Welcome, Kindred, to this Bloodlines 2 Dev Diary from the team at The Chinese Room. Tonight, we want to talk to you about our Blood Resonance feature. For those unfamiliar with Vampire: The Masquerade, this is blood that is emotionally charged. A valuable commodity for an experienced elder vampire like Phyre.
Our vision of Phyre as an elder is that they have accrued many clan abilities over their 400 years as a vampire, but the incident that brought them to Seattle has locked away their connection to them. By using resonant blood and drinking the blood of the Clan Contacts you can restore Phyre’s connection to the abilities that aren’t native to your chosen clan. For more on the specific clan abilities, please read our previous Clan Highlights: Brujah, Tremere, Banu Haqim and Ventrue. - Project Creative Director Alex Skidmore
Determining what Resonance a vessel has makes feeding more than just a pit stop. Most vampires observe their victims from a distance or engage them in conversation to feel them out. -Vampire: the Masquerade 5th edition
In-game gif of Phyre feeding on an NPC
Blood Resonance Mechanics
Blood Resonance is an important part of your journey when exploring the city. It feeds (pun intended) into how you tailor Phyre’s abilities to match your vampiric playstyle and fantasy.
When exploring Seattle you can find pedestrians with one of three potential blood resonances: Melancholic (feeling anxious or afraid), Sanguine (feeling aroused/sexual attraction), and Choleric (feeling annoyed or angry). This is something only a vampire can know so you need to use your Heightened Senses to identify these pedestrians. Once found, you need to “turn” these pedestrians fully resonated. This is done through conversations, in which you will attempt to manipulate your victim’s emotions as needed.
With this feature, it was important to us that roleplaying affected the outcomes of these conversations, so the way you act throughout the game determines what conversation options are available. Also, your appearance is an important factor in these conversations, so choose your wardrobe wisely!
If you manage to “turn” the pedestrians, they will become fully resonated and react accordingly. This means they might start a fight with you, run from you in terror, or even find you irresistibly attractive, all of which increases the resonant blood of that type gained from feeding on them.
Whilst these are great ways to gain resonated blood, they aren’t the only way! You can find events happening around the city - highlighted on the map - where NPCs are already fully resonated allowing players to skip the conversation and jump straight into the feeding. Either way, you are attempting to accrue enough blood of different resonance types to ultimately increase the range of the abilities you can use, and this is where Clan Contacts come into the mix.
Once you are Sheriff of Seattle, Clan Contacts, such as Mrs Thorn (clan Tremere) at Wake The Dead Café, will offer to aid you in restoring your connection to the abilities of their clan by drinking their blood. A pre-requisite is collecting the required amounts of the resonant blood for the ability you wish to “re-learn”. Once collected you can drink the Clan Contact’s blood, adding the ability to the Ability Tree to unlock with Ability Points.
I'm really looking forward to seeing your reactions to the pedestrian conversations and can't wait to see what combinations of abilities you all put together! See you in the dark alleyways of Seattle. - Lead Game Designer Gavin Hood
In-game image of clan menu.
Cross-Clan Ability Combos
As your key to unlocking clan abilities beyond your clan's base set, Blood Resonance opens up a lot of options for players who like to experiment. You'll find abilities that already befit your bloodline much easier to unlock, and generally will suit your style of play best. For instance, a Banu Haqim Phyre can get hold of blood sorcery powers relatively easily, but if you're committed, all abilities can eventually be gotten hold of.
To collect resonant blood even faster, certain abilities induce a blood resonance on their own - Brujah’s Taunt will fill people with rage, causing them to gain Choleric blood resonance right away.
There's some really strong ability combinations available, as well as some silly ones! I'm not sure if Earthshock is suited to a sneaky build, but it does make breaking stealth more dramatic. Mass manipulation can be used in a few more ways, and there’s no shortage of things you’ll want to do inside of stopped time (Split Second).
Personally, I like to have multiple relocate abilities unlocked so I can adapt my movement to different situations.
Unlocking a clan's abilities also gives you access to that clan's perk, which you can stack up with others for a powerful edge as you progress through the game. You’ll definitely want to collect a few of them if you’re looking to reach the apex of what an elder vampire can be. - Senior Game Designer Max Bottomley
In-game picture of Ability Tree with Abilities Equipped from Across Clans.
Visualising Heightened Senses
Following our previous post, in which we explored Phyre’s heightened senses, the next step was all about how we could differentiate what we see to easily show the player what kind of prey they’re dealing with. We called this part of Phyre’s senses “Blood Resonance,” where we visualise the type of person we’re hunting based on the scent of the blood pumping through their veins.
When it came to concepting the visual style of this feature, we needed to consider a few different factors. Firstly, the level of danger a person has in relation to Phyre. Are they unaware of your presence? Are they actively searching for a threat, or are they just a bit agitated or worried after they’ve caught a glimpse of you in the shadows? Additionally, we wanted to visualise a way to show the types of emotions that enemies and the public are feeling too, are they angry? Lustful? Fearful? These types of blood resonance may just come in handy while exploring Seattle.
For the concept itself, we felt like a good direction would be colour-coding the types of blood resonance enemies and the public are experiencing. When they’re idle and unaware of us, a cool blue signifies their calm demeanour. When they’re actively hostile, a vivid red to show their blood pumping, their silhouette almost on fire.
Concept art for how Blood Resonance appears in Heightened Senses.
As you are exploring the world, we hope that this feature will be a great tool to hunt down Phyre’s prey while keeping her safe in the underbelly of Seattle. - Senior Concept Artist, Jordan Grimmer
Writing the Blood Resonance Conversations
Some Kindred are picky eaters. Some of them prefer to hunt specific prey that fit their preferred tastes. In Bloodlines 2, Phyre will sometimes need to deal with fellow night-dwellers who desire certain delicious meals.
Behind the scenes, we wanted to look at what it would feel like to go hunting for specific prey like this. Seattle is populated by people who have an inclination to certain types of Resonance in their blood. Maybe they are Choleric, prone to anger if pushed too far. Perhaps they are merely Melancholic, having a bad day and fearful of what the future holds? Or maybe they are Sanguine in their mood, ready for… love?
The key for us was that merely by being prone to these feelings, their blood wasn’t quite ripe yet. This is where our Blood Resonance conversations come in. Phyre needs to search out these people in Seattle and give them that little extra push. And not everyone will respond to the same type of push! What might push a Lustful Businesswoman to be ready for a romantic dalliance with someone who appears to have wealth won’t work if you want to terrify a Fearful sex worker into running for his life.
In-game gif of Phyre using Heightened Senses to see the Blood Resonance of an NPC.
Phyre will need to use all the tools at their disposal. It starts with a hunt through city streets to find the right person, then sizing up what approach to use. If dressed like a wealthy partygoer, will this potentially fearful Biker be properly terrified? And even if the right clothing is selected, what if Phyre says the wrong thing? Or maybe Phyre is strong enough that they can rely on their vampiric abilities in the conversation to properly prepare the meal they crave? After all, everyone likes a bit of seasoning on their midnight snack. - Senior Narrative Designer Arone LeBray
Our players knowledgeable in the lore of Vampire: The Masquerade may wonder if playing as Ventrue Phyre will be much more difficult, giving Ventrue Bane in the 5th Edition forces them to drink only from a preferred “type”. Your feeding in game won’t be limited at any point - the mark on your hand has affected not only your powers but also your Bane, as you find yourself slowly returning to your old self. This gives you more freedom in feeding or, for example, doesn’t make you prone to raging outbursts as a Brujah. Clan-specific dialogue options allow you to tap more into your clan characteristics and play more as the “type” that will differ from playthrough to playthrough. Ventrue Phyre will probably feed less than others, given you heal more from a single bite - which is a part of how we translated Fortitude into the game.
However, that temporary “freedom” is not the case for other NPCs you will meet in the game. You will still find Ventrue dealing with refined tastes, which will cause them problems. We won’t spoil you more now, though!
Hunting and Feeding
Welcome, Kindred, to this Bloodlines 2 Dev Diary from the team at The Chinese Room. Tonight’s diary is about hunting and feeding, both in combat scenarios and the more social setting of Seattle. Feeding is at the heart of the game loop and fantasy of being a vampire so if you faint at the sight of blood, read no further. - Project Creative Director, Alex Skidmore
Feeding is a really important part of the vampire fantasy, and so from a gameplay perspective, we were set on making it a fundamental part of the player’s actions and strategies. You’ll be doing a lot of it - Phyre’s a little-and-often kinda drinker; that helps keep the beast in check- plus it’s your main source of healing, and critical to using your powerful discipline abilities. A lot of incentive for us to make it feel good!
Your main concern will be your surroundings - getting spotted feeding on the streets is a blatant Masquerade violation, and more violent types won’t be content to let you feed on their friends unscathed, so you’ll want to isolate your targets. Feeding in the swing of combat is risky, but not impossible - if you’re mindful of which direction you start a feed from, for example, your victim can help soak up a lot of gunfire for you!
One aspect that was really challenging was presentation, from a first-person perspective. Feeding in first person doesn’t really show you much at best, and looks silly at worst, but a simple cut in and out of third-person can also be disorienting and feels a bit disconnected. What we settled on uses a bit of both, with some basic cinematic action cutting techniques to maintain continuity of motion, and enough first-person action at the end to get you settled into your next move. It’s subtle, but I think it goes a long way in helping the flow of the game in hectic situations! - Senior Game Designer, Max Bottomley
As a vampire, Phyre has access to senses that are much more powerful than that of a human. Whilst exploring Seattle, Phyre will be able to tap into these Heightened Senses, enhancing her ability to smell, see and hear her enemies. By concentrating on these senses, Phyre will detect the beating hearts of nearby prey even through walls, allowing her to choose just the right strategy to pounce on them.
When it came to visualising this, we wanted our concepts to reflect the vampiric nature of homing in on your next meal, sensing and smelling blood through the air. We wanted Phyre to feel like a predator stalking her enemies using all her vampiric gifts. To do this we wanted to tap into a striking art style for this part of the gameplay, something that highlighted Phyre’s vampiric lust for blood while also being very clear for the player experience.
Art by Jordan Grimmer. A concept of heightened senses exploring how to differentiate between humans.
Art by Michele Nucera. Explorations of how feeding could look.
Once we get up close and personal, that’s when we can feed. We wanted the feeding to feel like an intimate experience between you and the victim - biting someone's throat will always give you a sudden rush of power. Drinking blood is a way to restore your powers and by doing so will become an addictive experience for the player.
We wanted the action of feeding to reflect the visceral nature of stealing life from a beating heart, taking life from a host, and transferring it to the player. Above we explored a few ways we could show this through the reaction to Phyre’s vision as the blood enters her system. This level of exploration, creating many different ideas and iterations, is key when we’re trying to find something that could work for a feature like this. - Senior Concept Artist, Jordan Grimmer and Lead Concept Artist, Michele Nucera
Art by Michele Nucera. Get up close and personal with your victim.
Blood Resonance Events
Not only is Seattle brought to life with people going about their own business, including NPCs reacting to the player (perhaps even running away in terror!) it’s also a place where the player can hunt!
As you move around the city, you’ll be able to track and hunt NPCs that have the potential to become fully resonated with a specific type of blood to feed on. Track these NPCs down using Heightened Senses and knowledge of the city, then use charm, fear, or anger to convince and bend them to your will.
Very early on we wanted these events to feel like something players would want to go and investigate as they pop up around the city, I like to refer to these events as vampire candy for players to track, follow, and feed on! Social Feeding is a key part of the players' time in our Seattle, and revolves around influencing the NPCs in certain ways - maybe you’ll stumble upon someone angry that the ATM has stolen their card and you can take that anger and feed on it. Maybe someone’s scared after missing the last bus home, and chasing them down a dark alley will tip them into terror and give you the Social Feed you’re craving.
It’s been great working on a system where the NPCs display very raw emotion letting the player really lean into the vampire fantasy allowing them to interact with the denizens of Seattle in a number of different ways. You can use abilities, conversations, or just plain terrify them then reap the rewards with a careful feed.
We wanted to give players the freedom to hunt the way they want but it was also important that players need to be mindful of how and where they feed to avoid breaking the Masquerade! Social Feeding is a slower process so it's best to lure victims to secluded areas. Explaining to animators that I want an animation of someone cowering like a shocked actor from a 1950s horror movie then watching those animations come to life… Chef’s Kiss!
It's been really great to just sit and think, wouldn’t it be great if Phyre is approached by a mugger and threatened… only to have them turn and flee in fear once they realise what Phyre is! I’m really looking forward to seeing how players choose to tackle the hunt and feed within the city area itself. - Project Lead Game Designer, Gavin Hood
Don’t miss the next DD where we sink our teeth deeper into the intricacies of Blood Resonance!
Building Our Seattle
Welcome Kindred to another Bloodlines 2 Dev Diary from the team at The Chinese Room. In this diary, we want to give you some further insight into the choices we’ve made when building our version of Seattle (see Dev Diary 8 for my previous statements on building Seattle for The World of Darkness). Seattle is at the heart of the game, which you will return to again and again between quests or sometimes during them. It is the most human location in the game where you are vulnerable to being exposed as a vampire (aka breaching The Masquerade) resulting in swift and violent justice from the vampires of the Camarilla that rule the city. It is also a kind of vampire playground where you can feed on humans in order to restore your vampiric powers or just for the thrill of the hunt. We hope this diary gives you a taste of what you will experience when stalking the streets and rooftops of the Emerald City. - Project Creative Director Alex Skidmore
(Visit the Weaver Tower, a seat of power for the Camarilla Court.)
Building the player’s movement through Seattle, we really wanted to create traversal that interacted with The Masquerade and reinforced the vampiric experience. Phyre has some absurd movement from the get-go, being able to immensely fast, dash and glide through the air, and can move faster while still using discipline abilities later- but of course, do any of this on the streets without obfuscation and you’ll quickly find yourself breaching the masquerade.
(The Atrium club, where you will meet the enthralling Ysabella.)
Dark alleyways don’t just give you a quieter place to feed on prey, they also provide routes up to Seattle’s rooftops- up here there’s fewer prying eyes, so you can really let your capabilities loose, moving fast and leaping between buildings. The local Anarchs won’t be thrilled about you moving through their rooftop turf though, so it’s a dangerous place for the weak or uninitiated.
This means, there’s a choice to be made at any point between danger to the masquerade and danger to yourself! Finding yourself drawn to the kinds of places vampires would lurk is the goal of this arrangement. As you regain your powers as an elder, you’ll also be more capable of moving as you please- I’m really looking forward to seeing people master it! - Senior Game Designer Max Bottomley
Since joining the Bloodlines 2 team, a key responsibility I’ve undertaken is bringing life to a key area of the game – our Seattle.
(The Glacier Hotel is where you will find Lou Graham.)
Working closely with the Environment team, I wanted to make sure that as players explore the world it feels both alive and reactive to what they are doing. Players will discover a wide variety of people going about their daily (or nightly!) lives. We’ve crafted a personality for the city that compliments its unique setting, mood and layout. Time has been taken to map out city districts that favour different types of NPCs – you’ll be able to sit back and watch the world move on around you.
When you walk round a corner you never know what you’ll find; maybe it’s a businessman arguing on his phone, or a graffiti artist improving the local artwork, it could be a car thief struggling to break into a car, or even a sex worker making good on their promise with a client.
(You might meet all sorts of people in the seedy underbelly of Seattle.)
We’ve been filling the world with characters that actually do things; taking breaks on seats, telling the police about crimes they’ve seen, or seeing the police chasing down a criminal. The world turns without you, it should feel like you’re just passing through – and as the player, you can interact or just sit back and watch!
Working on this stuff and building out a believable world where bikers drink outside bars or start fights with you has been a hell of a lot of work, but I hope people will find it a fun place to explore.
The city isn’t all combat, it’s also home to exploration and interactions with the inhabitants of Seattle.
(Join Mrs. Thorn or perhaps run into Safia at Wake the Dead café.)
As with many other areas of the game a large part of what we wanted to give players was choice; some of that choice comes down to what conversations you’ll have with some of the NPCs and characters you’ll meet in the city. Use your Vampiric charms to seduce someone, proposition a sex worker, or flip off some angry bikers with a Brujah-approved hand gesture.
The first time you try to flirt with a Sex Worker in the game and get turned down because your choice of clothing didn’t impress them will be an eye-opener! - Lead Game Designer Gavin Hood
Seattle plays a big part in our game, in both setting the tone of the game and providing an exciting and alluring space for players to explore and discover. Whether it’s the vibrant, ethereal world of Nick Miller’s photography or the majesty of a real world American Metropolis like Seattle, it’s been really important for us to capture these moments and inject it uniquely into our take on a city inside the World of Darkness.
(A view from the ground in our Seattle.)
One of the ways we’ve done this is to focus on making Seattle “feel” exaggerated, seen through the heightened reality of a 300 year old elder. Exaggerating building heights to make most untraversable, our phrase “Tree trunking”, has helped to do this both visually and viscerally. Unlike a superhero gliding over a City, we’re creating a world that forces you to be part of it. Running through alleyways or gliding across rooftops, you’re never above it or beneath but really part of it. You can’t beat the feeling of stalking on a victim along a ledge or a building precipice with a whole towering City above you. - Associate Art Director Ben Matthews
Heya fellow Kindred, I'm super stoked to give you a sneak peek of the Seattle you'll be sinking your fangs into in Bloodlines 2!
We’re bringing that gritty, atmospheric, and immersive vibe that made the original Bloodlines such a cult classic into our version of Seattle, making sure every alleyway, rooftop, and hidden corner feels like it belongs in the World of Darkness. You’ll be stalking through Pioneer Square, lurking around Downtown, and exploring our take on Chinatown, all wrapped in a snowy, seedy, nighttime setting that bleeds neo-noir. Shaping parts of Seattle to fit our setting has been one of the coolest parts of making this, while working with the latest tech. Our favorite bits have definitely been creating those hidden details—cryptic setups, narrative clues with deeper meanings—just waiting for you to uncover.
(Visit the Dutchman to meet all manners of punks and bikers, and possibly meet Silky.)
Each district has its own distinct vibe, whether it’s the cold, corporate chill of the Financial sector or the vibrant pulse of Chinatown. We’re using lighting and color to set the mood and make each area feel unique and immersive.
We’ve been using a hybrid workflow to bring this city to life, combining Houdini for our building structures with modular kits for shopfronts, alley walls, and rooftop dressing. But what really gets us excited is the storytelling dioramas we’ve crafted into each block. Whether it’s a hint of a backstory, a touch of conflict, or just a nod to something darker beneath the surface, we’ve worked hard to make every corner feel like it has a story to tell. This lets us give each block its own flavor while weaving them all together into a larger narrative tapestry that not only looks great but feels alive and full of stories, all while being optimized for performance.
I can’t wait for you to sink your teeth into this fresh take on Seattle, Kindred. Get ready to embrace the night! - Lead Environment Artist Genesis Asis
The Anarchs and Unbound
In today’s dev diary we’ll introduce you to a few non-Camarilla Kindred you’ll meet in the game. As you might already know Seattle is primarily a Camarilla controlled city, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t non-Camarilla Kindred vying for power — or fighting to be left alone. Once again we’ve got Writer Cherish Goldstraw and Narrative Director Ian Thomas describing the profiles to you as they appear at the beginning of our story.
The Anarchs and Unbound
The unbound are all those vampires who fall outside the Camarilla. The Anarch Movement in its various forms is a subset of the unbound and their most visible manifestation. Many seek to escape from Camarilla control by hiding. But those loyal to the Movement have decided to fight back, attempting to conquer and control domains originally held by those who would claim themselves their masters.
The Anarch Movement is different in each city. Sometimes an Anarch city has a ruler called a Baron. More commonly, it’s led by gangs who each have their own territories. Some cities are currently divided between Anarch and Camarilla vampires — both sides itching to take over.
Where Camarilla vampires usually influence mortal society from the outside, Anarchs burrow deep inside. Many maintain mortal identities, perhaps even families and jobs. This makes them simultaneously more vulnerable and more secure. Vulnerable because they are in contact with their surroundings every night and are sure to make mistakes. Secure because the Anarch is never the vampire lord in a mansion on the hill. They’re the DJ in the nightclub, the terrifying cop from internal affairs, the junkie creeping outside your window. - From 5th edition book
History of Thin-bloods in Seattle
The strength of each vampire Embraced is more dilute than that of their Sire. Thin-bloods have earned their name because their blood is seen as too distantly removed from the original progenitor, Caine. Most Kindred consider them a weakness and an embarrassment to their kind - or even a threat. Thin-bloods are not considered part of any clan, but rather the dregs of Kindred society.
Many view thin-bloods as a risk to the Masquerade due to their close ties with the mortal world, often leading to their being hunted and destroyed without a second thought. Overlooked and downtrodden, they band together in a form of resistance. Seattle acts as a haven of a sort. In this city, the weak-blooded are not destroyed out of hand. Instead, by order of Prince Campbell, they must be branded to set them apart from true vampires; only then will he allow them to remain.
Many have found shelter amongst those of Seattle's Anarchs; particularly under the watchful eye of the Brujah Katsumi, who leads one of the major Anarch groups, and has, because of her involvement with the Thin-bloods, been branded as one herself.
As newly-minted Sheriff Phyre must negotiate the delicate balance between Katsumi's people and the Camarilla - and deal with the fact that many Anarchs and thin-bloods don't respect anyone as leader. Seattle is a powderkeg and each faction waits for its opportunity. Some are more impatient than others. If Phyre is seeking Katsumi, she may find her at a bar called the Hole in the Wall with the other misfits of her cause.
Katsumi Ishizaki
Brujah Anarch Leader
Quote
“Tell the Prince I'm busy. The only blood around here is Anarch – always the way, right? I’m going to deal with it.”
Description
Katsumi is a reluctant leader, forced by circumstance to speak for one of the larger groups of Kindred that consists of anarchs, thin-bloods, and the other dregs of the city. She maintains an uneasy peace with the Court, keeping a lid on the demands and fears of her followers as best she can. You’ll find her out on the streets among those who need her most, or at one of the spaces she maintains to keep her charges out of trouble. In her mortal life, she used to be a surgeon, and while still trying to fix things, nowadays, she is now mostly doing triage.
Max Webber
Brujah Unbound
Quote
“I was a piece of shit when I was a mortal, but the Embrace changed me. It took all my fear away, and I started to figure most assholes are just scared. I saw something in Benny, I thought he might be like me…”
Description
Unusually placid for a Brujah and unusually submissive for a sire, Max is something of an anomaly. Preferring to steer clear of both the Camarilla and the Anarchs, the only Kindred Max seems to want any relationship with is his intimidating childe, Benny - the Camarilla Sheriff. While many sires would forbid their childe joining the Court without them, Max seems content to live in Benny’s formidable shadow. The strange dynamic between the two has raised many a Kindred eyebrow, but few dare raise their voices for fear of rousing the Sheriff’s ire.
Nicola “Nix” Lee
Gangrel Unbound
Quote
“These city bloodsuckers live in a whole different world. Everyone’s playing these high stakes mind games, and I can’t even beat the peg game over at the Wagon Wheel. I need to find ways to be useful if I want to survive here.”
Description
Confident, brash and not to be trifled with, Nix loves the thrill of the hunt and fights like the beast unleashed. However, her kind are not usually city-dwellers, and Nix has little patience or aptitude for navigating the intricacies of vampire politics. Nobody knows why she has suddenly appeared in Seattle, and the Camarilla are naturally suspicious, but the possibility of enticing a leashed Gangrel into their ranks is a tempting prospect.
Anarch, Thin-blood, and Ghoul Enemies
The anarchs are the first, and most numerous faction you'll be butting heads with in Bloodlines 2. While Katsumi has the respect of a large portion of the Anarchs and Thin-bloods, not all of them follow her orders. Many have taken up residence in places you’ll need to investigate or are actively working against you. That means that among the many enemies you’ll face, Anarchs will use their powers against you. And so their members are a good baseline for the kind of threats you'll face throughout the game - roving gangs of fidgeting ghouls, armed with whatever they can get their hands on, and young, opportunistic kindred too naive to see the danger in taking on an elder face-to-face.
Ghouls are a tough bunch; they can take significantly more of a beating than your run-of-the-mill human, but they aren’t much of a threat alone. It’s when they work together, some bludgeoning you about, others carving you up, that you’ll want to take them seriously, so keeping things quiet is a sensible approach. Their Kindred masters are a much more potent threat- while they’re not as skilled in their disciplines as others, they more than make up for it with hardware.
As the situation in Seattle heats up, the Anarchs become more militaristic and heavily armed—but at their core, they’ve got more humanity than most. They’ll be hesitant to shoot with their friends in the way, more receptive to manipulation, and slower to catch who’s been turned against them—all weaknesses that can be exploited.
Camarilla Court
The team at The Chinese Room has been hard at work, and we’re excited to show you the cast of our Camarilla Kindred this week.
Seattle has been dominated by the Camarilla for a century. It is an organisation of Vampires that has fingers in many aspects of mortal society to keep power. The Camarilla Court is under the leadership of a Prince who dictates the laws maintaining the Masquerade. Under the Prince, there are several official positions, such as Primogen who represent major clans and a Sheriff to enforce Camarilla law. Each has a place in the nightly affairs of Seattle.
Exploring the city will introduce you to these Kindred, and you’ll have the opportunity to talk to and learn about them in their preferred surroundings. Phyre’s relationship with each can develop as you spend more time with them. Depending on how you play the games of vampire politics with them, they may grow to adore or abhor you.
In this diary, we’re sharing some profiles of the Kindred in Seattle’s Camarilla, provided by Writer Cherish Goldstraw and Narrative Director Ian Thomas, as if someone were describing them to you in-universe. This is the structure of the Camarilla, as you’ll learn about it at the start of the story.
"I know. I see the smile that does not reach your eyes. I see the brow that furrows, the dawn of panic. I see the tension in your shoulders, the hands that clench. Oh yes. I know. Why should my next word not end you?"
Description
Campbell is power personified. As the last century grew, he consolidated the Kindred’s hold on the streets; as the city rose, so did Weaver Tower and the Court, with tendrils into politics, business, society, and the underworld. Once Lou’s protege, it is now Campbell – urbane, perceptive, commanding – who leads Seattle into the future as Prince of the city.
Lou Graham
Ventrue, Ex-Prince
Quote
“Oh, this is ridiculous – something must be done. I know it is quite the fashion to hear a wide range of opinions, but blood under the nails is such a nuisance.”
Description
In life, Lou Graham pulled all the strings of the elite in Seattle; she had the ears of politicians, criminals, blue bloods and commoners alike. In unlife she has spent more than a century deepening that hold. She looms over Seattle as a storm cloud, a constant factor in the choices of even the most powerful Kindred despite her absence from day-to-day politics. To badmouth Lou Graham is to badmouth the city, and this city has a habit of burying its foes down deep.
Ryong Choi
Ventrue, Seneschal
Quote
“I’m not sure you grasp the situation. You will act in this as my agent, and in return you will gain both the benefits and responsibilities of that. It is not negotiable. You could, of course, refuse. But the sun is rising.”
Description
Ryong is of a new breed, a dealmaker, modern, efficient, and pragmatic. With a city under threat and with the Masquerade in tatters, Ryong is the calm centre of the chaos, negotiating, out-maneuvering, and doing everything that must be done to maintain stability. She is not afraid to cut away dead flesh if it will help save the whole.
Michael “Tolly” Tolliver
Nosferatu, Herald
Quote
“Hey, it’s the festive season; I’m just out for a stroll. I figure I bring joy to the world. And this little chat is courtesy of my selfless desire to entertain the elderly, so listen up, Nomad!”
Description
Most Nosferatu will hide themselves away from the world, but Tolly knows how little attention today’s mortals really pay to anything. The gregarious and gleeful intelligencer will be found where he’s least expected, always spinning webs for the Court, nudging this, gathering compromising information on that. Tolly knows where the bodies are buried, and has probably dug them up, critiqued their dress sense, and had a long and very pointed conversation with them about their stupid indiscretions.
Benny Muldoon
Brujah, Sheriff
Quote
“You have one night - ONE NIGHT - to sort your business and get the fuck outta Seattle. After that, it's open season.”
Description
Benny is the attack-dog of the Court, the enforcer, the bruiser, the bone-breaker. You want him leashed up and snarling at your enemies, not biting at your heels, so get on his good side. He despises those who he sees as lesser bloodlines, and prides himself on his ability to sniff out those who are working against Seattle’s best interests. If you’re lucky, you’ll find him standing at the Prince’s side. If you’re less lucky, you’ll encounter him elsewhere.
Safia Ulusoy
Tremere, Researcher
Quote
“That’s... fascinating. Uh. You wouldn’t mind if I take a closer look? Fourteenth century, I’m almost sure... and look at these markings! Hermetic in nature, obviously! Could you just let me... oops! Sorry. I’ll clean that up.”
Description
Safia is the eager enthusiast, her attention caught by theories, facts, and the fascination of learning from both the old and the new. If the Court has questions, she is the one to find answers; her skill with thaumaturgy and her dogged research techniques have proven her worth to Seattle, no matter the current standing of her clan. Recently, she’s been investigating the city’s growing thin-blood population, a particular concern to the Court. However, her focus does tend to distract her from the more mundane world. You’ll probably find her in her lab or lost in a pile of books at the Wake the Dead coffee-bar.
Ysabella Moore
Toreador, Primogen
Quote
“The delicate brutality to pursue one special idea... all art is violence without the right canvas.”
Description
Ysabella, queen of the nightlife, stalks her way through Seattle’s society as trend-setter, bon vivant, nightclub diva, and performance artist extraordinaire. Her legendary events at the Atrium nightclub thrill and shock – the mortals flock to be part of her world. There are some in the Court who believe she treads perilously close to the edge of the Masquerade. Ysabella wields her art like a weapon – to her, self-expression is much more important than any stricture.
Willem Axel
Nosferatu, Secret Keeper
Quote
“You don't understand, Nomad... if I took away their little black book, all their secrets... what would they have left?”
Description
Willem is the Prince’s archivist, keeping a century of secrets safe from the prying eyes of mortals and kindred alike. He’s long ago hidden himself away from Seattle’s society, unwilling to show his face on the streets, but maintains his contacts amongst the Kindred and the Court and the underworld of the city. Willem is never one to put himself forward or voice his opinion and this might lead others to overlook him or take him for granted, but he has the trades, transgressions, and debts are at his fingertips and such knowledge can be used as a knife.
What’s Next for Bloodlines 2
Good evening,
Today, The Chinese Room’s Alex Skidmore, Creative Director for Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2, and Mattias Lilja, Deputy CEO for Paradox Interactive, share an update on Bloodlines 2.
To quickly recap, Mattias and Alex share:
Bloodlines 2’s release window has been updated to the first half of 2025.
Paradox and The Chinese Room’s commitment to delivering a high-quality action RPG for Vampire fans, new and old.
Some of the things they're excited about working on with the additional time.
The Chinese Room and Paradox will continue to post frequent updates, including Dev Diaries, deep dives, and more. We are not going into a quiet period; our teams have been hard at work making the best possible Vampire Action RPG and have lots of cool stuff to share.
Why are you updating the release window?
Earlier this year, Paradox reaffirmed our commitment to delivering high-quality games to our players, and the launch update is a proactive decision derived from this commitment. Though the game is in a good enough place that we could have maintained our planned release window, Paradox and The Chinese Room collaboratively decided to prioritize polish.
What will the additional time be used for?
It will be used to create a quality assurance buffer, giving more time between testing and launch, ensuring we release the game when it’s ready. The extra time gives us an opportunity to adjust certain areas, such as Fabien, and incorporate other community feedback.
We will also use the time to expand the game’s story, and now Bloodlines 2 will have more than twice as many endings as its predecessor.
What’s next?
World of Darkness and The Chinese Room will continue to engage with Bloodlines 2 fans.
We’ll discuss everything from our vampire take on Seattle to social feeding and the different factions in the city. We’ll also introduce you to more characters, giving you a chance to get familiar with the Kindred, who controls the city from the shadows, ahead of the game’s launch.
It has been a long journey, but we’re near the final stages of development and will share the release date once we are confident with the game’s level of polish.
Seattle welcomes you to explore its dark vampiric underbelly in 2025; until then, stay tuned to our social media channels for more Bloodlines 2 updates: Discord, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
- Paradox Interactive and The Chinese Room
Dialogue Choice Systems
The summer break is over, and we’re back with a juicy Dev Diary for you. Today, Sarah Longthorne, TCR's Senior Narrative Designer and Writer, will delve into the intricacies of our dialogue systems and the thought processes behind their design for Bloodlines 2. Just a small warning: This journal delves into the inner workings of the branching dialogue code, which potentially contains minor spoilers.
“The presentation of dialogue options is different in Bloodlines 2 – a lot of it stems from TCR’s legacy of celebrating fully-realised characterisation and empowering voice actors to do more heavy lifting and explore more nuance.
To give an example, when selecting a dialogue option, players should know exactly what they’re opting into (we’ve all known the frustration of ‘But that’s not what I thought that meant!’), but the kind of spelling-out this requires precludes the ability to lean into the strengths of actors. This would also have caused problems for UI, since Phyre often has more to say that can be reasonably presented on screen—especially when we’re also catering to console. Ultimately, the needs of the player were integral: players should have all the information they need about their selected option and should feel confident in their choice, while the actor is allowed more playfulness in following that directive.
Now, seeing as you’re reading a Dev Diary, I assume that means you’ve seen some game materials that we have already shared, which means you’ll have noticed an early result of the above dilemma: we initially toyed with representing our dialogue choices in summary, to make the intention of the branch abundantly clear and lean harder into our ‘strategic’ approach to roleplay (more on that shortly).
However, this quickly revealed itself as the wrong direction—and not just because you guys (rightly) said so. Getting into the weeds of our conversations, I found that the choices on offer felt samey when viewed from above, even when the content was entirely different—zoom too far out and you lose fine detail, which is where your flavour lives.
So we settled on a compromise, the tried-and-true next best thing: (carefully) paraphrased speech.
But what about the content of these choices?
Remember what I said about strategies? The best way to approach choice design is to look at your theme. In Bloodlines 1, your options are a mixture of strategy and humanity (with other options thrown in to honour, for example, your clan). The same is true in other titles: in Baldur’s Gate 3, choice options are themed roughly around a simplified version of the morality alignment seen in D&D; in Telltale’s The Walking Dead, they are themed around the central question of ‘Do you have to be cruel to survive?’.
VtM’s World of Darkness is so named for its cynical perspective—its blood-tinted glasses, if you will. Kindred are a natural extension, a metaphor of that worldview. The recurring motif is typically ‘How can I get what I want?’, with little being left off the table, though with room enough for those fading echoes of humanity to cling on—or at least, appear to do so. In this way, Bloodlines 1’s approach of marrying strategy with morality is the ideal direction, and it’s the one we’ve chosen.
But what does that mean for division of choice in more concrete terms? In other words, what courses of action might an Elder vampire such as Phyre consider?
The first, and most obvious, is to lean into their status, age, potency and power to intimidate those around them. In other contexts, this can manifest as being willing to voice the unpopular opinion, and being direct about it—‘not beating around the bush’, so to speak. After all, nobody fucks with an elder, right? Right?
But what if they do? What if, after a century in torpor, your age is all that’s going for you?
Age counts for a lot, true, but being Kindred is about more than what’s supernaturally afforded to you, and a clever vampire will have more up their sleeve than what their abilities allow—other ways of exerting control. After all, Bloodlines without some political scheming and intrigue just wouldn’t be Bloodlines. And that doesn’t even account for Phyre’s unique and, well, unfortunate circumstances. (Picture, if you will, the eyes-looking-to-the-side emoji.)
Throwing your weight around isn’t always the best option, especially in a world overrun with big egos and at least thirteen different species of narcissists. Sometimes, the best way to deal with someone is to let them take the W… for now. Stroke their pride, affirm their delusions, whisper honeyed lies and fall under the radar of capability. Become the listening ear, the comforting shoulder, the trusted disciple. Such a strategy can take you far… assuming your victim buys it.
Two ways to play the game—two extremes. So what occupies the middle ground?
A shrewd Kindred may know better than to bet it all on a big play. Knowledge is power, both others’ knowledge of you and your knowledge of them. Better, sometimes, to remain a mystery, to let others show their hand. Perhaps you achieve this straightforwardly, by responding to questions with more questions, or indirectly by choosing words that might provoke a reply, a telling outburst. By scooting back from the table, flipping the board and laying the game bare. If social navigation among Kindred is a careful masquerade, what happens when you rip off another’s mask and expose the subtext—say, with perceptive observations?
Of course, your options are not always strictly limited to these three approaches (we haven’t forgotten about Clan-specific options, for instance), and how each approach manifests will not always be uniform. You may also be sitting here wondering where humanity factors in.
The beauty of this system lies in subjective interpretation, both by you and others. Unless clearly indicated, we will never assume the intent for your choice on your behalf. Perhaps you were buttering up Lou Graham so your treachery would go unnoticed, but perhaps you genuinely admire her? Perhaps you wanted to make sure the young Prince understood the hierarchy so they wouldn’t mess with your plans, or perhaps they were simply getting on your nerves? Strategy or sincerity—that much is up to you.
But of course, that won’t stop other characters from having their own interpretation.
Conversations are not an exception to gameplay, but an expression of it, and if gameplay is a test of skill, conversations are a test of emotional intelligence. To that end, each of our characters in Bloodlines 2 has their own preferences and biases rooted firmly in who they are and what drives them, which – combined with your choices – determines and flavours their opinion of you. This is a little more in-depth than like or dislike; to give a few simplistic and unrepresentative examples (no spoilers!): perhaps the compliment that so pleased the Primogen came across as sarcasm to the thin-blood? Perhaps to the Brujah your bullying was a blush of life? So you see, reactions to your choices are not uniform, but unique to the NPC and their unique disposition, and you’ll have to put some work into figuring out what makes them tick.
Above is a screenshot from our Inky editor showing how player choice influences perception and relationship in aggregate.
In the top choice, Phyre protests Lou’s intrusion on a private meeting, and if Lou is not used to this behaviour from Phyre, she will be slightly taken aback, responding with “Someone’s touchy tonight” before rejoining the branch that everyone else who took this option will see: “My childe and I have no secrets, do we, darling?”
Regardless, choosing this option will adversely affect Lou’s opinion of Phyre – indicated by ~Lou_DislikedThat – which over time can layer with her perception that Phyre is a bully, an empath or a sage. (RF_Unimpressed) represents the nature of her displeasure, which feeds the UI players will see.
In the second, softer choice option – “Welcome” – Lou’s interpretation of Phyre's response is again distorted by her existing perception of who Phyre is, which in turn affects whether her opinion of Phyre goes up or down.
If she’s used to you being aggressive, but here you choose the softer route, she’ll assume you’re being sarcastic and become annoyed, lowering her opinion – after all, Lou is fluent in sarcasm, so it’s no stretch that she would project this into others.
However, if you’re not usually aggressive then she’ll take you at your word and respond favourably, with her opinion rising in tandem. In this branch, there is no merge: players either see “Well there’s no need for sarcasm” or “And it’s in part thanks to you”.
Two variations of Lou reacting to the above scene, depending on if you irritate or please her.
But this is also accumulative. If you have always come across as weak, for better or worse, sudden strength could have its own, unique response. The same goes if you have a reputation for directness, or for keeping your cards close to your chest. Things like your Clan and the details of your legend colour how others see you, as well as the colour of the lens through which they filter their reality, but so do your actions over time. And let’s not forget context and situational factors—what worked once won’t necessarily work every time. We don’t want you getting complacent, picking options transactionally to fill up some bar or progress some metric; we want you thinking, and engaging from moment to moment.
As a Kindred would.”
- The Chinese Room’s Senior Narrative Designer and Writer Sarah Longthorne
Our Dev Diary schedule continues from August 14th, where we'll go into details about our Dialogue Choice System, with a look into the code we use for it.
August 14th 2024 - DD #15: Dialogue Choice System
August 28th 2024 - DD #16: The Camarilla
September 11th 2024 - DD #17: The Anarchs
What are we up to? Part 2.
As summer approaches we wanted to fill you in on a few processes and reflections our team is grappling with. So much going on right now!
Audio
“One aspect I’ve been enjoying about working on Bloodlines 2 from an audio perspective was imagining how a vampire perceives the world around them. A favourite moment of mine was weaving past moments into the soundscape as if we could hear the past itself. While it might sound a bit corny, I enjoyed playing with the idea of being an ancient being capable of sensing beyond their own time. In an abstract way, it added a supernatural feeling to the game rather than just providing linear sound design for the visual world. I also really enjoyed how the entire audio team were so dedicated into carving out this unique sounding character and world together. We would always present work, give critiques and just refine as much as possible. I am certain Bloodlines 2 will have a truly unique sound when it releases, thanks to the extraordinary efforts of the audio team.”
- The Chinese Room’s Sound Designer Corry Young
Concept Art
Nix “Here are some experimentations of Nix whom you'll meet in the underground. Although more integrated to the human side of civilisation, we wanted to maintain some of the animalistic feral nature hallmark to the Gangrel clan in her design.”
- The Chinese Room’s Junior Concept Artist Isobel Hine
Pioneer Square Concepts “In these concepts we were exploring the look and feel of the Pioneer Square section of the city. We were tasked with making sure this area of the city feels cold, atmospheric and is bathed in neon light. One of the main focuses of our art direction is making sure we’re always leaning into this neo-noir look for our world, a high contrast visual identity that is brooding and moody. Additionally, we were tasked with putting together several shopfront ideas that could appear throughout this area of the city.”
- The Chinese Room’s Art Director John McCormack and Lead Concept Artist Michele Nucera
- The Chinese Room’s Senior Concept Artist Jordan Grimmer and Lead Concept Artist Michele Nucera
Financial District Concepts “Like above, we were also briefed with exploring the look of the financial area of our city. With this we wanted to go in a very different direction, leaning heavily on a more cyan colour palette with high, glass front buildings. We wanted to make sure every area of Seattle feels distinct and instantly recognizable.”
- The Chinese Room’s Lead Concept Artist Michele Nucera
Code / Programming
“Time for an update from code. The team have been working hard on getting the city experience working well. We have been putting the MassAI framework of Unreal 5 through its paces, it’s a new system for simulating crowds and we’ve used it for the pedestrian simulation in our rendition of the streets of Seattle. By leveraging the smart object system, we've created interactive elements for pedestrians, such as cash machines and park benches. But, the crowds also need to chatter as we can’t have everyone walk around in complete silence. We’ve extended our banter system to allow groups of pedestrians and enemy NPCs to talk to each other, enabling general contextual chat about the world and reactions to you as you complete the missions. We’ve also been extending the combat system to allow many NPCs to fight, and for pedestrians to fight too with a just-in-time switch from the MassAI system to regular instanced characters, and we’ve made them able to fight each other when the circumstances are right – it’s very entertaining. Other than that we’ve been working hard on optimising the game to run on consoles and keeping the framerate solid on PCs, and the memory footprint small.”
- The Chinese Room’s Technical Director Nick Slaven
Design
“For my Quests, I like to lean into the protagonist's nature as an outsider in a foreign land. Seattle may at first seem inconsequential to an Elder Vampire but, powerful as you are, you're still at the bottom of the ladder. Phyre must quickly react to a Kindred power structure in chaos and the early missions in the city reflect this.
Rejection by those in power would mean certain befalling, and so Phyre must prove their worthiness to Seattle's elite. Many of my quests follow this thread of pressure being applied to our protagonist. For players to run the gauntlet through Seattle, deciding which relationships to nurture and which to break. Seattle is frozen in time under a blanket of snow, waiting for a new leader to emerge. Phyre is weakened and in need of both allies and answers. The weakest soldiers on the street, the Courts, and even the Cops will present challenges for players to navigate, or maybe just straight-up punch in the mouth. Our more open areas present players with more of a choice in their approach to combat and we've taken great care in crafting slick traversal options that reinforce that. Can't wait to show you more!"
- The Chinese Room’s Junior Level Designer Jack Goddard
“In the last Dev Diary, I mentioned how we build our levels to support the game’s awesome traversal system. This time, I’d like to dive deeper into this and some other key considerations when designing levels for Bloodlines 2.
Traversal Mechanics Let's start with traversal. When designing our spaces, we consider numerous factors to allow you to make the most of your Kindred abilities. Many of our environments would have been built for humans in Seattle, but you are a powerful Vampire, and our spaces need to support this. We have created multiple paths, some that are accessible by humans and some of which are only accessible through using your unique movements, enhancing both gameplay variety and immersion. However, using these vampiric abilities can risk breaking the Masquerade, so these paths are designed to be used discreetly, ensuring you remain hidden from prying human eyes.
Space Purpose The purpose of each space greatly influences its design. Are you likely to be fighting enemies here? If so, the area will look and feel vastly different from one meant for exploration or storytelling. Combat zones are crafted to support various playstyles, from stealth to brawling, and we sometimes design areas to encourage a particular approach to keep gameplay dynamic.
Narrative and Exploration For spaces focused on story and exploration, our approach shifts. Here, the goal is to provide opportunities for discovery and to guide you towards interesting moments organically. These environments are meant to contrast with combat-heavy areas, offering a slower pace. These spaces invite you to linger and delve deeper into the lore of our world.
Balancing the Experience Finally, while each space is carefully crafted to fulfill its specific role, we also ensure a balanced mix throughout the game. The interplay between fast-paced action areas and more serene, narrative-rich environments keeps the gameplay experience fresh and engaging. In summary, our level design philosophy revolves around maximizing the potential of your Vampire abilities, tailoring spaces to their intended purpose, and maintaining a balanced and engaging pace throughout the game. We can’t wait for you to experience the world we’ve built in Bloodlines 2.”
- The Chinese Room’s Level Designer Amy Lee
Production
“We are recording! My role in Production supports the cinematics and interactive dialogue pipeline, collaborating with the Narrative team to deliver scripts to the VO studio and planning the workflow with the animation team. This involves a lot of spreadsheets, Miro boards, and multiple overlapping schedules. Despite the logistical challenges, it’s incredibly rewarding when recording starts and we see our nighttime Seattle residents come to unlife—sometimes in unexpected ways! A crucial step in the process is ensuring everyone involved understands the dialogue branches and character reactions to player choices, maintaining consistent performance across branches. Watching our VO Director and talented cast navigate these complex branches and deliver is truly inspiring. I feel incredibly fortunate to see this process through. It's exactly why I joined TCR: to bring engaging narratives to life. I’m thrilled for everyone to interact with these wonderful characters. I've experienced everything from laughter to shivers during some of the VO sessions, and I can’t wait for people to enjoy them just as much as I’ve enjoyed witnessing them.”
Summer’s here so we figured it’d be a good time to pull back the curtain a bit and show you how a game like Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 is made. This month we’ll give you a couple of glimpses into how the magic becomes a game. In this post we’re focusing on the atmosphere of the game: Concept Art, Level Design, Lighting and Audio.
Concept Art
“For quite a while the Concept Team was working on an Underground area - exploring mood and tone for that section of the game. It took quite a bit of time since it's incredibly detailed. Once everyone was happy with our concepts, we decided to move on to one of the core locations of our city: Weaver Tower, the headquarters of the Seattle Camarilla.
We already had a basic layout for this area, so we focused on the entrance hall first. This is a large and striking space and solving the architecture and lighting fit was a fun task for the Concept Team. After this, we moved onto secondary places like corridors and rooms. We used the Entrance Hall as a main reference for what we wanted to achieve.
Like every location, Weaver Tower needed some unique features. We wanted to have something both mysterious, yet ancient feeling. Naturally, the real world provides the best inspiration, and the meticulous care and time it takes for bonsai trees to develop is where we gravitated towards. However, we also wanted it to feel different. So by juxtaposing the organic form of the tree, we designed it to be made of thousands of brass wires seemingly erupting from a Smokey quartz. All of which was achieved in Unreal Engine 5 to really get an established idea of how these statues fit in the space and create the most impact for players. We hope you’ll enjoy browsing around these spaces!”
⁃ Text - Junior Concept Artist Isobel Hine. ⁃ Image 1 & 2 - Isobel Hine. ⁃ Image 3 – Lead Concept Artist Michele Nucera.
Level Design
“As a Level Designer, I love working on spaces that evoke a range of powerful emotional experiences for the player. I've been exploring how we can best achieve this, while collaborating with our other departments. I am very excited to see your reactions!
Recently I’ve been working on an early level in the game, where I focussed on how we can encourage player learning, and how we can help you to feel confident when playing our game. We also want to build levels that support a variety of playstyles, to make sure that you can play as your chosen Clan. As a Vampire, we want you to be able to embrace your supernatural movement options. Our levels have been carefully crafted in a way that will allow you to experiment and have fun with our traversal system, and in some places, be challenged.
I can’t wait for you all to play!”
⁃ Level Designer Amy Lee
“In Bloodlines 2 my main focus is to guide you through the cold and looming backdrop that our Design and Environment Art teams have meticulously crafted over the past few years. These quests, set in our nocturnal version of Seattle, allow you to delve into the lives of its many Kindred inhabitants. Taking place after pivotal moments in the main questline, these adventures will offer you the chance to explore Seattle at your own pace. You will be visiting its Clan leaders, keeping the competition at bay and making decisions that will affect the outcome of your journey as Phyre. These are stuffed with Narrative and lore and I'll be taking you from the depths of the underground to the snow-capped high-rise rooftops.
Having so many great moments of Bloodlines 2's story under my care has always felt like a big responsibility. I am happy to report however, that working with the Narrative team has been wonderful, and bouncing ideas off of them has been some of the most fun I've had here at TCR. I look forward to heading into the night with all of you all, but for now I have more public spaces to deface.”
⁃ Junior Level Designer Jack Goddard
Lighting
“Lighting plays a central role in reinforcing the style, atmosphere of – and most importantly, immersion into – a game world. It can elevate, transform and enrich a simple environment into something much more than the sum of its parts.
The original Bloodlines is iconic for its atmosphere and sense of nostalgia, in part due to how it aptly captured the cultures and attitudes felt at the turn of the millennium. With Bloodlines 2 we wanted our atmosphere to resonate through the same blood-soaked spectacles, but to show the world as it is now. These nights, many cities have undergone what would look from the outside like a glow-up. Things are shiny and new, flawless, stripped of anything that might bely their history and heritage. Not because we ourselves are flawless, but because we've become better at hiding our monstrosity. But the brighter the light, the darker the shadow. And the more vibrant that light, the more pressing the darkness that seeks to swallow it.
With this in mind, the tenets of Neo-Noir work hand-in-hand with our desire to create an atmosphere of deception and intrigue. Neo-Noir places a strong emphasis on silhouette, form and negative-space to create striking, stylish scenes that have an inviting yet threatening ambience. Seattle at night is a dangerous place with a diverse range of environments and districts all with their own unique personality. The Lighting team have been working hard to ensure these areas feel enticing, seductive and immersive.”
⁃ Senior Lighting Artist Freddie Pitcher
Narrative
“It is simply a tad too early to reveal what I’m working on right this minute, but I figured perhaps you’d enjoy hearing about how we as Writers create Ambience in games. Something perhaps players don’t think of much (means we did our job right!), but that is still a big part of the overall experience. “Ambients” are the sounds you hear in the game outside of roleplay conversations; this can range from short lines you might hear from a passing NPC to situation-specific enemy dialogue. They're a vital part of developing the game's soundscape to help it feel like a fully fleshed-out world.
It's a process that involves close communication between Level Design and Narrative Design. Getting the ambients right requires understanding every fight, every location, every NPC, and writing unique dialogue to fit. How many enemies are there in this fight? Do they all appear at once or do they come in waves? Why is that NPC here? If you lurk before approaching, can you learn their motivation? Does eavesdropping on them give you a hint for where to go next? What can you learn about the wider world by listening to them?
Ambients are a perfect opportunity for world building, we give each NPC their own personality and a brief look into their life, no matter how minor a part they play. So while it's fun for the player to get a glimpse into their world, ambients really reinforce just that: this is their world. So Phyre (and by extension, the player) is just a small part of it.
Our team mould these around the traversal of the world while accounting for various playstyles; a player who favours stealth might overhear an entire enemy conversation, while a player who prefers to brawl might jump right into the fray and cut off all but the first line. We then move on to implementing every piece just so, to ensure it triggers at exactly the right moment, giving the player an immersive experience that feels alive and natural.
Thanks a lot for reading about this part of game development!”
⁃ Games Writer Cherish Goldstraw
Sound
Hi, all! I've created a few behind the scenes videos showing the process of recording some of the sounds for VtM:B2. I used a variety of different microphone types and techniques to capture close detailed recordings of various textures which would work well for the blood and gore in BL2. I then processed these recordings to bring out the finer details of the sounds to help create a hyper-realistic sonic aesthetic for them bone-crunchy moments in the game.
