Elden Ring is considered to be FromSoftware’s magnum opus, and it’s hard to argue with that sentiment since it brought the studio to the forefront of the industry while also ending up winning the GotY award. The developer’s collaboration with George R.R. Martin may be the biggest title that the Soulslike genre has seen, but there’s still a game that was released nearly a decade ago that holds up quite well to this day.
In fact, Bloodborne is just as important of a pillar in the Soulsborne series, and it handled one aspect better than FromSoftware’s latest effort.
Elden Ring Weapons Are Good, but Bloodborne Ones Were Better
A FromSoftware fan shared his thoughts on YouTube to showcase the various elements that other Soulsborne titles executed better than Elden Ring.
As far as Bloodborne is concerned, the element that Hidetaka Miyazaki managed to nail was its weapons, with the YouTuber calling them “straight up badass.” It’s something that the studio never went back to to recreate for its other games, but considering how the weaponry was a highlight from the 2015 title, fans would appreciate the style’s comeback.
The YouTuber fan does give ER some credit, saying that the latest FromSoftware title does come pretty close to the masterful weapon aspects of Bloodborne, but it never quite fully reaches its level and is “no match” for the 2015 game. There is just something really “fun” about the PlayStation 4 exclusive title; although there were definitely moments where the weapons would not be doing any proper damage to the enemies, it was forgivably entertaining.
The weapons in Miyazaki’s gem from nine years ago were all “instantly recognizable,” and it genuinely used to feel like each weapon had its “own identity.”
The Weapons in Other Soulslike Games Do Not Have Their Own Individual Identity
The fan making the comparison stated that he feels that “none of the other games have really” managed to give unique identities to their weapons, which is something that Bloodborne successfully accomplished almost a decade ago. Weapons in other Soulslike titles are not anything special, and if they belong to one group, they usually all have the same basic move set with very little innovation.
Which is why it was such a breath of fresh air when the 2015 PS4 exclusive introduced weapons that felt “completely different” from one another when used in combat.
Perhaps the greatest concept that the game included was Trick Weapons, which basically meant that each weapon was a “two-in-one” as players could transform their appearances and move sets as they saw fit during various battles. It provided the player with numerous options regarding how to approach fights, and FromSoftware undoubtedly outdid itself.
Do you also prefer the weapons in Bloodborne to the ones in ER? Let us know in the comments!
