Summary
I’m pretty sure most of us had similar expectations for the Switch 2 Direct: a 3D Mario game, a couple ofZeldaremasters, and maybe a new IP. But this is Nintendo, we should’ve expected curveballs, likea new 3D Donkey Kong, GameCube games finally being added to NSO (close enough),and The Duskbloods. A new IP, sure, but a FromSoftware one. Nobody saw that coming.
As the trailer opened with an NPC muttering about blood, everyone perked up. Bloodborne 2? A Switch exclusive? It sure looked that way, with the slick Soulslike combat and steampunk aesthetic only hammering the idea home. Then came the titlecard, putting those theories to bed almost immediately (not that Bloodborne 2 would ever launch on anything but PlayStation). But then again,Dark Soulswas pretty much Demon’s Souls 2, so at least the Lovecraftian epic would live on in its own way.
Except, FromSoftware quickly clarified that The Duskbloods is PvPvE. So, even in spirit, it’s not Bloodborne 2. Granted, the studio’s other foray into multiplayer withNightreignhas been a pleasant surprise so far; after getting hands on withthe previewand closed beta, it’s clear that FromSoft has captured the Soulslike magic in a multiplayer bottle. But the reveal of asecondmultiplayer game understandably led many, who were otherwise excited during that debut trailer, to lose interest, including New Blood Interactive (Gloomwood, Ultrakill) co-founder Dave Oshry.
I’m old. I get it, I’m not the target audience for these games.
“You’ve seen the posts, like [FromSoftware president Hidetaka] Miyazaki’s been playing[Escape from] Tarkov,” Oshry said on theQuad Damage Podcast(viaGamesRadar+). “Tarkov has done irreparable fuing damage to the game industry, because everything needs to be a fuing, what do they call it, an extraction shooter? I just like regular a** games, but I’m old. I get it, I’m not the target audience for these games.”
Don’t Worry Though, FromSoft Isn’t Done With Single-Player
With Nightreign and The Duskbloods back-to-back, there wasn’t just concern that “Bloodborne 2” wasn’t actually Bloodborne 2, but that FromSoftware was beginning to pivot away from its single-player roots towards more multiplayer offerings, edging closer and closer towards the live-service abyss. That isn’t quite the case; Miyazaki and co. are simply experimenting with some new ideas, which is exactly what led to Demon’s Souls and the entire Soulslike genre, to begin with.
“This is an online multiplayer title at its core,“Miyazaki said of The Duskbloods. “But this doesn’t mean that we as a company have decided to shift to a more multiplayer-focused direction with titles going forward.” He claims that FromSoftware still intends to “actively develop single-player focused games” that will “embrace our more traditional style”.
Granted, it doesn’t sound like The Duskbloods will be a traditional extraction shooter, either. There’s a hub area where you can choose and customise a character before entering multiplayer, and even if you lose the match, you’ll receive “some sort of reward”. It also appears to have some battle royale elements, as “generally” matches boil down to the last player standing, but there are other circumstances that can unfold, such as if you take down a powerful boss. So far, that sounds more like a Nightreign spin-off for Bloodborne than it does Escape from Tarkov.
But with Nightreign up first, and The Duskbloods not due until 2026, it’ll be a while before we see more of the game in action.
