A good friend of mine once told me that “Ignorance is bliss”. At that time, I didn’t understood him too well and I was quite amused by his remark, since I didn’t understand how this could be true. That is, until I played Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. Now I wished I never played Fallout 2, Morrowind, Baldur's Gate 2 or Knights of The Old Republic. I wished I never saw Half-Life 2 and the Source engine in action. Maybe then I could have appreciated the newest game from Troika, makers of Arcanum and Temple of Elemental Evil, a game for which I had high hopes, but ultimately proved to be a disappointment, just like Deus Ex: Invisible War was last year.      Released in a year flooded with First Person Shooters, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines should have been a breath of fresh air for RPG fans (although it’s a combination of RPG and FPS) especially considering that Knights of the Old Republic 2: Sith Lords was pushed back to February 2005. Being in development at Troika, founded by most of the ex Black Isle members, and having the Source engine as the technical backbone, Bloodlines had all the cards to be a hit. But somewhere during its development, something went terribly wrong.

     Just like Deus Ex 2, Bloodlines is a game that tries to convince the player that his actions can and are changing the world around him, whether it’s the way he tackles the various missions (even though it’s still the choice between the “Rambo, all guns blazing” approach and the more stealthy option) or how he talks with the NPC’s. And as a direct result of these choices, Bloodlines has 5 endings, some better than others, but with none that will shock you beyond belief. The roads that you must travel to reach one of these endings however is long and treacherous, filled with obstacles, and because of this you will even have to cheat to finish the game.      I received the first bad omen right at the start of the game, in the character creation screen. You can choose between 7 vampire clans (from a total of 13 in the pen&paper universe, from which the game is inspired), all of them belonging to the Camarilla, the so-called “good guys” of the game. Beside the clan choice, which dictates how you will play the game (for instance, if you choose to play as a Nosferatu, you will have to avoid the human population, in order to maintain the masquerade), you will also have to select your gender, and to the game’s credit, the NPC’s will react differently to you depending on what you choose to be. However, as far as the visual options are concerned, this is it. You can’t change your hair/skin/face color, height, weight or anything like that. This is a real shame, considering the fact that a Role Playing Game should let you customize your character down to the finest detail. Because of this lack of customization, I had a hard time identifying myself with my alter-ego, since my idea of an immortal vampire was a bit different from that of the producers. The bitter taste left by the lack of visual options was sweetened a little by the Character Sheet (CS), where the player can spend his experience points (for the lazier ones, there’s also the option of automatically create the character, via answering some questions, just like in Ultima 9: Ascension or Morrowind).