World of Darkness Vampire: The Masquerade – Swansong - narrative RPG from The Council devs - now on Steam

[Clockwork Knight]

Also couldn't find a community forum or similar, so no way to report the bug or find out how to circumvent it...

I guess it's their Discord since their site is only for promotion materials. There's their Twitter but they direct you to the discord anyway

 

[RaggleFraggle]

If only it's been lore only. Sometimes it's shit like

That’s completely lore accurate. The werewolf lore goes into more detail about how basically Captain Planet is true and pollution is a sentient cosmic force of evil, civilization and technology is evil, etc. Also, science is a lie invented by evil wizards who want to enslave humanity and destroy fun. Concrete literally poisons fairies!

…

Sometimes lore is just fucking stupid. Hence why I’m lore critical now

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I checked the screenshots and all the characters are ugly idk I can't play this, getting outerworlds flashbacks just thinking of it

maybe we shouldn't let people who glorify ugliness make video games

 

[SumDrunkGuy]

When you click Restart thinking it's going to restart the scene, but it restarts the entire game on that particular save slot and game doesn't have manual saves.



Thank fuck this happened ~40 minutes in.

SHOOSH! Don't warn them about that shit. They deserve all the frustration that comes along with buying a turd in a box.

 

[Fedora Master]

Who came up with these fucking retarded haircuts

 

[notpl]

I haven't played this game and don't plan to, but look at these two points together and think about it very hard. The answer to your first question is "no."

Acting smug doesn't mean your math adds up to anything. Gonna have to show your work.

Remarking about how impressive it is that success or failure doesn't actually mean anything right after you wondered how much the plot would diverge doesn't strike you as dissonant? It's just a telltale-style narrative adventure game, nothing you say or do will matter at all.

 

[Modron]

I checked the screenshots and all the characters are ugly idk I can't play this, getting outerworlds flashbacks just thinking of it

maybe we shouldn't let people who glorify ugliness make video games

Wouldn't going vampire heal damage received and fix that eye, David Bowie's was like that as a result of a schoolyard fight.

 

[Marat]

Swampsunk or no?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Wouldn't going vampire heal damage received and fix that eye, David Bowie's was like that as a result of a schoolyard fight.

the amount of lolsoquirky attributes they seem required to have just feels fucking ridiculous

 

[Fedora Master]

I checked the screenshots and all the characters are ugly idk I can't play this, getting outerworlds flashbacks just thinking of it

maybe we shouldn't let people who glorify ugliness make video games

Wouldn't going vampire heal damage received and fix that eye, David Bowie's was like that as a result of a schoolyard fight.

Once Embraced, vampires are locked into a form of stasis. Apart from wounds (healed with blood), vampires are restored to their condition at the time of Embrace every time they rise up for the night.

 

[Zombra]

I haven't played this game and don't plan to, but look at these two points together and think about it very hard. The answer to your first question is "no."

Acting smug doesn't mean your math adds up to anything. Gonna have to show your work.

Remarking about how impressive it is that success or failure doesn't actually mean anything right after you wondered how much the plot would diverge doesn't strike you as dissonant? It's just a telltale-style narrative adventure game, nothing you say or do will matter at all.

Who said successes and failures don't mean anything?

 

[RaggleFraggle]

Wouldn't going vampire heal damage received and fix that eye, David Bowie's was like that as a result of a schoolyard fight.

It could be congenital, psychological or supernatural in nature. Jeanette developed heterochromia, for comparison.

 

[notpl]

I haven't played this game and don't plan to, but look at these two points together and think about it very hard. The answer to your first question is "no."

Acting smug doesn't mean your math adds up to anything. Gonna have to show your work.

Remarking about how impressive it is that success or failure doesn't actually mean anything right after you wondered how much the plot would diverge doesn't strike you as dissonant? It's just a telltale-style narrative adventure game, nothing you say or do will matter at all.

Who said successes and failures don't mean anything?

'"Fail forward" is super real. There are no roadblocks to moving the story forward so far, which means it is all on me to succeed or fail, be thorough or sloppy, etc. along the way. It's great.'

This description makes me think of this scene from heavy rain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSTYpaRp5kQ

The inputs don't make any difference to the resolution whatsoever. It's a visual novel with some set dressing.

 

[Zombra]

notpl I get it. You don't see the difference between a game moving forward in a good way and moving forward in a bad way. You're one of those "gamers" for whom nothing matters except getting to the end credits so you can say you "beat" the game. *pats head* That's cute. Hush now, grown-ups are talking.

 

[marek]

I don't mind the narrative style game, its not Vampire: Bloodlines but mostly about investigation - i.e. you have to like reading, intrigue, mystery & investigation. However i absolutely hate the save game system (or more: the lack thereof). Your only option: Completely restart a level, or continue from autosave. This might be ok if the game was bug-free, but sadly its not.

Example: In the very first level, I ran into a bug: an invisible wall stops access to an alclove (its open, you can look inside but you cannot walk there). According to guides, you are supposed to get in, look at a shawl and thats it. But for some reason, likely a skript not firing, i cannot. Since the game uses a single savegame & auto-overwrites it, i cannot reload the a previous checkpoint but have to restart the whole level in the hopes i won't trigger this bug next time. Dialogue - at least in the intro level - cannot be skipped (despite a message saying hold space to skip, but nothing happens). Means i have to go through the same full dialogues again and hope i won't run into the same bug twice. Don't have the nerve to do that today, but its a very stupid savegame design even without bugs.

Also couldn't find a community forum or similar, so no way to report the bug or find out how to circumvent it...

Do you want me to write you a program that automatically backs up the file?

Thank you, but its tab-copy&paste for me, so no real problem. Its more the idea that annoys me, less so the difficulty of circumvention...

 

[marek]

I have to qualify my initial annoyance with the game after playing bit more:

* Still don't like the forced ironman but its easily circumvented by backing up the save file via Explorer.
* I was initially very unlucky with bugs - encountered 2 (one gamestopping) in the first level, but none after that.
* After you have played a level, the skip dialogue option will start to work in further replays. So if you like to experiment, just finish the level and then start to play around
* The core of the game: Investigation, intrigue & mystery in the WoD setting is actually very well done, tons of lore and interesting characters with well written backgrounds
* Caveat: Don't expect humor in storytelling, everyone is dead (^^) serious, always! Also, don't expect combat, its almost exclusively character & environmental interaction, not action&combat.

That said, if you like the WoD lore and also like reading, social challenges & exploring, i would actually recommend the game now.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

notpl I get it. You don't see the difference between a game moving forward in a good way and moving forward in a bad way. You're one of those "gamers" for whom nothing matters except getting to the end credits so you can say you "beat" the game. *pats head* That's cute. Hush now, grown-ups are talking.

I hate the concept of "fail forward", it has become popular in tabletop design and I think it's terrible.
It is in essence a narrative mechanic taken from linear storytelling and used where it does not fit. Failing forward is how linear plots move forward.
Video games & tabletop are inherently nonlinear, but it is no surprise that since many of the writers now writing for video games & tabletop came from writing YA fiction, they have brought those tools with them and everything looks like a nail to their hammers.

Failing forward is how bad GMs keep their railroad going.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

if you like the WoD lore

I would prefer games that tried to be entertaining first rather than relying on bloated irrelevant 30 years old emo goth lore in an transparent attempt to cash in on nostalgia from the shrinking tabletop scene.

While I didn’t really enjoy REH for its plot, because it wasn’t beholden to an existing IP it did have the freedom to implement some really good ideas here and there. Namely, it cut down the number of classes from 7 to 3. Turns out you don’t actually need that many. It still suffers from poorly distinguishing the classes from the factions (as these aren’t actually synonymous), but I think this decision helped it a lot.

 

[J1M]

I don't mind the narrative style game, its not Vampire: Bloodlines but mostly about investigation - i.e. you have to like reading, intrigue, mystery & investigation. However i absolutely hate the save game system (or more: the lack thereof). Your only option: Completely restart a level, or continue from autosave. This might be ok if the game was bug-free, but sadly its not.

Example: In the very first level, I ran into a bug: an invisible wall stops access to an alclove (its open, you can look inside but you cannot walk there). According to guides, you are supposed to get in, look at a shawl and thats it. But for some reason, likely a skript not firing, i cannot. Since the game uses a single savegame & auto-overwrites it, i cannot reload the a previous checkpoint but have to restart the whole level in the hopes i won't trigger this bug next time. Dialogue - at least in the intro level - cannot be skipped (despite a message saying hold space to skip, but nothing happens). Means i have to go through the same full dialogues again and hope i won't run into the same bug twice. Don't have the nerve to do that today, but its a very stupid savegame design even without bugs.

Also couldn't find a community forum or similar, so no way to report the bug or find out how to circumvent it...

Do you want me to write you a program that automatically backs up the file?

Thank you, but its tab-copy&paste for me, so no real problem. Its more the idea that annoys me, less so the difficulty of circumvention...

I already wrote a program, so if you change your mind let me know how you want it shared.

(Was going to use it as an excuse to try .NET 6 MAUI, but realized that requires Android emulation, so I ended up slapping together something in WPF.)

 

[Berengar]

 

[notpl]

notpl I get it. You don't see the difference between a game moving forward in a good way and moving forward in a bad way. You're one of those "gamers" for whom nothing matters except getting to the end credits so you can say you "beat" the game. *pats head* That's cute. Hush now, grown-ups are talking.

The nice thing is that in the age of high speed internet, wikis and youtube it'll only take a day or two for all possible plot variations and skill results to be mapped out completely, so we don't need to even discuss this. I'll be proven right or wrong shortly.

 

[SumDrunkGuy]

I checked the screenshots and all the characters are ugly idk I can't play this, getting outerworlds flashbacks just thinking of it

maybe we shouldn't let people who glorify ugliness make video games

Can't have attractive people in media anymore. It makes the fat pink-haired abominations feel insecure with themselves.

 

[Zombra]

I hate the concept of "fail forward", it has become popular in tabletop design and I think it's terrible.
Failing forward is how bad GMs keep their railroad going.

I mean, sure. Would narrative games be better if every decision drastically changed the story so that every playthrough shared only 4% in common with the last? Yes, I'll sign off on that. And in PnP RPGs, it's indeed terrible to stick to the railroad tracks when player actions and success levels clearly imply a drastic reroute. In video games though, we're moving towards stories that have the big plotlines in common but variations leading to multiple endings based on player action. I was very happy with the ending slides in The Council and it is a fact that my actions, decisions, successes and failures had substantial impact on the results. What we have here is a million times better than "You failed your climbing roll and fell and died, reload a save and try again." Preferring traditional "fail/reload" mechanics to "fail forward" means you prefer games to be more linear, not less.

In my current PnP game, every dice roll has consequences .. otherwise, why roll the dice at all? When it's not clear why the dice are being rolled, the GM says, "If you fail this, such and such will happen." There is always an interesting consequence. This doesn't mean the campaign has to end, or that the main plot has to be derailed. It does mean, however the roll goes, that something at least slightly memorable will have happened. Those successes and failures are what make up the real story of the campaign. That's the feeling I get from the fail forward mechanics in Swansong.

 

[Zombra]

notpl I get it. You don't see the difference between a game moving forward in a good way and moving forward in a bad way. You're one of those "gamers" for whom nothing matters except getting to the end credits so you can say you "beat" the game. *pats head* That's cute. Hush now, grown-ups are talking.

The nice thing is that in the age of high speed internet, wikis and youtube it'll only take a day or two for all possible plot variations and skill results to be mapped out completely, so we don't need to even discuss this. I'll be proven right or wrong shortly.

Why wait?
https://www.gamerguides.com/vampire...-outcome-in-vampire-the-masquerade---swansong

8x Emem ending states
3x Galeb ending states
4x Leysha ending states
2x Berel ending states
5x Xu Feng ending states
2x Dunham ending states
3x Kurt ending states
3x Hartford Chantry ending states
2x Anarchs ending states
2x Camarilla ending states

8x3x4x2x5x2x3x3x2x2 = 69,120 possible endings

including many in which

Spoiler

all three protagonists are dead.

But I guess player actions, successes, and failures don't matter.

 

[Semiurge]

It could be congenital, psychological or supernatural in nature. Jeanette developed heterochromia, for comparison.

Fuck logic, pop kultur sense says that crazies have fucked up eyes.