Wow.

[Homer]

I got a chance to play this bloodlines for a few hours over at a buddy's house last night and wow. This game is amazing. Exactly what I've been hoping someone would release for years now.

I cant believe I'm saying it, but I actually enjoy playing it more than halflife2! And thats not to say I don't enjoy halflife2 more than anything ever, it just that bloodlines is an answer to my prayers.

Anyone who likes RPGs needs to get this game.

 

[PvtRyan]

Good to hear that, I'll pick it up later in a month or so.

According to Gamespy, the combat feels shitty and physics are pointless, is that true?

 

[Homer]

Gamespy doesn't have a adaptable enough review system, this is much better than a 4 out of 5 game.

I will say that using a gun at low levels seems useless, but its a bloody RPG. Deus ex was the same way. I'm assuming that by high levels gun combat get better. And melee is pretty damn good for a RPG to begin with.

The physics aren't used extensively, they are just there. Which is cool in my opinion, games without physics just feel... crappy by modern standards. True there is no gravity gun, but damnit, its a RPG.

And at the core of what matters is the RPG elements, which are freaking amazing.

 

[SubKamran]

Comparing Bloodlines to Morrowind, the combat system is a BILLION times easier and better.

And Morrowind got GOTY so...

Anyways, it's so fun... and I like the salty language, it gives the whole LA feel. :thumbs:

I'm trying to get my friend to buy it, she's into the Vampire stuff, plus I showed her the walkthroughs... just has to get her parents to let her.

And the RPG elements are great. It keeps track of important information (which Morrowind didn't do sometimes) and keeps it clean and organized. Switching weapons is easy enough and melee is satisfying.

The quests are damn fun too. Though I can't find any painkillers for Mercurio (or whatever his name is). I feel sorry for the guy...

 

[Homer]

Yea, where are those damn pills?

 

[Agent.M]

I just bought it, im looking foward to checking it out. :bounce:

 

[Homer]

I take back all the good things I said.


I'm halfway through the game now, and every step I take it feels more and more unfinished.

For one thing, there is absolutely no way to use guns. The firearms skill is just there to waste points. Even if you could actually aim well enough to hit shit at the second highest level, you need roughly 3 times the max amount you are allowed to buy for every single dungeon. Thats right, if you buy 200 rounds for the .44 and go into the sewers or any of the other goddamn endless dungeon crawls, you will be out of ammo before you get halfway through.

As I said, the dungeon are ENDLESS. You will spend roughly 4 hours walking through a goddamn sewer fighting about six times as many monsters as you have the ammo to kill at one point in the game.

Hell, I was just in this mansion where half the rooms were just empty. No furniture, no windows, no anything. Like they just didn't have time to finish the map.

The first few hours were pure bliss, I'm guessing its because they actually had time to finish them. But once you get out of the first hub things fall apart like you would not believe.





They clearly intended to spend another year or so on this game, and I think we can all thank activision for this shitty release. Maybe we should stop hoping Valve dumps VUG for activision and start hoping valve goes 100% steam.

 

[mortiz]

Firearms are pretty pointless, I just went with a big Axe straight of the bat, it's a lot simpler!

I can't say at any point in this game have I had more fun than Half-Life 2, but it's still pretty fun, only thing is that some of it is incomplete unfortunately.

 

[killahsin-[CE]]

While I agree with some of your points homer. Alot I just don't. What kind of rpg would allow you to just shoot your way through everything? I very much like the fact that you can mix the melee and ranged combat. And in some instances you have to mix them to survive and also use your feed to finish them. And i definatly think the game looks very very polished. Of course some areas are more fine tuned than others, and that usually relates to who mapped it. And 4 hours in a dungeon, lol? Your getting a bit carried away there, lol. Firearms for me are for the ranged initiators, than its melee time. But you have to remember soem clan races are better at firearms than others. Some clans are better at seduction and so forth.


I do hope theres a patch though to up the ranged damage slightly, but not to much.

 

[mortiz]

While I agree with some of your points homer. Alot I just don't. What kind of rpg would allow you to just shoot your way through everything? I very much like the fact that you can mix the melee and ranged combat. And in some instances you have to mix them to survive and also use your feed to finish them. And i definatly think the game looks very very polished. Of course some areas are more fine tuned than others, and that usually relates to who mapped it. And 4 hours in a dungeon, lol? Your getting a bit carried away there, lol. Firearms for me are for the ranged initiators, than its melee time. But you have to remember soem clan races are better at firearms than others. Some clans are better at seduction and so forth.


I do hope theres a patch though to up the ranged damage slightly, but not to much.

But Melee and Ranged are just so unbalanced, Melee is super powerful even early on in the game.

 

[Phate]

But Melee and Ranged are just so unbalanced, Melee is super powerful even early on in the game.

Well duh silly, you're a vampire. The vampires main strength is it's super human power. If you use guns you are gimping the vampires main asset, and I found that putting points into guns is useless anyway because they aren't that great against the undead...which are many in the game. The flamethrower on the other hand....
:sniper:

 

[mortiz]

Well duh silly, you're a vampire. The vampires main strength is it's super human power. If you use guns you are gimping the vampires main asset, and I found that putting points into guns is useless anyway because they aren't that great against the undead...which are many in the game. The flamethrower on the other hand....
:sniper:

to be honest, that's a stupid exscuse for unbalanced gameplay.

 

[Dragoro]

You not liking it does not make it unbalanced. Phate is correct in what he said.

 

[Mac]

to be honest, that's a stupid exscuse for unbalanced gameplay.

I disagree. The whole game revolves around vampires... It's an excellent "excuse" for "unbalanced" gameplay

 

[lans]

I found bloodlines extremely buggy and boring. I don't know, maybe I was expecting a near flawless RPG (i had higher expectations for this than for HL2).

 

[^Ben]

And talk about the show stopper bug half way through the game.

Hay activision ever heard of Q&A?

 

[spinkitten]

it seems both HL2 and Vampire:Bloodlines suffer from the same stutter issues and glitches, though Bloodlines does appear to have some really special problems of it's own - i've managed to complete HL2 with bugs, without too much fuss really - but the bugs in Bloodlines are currently putting me off purchasing it. There also seems to be an issue of censorship - US release had a decapitation which seems to have been omitted from the UK release - taking into consideration the violent nature of the game, and even considering the current political climate - it seems a rash move to make.

 

[Dragoro]

They didnt remove that because they wanted to. They were forced to if they wanted to release the game in Europe.

 

[spinkitten]

yes, but i just read someone from Germany who posted on the Bloodlines forum has the uncut version, which is strange as Germany are normally pretty stringent on their censorship.

 

[mortiz]

I disagree. The whole game revolves around vampires... It's an excellent "excuse" for "unbalanced" gameplay

Vampire's are also meant to have better eye sight and senses in general, you would have thought they'd be able to shoot a gun with some competency. It just seem's like a pointless aspect of the game to follow when you can just use melee weapons. Every developer will tell you, the first thing you want to do when polishing your game is to get rid of all the parts that don't really serve any purpose.

Balancing in RPG's is one of the most important aspects, to say "but they're Vampire's! Which means it doesn't matter that guns are pointless!" is silly in my opinion. It's not like gun's are cheaper either, most of them are more expensive that their melee counterparts, made worse so by the fact that you have to factor in ammo.

 

[Marius]

Well as far as I'm concerned, the firearms issue is dead to me, I can run up and waste people at close range with a couple of shotgun blasts!

 

[XBORGZORZ]

Im at the second hub right now (downtown LA) and the game is very enjoyable. A few frame rate issues though... For the most part it is to me at least, as enjoyable as HL2. Although HL2 is the best FPS Ive ever played. I cant say that Bloodlines is the best RPG of all times...

 

[Shadow-warrior]

Just been playing for 20 mins - its bloody crap.

Jerky cameras, runs half as slow as HL2 with the trademark 'infamous source engine stutter', crappy character movement, horrible models, badly designed menus ...it goes on. Looks like a complete amateur effort.

Dissapointed.

 

[tic]

play it for longer. you might start to like it. at first didn't seem the best but after the first hour or two it gets really really good. & i heard alot of people saying it runs bad even on high end pc's. well i got a p4 2.8 at 3.1ghz & 1024mb ram with a radeon 9800 pro & it runs great. both outdoor & in. when it rains it slows a little but not much. very very playable. also have not seen any real bad bugs or anything. ai is not the best but so was the ai in deus ex. & we all know that that is one of the best games ever. system shock 2 didn't make the best use of guns. either did deus ex. but both games are 2 of the best ever. this one might be too.. time will tell. hope there is a few patches but

 

[Phate]

I think this game has the potential of being up there with Deus Ex, Planescape: Torment, and Fallout 2 if they fix some of the bugs.

Don't forget that when Fallout 2 came out there were plenty of bugs in that game as well. People don't really talk about it today since they fixed pretty much all of them, but both games are made by the same developer essentially. Troika, it seems, puts all of their effort into developing an immersive universe and compelling story while neglecting the technical aspects at times. So while you have developers like ID focusing on technical aspects you have Troika focusing on the opposite...almost to a fault.

I wish people would stop mentioning Half Life 2 when they talk about Bloodlines. Bloodlines is to Half Life 2 as Deus Ex is to the original Unreal.

 

[Homer]

Well, now its sealed. I just hit a 100% showstopper. I have to jump into a boat at some point in the game I won't name, and once I do it loads then crashes 100% of the time.

This is just that much worse because the game is SO good outside of combat and bugs. I almost wish the rpg elements sucked, that would make it easier to just be done with it.

This game needed another year in the oven, I dont know if this is trokia's or activison's fault, but this is total crap. You have to finish your damn games.

 

[^Ben]

Homer i mentioned a get around in another thread.

 

[Homer]

I saw that. Classy of them.


I think I'll just wait for a real patch or two, I just started playing ff7 again and that should carry me long enough that they fix some of the really bad stuff.

 

[Eon Blue]

Activision has said that they don't know about any patches any time soon.

This is the thing with developers. Making money sooner isn't as good as making a good game, damnit. ****ing greed

 

[AH_Solid_Snake]

I came to this game in more or less the reverse to most of you, i was stoked about HL2 and only took an interest in Vampire a few weeks before release. Im just past the showstopper bug with the speedboat (thanks to that dude who posted the fix here). I've not had any other bugs besides that one, no frame rate issues and no problems at all with the game (maxed out 1024 at 4AA 4AF). Not even the source stutter that seems to be a big problem.

Anyway, as you can tell by my position at the boat i've been playing the game for several hours and i've been totally engrossed by it, i havent made any progress in HL2 for days. The quests are multifaceted and i have freedom of choice and movement. Sure if i want to advance the story i have to do the main quest. But the point is i can blow it off for a bit and do some little jobs for other folk. Or go to my bar and hang out or just go visit some of the interesting and slightly insane peeps i've met, see how they are hanging. Freedom of choice is something HL2 completely lacks, but its supposed to its a linear shooter.

Ranged combat is not perfect by far, due to the use of RPG stats instead of FPS damage modelling. But to the guy who was complaining, yes its true if you use firearms in some of the dungeon areas you wont get through them. Theres a reason thats been drummed into you repeatedly by the manual, the game and your character as you play.

Bullets dont work on the undead or at least not very well. NPC's tell you this in the tutorial and a few other points at the start, and notice when you walk into a shooting situation you take more than a few rounds to put down. The point here is to use your blade when theres weird undead monsters, save the firearms for the human foes.

After that, always remember the point of the RPG, its about the character you choose to make. Not the situations but the way you choose through the situation. Besides that enjoy it, or uninstall it.

 

[-JeZ-]

The game is engrossing! I've stayed up past 2am the last three days in a row playing this game and I haven't played HL2 much at all since installing this. Not that this is better than HL2, it's just more engrossing and will last longer. I hope that Activision lets Troika patch their baby soon as some of the animation looks clunky and some of the subtitles are typo'd and not written correctly (as I've mentioned before) but aside from that I'm very happy!

 

[Homer]

Gah, this bullets don't work on the undead shit is moronic. First off they say shotguns are something to look out for, and last I checked the shotguns work just as poorly as the other guns. Second THEY PUT GUNS IN THE GODDAMN GAME. They should be a viable option since the points cost just as much as melee.



I am finding it unfortunately difficult to just let this game go. I enjoy it to much when its not broken, running poorly, or impossible because I put all my combat points in firearms. Hell, I swore I wouldn't play it again until a patch came out, and within 2 days I was right back to it.

DAMN you Trokia! Damn your brilliance at design and your idiocy at programming!

 

[Dragoro]

Idiot = someone thats uninformed about politics.

 

[Eon Blue]

DAMN you Trokia! Damn your brilliance at design and your idiocy at programming!

Ahahahhahahhaha

 

[Homer]

Idiot = someone thats uninformed about politics.

Well THAT was out of place.

I assume you are referring to my sig? Well, if you really want to talk about it then post in the politics forum. I won't be joining you though.

 

[Edcrab]

Still don't know whether to get this game...

If it gets a patch that fixes the bugs and preffably gives us Brits back our violence and nudity, I'd consider getting it.

Any volunteers on the gore and nakedness front? Sure someone could make a Fallout-Kids-esque patch for it...

 

[johnnypoopoopant]

im d/l the demo from file shack....lets see if its good or not, i can't wait till its is fisnished

 

[Sparta]

im d/l the demo from file shack....lets see if its good or not, i can't wait till its is fisnished

Downloading the wrong game dude. You're downloading the demo from another Vampire: The Masquerade game from 4/5 years ago.

 

[Eon Blue]

It IS good... and there's no nudity. The rumor that there is is an unfounded rumor. At best, strippers wear nipple tassles. Troika confirmed this, at [email protected]

The beheading is the only violence cut from the game, and it's not really worth it.

There IS a gameplay patch coming up, to fix Source engine problems (like the stutter bug), and also the game-stopping bug. It's a damned fine game, though.

 

[johnnypoopoopant]

awwww crap i d/l the old vampire game...i feel stupid o well