Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines Retrospective

Games On Net has treated us to a retrospective feature for Troika’s Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, though the article spends more time pointing out the game’s flaws than its strengths. 

But as anyone who has played Bloodlines will tell you, cramped and unconvincing levels are the least of its problems. In its native state, sans patches, this game is a broken unfinished mess. For the first 20 hours or so, it’s not a huge deal: the performance isn’t great and there are a few wonky quests here and there, but by and large things are pretty excellent. In a lot of ways, this part of the game feels very much like the original Deus Ex there’s the same sense of depth, the same multiplicity in problem solving.

After the 20 hour mark, things take a turn for the worse. The much, much worse. Creative quests and thoughtful level design (the Ocean House Hotel remains a paragon of both) are gradually replaced by tedious combat slogs through endless corridors of respawning supernatural goons. There are boss fights. Stupid, awful, frustrating boss fights that are totally out of keeping with the rest of the game. Bugs become more frequent, and more serious. Some are game-breaking. In fact, there is one bug that is both game-breaking AND nearly unavoidable.

I’m not sure why anyone would bother writing an article about a years-old game they find “tedious”, but maybe that’s just me.