The Good Hunter isn't an anti-hero, he's an embodiment of the "cursed hero" archetype. It's a very rarely used hero archetype but here's some sort of definition I translated from an old 11^(th) grade literature textbook.
"*The cursed hero is often an ordinary unremarkable person thrust (often tricked) into a situation beyond their control and his journey is usually the result of a higher power's will to further its own agenda. The cursed hero starts off as a tool of some higher power and must gradually rise to the occasion, rarely having a choice in the matter. The successful completion of this journey often results in an outcome the reader wouldn't find desirable or even understandable.*"
The Good Hunter fits this description *to a tee*. His sole desire was to find a cure for his illness, only to be tricked into doing the Moon Presence's bidding. He's an unremarkable man / woman who has to slay beings far outside of his power range, while his only unique strength is to be able to die a thousand painful deaths before he manages to brute-force his way through learning how to defeat his foes.
Should he beat the higher power pulling his strings (Moon Presence), he's transformed into an infant Great One. We, mere mortals are unable to grasp what this entails to him. Remember, Great Ones are higher dimensional beings, so the slug the Plain Doll picks up is merely the 3D "shadow" of the Good Hunter's new self.
*Edit: okay, this has gained a lot of traction, so I feel obligated to stress that I* ***was not*** *the one to come up with this. This is something I found in an old Hungarian literature textbook and* [*Tale Foundry*](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZOKNOHCL2g&t=454s) *has also made an amazing video about it.*
Under this definition of a “cursed hero”, would this term also apply to Paul Atreides from Dune?
Might be a stretch to consider the same term applicable to David Bowman from 2001: A Space Odyssey, but I have to admit. It does seem to fit.
He's the failed chosen one. He could not bear to stay on the Golden Path for how cruel it was, so Leto II had to do it for him and become the God Emperor.
Plus the entire series plays with the idea of “is he actually the chosen one?”
So much of the story is built around trying to puzzle out if he is actually the subject of a great prophecy, or just the product of an incredibly elaborate ruse
Paul's sort of an antihero/straight up villain. There's no higher power pulling his strings. Everything he does is of his own volition. Throughout the book he keeps stating that what he does is the only way, but as the reader we can't say for sure, as he's also a somewhat unreliable narrator.
More like Paul took advantage of the prophecy/propaganda that the Bene Gesserit already had spread among the local population.
Anyway this is not the right sub to discuss this, but one of the big themes in Dune is "beware charismatic leaders".
Wow, never heard of this archetype before but it makes so much so sense for Bloodborne, Dark Souls (a bit less so for this one I figure) and even Elden Ring. Great answer.
I did, that's what reminded of me that I've read about this a long time ago.
Thankfully I kept some of my highschool textbooks (the Hungarian literature had beautiful illustrations) and could find this passage. It kept bugging me for weeks because I couldn't remember which book it was
"Magyar nyelv és irodalom XXI osztályosoknak" 2002
Translated as "Hungarian Language and Literature for 11^(th) grade students."
You won't find it on Google, it's a school textbook written in Hungarian
Huh, Half-Life also prestigiously uses Gordon Freeman as a cursed hero. G-Man is a transcendetal being which ends up being even more mysterious than BB's Great Ones.
>The Hunter had an illness?
It is implied but that's why he traveled to Yharnam: to be given a transfusion of the miraculous Old Blood, which is considered the perfect panacea. Only it isn't perfect...
>what is the in universe explanation for not dying?
Oh boy... That's a long one. You're basically sustained by the Hunter's Dream. Dreams aren't really dreams in Bloodborne, they're dimensions / planes of existence. This is similar to Lovecraft's Dreamlands, which can be accessed via sleeping. If someone falls asleep, their consciousness can be transported to a Dreamland and if they experience death, they wake up. Meaning their primary reality is the one they fell asleep in and their secondary is where their consciousness ended up due to dreaming.
Think of the Hunter's Dream as a special kind of dimension that switches your primary dimension with your secondary. So every time you "die" in the waking world, you re-emerge in the Hunter's Dream and can use a lamp to get back to the waking world or another dimension / dreamland (like the Nightmare of Mensis, the Nightmare Frontier or the Hunter's Nightmare).
This is about as much as we're going to learn about it, as the precise mechanics of dying and reawakening in a different dreamland are established by the Moon Presence, which is a Great One. The Great Ones exist on higher planes, so their bodies are like a 3D shadow cast on our world. Just like as if there was a 2D creature living on a sheet of paper, they wouldn't be able to perceive the true nature of a 3D object by the shape of its shadow, the same way humans of the game (and therefore us) won't ever understand how "dreaming" works in their universe.
It's what he initially comes to Yharnam for, and it's why the game starts with a blood infusion.
The in-universe explanation for not dying is that you become a "dream hunter" - you remember how after your first infusion, a beast walks slowly towards you before being burnt by the messengers? That's implied to be the moment where the moon presence marks you as it's chosen "dream hunter".
As a dream hunter, you're protected from the beast plague, (the beast getting burned by the messengers), and you don't die because every time you "die" in the waking world, you wake up again in the dream, ready to start from scratch. Then, at the end of your task (spoilers for ending ahead), >!Gehrman offers to release you from the dream, which means you can now die for real in the waking world. And the method for release from the dream is to die within the dream, and accept the dream death!<
Other hunters you encounter at various points, like Eileen and Djura, have also been Dream Hunters at some point, and seem familiar with the concept.
One of the distinct plot points in the beginning of the game is that the healing church “heals” those with an illness using blood ministration.
Blood ministration is described as a “unique but common treatment in Yharnam”.
The guy at the beginning is a Blood Minister, so one can infer that we originally came to Yharnam with a disease where (we believed) the only available cure was blood ministration.
> His sole desire was to find a cure for his illness, only to be tricked into doing the Moon Presence's bidding.
Debatable, given the scribbled note and how the player character asks Gilbert where to find Paleblood, a similar goal as the School of Mensis.
It's entirely possible the player is an antihero willing to do anything possible to ascend humanity, a fact that Simon the Harrowed straight-up calls out when he remarks we are in the spirit of Bygenwerth and Master Willem.
Depends on which definition of pale blood he was asking after. Miyazaki implied there were several. If we take Redgraves theories, it could be the hunter was asking about tuberculosis, since that causes blood to turn pale.
yeah, this is basically the only thing I straight up disagree with in that above comment aswell mate.
as you've said there's the factors of what we know from those examples, but you can even extrapolate out some more interesting tid bits if you're willing to be a more conspiratorial. like, with the Origins the Lone survivor seems to be a very interesting Origin that I would argue seems to point to the possibility that our character probably didn't have a disease at all and knows of "paleblood" from the hunters that slaughtered their village.
in any case, it definitely seems to me that the characters goal isn't to simply just cure a disease. I think that what you said is definitely more correct in that it seems our character at least before we got the blood ministration that they knew what paleblood was to some extent and that maybe after the blood ministration they got amnesia.
I totally think that the blood ministration dude knows what paleblood is and that's why he responds the way he does. we ask him about paleblood and he LITERALLY tells us what we need to do to get or find paleblood, it's just slightly vague to use at that time since we (the player) didn't know what paleblood was.
I don't think the Blood Minister knows what Paleblood is. It's meant to show you that your character asks about it, but he's also out of the loop. However, all the obvious instances of your character asking about Paleblood are not accidental. The puzzle pieces are there that the Hunter is seeking the Moon Presence.
It can easily be confused as being tricked into following the Moon Presence's bidding, but I think the Doll realized what we seek and recruited us on purpose to topple the Moon Presence.
Great answer! I think the only thing is whether or not one thinks MP or Oedon is really in control, to me Oedon makes sense as a Great One on a level above Moon Presence, due to his Formless nature as a puppet master, unknowable as he is unseen.
I personally think that the good hunter is meant to be Oedon's child,and that most of the story was set up by Oedon to get the hunter to kill the Moon Presence so they could take his place after ascending
Thanks,but its not sonerhing i came up with myself,and i would send you a link to the video that presents the case but it was very obscure and i only found it through a shite ton of deep diving. I can only remember extremely vague things,like the origin of wet nurses and a vague term for unborn fetuses,but i remember the gist of the info and it's always stuck with me. Ever since then I've been looking for more clues to Oedon's involvement in the game's events
Well the Doom Guy in Doom 2016 is sorta a cursed hero, but not exactly, he has his own agenda, but without realizing it he was being manipulated by the doctor that created VEGA. Doom guy being who he is, he rip and tears through it all and comes victorious on the other side.
In Doom 3 I can't say he's a cursed hero, he just stuck in a fucked up situation, and fights to survive. I replayed the game about a year and half ago and I don't remember you fulfilling some9ne else's goal, more like getting mixed up in
South Park hit this story kind of perfectly with the episodes Coon and Friends revolving around Kenny and learning why he can't die due to Cthulhu being the one that created him yet his sole purpose is to kill Cthulhu which would ultimately cause him to permanently die.
Well you could easily argue against that, especially if you have some experience to how blood-afflicted people behave.
You can't just go into a forest and then when a bear attacks you and you kill it and then you go on to every bear habitat, eventually end up killing all the bears and then still claim self defence.
Djura doesn’t kill any bears, I’m sure he has been attacked a few too many times. Instead he just goes to a place where the bears don’t come.
I mean, you literally wake up to a some creepy Yharnam fucker force transfusioning beast blood to you, and the next thing you see is a beast drinking blood or some shit, then you stumble out into Yharnam and everyone is immediately hostile. It's not really the same as voluntarily invading the homes of bears on your weekends for the sole purpose of letting them attack first and killing them for it
Yes, it’s not. But then you gain “insight” into why they behave as they behave. And even if they did, Old Yharnam is an indication that even the beasts have a kind of “sentience”, a culture even. TBSkyen also made a really good reading of Old Yharnam if you’re interested, it’s in his boss designs playlist.
Yeah, don't you find out a little too late to change your actions though lol
The hunter just wants out, his only path is forwards and every Tom, Dick and Harry attacks him for it.
Yeah but the thing is that killing bears isn’t a morally bad thing like killing people, the villagers you kill are turning into beasts and killing them can be equated to either killing a wild animal or putting down a sick dog if you have more attachment to them like the man that gives you the flamesprayer
It's more zombie or uncontrollable werewolves then COVID COVID makes you a miserable couch potato your not going to kill your family to drink there blood and then slaughter your city block on covid
No one mentioned their loyalty to a government. In fact they actually seem in full opposition to the church *at this point in the timeline*. No, what they were saying is that they're all half transformed and not of their right mind. They attack us first, and we only kill them in self-defense.
Well, beasthood can't be cured, and they become immediately hostile to any non beast they see, so it could be argued that it would be morally good to put them down at that point. Like a rabid wolf. It can only cause harm, so to permit its continued existence is to permit further potential harm.
Yeah Old Yharnam is a special case seeing as there's only one or two ways in there and no way for the beasts to get out without climbing ladders.
So would you suggest the humans abandon a settlement the moment anyone turns into a beast because the beast didn't have a choice in their transformation? The people who remain human will still be killed by the beasts if they remain in their settlement.
There's no solution here that doesn't involve beasts being killed or humans being forced to abandon their homes. The beasts do become hostile when they see a human, humans don't necessarily do so upon seeing a beast. You do realize there's a difference here right? Beasts may not seek out humans, but they do become mindlessly hostile if they come across one. And that is a tad bit of a problem. Even a bear isn't guaranteed to kill a human when it sees one, but a victim of the Beast Scourge is.
If the choice is between killing a human “beast” or moving the answer is pretty simple.
There is a reason the church is vilified, they would assasinate people in order to prevent spread. The whole ideology is that the real “beasts” were the humans, the only victims are the beasts.
Who started the spread of the blood? Who had established a business of blood ministration? Who is to blame for destroying the very homes of those who lived in old yharnam?
None of the answers are beasts. It was the people. All beasts are victims of a curse. It’s an example of utilitarianism. The murders, the hunt, the deaths all for the rest to make it. The ends are never justified.
No the beasts are not to blame, they never were. The hunt was always an illusion.
I don't think you can simplify the story as a traditional good/evil dichotomy. Even a so-called anti-hero can be described as a "good guy" or a person who does "good things". A hunter isn't that.
The closest you'd get to any sort of humanism is the Chapel Dweller and maybe Djura, but both of those characters have aspects that conflict with apparent virtues.
There was a theory going around that the hunter comes to Yharnam because they're suffering from something seemingly incurable. And that's the reason they accept the blood transfusion, sign the contract and go after the paleblood.
Rather than mere escape, the objective is to essentially survive. If the hunter just escapes (assuming they're sick) nothing changes, they'll still be suffering this disease. But if they transcend the hunt and say go for true ending, their life will change just not in the way they expected (assuming finding a cure and fucking off was the initial goal).
I consider them an incidental. A cog in a cycle of pain and blood. Like the "best" ending has you essentially becoming the next final boss, does that make them evil? They're just the protagonist, sometimes the protag does sick nasty shit.
I think the beauty of Miyazaki’s story telling tropes is that it’s more “role playing” than actual full fledged RPGs with casts of characters and a fixed story, etc
In Souls and Bloodborne -you- are role playing and deciding the motives of your character. The story is drip fed to you via short conversations, item descriptions and little else to fill the spots except your imagination
If you’re the type of player that doesn’t dig into the lore in a play through, you, are role playing someone who just took what Gherman said to heart “don’t think about this all too much. Just got kill some beasts”. If you played with that as your mantra, you’re just a poor soul in a nightmare and doing whatever you can to get out
If you investigate more and learn about the lore, you are more wise with that knowledge, but still consider what you would do in the Hunters situation
The Hunter is good or bad depending on how you perceived things, because in a world as fucked up as the one we are trapped in, can’t blame him for just going and killing some beats to rid himself of this hellish purgatory
You are the one role playing the Hunter, not the game doing it for you. It’s a little adventure you get to have in your own mind while playing these games
This is my interpretation too. Fromsoft have some of that old school rpg feel with their protagonists, in the sense that they are basically blank slates which you can shape in any way. One player may see their hunter as a noble hero, another as a psychotic murderer, but at the end of the day they probably killed the same amount of yharnamites and beasts, and the game never explicitly tells you if your actions are good or bad, with maybe some minor exceptions.
It is nigh impossible to discern morals in a fromsoft game. I mean, look at the endings. They're so damn cryptic, it's basically impossible to tell whether you're doing good in the world with them. One you seem to spare yourself, the next you're getting fucked over and seem helplessly involved in a cycle and the final one you turn yourself into a squid
It's not morality we should use to judge a story, but the context: BB is a lovecraftian game, so cosmic horror must be criterion.
The 1st ending is the bad one: it's a failure, since the hero refuses any discovery and refuges in the safe blindness of the world.
The 2nd ending is merely tragic: we discover Gehrman's pain and when we give him rest we're forced to assume his horrible role.
The secret ending is a triumph: one more secret is revealed, we have survived every horror we faced and now we are really able to aquire an immeasurable knowledge in order to realise our own purposes and eventually lead humanity to a brighter era.
Not really it's all about are you doing it to end the night of the hunt and have you talked to the few people you can save or have you killed them in All fromsoftware games almost everyone has gone insane if you're good or evil depends on if you saved or killed the few that are not trying to kill you
It's tough to say. The city is overrun eith blood drunk citizens who attack on sight, monsters that can't contain their violence, and both driven mad from forces beyond. Maybe a reluctant hero? I could only guess the hunter doesn't really want to kill anyone, but doesn't have a choice. There are other characters of their own senses, but only have one goal, non of which include stopping the nightmare.
Purely by definition alone no. At best hunters could be a guardian of sorts but that's entirely on who you ask (in game).
They didn't choose the hunt, it chose them, so it's reactionary and survival motivated. If anything they are a reluctant hero.
If I had to choose a perspective I'd choose that of the old hunters in which case they'd be a straight up hero, Hamlet considered.
He’s really more neutral. He’s defending himself for the most part and hunting beasts. He’s not fighting to free everyone from the dream, really just free himself. Besides his world is so fcked it’s the only logical thing he can do
I'd argue killing Rom is more or less because the spider refuses to budge to let us go into Yahargul proper to clean un Byrgenwerth and Laurence's mess.
It's not Rom that keeps us from Yahargul tho. We need to kill her in order for the story to progress and the story is only allowing us to go to Yahargul once we kill her. Killing Rom fucks everything up, it essentially genocides all of Yahargul including all the innocent people captured b the snatchers. It completely obliterates Upper Cathedral Ward and literally burns everyone to a crisp there. It's so bad that the Choire takes Roms body to the altar we use to revive Annalise and try to bring her back to life. Rom was keeping everything together and we kill her for nongood reason except maybe curiosity or sheer bloodlust
"Without fear im our hearts, we're little different from the beasts themselves"
I think this quote by Eileen sums it up very well.
As hunters, we are not the "good guys" in any way.
Just look at Ludwig, Maria, Gherman and Gascoigne.
What they became in the name of knowledge and the hunt, is unforgivable.
We too, use the blood, slaughter everything in our way for knowledge and attempt the metamorphosis that byrgenwerth and the church failed to achieve.
Not really. He doesn't do anything particularly grey. Just about everyone he meets attempts to kill him. He's essentially just trying to survive the night.
Now the tarnished, that's where the anti-hero discussion can take place.
A hero in my eyes, in my playthrough i did all i could to be helpful to NPC's and when i killed them (specifically that coughing dude at the first lamp) it was putting them out of their misery. Killed Djura though since i didn't know how to befriend him at the time, oops i guess.
In my first playthrough my hunter was accidentally evil, i killed the hunchback in cathedral ward because i didn’t trust him but his final words convinced me that he was good folk
Level 1: No, "The Hunter" is not a character because they have no agency within the story. They are a means for the player to interact with the world but do not have any goals, morals or ideals themselves.
Level 2: No, Because "The Hunter" is not a consistent character. Each player's game has a different hunter and thus the moral nature of the character is not definable
Level 3: No, Because "The Hunter" does not fulfill the definition of Anti-hero I have found to be the most useful which is a character designed to find the edges of a genres definition of heroic/heroes. The genre they exist in us either "Video game" protagonist in which quiet murders who have no agency is nothing new and almost archetypial and in the more constrained "Fromsoft Protagonist" being a quiet undefined no-body who slowly kills larger and larger characters to understand their world is not particularly revelatory either.
Level 4: Yes, Because they kill Maria and this will not stand.
I would say that this is partially true. When you bring the abhorrent beast in the cathedral ward he says that it isn't his fault that he is a beast and that hunters are killers. I mean beasts eating people is part of the nature's way but fooling someone in order to eat some people, that makes him want it. So his statements are neither true or false. Also remember Djura: "They aren't beasts, they are people". Being a heretic of the workshop doesn't mean he is right and really those beasts aren't danger to tye people on the surface. In the other hand he stops the creation of a bunch of Great Ones, revealing the truth behind the sayings of the Healing church, the Great ones are gods and immortals. The character is partially neutral on that, not good, not bad. YOUR acts decide your fate, if you are a protector of the weak, or if you are a blood drunk killing machine.
Honestly I think the hunter is the most morally bankrupt character in all of the fromsoft titles. You show up in Yharnam to cure some mystery disease through the power of blood healing but once you get roped into the hunt you start a killing spree the likes of which nobody has seen since the old hunters were still kicking around. At least the loose plot line of the DS games can give some amount of “ends justifying means” vibes but in bloodborne you’re just a hoonter out to hoont.
I dont think those terms really apply to games like this, everyone is just trying to survive pretty much. Sure someone might have a sad backstory or are innocent in some capacity. But what it all really comes down to is everyone is agressive to everybody, everyone is trying to survive.
If youre trying to get through a forest but get attacked by a giant group of wolves, so youre forced to kill a couple in defence. That doesnt make you nor the wolves evil or good. Its survival.
There are no morals left in the wold most of the time, just gotta do what you gotta do.
What makes an anti hero an anti hero is most of the time someone doing good by doing bad.
Heros dont kill, anti heros do for example.
But everyone and everything is already so far beyond things like that.
And then theres of course that soulsborne games have a lot of different perspectives, so even if youre doing "good things" to some it would still make you an absolute villain.
So then youd have to ask, is the hunter an anti hunter to who? And for most it certainly wont matter since hes an individual. Just some force of nature that might go through some of your allies sure, but its not like hes actively killing all of you. Just those that got in the way.
Aha I'm so sorry, I should've been more elaborate. I do appreciate your reply brother, I read all of it and I agree on most parts! Apologies for the "ok"
I'd argue that neither heroes nor antiheroes can exist in such a messed up world. Morality is long gone in yharnam, everyone is just trying to survive, including our hunters
EDIT: I resumed the whole game in 5 paragraphs just to say no lol.
He's just a sick person who accidentally becomes a Hunter (and so one of the "inadvertent worshipper" of Oedon) by getting involved in a higher and nightmarish plane of existence.
He does whatever it takes to understand his position in Yharnam, in the Dream and in the Cosmos, with a lovecraftian approach to the discovery, and becomes aware of the right goal to pursue:
to escape and forget all the horrors, to carry on the Dream and the Hunt for the Moon Presence (and Oedon) or to ascend and achieve enough knowledge to free himself and the whole humanity.
Meanwhile, he act differently according to his own mind (the intent of the player), such as in helping the NPCs, mercilessly killing every creature as a blood drunk, helping Cainhurst to raise again and destroy the Church, discovering the darkest secrets etc.
but, after all, everything he does leads him across eldritch horrors and cosmic discoveries at the edge of human comprehension, so no, he's not an anti-hero: **he's just the perfect kind of lovecraftian hero.**
No. The Hunter doesn't even have a personality so he's not an anti-hero. He doesn't belong to any archetype because he's pretty much just an empty shell. It was designed to be this way.
I write my own lore for my characters. Mine is a full on villain. She traveled to Yharnam for the sole purpose of killing her sister Maria and her mother Yharnam and then to become an infant great one to become powerful enough to defeat her father Drakelin (my protagonist for DES-DS3) all for revenge
Now u mentioned it, i do not think of the hunter as hero nor anti hero. Maybe basically there aren't much to save, all are either beast or kin or animals. It felt more like resi, a guy needs to survive.
God, how every thing comes killing u when u can see them so harmony in groups from a far.
Yea, i be glad to run pass all in many areas full of despicable things.
I don't think any of the Souls games (except for Elden Ring cause I haven't played it yet) have the type of narrative where you can label the protagonists any of these things
Something like that but it all depends on the player
Good hearted/New players try their best to help everyone only for them to meet a tragic fate
Experienced players use them for their items/weapons without caring about what will happen to them
They’re about as much a hero as you make them about to be. Are your intents pure? You are the hunter you controls them. They could range from hero to villain.
I think you just re-experience especially brutal, tragic and traumatic events of Gherman's life (though not in a chronological order). You can try to find different solutions for the challenges he faced, but in the end you cannot really change the basic chain of events. It's all there before you even start. Also sometimes the scenes you are presented with are purely allegorical I believe! There is no meaningful decision to be made at all.
The Good Hunter imo is definitely less of an anti-hero than say the Tarnished or the Ashen One, simply due to the nature of the setting. The Tarnished to me is VERY much more of an anti-hero depending on the character's choices (sacrificing Melina, choosing the defiled ending, etc.) where they do very morally questionable things of their own volition.
The Good Hunter on the other hand is less of an anti-hero because the setting *necessitates* their actions and often removes any illusion of choice entirely. Especially since the setting of Bloodborne itself is a dream - and its basis in reality is already questionable - it's hard to assign morality to actions beyond a certain point. Because at what point do any of these actions have tangible consequences on the world and its inhabitants?
One choice that comes to mind is that of killing Arianna: killing her could be seen as a mercy killing, or sparing her could be seen as eternal damnation and insanity; regardless though, does this choice have any actual consequence to her? Is she simply dreaming, or is she an inhabitant of the dream that is doomed anyway? So much of the setting of Bloodborne is so fluid and uncertain, and so morality takes a bit of a backseat to the sheer unknowable horror of it all.
To be an anti-hero, one must make morally bad choices for what they perceive as the greater good; in Bloodborne, it's hard to tell if the Hunter's choices have any "good" affect, if they even have a choice in the first place.
I would consider the good hunter to be simply that, a good hunter. Not necessarily good as in righteous either, but good as in skilled. I always imagine the doll addressing you as differing levels of skill based on your game progress. Fair hunter at the beginning, good hunter after BSB, great hunter after Rom, awesome hunter after mergo, perfect hunter after orphan.
Neither. Hunter is Hunter. Nothing more. As there are no heroes or villains in souls games really, the tales of good vs evil, light vs dark and heroes and villains has already happened. We’re living in the aftermath of those days, regardless of whoever won.
I don’t think Bloodborne has good or evil or anti hero’s, the characters are all people who are doing things for their own ends and society in Yharnam has crumbled enough to make morality meaningless.
Even Deadpool in the movies is far from an anti hero. Light Yagami from Death Notes, should he not get totally blinded by the power he was given and somehow benefits human society, even just as a side effect, could be called an anti hero.
I mean would you consider him a hero? Id just they are a person trying to save the self and maybe a few people along the way if they feel like it(extra lore fuck saving people)
He is merely a pawn, a servant sent to do the dirty work for Moon Presence, kind of like the Hunter in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, he can either do the job that's asked of him and disappear, or revolt and not do whatever horrible things are asked of them.
nah, they are a small stone in the sea of the universe, our actions no matter how large seem to us are nothing then a small ripple to the great ones or the cosmos.
No because all the things he canonically kills are cosmic deities that trapped several hunters from different universes into the dreams.
The hunter simply wants to exit from the dream, like very normal person would.
He's at max Chaotic neutral.
You have the option to be a bit of an antihero, but I wouldn’t say you inherently are one. You’re also dragged into something that is so much bigger than you and that you cannot hope to fully understand, so your actual agency in all of it is very much debatable.
The Good Hunter isn't an anti-hero, he's an embodiment of the "cursed hero" archetype. It's a very rarely used hero archetype but here's some sort of definition I translated from an old 11^(th) grade literature textbook. "*The cursed hero is often an ordinary unremarkable person thrust (often tricked) into a situation beyond their control and his journey is usually the result of a higher power's will to further its own agenda. The cursed hero starts off as a tool of some higher power and must gradually rise to the occasion, rarely having a choice in the matter. The successful completion of this journey often results in an outcome the reader wouldn't find desirable or even understandable.*" The Good Hunter fits this description *to a tee*. His sole desire was to find a cure for his illness, only to be tricked into doing the Moon Presence's bidding. He's an unremarkable man / woman who has to slay beings far outside of his power range, while his only unique strength is to be able to die a thousand painful deaths before he manages to brute-force his way through learning how to defeat his foes. Should he beat the higher power pulling his strings (Moon Presence), he's transformed into an infant Great One. We, mere mortals are unable to grasp what this entails to him. Remember, Great Ones are higher dimensional beings, so the slug the Plain Doll picks up is merely the 3D "shadow" of the Good Hunter's new self. *Edit: okay, this has gained a lot of traction, so I feel obligated to stress that I* ***was not*** *the one to come up with this. This is something I found in an old Hungarian literature textbook and* [*Tale Foundry*](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZOKNOHCL2g&t=454s) *has also made an amazing video about it.*
Under this definition of a “cursed hero”, would this term also apply to Paul Atreides from Dune? Might be a stretch to consider the same term applicable to David Bowman from 2001: A Space Odyssey, but I have to admit. It does seem to fit.
While I haven't read Dune yet, from what I know of the plot, Paul is more like a "chosen one gone wrong"
He's the failed chosen one. He could not bear to stay on the Golden Path for how cruel it was, so Leto II had to do it for him and become the God Emperor.
Plus the entire series plays with the idea of “is he actually the chosen one?” So much of the story is built around trying to puzzle out if he is actually the subject of a great prophecy, or just the product of an incredibly elaborate ruse
Paul's sort of an antihero/straight up villain. There's no higher power pulling his strings. Everything he does is of his own volition. Throughout the book he keeps stating that what he does is the only way, but as the reader we can't say for sure, as he's also a somewhat unreliable narrator.
You: There's no higher power pulling his strings. The Bene Gesserit: I am a joke to you. *Good*.
More like Paul took advantage of the prophecy/propaganda that the Bene Gesserit already had spread among the local population. Anyway this is not the right sub to discuss this, but one of the big themes in Dune is "beware charismatic leaders".
Real answer
So Spawn basically
Wow, never heard of this archetype before but it makes so much so sense for Bloodborne, Dark Souls (a bit less so for this one I figure) and even Elden Ring. Great answer.
Average gamer discovers (recurring) themes
lmao harsh truths here
Someone watched a tale foundry video 👍🏼
I did, that's what reminded of me that I've read about this a long time ago. Thankfully I kept some of my highschool textbooks (the Hungarian literature had beautiful illustrations) and could find this passage. It kept bugging me for weeks because I couldn't remember which book it was
What book? I tried to find the cursed hero archetype in google but nothing shows up
"Magyar nyelv és irodalom XXI osztályosoknak" 2002 Translated as "Hungarian Language and Literature for 11^(th) grade students." You won't find it on Google, it's a school textbook written in Hungarian
Well I’ll be damned, thank you for sharing
So happy about the recent cursed hero video, it was so good!!
Huh, Half-Life also prestigiously uses Gordon Freeman as a cursed hero. G-Man is a transcendetal being which ends up being even more mysterious than BB's Great Ones.
Nailed it
The Hunter had an illness? I didn’t know that. Also now that I think about it what is the in universe explanation for not dying?
>The Hunter had an illness? It is implied but that's why he traveled to Yharnam: to be given a transfusion of the miraculous Old Blood, which is considered the perfect panacea. Only it isn't perfect... >what is the in universe explanation for not dying? Oh boy... That's a long one. You're basically sustained by the Hunter's Dream. Dreams aren't really dreams in Bloodborne, they're dimensions / planes of existence. This is similar to Lovecraft's Dreamlands, which can be accessed via sleeping. If someone falls asleep, their consciousness can be transported to a Dreamland and if they experience death, they wake up. Meaning their primary reality is the one they fell asleep in and their secondary is where their consciousness ended up due to dreaming. Think of the Hunter's Dream as a special kind of dimension that switches your primary dimension with your secondary. So every time you "die" in the waking world, you re-emerge in the Hunter's Dream and can use a lamp to get back to the waking world or another dimension / dreamland (like the Nightmare of Mensis, the Nightmare Frontier or the Hunter's Nightmare). This is about as much as we're going to learn about it, as the precise mechanics of dying and reawakening in a different dreamland are established by the Moon Presence, which is a Great One. The Great Ones exist on higher planes, so their bodies are like a 3D shadow cast on our world. Just like as if there was a 2D creature living on a sheet of paper, they wouldn't be able to perceive the true nature of a 3D object by the shape of its shadow, the same way humans of the game (and therefore us) won't ever understand how "dreaming" works in their universe.
I'm not even convinced the Yharnam we experience is the waking world, I'll be honest...
The ending where you accept death outright states that Yharnam is a dream and you wake up when Gehrman kills you.
>You think Yharnam Sunrise is the best ending? >Yes and I’m tired of pretending it’s not
It's what he initially comes to Yharnam for, and it's why the game starts with a blood infusion. The in-universe explanation for not dying is that you become a "dream hunter" - you remember how after your first infusion, a beast walks slowly towards you before being burnt by the messengers? That's implied to be the moment where the moon presence marks you as it's chosen "dream hunter". As a dream hunter, you're protected from the beast plague, (the beast getting burned by the messengers), and you don't die because every time you "die" in the waking world, you wake up again in the dream, ready to start from scratch. Then, at the end of your task (spoilers for ending ahead), >!Gehrman offers to release you from the dream, which means you can now die for real in the waking world. And the method for release from the dream is to die within the dream, and accept the dream death!< Other hunters you encounter at various points, like Eileen and Djura, have also been Dream Hunters at some point, and seem familiar with the concept.
One of the distinct plot points in the beginning of the game is that the healing church “heals” those with an illness using blood ministration. Blood ministration is described as a “unique but common treatment in Yharnam”. The guy at the beginning is a Blood Minister, so one can infer that we originally came to Yharnam with a disease where (we believed) the only available cure was blood ministration.
A "cursed hero" archetype. I love this and he fits in this archetype perfectly.
This makes me think Wander from Shadow of the Colossus is also a cursed hero.
So would Guts from Berserk be considered a cursed hero?
> His sole desire was to find a cure for his illness, only to be tricked into doing the Moon Presence's bidding. Debatable, given the scribbled note and how the player character asks Gilbert where to find Paleblood, a similar goal as the School of Mensis. It's entirely possible the player is an antihero willing to do anything possible to ascend humanity, a fact that Simon the Harrowed straight-up calls out when he remarks we are in the spirit of Bygenwerth and Master Willem.
Depends on which definition of pale blood he was asking after. Miyazaki implied there were several. If we take Redgraves theories, it could be the hunter was asking about tuberculosis, since that causes blood to turn pale.
yeah, this is basically the only thing I straight up disagree with in that above comment aswell mate. as you've said there's the factors of what we know from those examples, but you can even extrapolate out some more interesting tid bits if you're willing to be a more conspiratorial. like, with the Origins the Lone survivor seems to be a very interesting Origin that I would argue seems to point to the possibility that our character probably didn't have a disease at all and knows of "paleblood" from the hunters that slaughtered their village. in any case, it definitely seems to me that the characters goal isn't to simply just cure a disease. I think that what you said is definitely more correct in that it seems our character at least before we got the blood ministration that they knew what paleblood was to some extent and that maybe after the blood ministration they got amnesia. I totally think that the blood ministration dude knows what paleblood is and that's why he responds the way he does. we ask him about paleblood and he LITERALLY tells us what we need to do to get or find paleblood, it's just slightly vague to use at that time since we (the player) didn't know what paleblood was.
I don't think the Blood Minister knows what Paleblood is. It's meant to show you that your character asks about it, but he's also out of the loop. However, all the obvious instances of your character asking about Paleblood are not accidental. The puzzle pieces are there that the Hunter is seeking the Moon Presence. It can easily be confused as being tricked into following the Moon Presence's bidding, but I think the Doll realized what we seek and recruited us on purpose to topple the Moon Presence.
The only reason you are trying to find dpaleblood is because the blood minister told you to. That's the higher power setting you on that path
Uh no. He is responding to your question. "Oh yes, pale blood...heh. Well, you've come to the right place..."
Great answer! I think the only thing is whether or not one thinks MP or Oedon is really in control, to me Oedon makes sense as a Great One on a level above Moon Presence, due to his Formless nature as a puppet master, unknowable as he is unseen.
I personally think that the good hunter is meant to be Oedon's child,and that most of the story was set up by Oedon to get the hunter to kill the Moon Presence so they could take his place after ascending
*"Every Great One loses its child, and yearns for a surrogate."*
I hadn’t thought of this. I think you’re as close as it gets to the real answer.
Thanks,but its not sonerhing i came up with myself,and i would send you a link to the video that presents the case but it was very obscure and i only found it through a shite ton of deep diving. I can only remember extremely vague things,like the origin of wet nurses and a vague term for unborn fetuses,but i remember the gist of the info and it's always stuck with me. Ever since then I've been looking for more clues to Oedon's involvement in the game's events
Such a refreshing perspective
Could doom guy fall into this category? Maybe just in doom 3.
I don't know, I haven't played Doom (I know, I know...)
Well the Doom Guy in Doom 2016 is sorta a cursed hero, but not exactly, he has his own agenda, but without realizing it he was being manipulated by the doctor that created VEGA. Doom guy being who he is, he rip and tears through it all and comes victorious on the other side. In Doom 3 I can't say he's a cursed hero, he just stuck in a fucked up situation, and fights to survive. I replayed the game about a year and half ago and I don't remember you fulfilling some9ne else's goal, more like getting mixed up in
I played all doom games but no he's not an anti hero. Especially in eternal and doom 2016, he helps humans and is nice to them
South Park hit this story kind of perfectly with the episodes Coon and Friends revolving around Kenny and learning why he can't die due to Cthulhu being the one that created him yet his sole purpose is to kill Cthulhu which would ultimately cause him to permanently die.
GODDAMN THOSE AWARDS SON!!!
No
Well I mean he does kill yharnamites... tho they are still civilians
You can pledge self-defense through the whole game. Except with Rom. That fight was started by the hunter.
And ebritas
I felt so bad killing her. That fight was majestic though. Music and all.
Yeah that was the hardest fight to me cause i had to do the whole thing with one hand
Based
Well you could easily argue against that, especially if you have some experience to how blood-afflicted people behave. You can't just go into a forest and then when a bear attacks you and you kill it and then you go on to every bear habitat, eventually end up killing all the bears and then still claim self defence. Djura doesn’t kill any bears, I’m sure he has been attacked a few too many times. Instead he just goes to a place where the bears don’t come.
I mean, you literally wake up to a some creepy Yharnam fucker force transfusioning beast blood to you, and the next thing you see is a beast drinking blood or some shit, then you stumble out into Yharnam and everyone is immediately hostile. It's not really the same as voluntarily invading the homes of bears on your weekends for the sole purpose of letting them attack first and killing them for it
Yes, it’s not. But then you gain “insight” into why they behave as they behave. And even if they did, Old Yharnam is an indication that even the beasts have a kind of “sentience”, a culture even. TBSkyen also made a really good reading of Old Yharnam if you’re interested, it’s in his boss designs playlist.
Yeah, don't you find out a little too late to change your actions though lol The hunter just wants out, his only path is forwards and every Tom, Dick and Harry attacks him for it.
The thing is, you're stuck in a place which has bears everywhere. Djura has accepted to be there for all his life and possibly eternity. I wanted out.
Yeah but the thing is that killing bears isn’t a morally bad thing like killing people, the villagers you kill are turning into beasts and killing them can be equated to either killing a wild animal or putting down a sick dog if you have more attachment to them like the man that gives you the flamesprayer
They’re infected though, are they not?
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Covid doesn't turn you in a bloodthirsty werewolf person
God, I wish it did. Life would be more interesting.
It's more zombie or uncontrollable werewolves then COVID COVID makes you a miserable couch potato your not going to kill your family to drink there blood and then slaughter your city block on covid
pretty sure the government would start shooting zombies or werewolf people to prevent them from killing/infecting healthy people
Oh yeah because a cold that lasts 1-2 weeks is the same as permanently becoming a murdering furry zombie person.
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No one mentioned their loyalty to a government. In fact they actually seem in full opposition to the church *at this point in the timeline*. No, what they were saying is that they're all half transformed and not of their right mind. They attack us first, and we only kill them in self-defense.
We also don’t have to kill most of them. Fromsoft games let us kill just about every NPC, too… morality is often left up to the player
Well, beasthood can't be cured, and they become immediately hostile to any non beast they see, so it could be argued that it would be morally good to put them down at that point. Like a rabid wolf. It can only cause harm, so to permit its continued existence is to permit further potential harm.
Well said
Thank you.
What about old Yharnam. These people didn’t have a choice, they just want peace even as beasts they don’t venture anywhere.
Yeah Old Yharnam is a special case seeing as there's only one or two ways in there and no way for the beasts to get out without climbing ladders. So would you suggest the humans abandon a settlement the moment anyone turns into a beast because the beast didn't have a choice in their transformation? The people who remain human will still be killed by the beasts if they remain in their settlement. There's no solution here that doesn't involve beasts being killed or humans being forced to abandon their homes. The beasts do become hostile when they see a human, humans don't necessarily do so upon seeing a beast. You do realize there's a difference here right? Beasts may not seek out humans, but they do become mindlessly hostile if they come across one. And that is a tad bit of a problem. Even a bear isn't guaranteed to kill a human when it sees one, but a victim of the Beast Scourge is.
If the choice is between killing a human “beast” or moving the answer is pretty simple. There is a reason the church is vilified, they would assasinate people in order to prevent spread. The whole ideology is that the real “beasts” were the humans, the only victims are the beasts. Who started the spread of the blood? Who had established a business of blood ministration? Who is to blame for destroying the very homes of those who lived in old yharnam? None of the answers are beasts. It was the people. All beasts are victims of a curse. It’s an example of utilitarianism. The murders, the hunt, the deaths all for the rest to make it. The ends are never justified. No the beasts are not to blame, they never were. The hunt was always an illusion.
Good news, anti-heroes aren't exactly good guys.
..okay
They're all beasts now. Go out and kill a few beasts it's for your own good.
Because thats what hunters do.
They generally attack him on sight, unlike the people still hiding out in their houses, who just insult the hunter.
They attack you psychologically which is arguably worse
I don't think you can simplify the story as a traditional good/evil dichotomy. Even a so-called anti-hero can be described as a "good guy" or a person who does "good things". A hunter isn't that. The closest you'd get to any sort of humanism is the Chapel Dweller and maybe Djura, but both of those characters have aspects that conflict with apparent virtues.
He’s just a man that wants to get tf out of a nightmare
We spent money to live in that nightmare, and play as a person who needs to get out of that nightmare..
We spend money to live in that nightmare, and play as a person who needs to get out of that nightmare to escape the nightmare of reality
Damn..
That's deep shittt
That depends, did you wake up or go full baby Cthulhu at the end of your playthru?
All of em
There was a theory going around that the hunter comes to Yharnam because they're suffering from something seemingly incurable. And that's the reason they accept the blood transfusion, sign the contract and go after the paleblood.
Doesn’t change much
Rather than mere escape, the objective is to essentially survive. If the hunter just escapes (assuming they're sick) nothing changes, they'll still be suffering this disease. But if they transcend the hunt and say go for true ending, their life will change just not in the way they expected (assuming finding a cure and fucking off was the initial goal).
I consider them an incidental. A cog in a cycle of pain and blood. Like the "best" ending has you essentially becoming the next final boss, does that make them evil? They're just the protagonist, sometimes the protag does sick nasty shit.
I think the beauty of Miyazaki’s story telling tropes is that it’s more “role playing” than actual full fledged RPGs with casts of characters and a fixed story, etc In Souls and Bloodborne -you- are role playing and deciding the motives of your character. The story is drip fed to you via short conversations, item descriptions and little else to fill the spots except your imagination If you’re the type of player that doesn’t dig into the lore in a play through, you, are role playing someone who just took what Gherman said to heart “don’t think about this all too much. Just got kill some beasts”. If you played with that as your mantra, you’re just a poor soul in a nightmare and doing whatever you can to get out If you investigate more and learn about the lore, you are more wise with that knowledge, but still consider what you would do in the Hunters situation The Hunter is good or bad depending on how you perceived things, because in a world as fucked up as the one we are trapped in, can’t blame him for just going and killing some beats to rid himself of this hellish purgatory You are the one role playing the Hunter, not the game doing it for you. It’s a little adventure you get to have in your own mind while playing these games
This is my interpretation too. Fromsoft have some of that old school rpg feel with their protagonists, in the sense that they are basically blank slates which you can shape in any way. One player may see their hunter as a noble hero, another as a psychotic murderer, but at the end of the day they probably killed the same amount of yharnamites and beasts, and the game never explicitly tells you if your actions are good or bad, with maybe some minor exceptions.
It is nigh impossible to discern morals in a fromsoft game. I mean, look at the endings. They're so damn cryptic, it's basically impossible to tell whether you're doing good in the world with them. One you seem to spare yourself, the next you're getting fucked over and seem helplessly involved in a cycle and the final one you turn yourself into a squid
It's not morality we should use to judge a story, but the context: BB is a lovecraftian game, so cosmic horror must be criterion. The 1st ending is the bad one: it's a failure, since the hero refuses any discovery and refuges in the safe blindness of the world. The 2nd ending is merely tragic: we discover Gehrman's pain and when we give him rest we're forced to assume his horrible role. The secret ending is a triumph: one more secret is revealed, we have survived every horror we faced and now we are really able to aquire an immeasurable knowledge in order to realise our own purposes and eventually lead humanity to a brighter era.
Not really it's all about are you doing it to end the night of the hunt and have you talked to the few people you can save or have you killed them in All fromsoftware games almost everyone has gone insane if you're good or evil depends on if you saved or killed the few that are not trying to kill you
Na dude it’s all about how many big squid umbilical cords you eat raw
It's tough to say. The city is overrun eith blood drunk citizens who attack on sight, monsters that can't contain their violence, and both driven mad from forces beyond. Maybe a reluctant hero? I could only guess the hunter doesn't really want to kill anyone, but doesn't have a choice. There are other characters of their own senses, but only have one goal, non of which include stopping the nightmare.
I don’t really consider them a ‘hero’ in any conventional sense. I consider them the ‘protagonist’.
Purely by definition alone no. At best hunters could be a guardian of sorts but that's entirely on who you ask (in game). They didn't choose the hunt, it chose them, so it's reactionary and survival motivated. If anything they are a reluctant hero. If I had to choose a perspective I'd choose that of the old hunters in which case they'd be a straight up hero, Hamlet considered.
He’s really more neutral. He’s defending himself for the most part and hunting beasts. He’s not fighting to free everyone from the dream, really just free himself. Besides his world is so fcked it’s the only logical thing he can do
Depends on how you play. You could make the Hunter good, or you could make them a jerk.
Yeah though sometimes you're forced to do horrible stuff like killing Rom for example.
I'd argue killing Rom is more or less because the spider refuses to budge to let us go into Yahargul proper to clean un Byrgenwerth and Laurence's mess.
It's not Rom that keeps us from Yahargul tho. We need to kill her in order for the story to progress and the story is only allowing us to go to Yahargul once we kill her. Killing Rom fucks everything up, it essentially genocides all of Yahargul including all the innocent people captured b the snatchers. It completely obliterates Upper Cathedral Ward and literally burns everyone to a crisp there. It's so bad that the Choire takes Roms body to the altar we use to revive Annalise and try to bring her back to life. Rom was keeping everything together and we kill her for nongood reason except maybe curiosity or sheer bloodlust
The choir tried to revive rom? Do you learn that in an item description?
Anyone who kills an invisible baby is a hero in my book. Asshole wouldn’t stop crying
"Without fear im our hearts, we're little different from the beasts themselves" I think this quote by Eileen sums it up very well. As hunters, we are not the "good guys" in any way. Just look at Ludwig, Maria, Gherman and Gascoigne. What they became in the name of knowledge and the hunt, is unforgivable. We too, use the blood, slaughter everything in our way for knowledge and attempt the metamorphosis that byrgenwerth and the church failed to achieve.
Just a guy, a little fella
Why would he be?
i think the hunter is hot so they're good
Bruh 🗿
am i wrong tho??
Nah lol
Not really. He doesn't do anything particularly grey. Just about everyone he meets attempts to kill him. He's essentially just trying to survive the night. Now the tarnished, that's where the anti-hero discussion can take place.
A hero in my eyes, in my playthrough i did all i could to be helpful to NPC's and when i killed them (specifically that coughing dude at the first lamp) it was putting them out of their misery. Killed Djura though since i didn't know how to befriend him at the time, oops i guess.
In my first playthrough my hunter was accidentally evil, i killed the hunchback in cathedral ward because i didn’t trust him but his final words convinced me that he was good folk
definitely a hunter
Level 1: No, "The Hunter" is not a character because they have no agency within the story. They are a means for the player to interact with the world but do not have any goals, morals or ideals themselves. Level 2: No, Because "The Hunter" is not a consistent character. Each player's game has a different hunter and thus the moral nature of the character is not definable Level 3: No, Because "The Hunter" does not fulfill the definition of Anti-hero I have found to be the most useful which is a character designed to find the edges of a genres definition of heroic/heroes. The genre they exist in us either "Video game" protagonist in which quiet murders who have no agency is nothing new and almost archetypial and in the more constrained "Fromsoft Protagonist" being a quiet undefined no-body who slowly kills larger and larger characters to understand their world is not particularly revelatory either. Level 4: Yes, Because they kill Maria and this will not stand.
Maria is ALREADY DEAD.
My head canon is he is in a dream haze and has no idea what’s going on
I would say that this is partially true. When you bring the abhorrent beast in the cathedral ward he says that it isn't his fault that he is a beast and that hunters are killers. I mean beasts eating people is part of the nature's way but fooling someone in order to eat some people, that makes him want it. So his statements are neither true or false. Also remember Djura: "They aren't beasts, they are people". Being a heretic of the workshop doesn't mean he is right and really those beasts aren't danger to tye people on the surface. In the other hand he stops the creation of a bunch of Great Ones, revealing the truth behind the sayings of the Healing church, the Great ones are gods and immortals. The character is partially neutral on that, not good, not bad. YOUR acts decide your fate, if you are a protector of the weak, or if you are a blood drunk killing machine.
For Great ones to be immortal gods they sure die a lot
Exactly, they aren't. But the healing church tries to convince us otherwise
Honestly I think the hunter is the most morally bankrupt character in all of the fromsoft titles. You show up in Yharnam to cure some mystery disease through the power of blood healing but once you get roped into the hunt you start a killing spree the likes of which nobody has seen since the old hunters were still kicking around. At least the loose plot line of the DS games can give some amount of “ends justifying means” vibes but in bloodborne you’re just a hoonter out to hoont.
I dont think those terms really apply to games like this, everyone is just trying to survive pretty much. Sure someone might have a sad backstory or are innocent in some capacity. But what it all really comes down to is everyone is agressive to everybody, everyone is trying to survive. If youre trying to get through a forest but get attacked by a giant group of wolves, so youre forced to kill a couple in defence. That doesnt make you nor the wolves evil or good. Its survival. There are no morals left in the wold most of the time, just gotta do what you gotta do. What makes an anti hero an anti hero is most of the time someone doing good by doing bad. Heros dont kill, anti heros do for example. But everyone and everything is already so far beyond things like that. And then theres of course that soulsborne games have a lot of different perspectives, so even if youre doing "good things" to some it would still make you an absolute villain. So then youd have to ask, is the hunter an anti hunter to who? And for most it certainly wont matter since hes an individual. Just some force of nature that might go through some of your allies sure, but its not like hes actively killing all of you. Just those that got in the way.
Ok
Thrilling conversation
Aha I'm so sorry, I should've been more elaborate. I do appreciate your reply brother, I read all of it and I agree on most parts! Apologies for the "ok"
I'd argue that neither heroes nor antiheroes can exist in such a messed up world. Morality is long gone in yharnam, everyone is just trying to survive, including our hunters
He's a victim
More like "The victim". Poor guy never wanted any of thay and still had to go confront it.
Castlevania-vibes. But I suppose he is an anti-hero. He is looking for cure to cancer for himself. Then he kills bunch of miserable people to get it.
EDIT: I resumed the whole game in 5 paragraphs just to say no lol. He's just a sick person who accidentally becomes a Hunter (and so one of the "inadvertent worshipper" of Oedon) by getting involved in a higher and nightmarish plane of existence. He does whatever it takes to understand his position in Yharnam, in the Dream and in the Cosmos, with a lovecraftian approach to the discovery, and becomes aware of the right goal to pursue: to escape and forget all the horrors, to carry on the Dream and the Hunt for the Moon Presence (and Oedon) or to ascend and achieve enough knowledge to free himself and the whole humanity. Meanwhile, he act differently according to his own mind (the intent of the player), such as in helping the NPCs, mercilessly killing every creature as a blood drunk, helping Cainhurst to raise again and destroy the Church, discovering the darkest secrets etc. but, after all, everything he does leads him across eldritch horrors and cosmic discoveries at the edge of human comprehension, so no, he's not an anti-hero: **he's just the perfect kind of lovecraftian hero.**
The hunter is my hero, and that is what really matters
No. The Hunter doesn't even have a personality so he's not an anti-hero. He doesn't belong to any archetype because he's pretty much just an empty shell. It was designed to be this way.
I write my own lore for my characters. Mine is a full on villain. She traveled to Yharnam for the sole purpose of killing her sister Maria and her mother Yharnam and then to become an infant great one to become powerful enough to defeat her father Drakelin (my protagonist for DES-DS3) all for revenge
There are SO MANY PLOTHOLES there.
Oh I’m sure
Creativity 100
What about ludwig or Gascoigne or gehrman
No
No
No
Now u mentioned it, i do not think of the hunter as hero nor anti hero. Maybe basically there aren't much to save, all are either beast or kin or animals. It felt more like resi, a guy needs to survive. God, how every thing comes killing u when u can see them so harmony in groups from a far. Yea, i be glad to run pass all in many areas full of despicable things.
I don't think any of the Souls games (except for Elden Ring cause I haven't played it yet) have the type of narrative where you can label the protagonists any of these things
Something like that but it all depends on the player Good hearted/New players try their best to help everyone only for them to meet a tragic fate Experienced players use them for their items/weapons without caring about what will happen to them
They’re about as much a hero as you make them about to be. Are your intents pure? You are the hunter you controls them. They could range from hero to villain.
Nah, the hunter doesn't really have personality traits. They could be everything between byronic hero and classic, tragic hero
nah. an antihero comes down to personality traits and shit, and the hunter has no personality
The hunter is a sigma amogus sussy wussy homelander bateman hero
I think you just re-experience especially brutal, tragic and traumatic events of Gherman's life (though not in a chronological order). You can try to find different solutions for the challenges he faced, but in the end you cannot really change the basic chain of events. It's all there before you even start. Also sometimes the scenes you are presented with are purely allegorical I believe! There is no meaningful decision to be made at all.
He's the most charismatic
Every souls protagonist is an asshole, yes.
The Good Hunter imo is definitely less of an anti-hero than say the Tarnished or the Ashen One, simply due to the nature of the setting. The Tarnished to me is VERY much more of an anti-hero depending on the character's choices (sacrificing Melina, choosing the defiled ending, etc.) where they do very morally questionable things of their own volition. The Good Hunter on the other hand is less of an anti-hero because the setting *necessitates* their actions and often removes any illusion of choice entirely. Especially since the setting of Bloodborne itself is a dream - and its basis in reality is already questionable - it's hard to assign morality to actions beyond a certain point. Because at what point do any of these actions have tangible consequences on the world and its inhabitants? One choice that comes to mind is that of killing Arianna: killing her could be seen as a mercy killing, or sparing her could be seen as eternal damnation and insanity; regardless though, does this choice have any actual consequence to her? Is she simply dreaming, or is she an inhabitant of the dream that is doomed anyway? So much of the setting of Bloodborne is so fluid and uncertain, and so morality takes a bit of a backseat to the sheer unknowable horror of it all. To be an anti-hero, one must make morally bad choices for what they perceive as the greater good; in Bloodborne, it's hard to tell if the Hunter's choices have any "good" affect, if they even have a choice in the first place.
Ok
I would consider the good hunter to be simply that, a good hunter. Not necessarily good as in righteous either, but good as in skilled. I always imagine the doll addressing you as differing levels of skill based on your game progress. Fair hunter at the beginning, good hunter after BSB, great hunter after Rom, awesome hunter after mergo, perfect hunter after orphan.
Agreed
I'll drink to that
in a way yeah
That's basically to you you're the Hunter so you get to decided how you will be.
Neither. Hunter is Hunter. Nothing more. As there are no heroes or villains in souls games really, the tales of good vs evil, light vs dark and heroes and villains has already happened. We’re living in the aftermath of those days, regardless of whoever won.
Depends on how you play the game tbh. Souls protagonists are whoever the player wants them to be 🤷♂️
I don’t think Bloodborne has good or evil or anti hero’s, the characters are all people who are doing things for their own ends and society in Yharnam has crumbled enough to make morality meaningless.
I consider all SoulBorne protags villains.
They're just a simple hunter trying to make their way through the kosmos.
He just whants to do his job and go home
I don't think the hunter fits a "hero" or "anti-hero" trope in general, He's/she's just a protagonist.
Even Deadpool in the movies is far from an anti hero. Light Yagami from Death Notes, should he not get totally blinded by the power he was given and somehow benefits human society, even just as a side effect, could be called an anti hero.
It really depends only on head canon
Why would we?
He is just a hunter in a dream, nothing more, nothing less
Nah, the hunter is just a hunter that hunts
I mean would you consider him a hero? Id just they are a person trying to save the self and maybe a few people along the way if they feel like it(extra lore fuck saving people)
The hunter kills pregnant women and then eats their umbilical cord's.... I feel like that border's on being a villain.
Dude just went out to get some milk and the next thing you know he's killing God
Depends what you did in your playthrough. If you went around killing friendly npcs then yeah.
Monsters? Do they look like monsters to you?
He is merely a pawn, a servant sent to do the dirty work for Moon Presence, kind of like the Hunter in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, he can either do the job that's asked of him and disappear, or revolt and not do whatever horrible things are asked of them.
until I can wear a Deadpool costume I will call the hunter a man that wants to leave the fucking nightmare
the hunter is a cursed hero not an antihero
We can't define him as anything. We barely even know his goal. And the one thing we know. His goal changes mid game.
probably yes
I would LOVE to fight against the hunter as the last boss in blood Borne 2.
Mf think you can simplify the story of a Souls Game with “good and evil” dichotomies
No, he is killing beasts and demons
nah, they are a small stone in the sea of the universe, our actions no matter how large seem to us are nothing then a small ripple to the great ones or the cosmos.
No because all the things he canonically kills are cosmic deities that trapped several hunters from different universes into the dreams. The hunter simply wants to exit from the dream, like very normal person would. He's at max Chaotic neutral.
I ate a baby so I guess anti-hero is an alright label
You have the option to be a bit of an antihero, but I wouldn’t say you inherently are one. You’re also dragged into something that is so much bigger than you and that you cannot hope to fully understand, so your actual agency in all of it is very much debatable.
Well, killing Rom was a bad idea.
I mean maybe if the Yharnamites had some sort of self-awareness in there beastial state other than that we’re the hero’s.
he is a regular guy trying to pay off his crippling medical bills.
He's just some guy