Since it released in 2004, the first Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines has amassed a cult following. Naturally, that means fans have been eagerly awaiting the sequel ever since it was announced in 2019. Now, with a fitting October release date, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 is finally making its debut. This sequel arrives 24 years after its predecessor and brings in a new developer, The Chinese Room. In many ways, Bloodlines 2 will feel familiar to fans of the first game, but it also makes some big departures that ensure it’s a whole new way to experience the world of Vampire: The Masquerade.
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After playing a preview earlier this year, I was eager to jump back in and continue Phyre’s story. Though the combat was a struggle, I came away from that first experience with a thirst to see what else this version of Seattle had to offer. I did have a ton of fun with Bloodlines 2, but I couldn’t help but feel I was playing a game from the PS2 era. While that might be a nostalgic treat, some mechanics and choices felt like Bloodlines 2 wanted to be a sequel that followed right after Bloodlines, leaving the changes to games and gaming technology behind.
Rating: 3 out of 5
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Engaging story that makes you want to keep playing | Combat is clunky and difficult to master, even on Easy Mode |
| Interesting NPCs with compelling backstories and dialogue | Several core mechanics and gameplay elements feel dated |
| Elder vampire powers are just plain fun | Some performance issues with stuttering and minor glitches |
Bloodlines 2 Tells a Complex and Engaging Story You Won’t See Coming
As someone who spends a lot of time consuming stories in games, books, and movies, I admit I can be a bit hard to impress. Even well-crafted plot twists often hate to see me coming, because I’ve got a knack for predicting them. But with Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, The Chinese Room and Paradox Interactive kept me guessing. At its heart, Bloodlines 2 is a mystery, complete with some fun references to classic noir through the Malkavian character, Fabien. And that mystery is well-crafted and engaging, making you want to keep digging until you uncover what’s going on.
Bloodlines 2 uses a clever framework to weave its story. Phyre is an Elder Vampire who has just awoken from a long slumber, but when they wake, they aren’t alone. Somehow, Seattle’s resident fanged detective, Fabien, finds himself inside the Nomad’s head. In this way, we get to explore present-day Seattle by night, and weave through Fabien’s memories to uncover tales of the past while Phyre slumbers in the daylight hours.
This storytelling device works well, for the most part, by letting us piece together the mystery from two directions. The clues are laid out slowly, and it’s compelling to try and piece them together before Fabien and Phyre do. It also means we get to play as two vampires with very different abilities. Fabien is Malkavian and focuses on mental manipulation, while Phyre is an Elder of your chosen Clan. At times, the difference can be jarring, especially as Fabien can’t do basic things like jump even over small obstacles compared to the building-scaling powers of Phyre. But storytelling-wise, moving between these two perspectives and timelines is a slam dunk.
If there is one thing that Bloodlines 2 absolutely gets right, it’s the storytelling. The NPCs are engaging and interesting, and their dialogue helps build out the complexities and nuance of the Kindred society in Seattle. Though I enjoyed flying around rooftops and taking off heads with my vampiric strength, the narrative is ultimately what I kept wanting to sink my teeth into.
That said, navigating the game itself to unpack that story feels like something right out of the PS2 era. The NPC dialogue menus took me back to my earlier gaming days, as did the strangely empty streets of Seattle. You can hear cars, but you never see them. And as you race through the streets, there’s not too much you can actually interact with. Most objects are static, unless they’re clearly marked for interaction, and the people that populate many key locations barely move and never speak. I’ve gotten used to seeing cars actually moving on the streets and more random interactions with the world around me in modern games, so this version of Seattle did feel a bit lifeless at times.
While the main story quests delivered, I wanted more from the side quests. You get a few nightly side quests to do for various contacts in the city, but they’re pretty much a trio of copy/paste tasks with a slightly different story each time. Doing them rewards you by bettering your relationship with the clans, and you get to traverse the city with Phyre’s full power, but I wish there was a bit more variety in these quests compared to the depth of the overall story.
The Combat in Bloodlines 2 Is Poorly Balanced and Hard to Master
When I review a game, I typically keep the difficulty set to the default/normal range to get a good idea of how things are balanced. With Bloodlines 2, this difficulty curve still feels incredibly steep in early game. Phyre is an Elder Vampire, but their long slumber means they’ve lost many of their powers. It’s up to you to reawaken them as you play, but the game’s early combat seems to largely forget that fact.
You are confronted with a ton of enemies right away, and tackling those hordes of angry Anarchs isn’t easy to get a grip on. The combat isn’t very intuitive, and just punching and kicking is a sure way to die every time, as the group loves to gang up on you. In theory, using abilities like telekinesis can help you leverage stealth to your advantage, but many of the scenarios you’re thrown into don’t make that an easy task. I eventually toggled down to Easy just to try and get through the story more efficiently, but even then, certain groups of enemies stumped me until I found some small detail that would help me get to victory.
The game’s combat is certainly fast-paced, and that should feel good in an action RPG. But when you’re getting your butt kicked because combat doesn’t feel balanced, it’s a bit more of a frustration. Things do even out as you get further on and unlock more of your abilities, but because there’s so much combat early on, it can feel punishing before the game even really gets its hooks in you.
Add in the fact that Bloodlines 2 opts for a dated Checkpoint save mechanic, rather than letting you quicksave at key points, and this is downright infuriating at times. I can’t count the number of times I crawled through the same air conditioning duct and heard the same NPC dialogue when I was stuck trying to puzzle out a difficult fight. If only I could have saved at the end of that duct rather than being forced to climb through every time, the experience would’ve been so much smoother.
By leaning into dodging and tricks like pulling enemies off rooftops to lessen their numbers, I eventually got okay at combat. I even enjoyed it, as the kill cutscenes are the kind of vampiric gore you expect from a horror RPG. But I wouldn’t say I ever quite managed to master it, even on Easy mode. And if Easy isn’t Easy, that’s a balance issue.
I will note there is one difficulty tier below easy, which is designed for people who really just want to dig into the story. So if you’re really struggling, that option is available to you to smooth things over even more. But ultimately, Bloodlines 2 combat isn’t quite what I hoped.
Despite Its Flaws, This Is a Vampire Game Worth Playing
In many ways, Bloodlines 2 feels like a bit too much of a spiritual successor to Bloodlines. Playing it, I got the sense it felt like the kind of follow-up the game might have gotten in the years right after its 2004 release. If you are looking for a modern vampire RPG, this doesn’t quite hit that mark. Instead, it leans into some of the positives and negatives of RPGs from the early aughts. At times, that’s a fun bit of nostalgia, but at others, it holds the game back from its full potential.
For instance, the romance and relationship mechanics rely on a few straightforward menu choices, with clearly marked “flirt” options for those characters you can romance. You do get to puzzle out the right way to please different members of the court, but it’s not always clear how much that ultimately influences what happens next. Similarly, the game’s romances are limited to a quick fade to black rather than a real emotional story like you might get from a Baldur’s Gate 3 companion’s love story.
Because of some of its dated mechanics and technical issues, the $59.99 price tag does feel like a bit of a tough ask. I want a modern-feeling game for that modern price point of a $60 RPG, and I just didn’t quite get that from Bloodlines 2. Though it suffers from far fewer bugs than Bloodlines, opening doors or moving too quickly through the streets can cause the game to stutter or even freeze up for a moment. I only had two actual crashes and two bugs that forced me to restart the game, but I still wish it ran just a bit better, especially on a console like the PS5.
For all the old school mechanics and minor gripes, I ultimately really enjoyed playing Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines 2. Once I got the hang of gliding across rooftops, scurrying up fire escapes, and kicking some vampire butt, Bloodlines 2 gave me that immersive vampire roleplay feeling that led me to pick up the Vampire: The Masquerade TTRPG in the first place. It may not quite live up to what I wanted it to be, but it still feels like a vampire game worth playing if you’ve been craving a spooky, blood-soaked RPG this October.
Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 releases on October 21st for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S. A PS5 code was provided by the publisher for the purposes of this review.
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