One of the most surprising announcements to come out of GDC this week is that Paradox Interactive and Harsuit Labs are creatingVampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2.It’s set to be a reactive first person RPG with several interesting open hubs in Seattle for players to explore. That being said, one typical RPG featureVampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2won’t include is a day/night cycle.
DualShockers asked Creative Director Martin Ka’ai Cluney about how time will progress throughout the story inVampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2.He revealed to us that while time will progress through the story, the development team chose not to include a day/night cycle in the game because there wasn’t enough to justify playing in the daytime “In terms of a day/night cycle, we just didn’t want to get into it. We didn’t feel like there was enough benefit to actually supporting it. You’re always there at night, you’re able to’t do anything in the day.”
This isn’t entirely uncommon, games likeBatman: Arkham Cityand the originalVampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlinesopted to take place entirely at night to benefit gameplay, aesthetics, and story. Vampires obviously can’t be out a lot during the day, so it could end up being quite boring if large chunks of time were dedicated to surviving in the daytime. Cluney described the game’s setting as “effectively always 1:30 in the morning.” He says this because as players are exploring Seattle they will see that “everyone’s in bed, bars are still open, but it’s too late for anyone to really do much.”
Like I previously mentioned, time will progress throughout the story ofVampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2. “We do have ways to push you through the story. You can go to sleep…and sometimes things will happen while you’re sleeping. Other times, you’ll need to sleep, vampires need rest too,” Cluney told DualShockers. “So there is no day-night cycle, but we are very much pushing you through time, if not always pushing you through the story. "
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2will release for PC, PS4, and Xbox One in Q1 2020. If you need a refresher on the game, you can check out its reveal trailer below.
