Vampire: The Masquerade — Sins of the Sires

Reviewing (mostly) every game (or DLC) in my library, part 628: ⭐️⭐️⭐️☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ (3/10) Okayyyyyyy, then. Yeah, yeah, I see why [i]Vampire: The Masquerade — Sins of the Sires [/i](“SofS”) has such a controversial rating in the fandom. Because it’s frankly, uh, not good. Incredibly rushed and disappointing. I finished the game in one hour. One. And while I am a fast reader, most CoG/HG titles are twice that length. I literally checked the word count on the Steam page after finishing the game because I thought no way, is the game over already. While Theodoridou’s writing is as lovely and philosophical as ever, it’s not enough to hide how flat, nonsensical, and lacking SofS is, both as a narrative and as a [i]Vampire: The Masquerade [/i]game. [b]Thank you to the staff for the free copy![/b] [b][h2]Pros:[/h2][/b] ✅ [b]Writing/atmosphere.[/b] I’ve quite enjoyed Theodoridou’s previous games: [i]Rent-a-Vice[/i] and [i]The Odyssey.[/i] I’ve pointed out his flaws as a writer in the past—the narrowing linearity of some choices and abrupt endings—but I’ve always liked the philosophical glimmers present in a usually dark setting. While oddly choppy at the beginning, SofS’s prose is beautiful a…

This isn't absolutely terrible, just jumps around a lot without good transitions and some of those are extremely jarring with big plot holes. The main writing is alright, but It doesn't feel fleshed out and really finished at all; it's more like an outline or as someone else said a rough draft. It's not in the same league at all as Nightroad, Parliament of Knives or even Coteries of New York (all 3 of them, and not all those are great). This is much shallower and much shorter, stats and skills barely matter at all, the last half is especially rushed. I got this on sale for $8 and finished in under 3 hours, I don't see myself doing another play through. Even on sale I'm not sure I can recommend this. Get the other Vampire the Masquerade ones listed above first, and then Book of Hungry names from the Werewolf ones at least. If you have nothing else to read, because you've played nearly everything else as I have, I still wouldn't pay more than $5.

I started with the incomparable Night Road, and my expectations were high and I knew it, so I prepared for disappointment. But not enough. The writing is starts and stops: at times it is good, and then it just fizzles out like a car running out of gas. Theres a skill system, but its never properly used, so just forget about it. Theres a plot, that starts ok, teaches about feminism and LGBT, and then says, **** this, Im out, and commits suicide. I though I was maybe 1/3rd of the way through the game, when it comes to an end. Its not that its not long enough, its that it suddenly stops without coming to a close without explaining anything or giving any closure. You pay the full price, but receive a demo that just ends suddenly. If you play just for the mood, go ahead. Theres a few very good scenes. But dont expect a finished product, expect a half-done manuscript that has some promising bits.

I went into this one with incredibly low expectations and was still so disappointed. Not even my super autistic hyper-fixation on VTM could convince me this was good. The first chapter starts off pretty decent, but anything after that is terribly written. Doesn't feel like it takes place in the universe or has much to do with VTM. Very flat characters and story that I could not care about at all. It's also super short, I can't believe it's price for two hours of content. Don't bother with this one, just play Night Road and Parliament of Knives instead.

I liked Night Road, I liked the three New York games, Parliament of Knives even had some good moments... this game was ♥♥♥♥. Just as it starts getting good around chapter 7ish the game ends extremely quickly after, good or bad endings it still feels entirely unfulfilling. I'd skip this one if I could redo it.

This one is hard to rate. It's different from the other WoD CoGs, the endings are more varied but they seem wholly detatched from you and your choices. This story has so many moments that are fantastic and characters you can love and want to spend more time with. But it has other moments and events that even on a 3rd, 5th playthrough don't follow or make sense and so much just comes out of no where or appears random. Play through twice taking the exact options and see a completely opposite ending. Characters pivotal, but only seen in the corner of your eye and others that feel like they should be end goals but, you never get the option. Like being able to go back to protect your touchstone but, never get the option to talk to them or even see them again, but you do get to run away with another character? This maybe has the weirdest character creation I've seen so far too, which puts the touchstone front and centre setting you up to expect the story to be about them but no. First time I played it I got a post-apocolyptic ended set centuries after the story, and that's an experience you don't usually see in WoD so yeah, I recommend this game. It is full of wild off the wall moment…