Bloodborne PC

Bloodborne PC

Bloodborne on Windows in one package: my launcher and my own engine. You only need your own game dump.

Community: join the Discord for help, news, co-op partners and beta feedback.

No game files are included. Bring a decrypted Bloodborne dump (CUSA03173 or another region) with update 1.09.

Install

1. Download BloodbornePC-<version>-win64.zip from Releases and extract it anywhere.
2. Run Bloodborne Launcher.exe and choose your game folder (the one with eboot.bin).
3. Press Play.

The launcher updates itself from the Releases page.

Features

• Play: game folder check, player profiles (each with its own saves and trophies), automatic save backups with restore, save import from shadPS4 or another port, DLC folder (The Old Hunters on base-game dumps), session summary. Bloodborne.exe starts the game straight away with your settings (for a shortcut or Steam).
• Display: resolution (or your display's own, any shape), monitor selection, fullscreen, widescreen (21:9, 32:9), native HDR, 30 to 144 FPS or uncapped, in-game menu in 9 languages.
• Graphics: FSR 4, FSR 3, DLSS and DLAA, TAA, sharpening, occlusion culling, picture and camera tuning, FPS counter (frame rate, frame time, upscaler), best settings for your PC.
• Controls: keyboard and mouse for every action, the game's button prompts shown as your keys or as Xbox buttons, controller remapping, stick options, live controller detection, shareable profiles.
• Cheats: Blood Vials and Quicksilver Bullets (infinite or a set amount), infinite consumables and stamina, stealth, no weapon wear, firearm range, keep echoes on death, echo multiplier. Each can be turned off.
• Trophies: all 40, completion rate, in-game notification, reset.
• More: mods and patches, online on The Hunter's Dream (messages, bloodstains, co-op and invasions with bbhost players, through bbhost's own network code; an account with Discord or without it, with a recovery code), game log, crash helper with safe mode, memory check before starting, stable or beta updates with a version selector.

Control profile format

{
  "format": "bbport-controls",
  "version": 2,
  "name": "Mouse focus",
  "author": "you",
  "description": "Attacks on the mouse",
  "bindings": { "attack": "Mouse1", "strong_attack": "Mouse3", "lock_on": "Mouse2", "roll": "Space" }
}

Actions: move_forward move_back move_left move_right walk roll l3 attack strong_attack strong_modifier transform firearm lock_on blood_vial use_item interact switch_item switch_right switch_left dpad_up gestures personal_effects menu confirm back look_up look_down look_left look_right. Keys use SDL names (Space, Left Shift, Return, F); mouse inputs are Mouse1 (left), Mouse2 (middle), Mouse3 (right), Mouse4, Mouse5, WheelUp, WheelDown. Each action takes one key and one mouse input.

Building the launcher

.NET 8 SDK on Windows:

dotnet build launcher/windows/BloodborneLauncher.sln -c Release

launcher/windows/LauncherBuilder builds Build Launcher.exe, which rebuilds the launcher when its sources change (--force always). Put a folder path in launcher/windows/install.txt to install into a package folder instead of LauncherApp/.

Engine

The engine is developed here. It started from DarkIzuku/bloodborne_pc (built on bbport and shadPS4) and has been reworked for Windows since: about 19,000 lines changed or added across nearly 150 files.

• Performance: occlusion culling with real query results, cached texture, sampler and render target lookups, the end of each frame handed to the draw thread, render threads first, uncapped FPS. Up to the 120 FPS cap in busy areas on a Ryzen 5 5600 with an RTX 5060. Some of these are switches under Graphics › Experimental.
• Picture: native HDR (highlights from the game's own HDR scene), DLSS texture LOD bias, FSR 4 balanced model.
• Stability: fixes for silent crashes (0xC0000005), exit 23 asserts, low memory and display loss; crash reports and dumps; a GPU hang guard; VRAM cleanup, and game data leaving VRAM on cards that run short (4 GB).
• Sound: the game's audio threads at their PS4 priority on Windows.
• Game: cheats, menu languages, controller support, online with The Hunter's Dream, The Old Hunters on base-game dumps (DLC folder), 120 and 144 FPS from the 90 FPS patch.

The patch against the starting point, every change with its switch, and build steps are in engine/.

What I changed

The starting point already ran the game's own code natively and split GPU work over several threads. The charts show what was changed here on top of it; each item is a row in engine/ with its switch. (option) means off by default, with a switch in the launcher.

Performance: where each change acts

flowchart TD
    subgraph G["Game threads"]
        g1["Shorter spin at the end of the game's sleeps (option)"]
        g2["No waiting behind texture work on write faults (option)"]
    end
    subgraph A["GPU command thread"]
        a1["New pipelines created on compile threads:<br/>shorter hitches in new areas"]
        a2["A draw whose shader is still compiling is<br/>skipped for a moment instead of freezing (option)"]
    end
    subgraph B["Draw thread (bb:DrawRec)"]
        b1["Texture hashes kept: no 9 MB re-hash every frame,<br/>about 13% less work per draw"]
        b2["Texture sets remembered<br/>for every shader stage"]
        b3["Lookups kept when textures change, samplers remembered,<br/>end of each submission handed over (option)"]
    end
    subgraph GPU["GPU"]
        q1["Occlusion culling with real query results:<br/>hidden objects skipped (option)"]
        m1["Up to 80% of the card's VRAM<br/>for textures (option)"]
    end
    subgraph P["Present"]
        p1["120 / 144 / uncapped FPS"]
        p2["Precise frame pacing (option)"]
    end
    G --> A --> B --> GPU --> P
    classDef ours fill:#2b4a2b,stroke:#6fbf6f,color:#fff
    class g1,g2,a1,a2,b1,b2,b3,m1,q1,p1,p2 ours

Stability: what used to go wrong, and what happens now

flowchart LR
    s1["Write fault at the end of a GPU mapping:<br/>crash 0xC0000005"] --> f1["Handled, the game goes on"]
    s2["Engine fault on a game thread:<br/>Windows closed the game without a trace"] --> f2["Crash report with the thread and call chain,<br/>crash.dmp next to the log"]
    s3["Unknown texture format or lost display:<br/>exit 23"] --> f3["A known format is used,<br/>the display is recreated"]
    s4["Textures freed while still in use:<br/>stalls, GPU device lost"] --> f4["Hang guard: textures in use are never freed,<br/>deleted ones kept a little longer"]
    s5["VRAM fills up over a long session"] --> f5["VRAM cleanup: GPU-drawn textures written back<br/>and freed under memory pressure"]
    s6["Patch made for another executable:<br/>writes into the wrong code, crash at start"] --> f6["Checked against the 1.09 executable,<br/>left out and logged"]
    s7["Resolution patch above 1080p:<br/>game memory pool full, crash"] --> f7["Larger pool given;<br/>a full pool is explained in the crash report"]
    s8["Sound slowly falls behind the picture"] --> f8["Output follows the device's real rate"]
    s9["Online: signed out by the server,<br/>a network drop sent the game to the title menu"] --> f9["Client reports its version,<br/>90 s to reconnect"]
    s10["Unlock Game Region with online on:<br/>no server for that region"] --> f10["Left out while online, unless you keep it"]
    s11["Busy frame (a boss intro at high model detail):<br/>a render pool ran out, crash"] --> f11["Render pools four times larger"]
    s12["120 / 144 FPS: the game froze<br/>at the end of Vicar Amelia's intro"] --> f12["The 90 FPS patch,<br/>with its values for that rate"]
    s13["4 GB cards: game data piled up in VRAM,<br/>exit 23 or a lost device"] --> f13["Above 85% of the VRAM budget, data unused<br/>for 30 s leaves VRAM (chart below)"]
    s14["1440p or 4K output: 10 GB asked at start,<br/>Windows error 1450, crash at launch"] --> f14["10 GB only for a scene above 1080p; the launcher<br/>warns first and closes a game left running"]
    s15["120 / 144 FPS: the character<br/>fell 1.5 to 1.8 times as fast"] --> f15["Its frame time scaled<br/>like the patch's other values"]
    s16["Keyboard: W right after closing a menu<br/>was a held d-pad up (HP into bullets)"] --> f16["Keys act as the d-pad only<br/>while a menu has the screen"]
    classDef was fill:#4a2b2b,stroke:#bf6f6f,color:#fff
    classDef now fill:#2b4a2b,stroke:#6fbf6f,color:#fff
    class s1,s2,s3,s4,s5,s6,s7,s8,s9,s10,s11,s12,s13,s14,s15,s16 was
    class f1,f2,f3,f4,f5,f6,f7,f8,f9,f10,f11,f12,f13,f14,f15,f16 now

Button prompts: keyboard, mouse and Xbox

flowchart TD
    T["The game uploads a texture"] --> I{"One of the game's button icons?<br/>(its 20 key-guide icons, the HUD's buttons)"}
    I -->|"no"| N["Uploaded unchanged"]
    I -->|"yes"| D{"Keyboard or mouse in use?<br/>(Button Prompts: Automatic)"}
    D -->|"controller"| X{"A PlayStation controller in use?<br/>(Controller Icons: Automatic)"}
    X -->|"yes"| O["The game's own icon"]
    X -->|"no: Xbox, 8BitDo, any other"| P["The Xbox button bound to it (A, B, X, Y, LB, RT...),<br/>drawn the same way"]
    P --> U
    D -->|"keyboard or mouse"| K["A keycap of the bound key, drawn and encoded<br/>in the game's texture format"]
    K --> U["Uploaded in its place;<br/>the game's memory is not changed"]
    S["Device or controller switched, menu opened or closed, key rebound"] -.->|"icons uploaded again"| T

Game data in VRAM: why 4 GB cards no longer run out

Every block of the game's memory a draw uses gets a copy in VRAM. Before, those copies stayed for good, so VRAM only grew with every area visited.

flowchart TD
    L["Once a second: VRAM used against the driver's budget"] -->|"under 85%"| K["Everything stays in VRAM"]
    L -->|"85% or more"| E["Blocks unused for 30 s leave VRAM<br/>(10 s from 90%)"]
    E --> H["Kept: blocks with data the GPU wrote (only VRAM has it),<br/>and all of them while shaders read the game's memory directly"]
    E --> F["Their slots take the next blocks:<br/>VRAM stops growing"]
    U["A draw needs a block that left"] --> B["Bound again in a free slot, cleared first,<br/>or in new VRAM"]
    B --> W["The other blocks of its 2 MiB group come back with it, whole:<br/>draws read past their own range"]
    W --> R["Uploaded from the game's memory, then drawn"]
    classDef ours fill:#2b4a2b,stroke:#6fbf6f,color:#fff
    class E,H,F,B,W,R ours

Starting the game

flowchart TD
    A["Play in the launcher"] --> C{"Game left running?"}
    B["Bloodborne.exe, from a shortcut or Steam:<br/>the launcher stays out of sight"] --> C
    C -->|"yes"| C2["Offered to close it first"] --> M
    C -->|"no"| M{"Room for the<br/>memory pool?"}
    M -->|"no"| M2["Not enough RAM plus page file:<br/>a warning with the fix, or start anyway"] --> R
    M -->|"yes"| R["scripts/run_windows.py: every log starts<br/>with the launcher version and engine"]
    R --> P1["Patches checked against the 1.09 executable:<br/>FPS preset, resolution, render pools,<br/>third-party patches (01.09 or 1.09)"]
    R --> P2["Memory pool: 9152 MiB for a scene above 1080p<br/>or a patch that enlarges the game's heaps, else 5056 MiB"]
    P1 --> E["Engine (bb-probe.exe)"]
    P2 --> E
    E --> D["Add-ons in the DLC folder reported installed:<br/>The Old Hunters on base-game dumps"]
    D --> G["The game"]
    G -->|"ends normally"| X1["Bloodborne.exe: the launcher closes"]
    G -->|"crashes"| X2["Crash helper: the cause, safe mode,<br/>a report to copy"]
    classDef ours fill:#2b4a2b,stroke:#6fbf6f,color:#fff
    class B,C2,M2,P2,D,X1 ours

Credits

Engine starting point	DarkIzuku/bloodborne_pc (built on bbport and shadPS4)
VRAM cleanup	adapted from IFreemz/shadPS4-Bloodborne-DLSS-FSR
Crash and controller fixes	adapted from AwesomeObserver, Supermedo and deadinside28
Cheats and occlusion culling research	droogie/bbhost
Controller mappings	SDL_GameControllerDB
Trophy list	pyL1nx/bloodborne_pc
UI library	WPF-UI

License

The launcher is GPL-2.0-or-later (see LICENSE). The engine is GPL-3.0-or-later; its licenses are in the package's licenses/ folder.