Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines

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I got this game for christmas, and DAMN is it good!

The haunted hotel is the scariest moment in any game, even scarier than AvP2

Playing as a Malkavian is awesome, arguing with a STOP sign is priceless

I know a lot of people complain about bugs, but I haven't run into a single one in two play-throughs.

I really recommend this game to any CRPG fans

[ December 29, 2004, 13:51: Message edited by: Jesper898 ]

 

Oh you will run into bugs, take my word for it.

The worst one is at the end of the mission in the Society of Leopold. The game simply won't let you continue from there on. There has been an official patch released, but from reading other forums, i understand it only makes things worse, so naturally i didn't download it myself. There's also an unofficial patch outthere, that SHOULD fix that problem, but i haven't read anything about it being succesful yet, so i didn't bother with that one either. Instead i used a console command to "teleport" myself to the area you were going anyway, and i didn't lose any XP or anything, so that was good enough for me, at least i got to continue this otherwise fantastic game.

I'm playing for the second time now, because i missed a whole bunch of sidequests the first time, which made me miss out on quite a lot of XP points, and i can't let that happen. I picked the same character as the first time, which is a Brujah, because he could handle anything relatively succesful, including the romance sequences, which turned out to be quite important in the story.

 

I might get it, but the price tag on the game makes me sceptic, there seems to be a lot of unfixed flaws.

 

@pac man: I'm using the unofficial patch.

And what romance sequences are you talking about? The only one I can remember is shagging Jeanette

 

I never managed to get Jeanette in the sack, because it was her sister that pulled the trigger on both occasions, and she doesn't say anything once that's all over. I guess i'm gonna have to play a third time once i'm done.

I'm talking about the hot redhead in that Hollywood stripjoint. Maybe you're not that far in the game, so i won't spoil anything for you by telling too much. Go see for yourself.

 

Aside from graphical glitches and stuff (probably due to my aging computer) one think that kind of irked me was the fact that non-clan disciplines aren’t available. Oh well.

 

(my thoughts on bloodlines, copied from 'year 2004 at rpg codex' thread)


First off: great game. Fps elements aren't a total distaster. Sure, it ain't great, but it works. Now bugs: there are a lot of them. Most have been fixed by the 1.2 patch though, so its almost perfectly playable now.

The biggest issue however, is performace. I have a P4 GeForce 4 ti4200 256RAM 2.6GHZ, and the loading times are nearly ten (!!) minutes for the whole town you are currently playing in. When the loading is done, the game runs pretty smooth, till it starts raining. Now, you can imagine, there are quests where you have to go to small house x, ask y and bring a message to another house z. Result: load the entire town twice, and each house twice. 25 minutes loading time. And all of this at absolute minimum settings and my cache file set to 1.4GB.

The game is great, awesome roleplaying and looks even at low settings, but boy, I lost all will to play it becouse of those loading times. If you got a good, and I mean a REAL good computer, go ahead and buy it, you won't be dissapointed. Ironically, Half Life 2 runs smoother than this game using the same engine. To think I had the chance to turn this game in, pity I didnt.

 

I'm playing it too, and it's GREAT - although the indeed extreme loading times are a pain, some of the 'longer indoor levels' really kick ass - and that haunted hotel was INCREDIBLE - I haven't been so freaked out since Thief I when I was a little kid.
Also, performance is pretty shaky on my PC, dunno 'bout the settings actually, but it's not as smooth as it should be.
Still, as a roleplaying experience, it's great, and although rather dumb to *do*, the combat *looks* pretty cool.
About bugs: it crashes to desktop every now and then, that's pretty much it. Haven't encountered any 'critical' bugs, but I haven't finished the game yet.


PS: Anyone know a cool specialised site 'bout this game, as SP isn't 'covering' it?

 

About the loading times...what on earth do you expect with only 256 RAM in your system ???? That's simply not of this day and age anymore guys. And it's not just VTM Bloodlines, just take a look at Doom 3, Far Cry, MOH Pacific Assault, just to name a few newcomers from last year, all of these games recommend 512 MB. And that's AT LEAST, even though they don't mention it. But believe me when i say that 1024 MB these days isn't a luxury, it's almost a must.

Hugo, go here

 

I realise i have only 256 ram, but I have set my cache file to 1.4GB, plus the ram, thats a lot. Not optimal, but it should at least warrant some shorter loading times.

 

@Pac Man: Do you mean VV? She always ended up hating me. Damn stuck up Toreador skank

 

Not me, she's completely nuts about me. There hasn't been anything going on like what happens with Jeanette, but she promised something alike. And now it finally seems to be going in that direction, since i found 4 e-mails from her on my PC in my Downtown haven. Time to go back to Hollywood.

 

@Pac man: Meh, lucky bastard


By the way, in case you guys answered the questions, what clan did you get? I answered them and got Ventrue.

 

The only part that bothered me is that you can't change the character model for your clan, you're stuck with the basic one

I tried to download some new skins, but there was no readme so I didn't know how to install them.

Jesper: I got Brujah

 

Brujah here too.

Was kinda used to that name, since Christoph was embraced by that clan in VTM Redemption, and i played that game like 20 times or something.

At first i started out as a Nosferatu, at least that was the outcome after answering a handful of questions, but soon i realised that being a Nossie may have some advantages, but they don't weigh up against the disadvantages, romancing being one of them. So i started a new game with a Brujah.

 

All the reviews I've read the more 'combat' based clans have a huge advantage in the game - clans like the Brujah and Gangrel (sp?).

I'm going to buy it while I'm in Thailand. Pity it hasn't come out here yet...

 

Great game, the 1.2 patch fixes most bugs(including the showstopping ones).

I played as a Toreador, with fairly poor combat skills, and had no problems.

 

My only qualm with this is the poor graphics card on my brothers computer. The load times are never more than 40 seconds, but the gameplay is very choppy. He'll be buying a new graphics card sometime soon, though.

 

Jesper: I agree with you totally about the haunted mansion. I was absolutely bricking it with every step my character took. So much for the hard arse Brujah

 

what is the gameplay like? i've never been a fan of non-isometric view games but KotOR has made me change my mind. is the gameplay similar to KotOR? if not, I'd appreciate it if someone gave me the name of a well-known game that it's gameplay IS similar to (and don't say the previous games ). thanks.