Mera'din

They've been throwing up a Dev Diary every couple weeks since the announcement talking about different aspects of the game, and just did a longer video interview type thing yesterday talking about the narrative and a little about game systems. I'm liking most of what I've seen so far, and the things I don't care for are far from deal breakers. Some of the main things revealed yesterday were that the main character goes by the name "Phyre", they've been in torpor for 100 years. You have some notoriety and legends about you that people are aware of and you can lean into that or skew peoples perceptions of you based on what they think they know. You woke up with your power suppressed presumably via a series of sigils branded into your body (probably via some Blood Sorcery or Thin-Blood Alchemy shenanigans) and are trying to find out what the hell is going on. To top it off, you have a constant companion in the voice in your head, belonging to a Thin-Blood named Fabian. It has not been revealed how you got stuck with him, but likely it relates to the aforementioned Shenanigans, or you ended up eating him when you were first woke up and you didn't completely absorb his soul. Or possibly both. You will be able to choose some background/origin stuff for the character, their clan, gender, and it seems like at least some stuff will be customizable for the character based on in-game and concept stuff shown. Outfits for sure though, and they mentioned that the outfit you where can affect how some people treat/talk to you. It sounds like they've cut back more on clans though. It will be 4 at launch now, with at least 2 added via DLC. It was mentioned that the 4 still in don't necessarily match up with everything that was there in the first iteration, so we could see something different than what's been done before which would be nice. Dev Diary #1: Introducing the company and giving some basic info on the game. https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/games/vampire-the-masquerade-bloodlines-2/news/welcome-to-the-chinese-room Dev Diary #2: Narrative Atmosphere & Themes https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/games/vampire-the-masquerade-bloodlines-2/news/narrative-atmosphere-and-themes Dev Diary #3: Neo Noir Art Style https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/games/vampire-the-masquerade-bloodlines-2/news/neo-noir-art-style Narrative & RPG video interview:

Yeah, the combat gameplay is the biggest thing holding it back by far. It wouldn't even be BAD with a few adjustments, but still feels very anti-Final Fantasy in its execution. There were two better ways to do it, and FFXVI and VII Remake are excellent examples of them both that they could have looked at as you noted. You'd think the guy that is known for saving FFXIV would have had the wherewithal to keep party management, of all things, in mind. XD

13.) Final Fantasy XVI FINALLY got through this. Had abandoned it for a while due to Baldur's Gate 3 (which I'm still working on), but with Spider-man 2 and Alan Wake 2 imminent I decided to focus on it and get through. Overall I really enjoyed the game, there's a lot to love about it, but also a fair bit of stuff I found annoying. I know a lot of people liked the first half of the story, but I found it the least enjoyable part (though I didn't hate it). Just didn't have much of an FF feel a lot of the time. Felt more like Game of Thrones or Dragon Age narratively, which is fine I guess. Just wasn't expecting it. The last half really starts to take off and get into that weird Final Fantasy magic bullshit that I wanted to see. This game is a spectacle visually, and I loved every second of it. My main gripes come from a couple places. I hate a lot about the combat honestly. I don't mind an action RPG, but the fights (especially a lot of the mini-bosses and bosses) felt very rote. You just cycle through your abilities that are off cooldown and chip away at their HP and it was kind of boring until late in the game when the time spent in each fight was a lot more manageable with upgrades. Not being able to pick party members was all a huge drawback. Recruiting party members and choosing who to take with you is a big part of what makes RPGs fun and everything was preset in this when you were actually allowed to have anyone in the first place other than the dog. Even XV being a set party the whole game felt better than this because they were always there and it felt like they were actually part of the fight. The other characters in this game felt less necessary than Donald and Goofy in a Kingdom Hearts game. >_> My other main gripe was the accessories. Aside from the fact that their major accessibility "options" were tied to accessories, the other accessories available in the game were downright boring. Nearly everything was for one specific ability and just reduced the CD or increased the damage of that specific ability by x amount. At that point, it was more interesting to use the accessibility stuff because they actually felt like they meant something. The only other ones that felt worth using until end game were the ones that gave you more XP, Gil or ability points each fight. The main story was fun, batshit crazy FF shit, and the side quests had some really solid story to them even when they mostly amounted to fetch quests. They were interesting and well written and often gave you a lot of insight into the side characters. The combat had its moments despite its flaws, and the crazy Eikon fights, even though they were mostly QTEs, were a hell of a roller coaster. Voice acting was really solid most of the time too. However, there was a line near the end of the game while fighting the final boss, that I just don't think I can forgive. I had to pause and just let it sink in that they actually did this.

Really happy that this is back. After Secret War being pretty much a shit show, I was really hoping this was still going to hold the quality that it had previously, and so far it definitely looks like it does. I definitely missed this show.

OMG. That was him. Holy shit. ?

I enjoyed it, I just think they pushed too hard to fit certain things into the first season that it threw off a lot of stuff despite how well they handled many of the things they did. Casting was wonderful. I feel like they should have got an Asian actor for Vicious too, but ultimately I didn't dislike him as a choice by the end I just think there were probably better options. Faye was often hit and miss for me. Spike and Jet were perfect, and they did a great job with a lot of the other bad guys they used. I definitely had the same feeling of wanting to rewatch the original after. I actually did end up doing that once I finally got through the live action one. XD I wish they could have done another season, but at the same time I'm not bothered that they didn't mostly because of the bit at the end.

I'm tentatively looking forward to it, but what they show in the coming months will be a big part of it. The trailer doesn't really give us much to work with. What they have shown certainly looks better than what HSL had though in terms of actual in-engine stuff, so that much has improved at least. The story is something we'll have to see on, but at the very least I like the elder awakening from torpor starting point better than the Thin-Blood one, personally.

New developer is The Chinese Room, which was rumored a ways back, but most people wrote it off since they're typically known for walking simulators, but it seems like they've expanded a lot since the last couple games of theirs I've played (which I liked, to be fair, walking simulator or no). Seems like they've completely retooled the story from what they were doing before though. No more Thin-blood starting point. You're a reawakened elder now. Could be fun, but RIP Brian Mitsoda's work I guess. Here's everything they've basically put out, mostly on the refreshed Website: https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/games/vampire-the-masquerade-bloodlines-2/about Fight your way through a modern-day Seattle on the brink of an open war as an elder Vampire. Meet the power-players, ally yourself and decide who will rule and what the city will become. A three-front siege on Seattle, a power vacuum in the vampire court and an awakened elder at odds with the voice in her head, realized by BAFTA award winning studio, The Chinese Room. You are the Monster Blood sustains you and powers your vampiric Disciplines. You’ll stalk and feed on the city’s population by night. Use your supernatural powers or raw persuasion on civilians and lure them into deep, dark alleys to sate your Hunger. Beware of breaking the Masquerade though: do not reveal what you are or you risk reprisals - at first from law enforcement and then, well, remember you are not all that goes bump in this night. Explore visceral, immersive combat rewarding entirely different playstyles and approaches based on your choice of vampire clan. Will you wade into the fray with supernatural fists, harangue from afar or rebalance your odds by thinning the herd like the apex predator you are? Clan choice supports these playstyles and more. A World of Darkness Enter the World of Darkness and rise through vampire society or rail against it. Experience Seattle - a city full of alluring, dangerous characters and factions, not to mention the mortals at stake in the clash of powers beyond their knowing. In this sequel to the cult classic, your choices, plots and schemes will determine the balance of power and what becomes of the city and its people. Between today and the end of 2023, we will reveal all playable clans in Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2. In the opening months of 2024, we will reveal gameplay and go into depth on disciplines, playstyles and the experience of playing the game as each clan. Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 will release Fall 2024. We’ll be back with a precise date when we open pre-orders.

So, how has everyone been the past 2 years? Since I last posted in here, Bloodhunt released and I actually really liked it despite it being a Battle Royale, to the point that I started making lore/story videos centered around the game since nobody else was doing it, got to know a number of the developers, was able to do a recorded interview with the writing team, and now the game has stopped development and is in maintenance mode because they kind of biffed their launch and took too long to fix the nastier bugs the game had and lost most of their concurrent player count. Swansong also released and it was decent. Nothing standout, but I enjoyed it a lot. And in all that time there was no real news on Bloodlines 2 other than "We're happy with the progress the team is making on it." from Paradox. Still no idea who the developer is. They never ended up saying because they didn't want them to have to deal with all the shitty people the last team had to deal with who were sending threats and what not. Understandable, but frustrating. HOWEVER, there is finally a light a the end of the tunnel. They announced not long ago that real news would be coming in September. They dropped all their physical preorders if people had bothered to keep them due to changes to their contents incoming (digital preorders were left alone though), and they purged the website and their discord channels of anything referencing what had been shown before (including emojis). They just announced today that the World of Darkness brand team will be appearing at PAX West, Sept. 1-4. Considering the game is set in Seattle, PAX is one of the bigger gaming conventions anymore, and they said news would be coming in Sept. I assume this will be where they announce everything, including who the new developer actually is and what form the game has now taken. I'm mostly interested in seeing if anything of the original story remains since the writing had supposedly been completed, and one of the big draws was the game having the writer from the original on board. I imagine the game is all but done though, so we may even get a release date. I seriously doubt Paradox would risk trying to hype this game up again without being sure there's actually a functional game to hype this time. XD

It's not a super long game, so if you have the money I'd say go for it. I got through it in about 8.5hr. but I play stuff super slow and idle a lot, so I'd say an average playthrough is probably around 6 hours. Unless you got a lot you're playing right now, you get definitely get through it at least once before Starfield drops. I'm much more worried about getting through Baldur's Gate before Starfield shows up. I'm at least 25 hours in and still not even as far as I was in the Early Access. Speaking of Starfield though, it looks like the preload is up (at least on the XBox app).

12.) Stray Gods What a fantastic game. It's a narrative RPG (leaning Telltale style game but more of an animatic/animated style), that is also a full on musical. Really interesting concept overall. Great voice acting, solid songs, though the audio mixing is a bit all over the place. Story was pretty fun to. Basically it works off the premise that gods (primarily of the Greek variety in this case) are real and have been living among us for thousands of years, though some of the "big" ones (Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon for example) are dead and gone, and the others are fading. The main character is a normal human who ends up with one of the muses dying in her arms and her power is passed to her and she gets dragged into their world and has to find out what happened to the former muse or she'll be executed for her murder. The choices seem pretty varied and many even occur mid-song and change what is being sung. Based on the achievements in the game, there are even whole songs you don't see depending on the choices you make. I'm curious to see how much the story could change as it seems to be better off than these sorts of games usually are. It was written by David Gaider who was lead writer on things like Neverwinter Nights, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, and all the Dragon Age games, so I'm expecting to see some interesting differences with some of the choices available.

I had heard there were different cuts of the movie that were shown in different theaters with subtle differences. Apparently that extends to the digital release as well, and some of what is in that release may or may not be the same if you saw it in the theater first. Someone compiled a bunch of them on twitter.

I didn't hate it. It was fine. Mismanaged. Story focused on wrong things. Basically the same sort of missteps we've been seeing more and more with Marvels stuff it feels like.

9.) (PSVR2) Beat Saber I had only messed with VR stuff a little via a friend letting me borrow the original PSVR for a month or two and playing Beat Saber on that was really fun (helped that it was just about the ONLY thing the shitty Move controllers lent themselves well to). Decided to splurge for my birthday and get the PSVR2 and when they finally released the upgrade to PSVR2 for it, I was super excited. Have been playing it quite a bit and actually managed to beat the campaign, something I didn't think I'd ever pull off when I first started playing it. Don't think I'll ever quite muster the skill to get the Platinum for it, but I'm honestly surprised at how much better I've got with it over time. Only downside is the music selection is pretty limited on the console side, but there's enough good stuff that I'm enjoying myself. Have actually managed to start playing consistently on Expert mode. It's a hell of a workout too. XD 10.) (PSVR2) Horizon: Call of the Mountain Got the version of the PSVR2 that came with this. It's the first "real" VR game I've managed to play all the way through. Not because it wasn't fun, but because I have limited time to play on it, and it took me a little while before I could play for more than 30 min. or so at a time. I've finally started acclimating to the VR stuff and have even been able to reduce the vignette settings when moving. Game was pretty interesting overall. The majority of it is basically climbing puzzles, but they were really fun honestly. There's set points where you fight machines and I thought those parts would end up being awful purely because I was expecting the shooting controls to be extra janky (insert flashbacks to Wii FPS games here), but it was actually set up pretty well. You have a quick dodge to avoid attacks, and the system has a pretty solid eye movement tracker that ties into the aim assist settings, so you generally hit what you are looking at which made it kind of fun to do. The graphical detail in the game was really great too. Made it a pretty solid experience compared to other VR stuff I've tried. 11.) Oxenfree 2 I have been waiting for this game for quite a while. Absolutely loved the first one and was excited to finally play this. I worried it would feel really samey, and wouldn't be as interesting since the "mystery" that made the first game so great is kind of already apparent, but they managed to do something unique with it still that kept it interesting despite having an idea of what was up. The way it tied to the first game was really cool too. It feels a bit more "shallow" than the original at the moment, but I've only played through it once and if it's anything like the first in that regard, it will take more than one play through to fully grasp the depth of the story and the effect your choices have. I'm looking forward to seeing if it holds up in that regard.

Yeah, this wasn't nearly as fun as I was expecting. It had some good moments to it overall, but it felt more like a vehicle for getting Fury "back in the game" than anything. The Skrulls were just a vehicle for that and it felt like a wasted use of them (and Talos). They could have pulled one of a half a dozen comic plots to achieve what they were going for here. It honestly also felt like something that should have had more time to breath. The concept really needed to be woven into at least 1 full phase of MCU stuff to build suspense. Like if the whole "Harvest" thing would have been used as a after credit thing in End Game or something instead of feeling tacked on here, and things like that (though I get why they didn't want anything post credits for that movie honestly).

Yeah, after FFVII Remake, and even FFXV (thought I wasn't fond of the magic system in that one) it felt a bit meh. I do like the switching between elemental powered ability things, that feels nice but everything feels so spongey. Probably one of the pitfalls of it being made by people who are used to working on an MMO. There are definitely a lot of MMO vibes to it in places that aren't necessarily always a detriment, but don't often seem to do it any particular favors other.

I assure you I am actively playing it at the moment. Not sure how far am I in at this point but probably not terribly far. Having 4 kids means I have limited time to use my TV/Playstation. X_x Even got the fancy collectors edition for this one. XD It's been pretty fun so far. Story is interesting if very Game of Thrones feeling. Not sure I'm a huge fan of the combat at the moment, but the Eikon battles are a hell of a spectacle at least.

Yeah, I'm more excited for this one than most of the stuff that's come out lately. Genuinely looking forward to it.

I am way more excited for this than I probably have any right to be.

I could see them rolling back some of the shit they changed in this patch. It's bad enough people are legit uninstalling, and the game is getting review bombed because of it. Almost every article and what not that I've seen about it too points to the Sorcerer stuff specifically because yeah, they needed help, not to be pile driven further into the ground. They're apparently going to be doing a live stream to talk about the patch around 11am (PT) Friday, so we'll see if they intend to roll back any of the shit then I guess. I feel annoyed that I didn't play more before the pulled this, but since I have a ton of shit to play still, I guess I can just hold out until they start getting their shit together before going back to it. XD

I got it. Still somewhere in Act 1. I was only semi-enthusiastic about the game in the first place and bought it because I got a really good deal on it, but this last month along with the next few are so loaded with stuff I want to play that it quickly got shuffled into the corner since I know it's not going anywhere, and may actually be improved enough to be straight up fun. Not falling for the trap of dumping 500 hours into it and then being so burnt out that when they add the things I actually wanted I don't want to play it any more (looking at you Diablo 3 Paragon system). If my wife finally decides to start it up, or I have someone else to play with I might wander back over to it in the interim, but at the moment I still have Jedi: Survivor, FFXVI and Oxenfree 2 to keep me busy and Baldur's Gate 3, Starfield and some other stuff right around the corner.

8.) Bramble: The Mountain King Nice little atmospheric horror game based on Nordic folklore and fairy tales. Gets pretty gruesome at times, and has this nice unsettling vibe through most of the game. Story was interesting enough. Had a lot of fun with it. Wasn't terribly long, maybe 5-6 hours, but I like games like that when I don't have a lot of time, or as a palate cleanser between all these stupidly long games. XD

7.) Ori and the Blind Forest Fun platformer game. Or would be if the controls on the Xbox app version weren't completely fucked. Had to play it in windowed mode in order for the cursor to appear to direct one of the attacks that it makes you use constantly during the game for the super intense platforming sections, and there was no option to keep the mouse pointer from leaving the game window, so I was constantly veering off and clicking outside of the game which messed me up a lot. The game just flat out wouldn't recognize a controller for some reason either. Other than the frustrations, it was a pretty fun game. Some challenging parts that took some repetition to get used to. Definitely not interested in trying to 100% it, but was fun enough I'll play the 2nd one at some point.

It has few to no redeeming qualities, honestly. Not to mention the super forced Spider-Man tie-ins (to all 3 versions, technically), at least one of which even the director didn't know was put in I recall reading.

I don't think it's possible for another movie to hit such a prestigious level of bad that it manages to get meme'd back into the theaters and even got the main actor from the movie to poke fun at it (especially one that seems a bit touchy about his work otherwise). Though I don't think it's possible, I want to clarify that I am absolutely here for it to happen again regardless. I DARE the universe to do it again, if we're being honest.