For years,Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2has been an awful lot like its namesake monsters: not quite dead, not quite alive. The long-awaitedRPGsequel was officially announced back in 2019, with a planned 2020 release date. Publisher Paradox Interactive was so sure it was really coming out (and relatively quickly) that preorders went up in anticipation of the launch.
The company stopped accepting preorders in 2021, whenParadox announced that developer Hardsuit Labs had been replaced by a new, still unnamed studio. That was after leads Brian Mitsoda and Ka’ai Cluney were terminated and senior writer Cara Ellison departed the game in 2020. The game’s path to the finish line has been as tortured as any in recent memory, but it finally seems like the end might be in sight. Paradox Interactive has been teasing a reveal atPAX West, which is coming up in earlySeptember. And now Plaion, the physical distributor for the game in certain territories,has online listings showing an October 27 release date.
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It would be strange to see the project go from presumed dead to coming soon without much of an intermediary phase, but it would also make a certain kind of sense. WhenNo Man’s Skylaunched back in 2016, Hello Games' failure to live up to certain aspects of its initial pitch (and, to be fair, gamers' imaginations) painted a target on the team’s back. After a while, Hello Games stopped trying to spin anything and just worked on updates for the game, quietly transforming it over the course of a few years of unhyped work.
Now No Man’s Sky is beloved, and still enjoys a robust playerbase. Over time, Hello Games has made the game much more than it ever promised. There’s value in shutting up: for people whose minds can still be changed, the work will speak for itself, and for people who will never change their minds, no amount of reasoning will break through.
Is a No Man’s Sky-style redemption arc awaiting Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2? It’s hard to believe it (not least because VTMB2 needs a redemption arcbefore it has even released). It’s rare for a game to change development teams midway through development, and that kind of switch seems especially hard to deal with for a crunchy RPG like VTMB2. Plus, even if it’s good, it will be released in the shadow ofBaldur’s Gate 3andStarfield. Those are two huge, crunchy RPGs, and we already know that one of them is incredible. If the date is correct, it will share a release week withMarvel’s Spider-Man 2,Super Mario Bros. Wonder, andCities: Skylines 2.
With all that competition, is there a world where Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 can be a success? Maybe not in the traditional sense. It’s hard to not see an October 27th release as leading to a rehash of the ignominious fate the original suffered by launching on the same day asHalf-Life 2. But, if Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 comes out? After this development cycle, that seems like a win. If it comes out and it’s good? I’m not even letting myself think about it yet.
