Bloodborne: The Old Hunters (2015): The Review

Overview

The Old Hunters is a powerful injection of everything that made Bloodborne great, a return to the same vicious, intoxicating rhythm that defined the original. While hardcore fans might tear through its secrets in no time, my 15 hours exploring its nightmarish depths and testing out every new weapon of destruction felt rich and rewarding. It’s an impressive expansion that perfectly captures FromSoftware’s haunting brilliance, and even if it treads familiar ground, it’s a journey absolutely worth reliving.

Score: 10 out of 10

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The Positives ✅

The Old Hunters is exactly what a Bloodborne expansion should be, brutal, haunting, and unapologetically cruel. It doesn’t reinvent the wheel; it simply sharpens its teeth. Set within the eerie confines of the Hunter’s Nightmare, this DLC drags you back into the kind of grotesque dreamscape that FromSoftware has perfected, a grim echo of Yharnam where the hunters themselves have become the beasts. From the first twisted chapel to the last moonlit cliff, the atmosphere is oppressive and intoxicating in equal measure. It’s a world of decayed glory and whispering horrors, and it’s every bit as enthralling as the original game’s bloodstained streets.

Visually and thematically, it’s a masterclass in environmental storytelling. Each of its three major areas feels distinct yet cohesive, gothic architecture collapsing into madness, fishing villages draped in fog and death, laboratories humming with quiet insanity. You can almost smell the rot in the air. It’s a reminder that no one does unsettling beauty quite like FromSoftware. Every narrow staircase and distant bell toll feeds the same gnawing dread that made Bloodborne legendary, and each secret feels earned through blood, sweat, and caution.

And oh, the weapons. If Bloodborne’s arsenal was a symphony of violence, The Old Hunters is the encore. The buzzsaw spear, the Whirligig Saw, the Church Cannon, each one a macabre masterpiece of murder engineering. There’s nothing quite like beating an enemy to death with the literal arm of a god or watching a summoned serpent consume your foes. The creativity behind these instruments of suffering is pure, unfiltered FromSoftware brilliance. Combine that with the updated Hunter’s Bell mechanic that lets you summon iconic allies from the lore, and you’ve got a sense of continuity that feels both nostalgic and exhilarating.

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The Negatives ⚠️

If there’s a criticism to be made, and there is, it’s that The Old Hunters is a bit too content with staying in its comfort zone. For all its new weapons, monsters, and environments, the actual encounters rarely break new ground. The bosses are menacing, but they follow a rhythm that’s instantly familiar. Their movesets, while flashy and grotesque, echo the cadence of fights we’ve already mastered. In one instance, I even felled a new boss on my first try simply because its patterns mirrored a previous one almost beat-for-beat. It’s challenging, yes, but never surprising, and for a world built on discovery and dread, predictability is its deadliest sin.

That familiarity extends to the moment-to-moment combat as well. It’s still razor-sharp, still thrilling, but the lack of true innovation in enemy behavior makes the tension fade faster than expected. The difficulty remains punishing, but it’s the same flavor of punishment we’ve already grown numb to. It’s not that the DLC fails, it’s that it refuses to evolve beyond being an extension of Bloodborne rather than a bold continuation. The Old Hunters feels like comfort food for masochists: delicious, familiar, and maybe just a little too safe.

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The Experience 🎮

Despite its cautious design, The Old Hunters recaptures something rare, that intoxicating Bloodborne feeling of dread, curiosity, and triumph. It’s not just about the combat or the lore; it’s about the rhythm of obsession. You enter the Hunter’s Nightmare thinking you’ve seen it all, only to be reminded that every shadow hides a secret, and every secret might kill you. The cryptic storytelling remains the glue holding it all together, item descriptions that double as riddles, notes that lead you down existential rabbit holes, and the quiet joy of realizing you’ve stumbled onto something no one explicitly told you was there.

That’s the real magic of The Old Hunters: discovery. Following a hunch from a cryptic item description, donning a forgotten set of armor, and unearthing a hidden encounter hours later, it’s the kind of payoff that defines FromSoftware’s design philosophy. Every new clue feels like a thread in a cosmic tapestry, one you’ll happily lose your sanity trying to untangle.

In the end, The Old Hunters isn’t about reinventing Bloodborne. It’s about diving deeper into its madness, exploring the parts of the nightmare you were too afraid to see before. It’s grotesque, beautiful, punishing, and endlessly fascinating. It may not surprise you, but it will consume you, and that’s more than enough reason to step back into the dark.