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Bloodlines is an ambitious game, for several reasons.
First, it's an action/RPG in which quests often have multiple solutions, allowing players to choose between combat, stealth and diplomacy.
Second, it features an original setting, a seedy Los Angeles of the World of Darkness tabletop games, where vampires and other supernatural creatures hide among humans. I love Tolkien as much as the next ninth-level ranger, but it's always refreshing to see a RPG which isn't about orcs and elves in a medieval-like world.
Third, the player can choose between one of seven different clans, and the choice is not just cosmetic: if you pick an aristocratic Ventrue focused on diplomacy or a seductive Toreador, you'll be playing a completely different game from the player who chooses a monstrous Nosferatu, always lurking in the shadows. To say nothing of the hilariously insane Malkavians.
There is an abundance of great ideas: multiple endings, some of which only available if you made specific choices earlier the game; the necessity to balance the need between feeding with blood and not losing your humanity, while also keeping a low profile (the "Masquerade"); apparently minor choices developing into neat subplots.
What further elevates the game is the writing: wonderfully charismatic characters, with superb voice acting and expressive facial animations, and a creepy story featuring plenty of horror and black humour.
Flaws? Well, even after loads of official and unofficial patches (some remarkable work by fans), the game is still somewhat buggy (although now bugs are not game-breaking anymore). Also, the last act drops the RPG elements and focuses almost exclusively on fights, penalizing non combat-oriented characters - a cop-out for a game which, for most of its course, is so flexible.
There are also a few puzzling bits - a sewer section so drab and unimaginative compared to what precedes and follows it, you wonder what the developers were thinking - but overall this is a must-play classic.
First, it's an action/RPG in which quests often have multiple solutions, allowing players to choose between combat, stealth and diplomacy.
Second, it features an original setting, a seedy Los Angeles of the World of Darkness tabletop games, where vampires and other supernatural creatures hide among humans. I love Tolkien as much as the next ninth-level ranger, but it's always refreshing to see a RPG which isn't about orcs and elves in a medieval-like world.
Third, the player can choose between one of seven different clans, and the choice is not just cosmetic: if you pick an aristocratic Ventrue focused on diplomacy or a seductive Toreador, you'll be playing a completely different game from the player who chooses a monstrous Nosferatu, always lurking in the shadows. To say nothing of the hilariously insane Malkavians.
There is an abundance of great ideas: multiple endings, some of which only available if you made specific choices earlier the game; the necessity to balance the need between feeding with blood and not losing your humanity, while also keeping a low profile (the "Masquerade"); apparently minor choices developing into neat subplots.
What further elevates the game is the writing: wonderfully charismatic characters, with superb voice acting and expressive facial animations, and a creepy story featuring plenty of horror and black humour.
Flaws? Well, even after loads of official and unofficial patches (some remarkable work by fans), the game is still somewhat buggy (although now bugs are not game-breaking anymore). Also, the last act drops the RPG elements and focuses almost exclusively on fights, penalizing non combat-oriented characters - a cop-out for a game which, for most of its course, is so flexible.
There are also a few puzzling bits - a sewer section so drab and unimaginative compared to what precedes and follows it, you wonder what the developers were thinking - but overall this is a must-play classic.
9/10
