The first enemy you encounter in Bloodborne is a big werewolf. He's supposed to kill you, so that you can be introduced to the game's hub, the Hunter's Dream. In fact, the game sends you against the fearsome monster completely unarmed.

But you don't really have to die. If you're good and/or stubborn enough you can actually beat him.

Here are a few pointers:

• Always attack from the rear. Wait for the werewolf to start charging its attack and dodge to the side and behind him. Then land your combo while he recovers.
• Use light attacks (R1), as you can get in four or five before the monster turns on you. It's also faster to recover. You'll be able to deal a lot more damage faster than with heavy attacks.
• Always plan ahead. After you land a combo on the boss, withdraw slightly and put yourself in a position where you have plenty space to dodge. Decide beforehand in which direction you'll dodge and make sure that there are no obstacles there.
• The werewolf can walk behind the curtains or get too far, making you loose lock on him. Don't forget to renew it.
• Don't overextend. It's better to miss an opportunity to hit or retaliate, or to land a shorter combo, than to be killed and have to restart from scratch. Be conservative and withdraw as soon as the monster starts turning towards you.

You can watch how I did it below. There's no special reward for killing the werewolf unarmed, and you get the same three blood vials you would by killing him afterwards with your starting weapon. Sooner or later you'll have to die anyway, in order to be introduced to Hunter's Dream and get your weapon, even if I don't doubt that there will be people trying to ironman the whole first area without weapons.

You could say it's totally not worth it, but killing a big bad wolf by punching him in the face (or more precisely, with Karate chops to his butt) is still absolutely badass.