Revisiting VtM: Bloodlines

[Clockwork Knight]

The game sets it up so you look like an one night stand whom your sire decided to embrace for kicks, but the way that Lacroix immediately finds out is pretty suspect. But since your sire dies before getting a word in, there's no way to know whether this was a set-up from a chessmaster or Lacroix simply had spies in the club keeping an eye on local vamps' activity, and one of them bringing their supposed prey home raised some red flags.

You can't accidentally embrace someone.

Tasteful embrace

 

[pippin]

You can't accidentally embrace someone.

Tasteful embrace

every vampire is an embracer
#killallvampires
#idrinkvampiretears

 

[Clockwork Knight]

A shirt showing my bare neck is NOT "asking for it".

 

[Excidium II]

Wasn't Bloodlines planned to be open world something and then scaled back to hub design for the lack of funds? Is that true or I snorted too much cocaine today?

Not open world exactly but more complex in terms of level/area design. Initially there was even jumping and athletics, pointing maybe to a planned more extensive use of verticality when traversing levels and hubs.

Here's a glimpse of what was cut:

https://tcrf.net/Vampire:_The_Masquerade_-_Bloodlines#Unused_Levels

A game can be linear with levels but still have them be set in fairly large urban areas with plenty of opportunity for (both horizontal and vertical) exploration, a good example is Urban Chaos.

 

[Bubbles]

every vampire is an embracer
#killallvampires
#idrinkvampiretears

I like the implication that only vampires embrace humans, and never the other way around

 

[Delterius]

<snip>

I wonder if those are indeed all the 'unused levels' or just the ones Wesp has found and remade.

 

[Lacrymas]

Some levels do have multiple solutions and routes. The early warehouse level is one, the boat one is too (I remember 2 distinct ways you can see that the sarcophagus has been opened). They just get progressively more linear as the game goes along.

 

[Mozg]

The early Codex' Fallout centrism shows, but all in all a very fair appraisal of the game. Notice how magical unlockable doors were a pet peeve of the Codex back then, it's true though: there's very little in-game logic to which locks you can pick and which not, it's all dictated by the needs of plot/quest progression and can be jarring at times.

This prompts another weird 8+ year old memory of the game: In the tutorial, Jack describes some door in a random urban building as "magnetically sealed" (i.e. you need to go get a Doom keycard for it or something). I am 99% sure the line was written to be said in an eye-rolling 4th wall breaking kind of way. However, John DiMaggio says it with a lot more actorly conviction than eyerolling and you probably never even notice the line and just accept that this door is magnetically sealed OK

 

[Gay-Lussac]

The early Codex' Fallout centrism shows, but all in all a very fair appraisal of the game. Notice how magical unlockable doors were a pet peeve of the Codex back then, it's true though: there's very little in-game logic to which locks you can pick and which not, it's all dictated by the needs of plot/quest progression and can be jarring at times.

This prompts another weird 8+ year old memory of the game: In the tutorial, Jack describes some door in a random urban building as "magnetically sealed" (i.e. you need to go get a Doom keycard for it or something). I am 99% sure the line was written to be said in an eye-rolling 4th wall breaking kind of way. However, John DiMaggio says it with a lot more actorly conviction than eyerolling and you probably never even notice the line and just accept that this door is magnetically sealed OK

It's funny because Mitsoda actually mentioned one of the keys to good voice acting in games is giving the actors clear directions on how to deliver the lines.

And I believe him, because the VA in Bloodlines is consistently great.

 

[Jaesun]

Troika just didn't feel like writing 7 different sires and integrating them to the story would be worth the effort, so they die.

While that is most likely true, them not addressing this actually added to the story (and it worked, we are still discussing it today)...

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Jack's "uh, I took a shortcut" handwave also made me laugh.

I like the implication that only vampires embrace humans, and never the other way around

Reverse Embrace is NOT a thing. You can't embrace if you don't have political power.

 

[Krivol]

I just finished Ocean House and died in boiler room . Overall finishing it 3rd or 4th time is rather boring.

Could anyone explain to me why main hero is not angry on Lacroix or whole society for killing his/her boy/girlfried in the begining? I mean she/he is transforming us into vampire, violating the masquarade, risking a lot - and why? Only two reasons on my mind are:

1. She/He is actually part of conspiracy, and turns us into a vampire due to someone's request - and his/her death is unexpected for him.her (Lacroix killing his puppet maybe?)
2. There is some huge love affair and he/she is our lover and all that shit from Iced Earth writing - if that's so then why we don;t give a shit after he/she being killed? I mean Lacroix is saying that we should do something for him in Santa Monica, and we should obey the vampiric law and we are totally submissive.

Maybe I've missed something...

I thought it was fairly obvious it was a one-nighter, not a relationship.

Second, as I mentioned earlier, the whole story stinks.

(1) You're eight-generation (you can tell by the blood points). That means your sire is seventh-gen. That is very powerful: most seventh-generationers would've been 500-600 years old by the 2000's. This is not someone some princeling can just nab and execute; it's much more likely to be someone who's behind the curtains, pulling strings.

(2) You're fucking in the opening scene. This isn't foreplay, there are ripped-open condom packages on the floor. Vampires don't do that (except Jeanette, but she's... Jeanette).

(3) The mysterious emails reveal the whole thing as a chess game, planned from the first move.

(... and more)

It can't have happened like it appears. I think the most plausible story is that your 'sire' is a plant. Someone -- Caine/the taxi driver -- engineered it. Who your real sire is, we will never know; if the taxi driver really is Caine, it could easily have been him -- he's Caine, which means he can do pretty much anything, including skipping over seven generations when siring a childe and giving him any bloodline he chooses; he is the father of them all, after all. Or he could easily have gotten some other sevent-generation Elder to do it on his behalf. The main thing is that the plot is kicked into motion; all the players in LA think you're a helpless, late-generation neonate, when in reality your blood is as strong as any of theirs, perhaps stronger.

If there is someone with 7th generation no one knows about it (Lacroix or anyone are not giving a shit about killing the most powerfull vampire ever in the opening scene) why to create one with 8th gen and not use the one with 7th?

 

[Prime Junta]

If there is someone with 7th generation no one knows about it (Lacroix or anyone are not giving a shit about killing the most powerfull vampire ever in the opening scene) why to create one with 8th gen and not use the one with 7th?

Because everyone had to believe he's a harmless, naive neonate. A lot harder to pull that off if you're 7th gen. (I know it's been done, but still.)

Or, hey, that's another possible explanation: perhaps you are actually a 500-year-old 8th-gen. You'd be mind-wiped to make it more plausible. The whole embrace thing is a setup and the 'sire,' isn't.

 

[Jaesun]

Because your actual original Sire manipulated the very lower generation Vampire to appear to Sire you, and take the fall....

 

[Krivol]

Because your actual original Sire manipulated the very lower generation Vampire to appear to Sire you, and take the fall....

Ok, that sounds legit .

 

[Jaesun]

And he may have actually intentionally diluted your blood, so at first, you don't seem much a threat to Lacroix. However, it is when Lacroix directly tries to manipulate you (later on) and fails, he then knows something is very wrong....

 

[Zero Credibility]

Why do I get a feeling that we here have put a lot more thought on the whole thing than Troika ever has?

 

[Krivol]

Because we have, and that's why this game is so great - there are so many teases and understatements that we can still look for new interpretations.

Janette/Therese plot is still awesome, even after few replays.

 

[Gay-Lussac]

Why do I get a feeling that we here have put a lot more thought on the whole thing than Troika ever has?

It's weird because the PC rapid power progression could just be chalked down to videogame convention, but Troika seemed to have wanted to address it on at least some level with Andrei's comment's about how strong your blood is.

And the writers certainly seemed to know the source material well enough that they'd come up with a reasonable in-universe explanation.

 

[ghostdog]

And he may have actually intentionally diluted your blood, so at first, you don't seem much a threat to Lacroix. However, it is when Lacroix directly tries to manipulate you (later on) and fails, he then knows something is very wrong....

I really like the part with the diluted blood. How would it work though... maybe he made you drink some of his blood and then added some lowlife vampire's blood on top (from the stooge who took the fall), so at first yous don't seem very powerful, but as time passes the strong blood wins over the weak blood and you start to kick ass.
But then how was he sure you'd be spared, if it wasn't for Nines you'd probably be dead. So maybe Nines is you real sire... but it doesn't feel like something Nines would do. But maybe Jack is your sire and he coerced Nines into helping you... hmm this sounds better...
Well, my favorite candidate for a sire is of course the Taxi Driver, who it seems is in cahoots with Jack and is mysteriously vague and supposedly pretty powerful. And maybe after you win the game, you get your own taxi and roam the streets like a boss.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

I wonder if those are indeed all the 'unused levels' or just the ones Wesp has found and remade.

Wouldn't surprise me if the main (or only) source of the article is Wesp. He's the only one who's been consistently digging through game files and was even interested in restoring game's lost features, other modders are/were mostly about adding their own stuff (with terrible results of course aside from a rare exception or two) and developers/people involved in the game have moved on years ago.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

You're eight-generation (you can tell by the blood points). That means your sire is seventh-gen. That is very powerful: most seventh-generationers would've been 500-600 years old by the 2000's. This is not someone some princeling can just nab and execute; it's much more likely to be someone who's behind the curtains, pulling strings.

Problem is, that would make LaCroix and even Jeanette/Therese probably 7th generation (8th at most) themselves (given that Prince dominates you easily at first and you fail to Dominate Jeanette/Therese as a Ventrue) when it's obvious they're not that powerful or that old, prince is barely over 200 years old and Jeanette/Therese' father on the painting looks like he's from the 20th century atleast (and they also talk about Therese shooting him which means firearms obviously). There are just a lot of inconsistencies but atleast it isn't handwaived completely as just being a gaming convention (stomping goblins and doing errands for peasasnts eventually make me powerful enough to take on liches and dragons because game).

 

[Prime Junta]

I'd put all of the vamps we meet (except Taxi Driver and just possibly Strauss who miiiight be 8th-gen, certainly not 7th or older given his position in the Pyramid) at 9th gen or below. 8th-gen are supposed to usually date from the 14th century or so, and 7th-gen are just about one step down from methuselahs -- they're the oldest vampires still (mostly) active, with power far greater than anyone we meet in Bloodlines (again, other than possibly Taxi Driver).

I think Jack is the only one where the generation is known, and he's 10th-gen... and pretty senior among the Anarchs.

I.e., either you're a much younger-gen vampire with your generation lowered through some unknown means (thaumaturgy? I don't think you can diablerise someone without knowing), or you're a genuine 8th-gen, in which case your ostensible sire can't be your real one, as s/he would certainly have been way too powerful (not to mention cunning) to be nabbed and executed by LaCroix. (Also, in the unlikely event that such a one had fallen under LaCroix's power, he would certainly have diablerised him. He's wiling to risk that with an antediluvian, which is just incredibly foolhardy and will most likely result in the elder blood overcoming his and the antediluvian getting a second lease at unlife in his body.)

I can't see any other options which would fit the lore.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

It clashes with the way Dominate works, if you're so low gen you'd be dominating vampire NPCs left and right as a Ventrue right off the bat and Prince wouldn't be able to use the same trick to force you to do errands for him.

Maybe Troika just weren't so anal about the relation between blood pool and generation and thought that fewer blood points would be too restricting for the player in the actual gameplay. It could be you're 10th or 11th gen regardless, Caine lowers it at some points and gives you a boost in power, you kick everyone's ass.

 

[Prime Junta]

It clashes with the way Dominate works, if you're so low gen you'd be dominating vampire NPCs left and right as a Ventrue right off the bat and Prince wouldn't be able to use the same trick to force you to do errands for him.

Maybe Troika just weren't so anal about the relation between blood pool and generation and thought that fewer blood points would be too restricting for the player in the actual gameplay. It could be you're 10th or 11th gen regardless, Caine lowers it at some points and gives you a boost in power, you kick everyone's ass.

Yeah, it does. Either your stronger blood must've been suppressed somehow in the early game, or your weaker blood must've been strengthened.

If the taxi driver is Caine, either one is trivial of course. He willed, and it was so. I suppose thaumaturgy could do it too; I'd suspect it'd be easier to temporarily suppress it, raising your apparent generation, than gradually lower it. The fact that your blood points stay the same all through the game (and match 8th-gen) would favour the suppression hypothesis methinks...

Edit: I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THAT IT'S A MISTAKE