Publisher Paradox Interactive and developer The Chinese Room have published a new dev diary for Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2. The dev diary goes into how The Chinese Room will be picking up development for the game.
05.09.2023 - 00:23 / thesixthaxis.com / New
Paradox interactive has re-announce Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, now with The Chinese Room taking over as the game’s developer.
Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 is now expected to launch in Autumn 2024 across PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC.
The pitch and story for Bloodlines 2 has now shifted compared to the originally revealed version of the game. Still set in Seattle, there’s a three-way power struggle for power in the Vampire Court, and in an intriguing shift, players will take on the role of an elder vampire, which sounds like a gateway to unleashing plenty of fun vampire powers on hapless lesser beings.
Paradox chose to reboot the game’s development in 2021, and has now revealed that The Chinese Room have taken on the challenge. The studio built up its reputation for excellent storytelling across “walking sims” Dear Esther, Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture, as well as the cult horror game Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs. They’re also working on a new horror game set on an oil rig called Still Wakes the Deep.
However, this is a very different studio compared to a the mid-2010s. In 2017, the Brighton-based studio went into stasis as they were between projects, and were later acquired by Sumo Digital in August 2018. Co-founder Dan Pinchbeck took the role of creative director, with the studio re-staffing with Ed Daly as studio director and John McCormack as art director, however Pinchbeck has now departed the studio as of July 17th 2023.
Still, there’s a lot of reputation built around the name (even if they’re now a Ship of Theseus), and with Sumo Digital’s resources behind them and years to build up, there’s bound to be expectations they can marry storytelling with more action-oriented RPG gaming. Here’s a little more on the team within The Chinese Room that are making the game.
Announced in March 2019, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 was originally in the hands of Seattle-based Hardsuit Labs, the studio having pitched the game shortly after Paradox Interactive acquired White Wolf and the World of Darkness IP in October 2015. Intended for release in 2020, Paradox delayed the game as the team adapted to working through the pandemic, faced a delay in receiving PS5 and Xbox Series X|S dev kits, and more fundamentally, had changes in leadership. Creative Director Ka’ai Cluney and narrative lead Brian Mitsoda were both shown the door, and senior writer Cara Ellison departed soon after, all with little explanation.
Then, in February 2021, Paradox announced that Hardsuit was no longer working on the game and that they would be collaborating with another developer to finish it up. Who that developer is is actually still unknown, though Paradox CEO Fredrik Wester said at the time that it is “a very
Publisher Paradox Interactive and developer The Chinese Room have published a new dev diary for Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2. The dev diary goes into how The Chinese Room will be picking up development for the game.
Following the surprise news earlier that Paradox Interactive's beleaguered Vampire: The Masquerade — Bloodlines 2 is now in the hands of Everybody's Gone to the Rapture and Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs studio The Chinese Room, the developer has talked a little about its goals for the rejuvenated project, saying it's building its action around 'doing things only a vampire can'.
Intimidating shadows looming near wish to snap your sanity, adventurer. Will you waver in their presence?
Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines 2 recently received (September 2023) some news regarding its targeted release, having been moved over to a new development studio. The game was initially supposed to be released all the way back in March 2020, but after several delays, the project appears to have been refocused somewhat.
The Chinese Room's rebooted version of Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 won't be an immersive sim like Hardsuit Labs' version of the game was said to be.
The Kirin 9000S found in Huawei’s latest flagship smartphone, the Mate 60 Pro 5G, would not have been possible without the involvement of SMIC, a Chinese chipmaker that leveraged its second-generation 7nm process to mass produce the SoC. However, one U.S. congressman believes that stricter sanctions should be placed on both SMIC and Huawei as the trade between them should not have happened.
There's been much secrecy regarding Vampire: The Masquerade — Bloodlines 2, the sequel to the 2004 cult favorite vampire RPG. First announced in 2019—with the original creatives returning for the sequel—work on that game hit a roadblock, and a creative and developer shakeup was announced in 2021.
Everybody's Gone to the Rapture team The Chinese Room has been confirmed as the new studio behind the troubled Vampire: The Masquerade — Bloodlines 2, with an updated release window set for late 2024. It's unclear how much of the work original developer Hardsuit Labs put into the project will carry over into the final version, but you can catch a new trailer above.
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 has risen from the depths of development hell, two years after Paradox Interactive parted ways with the game's former developer, Hardsuit Labs, and delayed the game indefinitely. The publisher has since recruited Dear Estherand Everybody’s Gone to the Rapturestudio The Chinese Room to work on the sequel to the original RPG from 2004. Bloodlines 2 is now set to arrive in fall 2024.
Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines had a cult following, and for years, it didn’t look like the game would see a new installment. However, that changed just a few years ago with publisher Paradox Interactive working with the studio Hardsuit Labs. This team would bring out a new thrilling installment with players tossed into a war filled with legions of vampires. Details were a bit scarce, but the studio was full steam ahead for getting this game out into the marketplace. However, it all fell apart a couple of years ago.
Paradox Interactive recently re-revealed Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, confirming that the action RPG is now being developed by The Chinese Room (Dear Esther, Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture). Of course, until early 2021, the studio in charge of the project was Hardsuit Labs, before being taken off it due to behind-the-scenes development issues– however, the project wasn’t rebooted and started from scratch.
When Paradox Interactive announced in early 2021 that Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 had been indefinitely delayed, with developer Hardsuit Labs being taken off the project, many feared the worst, with questions being asked about whether the game would even see the light of day. After all, after the decision was made to take Hardsuit Labs off development, the game almost ended up getting cancelled.