stranding "A Hideo Kojima Game"? Absolutely. Can it be better? Yes, it can. Death Stranding is an ambitious experiment that might not have worked 100%, but the plot and themes it tackles, and the amazing way it presents them is unique and interesting. Death Stranding is a journey about accepting pain and sorrow, connecting to the ones you love and believing again in humanity through the eyes of Norman Reedus and his funky fetus  a delivery man and his weird cute baby. We hate, we love, we suffer, we laugh.. And as Sam, if we let people in, we can change for the better, because we need to... What else is there to do? In Death Stranding and life at the end of the day all we have in a hopeless world... is hope.

Spec Ops: The Line (2012): Liberate Te Ex Inferis

"If you were a better person, you wouldn't be here"

Spec Ops: The Line (2012) is a third-person shoot video game developed by the studio Yager Development and published by 2K Games. The game is available for Microsoft Windows, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. The title serves as a reboot of the Spec Ops franchise.

The game tells the story of Captain Martin Walker and his Delta Force unit in Dubai during a sandstorm crisis. A lot of civilians were abandoned inside the city by their leaders and Colonel John Konrad and his 33rd Infantry Batallion of the United States Army went to help survivors escape, but failed. He and his men then stablished martial law in an attempt to keep peace inside the city while the storms intensified, but the situation went awry as Konrad's men started committing crimes against the people. Moreover, the CIA sent a black ops team and armed civilians against Konrad and his forces and, as expected, things got even worse, but soon the events led to a ceasefire. After that, Konrad tried to lead survivors out of the city, but ultimately failed and sent a transmission for help. Then, the United States Army decided to send a Delta Force team lead by Captain Martin Walker, accompanied by Lieutenant Adams and Sergeant Lugo, to Dubai in order to rescue the surviving civilians and figure out what's really going on with Konrad and his men.

Our main characters are:

- Captain Martin Walker (voice by Nolan North): He is a member of the United States Army's Delta Force. He is the main character and the person the player controls throughout the game. He has a strong sense of loyalty towards Colonel Konrad and wants to find him no matter what.

- Lieutenant Alphonso Adams (voiced by Christopher Reid): He is another member of Walker's Delta squad. He is the heavy gunner of the team.

- Sergeant John Lugo (voiced by Omid Abtahi): He is the third and last member of Walker's unit. He is a remarkable marksman and the medic of the group. He often discusses with Walker and Adams over decisions made on the battlefield.

- Colonel John Konrad (voiced by Bruce Voxleitner): He is the commander of the 33rd Infantry Battalion. He offered to help in the Dubai situation, but everything went south and is viewed as a traitor by the United States for disobeying orders.

In Spec Ops: The Line you control Walker and you have to kill your enemies by using a variety of weapons such as rifles, hand guns, grenades, and so on and so forth, very similar to the Call Of Duty series. You can also guide the other characters, Adams and Lugo, to kill enemies or cure injuries. Moreover, even sand can be used to exterminate your enemies.

The gameplay for me is not that good, and it can be kind of "clunky", but it is "entertaining", and the graphics look a bit outdated, which is weird for a 2012 game, but it was not created by a big company, so it is understandable. The strong points of this shooter are the complex plot and themes it tackles.

The OST composed by Elia Cmíral is amazing and haunting, because for every memorable scene, there is the incredible metal/rock-driven background music accompanying it. I leave at the ending of this review a video with one of the songs.

When you begin playing SO:TL you hope to find a very entertaining shooting game in which you kill bad people and call it a day, but it's not. The more you play, the more you realize that war is indeed hell. SO:TL puts you in morally ambiguous situations in which you have to choose between doing something bad and something horrible. In addition, as the game progresses, your characters start slowly losing their minds and becoming more unstable, specially Captain Walker as he becomes more violent and cruel in his dialogues and killings and hallucinates some pretty messed up stuff. Also, the previously mentioned moral decisions you make lead you to four different endings.

The breaking of the fourth wall is another important topic to talk about, since the player is challenged by the game, and asking us if we enjoy killing. Is a war game supposed to be fun? Why do we find killing entertaining? Games were originally created to pass time and have fun, nowadays, they make us face reality even harder than real life itself and SO:TL is no stranger to this. It comes to my mind the infamous "No Russian" level in Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009) in which you are an undercover CIA agent working with Russian terrorists and you start a mass shooting inside an American airport , murdering men, women and children. The level was very controversial at the time and still is to this day for having you play as a terrorist in a videogame. SO:TL takes that level to eleven by putting you in very similar situations many times, and those affect your characters' psyche, and even the loading screen addresses you, the player, to make you understand that what you do is evil.

SO:TL is heavily influenced by the book Heart Of Darkness (1899) by Joseph Conrad and the movie Apocalypse Now (1979) by Francis Ford Coppola (which is loosely based on the novel), and both tackle the psychological effects war has on people and the savageries people commit in such times. On a battlefield you can look into the abyss and it looks back at you, you see "The Heart Of Darkness" and the horrible truth about humanity: We are beyond saving. When someone gets to that point, there is no coming back. There is no glory in killing, no heroes in war, no salvation in hell.

Mixing the action shooter elements from Call Of Duty and the psychological horror from Silent Hill, Spec Ops: The Line offers a statement about war games and war in general, in which you are not a hero, but a broken man haunted with the horrible actions you commit in the name of patriotism and glory and an engaging story full of twists that will keep you playing, even if it means sacrificing your character's sanity to reach an ending.

The Irishman (2019): Gods At Dawn

"I heard you paint houses"

The Irishman (2019) is a crime drama film directed and produced by Martin Scorsese (Taxi Driver, Goodfellas, Gangs Of New York) and written by Steven Zaillian (Schindler's List, American Gangster, Moneyball). Based on the book called I Heard You Paint Houses by Charles Brandt, the film chronicles the life of Frank "The Irishman" Sheeran (Robert De Niro), a truck driver turned hitman and his ties to the Bufalino mafia and his friendship with Jimmy Hoffa.

First of all, I must say that I have watched eleven (twelve if we include this one) movies directed by Scorsese and not once have I hated or disliked one of his films. Some were better than others, but all of them have been enjoyable at the very least, and The Irishman is a new addition to the collection. Martin Scorsese is not my favorite director, but I like his style a lot, however, I prefer his more drama-driven films than the gangster-inspired ones, but this is just a matter of opinion.

The Irishman, as said before, chronicles the life of Frank Sheeran (Robert De Niro) and how he became a hitman working for the gangster Russell Buffalino (Joe Pesci) and Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino). The movie has three timelines that interconnect:

1. Sheeran starting his life of crime.

2. Sheeran traveling to an unknown place with Russell Buffalino and their respective wives.

3. Sheeran in a retirement home talking about his early life to an unseen person.

The characters are really complex and the film shows how complicated their lives are by being involved in the crime underworld:

Frank Sheeran is a World War II veteran who loves his family, but does awful shit to others. Most of his life he was a bad person and it really shows. He loves his daughter Peggy (Lucy Gallina as Young Peggy and Anna Paquin as adult Peggy), but she knows who he really is and loathes him for it. Sheeran is not a good man, never was, and never will be. The Irishman does not try to redeem this character, because there is no way he is going to be anything else than the monster he truly is. De Niro is amazing as usual, so I have no complaints.

Jimmy Hoffa is a powerful teamster who believes himself to be above others, and in a way, he is. Hoffa has all the power and he is a really, really dangerous man. He shows a caring and kind side to the people, and the other side that plots assassinations and frauds is hidden. It is no secret that the real Hoffa was never found, so this movie shows an interesting take of his persona. Al Pacino as Hoffa is excellent and working with De Niro, Pesci and Scorsese, his acting delivers even more than usual.

Russell Buffalino is Frank's friend and the one who guides him into the crime world. Buffalino is relentless, cruel, and does whatever it takes for power. On the outside he tries to look like a normal guy, but Peggy knows who he is as well. Pesci, after being retired for years, still has some juice left. 

Peggy Sheeran is Frank's daughter and she barely speaks in the movie. This has been a very controversial topic, and I do understand where the critics are coming from, because you have Anna Paquin being silent, but I believe acting requires more than saying words. I think Frank is not deserving of Peggy's words.

I think that this movie is an epic crime drama, and its length (209 minutes (almost 3 hours and a half)) can scare anybody away, and there's no way in hell I could have watched this film on a cinema. Some believe that it may have been better for this to be released as a mini-series, and I agree, but Scorsese is running for the Oscars, so he needed the story to be a full-length film. I think that the best way to watch this is to divide it, because not everybody can be sat for 3 hours and a half watching something. If you can, hats off to you.

The photography was very good, and there are many interesting themes the movie tackles, including the usual topics of masculinity that pervade Scorsese's filmography, grey morality, redemption, among others, but also the heavy political background involving presidents Nixon and John F. Kennedy. Another interesting thing was the introductions for each character, which shows when and how every gangster died, meaning we know they die in horrible ways.

Moreover, despite being a mob movie, the violence is not very explicit compared to other movies of the same genre, and it is a slow-driven crime drama, so the lack of gore and the slow pace can be a turn off for a lot of people (not for me though). In addition, the CGI used to make the actors look young is not the best sometimes, but it does not distract you from the story. I also think there were some editing issues, which is not usual in Scorsese's films.

To sum up, The Irishman is an epic mob drama about the life of a criminal and the consequences of his actions. In addition, The Irishman can be seen as a tribute to the gansgter genre and perhaps a swan song to Scorsese, De Niro, Pacino, and Pesci, because it feels like the end of an era, however, if they still make more movies like this I would be glad to watch them, even if I pause them every 30 minutes.

Bloodborne (2015): Waiting For The Sun

“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown”

- H.P. Lovecraft

Bloodborne is an action role-playing/horror game released in 2015. It was developed by FromSoftware and published by Sony Computer Entertainment exclusively for the PlayStation 4. Bloodborne tells the story of a hunter who travels to the city of Yharnam to cure his unknown illness, but inside this gothic/victorian-esque city, he finds people who have been infected with a blood-borne disease (hence the name), turning them into horrific creatures. The more you advance into killing the beasts, the more you unravel the misteries surrounding Yharnam.

Played from a third-person perspective, the player controls a customizable main character with a gameplay focused on an aggressive weapon-based combat and exploration. While you explore Yharnam and its surroundings you encounter a wide arrange of enemies, including lots of bosses. Throughout the story the player can use a variety of weapons such as swords, axes, pistols, etc., and level up in order to improve their skills. In addition, you have to use items to cure wounds and poisons and explore the different locations available while interacting with NPCs.

The plot is pretty cryptic and you get to know more about it by reading descriptions of objects and items, talking to NPCs, and the few cinematic scenes the game has. A brief summary of the story is as it follows: A traveler (you, the player) arrives into the city of Yharnam in order to cure an unknown disease your character has. In there, the traveler discovers that the cure is turning the people of Yharnam into despicable blood-thirsty creatures and has to survive the night by hunting them while uncovering the truth about the city.

Bloodborne is my first "Soulsborne" videogame, since I haven't played any of the other videogames created by Hidetaka Miyazaki (Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1, 2 and 3, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice), and I have had both good and frustating time, since I absolutely adore the videogame, but its high difficulty can make anyone get mad. You have to be aggressive, brutal, relentless in order to survive the night, and even the easiest enemies, if not playing properly can absolutely destroy you. Bloodborne is a really challenging game that forces you to improve or die trying (git gud). Moreover, the lack of maps makes you use all the resources available, since if you die in a specific area, you start from the last "checkpoint" which are magical lamps that lead you to the Hunter's Dream. The Hunter's Dream is the area in which you can level up, modify weapons, store goods, etc. and the only place in which no one can harm you, so, if you wish to take a break from the fight, you have to find a lamp and reach this area. As a reminder, I also have to mention that there is no pause in the game, so if you leave your character in a dangerous area, the probability of dying is high. In addition, if you die, and reach a previously explored area, enemies are alive and well again, so try not to die (much).

The game as a whole can be seen as a homage to the horror genre in general, since you begin fighting werewolves and crazy villagers, and then the more you advance we encounter aliens, vampires, chimeras, giants, zombies, gods and other indescribable horrors. We start with a gothic setting in the vein of Bram Stoker, and, at the same time, it reminded me of the beginning of Resident Evil 4, in which we are also a stranger who ends up in a disturbing place with insane and violent characters, but the tone shifts and we end up in a Lovecraftian nightmare in which we try to fight some eldritch horrors beyond human comprehension. The shift between the different branch of horrors doesn't feel inorganic though, it flows really well within the context and the narrative of the Bloodborne world. Despite the fact that it is mainly classified as an action role-playing game, the videogame gives many scares, and I felt really tense and anxious when I encountered certain beings. There is some really messed up stuff happening in Yharnam, and you are in the eye of the storm.

Thematically speaking (at least for me), Bloodborne is a game about depression. Some people might disagree, but I don't care really. I see the journey of this lone hunter fighting monsters in a nightmarish landscape as a person facing his demons in an uncaring world. The more you advance the uglier Yharnam gets, and nothing seems to change for the better, but our main character is still standing, being brought back from death over and over again, fighting and killing these beasts in order to finally conquer or at least survive the horrors they witness. Life is ugly, but as the hunter we can still stand against the creatures that dwell inside of us.

Moreover, the obvious references to the American horror author H.P. Lovecraft and cosmicism are really interesting to say the least. The Great Ones from Bloodborne (some examples being Ebrietas, the Daughter of the Cosmos or The Moon Presence) are direct reference to the Old Ones and the Cthulhu Mythos. Who are we, as humans, to the eyes of outer-wordly alien gods and eldritch horrors? We are merely ants, toys to be played with, puppets in the great scheme of things. In Lovecraft's stories, his characters, upon encountering some indescribable horror, either go insane or kill themselves, and in Bloodborne there is some similar theme going on. In the game, many characters mess with forces they do not fully understand, and are turned to monsters or go insane, because their minds cannot grasp what these so called forces may offer, which makes me ask again: What are we in the eyes of gods?

In Bloodborne, reality and dreams are interconnected and sometimes it is really difficult to discern which one is each. The hunter is in a living hell and there is -apparently- no escape. The player can only fight these horrors and gain knowledge, which the more you gain, the more this sense of dread and vulnerability is expanded.

The game has many characters such as:

- The Hunter: Our silent customizable character. We can choose a backstory and look for them, so, the only thing that we know for sure is that we are looking for a cure of an unkown disease.

- Gehrman, the First Hunter: A retired hunter who lives in the Hunter's Dream, and guides and helps hunters.

- The Plain Doll: A living doll. She is very kind and genuinely cares about the hunter. She is the one who helps us to level up.

The game has three different endings, so read a guide before you decide to unlock a specific one, because there are some rules to follow.

Regarding the bosses, they are horrifying. They are taken straight out of the most messed up and creative minds in the field. Most of them are really hard to beat, which makes the hunting even more of a challenge. The fights require the process of trial and error, which means finding weaknesses until you slay the boss.

The graphics are impressive, the landscapes and characters are very detailed, and the whole aesthetic of the scenarios are a beautiful and horrifying sight. There are some minor glitches though: The enemies are sometimes transparent or get stuck in areas that are not supposed to get stuck in. I remember one time I got attacked so hard that my character broke the ground and fell for a full minute until he reached the ground. I found it funny, but it happened once, so these issues do not ruin the gaming experience.

The music is also one of the strong points of Bloodborne, however music is only present in boss fights and some selected areas, but the score is amazing: Powerful orchestras to inspire you in an epic battle against the worst of the worst. Most of the time there is ambient sound, and it can really mess you up, since you hear the beasts growl, howl, screech, scream, babies crying, people laughing like crazy, and so on and so forth. Sounds created to play with your mind and make you feel tense in order to lose.

Another important point are the chalice dungeons, which are special areas. Chalice dungeons are randomly generated labyrinths in which you can level up and fight some previously seen bosses and  new ones. They are optional, but I highly recommend them in order to become stronger.

All in all, Bloodborne is a great game, with amazing and challenging enemies, an interesting story, epic soundtrack, and an ever-growing lore that pays tribute to the best of the horror genre through the eyes of a human that has to face the abyss and live to tell the tale.

P.S.: I have not played the DLC, but when/if I get my hands on it, I will review it as well.