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

[Rean]

This is somehow 50 times worse than Vampyr.

I never finished Vampyr and haven't played Swansong, but why is the male protagonist looking almost the same? Isn't there supposed to be decades between those games?

You will be glad to know both studios are in fact French.
The fuck is up with the French and their degeneracy?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I never finished Vampyr and haven't played Swansong, but why is the male protagonist looking almost the same? Isn't there supposed to be decades between those games?

I spent about 85 real life hours on various forums arguing that the hipster "shaved sides poofy on top full beard" look in Vampyr was incredibly stupid and completely anachronistic for 1918 London. There was plenty of pushback but nobody was able to come up with a photo, drawing or portrait from that time depicting anyone with that godawful cut. I ended up paying cash money for the "wear a hat" DLC so I didn't have to look at that shit. That DLC alone was worth more to me than the price of the whole game.

Galeb looks fine.

I find it amusing that you took more offense to his haircut than the anachronisms of there being so many minorities and gay people -- I swear half the characters in Vampyr are gay -- in early 20th century London.

finally got around to this
the amount of non-british people in early 20th century london is kinda killing the immersion

 

[Reinhardt]

monsters are constantly rampaging through the streets of London and nobody notices, nor is there any explanation why there are monsters in the first place.

monsters are metaphor for whypipo. there was time when london was full of whypipo.

 

[SumDrunkGuy]

I never finished Vampyr and haven't played Swansong, but why is the male protagonist looking almost the same? Isn't there supposed to be decades between those games?

I spent about 85 real life hours on various forums arguing that the hipster "shaved sides poofy on top full beard" look in Vampyr was incredibly stupid and completely anachronistic for 1918 London. There was plenty of pushback but nobody was able to come up with a photo, drawing or portrait from that time depicting anyone with that godawful cut. I ended up paying cash money for the "wear a hat" DLC so I didn't have to look at that shit. That DLC alone was worth more to me than the price of the whole game.

Galeb looks fine.

I find it amusing that you took more offense to his haircut than the anachronisms of there being so many minorities and gay people -- I swear half the characters in Vampyr are gay -- in early 20th century London.

finally got around to this
the amount of non-british people in early 20th century london is kinda killing the immersion

I just realised Zombra doesn't have you on his epic ignore list. That's highly unusual. Is there something goin on between you two, hm?

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

But somehow you don't see people get up all in their feelings about Darklands charactrers looking 1980s as fuck. I wonder why...

Because the 1980s had a cool aesthetic, unlike today's.

 

[Zombra]

I find it amusing that you took more offense to his haircut than the anachronisms of there being so many minorities and gay people -- I swear half the characters in Vampyr are gay -- in early 20th century London.

Obvious Bait x 1
but what the heck

The existence of black and/or gay people in London isn't an anachronism though. Unless you're telling me that factually there were never 3 gay people in any 1918 London neighborhood, it is not anachronistic to meet 3 gay people in a 1918 London neighborhood. At absolute worst it is "somewhat unlikely", which hardly breaks the setting.
Contrariwise, I maintain that the very specific early 2000s "beard hipster" style of a clean haircut combined with thick, full beard did not exist in 1918 London at all, and it's as out of place there as a digital watch, assault rifle or moon buggy. 3 years later, I have still seen no evidence of a single counterexample to disprove my assertion.

Also, even if you were right about impossible diversity levels, which you're not, the promotional materials for the game didn't show "anachronistic" levels of minorities on every page, but I had to see that hipster doofus in at least every other screenshot. I was mad long before I ever got my hands on the game.

To be honest, I didn't get far enough in the game to see all these pride parade floats you keep mentioning. If I saw them I might be inclined to agree with you, I don't think they had the parades back then.

 

[Fedora Master]

You would not find a lot of OPENLY gay people in 1918s London or anywhere else at the time.

 

[V_K]

early 2000s "beard hipster" style of a clean haircut combined with thick, full beard

In this specific wording, let me give you some Russian royals:

And a screenshot for a reference of beard thickness:

I don't know about you, but looks close enough to me.

 

[Zombra]

V_K I salute your perseverance. Those are very close but still don't have the hipster look to me. I'll freely admit that I'm moving the stated goalposts at this point if it will make you feel better, as I am not a professional style dictionary, but the thing I hate has always been the same and I've still never seen it in any historical photos. If I expressed myself poorly I apologize. Those Russian guys have a consistent thickness and look, not "poofy then shaved then heavy". The hipster is typified by this specific convergence of clashing styles which Reid shows large as life. (I'm shocked if you really can't see the difference.)

If I have to die on this hill so be it. It's been good knowing all of you.

 

[V_K]

I'm shocked if you really can't see the difference

No, the Vampyr guy has been obviously made somewhat edgier and modernized, I'm not disputing that. I just don't see it as so historically implausible as to be immersion-breaking - the severe undercut itself is not anachronistic and neither is the undercut+beard combination. And again, modernizing the looks is pretty normal for "historical" media of any era - just look at some costume dramas from 70s and 80s.
Characters in historical settings having good teeth is far more anachronistic than this.

 

[marek]

The "short back & sides" haircut was popular in the 1920s (even more so in 1930s, at least in germany). Full beards not so much, most were clean shaven, or upper lip only (or in germany the Kaiser Wilhelm style) - but there are enough photos of people with full trimmed beards showing it wasn't completely unheard of. Did they choose that style because it was also fashionable in the present when the game released? Most likely. But its not like everyone in the game is running around like this, and for the doctor being a returning WWI veteran i found it fitting (both the haircut as well as not going for the clean shave).

 

[Wesp5]

No, the Vampyr guy has been obviously made somewhat edgier and modernized, I'm not disputing that.

I agree. And I agree with Zombra that this TOGETHER with all the other anacronistic things breaks the immersion! It reminds me of the Clash of the Titans remake with the hero having a modern GI hair cut while all the other people have long flowing hair...

 

[V_K]

I agree. And I agree with Zombra that this TOGETHER with all the other anacronistic things breaks the immersion!

The hypocrisy of that statement is that neither you, nor Zombra are experts in WWI era. You just irrationally dislike certain things are rationalize it by them being supposedly anachronistic - but you don't have the first clue if they truly are.

 

[Don Salieri]

The existence of black and/or gay people in London isn't an anachronism though.

If it isn't the mystery meat faggot queen of ignoring. Seems like you have gotten caught in the act of peddling horseshit again. I know brown people and shit are drawn to one another like a bear to honey or a dog to its own vomit but you don't think it's a bit much when you tell stories with less weight to them than fairy tales? This fairy nonce manure stinks worse than a fucking paki family dinner. You know as well as I do that the nigger bio-bomb hadn't been dropped on London in 1918 yet and that there were no queers around. Before the kike financiers got around to pushing this on normal people they had to keep their noncery to themselves and if they were found out they were put in the trash where they belong.

Meeting a faggot in 1918 would either go unnoticed or you'd be throwing stones at the disgusting fuck to make sure he's not molesting your kids anytime soon. The rare misfortune of meeting a soulless nigger would be had in the harbor but nowhere else, since they were swabbing the decks of some ships that came in but they weren't raping and murdering all around London freely at that point.

 

[Don Salieri]

early 2000s "beard hipster" style of a clean haircut combined with thick, full beard

In this specific wording, let me give you some Russian royals:

And a screenshot for a reference of beard thickness:

I don't know about you, but looks close enough to me.

The real difference and why even a retarded mutt as Zombabwe finds this guy nasty is because his facial features are those of a 21th century mongrel and that doesn't pair with the beard or haircut blue bloods in the past wore so well. Same reason why so many modern people look like shit wearing a hat, it's not the hat that is the problem, it's because they've been reared on a soy diet and have the genes of a turkish gangbang. They're never going to look half as good as even a chubby Sicilian lowlife did a century ago.

 

[Wesp5]

I agree. And I agree with Zombra that this TOGETHER with all the other anacronistic things breaks the immersion!

The hypocrisy of that statement is that neither you, nor Zombra are experts in WWI era. You just irrationally dislike certain things are rationalize it by them being supposedly anachronistic - but you don't have the first clue if they truly are.

Of course we were not around during WWI era, unless we are vampires ourselves , but we probably have seen a lot of media of that time where people looked and behaved differently. But maybe all of these were wrong and Vampyr is right?

 

[V_K]

but we probably have seen a lot of media of that time where people looked and behaved differently

And again, modernizing the looks is pretty normal for "historical" media of any era - just look at some costume dramas from 70s and 80s.

 

[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.

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.

Did you actually read that link? Are you seriously considering "secondary character is alive vs secondary character is dead" as plot divergence? Baldur's Gate 2 has 18 possible party members, any one of whom can permanently die at any time, so I guess that's 2^18=262,144 endings, right?

Actually READING that link, it looks like Emem is the only main character where your choices during the game have any meaningful impact whatsoever.

 

[Comrade Goby]

It doesn't matter how many variations there are when these immortal wise vampires are written and act like modern 20 year olds

 

[jackofshadows]

I give up. This game is just too shitty. It's poorly animated, poorly written, bad looking, bad voiced excuse for a game. The detective sections are the best part of it but the cut-scenes and other stuff bore me to tears. I salute to everyone who's been able to finish this

 

[RaggleFraggle]

It doesn't matter how many variations there are when these immortal wise vampires are written and act like modern 20 year olds

To be fair, Duncan MacLeod and Nick Knight didn't usually behave in distinctly inhuman ways. That said, they still behaved at least as mature as men in their thirties do. World weary, crazy survivalist, hopeless romantic, etc depending on the episode.

It's difficult for human writers to write the psychology of immortal man-eating monsters that don't exist in reality. In all likelihood, it's easier to write speculative alien biology because that imagines what could be possible within the constraints of real physics. With vampires you're pretty much throwing physics out the window and relying on how the author/audience subjectively imagines such creatures might act. But I digress.

Anyway, this could've been a good opportunity for some character comedy by writing them as "how do you do fellow kids" types of characters who think "the bee's knees" and "totally radical" is still current slang.

 

[Harthwain]

It's difficult for human writers to write the psychology of immortal man-eating monsters that don't exist in reality.

It's not that difficult if you keep in mind the tenet of being a vampire in the 1st Edition: you're losing humanity as time goes on, the only difference is how fast you do it. So you are:

1) Becoming emotionally detached/dead, because it is not possible for a vampire to forge a lasting connection with humans as they inevitably die.
2) Start using others more and more instrumentally, even if it's just a force of habit and something you need to do merely to ensure your own survival.
3) You develop severely trust issues as the people you interact with are the other vampires, who might be using you (at best) or trying to kill you (at worst).
4) There is a strong desire to give in to your Inner Beast as well as your addiction to blood that can overrule you (which, I feel, isn't portrayed as well as it could be in various media. I think Vampyr was going in the right direction, from the little that I have seen of it).

What you can fiddle with here is - as I said at the start - the degree of all of the above, as well as the individual interests of particular vampires.

 

[RaggleFraggle]

It's difficult for human writers to write the psychology of immortal man-eating monsters that don't exist in reality.

It's not that difficult if you keep in mind the tenet of being a vampire in the 1st Edition: you're losing humanity as time goes on, the only difference is how fast you do it. So you are:

1) Becoming emotionally detached/dead, because it is not possible for a vampire to forge a lasting connection with humans as they inevitably die.
2) Start using others more and more instrumentally, even if it's just a force of habit and something you need to do merely to ensure your own survival.
3) You develop severely trust issues as the people you interact with are the other vampires, who might be using you (at best) or trying to kill you (at worst).
4) There is a strong desire to give in to your Inner Beast as well as your addiction to blood that can overrule you (which, I feel, isn't portrayed as well as it could be in various media. I think Vampyr was going in the right direction, from the little that I have seen of it).

What you can fiddle with here is - as I said at the start - the degree of all of the above, as well as the individual interests of particular vampires.

I don’t like 90s gritty grimdark nihilism. I liked Bloodlines because it spoofs that attitude.

 

[Tao]

The game feels very rushed. It has some things nailed but others are just barely implemented like the feeding.

Another Vampire game that could be good but it's not. Not worth 50$ at all even if the game were flawless in the execution. It has too many poorly implemented ideas.

 

[gerey]

I don’t like 90s gritty grimdark nihilism. I liked Bloodlines because it spoofs that attitude.

VtMB writers had this baffling ability to understand the context of nuance of any given situation, and to attune the writing accordingly, so you had a good balance of serious beats, funny situations, spoofs, parody, horror, action etc.

A good writer can make almost any combination of elements work, which is why Bloodlines is so memorable - despite the mishmash of ideas there is a clear vision idea what they wanted the narrative to be.

Grimdark nihilism is garbage when the writers make it obvious everything and everyone is shit - it makes the audience question why they should care about anything that happens in the story if neither the writer nor the characters themselves actually care. There needs to be a glimmer of hope, the characters themselves need to have a chance to rise above the amorality, apathy and despair and be more - otherwise it's just a wank about what an edgy know-it-all you are.

Another Vampire game that could be good but it's not.

I still don't understand why it's so hard to make a proper vampire game, especially when VtMB gives you the perfect blueprint. Gritty urban environment, immersive sim gameplay, vampire powers in place of augmentation, combination of mundane modern weapons and magical artifacts, a variety of factions and fixers offering you jobs.

It shouldn't be that fucking hard to make a game about vampires, and also avoid making it so gay you get AIDS from simply booting it up.