Revisiting VtM: Bloodlines

[Storyfag]

Huh?





Huh?


I mean if it were Malkavian I'd understand, but wtf?

Anarchy. Not that I agree, but that's clearly what the author went for.

 

[Delterius]

Huh?





Huh?


I mean if it were Malkavian I'd understand, but wtf?

they are pushing the envelope

 

[jackofshadows]

Huh?





Huh?


I mean if it were Malkavian I'd understand, but wtf?

Parallel between bruja spirit and joker's image from the very recent movie is even stressed by its wide-known poster. And yeah, I see some resemblance: Joker in the end becomes some sort of hero of the opressed, odrinary folk who's tired of social injustice, corruption and hypocracy to the point when they prefer 'peaceful protests' over current situation. While bruja vampires, at least the most naive and stupid ones as Damsel are tired of Camarilla with its laws, hierarchy and pestering in general and ready to fight against it.

 

[Bester]

Huh?





Huh?


I mean if it were Malkavian I'd understand, but wtf?

Parallel between bruja spirit and joker's image from the very recent movie is even stressed by its wide-known poster. And yeah, I see some resemblance: Joker in the end becomes some sort of hero of the opressed, odrinary folk who's tired of social injustice, corruption and hypocracy to the point when they prefer 'peaceful protests' over current situation. While bruja vampires, at least the most naive and stupid ones as Damsel are tired of Camarilla with its laws, hierarchy and pestering in general and ready to fight against it.

You've misunderstood the movie. At no point does the Joker suffer from "corruption". Joker's main problem is that the Western society has "normalized" most psychopathies and shut down mental institutions, creating millions of homeless people with obvious mental disorders. Western society doesn't take care of its mental invalids and this is the only injustice the Joker experiences.
It's the same injustice that created transvestites with a 42% suicide rate and a million "genders".
Joker is suffering from being unable to have a traditional family and a normal life. He imagines a relationship with a woman, because a normal one wouldn't date a psychopath. He represses an unhealthy relationship with his mother. All he ever wanted was a healthy family.

The idea of the movie is - we need to return to traditional values and take care of our mentally unhealthy people. The so called "protests" in the movie is an allegory of people who are just fucking tired of 999 genders and that one day they will revolt.

Given that the Joker's only problem is his mental unhealth, Malkavian is the only clan to go with here.

 

[Delterius]

the chad move is not watching the movie and making a version of the jokah for every clan except malkavian just because

 

[jackofshadows]

At no point does the Joker suffer from "corruption".

I was talking about folk who have cheered to him, not Joker himself who suffered from lack of govern support on which the movie does some emphasis. As for your overall interpretation - truly fascinating but I disagree: Joker's mental health isn't bound in any way to trannies, genders or other deviations from traditional values.

The movie about Gotham's social bottom with Joker as a major victim and various links to the real world. Thanks to that, I have much more enjoyed it in the process rather then its aftertaste.

 

[Semiurge]

Custom models for clan Brujah: Cassidy and Trash. Trash has different levels of undress. Cassidy wears his shades in the first four armor levels, last one is without them and shows his prettier post-redemption face.

 

[Monkey Baron]

I have recently completed a play through of True Patch Gold, and I'm currently 3/4 through a version 1.2 vanilla play through.

TPG has turned out to be significantly buggier for me than vanilla. The only fix I've noticed was that Grout's wife is visible for most of her cutscene. I've had two different instances of essential quest items not dropping, the game has frozen three times, two of those times I had to reload to fix. With quest items not dropping, I found restarting the client fixed everything. I'm pretty sure these are bugs that are left in from vanilla, I just have been lucky enough to not re-experience them in my current play through. I also got stuck in doors twice and had to noclip out of them. I found that this was due to my framerate being way too high, but this is something a mod should fix (the UP certainly does) but for all I know people weren't playing with 100+ FPS in 2012.

I still need to complete my vanilla playthrough (and I intend to replay it at least once more right after) but the bugginess of the vanilla game is really overstated. I would recommend any fan of Bloodlines to replay it without the UP. I love wesp and admire his dedication, but even the basic patch introduces a lot of unnecessary changes which alters the atmosphere of the hubs significantly. I tried walking through Santa Monica on the basic patch earlier today and it was so noisy! 95% of NPCs had something to say, and since there's only a few lines it gets old, really fast. I didn't find it annoying during my first playthrough because that's all I knew. I don't think the dialogue is bad per se, I think it was re-implemented without much restraint.

Also, reading the old version of the UP patch notes, I didn't notice like 90% of those "bugs." I'll have the notes handy for my next playthrough, however.

 

[deama]

I have recently completed a play through of True Patch Gold, and I'm currently 3/4 through a version 1.2 vanilla play through.

TPG has turned out to be significantly buggier for me than vanilla. The only fix I've noticed was that Grout's wife is visible for most of her cutscene. I've had two different instances of essential quest items not dropping, the game has frozen three times, two of those times I had to reload to fix. With quest items not dropping, I found restarting the client fixed everything. I'm pretty sure these are bugs that are left in from vanilla, I just have been lucky enough to not re-experience them in my current play through. I also got stuck in doors twice and had to noclip out of them. I found that this was due to my framerate being way too high, but this is something a mod should fix (the UP certainly does) but for all I know people weren't playing with 100+ FPS in 2012.

I still need to complete my vanilla playthrough (and I intend to replay it at least once more right after) but the bugginess of the vanilla game is really overstated. I would recommend any fan of Bloodlines to replay it without the UP. I love wesp and admire his dedication, but even the basic patch introduces a lot of unnecessary changes which alters the atmosphere of the hubs significantly. I tried walking through Santa Monica on the basic patch earlier today and it was so noisy! 95% of NPCs had something to say, and since there's only a few lines it gets old, really fast. I didn't find it annoying during my first playthrough because that's all I knew. I don't think the dialogue is bad per se, I think it was re-implemented without much restraint.

Also, reading the old version of the UP patch notes, I didn't notice like 90% of those "bugs." I'll have the notes handy for my next playthrough, however.

There was a video done by a bloodlines speedrunner wherein he goes through the changes of the UP and true patch gold, as well as a brief tutorial on how to get the vanilla working fairly well.

 

[Wesp5]

Except for the bit about using the 1.1 version to get a speedrun XP exploit, the same thing as described in the video can be achieved by using the Unofficial Patch and then starting the game from the exe instead of the shortcut. Or using the GOG vanilla shortcut. Also some of the "arbitrary" changes mentioned in the video do have a reason...

 

[Bad Sector]

So after watching that video above i decided to play a bit (i guess that image at the beginning that when you mention the game someone is going to install it is true :-P)... and a couple of days later:

Yeah, this is officially in my "i forgot how many times i finished this" list :-P.

Out of curiosity i played the vanilla-ified version from GOG by removing the reference to the Unofficial Patch. Though i wonder if it is 100% vanilla because i downloaded and compared the files with the Steam version and the vpk files in the base directory are different. I didn't bother checking out what exactly is different (like extracting the vpk files, etc) though. It could be GOG and Steam have files from different regions or something.

The game played pretty much the same though, the biggest issues i noticed were that the enemies were respawning very often and... i do not remember respawning monsters in the UP (or they were rare that i didn't notice it). Free ammo though! Also Chuck stopped reacting to me after some point and i had to noclip to the elevator to go to LaCroix's office. I do not remember anything other that stand out to me, aside from these the game played more or less as i remember it, though it has been a year or so since the last playthrough and i might be forgetting some details.

 

[Monkey Baron]

Also some of the "arbitrary" changes mentioned in the video do have a reason...

I think this really hinges on what you consider a bug. The tutorial level not matching with the outside of the nocturne theatre isn't a bug, it's more of an oversight that isn't worth changing imho. NPCs were probably meant to have some dialogue, but probably weren't meant to utter it whenever you walked near them. What does "buy a watch?" even mean..?

There also is the issue of changed dialogue, I'm assuming some of this may have been left over from when the UP was split into two. I don't understand the point of changing "I will do this deed" into "now you see me now you don't" or some other cheesy one liner. I think there were three instances of those in the tutorial alone.

Don't get me wrong, I think the basic patch does a lot right, and is probably the superior option for a newcomer or someone who is less accustomed to janky games. But the neccessity of a community patch for this game seems overstated.

I may change my opinion after doing some playthroughs, however.

i do not remember respawning monsters in the UP (or they were rare that i didn't notice it). Free ammo though! Also Chuck stopped reacting to me after some point and i had to noclip to the elevator to go to LaCroix's office. I do not remember anything other that stand out to me, aside from these the game played more or less as i remember it, though it has been a year or so since the last playthrough and i might be forgetting some details.

I also noticed enemies kept respawning in the Giovanni mansion. I haven't used the loud lethal approach there in a long time so I don't know if they respawn in basic. I'll kill Chunk in my next playthrough but one of the TPG freezes I had was in a conversation with Chunk. I've heard people mention that Chunk is known for doing that, so I might have the same issue in vanilla eventually.

EDIT: I forgot to mention but the biggest bug I've encountered in vanilla so far is that Tap Hotel (for Gary's poster email) did not spawn. I think this may be due to me doing the gargoyle quest the moment it was available to me. I just used a console command to give me the tape, so it's not a big deal.

 

[Bad Sector]

But the neccessity of a community patch for this game seems overstated.

TBH i think the main reason i got to finish the game in this patchless playthrough is that i already knew the console commands to skip bits - someone playing for the first time certainly needs the community patch. The changes it does are minor anyway and do not take away from the game.

Also i remember reading that you can't finish the game if you play as Nosferatu though i'm not sure if that was later fixed in an official patch or not. Aside from the playthrough i just did and the first playthrough i did back in 2011, all other playthroughs were with the unofficial patch.

 

[bayoubilly]

I have recently completed a play through of True Patch Gold, and I'm currently 3/4 through a version 1.2 vanilla play through.

When you say vanilla - do you mean unofficial patch plus but no other mods? If so, since you are almost done with both playthroughs, would you recommend first time run as true patch gold or just unofficial?

If you mean vanilla as a fresh install - you are a brave man. Couldn't even get it to start on my end without the patch lol

 

[Grunker]

I have recently completed a play through of True Patch Gold, and I'm currently 3/4 through a version 1.2 vanilla play through.

When you say vanilla - do you mean unofficial patch plus but no other mods? If so, since you are almost done with both playthroughs, would you recommend first time run as true patch gold or just unofficial?

If you mean vanilla as a fresh install - you are a brave man. Couldn't even get it to start on my end without the patch lol

I’ve played all versions and I recommend the Unofficial Patch. The changes I disagree with are so minor they are barely noticeable, while the great changes are just that; great.

 

[Monkey Baron]

I have recently completed a play through of True Patch Gold, and I'm currently 3/4 through a version 1.2 vanilla play through.

When you say vanilla - do you mean unofficial patch plus but no other mods? If so, since you are almost done with both playthroughs, would you recommend first time run as true patch gold or just unofficial?

If you mean vanilla as a fresh install - you are a brave man. Couldn't even get it to start on my end without the patch lol

Vanilla with the official Troika patch 1.2. You can play it by installing the unofficial patch and removing the -unofficialpatch launch option in steam or the GoG shortcut. If you are playing the CD version, you can patch it to version 1.2 first and then swap out some .dlls and the exe you can get from here.

For a first time run I would still say the unofficial patch basic is still the best option. There are changes I dislike in it, but it cleans up the game, and if you do stumble into a bug you can post about it anywhere online and wesp will be able to rescue you. But I would recommend trying to play vanilla at least once to determine if you prefer it over wesp's patch. I also think that vanilla is harder than basic in terms of combat. The end-game combat sections are a massive slog and I struggled in my most recent playthrough as a unarmed Brujah. I ended up switching to using the Ra Blade, and speccing into melee with the exp I had in the middle of one of the last boss fights because the boss wasn't taking much damage despite having maxed out unarmed, potence and celerity.

I'm really surprised to find that my playthrough of 1.2 was less buggier than TPG. I experienced a few minor bugs with reactivating quest logs due to conversation triggers remaining after completing the quest. I wasn't able to re-do those quests and get extra exp though so it's really not a big deal. I did however get to use the infamous Chinatown exploit which was awesome, it was patched out in TPG. Other than that I had no freezes and I didn't get stuck in anything which I attribute this partially to capping my framerate in the autoexec.

The two biggest bugs I experienced in my playthrough

Persuading the serial killer to stop killing lead to a Masquerade violation while letting the serial killer go and continue killing didn't lead to any Masquerade or humanity changes.
At the very end of the game, I chose the option to leave the key with LaCroix and say it was a gift from the Anarchs. After the cutscene I was back in the room with him and could talk to him again. It wasn't a big deal though, I was able to just pick the other option of leaving the key with him.

Other than that I did have a really hard time with the respawning enemies in Ming Xiao's temple and died a bunch of times there. Was a little frustrating but other than that, I had a really good time and I'm looking forward to my next playthrough.

 

[Wesp5]

Also some of the "arbitrary" changes mentioned in the video do have a reason...

I think this really hinges on what you consider a bug. The tutorial level not matching with the outside of the nocturne theatre isn't a bug, it's more of an oversight that isn't worth changing imho.

Normally yes. In that case a fan buggered me for a long time and even finally helped me build this, so I added it in! On the other hand many other buildings in Bloodlines look nothing on the inside like on the outside and most people don't care...

I don't understand the point of changing "I will do this deed" into "now you see me now you don't" or some other cheesy one liner. I think there were three instances of those in the tutorial alone.

If I remember correctly these were changed because they were the only lines where Malkavians had the same dialogue as other clans which clearly was an oversight. Sadly, even though some native speakers helped, we all are not Mitsoda !

Don't get me wrong, I think the basic patch does a lot right, and is probably the superior option for a newcomer or someone who is less accustomed to janky games. But the neccessity of a community patch for this game seems overstated.

You need the fixed exe and dll files to get it running in the first place but then you can theoretically continue as I wrote without the UP folder changes, which basically makes it the original 1.2. game with widescreen, memory and DRM fixes only.

I also noticed enemies kept respawning in the Giovanni mansion.

Yep, respawning from impossible locations was among the first things I fixed, because I consider this a bug ! I have no problems with hunters or cops spawning in hubs, but enemies appearing in empty rooms with no exits is a no go to me!

 

[Monkey Baron]

If I remember correctly these were changed because they were the only lines where Malkavians had the same dialogue as other clans which clearly was an oversight. Sadly, even though some native speakers helped, we all are not Mitsoda !

I just checked it, comparing the Malk vs. Brujah lines in the tutorial that's not right. I think "I will do this deed" sounds very Malky, it didn't need to be changed.

Jack: Alright now go feed. Careful, though...he's gonna drain fast.
Malk: I will do this deed
Brujah: Be back in a minute...
UP Malk: Aye, aye

Jack: Alright go.
Malk: I will do this deed.
Brujah: I'll do my best. See you in a minute...
UP Malk: Now you see me... then you don't.

Jack: Ah, he was probably just t urned and beaten over the head. They like to do that... make shock troops, cannon fodder. Put him out of his misery.
Malk: I will do this deed...
UP Malk: Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Jack: That's that. Sounds like we got another pack moving in though. The Sabbat're goin' all out. You better head underground, avoid stray bullets.
Malk: I will do this deed...
UP Malk: This plan is fine to me.

UP: (note that it's in a dialogue box and you can respond)

Vanilla (you don't respond):

These were all within the span of a few minutes in the tutorial. They're small changes but they unnecessary and more importantly don't match the Malkavian's usual speech.

 

[jackofshadows]

Yep, respawning from impossible locations was among the first things I fixed, because I consider this a bug ! I have no problems with hunters or cops spawning in hubs, but enemies appearing in empty rooms with no exits is a no go to me!

No go for you but apparently was ok for the original devs. That's why UP should be considered as a mod, not patch.

I think "I will do this deed" sounds very Malky, it didn't need to be changed.

Yup, little shit like this is what annoys me about UP greatly.

 

[Krivol]

Wesp5 I've spoken with few modders and 99% of them are nuts. You really seem sane compared to them, but even you must say that UP is not that vanilla at all.

 

[Wesp5]

I just checked it, comparing the Malk vs. Brujah lines in the tutorial that's not right. I think "I will do this deed" sounds very Malky, it didn't need to be changed.

Interesting. As I wrote I didn't change most of this myself, as very early in patch development I had native speakers go over all the dialogue for errors. Some of them also added missing Malkavian lines, but I wasn't aware that they changed already existing ones. I can only imagine they did this because the Malkavian line too often was the same, like it was nine times "I will do this deed." alone in the tutorial while the other clans had all different lines. I hope that this was done not as often in other dialogues though. As for the additional response to Jack that wasn't originally there, this was done for several reasons in many cases where the last dialogue of an NPC was very long: 1) you can't cut it short in case events are triggered at the end and 2) facial animations got lost when you watched them from far away...

 

[Wesp5]

No go for you but apparently was ok for the original devs.

Not really. Tim Cain said very clearly that Troika was forced to release the game unfinished and broken. So who knows what they would have changed if they would have had the time?

 

[Sykar]

I have recently completed a play through of True Patch Gold, and I'm currently 3/4 through a version 1.2 vanilla play through.

TPG has turned out to be significantly buggier for me than vanilla. The only fix I've noticed was that Grout's wife is visible for most of her cutscene. I've had two different instances of essential quest items not dropping, the game has frozen three times, two of those times I had to reload to fix. With quest items not dropping, I found restarting the client fixed everything. I'm pretty sure these are bugs that are left in from vanilla, I just have been lucky enough to not re-experience them in my current play through. I also got stuck in doors twice and had to noclip out of them. I found that this was due to my framerate being way too high, but this is something a mod should fix (the UP certainly does) but for all I know people weren't playing with 100+ FPS in 2012.

I still need to complete my vanilla playthrough (and I intend to replay it at least once more right after) but the bugginess of the vanilla game is really overstated. I would recommend any fan of Bloodlines to replay it without the UP. I love wesp and admire his dedication, but even the basic patch introduces a lot of unnecessary changes which alters the atmosphere of the hubs significantly. I tried walking through Santa Monica on the basic patch earlier today and it was so noisy! 95% of NPCs had something to say, and since there's only a few lines it gets old, really fast. I didn't find it annoying during my first playthrough because that's all I knew. I don't think the dialogue is bad per se, I think it was re-implemented without much restraint.

Also, reading the old version of the UP patch notes, I didn't notice like 90% of those "bugs." I'll have the notes handy for my next playthrough, however.

Weird, I played with TP twice, though over a decade ago, without encountering any such bugs and for sure is the game not buggier with the TP. Hell the original relase could not even be finished due to a critical error during scene transitions late in the game during Society of Leopold encounters.

 

[Monkey Baron]

I just checked it, comparing the Malk vs. Brujah lines in the tutorial that's not right. I think "I will do this deed" sounds very Malky, it didn't need to be changed.

Interesting. As I wrote I didn't change most of this myself, as very early in patch development I had native speakers go over all the dialogue for errors. Some of them also added missing Malkavian lines, but I wasn't aware that they changed already existing ones. I can only imagine they did this because the Malkavian line too often was the same, like it was nine times "I will do this deed." alone in the tutorial while the other clans had all different lines. I hope that this was done not as often in other dialogues though. As for the additional response to Jack that wasn't originally there, this was done for several reasons in many cases where the last dialogue of an NPC was very long: 1) you can't cut it short in case events are triggered at the end and 2) facial animations got lost when you watched them from far away...

The justification is understandable but they aren't bugs so they shouldn't be in the basic patch. Same with the tutorial teleportation thing (to sound like a broken record.)

Tim Cain said very clearly that Troika was forced to release the game unfinished and broken. So who knows what they would have changed if they would have had the time?

I agree, and I do respect a lot of the restorations you've made which I'm sure would have made it into the final release if Troika had a few months extra to work on it. But the point is, restorations have no place in the basic patch.

Weird, I played with TP twice, though over a decade ago, without encountering any such bugs and for sure is the game not buggier with the TP. Hell the original relase could not even be finished due to a critical error during scene transitions late in the game during Society of Leopold encounters.

Yeah, I don't know why I ran into so many problems. I also tried to patch my Steam version (Tess says Bloodlines is not compatible with Steam but his is the only patch that is incompatible with it) which fared even worse. It probably would have been worse than lurk's experience with it. HansDampf also had a really bad experience, too.

 

[Wesp5]

The justification is understandable but they aren't bugs so they shouldn't be in the basic patch. Same with the tutorial teleportation thing (to sound like a broken record.)

That's why it is called an "unofficial" patch .