Vampire: The Masquerade® - Bloodlines™ 2

[GhostCow]

The real question is why hasn't anyone made something similar to Bloodlines that is just as good or better if the IP is so generic? Shouldn't be that hard, but here we are 21 years later and nothing has even attempted it.

[rusty_shackleford]

The real question is why hasn't anyone made something similar to Bloodlines that is just as good or better if the IP is so generic? Shouldn't be that hard, but here we are 21 years later and nothing has even attempted it.

for the same reason nobody has made anything like arcanum, presumably.

[Bertram_Tung]

chronicling modern game devs inability to make video games, case # 1338533205

[rusty_shackleford]

This is made by a solo developer and is actually decent if you adjust your expectations to that.


To be fair, the developer has been making indie games longer than Jeff Vogel by about 6 or 7 years.

[rusty_shackleford]

The closest thing to a real adaptation of VTM is of course, Gothos.

Which came out in '97.

---

As far as '90s-ish urban fantasy vampires' goes:

BloodRayne 2 takes place in a contemporary setting iirc
Vampire Rain
(boulder punch plug, cool guy)


the sequel to the game I posted above + some of his other games too


Probably others I can't think of.
As to whether they're good… well… 99% of all video games are poop, if not 99.9%.

[J1M]

There's DARK, but I think that doesn't really support the argument that there's nothing special about VtM.

[rusty_shackleford]

I consider unique IP to be something like Lovecraft or, as mentioned earlier, Shadowrun. Something that you couldn't file the serial number off of without it being called a blatant copy.
VTM has some unique motifs that were mentioned(usually coming back to the clans), but as an IP it's not really unique.

Contrast how Dragon Age Origins was just AD&D(I'm not referring to FR/Greyhawk/etc., here — both D&D and AD&D have an implied setting, and they're different) with its serial number filed off but… what it's copying is too generic to be considered a clone.

VTM itself was predated by a tabletop RPG called Nightlife, by the way. Perhaps you'll notice one or two similarities?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nightlife ... ying_game)

Nightlife is set in New York City in the then near-future of the 1990s. Players take on the roles of monsters, divided into several races and collectively referred to as "Kin," living secretly among human society, whom they refer to as "The Herd."

All of the Kin have certain attributes in common. They are immortal unless killed by special methods, immune to most diseases, and cannot be photographed. Most importantly, Kin have the ability to steal the life force of humans in order to survive, through a process called Drain. The Kin are divided into a number of groups, called Factions, who vary in their attitude toward humans and their willingness to be discreet about their activities. Players are generally encouraged to play Kin who prefer to defend Herd as well as Kin society, and to not kill mercilessly or wantonly.

The nightlife of Kin in New York City is one of the primary foci of the game. Kin spend much of their time preoccupied with subculture music and fashion, and the game's lists of equipment and clothing available to players assumes that they will adopt underground, cutting-edge, and designer styles. The city contains several important nightclubs which are run by and for Kin. In addition, a large part of the game is the constant streetfighting between members of various Kin factions.

The Complex: The Complex believes that the Herd is only fit to be ruled, exploited, and fed upon. Although merciless, they are generally discreet and less of a threat than the more radical factions. The Complex gains power by working toward gaining control over organized crime in New York City.
The Morningstar Corporation: The Morningstar Corporation wants to conquer humanity, and believes that the best way to do so is from within. They attempt to destabilize human civilization by infiltrating high society, politics, and big business, and attempting to cause financial and economic chaos. They are believed to be responsible for the Wall Street crash of 1929. Their membership consists mostly of vampyres and daemons.
Red Moonrise: Red Moonrise is a terrorist organization who believe that humanity must be subjugated through acts of random, wholesale slaughter. They are the most dangerous of the Factions because of their ruthlessness, sadism, and unwillingness to adequately conceal their superhuman nature. Their exploits resulted in the secret extermination of Kin society in Boulder, Colorado by the U.S. Government. They are made up almost exclusively of werewolves and wyghts.

It was, however, much more punk rock in tone than goth.

To the best of my knowledge, there was no common designer/publisher between the two.

[J1M]

Can you elaborate on what makes Shadowrun special? I have always viewed it as a bargain bin IP, something that amounts to "fantasy races + cyberpunk setting".

[Rand]

Can you elaborate on what makes Shadowrun special?

Nobody can. It was cooked up in a period in the late 80s when all the companies were looking for the "next big thing" and several dozen IPs were made like MadLibs.
A ...cyberpunk... setting with ...magic... set in ...Seattle.
Brilliant! Commission art and market it!

Shadowrun succeeded because despite cyberpunk at the time being new and gaining momentum, there were almost no games taking advantage of this new energized genre in novels.
The companies were pretty stupid. And so they deserved to be decimated when Magic: The Gathering turned the game trade into pure market greed speculation and crashed the distribution companies when there was no payoff.

Would you care to guess what the OTHER main cyberpunk game was? You already know it, though it took a LONG time for normiegamers to ever hear of it...

[rusty_shackleford]

Can you elaborate on what makes Shadowrun special? I have always viewed it as a bargain bin IP, something that amounts to "fantasy races + cyberpunk setting".

It's neuromancer with elves.
I can't really think of any other cyberpunk fantasy off the top of my head.

[Rand]

I can't really think of any other cyberpunk fantasy off the top of my head.

Two variants were attempted. Rifts and Torg.
Neither were exclusively cyberpunk at their core and both had a bit of a kitchen sink approach. Rifts especially, adding in Mecha and a semi-post apocalypse.
Torg died quick, while Rifts still has a following, despite nobody really knowing what to do narratively game-wise as adventures in the setting.

[DemoGraph]

I have no clue how they'd keep a lid on the masquerade with every random ****** having access to a HD camera, with the ability to instantly beam the recording online for thousands, and likely millions, of people to see.

Oh, you sweet summer childe!.. Living under the threat of drone attacks IRL quickly teaches you how fragile and precarious online streaming really is. All vamps have to do is steal some spell from mages (or something) that scrambles radiowaves in the vicinity.
Cable cameras are much more dangerous in this regard. The only measure against them is probably full vampire government control, Men in Black style. Or changing the whole definition of vampire.

[wndrbr]

Why even hide? Just come out of the closet, call yourself a 'blood-attracted person', and say that whoever is against you is a bigot and a nazi. Problem solved.

Camarilla can just rebrand into "Anti-vampirephobic league", and start sending all the people who dislike vampires to prison.

[Roguey]

Shadowrun succeeded because despite cyberpunk at the time being new and gaining momentum, there were almost no games taking advantage of this new energized genre in novels.
The companies were pretty stupid. And so they deserved to be decimated when Magic: The Gathering turned the game trade into pure market greed speculation and crashed the distribution companies when there was no payoff.

Would you care to guess what the OTHER main cyberpunk game was? You already know it, though it took a LONG time for normiegamers to ever hear of it...

Seems to me that as a genre, cyberpunk only has enough appeal to support 1-2 games. A list of late 80s-90s cyberpunk tabletop RPGs nobody cares about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceTime
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberspac ... ying_game)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GURPS_Cyberpunk
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undergrou ... ying_game)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SLA_Industries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Dawn

Fantasy, that's evergreen. Shadowrun justified its existence by combining Cyberpunk with more of the thing most RPG players like.

[DemoGraph]

Seems to me that as a genre, cyberpunk only has enough appeal to support 1-2 games.

Cyberpunk is modern day minus cyberimplants, AIs, virtual world and other buzzwords (for now).

[Rand]

Shadowrun succeeded because despite cyberpunk at the time being new and gaining momentum, there were almost no games taking advantage of this new energized genre in novels.
The companies were pretty stupid. And so they deserved to be decimated when Magic: The Gathering turned the game trade into pure market greed speculation and crashed the distribution companies when there was no payoff.

Would you care to guess what the OTHER main cyberpunk game was? You already know it, though it took a LONG time for normiegamers to ever hear of it...

Seems to me that as a genre, cyberpunk only has enough appeal to support 1-2 games. A list of late 80s-90s cyberpunk tabletop RPGs nobody cares about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceTime
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberspac ... ying_game)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GURPS_Cyberpunk
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undergrou ... ying_game)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SLA_Industries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Dawn

Fantasy, that's evergreen. Shadowrun justified its existence by combining Cyberpunk with more of the thing most RPG players like.

GURPS Cyberpunk was a sourcebook, not a game. It was just a set of rules and ideas for adding cyberpunk to whatever setting you wanted, from a pure game, to one with Cthuloid conspiracies, to Star Wars with cyberware.
The rest are so niche that I've only barely heard of a couple and know nothing about any of them.

The other cyberpunk game at the time was R. Talsorian Games' Cyberpunk (2013, 2020, v3, etc...) and it was niche as well. Just less so than the others because it was done decently well and didn't muddy the genre with extras.

[Roguey]

The rest are so niche that I've only barely heard of a couple and know nothing about any of them.

Yeah, they're niche because cyberpunk is a setting with limited appeal. Pondsmith got there first and staked his claim by naming his game after the genre itself.

[rusty_shackleford]

cyberpunk is a libtard power fantasy

[wndrbr]

Anyone watched 'True Blood'? How similar it to VTM?

I'm aware that it's a womanslop in the vein of Twilight, I'm just asking about the universe and worldbuilding.

[Acrux]

I don't know much about the show but I don't think they are similar at all from the bits I've heard about it.

If you want a VtM tv series, you're looking for Kindred: The Embraced from the 90s.

[GhostCow]

Anyone watched 'True Blood'? How similar it to VTM?

I'm aware that it's a womanslop in the vein of Twilight, I'm just asking about the universe and worldbuilding.

I watched the whole thing and it really doesn't have anything in common other than being about vampires

[Irenaeus]

I never saw anything valuable in the IP itself to begin with

The Clans were a great way of incorporating all the various depictions of vampires that have appeared in folklore and fiction, plus the ambiguity of the background lore about Kain, Gehenna, the Antediluvians etc. creates an interesting backdrop. Also, the fact it was urban fantasy that wasn't made for women to goon to, and tried to make the vampiric existence sound monstrous and horrific helped make it stand out.

That being said, it's very late 1990s and early 00s, and doesn't really work that well outside of that cultural context. I have no clue how they'd keep a lid on the masquerade with every random ****** having access to a HD camera, with the ability to instantly beam the recording online for thousands, and likely millions, of people to see.

Werewolf was ****** from the get go - bestiality, eco-faggotry et al ruined what could have been a pretty cool "rip and tear" setting where you control a werewolf that can summon spooky spirits.

Your posts are too good for me to just keep you in ignore. I can't wait for Christmas, I'll open the box earlier!

I'll go ahead and unignore @Breathe as well.

[LemonDemonGirl]

Anyone watched 'True Blood'? How similar it to VTM?

I'm aware that it's a womanslop in the vein of Twilight, I'm just asking about the universe and worldbuilding.

Yes.
It's full of 'muh racism' 'muh gayz' ****. Avoid.

[logincrash]

Anyone watched 'True Blood'? How similar it to VTM?

I'm aware that it's a womanslop in the vein of Twilight, I'm just asking about the universe and worldbuilding.

It's very gay and lame. There's a couple of cool ideas/scenes but's it's depraved trash otherwise.
The couple of memorable scenes are a vampire finding out that the girl he's banging is actually his great-great-great-granddaughter, freaking out and making her **** off with his vampire hypnotism and vampires getting slaughtered by human spec ops for getting too uppity. Both are in the later seasons.
But other than that it's all about whores, gays, *******, and gaynigger whores, literally. One of the prominent side characters is a homosexual prostitute black guy who's also a witch.
So, to answer your question, I guess it's nearly identical to modern World of Darkness stuff.

[gerey]

Oh, you sweet summer childe!.. Living under the threat of drone attacks IRL quickly teaches you how fragile and precarious online streaming really is. All vamps have to do is steal some spell from mages (or something) that scrambles radiowaves in the vicinity.
Cable cameras are much more dangerous in this regard. The only measure against them is probably full vampire government control, Men in Black style. Or changing the whole definition of vampire.

For one, vampires can't use mage spells. The Tremere turned themselves into vampires and discovered just that, to their dismay, forcing them to come up with thaumathurgy.

Vampires do have methods of avoiding detection, and ways to suppress information, but only up to a point - the main issue with everyone having a smartphone is that the number of people that would be able to record a masquerade breach increases exponentially each year after the iPhone gets introduced, and the further along into the 21st century you, the worse it gets. Good luck trying to stop a video uploaded on a popular platform from spreading like wildfire as everyone keeps resharing and uploading it elsewhere.

Barely any of this is unique to the IP

Arguably, the idea of trying to combine all existing vampire lore into one coherent setting via the Clans was genius, and the only reason we view it as mundane these days is because it is so simple and elegant that it looks obvious in hindsight, despite VtM being the first (far as I know) attempt of doing so.

Why even hide? Just come out of the closet, call yourself a 'blood-attracted person', and say that whoever is against you is a bigot and a nazi. Problem solved.

One of the movies that explored this idea was Daybreakers, and it made the interesting observation that modern humans wouldn't be horrified at the leeches in their midst, but would rather fall over themselves to become vampires, so they can be immortal. The movie then shows the population of actual humans that can provide blood for the increasing number of vampires dwindling, until the whole society is poised for a complete collapse.

Naturally, the vampires in Daybreakers are a biological phenomenon, without any of the spiritual and religious baggage that the VtM variety has.

Also, most VtM vampires would like to avoid exposure. Despite a vampire being more powerful than a regular human, or several, they are not invincible, they are incredibly vulnerable during the daylight and any schmuck with a shotgun can do serious damage to them. If humanity were to know about them, they'd also soon discover just how monstrous many of them truly are, maybe find out about the Antediluvians, and then the hunt would be on.

If you were to feature the wider setting (even though the lore of the various races doesn't necessarily mesh well together), then any attempt by the vampires to threaten humanity as a whole would be met with a united Free Council and Seers of the Throne (and their backers), which would bring down the hammer against the vampires.

[DemoGraph]

For one, vampires can't use mage spells

Yeah, I know. But we manage to disrupt radiowaves even without magic. Even a plain brick wall is often enough if it's thick. Surely vamps (who manage to manipulate light via obfuscate) should be able to come up with an effect that would equal that.

Good luck trying to stop a video uploaded on a popular platform from spreading like wildfire as everyone keeps resharing and uploading it elsewhere.

That's why I said that vampire control over government is most likely to be necessary in this case.
(Well, it could be desirable for vamps any way. Ghoulify Douglas Fink - get practically unlimited cash. Ghoulify Bessent - get a really unlimited cash.)

[MrTwinkls]

You overestimate the role of paranormal internet leaks. Unless it would go viral nobody would care about another posers/freaks in the internet. Even if it went viral people would create many "proofs" why it was fake and copycats would create there own fakes to ride the hype train and discredit the genuine ones.

[gerey]

Surely vamps (who manage to manipulate light via obfuscate) should be able to come up with an effect that would equal that.

True, but there's the issue that many vampires are not trained to do that, or equipped to do it, or plainly don't give a **** (Sabbat), and the Camarilla can't keep a lid on everything. It's why even in Bloodlines 1 they emphasize the danger mobile phones and digital cameras.

(Well, it could be desirable for vamps any way. Ghoulify Douglas Fink - get practically unlimited cash. Ghoulify Bessent - get a really unlimited cash.)

IIRC the reason why vampires, or some other critter, doesn't completely dominate is because other supernaturals are trying to exert dominance on mundane government officials too, and they are all tripping over each other, to the point none can extend their influence too far.

Naturally, this is mostly an excuse to explain why human governments haven't all been subsumed by one supernatural group or the other, when it would be comically easy for them to do so.

Even if it went viral people would create many "proofs" why it was fake and copycats would create there own fakes to ride the hype train and discredit the genuine ones.

Yeah, but what if it kept happening again, and again, and again?

How long would suspension of disbelief last, or keep law agencies at bay?

[MrTwinkls]

Yeah, but what if it kept happening again, and again, and again?

How long would suspension of disbelief last, or keep law agencies at bay?

The ocean of information is so vast nobody would pay attention to a mere occasional droplet.
Law agencies are even easier to manipulate by utilizing their hierarchy and vampire powers.

[logincrash]

Vampire hunter factions exist in the World of Darkness and they're quite well established too. The Second Inquisition dealt a huge blow to the vampire society and is keeping a close watch on the Internet for any possible vampire sightings. They destroyed the Tremere hierarchy and burned down their stronghold in Vienna. Modern vampires have to live totally off the grid, using couriers and **** to avoid digital detection.
The vampire hunters aren't even the biggest problem vampires have to worry about, considering that mages exist in the setting. And mages in WoD are leagues above vampires on the power scale. They basically have cheat codes for reality itself, so some bloodsucker "magic" is nothing but parlor tricks to them.
All the different mage sects have been fighting for dominance amongst themselves throughout history too. And the most successful sect that emerged from those conflicts is the one that disguises their magic as science. Stamping out any vampire nonsense out of the public eye is in their vested interests, since their magic works best when the normies are convinced that magic doesn't exist.
So, no, you can't just waltz into the White House and make Trump suck some of your vampire blood. You're gonna be staked in a heartbeat and then hung up in some basement, with a bunch of eggheads conducting experiments on you to figure out how to kill vampires more efficiently.