Bloodborne is well-settled as a masterpiece in environmental storytelling, but was that developer From Software’s only intention to flesh out characters? Apparently not. In a recently discovered dive into some of the game’s cut content, it appears that early boss Father Gascoigne was planned to be a companion DLC with voice-over dialogue.
News comes by way of Souls series dataminer and From Software expert, Lance McDonald. In an April 1st video (though not an April Fools Day joke), McDonald returns back to Bloodborne, uncovering code and sequences that was unfinished in the original Update 1.0.
For those of you unaware, Father Gascoigne is the first mandatory boss of Bloodborne — and is the first step in engaging the whole Gascoigne family. However, by rebuilding the code from the Alpha release, McDonald is able to show that initially you were supposed to engage with Gascoigne as a Hunter, first appearing on the Great Bridge and taking on enemies.
The scene — which begins around the two-minute mark — begins after helping Father Gascoigne take on an enemy. After clearing the path, he approaches you: “…well well, a hunter is it?”
From there, he will stick by your side as an NPC companion, helping clear enemies in the way. Through this, he will spout a few lines of unused text and is able to be defeated by enemies. McDonald doesn’t mention explicitly how long Father Gascoigne is able to follow you, for instance if he is limited to an area or would be a companion until the boss fight.
Interestingly enough, there is a tie-in between his unused lines and some voice over within a trailer. Specifically, The Game Awards 2014 trailer begins with one of his unused lines: “Let there be no doubt… if it moves, you can be sure it’s a beast. And even if it doesn’t, well, don’t take any chances!”
This is a truly fascinating discovery to fans of From Software — it shows a (perhaps) more heavy-handed implementation of storytelling, where you could see Father Gascoigne both before and after transforming, offering a bit of a reference point. And frankly, I think it’s a shame this was cut from the main version of the game — Gascoigne is one of the better voice actors, and truly brings some of that Yharnam horror elements.
Outside of this discovery, Bloodborne fans are keeping a bonfire alive for the game by picking apart old data, including finding an unused boss titled Great One Beast. Of course, others are flexing their Bloodborne skills in different ways, including perfect runs of the title’s hardest boss or creating some awesome DIY projects.
Bloodborne is available exclusively on PS4. If you somehow missed the atmospheric Souls-like title, you can still grab it via Amazon.
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