RIP PS5 PlayStation Plus Collection, which introduced me to one of my favourite games

“So there’s this stat in Bloodborne called Insight,” I’d tell anyone that would listen. “It governs the amount of inhuman knowledge you’ve gleaned from the world as you slaughter unnatural abominations.” So far, so videogame-y; you kill something, or use an item, and numbers go up. So what? “But Insight isn’t just used to summon other players and stuff – it changes the world. It’s maddening. Frightening.” By this point, the strangers at the bar I’m in have wandered off, circling their fingers next to their temples to indicate I’m nuts to their giggling friends. And maybe they’re right – Bloodborne really got in my head.

But that Insight stat… I’ve never come across anything quite like it. Every major boss you’d kill would confer a little more Insight to you, and if you went out of your way to explore the game and break the loop a little away from the expected path, you could very quickly gain a significant amount of knowledge about Bloodborne’s dying, fucked-up world.

It manifests passively – maybe certain enemies become more powerful as you begin to understand their real function in this world. Maybe certain NPCs start mumbling apparently innocent nonsense. Maybe you start to see the creatures that are really in charge of the world, clinging to the belfries of cathedrals or skulking about in the shadows. Maybe otherworldly abominations start singing, wretchedly off-key, whenever you’re nearby – cooing bastardised hymns to the terrors beyond all that we can actually see.