14 DAY TRIAL // Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 is probably the most anticipated game of 2020 if we don't count CD Projekt Red's Cyberpunk 2077. Unfortunately, that right there is one of the game's biggest problem. Vampire: The Masquerade cult saga has a huge pool of fans who hope the upcoming game will, at least, rise to the same level of goodness as the predecessors.
Another problem for the game developed by Hardsuit Labs and published by Paradox Interactive is the release date. Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 is scheduled for release in March 2020 for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, just one month ahead of Cyberpunk 2077.
To make things even worse, it looks like the combat mechanics are far from what you would expect from a game where you play as a vampire.
An extended 28-minute Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 gameplay demo from Gamescom 2019 was recently provided by the developer to the media. Although the demo contains less than 10 minutes of action, it's enough to give us an idea of how the game feels.
Even though this is a pre-alpha demo, the combat is clunky and slow considering you're playing a vampire. The animations are stiff and weird, not even deemed worthy for a pre-alpha build. If not for the title, we wouldn't even know we're playing a vampire game.
The good news is there's still time to polish many of the animations, but with six months before launch, we doubt a more important aspect of the game will be improved. Even if this is a pre-alpha build, probably the same that was presented at E3 2019 in June, what we're seeing in this demo is most likely what we'll get in the final build.
On the bright side, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 shapes up to be a long game. If the previous game in the series took about 30 hours to complete, the upcoming title should take around the same time to go through the end.
“At the beginning, we expect that quite a few people will not be playing this only once, but instead play it in one configuration and then choose different backgrounds, a different plan, and go right back in. For one playthrough, right now we’re assuming about a 30-hour playthrough on the first go. That’s for somebody who isn’t an obsessive completionist, but who likes to have seen the world,” product manager Florian Schwarzer tells PCGamesN in an interview at Gamescom.
Although the original Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines was far from being perfect, the sequel will compete with much better games, so the expectations are much higher. We clearly want Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 to succeed, and it probably will, but we're hoping for something less generic than what we're shown in the demo.