Mod News Bloodlines unofficial patch updated to v4.8

[Ausir]

Tags: Troika Games; Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines; VTMB Unofficial Patch

The <a href=http://www.patches-scrolls.de/vampire_bloodlines.php>unofficial patch</a> for Troika's Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines has been updated to version 4.8. Here are some of the new changes:
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<blockquote> v4.8 22.02.2008
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+Recovered grenade as Intimidation powerup and fixed netcafe laptop.
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+Created new Gary quest to swap pull toy prop with poster of Tawni.
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+Added humanity points for granting money to haven bum and Mercurio.
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ade killing pier cops result in loosing humanity and gave one the baton only.
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+Changed Pearl of Dubai powerup to Charisma so Nosferatu can use it.
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+Swapped Gary's quest order and his CD for a box with vacuum tubes.
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Made Isaac give his gift earlier and SWAT cops use Steyr Augs only.
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+Exchanged knowledge requirements of high computer and dodge books.
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Fixed side quest breaking bug at Empire Hotel after speaking to Boris.
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Made Carson pack his laptop and fixed bad loading tip word choice.
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Fixed Imalia still being pissed off when you sold her the magazine.
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+Added overlooked humanity loss when killing Phil at the SM clinic.
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Corrected bad Ming Xiao, Tzimisce fatguy and Ra blade damage stats.
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Restored sound to Bach's grenades and fixed minor dialogue issues.
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Delayed reaction to changes of Heather's state in medical computer.
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Updated netcafe entry for Tawni Sessions dependent of quest state.
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Placed serial killer card more reasonable and restored more sounds.
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Prevented continueing the Tawni quest after you have been noticed.
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Added gestures to a Jack tutorial line and fixed stealth kill icon.
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Fixed Ming dropping out of dialogue and a possible Gary phone bug.</blockquote>
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You can download the patch at <a href=http://www.patches-scrolls.de/vampire_bloodlines.php>The Patches Scrolls</a>.
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Spotted at: <A HREF="http://www.rpgwatch.com">RPGWatch</A>

 

[elander_]

Looks more like a fan mod to rebalance the game to me.

 

[thesheeep]

I think all release notes of community patches for Vtmb bundled together would exceed the length of the LotR Trilogy...

 

[Mefi]

Looks more like a fan mod to rebalance the game to me.

I know from experience that it ain't bad thing to poke about in the files to find out what Troika wanted to do and how far removed that is from what they ended up doing.

 

[Fez]

Part of the fun of fan made patches and mods. Roll the dice and hope for the best. You'll find what looks like a great mod that fixes all the problems and niggles you have with a game, adds in hidden content or improves the gameplay - but for some reason the author will feel compelled to make every character in the game wearing a thong, make drastic changes to the game balance that make it pathetically easy or ridiculously hard, change all the music to Slipknot and it plays non-stop through the game at volumes that drown out everything with no way to turn it off or something equally annoying and nonsensical. Best thing to hope for is the minimum of annoyance with the maximum of goodness.

 

[cardtrick]

You guys know that everything marked with a + is optional, and not included in the standard installation of the patch/mod, right? That takes care of most of the "mod-like" changes.

 

[Mefi]

Part of the fun of fan made patches and mods. Roll the dice and hope for the best. You'll find what looks like a great mod that fixes all the problems and niggles you have with a game, adds in hidden content or improves the gameplay - but for some reason the author will feel compelled to make every character in the game wearing a thong, make drastic changes to the game balance that make it pathetically easy or ridiculously hard, change all the music to Slipknot and it plays non-stop through the game at volumes that drown out everything with no way to turn it off or something equally annoying and nonsensical. Best thing to hope for is the minimum of annoyance with the maximum of goodness.

Fair point Fez. Although for Troika games, it's often a case of "can you spot where they were told that the game had to ship and rushed through cut and pasting scripts hoping for the best".

 

[elander_]

You guys know that everything marked with a + is optional, and not included in the standard installation of the patch/mod, right? That takes care of most of the "mod-like" changes.

Looks like this one is missing a +

"Made Isaac give his gift earlier and SWAT cops use Steyr Augs only. "

From personal experience playing Bloodlines i can't see how this was a problem or makes the game better.

 

[nik2008ofs]

"Made Isaac give his gift earlier and SWAT cops use Steyr Augs only. "

Immerz1on!!!!

 

[cardtrick]

Looks like this one is missing a +

most

 

[headache]

I have to put in an unequivocally good word in these comments for this patch. The publicity for its constant updating finally got me to play VTMB for the first time this year (yes with the patch) and it's definitely an all-time favorite now. And as a result I also got Steam, which is a cool service.

I admire the modder's dilligence/obsessiveness. More power to perfectionists who help rushed-to-market games get it right.

Though I never played it vanilla, I'm confident that everything new, even in the "plus patch" (you get to choose whether to install it as plus or basic) is in the spirit of the game (no thongs at least).

Bonus for graphix whores: There's a tool included in the download that lets you patch it to play widescreen, which works great on my HDTV newly pressed into monitor service.

 

[Mr.Rocco]

which works great on my HDTV newly pressed into monitor service.

Did you have any trouble hooking up your HDTV to pc? I have hell of trouble doing it.

 

[NiM82]

Wesp's doing a good job, but imo it would be better if he focussed on fewer, more substantial releases than a constant deluge of little patches. That way he could have them tested more before they go public and the impact of the improvements would be greater.

It's kinda annoying to start a game and have multiple patches come out before you've even finished, which can't be applied without breaking the game.

 

[RK47]

Well most fights are usually a pushover if you upgrade to tier 4 disciplines for early game. My Ventrue, despite the disadvantage of 'no feeding from rat diplomats or low-borns' breezed through the sewers with max fire arms and medium persuasion/finance to fund my bullets & blood transfusions.

I'm staring at the finale now with full blood supply, ammo and armour, plus $2000+ cash leftover.

 

[RK47]

HAHA the 4.8 patch did something weird to the Downtown apartments (that area is notorious for crazy bugs) The first visit, the door knobs are replaced with cardboard boxes, even though I could open the doors, the 6th level proved to be a problem since I can't 'use' the keypad (it's behind a box).

I exit, and returned to find the boxes disappeared but I cannot 'interact' with the keypad. There seem to be an issue with 'hotspots' such as elevator buttons and keypads. I'm quite annoyed since I didn't encounter this quest killing bug on previous versions.

 

[headache]

Did you have any trouble hooking up your HDTV to pc? I have hell of trouble doing it.

I bought a DVI-to-HDMI cable (be warned, $60 at Best Buy) and that worked fine out of the box. The TV actually has a VGA hookup but this looks better. Never tried the 5-in-1 adapter that the graphics card came with.

On-topic: All the little patches are sort of annoying, and probably a bit too much. I'm inclined to cut some slack though because I like seeing newsposts reminding people the game exists, but too much can be spamming.

However, nowadays it's not like there's lots of important new CRPG news getting buried. And personally I don't mind patching frequently-- sucessfully patching is kind of a cheap thrill for me.

 

[elander_]

I disagree with many changes to the game (optional or not) but I agre that what this guy doing is greatly beneficial to crpgs. Bloodlines is an awesome game. Not with the details and fine choices of Fallout but still an awesome game.

One thing i would like to see changed from the original game design was Humanity. Just get rid of it completely make it have a fixed value for each race that remains fixed for the entire game. What if the player kills an innocent empty of blood? Make it a Maskerade Violation if too many innocents are killed like this in one town. The player must still uphold the Maskerade.

 

[RK47]

True, humanity seems like a needless stat. My first impression was if I lost all my humanity I'd lose the game, but this does not seem like the case.

More or less this is the karma-metre for VtM:B that gives you penalty if you are too evil. The reckless metre is probably the Masquarade.

 

[elander_]

Those bursts of beast rage are very powerful and can even work as an advantage sometimes. It would be interesting if we started a vampire character with 0 humanity (one of those races that is closer to the beast). It could be a good motivation to play the game in a different way.

 

[RK47]

What I want is Masquarade (if there ever is a sequel) to actually influence the world. Should you break it too much, some factions would actively hunt you down, making missions more harder to undertake with hunters and police going after you..

 

[elander_]

Maskerade violations already influence the game by unleashing hunters in towns but i see your point this could be done much better. The places where hunters are added to the game are very predictable and are never added to the game when the player is in a quest area.