Vampyr

A lot of people were disappointed by this game because they wanted it to be a spiritual sequel to Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines. This is nothing of the sort. It's its own thing, and a very fantastic and atmospheric action-adventure featuring an interesting premise and pretty fun, if very difficult combat. That combat is clearly inspired by Dark Souls, with an emphasis on positioning and timing of attacks but, unlike Dark Souls, you can't grind your way to victory here. There is an experience system, but you get very little XP from combat, and even if you kill all the NPCs in the game (which is your primary means of gaining XP) and max out your character, you won't be able to steamroll the battles.... Unless, that is, you figure out the best tool for the job. There are a couple weapons available that will make every battle a breeze, to the point that even a person like me, who sucks at Dark Souls style games and plays every game on the easiest difficulty available, could get through a pacifist run of the game. That might sound like a bad thing, but I love games that give players tools to tailor the difficulty to their liking. If you want an easy experience, you can use one of the overpowered weapons; if you want a more difficult experience, use one of the many others. Either way, you can experience all the content in the game regardless of your skill level, which is awesome in my book.

I'm not surprised to see this on sale, so early. I'd purchased this game last year, fairly early after the release. This was on the ps4. The games presentation is good; but the game play is redundant and frankly: I found the story to be rather drab and boring. I do like the aspect of making medicines and treating the sick; but I had reached a point where, I'd treated all the patients I could and the all fell victim to illness anyway--very frustrating. The combat system is good; but it is more akin to Bloodborne in the sense that it is more about counter-attacks. The designers implemented a good mechanic in terms of the combat though: you can, if you so wish, face an enemy that is about 4 levels above you; but chances are: it'll finish you off in one hit. I also liked the Mesmer aspect of the game and also the medical information for each NPC you encounter. A good game, about a 6 out of 10 I'd say: but it wasn't worth the $70 I paid for it initially.

The gameplay was quite enjoyable knowing it wasn't going to be the most complex system created. The story was building up to be far better than I thought, but I ran into the infamous Petrescu glitch and halted all my progress in the game. So this is making me reluctant to look into other games from this developer because this is a known problem with no known fix. The present narrative is that the dev has abandoned the game. So I'm leaving this review so others aren't caught unaware as I was.

The game is great, it does have issues, but since it's the first one, and also it's the first one of his kind that the company made, I'll give it a strong 8,5. Bad things: I didn't like the ending story, too grandiloquent. Something more tied to the vampire society would be nice for next releases. Another bad thing is to have to fight a lot against minions in the streets, there should be a way to make them never appear again or be more about boss fights, narrative fighting maybe that fits how strong you currently are at that point. And some minor issues with some mechanics and bugs(probably fixed by now so irrelevant). Good things: Great storyttelling, the core of the game, became a vampire, interact with the world, the people, finding out what's going on, secret societies, making choices that change the world, using your powers to manipulate people, finding their secrets..... I would go for a second release, more focused on narrative and even with the option to finish the game without killing anyone, even npc from the street, would be great, the narrative is it's strong point. But the option to fight is good, battling great foes to test your powers if you want can't be out of the game.