Your opinion on Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines

[crazyirish]

Definitely one of my favorites from the "modern era" of RPGs.

 

[Comrade Goby]

Next one after is supposedly going to add a new library level that was planned.

You know, that big building across from the ventrue tower? There's a way to add areas to the game now.

Clan quest has two nice quests that would be nice to have in the main game if polished some more (possibly modified to avoid VA over a existing character).
(they avoid the fu syndicate and the sewers sequence)

Someone recommended CQM to me and I wanted to murder them after I found out they replaced Bloodlines songs like Lecher Bitch with some shitty generic rock.

 

[attackfighter]

The thing I liked most about Chinatown was the visual design. Silhouettes of foreboding towers obscured by smog, colourful lanterns strung across the streets, gaudy advertisements. Went perfectly with the music to create a very strong atmosphere.

As for the missions in Chinatown - there weren't many of them and none of them were very well fleshed out. The area kinda went to waste because of that sadly.

 

[Wyrmlord]

attackfighter
One would almost think that David Lo Pan from Big Trouble In Little China would be living in one of those towers.

 

[LoPan]

Suppose it is rather obvious I quite fancied that movie.

It is a very charming setting. All the little touches like the facial expressions and the radio personalities really added to the whole game. The story was pretty nice as well, though the combat was pretty bad as has been mentioned numerous times.

It has definitely become one of those games that "when it's mentioned, someone reinstalls it"

It's odd how Troika got expressions right and yet big houses like Bethesda and Bioware still struggle fruitlessly with the concept. When I am made to remember how awful of an idea it was to do those ruthless close-ups of someone's face in Oblivion/Skyrim I forget the same thing worked quite well in Bloodlines. Boils down to making the bastard on the other end actually emote, even if they do so rather clownishly at times; prefer to have hyperbole of expression than the middling ground Oblivion/Skyrim settles on.

Now that I attempt to think of it, can't recall many games with expressive characters. Suppose it's more important to develop x1082 anisotropic filtering.

 

[Horus]

Now that I attempt to think of it, can't recall many games with expressive characters. Suppose it's more important to develop x1082 anisotropic filtering.[/quote]

La noire was good at expressive faces but it had horrible body movement that could not keep wth the faces.
Plus they were hilarious when they were lying.

Other than that you're right there aren't any games with good faces,they just seems funny theatre scenes acted by nervous teenagers.

 

[Carrion]

I don't know if it's a Source thing. Half-Life 2's characters still look really lively compared to almost any game, although their behavior is more theatrical than realistic (same applies to Bloodlines too). Watching Skyrim's "interactive cutscenes" with terrible animations and nonexistent body language was like travelling a decade back in time.

 

[SCO]

Most faces were good, but a few expressions were fucked up.

Look at nines when he gets angry for instance.

 

[Harpsichord]

It's a fantastic game if we're looking at the first two hubs. It's a good game if we include the third hub and none of the content branching off of it. But it's painfully obvious that they didn't have the time/money/something to finish it properly and the whole thing degrades into an utterly painful chore by the end.

I would like to live in another dimension. One where this game was a hit and every fps game took cues from it.

I was thinking something similar about a year ago, except I was wondering what the world would be like if we were on Arcanum 3.

 

[TripJack]

why was this shit thread resurrected?

the poll doesn't have the mediocre game option that bloodlines deserves

 

[LoPan]

All Troika games can be described by the analogy of the geode in 'Whisper of the Heart'. There's nothing good in Dragon Age 2 because they did not find the small crystals within and settled on the beryl itself, and so they end up polishing a rock, a thing which can never shine, but Troika did find these emerald crystals deep within, probably because they had experienced them before, though as hard as they worked they simply did not have enough time to polish them.

 

[Malpercio]

A decent game with an awesome start, decent middle and shit endings and combat.


Also, a lot of bugs that made me restart the game like 6 times.

 

[Executer]

Bloodlines had it's issues (combat, sewers, Chinatown/endgame), but overall it's Deus Exy elements, dialogue, atmosphere, overall story, carry it over the line, can't think of any better 'modern' rpg released since.

 

[attackfighter]

I can't think of any better rpg released sooner. Maybe planescape...

 

[Emily]

The game is scary seriously, the whole game not just mansion and hospital.
The music, the atmosphere the sewers, the cults the gore, the lonesome feeling trought the game. Just fucking scary :S :S :S
Can't imagine how would anyone play nosferatu

 

[Icewater]

All Troika games can be described by the analogy of the geode in 'Whisper of the Heart'. There's nothing good in Dragon Age 2 because they did not find the small crystals within and settled on the beryl itself, and so they end up polishing a rock, a thing which can never shine, but Troika did find these emerald crystals deep within, probably because they had experienced them before, though as hard as they worked they simply did not have enough time to polish them.

That's kind of a drawn-out way to say that Troika produced diamonds in the rough while BioWare produces polished turds.

 

[oscar]

One of the best gaming experiences of my life. Beautiful, eerie, sinister, sexy, stylish and intriguing. An impressive and constant air of menace and suspicion. If it had been given another year and more funding I don't doubt it would have been the greatest game ever made.

 

[Jick Magger]

Can I vote that the first two-thirds and the finale are a good game?
Because everything inbetween that I did not enjoy very much.

 

[LoPan]

All Troika games can be described by the analogy of the geode in 'Whisper of the Heart'. There's nothing good in Dragon Age 2 because they did not find the small crystals within and settled on the beryl itself, and so they end up polishing a rock, a thing which can never shine, but Troika did find these emerald crystals deep within, probably because they had experienced them before, though as hard as they worked they simply did not have enough time to polish them.

That's kind of a drawn-out way to say that Troika produced diamonds in the rough while BioWare produces polished turds.

Yes, but a great film.

edit: I can hardly do it justice, but the geode analogy for creative pursuit is, in the film, rather touching.

 

[Beautiful Clown Painting]

"Bloodlines" is a great game, the last one on PC with "New Vegas" I genuinely enjoyed without being bored until the end (but then I still have to play "Mask of the Betrayer"). This thread should belong to "RPG Gaming" but then: who cares?

Edit: forgot about "Gothic II". But then I still prefer "Bloodlines" & "New Vegas" to "Gothic II". High hopes for "Wasteland 2". End of my absolutely uninteresting soap-box rant.

 

[Beautiful Clown Painting]

Talking about Masquerade games, it seems to me that "Redemption" is getting a lot of love around here. I just have a blurry memory of a really tedious ARPG but then I never went past the Middle-Ages. What's so great about it? Is it getting better the further you play it?

 

[LoPan]

I've also been intrigued, and my dim memory of it runs in the same fashion. The few times I've heard of it on the codex it has not been favorably spoken of.

Redemptionites, enlighten.

 

[asper]

Redemption has tons of very, very boring clicky combat. Otherwise, the setting is great, the style is great, the music is great and the story is enjoyable...

 

[villain of the story]

It's too late to play it now. The game hasn't aged well, given that one can easily point to FPS hybrids made after 2004 that were much much better. Longer RPGs such as all the three NWN2 campaigns give you better value for money as well.

It is today what Human Revolution is going to be in 7 years, and it was in 2004 what Human Revolution is today: a flawed but surprisingly entertaining game that is most enjoyed during the time of its release.

It doesn't fit with modern systems either. All the darkness has turned to blue-ish brightness. Movement speed has tripled.

What unsubstantiated bullshit.

 

[Eyeball]

Redemption has tons of very, very boring clicky combat. Otherwise, the setting is great, the style is great, the music is great and the story is enjoyable...

Correct. Redemption: Terrible combat, excellent setting, great mood, good storyline with a few interesting twists along the way.

From what I understand, it suffered greatly from being caught up in Diablo Fever at the end of development and had the devs try making a basically story-driven adventure game into an enjoyable hack and slash. They failed miserably.

Redemption is a game that is worth playing in the extreme, but I have never been able to convince myself to replay it. Which is a shame, because it is truly unique.