Editorial Reanimated: Eurogamer VTM:B retrospective profiles Brian Mitsoda and Wesp5

[Excidium]

Do we still get to kick Andrei's ass for being a incompetent retard if we go sabbat?

No, but if you join him you can save yourself the long fight through the Hallowbrook hotel !

Sounds good to me.

 

[Roguey]

Movement is good, using powers is satisfying,

When is this not the case?

loot has a nice progression,

Weapons and armors are a series of linear upgrades. The guns in Santa Monica and Downtown are shit. Guns are a stealth upgrade from melee which is a stealth upgrade from unarmed. No customization to be had here.

I liked exploring the detailed hubs.

Those hubs were small and had nothing worth exploring. That being said, I do like how Santa Monica, Downtown, and Hollywood have NPCs direct you to points of interest so you'll eventually cover everything and never have to aimlessly wander around to find all the content. Unfortunately, Chinatown doesn't. Possibly a time thing.

White actors playing Asians is one thing but voice acting? Give me a fucking break. You shouldn't just repeat every feminist/SJ trope that you hear without questioning the context.

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

Any work is to be considered as a whole, not on the basis of its individual parts. Dialogue is part of gameplay. Exploration is part of gameplay. And they are good. That is half the game.

Might I recommend The Walking Dead?

Even combat and stealth had good bits. Therefore, it is a good game with major flaws.

I'd say not.

And it wouldn't work half as good as a visual novel because so much of the content is designed to be experienced through gameplay involvement that wouldn't work for passive spectating.

Walking Deeeeeeeeeeeeead.

As for Activision; dictating a release at the same time HL2 came out alone is enough to bury whatever slandering revisionist bullshit you come up with.

One's a first person shooter, the other is a role playing game with bits of bad first person shooter combat. You think there's a significant overlap in audience between the two genres?

Roguey What's your opinion of the original Deus Ex?

I've completed it at least quarce. Fun with a lot of problems. Still has more competent core gameplay than Bloodlines.

When you see Roguey saying a game has shitty gameplay remember she likes Alpha Protolol then point and laugh.

No I don't. It's awful, it just has better core gameplay than Bloodlines, worse than Deus Ex.

 

[tuluse]

When is this not the case?

When is movement not good? Every gamebryo game ever.

When are powers not satisfying to use? Many terrible games, but also I would put Alpha Protocol in this list. VATS never felt very satisfactory to me either. At any rate, VtM:B powers were more fun.

 

[Zero Credibility]

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

Are you for fucking real? Seriously, tell me - is it acceptable for a white voice actor to voice say, a blue character (Strauss)?

 

[Roguey]

When is movement not good? Every gamebryo game ever.

I just did a side-by-side comparison of Bloodlines and New Vegas and they pretty much feel the same.

When are powers not satisfying to use? Many terrible games, but also I would put Alpha Protocol in this list.

Bullet storm, room sweep, and chain shot are as awesome button as it gets.

At any rate, VtM:B powers were more fun.

I played a tremere, the caster class. There's blood strike, the pointless ranged projectile, blood purge, the stunner, blood shield, the take-less damage buff, blood salvo, the decent ranged projective, and blood boil, the massive damage/instant kill and aoe damage spell. Blood purge and blood boil had fun visuals but these effects aren't anything particularly original (in-line with Bloodlines being all style and no substance). You can use flashbangs to stun people in Alpha Protocol, mines and grades to take out a cluster.

 

[Excidium]

At any rate, VtM:B powers were more fun.

I played a tremere, the caster class. There's blood strike, the pointless ranged projectile, blood purge, the stunner, blood shield, the take-less damage buff, blood salvo, the decent ranged projective, and blood boil, the massive damage/instant kill and aoe damage spell. Blood purge and blood boil had fun visuals but these effects aren't anything particularly original (in-line with Bloodlines being all style and no substance). You can use flashbangs to stun people in Alpha Protocol, mines and grades to take out a cluster.

Besides if you're even passingly familiar with the pnp discipline, the thaumaturgy in bloodlines is like an insult.

 

[villain of the story]

No customization to be had here.

"Customisation"? Who gives a fuck about "customisation"? LOL

Those hubs ... had nothing worth exploring.

Wrong.

That being said, I do like how Santa Monica, Downtown, and Hollywood have NPCs direct you to points of interest so you'll eventually cover everything and never have to aimlessly wander around to find all the content.

That is not true, I'm afraid.

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

No. Any actor of any colour voicing any character is perfectly acceptable under the right circumstances.

This actually remind me of countless feminists bitching on teh internets:

"BAAAW WHITE people OPPRESS ME! by assuming that I'm a native of X DESPITE my PURRFACT IN-GLITCH even though I really am"
"BAAAW WHITE people OPPRESS ME! by ignoring my native culture BECAUSE of my PURRFACT IN-GLITCH!"
"CONCLUSION: WHITE PIGS SO INCONSIDERATE DISRESPECTFUL AND STUPID SOMEONE THROW ACID IN THEIR FACE!"

Don't be that guy/gal/whatever.

Might I recommend The Walking Dead?

Walking Deeeeeeeeeeeeead.

You like that shit? I don't. I think it's retarded and atrocious. Yeah, "storytelling" is the new buzzword and it's okay in TWD but it should have been made a proper game.

Oh wait, wait, here's another one: TWD?

TWD GOT NO CUSTOMISATION!

R00FLES!

One's a first person shooter, the other is a role playing game with bits of bad first person shooter combat. You think there's a significant overlap in audience between the two genres?

There is a significant overlap in marketing between the two games. The big market segment only cares about pretty graphics and being told that it's awesome. 10 million+ people didn't buy Skyrim because they thought it could be the perfect RPG. It sold because they backed it up with a solid marketing campaign. For marketing purposes, Bloodlines, at the time, was a game made with Half-Life 2 engine except with prettier, more interesting graphics and an actual story and more freedom, which was a big fucking deal. With proper marketing (and much fewer bugs), it would be a solid seller. Even Colonial Marines sold 1.5+ M units despite being proven to be a husk of a deceitful presentation and ridden with bugs as soon as it came out. And it's only common sense that you don't try to release simultaneously with other big titles, which Activision doesn't seem to have given a shit about with Bloodlines.

Now, I don't mean to be an asshole and I fully believe that woman are and can be equal if not better at a lot of things but then again, some women do really belong to the kitchen.

 

[villain of the story]

Besides if you're even passingly familiar with the pnp discipline, the thaumaturgy in bloodlines is like an insult.

If you are even passingly familiar with VtM pnp RPG, the entire VtM: Bloodlines the game is a bad fucking joke.

 

[Rahdulan]

Not sure if White Wolf would want another company to make a Vampire game. They've merged with CCP (makers of EVE), and are making a WoD MMO. Having another company make a different game would most likely dilute their brand.

I seriously doubt that. As far as brand overall goes that's even more unlikely considering CCP gutted White Wolf and WoD itself never really went past RPG books and TCG outside of few video games of which only two are really remembered. I just don't see any significant dilution at work there so I'll just have to attribute it to CCP's poor priority choices.

 

[Excidium]

White Wolf doesn't even publish books anymore. WoD, Exalted, etc are licensed to another publisher, Onyx Path, that was funded by ex-white wolf people.

 

[Roguey]

"Customisation"? Who gives a fuck about "customisation"? LOL

It's important aspect of RPGs. When you only have linear upgrades, you have an old-fashioned JRPG.

Those hubs ... had nothing worth exploring.

Wrong.

What was worth exploring?

That being said, I do like how Santa Monica, Downtown, and Hollywood have NPCs direct you to points of interest so you'll eventually cover everything and never have to aimlessly wander around to find all the content.

That is not true, I'm afraid.

Um... what? You'll find everything there is to discover in those three hubs through NPCs directing you to go to those locations. Person A tells you to go to location B where you meet person B who gives you a side quest to go to location C and so on.

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

No. Any actor of any colour voicing any character is perfectly acceptable under the right circumstances.

These weren't those circumstances. Bloodlines' voice casting was handled by Womb Music from LA. I find it difficult to believe they had no choice but to give that role to a white woman trying to sound Chinese.

Might I recommend The Walking Dead?

Walking Deeeeeeeeeeeeead.

You like that shit? I don't. I think it's retarded and atrocious. Yeah, "storytelling" is the new buzzword and it's okay in TWD but it should have been made a proper game.

Never played it. But it seems like a natural evolution of the Torment and Bloodlines-style game.

There is a significant overlap in marketing between the two games. The big market segment only cares about pretty graphics and being told that it's awesome. 10 million+ people didn't buy Skyrim because they thought it could be the perfect RPG. It sold because they backed it up with a solid marketing campaign. For marketing purposes, Bloodlines, at the time, was a game made with Half-Life 2 engine except with prettier, more interesting graphics and an actual story and more freedom, which was a big fucking deal.

Bloodlines has a nice art style, but prettier? That's a hard sell. They are technically worse. Half-Life 2 also has a story, it's told through the environment, gameplay, scripted moments, and sometimes through exposition.

With proper marketing (and much fewer bugs), it would be a solid seller. Even Colonial Marines sold 1.5+ M units despite being proven to be a husk of a deceitful presentation and ridden with bugs as soon as it came out.

Colonel Marines sold because of the Aliens name. Far fewer people care about Vampire: The Masquerade.

And it's only common sense that you don't try to release simultaneously with other big titles, which Activision doesn't seem to have given a shit about with Bloodlines.

It was the holiday season, it's a flood of big titles. They seem to do fine.

 

[jagged-jimmy]

Yo, Roguey, I'm really happy you fight the good fight, and Imma let you finish, but Bloodlines is one of the best games i ever played!

 

[The Vanished One]

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

I think that only the quality of the actor's work matters, but besides that, yours isn't a realistic goal everywhere. Sure, in a large and diverse country large companies can maintain a diverse cast to cover any gender/ethnicity combination. Elsewhere, what'd be the alternative to professional actors of the "wrong" race? Hunt down random people and pay them half a day's work? Use subtitles? I'd go with a good dubbing by experienced professionals instead.

 

[tuluse]

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

I think that only the quality of the actor's work matters, but besides that, yours isn't a realistic goal everywhere. Sure, in a large and diverse country large companies can maintain a diverse cast to cover any gender/ethnicity combination. Elsewhere, what'd be the alternative to professional actors of the "wrong" race? Hunt down random people and pay them half a day's work? Use subtitles? I'd go with a good dubbing by experienced professionals instead.

Roguey isn't concerned with who produces the best voice in this case. She's advocating based on political reasons.

 

[Diablo169]

You simply cannot apply standards like that in voice acting, you have women voicing young boy and teenage roles as well don't forget. Voice acting is one of the mediums where is SHOULDN'T matter what color your skin or what you gender is.

It should all be about their acting ability.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

What about a person of colour voicing a white character?

Spoiler

j/k, they have funny voices so it doesn't work

 

[Monty]

Got to hand it to Roguey actually - people keep biting.

 

[Cursed Platypus]

You simply cannot apply standards like that in voice acting, you have women voicing young boy and teenage roles as well don't forget.

And this is extremely annoying. When a young 12 is voiced by a 40 year old woman it does sound awful, the boy gets the voice of a old women trying to sound like a little girl. The only reason they do so is because of budget and logistics constraints : hiring kids is complicated, and they go to school in the day.
In big budget production, they tend to go through the hassle of using kids to provide kid's voice.
A white american should not be voiced by an hispanic if said actor sounds like an hispanic, and vice versa.

 

[Horus]

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

Isn't that racist?o_O

 

[Jaesun]

Can we ban Roguey from the News forum?

 

[Saduj]

What about a person of colour voicing a white character?

Spoiler

j/k, they have funny voices so it doesn't work

 

[Yaar Podshipnik]

They cheated on Darth Vader - the breathing was done with help of a diving regulator.

 

[RK47]

Yo, Roguey, I'm really happy you fight the good fight, and Imma let you finish, but Bloodlines is one of the best games i ever played!

...eh, I wouldn't call it one of the best. It was decent but flawed experience.
Just imagine it without the patch on release day.
I remember my apartment elevator just bugged out and refused to descent. I had to find a work around and climbed in the vents just to get in and out.... Talk about wtf.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

A white actor voicing any character of color is unacceptable.

Isn't that racist?o_O

It's reverse-racism, so it's okay.

 

[Excidium]

Yo, Roguey, I'm really happy you fight the good fight, and Imma let you finish, but Bloodlines is one of the best games i ever played!

...eh, I wouldn't call it one of the best. It was decent but flawed experience.
Just imagine it without the patch on release day.
I remember my apartment elevator just bugged out and refused to descent. I had to find a work around and climbed in the vents just to get in and out.... Talk about wtf.

Check your privilege, that's how nosferatu have to do.