Vampire: The Masquerade® - Bloodlines™ 2

[Atlantico]

WoD is faggy cringe, but BL1 did manage to capture it in a way that was not that faggy or cringy. Just a little bit.

BL2 doesn't quite get there. It is quite faggy and very cringy, but what it is lacking is the core attraction to the setting IMO, i.e. peering under the veil. Seeing that behind the porn industry there aren't just ****, there are Jewish vampires!

It is a parallel world where the normies are completely and utterly unaware of the secret powers and cabals who work behind the scenes to control everything and behind them are actual undead vampires.

Where you discover layer upon layer of subterfuge between the normal world and the hidden world. At the same time the world is oppressive, abusive, cruel, so the line between a vampire and a human isn't always so cut and dry.

This is what I like about the setting.

Well, unfortunately there are those who just like faggy LBGTQP+ larping and that's the first and only thing they think of when they hear the term Roleplaying. Roleplaying is always sexual to these cretins. I'm looking at you Ed Greenwood.

These sickos take the fun away from normal people to frolic in their degenerate fantasies and roleplays.

[Roguey]

I enjoyed all the characters in this one. **** I can tolerate.

[logincrash]

I enjoyed all the characters in this one. **** I can tolerate.

Even the sassy black ***** in charge of the Hunter Death Squads whose name is Latisha or Latonya or something like that? The one who demands you turn her into a vampire and if you don't, the Inquisition just burns the entire Seattle vampire population down? Which is a "bad ending" that is solely dependent on this one choice?
Or the main flaming homo "resident go-to-gal" Tolly? A Nosferatu who talks like the most stereotypical *** ever? The kinda *** that even the most homophobic twitter racist wouldn't be able to come up with as an anti-gay propaganda?
Or the pussy ***** Max who's a good boy who dindu nuffin?

[Atlantico]

I enjoyed all the characters in this one. **** I can tolerate.

Even the sassy black ***** in charge of the Hunter Death Squads whose name is Latisha or Latonya or something like that? The one who demands you turn her into a vampire and if you don't, the Inquisition just burns down the entire Seattle vampire population down? Which is a "bad ending" that is solely dependent on this one choice?
Or the main flaming homo "resident go-to-gal" Tolly? A Nosferatu who talks like the most stereotypical *** ever? The kinda *** that even the most homophobic twitter racist wouldn't be able to come up with as an anti-gay propaganda?
Or the pussy ***** Max who's a good boy who dindu nuffin?

The ****** ***** must die, no exception. Nobody is forcing me to embrace them. **** that.

I hated all of those characters. Sadly I could only kill the ****** *****. I would have loved to burn Tully and the pussy ***** Max

[Roguey]

Even the sassy black ***** in charge of the Hunter Death Squads whose name is Latisha or Latonya or something like that?

I wouldn't describe her as sassy. She's a coward who's afraid of dying and willing to defect from her own organization to survive.

The one who demands you turn her into a vampire and if you don't, the Inquisition just burns the entire Seattle vampire population down?

That's just a logical outcome. Killing a fed division director just means more feds show up to put you down. She and Tolly tell you in advance that will be the outcome of killing her.

It's too bad there's no option to just walk away, I assume they didn't have the time to implement three outcomes.

Which is a "bad ending" that is solely dependent on this one choice?

Bad in quotes, sure. From the perspective of a Nomad who doesn't care about the city and is happy to leave once the mark business is resolved, it's a suitable fate for the losers left behind.

Or the main flaming homo "resident go-to-gal" Tolly? A Nosferatu who talks like the most stereotypical *** ever? The kinda *** that even the most homophobic twitter racist wouldn't be able to come up with as an anti-gay propaganda?

He's hilarious and self-serving, I like him.

Or the pussy ***** Max who's a good boy who dindu nuffin?

I hate his facial piercings but I found him all right as a character. Embraced as a dumb naive kid so he'll be a dumb naive kid forever, **** shame.

[Bertram_Tung]

Roogy actually hates this **** more than anyone here but went insane years ago because of it, so now he's become sort of a joker-like figure in an act of defiance.

it's actually a tragic and sympathetic backstory when you understand the lore

[DemoGraph]

went insane years ago
joker-like figure

Fishmalks love, fishmalks life!

[Havitner]

Fun fact: the signature magic of the Ravnos (dot Indian) vampire clan is illusions (scams).

It's okay though, they all get genocided during the Week of Nightmares (Week of Flushing).

[Bertram_Tung]

Or the main flaming homo "resident go-to-gal" Tolly? A Nosferatu who talks like the most stereotypical *** ever? The kinda *** that even the most homophobic twitter racist wouldn't be able to come up with as an anti-gay propaganda?

I feel attacked by the devjews.

So disappointing. Why couldn't they just make a good game? (rhetorical question)

[Roguey]

I feel attacked by the devjews.

So disappointing. Why couldn't they just make a good game? (rhetorical question)

Gary Golden was also gay, just gay in a written-by-a-straight-man-to-be-inoffensive-to-straight-men way.

This is truer to the spirit of the VtM of the 90s. From the Nosferatu clanbook published in 1995:

[Bertram_Tung]

I feel attacked by the devjews.

So disappointing. Why couldn't they just make a good game? (rhetorical question)

Gary Golden was also gay, just gay in a written-by-a-straight-man-to-be-inoffensive-to-straight-men way.

This is truer to the spirit of the VtM of the 90s. From the Nosferatu clanbook published in 1995:

Gary Golden was an original character from the CRPG Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines and in no way, shape, or form was he implied to be gay. The picture you’re waving around from your gay coloring books, featuring some obscure character named "Doug", has zero relevance. Big reach even for you, my jester friend.

[Roguey]

Gary Golden was an original character from the CRPG Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines and in no way, shape, or form was he implied to be gay.

He was an old catty gossipy queen who hated women out of gay resentment as opposed to being a bitter incel like a straight Nos.

Know that Toreador in Vesuvius, "Miss Velour"? Back when she was breathing, it was more like "Miss Anything For Three Hundred".

Straight guys don't talk like this, they'd just call her a *****.

[Bertram_Tung]

Gary Golden was an original character from the CRPG Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines and in no way, shape, or form was he implied to be gay.

He was an old catty gossipy queen who hated women out of gay resentment as opposed to being a bitter incel like a straight Nos.

Know that Toreador in Vesuvius, "Miss Velour"? Back when she was breathing, it was more like "Miss Anything For Three Hundred".

Straight guys don't talk like this, they'd just call her a *****.

You're projecting.

[Tangerine]

Back when she was breathing, it was more like "Miss Anything For Three Hundred".

This sounds like @logincrash and I'm 100% certain he's not a homo.

[Bertram_Tung]

Roguey was, perhaps, too outspoken for his own good.

It started when a truck tried to run him down. As he hit the pavement, the truck screeched to a halt, and six guys — frat boys by the looks of them — jumped out. They carried lumber, chains, baseball bats — a melange of weapons —though the looks on their faces were identical.

They hissed the old epithets at him: ******, *****.

[logincrash]

Roguey was, perhaps, too outspoken for his own good.

It started when a truck tried to run him down. As he hit the pavement, the truck screeched to a halt, and six guys — frat boys by the looks of them — jumped out. They carried lumber, chains, baseball bats — a melange of weapons —though the looks on their faces were identical.

They hissed the old epithets at him: ******, *****.

Did they shout "This is RPGHQ country!" at him?

[J1M]

Technically didn't finish this. Got to the last ~90 minutes of the game. Encountered a progress-blocking bug in the main quest line. Can't save manually, so only had one previous save. Somehow that file was the exact same as the autosave even though the timestamp on it was from 30 minutes earlier. Watched the end on youtube.

Thoughts:

• People saying clan choice "doesn't matter because you can unlock all the powers" are ******** and can't math. There aren't enough experience points in the game to unlock all of the powers, no manual save system so no real mechanism to experiment, and by the time you have enough experience points to be branching into other disciplines, the game is at least half done.
• Tried Tremere and Assamites. Not sure why Tremere was labelled as 'normal'. It's a stealth class (slow abilities best used to open combat) without stealth; combat was painful. Assamites were not 'hard' to play because they have 3 good abilities that combo together to help recharge each other.
• Netflix writing. There is an A plot and a B plot and at no point is there an interesting side quest or a mystery that is introduced and wrapped up in an hour. Just like a streaming TV show, the writers had one idea they stretched out beyond anyone's ability to care.
• Combat isn't Arkham, not sure why people are saying that. It's about spamming powers and watching takedown animations.
• But really it's a walking simulator. Would have been stronger as more of a walking simulator, since the number of ghouls running around was immersion-breaking.
  
• No interactions with World of Darkness creatures other than vampires and vampire-spawn (ghouls, thin bloods, etc). Bloodlines 1 used these other creatures sparingly to great effect (Gargoyle, Werewolf, Ghosts).
  
• Primogens of Seattle were not cool or interesting or believable as leaders aside from Lou, but it is repeated constantly that she is the Prince in all but name. Most don't even give the impression that the city has more than one vampire of clan X.
• I thought there was a Ocean House Hotel level in the Hardsuit leaked videos. Appears to have been cut or turned into a combat arena here, showing a lack of skill on the part of The Chinese Room developers.
• Speaking of The Chinese Room and publisher statements from development, they completely lied about remaking the game. It is very clear that the bones of this product are the Hardsuit ideas, setting, environmental art, and even several characters. The fact that the game is set during Christmas having no mention or intersection with the plot is a huge miss, that frankly I don't believe Hardsuit could have tripped themselves with.
• Other obvious misses: nearly zero cameos or mentions of characters from Bloodlines 1. The way Damsel is used feels like an addition when someone pointed out to them late in development that they were making a sequel.
• Feels like the writers wanted to treat Sabbat as if they were the visions Shepard has in Mass Effect that the Council don't believe and are dismissive of. Which makes no sense, especially considering their court openly includes former Sabbat members. In addition to like half of the court being secretly Sabbat, including multiple characters exposed in the first half of the game...
• I guessed the plot twist regarding the Sabbat leader at the halfway point. But I was also expecting them to do something with the main character being blood bound to the court given how the other disciplines are unlocked and they never did.

[CheesusCrust]

But I was also expecting them to do something with the main character being blood bound to the court given how the other disciplines are unlocked and they never did.

I'm not a VtM rules expert in the slightest, but i thought elders (like Phyre) are not affected by blood bonds of lower generation vampires?

[logincrash]

But I was also expecting them to do something with the main character being blood bound to the court given how the other disciplines are unlocked and they never did.

I'm not a VtM rules expert in the slightest, but i thought elders (like Phyre) are not affected by blood bonds of lower generation vampires?

You need to drink straight from the vein three times on three separate nights to form a blood bond, if I recall correctly.
The protag drinks from the vein once and it's entirely optional.

[Roguey]

[*]Combat isn't Arkham, not sure why people are saying that. It's about spamming powers and watching takedown animations.

It's similar to Arkham and a number of other games. Stealth Predator gameplay and brawling, Arkham is the first thing to come to mind. The devs specifically cited Dishonored, stealth builds in Bethout and Elder Scrolls, Shadow of Mordor (which is Arkham meets Assassin's Creed), God of War (?), and Elden Ring (?!) but it's also only them in a superficial way.

[*]But really it's a walking simulator. Would have been stronger as more of a walking simulator, since the number of ghouls running around was immersion-breaking.

*game where the core gameplay is brutalizing opponents with stealth takedowns and combat* "Is this a walking sim?"

If you want a Vampire walking sim play Swansong. I thought just the one was enough, didn't need any more of that.

[*]No interactions with World of Darkness creatures other than vampires and vampire-spawn (ghouls, thin bloods, etc). Bloodlines 1 used these other creatures sparingly to great effect (Gargoyle, Werewolf, Ghosts).[/b]

I found it annoying Theme Park design myself. A story doesn't need Everything (and the kitchen sink).

[*]I thought there was a Ocean House Hotel level in the Hardsuit leaked videos. Appears to have been cut or turned into a combat arena here, showing a lack of skill on the part of The Chinese Room developers.
...
[*]Other obvious misses: nearly zero cameos or mentions of characters from Bloodlines 1. The way Damsel is used feels like an addition when someone pointed out to them late in development that they were making a sequel.

Not doing any of the Memberberries Force-Awakens-style-sequel crap was one of the best decisions they did as far as I'm concerned. Damsel's presence was very elegant. There's a letter from Nines addressed to Katsumi you can pick up early on where he discusses the Anarch Railroad they've established.

[*]Speaking of The Chinese Room and publisher statements from development, they completely lied about remaking the game. It is very clear that the bones of this product are the Hardsuit ideas, setting, and even several characters. The fact that the game is set during Christmas having no mention or intersection with the plot is a huge miss that frankly, I don't believe Hardsuit could have tripped themselves with.

There was no "lie" here. They were clear from the start they were reusing as many assets as they could. Gameplay and story were completely rebooted, but they had to reuse character models and levels to tell it. Lou was the only character to survive in a still-modified fashion, in the Hardsuit version she was deposed Toreador Prince.

The game takes place during a winter storm because they wanted a narrative reason for why there are no cars driving on the streets. All the roads are shut down.

[*]Feels like the writers wanted to treat Sabbat as if they were the visions Shepard has in Mass Effect that the Council don't believe and are dismissive of. Which makes no sense, especially considering their court openly includes former Sabbat members. In addition to like half of the court being secretly Sabbat, including multiple characters exposed in the first half of the game...

The only person who doubts you is Tolly and that's because it's his job to stay on top of these things, so the others value his advice. Did he completely botch it or was he being intentionally wishy washy to end up on top no matter who the victor was? It's established that he does keep secrets to himself, and no matter what happens, Tolly survives, he's a survival weasel. Deliberately ambiguous.

[J1M]

But I was also expecting them to do something with the main character being blood bound to the court given how the other disciplines are unlocked and they never did.

I'm not a VtM rules expert in the slightest, but i thought elders (like Phyre) are not affected by blood bonds of lower generation vampires?

You need to drink straight from the vein three times on three separate times to form a blood bond, if I recall correctly.
The protag drinks from the vein once and it's entirely optional.

Good points. They ignore other aspects of the setting out of ignorance/laziness, like how vampire bodies don't return to their natural age upon final death, so given the foreshadowing of that concept I was expecting them to play loose with that rule.

[J1M]

[*]Combat isn't Arkham, not sure why people are saying that. It's about spamming powers and watching takedown animations.

It's similar to Arkham and a number of other games. Stealth Predator gameplay and brawling, Arkham is the first thing to come to mind. The devs specifically cited Dishonored, stealth builds in Bethout and Elder Scrolls, Shadow of Mordor (which is Arkham meets Assassin's Creed), God of War (?), and Elden Ring (?!) but it's also only them in a superficial way.

[*]But really it's a walking simulator. Would have been stronger as more of a walking simulator, since the number of ghouls running around was immersion-breaking.

*game where the core gameplay is brutalizing opponents with stealth takedowns and combat* "Is this a walking sim?"

If you want a Vampire walking sim play Swansong. I thought just the one was enough, didn't need any more of that.

[*]No interactions with World of Darkness creatures other than vampires and vampire-spawn (ghouls, thin bloods, etc). Bloodlines 1 used these other creatures sparingly to great effect (Gargoyle, Werewolf, Ghosts).[/b]

I found it annoying Theme Park design myself. A story doesn't need Everything (and the kitchen sink).

[*]I thought there was a Ocean House Hotel level in the Hardsuit leaked videos. Appears to have been cut or turned into a combat arena here, showing a lack of skill on the part of The Chinese Room developers.
...
[*]Other obvious misses: nearly zero cameos or mentions of characters from Bloodlines 1. The way Damsel is used feels like an addition when someone pointed out to them late in development that they were making a sequel.

Not doing any of the Memberberries Force-Awakens-style-sequel crap was one of the best decisions they did as far as I'm concerned. Damsel's presence was very elegant. There's a letter from Nines addressed to Katsumi you can pick up early on where he discusses the Anarch Railroad they've established.

[*]Speaking of The Chinese Room and publisher statements from development, they completely lied about remaking the game. It is very clear that the bones of this product are the Hardsuit ideas, setting, and even several characters. The fact that the game is set during Christmas having no mention or intersection with the plot is a huge miss that frankly, I don't believe Hardsuit could have tripped themselves with.

There was no "lie" here. They were clear from the start they were reusing as many assets as they could. Gameplay and story were completely rebooted, but they had to reuse character models and levels to tell it. Lou was the only character to survive in a still-modified fashion, in the Hardsuit version she was deposed Toreador Prince.

The game takes place during a winter storm because they wanted a narrative reason for why there are no cars driving on the streets. All the roads are shut down.

[*]Feels like the writers wanted to treat Sabbat as if they were the visions Shepard has in Mass Effect that the Council don't believe and are dismissive of. Which makes no sense, especially considering their court openly includes former Sabbat members. In addition to like half of the court being secretly Sabbat, including multiple characters exposed in the first half of the game...

The only person who doubts you is Tolly and that's because it's his job to stay on top of these things, so the others value his advice. Did he completely botch it or was he being intentionally wishy washy to end up on top no matter who the victor was? It's established that he does keep secrets to himself, and no matter what happens, Tolly survives, he's a survival weasel. Deliberately ambiguous.

I knew you would immediately respond with an attempt to rewrite history regarding The Chinese Room's/Paradox's statements about the development process. I'm not going to debate specifics with you because we have already done this dance.

I don't understand why you would put so much effort into defending this game. That's some very selective memory there regarding how multiple characters respond to the mention of Sabbat.

Will also mention one other pervasive problem with the game. It seems as if the main goal of the rewrite was to try and have every conversation pass the Bechdel test. And they figured the easiest way to do that was to make all of the vampires either women or gay men. The only male vampires that don't look or openly state they are homosexual are final death before the end of chapter 1.

[Roguey]

I don't understand why you would put so much effort into defending this game. That's some very selective memory there regarding how multiple characters respond to the mention of Sabbat.

I played it twice very recently so I'm pretty sure I'm not misremembering that it largely goes
"Ysabella said she was Sabbat."
"Tolly, is this true?"
"What? No."

What's he going to say? "Yeah I guess I ****** up there, guess I'm in the doghouse now"? "Yeah, but I kept it to myself because I didn't see any way out of it that wouldn't also risk my life"?

[logincrash]

I don't understand why you would put so much effort into defending this game. That's some very selective memory there regarding how multiple characters respond to the mention of Sabbat.

I played it twice very recently so I'm pretty sure I'm not misremembering that it largely goes
"Ysabella said she was Sabbat."
"Tolly, is this true?"
"What? No."

What's he going to say? "Yeah I guess I ****** up there, guess I'm in the doghouse now"? "Yeah, but I kept it to myself because I didn't see any way out of it that wouldn't also risk my life"?

Tolly repeatedly calls Nomad an alarmist conspiracy theorist every time he brings up the Sabbat. He doesn't just "doubt you." He's so vocally against the idea that it makes it look like he's in on it and is running interference for the Sabbat.
Ryong is skeptical throughout the game. Even Fabien (who actually sees everything you see and hears Ysabella admit that she's Sabbat) tells you that you're being paranoid.

[Roguey]

Tolly repeatedly calls Nomad an alarmist conspiracy theorist every time he brings up the Sabbat. He doesn't just "doubt you." He's so vocally against the idea that it makes it look like he's in on it and is running interference for the Sabbat.
Ryong is skeptical throughout the game. Even Fabien (who actually sees everything you see and hears Ysabella admit that she's Sabbat) tells you that you're being paranoid.

Yeah, Ryong trusts her spymaster. She trusts too many people really, absolutely hoodwinked. Fabien's just open to other possibilities. After all, Ysabella could have been lying, planting a false flag. Falls in line once the evidence becomes irrefutable though.

[logincrash]

Tolly repeatedly calls Nomad an alarmist conspiracy theorist every time he brings up the Sabbat. He doesn't just "doubt you." He's so vocally against the idea that it makes it look like he's in on it and is running interference for the Sabbat.
Ryong is skeptical throughout the game. Even Fabien (who actually sees everything you see and hears Ysabella admit that she's Sabbat) tells you that you're being paranoid.

Yeah, Ryong trusts her spymaster. She trusts too many people really, absolutely hoodwinked. Fabien's just open to other possibilities. After all, Ysabella could have been lying, planting a false flag. Falls in line once the evidence becomes irrefutable though.

Therefore Tolly isn't the only person who doubts you.

[Roguey]

Therefore Tolly isn't the only person who doubts you.

... because they're relying on Tolly's expertise.

[logincrash]

Therefore Tolly isn't the only person who doubts you.

... because they're relying on Tolly's expertise.

Therefore Tolly isn't the only person who doubts you.

[Atlantico]

Therefore Tolly isn't the only person who doubts you.

... because they're relying on Tolly's expertise.

Tolly was a mistake. Stupid and annoying character.

[CheesusCrust]

Therefore Tolly isn't the only person who doubts you.

... because they're relying on Tolly's expertise.

Tolly was a mistake. Stupid and annoying character.

what about the ****** "Child" part? ***** femoid Prince that stepped in after the previous white male Prince got murdered? middle age femoid ex-Prince? ****** Lasombra femoid? femoid ***** Anarch? ****** soyboy Bruja? ***** femoid Gangrel?