World of Darkness Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 from Hardsuit Labs

[Heroic Liberator]

I want to give you a little advice. The purpose of parentheses is to to make a small clarification in case the original thought isn't clear enough, or a little off-topic remark. In a well-written text, the parentheses and their content can be removed, and the text wouldn't suffer from it.

I'm using them appropriately although perhaps the post suffers stylistically due to the amount of content contained within them when compared to the bulk of the text. I could be using asterisks and adding footnotes at the end of my posts instead, but meh.

You assume that something "less" artistic would sell better. It's the opposite. It's the art that is sought after the most.

If you go for a subjectivist "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" understanding of art, sure. Otherwise it is precisely mediocre stuff that is sought after the most since the ever increasing democratization of art (financially speaking, as opposed to the patronage-based higher quality art of the past) did not correspond to an equal rise in the level of culturalization for the average man whose cash now contributes to setting artistic trends.

It sounds like you want to say that Marvel's Spider-Man could've been a work of art, if only it wasn't directed at the masses or had a better theme, somehow? Spider-Man doesn't have a foundation to be anything, but an entertainment product.
You don't dumb-down art for it to sell more. You dumb down entertainment products. Art is nowhere near.

Oh, but it is precisely art. Vulgar art meant to entertain mediocre people, but art nevertheless. And it isn't being dumbed down from some platonic ideal that it could've embodied, but it's exactly the sort of art that it was meant to be. Can't blame the artist for making mediocre shit for mediocre people just as you can't blame a carpenter for making crappy IKEA tier furniture if that's what you demand of him. Sure, guy could've made some fancy furniture out of massive oak and with plenty of sculpted details, but Joe Schmoe had neither the taste to demand such a thing nor the money to back it up. And if he had the money, he'd probably spend it on some crappy furniture plated with gold dust instead since that's the level of cultural development that he's at.

 

[Sarathiour]

trying to rope herself something young to remind her she too once was "it"

Is this a metaphor for vtmb, white wolf, paradox, or all three of them ?

 

[Tyranicon]

You are equating the success of art with popularity. I can't disagree more.

The success of art depends on the goals of the artist.

You don't understand the definition of art. You think some "auteur" squeezing one out in his ivory tower is an "artist". Who would've thought that a guy who makes insipid low quality shit has complexes of inferiority towards charlatans and hacks who don't even attempt that in the first place and pretend that "they had different goals". Realize this: even you're better than them.

You are not introducing new arguments, but simply repeating what you've said before. Also giving me a curiously insult-wrapped compliment.

Yeah, yeah, art is inescapably part of the economic system, etc. Applying economic theory (especially those flavored by ideological leanings) to everything takes the joy out of life.

It’s like humans are just fundamentally unworkable as a species. We have all these contradictory desires that are impossible to reconcile.

Humans are violent, lecherous little shitbags that live short lives. Civilization has only manged to barely temper those urges with the rule of law.

We have a lot more growing to do before we reach any kind of utopia state. Or perhaps the singularity will happen, and if we don't go extinct, it'll be a neat shortcut.

 

[Wesp5]

Paradox turned from an indie developer into a publisher and failed to pay proper attention to Bloodlines 2's development, despite it not being their first rodeo.

I still believe there must be more to that. I was shown the beginning of the game and we all saw videos from the demo, how could this not be salvaged at least to the buggy state that Bloodlines was released in? Also Mitsoda claimed that writing and voicing was complete when he was fired and influencers like Outstar said they played early builds and liked what they saw.

 

[Roguey]

If it was salvageable, the Ubisoft guy would have said as much and it would have been released already instead of having to wait another three years for them to make another one.

Chris Avellone's insider-perspective was that "The whole experience was like the last five minutes of Barton Fink (not the beach scene, the scene before it, know-it-all), but stretched out over 2 and a half years." They were always underwater.

 

[Hammer Of The Heretics]

The kernel of truth is that there is a tension between holding to your vision and making more money

A bunch of nonsense. But let's pretend it's true. I'm making an indie RPG. Tell me how to compromise my vision and make more money, I'll do it. Do I put LGBTQ+ and trannies into my game? It won't make me more money, ESG won't take notice of me. I'll wait and give you chance to tell me how to make more money.

Obviously it depends on the nature of your vision and the demands of your potential customers. One possible example would be a developer who wanted to make a game with deep choice and consequence, who decides to add full voice acting to appeal to consumers who demand it, and winds up cutting down the choices because they now cost too much.

There's also a difference between abandoning vision with the goal of making more money and actually succeeding in making more money.

 

[Bester]

One possible example would be a developer who wanted to make a game with deep choice and consequence, who decides to add full voice acting to appeal to consumers who demand it, and winds up cutting down the choices because they now cost too much.

Not an example anymore, voice acting doesn't need people as of early 2023.
Also, you originally stated there are ways of "making more money". And the example you give is not about making more, but spending less, which is different.

 

[Bester]

Vulgar art meant to entertain mediocre people, but art nevertheless

Art is the very opposite of vulgarity. Art elevates man, vulgarity drags him down.

 

[Semiurge]

The last two pages

 

[NecroLord]

Humans are violent, lecherous little shitbags that live short lives. Civilization has only manged to barely temper those urges with the rule of law.

This reminds me of a Loghaire Thunder Stone quote from Arcanum.
Basically, the dwarves think that humans can do so much fucked up things because of their short lifespans (compared to dwarves).

 

[Wesp5]

If it was salvageable, the Ubisoft guy would have said as much and it would have been released already instead of having to wait another three years for them to make another one.

The Ubisoft guy probably just looked if it could be turned into an Assassin Creed or Far Cry game, and I can't imagine that this would be possible, even with Bloodlines itself !

 

[Roguey]

If it was salvageable, the Ubisoft guy would have said as much and it would have been released already instead of having to wait another three years for them to make another one.

The Ubisoft guy probably just looked if it could be turned into an Assassin Creed or Far Cry game, and I can't imagine that this would be possible, even with Bloodlines itself !

He promotes himself as a game whisperer, a guy who looks at troubled projects and tells them what they need to do to ship. Turning it into something else entirely isn't how you ship a game.

 

[Delterius]

I'm willing to bet they had a vertical demo and maybe the start of act 1 ready but everything else was in a rough state or plainly not implemented.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... outside of shitty mobile games. It should be obvious that there are tons of consumers who want to play urban fantasy. Not even indie games. The only games I can find that take place in modernish times are either FPS games where you shoot terrorists and zombies or pure horror games where you're running from monsters trying to eat you. It's really strange. Urban fantasy is not a genre that lacks for ideas. Sure, it's 99% paranormal romance nowadays, but coming up with monster ideas should be really easy since you have the whole of world myth, folklore and pop culture to drawn from. It may not be isekai, but you can play to the same power fantasy tropes. "Regular guy with no personality (so the player can project) gets pulled into a hidden world of magic and monsters, with magical powers of his own to do stuff with like collect a harem or solve mysteries or whatever. If we want to be inclusive of girl gamers we can add some hunky male characters who have some kind of psychological trauma that our self-insert heroine can heal with her magic vajayjay and a threesome with some other hunky guy like a Laurel K. Hamilton novel."

This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

 

[Zombra]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Devs who want this audience don't bother with imsims or RPGs, and why would they when they can go straight to visual novels for a fraction of the cost?

 

[Delterius]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Devs who want this audience don't bother with imsims or RPGs, and why would they when they can go straight to visual novels for a fraction of the cost?

the answer is that making RPGs is a humongous and fundamentally irrational idea that requires a sort of attachment that urban fantasy games generally lack. it takes a nerd with a company who grew up on D&D to make those sorts of CRPGs and let's face it, any walking sim with jump scares can sell 10 times more than the genre's greatest. the paradox of course is that emotionally compromised people aren't cutthroat administrators or realistic enough to get games out the door. we saw it with the WoD MMO deciding to implement parkour because assassins creed happened and we may have seen it with bl2.

there is no future only darkness. gehenna was all the cancellations along the way.

 

[Tyranicon]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... outside of shitty mobile games. It should be obvious that there are tons of consumers who want to play urban fantasy. Not even indie games. The only games I can find that take place in modernish times are either FPS games where you shoot terrorists and zombies or pure horror games where you're running from monsters trying to eat you. It's really strange. Urban fantasy is not a genre that lacks for ideas. Sure, it's 99% paranormal romance nowadays, but coming up with monster ideas should be really easy since you have the whole of world myth, folklore and pop culture to drawn from. It may not be isekai, but you can play to the same power fantasy tropes. "Regular guy with no personality (so the player can project) gets pulled into a hidden world of magic and monsters, with magical powers of his own to do stuff with like collect a harem or solve mysteries or whatever. If we want to be inclusive of girl gamers we can add some hunky male characters who have some kind of psychological trauma that our self-insert heroine can heal with her magic vajayjay and a threesome with some other hunky guy like a Laurel K. Hamilton novel."

This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

All this talk of harems and vajayjay makes me think this is just a pointed statement for me to hurry up on dev.

I'm working as fast as I can. It'll be ready when it's ready.

Working on finishing up combat basics.

combat screenshot/unabashed self-shilling

 

[RaggleFraggle]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Devs who want this audience don't bother with imsims or RPGs, and why would they when they can go straight to visual novels for a fraction of the cost?

I don’t see any decent visual novels either. Also, you can put rpg mechanics in visual novels.

Nighthawks isn’t out yet, but it looks like a decent game so far.

In any case, my monster of the week pitches seem to be beyond the scope of any VNs. Which is a pity

 

[Zombra]

I don’t see any decent visual novels either.

Sure, but we're not talking about quality at this point; we're talking about scratching an itch. Sex power harem fantasies, as well as gender-bending vampire stories, are fulfilled by VNs and outright porn.

But you know what, let me dial back and agree with you that integration of porn into the AAA gaming space will be blockbuster once publishers get over their fear of the puritanical right. On the other hand we're still seeing book banning and shit today, this year, now. Sadly the time still isn't right - or anyway, not right enough for Microsoft, and don't they own all the big budget names nowadays?

 

[RaggleFraggle]

I’m not suggesting integrating porn into mainstream video games. Quite frankly I would consider that a sign that society has reached terminal levels of decadence.

 

[CrunchyHemorrhoids]

Any chance of a Bloodlines remake when MS buys ActiBlizz?

 

[Semiurge]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... outside of shitty mobile games. It should be obvious that there are tons of consumers who want to play urban fantasy. Not even indie games. The only games I can find that take place in modernish times are either FPS games where you shoot terrorists and zombies or pure horror games where you're running from monsters trying to eat you. It's really strange. Urban fantasy is not a genre that lacks for ideas. Sure, it's 99% paranormal romance nowadays, but coming up with monster ideas should be really easy since you have the whole of world myth, folklore and pop culture to drawn from. It may not be isekai, but you can play to the same power fantasy tropes. "Regular guy with no personality (so the player can project) gets pulled into a hidden world of magic and monsters, with magical powers of his own to do stuff with like collect a harem or solve mysteries or whatever. If we want to be inclusive of girl gamers we can add some hunky male characters who have some kind of psychological trauma that our self-insert heroine can heal with her magic vajayjay and a threesome with some other hunky guy like a Laurel K. Hamilton novel."

This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Urban fantasy set in populated areas sets a higher bar for developers because of the environment's familiarity and complexity. CDProjekt failed at it because they bit off more than they could spit out and they weren't even limited by realism grounded in current day world, only the source material.

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Devs who want this audience don't bother with imsims or RPGs, and why would they when they can go straight to visual novels for a fraction of the cost?

the answer is that making RPGs is a humongous and fundamentally irrational idea that requires a sort of attachment that urban fantasy games generally lack. it takes a nerd with a company who grew up on D&D to make those sorts of CRPGs and let's face it, any walking sim with jump scares can sell 10 times more than the genre's greatest. the paradox of course is that emotionally compromised people aren't cutthroat administrators or realistic enough to get games out the door. we saw it with the WoD MMO deciding to implement parkour because assassins creed happened and we may have seen it with bl2.

there is no future only darkness. gehenna was all the cancellations along the way.

I'm beginning to think that the reasons why there still isn't a Bloodlines 2 boil down to the following:

• Vampires are too lame and untrendy for the masses, and masses means revenue.
• The rulebook and lore, even in their current neutered forms, are too problematic now.
• The original has grown in reputation and no spiritual sequel could match the expectations, which would mean a very likely financial flop. It's the "curse of Half-Life 3".
• And as you said - Urban fantasy + RPG mechanics = too high a bar for inexperienced developers, which may well be the only ones contracted to do a "risky" project like this. They work for free, essentially.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

That still doesn't explain why we don't see more indie games in that vein (pun intended). There are several medieval fantasy games where you play as vampires, like this one. The Bloodlust games have a serviceable infrastructure already in place, so I'm surprised that hasn't been used to make a non-dungeon crawler.

As it stands, the only games I can name are Bloodlust, Nighthawks and Vampire Gangs of Moonfall. Both of which are very different from Bloodlines even in the basic premise. Bloodlust is a pure dungeon crawler for which the urban part is cosmetic. Nighthawks takes place in a special city where vampires are openly known to the public and more concentrated than elsewhere in the world. Moonfall is futuristic cyberpunk (the second cyberpunk crpg with vampires since 1992's BloodNet).

I haven't mentioned urban fantasy games with wizards, werewolves or whatever because I can't find any of those. You'd think the popularity of Harry Potter would spillover into countless copycats, but apparently not? Even Hogwarts Legacy seems to be trying to channel medieval fantasy and desperately ignore itself taking place on Earth.

The rulebook and lore, even it their neutered forms, are too problematic now.

It was problematic then too. Everyone else in the tabletop scene loved mocking the pretentious goths who thought themselves above the other gamers.

 

[Delterius]

You'd think the popularity of Harry Potter

you'd think the popularity of Harry Potter would have spawned more high level Harry Potter projects in a timely fashion, but it didn't. you have the pc/console games for when the audience was kids and you have hogwarts legacy which all things considered is at the worst a mediocre fetch questzone and at best 'good for what it is'.

if there is an investment in RPGs then odds are it will be in generic fantasy because that's what the audience cares for. that's where all the in built marketing and all the cultural cachet is invested. which, by the way, isn't the big a deal either in the larger scheme of things as the D&D movie hasn't beaten capeshit fatigue on its own terms.

wether we get indie urban fantasy of any kind is entirely up to the handful of people who are well positioned to ride the waves and have studios ready to make 'em. the reason we got shadowrun instead of vampire: the masquerade: the indie bloodlines is because weissman and not mitsoda happened to be independently wealthy and had done his homework by the time of the kickstarter craze. and even then nobody is rushing to make new shadowrun games, or their own versions of them. harebrained scheme jumped ship as soon as they could.

 

[lycanwarrior]

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... outside of shitty mobile games. It should be obvious that there are tons of consumers who want to play urban fantasy. Not even indie games. The only games I can find that take place in modernish times are either FPS games where you shoot terrorists and zombies or pure horror games where you're running from monsters trying to eat you. It's really strange. Urban fantasy is not a genre that lacks for ideas. Sure, it's 99% paranormal romance nowadays, but coming up with monster ideas should be really easy since you have the whole of world myth, folklore and pop culture to drawn from. It may not be isekai, but you can play to the same power fantasy tropes. "Regular guy with no personality (so the player can project) gets pulled into a hidden world of magic and monsters, with magical powers of his own to do stuff with like collect a harem or solve mysteries or whatever. If we want to be inclusive of girl gamers we can add some hunky male characters who have some kind of psychological trauma that our self-insert heroine can heal with her magic vajayjay and a threesome with some other hunky guy like a Laurel K. Hamilton novel."

This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Urban fantasy set in populated areas sets a higher bar for developers because of the environment's familiarity and complexity. CDProjekt failed at it because they bit off more than they could spit out and they weren't even limited by realism grounded in current day world, only the source material.

I don't understand why anyone else hasn't tried to capture the audience... This genre is so formulaic with its monsters of the week copied almost verbatim from poorly-sourced misinformative online wikis and heroines that heal her bi-curious harem's trauma with her magic vajayjay that you would have to be terminally stupid to struggle this much.

Devs who want this audience don't bother with imsims or RPGs, and why would they when they can go straight to visual novels for a fraction of the cost?

the answer is that making RPGs is a humongous and fundamentally irrational idea that requires a sort of attachment that urban fantasy games generally lack. it takes a nerd with a company who grew up on D&D to make those sorts of CRPGs and let's face it, any walking sim with jump scares can sell 10 times more than the genre's greatest. the paradox of course is that emotionally compromised people aren't cutthroat administrators or realistic enough to get games out the door. we saw it with the WoD MMO deciding to implement parkour because assassins creed happened and we may have seen it with bl2.

there is no future only darkness. gehenna was all the cancellations along the way.

I'm beginning to think that the reasons why there still isn't a Bloodlines 2 boil down to the following:

• Vampires are too lame and untrendy for the masses, and masses means revenue.
• The rulebook and lore, even in their neutered forms, are too problematic now.
• The original has grown in reputation and no spiritual sequel could match the expectations, which means a very likely financial flop. It's the "curse of Half-Life 3".
• And as you said - Urban fantasy + RPG mechanics = too high a bar for inexperienced developers, which may well be the only ones contracted to do a "risky" project like this. They work for free, essentially.

The Twilight movies were massively popular, albeit very cringe and only mildly supernatural.