Swipe left for the new Vampire game
Fans of the World of Darkness universe finally have a reason to celebrate. It’s been over a decade since we’ve had a Vampire: The Masquerade videogame. We have a new one now. It’s Vampire: Prelude from Asmodee Digital. Ever since Paradox acquired White Wolf Publishing and the rights to World of Darkness in 2015, people nostalgic for eyeliner, all-black outfits, and dime store fangs have been ravenous for whatever the company was going to do with the license. Vampire: Prelude is an Apple iOS and Google Play text game written by Sarah Horrocks with art by Zak Smith. The game puts players in the role of a newly born (risen?) vampire that has to work through the change via phone messaging. Apparently, there’s nothing scarier than texting on the morning after.
If you’re not into being undead, but still want a touch of Darkness, the similar Mage the Ascension: Refuge, also by Asmodee Digital is available for Apple iOS and Google Play.
PC players can dip into both games with one purchase on Steam. The last videogame based on the Vampire: The Masquerade license was 2004’s Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines from Troika Games.
He’s a good artist, and not too shabby as a writer, and also by all accounts one of the most toxic personalities in the roleplaying end of the internet.
Toxic is the wrong word. He is confrontational, obnoxious and a tad paranoid but not toxic. There are people that try to paint him as such, but he isn`t. I was right there when most of the shit happened. It is so bad that White Wolf had to say something about it. His DnD works Vornheim, Red & Pleasant Land and Maze of the Blue Medusa is also absolutely stellar. That he is connected to WW and the new Vampire RPG from the looks of it has me excited for a new Vampire PnP, something I never though I would say any time soon.
Crazy, I’ve been watching lets plays of Vampire M just the last week and been actually watching to blushingly embarrassing YouTube channels regard WoD lore.
He did not do that. As is the opinion of the White Wolf guys as well apparently.He is a confrontational asshole but he never organized group harassment of people. There was one incident I can recall with a “have at them” comment on twitter I think when someone posted an untruth about him and his girlfriend while she was hospitalized and he was tired and stressed out and could not deal with it personally. But even then he said “Tweet him, ask question, provide links” or some such. He can’t ever let anything stand and asked his peeps to help disprove the false claims… But he did call people out to stop harassment later on. There is a toxic element that follows Zak and takes it upon themselves to harass others, But he cant really do more then tell them to stop that shit. I totally understand when he posts a link with "Destroy" as the only comment that people may take that "to mean attack that person". From the context of the times and the interactions I had with him back then it is clear though that he means" Destroy the false claims" not "destroy the person". He is the most inclusive person I know when it comes to RPGs and he gets a bad rep for being a misogynist, homophobic whatever monster. I sadly cant get back to the posts where he called out the harassers because he has me blocked on soc media for a disagreement we had. Like I said, not really a nice guy. But not a monster as he is portrayed either.
I’ve been told he has and that it’s why a creator who did a couple of games I like and was working on fulfilling another Kickstarter I had pledged to withdrew from the public scene. A lot of that stuff tends to happen in private contexts so it’s hard to tell what the truth might be. I certainly don’t claim to know for sure, but I think it’s worth flagging the possibility and people can make up their own minds about whether they want to support him. He certainly is talented, so I’m torn myself.
I did read White Wolf’s statement on the matter and it sounds like they looked at a couple of forum threads and decided they were done, so that doesn’t do much to assuage my concerns, personally.
I think that is indeed a prudent thing to do, investigate and make your own decisions, Just don`t stop at the first google hit you get. It is a total clusterfuck. As I said I was in the middle of those “wars” when they initially happened and spent far too much time on twitter and G+ fighting. Hence I believe I may know who you are referring to, but am not sure. Was that Hill? I was there for that and Hills claims where a lie. I know there is also another developer that claims Zak is responsible for them disappearing from the internet but I forgot the name as I was not that involved with that situation. Heh, this is sounding like a P+R thread. Sorry.
No idea who Hill is but it’s the internet and pseudonyms are a thing so for all I know maybe. And they, not being on the internet anymore, haven’t said anything on the subject. Initially all I’d heard was that they got harassed out of the industry, then later someone asked about why Zak S was so disliked and he came up in connection with said harassment.
But I will say that not telling his followers to “Destroy”, especially sans context, would probably be a good step towards not having them go harass someone en masse, whether or not that was the intention. It’s not like asking all your friends to gang up on someone in an online argument is good form to begin with. And if people do go further than he wants them to, calling them out on it when it happens and disowning them if they keep it up would also be good steps. It can be hard, I know, but just saying “please don’t do this” doesn’t carry much weight if you never actually back that request up.
The Vampire game is relentlessly millennial, but i suppose updating the setting for a new generation is necessary, since the whole setting is essentially twenty something vampires with a youthful narrow worldview hanging out around parties and clubs at 2am getting pulled into Vampire Drama every night. The beginning and ending of the game are also broken both; the wrong choice either breaks the game (the former) or keeps you from completing the game (the latter). It’s also entirely linear and the “wrong” choice forces a restart of the scene.
The Mage game was better. I feel better written and better executed, and i liked the format, art style and text blurring effects (or “liked” in the sense that i appreciated the way it made the text uncomfortable to read without actually being so uncomfortable to read you couldn’t read it). It also has more paths and more endings (and is a little LiS-y with the main character, #thumbsup from a fanboy), and has a broader world view of stuff going on than Mage Drama (though, never fear, there is Mage Drama). The Vampire game did have better art though, very urban angsty blurry street artsy stuff. There wasn’t much art at all in the Mage game; but i still preferred it. Probably because it was written by Karen Tidbeck and i like her stuff.
I was excited about this until I saw the screencaps and read that it was built around the idea of texting. I can’t conceive of a more tedious approach to gaming. Even at mobile-game prices, these are a pretty easy pass for me.
I’ve been playing the Vampire one and it’s pretty terrible - and this is coming from someone who played a lot of Vampire back in the day. The writing is just strange at times, and I’m not a fan of the artwork. The Mage one looks better so I’ll try that out.
Also ran into a bug in the Vampire one where no matter what choice I made ended in death. Ended up having to redo a chapter.
It’s super millennial. Self absorbed, self confident, and uninterested in “the older people” who “think they know more than us”. I mean, pretty deliberately both saying this outright and by the style. (Though, to be fair, that’s also a youth thing).
The basic flow of the game is something like “Just ripped some guy’s head off cause need to do this” <Well, i’m at a party with Ice Sculptures> “Get out”. What the game gets wrong imo is that it pretty much glosses over the horribleness of being a vampire. And also waiting for the texts to come through, though i guess that’s a stylistic choice. Or maybe being a millennial? Maybe millennials are cultural vampires?
Well, in fairness, the original V:tM had this, too. The players were basically the youth who felt like they were being shat upon by their elders. Sounds like it’s pretty true to the source material, just moved up a bit in time.
