What an abuse of Next gen engine

[Hotpot]

Wasted opportunity! This game could have been so good. But the AI is hopeless and the limited physics is laughable. They may as well have licenced the original Unreal engine. I was hoping for a Deus Ex with vampires but got a game that showed promise but wound up feeling like a late 1980's Atari ST game. No wonder the dice-rollers have got such a bad rep! I'm beginning to wonder if any of them have kissed a girl myself! And I don't like being forced into 3rd person mode just because I want to smack somebody in the kisser! It doesn't happen in real life and it shouldn't happen in a game. Keep first person to keep the immersion. You want to forget it's a game. Save the 3rd person for the console players. Currently, I'm disappointed.

 

[**CENSORED**]

I know a lot of people that disagree with you...

 

[Hallo]

I see what you're saying but I compare this to other RPG's, and there it's top notch according to me. You seem to review/view it as a regular FPS game and then of course it fails to deliver physics wise. I though have to say that I agree with you with the third person and that it probably could've looked and felt much better, but this is a great game none the less and I think you'll grow into ejoying it more and more as you play. Btw you'll have to excuse my bad english as I am from Sweden...

 

[Art_Crime]

Look, we know the technology sucks, but get over it, it's still one of the years best RPG's.

In case you forget, Deus Ex when it came out was just the same in these aspects as far as technology and use. I hope you didn't play it for the physics and effects.

 

[BanalityDUFF]

since when was Source a next gen Engine, it doesn't even have a pure dynamic lighting model. . PFFFFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTTT.

Vampire > Deus Ex: IW

and i agree with everyone else, its a RPG, the focus isn't on how a box bounces. =/

this isn't HL2 with Vampires...

 

[Hazar]

I'll have to play it sometime.

 

[johnnypoopoopant]

i dont think this game is that bad

 

[Kazuki_Fuse]

since when was Source a next gen Engine, it doesn't even have a pure dynamic lighting model. . PFFFFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTTT.

I could be wrong but I was pretty certain that Source supports full dynamic lighting. Just because it wasn't fully utilised in HL2 or Bloodlines doesn't mean it doesn't support it. Anyway I'm probably wrong 'cause I don't know shit about engines.

 

[Venmoch]

Bad use of tech?

I'd disagree. They used the Source engine very very well. (It just needs a little refinement thats all.)

I mean the facial animation? (I love it when they find out your insane ) There the weird lifelike effect on the eyes? thats there too. Smooth animation (When it isn't buggy) but hell its the world that sucked me in. It is very very good.

 

[Hotpot]

Don't get me wrong. There are good aspects and the facial animations and dialogue options are but two of them. But it some places it just feels amateurish. There are holes in the floor in the haunted hotel and I can see a room below. Why can't I jump through the hole? It's big enough. That may be a bug, I don't know. I spotted a bubblegum machine and the round bubblegums inside were just a 2D picture. They could have rendered the individual balls. The opponents don't even attempt to take cover when you're shooting at them. So much could have been done with this. What I DO like is that there is so much to do. The quests just keep piling up.

 

[Kadayi]

Principally I think they bought it for the facial tech, and from that respect I think it does the job admirably (even more so than HL2, because there are more characters in VTM:B). The combat is iffy, but generally that's the norm with RPGs (KoToR was iffy also). It would of been great if the game was as polished as HL2, but I suspect that troika don't have anywhere near the resources or staff, let alone the budget that Valve could afford to throw at HL2. Still despite the flaws, I'm enjoying it, and looking forward to replaying it as a different Vamp (presently Malkavian..but tempted to try Nosfu next).

 

[Cyanide]

I agree with the first poster. This game is a complete waste of the Source technology. They didn't use any of its best features very well. The animation is poor, the lipsync seemed way off compared to HL2, they didn't use the physics engine that is Source's best feature, the AI is retarded, the worlds did not seem alive or immersive to me. In fact, they pretty much did everything about the game half-assed in my opinion. It could have been a good game, but the execution was terrible. I'd much rather play the table-top RPG than this pile of sub-standard crap.

 

[WhiteZero]

It's an above average game, and could have been an extreemly excelent one (maybe even better than HL2) if it werent for all the bugs.

 

[Hotpot]

I must admit now though, that despite the flaws, I am rather enjoying it. Incredibly, more so than Half Life 2. Now that may seem like a massive turnaround from my original post but I have to tell it as I see it. This is a good game but if they would have utilised the engine to it's fullest, it could have been the best game since the original Deus Ex.

 

[Hallo]

Good to hear, Hotpot! I think most people who enjoy playing RPG:s or just computer games in general will appreciate VTMB. In the end it is the value of gameplay, feeling and how entertained you get by playing the game that really matters. I still consider the original Quake to be the absolute best shoot 'em up to play online, and I still play it with software graphics set to look just terrible to get max fps. I had a great time playing VTMB and that's what matters to me, no source engine or megapolygon monster can change that.

 

[Shadow-warrior]

I'd love to get into this game, was looking forward to it more than HL2, but between the immersion destroying 5+ minute loading times for hubs and then the terrible source stutter bug (10 times worse than HL2) and appallingly low fps, considering the average graphics, its just impossible.

 

[tank_fuel]

I would have liked this game and put up with all the load times and low frames,,, except that it keeps kicking me out to third person.. That just made me uninstall it and trade it into EB. I guess I was expecting everything I loved about Deus ex + vampires.
I know! They sould make a Deus EX on source! yeay!

 

[TKATK]

if you want pure fps you could just use a gun for combat(melee attacking auto swithces to 3rd p) and bind 1st person view to a button

 

[VonBek]

I think its a great game. It not a dummed down console rpg, like deus ex 2, its what dues ex 2 should have been.

Bloodlines is one of my favorite games of all time.

 

[WabeWalker]

It's a mistake to argue that because Vampire and Half-Life2 were produced using Source, then the two games, at least on a production level, should be of the same caliber.

An engine is just an engine - you have to take into account the people who are working with the engine.

If Game Company A has 200 people working on a game using EngineX, and Game Company B has just 50 people working a game using EngineX, then it's likely that Game Company A is going to produce a much more polished game, especially if they've been working on the game longer.

Of course Half-Life2 is going to look more polished than Vampire.

To argue that '... this Vampire game just does not technically measure up to Half-Life2' is... well, kind of silly.

And besides, I would have thought that comparing Vampire with HL2 was a bit like comparing apples with oranges. One's an FPS, and the other is an RPG.