Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines

• 1. Introduction

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  Vampire: The Masquerade , Bloodlines sold 72,000 copies in its initial release and earned roughly 3.4 million dollars. That is the entire commercial story of a 2004 action role-playing game from Troika Games, published by Activision for Microsoft Windows. Its rival that season, Half-Life 2, would reach 6.5 million copies by 2008.

  Troika never recovered. The studio closed in early 2005 with no other project secured. Yet critics now speak of Bloodlines as a cult classic, and some call it a flawed masterpiece.

  How does a game that sells so little earn that kind of devotion? What did the player actually do in a Los Angeles full of hidden vampires? And what went wrong behind the scenes while a small team tried to build something far larger than its budget allowed?

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• 2. Clans and Costs

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  Seven clans wait on the character creation screen: the Brujah, Toreador, Malkavian, Ventrue, Nosferatu, Tremere and Gangrel. Each comes with its own temperament and its own set of three vampiric powers called Disciplines. No two clans share the same trio, though individual powers overlap. Players can also skip the menus and answer questions, which build a character for them.

  The choice changes how the world answers back. The Toreador are attractive and gain bonuses for seduction and persuasion, but they are physically weak. The Nosferatu are monstrously deformed and must creep through shadows or sewers to avoid alarming humans. In exchange they gain intelligence and computer skill, which opens up more information. The Malkavians are insane, and their dialogue options show it.

  Points are spent across three areas: Attributes, Abilities and Disciplines. Attributes split into physical, social and mental traits. Abilities cover talents such as dodging, skills such as firearms, and knowledge such as investigation. Each ability can climb from zero to five. There is never enough experience to max them all, so the player must specialize or balance. Experience comes from finishing quests, finding items and unlocking secret paths, not from killing enemies.

  Blood is the currency of vampire powers. Every Discipline drains it. The player refills it by feeding on rats, visiting blood banks, or biting humans, whether by attack or by seduction. Drinking from an innocent for too long kills them, and that costs humanity points. A low humanity score makes dialogue more aggressive. When blood runs low, it also raises the chance of a frenzy and a killing spree.

  The second meter is the masquerade, the vampires' code of secrecy. Using powers in front of witnesses loses masquerade points. Violate it five times and vampire hunters arrive and the game is lost. Losing all humanity also ends the game, with the vampire reduced to a mindless beast.

  Combat adds a split in perspective. Shooting is first-person, while melee is third-person. Weapons range from katanas and sledgehammers to crossbows and flamethrowers. Sneak up on an enemy and the player triggers an instant kill, with an animation unique to each weapon. Some places, called Elysium, forbid both weapons and Disciplines. And a ghoul named Heather can be recruited as a servant who supplies blood, gifts and money.

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• 3. The Sarcophagus

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  Four districts of early 21st-century Los Angeles hold the game: Santa Monica, Hollywood, downtown, and Chinatown. In this version of the world, vampires, werewolves and demons quietly shape human history. The vampires obey a code of secrecy and restraint, and their government is the Camarilla. Opposing it are the Sabbat, who revel in the beast within, and the Anarch Movement, idealists who want power shared among all vampires. Chinatown belongs to the Kuei-Jin, Asian vampires led by Ming-Xiao, who need no blood and think themselves superior.

  The hero has no name. An ordinary human is killed and revived as a fledgling, and the unauthorized maker of that fledgling is brought before the Camarilla. Prince Sebastian LaCroix, voiced by Andy Milder, orders the sire executed. The anarch Nines Rodriguez intervenes to save the fledgling, who then goes to work for the prince.

  The errands lead toward a relic: an Ankaran sarcophagus said to hold an Antediluvian, one of the oldest and most powerful vampires. Its awakening would herald Gehenna, the vampire apocalypse. Aboard a docked ship, the Elizabeth Dane, the fledgling finds the coffin appears to have been opened from the inside.

  Then the sarcophagus keeps vanishing. The Malkavian chief Alistair Grout is found dead in his mansion, and suspicion falls on Nines. The Nosferatu chief Gary points to the Giovanni clan as thieves. The anarch Smiling Jack, voiced by John DiMaggio, suggests LaCroix wants the sarcophagus so he can drink the ancient blood inside.

  Later, Ming-Xiao reveals she holds the key. She says LaCroix killed Grout to silence his insight, and that she disguised herself as Nines to frame him. Soon the fledgling is hunted by the prince, and a werewolf attacks in Griffith Park.

  The finale branches by loyalty. Siding with LaCroix means he opens the sarcophagus, and hidden explosives kill both him and the fledgling. Siding with Ming-Xiao ends with the fledgling chained to the coffin and sunk in the ocean. Supporting the Camarilla instead puts Maximillian Strauss of the Tremere in LaCroix's place. The anarch path, or no allegiance, leaves LaCroix maimed and later killed by the coffin. Whenever the lid is opened, Jack watches from a distance, and the taxi driver who ferries the player around the city says, "The blood of Caine controls our fate... Farewell, vampire."

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• 4. Mitsoda's Pen

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  Brian Mitsoda joined Troika less than a year after development began, and by then much of the plot already stood. The prince, the restless anarchs, parts of the Gehenna storyline, and Jack and the sarcophagus subplot all predated him. He became the primary writer for many characters, quests, dialogue and side material such as in-game emails. No limits on language or content were placed on his script, and he could rewrite any character he judged weak.

  Each designer owned a section of the game and worked with a small team. That allowed quick decisions and kept the plot consistent from hub to hub. The story drew on White Wolf's Time of Judgment novels about a vampire apocalypse. White Wolf accepted it as canon, treating the game as a prequel to those novels, and Jack came over from the tabletop game.

  Mitsoda had firm views on how a quest giver should behave. He said, "You need a character to pose a problem or give out a quest or be a barrier of some kind." He disliked characters who announce what they need and what they will pay, because that makes them an automated quest kiosk. His people greet strangers with "who the hell are you?", or already expect the visitor, or simply do not care.

  One-scene characters got a single distinctive trait, so they would not feel disposable. Major characters had to react to what the player had done. To write each, Mitsoda asked who they were, why they were there, what they thought of the player and what they wanted from the player.

  The Malkavian script is the oddest case. Fellow writer Chad Moore suggested that a Malkavian player should have dialogue distinct from the other six clans. Mitsoda wrote it last, with time running out. Overwork and lack of sleep left him in what he considered an unhealthy state of mind, ideal for writing insane dialogue. He wanted the madness to unsettle rather than to be comic.

  One simplification shaped the cast. The story takes place during the Camarilla's takeover of Los Angeles, so the team allowed only clans based in LA as player choices.

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• 5. Tabletop to Screen

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  Fansite research by Troika co-founder Jason Anderson delivered a surprise: players of the tabletop game cared most about character interaction and vampire society, not statistics and powers. Troika still tried to stay faithful to the pen-and-paper rules. But rules built for several players around a table fit poorly into a single-player computer game.

  Some losses were unavoidable. Of 30 tabletop abilities, only 15 reached the final design, since traits such as knowledge of law made little sense on screen. Feats had a related problem. Common ones worked with a random chance of success, but rare ones seemed to fail too often, so difficulty replaced randomness. Tabletop falling damage is random. Here it depends on the distance fallen.

  Disciplines were the largest puzzle. On paper, one power might need a little blood and a long time, while another cost nothing and worked at will. Upgrades added requirements judged too confusing for a computer game. Troika normalized the costs, so a first-level power takes one blood point and a second-level power takes two. Balancing the clans meant letting the aristocratic Ventrue feed on lower-class humans, though they would gain less blood. An optional character biography with positive and negative traits was removed late, because Activision felt there was too little testing time.

  Combat was a different kind of trouble. The team's earlier work had been turn-based. Following the tabletop gun rules too closely, where a shot is a contest between skill and defense, made firearms feel broken, since bullets did not land where the player aimed. Melee had to handle many weapons and animations, and clashes between melee and ranged fighters.

  First-person view was chosen for immersion, so the player could face characters and watch their reactions. Following a single character created the isolation of a vampire who trusts no one. Level design started from a checklist of Disciplines, stealth and feats. Every area had to work for a shooter with enough ammunition, a Discipline user with enough blood, and a melee fighter who could reach enemies alive. Stealth routes were planned first, then direct, combat and dialogue paths.

  Director Leonard Boyarsky explained why Troika used an existing property. An original one lacks constraints, but it is untested and might be rejected, while an existing one is proven. One idea never made it: playable Activision arcade games, including Pitfall!, in the amusement arcade area, dropped for lack of time.

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• 6. Source and Deadlines

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  In November 2001, a studio of thirty-two people began work on a first-person role-playing game, convinced the genre had gone stale. Troika took the idea to Activision. Activision suggested the Vampire: The Masquerade license, which had been used a year earlier in Nihilistic Software's Vampire: The Masquerade , Redemption. Troika researched White Wolf's rules and storylines instead of making a direct sequel to that game.

  The engine choice was a gamble. Valve employee Scott Lynch approached Troika about the Source engine, still under construction for Half-Life 2, and Troika became the first outside team to use it. Boyarsky valued its facial animation and lip-sync system, since players would speak to characters face to face. Its "faceposer" tool let the team customize expressions and gestures, and every non-player character needed a voiceover. The physics system also allowed monsters to hurl corpses and dying characters to crumble realistically.

  Unfinished tools had a price. Troika had only one source of technical support and had to write code to compensate. The team built its own lighting for moody nights, a particle system for Discipline effects, and a cloth system for clothing. Source also lacked the artificial intelligence code it later gained, and Troika's own code fit it poorly.

  In October 2003, hackers stole the source code for Half-Life 2 from Valve. New security work delayed both games. Until May 2004, Troika and Activision promised multiplayer, including a team of vampires against a team of hunters. Source's multiplayer code was in its infancy, so that idea was abandoned.

  Meanwhile, Activision left the team without a producer for over a year before assigning David Mullich. He found the design incomplete and levels created and abandoned. The scope was enormous. Typical shooters of the time had 10 to 20 animated character models, while Bloodlines had over 150 characters and 3,000 unique animations. Content was seldom cut, other parts were refined endlessly, and everything needed approval from both White Wolf and Activision.

  Activision eventually gave the team an ultimatum: finish by the 15th of September 2004. It had earlier advanced money so Troika could finish work on The Temple of Elemental Evil for Atari and then focus fully on Bloodlines. Troika delivered a build on that date, and it got three weeks of testing. A contract with Valve barred release before Half-Life 2, so Troika used the wait to seek more funding. The extra money could not pay everyone, and some staff worked unpaid. Another three weeks of testing produced the release code.

  Anderson blamed Activision for taking the game before it was tested and polished. Boyarsky defended Activision for backing a project that overran its budget and schedule. Anderson estimated the team worked overtime for all but two months of nearly four years.

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• 7. Release and Closure

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  On the 16th of November 2004, Bloodlines appeared alongside Half-Life 2, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, Halo 2 and several other titles. The date had moved more than once. In February 2004 it was set for spring 2005, partly to dodge both Half-Life 2 and the Christmas rush, before Activision pulled it forward. The Valve contract also kept Bloodlines from being shown to the public until after Half-Life 2 was announced.

  Promotion leaned on Jeanette. Activision hired the model Erin Layne to portray her, and Layne spent a day with Bloodlines artist Tim Bradstreet posing for the images used on posters and clothing.

  Sound mattered too. Rik Schaffer composed and produced the original score. Troika licensed songs from artists including Lacuna Coil, Tiamat and Genitorturers, while posters for real bands decorated the club walls. Al Jourgensen and Ministry wrote and performed a title song, "Bloodlines", for the game. Activision chose the licensed tracks without Troika's input. The menu screen used Massive Attack's "Angel" as a placeholder. When Troika could not secure the rights, Schaffer was asked to create something similar.

  The studio's earlier games had done better. Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura moved 234,000 units for 8.8 million dollars, and The Temple of Elemental Evil sold 128,000 units for 5.2 million dollars. Layoffs began quickly. A first wave of staff left in November 2004 and the rest in December, except the three founders: Anderson, Boyarsky and Tim Cain. Some people worked without pay to fix the game.

  By February 2005, Boyarsky confirmed that no patch was in the works, since most of the staff had gone. The company closed that month with no other deals. Years later, Anderson said technical problems had damaged the perception of Troika's games and made new projects harder to win.

  The founders kept turning the question over. In 2013, Mitsoda said the game came out at "the worst possible time - most people didn't even know we were out." In 2017, Boyarsky said that another three to six months might have fixed many technical flaws. He added, "I feel the second half of the game isn't as good as the first. I feel like we devolved into relying too much on combat at the end."

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• 8. Flawed Masterpiece

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  Metacritic scores Bloodlines at 80 out of 100 across 61 reviews, a rating of "Generally Favorable". Critics at the time split. They praised the writing, the range of clans with their own dialogue, and characters that remembered each player's loyalty. Eurogamer called the script "effortlessly intelligent" and said, "no other game has come close. Nothing's even tried." Reviewers compared it to Fallout, Baldur's Gate and Deus Ex. Eurogamer described it as Deus Ex with vampires.

  The complaints were just as sharp. Reviewers cited crashes, typographical errors and long load times between hubs. GameSpot called the artificial intelligence poor, and IGN found stealth could leave enemies standing still. Combat drew criticism as clumsy and weak, especially firearms. The New York Times found the unavoidable late-game fighting so hard that its reviewer had to cheat. Reviewers also felt the later game abandoned dialogue and stealth for repetitive combat.

  Awards followed anyway. In 2004, IGN named it the Best PC RPG of the year and GameSpy picked the "Ocean House Hotel" quest as Level of the Year. Computer Gaming World named it Role Playing Game of 2004. Computer Games Magazine nominated it for Best Writing, but Half-Life 2 won.

  Then the fans took over. After early versions of an unofficial patch by Dan Upright, the analytical chemist Werner Spahl carried the work on from version 1.2, with permission and instructions. The community tested his builds and reported bugs. Spahl then began restoring cut content, with fan help for voices, models and whole levels. He contacted former Troika staff for insight into their intentions. Mitsoda told him only that a library area was connected to a main character and a Sabbat boss and meant to resemble the real Los Angeles library. A fan visited that library and took notes on its layout.

  The changes altered the original so much that some fans objected. So there are now two versions: a basic patch for technical fixes and a plus version with extra content. As of 2019, support had lasted over 15 years, and the patches ship with the GOG.com edition. Boyarsky said people still playing and modifying it made Troika's efforts feel more "worthwhile", adding, "it might have been too early for people to appreciate it, but we'll never know."

  Retrospectives have been generous. In 2009, Rock, Paper, Shotgun lamented that nothing like Bloodlines was on the horizon. In 2010, The Escapist called it a flawed masterpiece that might have been truly great with more time, money and staff. PC Gamer ranked it among its top 100 games in 2014, 2015-2017 and 2021, and in 2017 IGN placed it 42nd among its Top 100 RPGs.

  The story continued after the studio died. In 2015, Paradox Interactive bought the rights following its purchase of White Wolf. Vampire: The Masquerade , Bloodlines 2 was announced in March 2019 with Hardsuit Labs as developer and Mitsoda as lead writer. By 2020, Mitsoda and two others had left. In February 2021, The Chinese Room replaced Hardsuit Labs. The sequel followed an elder vampire named Phyre in modern Seattle and was released on the 21st of October 2025. A web series, L.A. by Night, ran from 2018 to 2021 and is set after the events of the original game.

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