Update Ninety-Eight: 16 December 2017
VAMPIRE THE MASQUERADE: BLOODLINES
~9 hours, No achievements
Did Not Finish/10
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
EDIT: OOPS! OOPS! OOPS! OOPS!
I hate to disappoint a bunch of people who were very excited for me to play Bloodlines and to hear my thoughts on it. I didn’t want to bring the strife that’s been storming in the Tsuper household into my beloved BLAEO space.
What strife, you ask?
I’ve been tormenting my girlfriend. I’d flop around, and moan, and groan, and she’d ask me what was wrong. I’d groan and moan and flop and eventually confess that I… didn’t want to keep playing Bloodlines. So stop playing it, she’d respond. I’d protest that I said I would! That people were excited! That it was the monthly challenge! And she, in her infinite girlfriendly wisdom, would stare me down and say, do you want to keep playing it? And I’d mumble…. no…. And she’d continue, don’t you have over a hundred other games you have to eventually play? And I’d mumble… yeah… And she’d finish: then stop playing, and play something else!
This conversation had to happen a few times for it to stick. But I played it up to getting into the Downtown area and I must conclude… it doesn’t do anything for me.
It’s certainly a well-made game! And the unofficial patch made a big difference. I was shocked at how good the character animation was - the conversation movements, eye tracking, head tilts, and especially the lipsync. Holy shit, more recent Bioware games didn’t have lipsync that good! Once I got into a good rhythm I was puttering along, I did all the side quests in Santa Monica, got a vampire to try to kill the president, inadvertantly made a ghoul, ate some rats, and tried to be as nice as I possibly could. I enjoyed the plot with Jeanette and Therese - I really did not see that twist coming! That was cool. The whole ‘Ghost at Midnight’ quest was really interesting, and I can see how that was influential on games that came after it (and I’m a sucker for haunted house sidequests).
But I just didn’t care about anything that’s happening. I don’t think Bloodlines aged particularly well - not necessarily in mechanics or graphics, but just in how the game is written and how the plots are constructed. I can absolutely see how revolutionary it was at the time… but I’ve played games that were inspired by it and then took that inspiration and did things to a higher level. It’s very 90’s-edgy and a lot of the themes it deals with just…. aren’t interesting to me. Vampire is my least favorite World of Darkness playbook (I’m a Promethean or Changeling fan) and the ooo spooky masquerade and Sabbat and Camarilla just… it’s…… ehhhhhh.
But my ‘unplayed games’ recently topped over 200 again, and I just don’t want to spend so much time on a game that really just doesn’t move me in any particular way. Also, I won’t be able to play any games at all if my gf strangles me bc I complain too loudly.
I’m sorry, you guys <:c I’m shelving Bloodlines in ‘won’t play’.
Next up: As penance, I’ll be clearing out my non-VN SG wins before the New Year, starting with -
See you soon!
I’ll be playing this game this month for the challenge me, so it’s nice to hear an honest response. I’ve played some extremely popular games that I just didn’t care for at all, so I think its good to be able to stop and just say, “this game isn’t for me.”
Also, this is a really dumb question, but can you link me to the patch you used? I’ve never used a patch before and it’s somewhat confusing to figure it all out.
Yeah - that’s really what it was. I can SEE why people liked it… but I wasn’t getting any enjoyment out of it. It was painful to start playing, it was a relief when I let myself stop, and as I was playing it was a neutral ‘well I guess this is happening.’ Those feelings do not a good experience make.
And of course! You can find it here. It’s really easy to set up. It’ll give you a new shortcut to launch the game from, so it won’t play through steam - that’s why I had to estimate my playtime, steam didn’t record it.
ate some rats
I guess you didn’t use Ventrue. :p
It’s not your job so if you’re not enjoying it, you can stop playing anytime. Bloodlines is probably one of those old games that are hard to get into if you haven’t played them before.
Probably forgot to edit the title of the game in your post. It reads “Shadows on the Vatican - Act II: Wrath”
No, I ended up doing Toreador. I was a lovely nice starving artist.
omfg I cannot believe I missed that. Thank you for alerting me
I’d flop around, and moan, and groan, and she’d ask me what was wrong. I’d groan and moan and flop and eventually confess that I… didn’t want to keep playing Bloodlines. So stop playing it, she’d respond. I’d protest that I said I would! That people were excited! That it was the monthly challenge! And she, in her infinite girlfriendly wisdom, would stare me down and say, do you want to keep playing it? And I’d mumble…. no…. And she’d continue, don’t you have over a hundred other games you have to eventually play? And I’d mumble… yeah… And she’d finish: then stop playing, and play something else!
No offense, but didn’t you have this exact same experience with another product, or was that someone else? Either way, if you ever have this experience again, just remember that you can still explain why you don’t recommend a game if you don’t beat it. Sometimes, you have to ask yourself “if I’m not having fun now, can anything afterward in the game make up for this?” The “won’t play” option is there for a reason, after all.
You really do tickle me, devon.
I was talking with a friend about the original Deus Ex a week or so ago. I asked her why she was playing that clunky, awful-looking game. She said that it was one of those games that you must have a nostalgic feelings towards it to fully appreciate.
I could help, but think that Bloodlines works exactly like that. It’s too old and dated for new players, but a timeless masterpiece for veterans.
One a side note, your story reminded me the time I won Rollercoaster Tycoon from a friend at the time, and was really hyped to played again after so many years. Absolutely hated it. Too old, terrible tutorial, very hard… I had to force myself to play 2-3 missions because I felt really bad about winning the game.. :/ Btw, I’m still wondering how my younger self played such a hard game. xD
It’s seeming like that more and more. I know a lot of people love it - but chances are they loved it when they played it back in the early 2000’s.
Oh man! I forgot rollercoaster tycoon actually had missions and things. I loved it, but I can’t remember actually making progress other than to make the most god-awful parks ever. Nostalgia is a double-edged sword like that - sometimes it’ll freeze time, and sometimes it’ll give you a very rude awakening.
Nostalgia can blur people’s opinion about something they loved when they were younger. I think it’s great that you stopped playing it, seeing how you did not care for the game. Much better than dragging youself through a game you don’t like and getting strangled in the process.
Bloodlines not aging well is my main concern with the game at this point. I’d love to go back and replay it after so many years, but yeah…it feels like a game that wouldn’t hold up well. That said, I think I would prefer the GOG version, as they are much better at keeping old games up to date and optimized for current systems (although you still have to use the mod even with the GOG version).
I will say that the technical aspects (other than some texture issues) weren’t that bad with the mod. (I had to quit out and restart in the tutorial, though. The ‘open door’ prompt just never appeared).
Like I said above, I really was impressed with the animations, and the conversations go nicely. If you liked the writing/plot/themes/etc. the first time around, you’ll probably wiill like it the same… or replay it thinking ‘wow, remember when I thought this was good?’
You’re right of course. I just need to clear my review backlog and then I can really start jumping back into some of these older beloved games.
I never played this one, but I remember enjoying the hell out of the first episode, Redemption! xD It might have aged badly though. Which is why I never really wanted to try it again, to avoid being disappointed and see all my good memories about the game die! Congrats for giving it a try though!
Don’t worry about not wanting to play, it’s not like you had to play it to begin with ;)
I think ultimately Bloodlines is one of those games that benefits from having been played at the time it came out, because if you play it again later (I replayed it a couple of years ago) you still have that “nostalgia” filter to help you go along with some of the more nonsensical parts of it– and there’s a lot! ^^
I’m nonetheless happy you appreciate some of the elements in it and how much of an influence it still is in so many games these days :)
Moral of the story: always listen to your girlfriend, I guess? xD
OH no - my girlfriend reads BLAEO and if she sees your comment I’ll never hear the end of it.
I think some of the issue was the idea of outside pressure. The last time I struggledwith this was the idea of giving up on a SG win, and now with so many people being like ‘can’t wait to hear what you think!’ I don’t like letting people down, and I wanted to play enough to give the game a fair shake.
Haha– also, hi tsupertsundere’s girlfriend ^^
On a serious note, I’m so sorry we put so much pressure on you :( I personally never meant it as such, it’s just that I’m always curious about what people will think of games/movies/etc I like. But ultimately, you’re supposed to enjoy the experience and you clearly weren’t, so stopping was definitely right the call.
I hope you’ll have fun with your next games! :)
Also, happy holidays for you and your loved ones! :D
Thank you for the apology, but it’s definitely no one’s ‘fault’ but mine. You weren’t pressuring (and, in fact, you helped me by linking to the patch so I can have the best experience possible) and nobody else was, either. I just didn’t want to let down my friends. Writing on backlog assassins this past 9 months or so has helped a lot with me feeling good about myself, and having people respond well to things I write makes me feel great! So I wanted that to continue, especially if people were excited, like you said, to hear what I thought about a game they really liked.
I’d like to say I’ll struggle less when this happens next time - but you’ll probably catch me in April or May or something doing the same song and dance. Until then, I probably will have fun with my games.
The both of us wish you and your family the same! Happy holidays, wolfborn c:
Aww, you’re so cute together ^^
I can definitely relate to what you said regarding writing on BLAEO. For reasons that are not really important right now, I’ve lived a very isolated life for the past few years and it was suggested to me that I’d join backlog assassins, because the person who kept telling me about it said this place had a ton of awesome people in it. And so far so true :)
Anyway, Miao93! This one’s for you. If/when it happens again and tsupertsundere is not having fun playing a video game, but keeps at it for the sake of her friends, remind her that her friends would much rather have her having fun and that no one feels like she’s disappointing them in the slightest ;)
All the best to the both of you!
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