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Newly trained Swedish developers Sharkmob are creating a Battle Royale game based on the world of Vampire: The Masquerade, a mix of setting and game genre that baffles fans and non-fans alike. The next game was announced via a 32-second preview and will be released in “the second half of 2021.”
The trailer shows vampires leaping across rooftops and fighting on the streets of a modern European city. They shoot each other, using explosive vampire powers to attack and defend themselves. In the end, a sinisterly armored figure with sword and shield attacks the lead vampire; the shield is briefly visible, but is branded from Vampire: The Masquerade’s Second Inquisition. Presumably, the hunting forces of the inquisitors will be their increasingly reduced circle. Here is the official description of the game:
Experience the next exciting evolution of multiplayer battle royale action games set in the cult classic Vampire: The Masquerade universe where vampire sects are at war on the streets and rooftops of Prague. Choose your style of play, play alone or together, fighting against rivals and enemies. Entity that is determined to exterminate all vampires. Use your supernatural powers, weapons and blood to make yourself stronger to hunt, fight and survive the night. “
In-world justifications for the game, and there are many, put aside: it’s a rather baffling decision to mix Battle Royale with a scenario first conceived and sold as a world of personal horror, where a single murder can be the event that becomes a person from a tragically afflicted vampire to a terrible, hungry beast. It’s a deeply strange choice to turn the grim politics of the undead and dark horror into a parkour shootout of vampire superheroes.
Even if the game is good, which we cannot rule out at all because there are a lot of veteran developers, it will still be strange.
Tabletop RPG Vampire: The Masquerade is perhaps best known for video games through the classic RPG Bloodlines and the upcoming Bloodlines 2. Since the acquisition of the license by Paradox Interactive in 2015 and the publication of a new edition of board games in 2018, Many new video games are licensed to use World of Darkness, Vampire’s larger setting.
