I’m surprised at the general ill acclaim this game has; surprise born both out of the quality I feel is inherent in the breadth of the game as well as the reach and size of the scorn against Vampyr, despite it being a AA game at largest and having very little penetrated the vitriolic spheres that hammer on the taller nails of any game with any features telling any story for any reason. Seeing the game somewhat consistently evaluated as a mediocre affair for reasons, other than bugginess, which I cannot comment on for fact that I never was even once a victim of a bug that I could notice or that impeded play, which either did not seem to me to be negative, or even worth special mention, or which even improved my experience is baffling. Vampyr is not a game taking enormous swings aiming for radical design home runs or strike outs but a game which tried to sand off the brusque and enormous open world RPG mechanics of the 2010s to modify and evaluate within their dialogue and management simulation, which itself was rudimentary for purposes of evening the play experience (likely due to various VO budgets and writing specificity). Vampyr is not a game which is tediously repetitive in impartation of necessity to continuance: the most obvious friction point for boredom is the combat (which I’ll get to), a system which purposefully delivers completely negligible XP and which can be bypassed with level 1 powers or mere running. I’m happy to admit that avoidance as such is in no way more fun than simply running through the 30 second brawls, but in almost every single instance of combat, Jonathan has already been running to and fro and avoiding the combat is more a continuance of whatever was already motivating the play at any given time. The writing, while spoken fast and loose with the period speech, is sufficient for the generic hamminess and melodrama, sacrificing neither character investment from the PC in his patients and city nor mutuality between NPCs and their world - to find this dialogue tedious would be to, I imagine, find the idea of Zola’s or Balzac’s or Dickens’ entire projects tedious, which is to say, the entirety of the thrust behind the social fiction of the 18-1900s. The art direction is no great shakes but as far as the Gothic Industrial Londons of the world go, I very much doubt that the board for their quality assurance would get in such up at arms over Vampyr’s setting and situations as to ensure that it is spoken of badly. All in all, while nothing herein flaunts magisterial brilliance, I find no qualms of enormous drudgery to be reputable to the experience I had with the game.
But, of course, I actually do know why people don’t very much love this game. The writing, while on an individual basis between interactors is legitimately compelling in a soap opera cum Hammerstein Horror kind of way, is axelled on a narrative arc compelling every interaction on the macro level toward a messy and unimaginative of its use of setting and character, telling a story which in no serious way confronts the life of London we have seen and bled in (and leeched off of), forgoing the ideals of a played, which are at best when found in both the menus detailing the failures of Jonathan to remain human in ways that matter and in the conversations of those who are unaware of the predilections forcing the good doctor along, and instead railroading instead the ideals of boss fight mandates. Of course this is made most obvious in the romance with Elisabeth: it was savvy of the devs to make this the fulcrum on which your ‘morality’ rests - it is a simple calculation on a single axis for which narry more than a day or two of work needs be put for its function to serve. However, obvious in the contra as well, is that many players are not investing the time in Elisabeth because she does not encourage any mechanical investment (which isn’t to say for XP or lore, but because after the first act, she cannot be operated within the machine of district politics or conversation confidencing, disallowing her from being engaged with using the actual format of the narrative: play).
The combat as well is deserving of some consternation expressed toward it. It has a modicum of depth that allows for both a more Bloodborne like aggression of rushing down and stagger-training as well as a more Dark Souls like defensive style of play that can be slowly played out both at short and medium range. There is build variety across the RPG skill tree that cannot possibly be climbed to all branches without killing a great deal of your citizens, something which most players will be discouraged from doing. The minute to minute combat engages in a visceral way; enemies have easily recognizable animations, as does Jonathan, the weapons feel legitimately dangerous and differently cut, and every power has the possibility to turn the edge. However, to need to specialize in a build, much less max out the tree, is so laughably unnecessary that the game’s insistence about the fastest way to level up if one is struggling seems to say exactly the opposite of its intended message. After hitting level 10, which happens about ⅕ of the way through the game, I didn’t once die and battered my way through every encounter with one of the first weapons I found in the game. I rarely felt the need to use my powers and only did so for the joy of seeing different animations, as the swing of a cudgel is far less vampiric that erupting pools of viscera. What I said earlier about running through enemy encounters was a suggestion at the barely necessary: to kill a level 30 enemy was a quick 3-second affair of two button taps.
Even so, with complaints to the game’s general doughiness acknowledged, I can’t help but be a bit sweet on it. It’s scrappy. It’s doe eyed. It made me want to watch a few vampire movies after finishing it to get more of the flavour, because that iron taste was put in my mouth by what would be called in another medium a great amateur cuisine. I have no ill will towards Vampyr, probably in part because I played the game for free on Epic. But even for $30, I would have been happy to been bitten.
But, of course, I actually do know why people don’t very much love this game. The writing, while on an individual basis between interactors is legitimately compelling in a soap opera cum Hammerstein Horror kind of way, is axelled on a narrative arc compelling every interaction on the macro level toward a messy and unimaginative of its use of setting and character, telling a story which in no serious way confronts the life of London we have seen and bled in (and leeched off of), forgoing the ideals of a played, which are at best when found in both the menus detailing the failures of Jonathan to remain human in ways that matter and in the conversations of those who are unaware of the predilections forcing the good doctor along, and instead railroading instead the ideals of boss fight mandates. Of course this is made most obvious in the romance with Elisabeth: it was savvy of the devs to make this the fulcrum on which your ‘morality’ rests - it is a simple calculation on a single axis for which narry more than a day or two of work needs be put for its function to serve. However, obvious in the contra as well, is that many players are not investing the time in Elisabeth because she does not encourage any mechanical investment (which isn’t to say for XP or lore, but because after the first act, she cannot be operated within the machine of district politics or conversation confidencing, disallowing her from being engaged with using the actual format of the narrative: play).
The combat as well is deserving of some consternation expressed toward it. It has a modicum of depth that allows for both a more Bloodborne like aggression of rushing down and stagger-training as well as a more Dark Souls like defensive style of play that can be slowly played out both at short and medium range. There is build variety across the RPG skill tree that cannot possibly be climbed to all branches without killing a great deal of your citizens, something which most players will be discouraged from doing. The minute to minute combat engages in a visceral way; enemies have easily recognizable animations, as does Jonathan, the weapons feel legitimately dangerous and differently cut, and every power has the possibility to turn the edge. However, to need to specialize in a build, much less max out the tree, is so laughably unnecessary that the game’s insistence about the fastest way to level up if one is struggling seems to say exactly the opposite of its intended message. After hitting level 10, which happens about ⅕ of the way through the game, I didn’t once die and battered my way through every encounter with one of the first weapons I found in the game. I rarely felt the need to use my powers and only did so for the joy of seeing different animations, as the swing of a cudgel is far less vampiric that erupting pools of viscera. What I said earlier about running through enemy encounters was a suggestion at the barely necessary: to kill a level 30 enemy was a quick 3-second affair of two button taps.
Even so, with complaints to the game’s general doughiness acknowledged, I can’t help but be a bit sweet on it. It’s scrappy. It’s doe eyed. It made me want to watch a few vampire movies after finishing it to get more of the flavour, because that iron taste was put in my mouth by what would be called in another medium a great amateur cuisine. I have no ill will towards Vampyr, probably in part because I played the game for free on Epic. But even for $30, I would have been happy to been bitten.