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distinctive atmosphere that is carried through each area with a sense of restraint and an unflinching eye for detail." Ario Barzan of the same publication calls
Yharnam's architecture a "fractured mountain of anomalies", stating that "the architecture as a collective entity clamors for space, so eager to become something absolute and grand that it threatens to collapse into nonsense". He adds that "as spires are piled onto innumerable balustrades, arches, and buttresses, Yharnam reaches a plane of feverish obsession that echoes the cosmic communion this civilization pursued to its ruin."
182:, with its residents, Yharnamites, resenting and mocking "outsiders". However, the use of the ancient blood had unintended consequences, as it began to indiscriminately transform those who possessed it into beasts, a plague that the Church attempted to suppress. Despite this, a phenomenon known as the Blood Moon brings about the city's downfall. When the player encounters Yharnam, most of its surviving inhabitants are either in hiding or already becoming beasts. Yharnam was praised by critics for its architectural and level design, as well as the subversion of classic
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foreign", he contrasts the fact that the player is an outsider in a city styled after London, while "the only friendly NPCs in the first area of the game – Gilbert and Eileen – speak with a
Scottish and Irish accent respectively", showing their status as foreigners as well. He also states that "it is revealed that Byrgenwerth, an elite educational institute (modeled on Lovecraft's own
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population center, and the
Cathedral Ward, the headquarters of the Healing Church. Alongside it exists Yahar'gul, the Unseen Village, run by the School of Mensis. At the highest levels of the city is the Upper Cathedral Ward, an area controlled by the Choir, a secretive branch of the Healing Church that seeks to contact the Great Ones; otherworldly alien entities.
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states that the details of
Yharnam's setting show the game's "active subversion and subtle indictment of Lovecraft's bigotry". Saying that a typical Lovecraft story features "a distinguished, Anglo-Saxon protagonist" discovering "unspeakable horror usually wrought by the simple, the ignorant, or the
178:, the city was founded by and experienced rapid growth due to an organization known as the Healing Church. The Church, which discovered miraculous, occult blood in ancient catacombs beneath the city that could cure any illness, drew many people to Yharnam from across the land. It encouraged rampant
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states that, with regards to
Yharnam, "none of Miyazaki’s other worlds—not the districts of Boletaria nor the peaks and troughs of Lordran—have ever felt so disgustingly real." Calling it "a nightmare vision of old Europe, with its bridges and spires, squares and alleys," he adds that "there is a
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The bulk of the city is laid out vertically, with the newer areas of the city having been built atop the old. At the lowest level is Old
Yharnam, a vestige of the city's past that was later burned and abandoned due to an outbreak of the Plague of Beasts. Above it lies Central Yharnam, its main
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A twisted, dreamlike version of
Yharnam also exists called the Hunter's Nightmare. Due to a curse placed upon them by inhabitants of a fishing hamlet they pillaged, Hunters are sent there "when drunk with blood" to eternally hunt beasts. The citizens of Yharnam are said to drink blood for
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imagery in
Yharnam's architecture, the Healing Church is contrasted from Christianity by its worship of "indifferent, malformed aliens" rather than "the image of a loving, personal God become man". This ultimately leads them to madness, as well as a "vast theological failure".
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The primary social institution in
Yharnam is the Healing Church, which is also the source of blood ministration, "a medical and spiritual practice that involves consuming special blood to heal illnesses and grow closer to the Healing Church's gods". Despite the heavy use of
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deserves to be remembered for anything, it’s the meticulously crafted geography of its first half. Those opening hours take players on a journey through some of FromSoftware’s best designed levels, beginning in the intricate
Victorian
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The architecture of Yharnam is described as "pre-industrial European", and "a spiny bed of super-imposed structures". Representing "humanity’s collapse despite (or due to) its ambitions", the architecture of the city is
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called Yharnam's "worship of terrifying otherworldly gods" a reversal of the Lovecraftian concept that "isolated, backwoods people" are most susceptible to superstition.
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of Central Yharnam before winding up toward the Grand Cathedral at the city center and beyond to the wooded frontiers outside the city gates."
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in style, with "bizarrely manipulated traditional elements".
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praised the level design of Yharnam, stating that "If
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