While the future of the precarious, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 is unforeseen, a new report claims that the highly anticipated RPG was almost canceled before being handed over to another development studio. Bloodlines 2 has faced a rocky development cycle since its announcement in 2019 and the title was setback twice before being indefinitely delayed and worked on by an unknown second studio in February.

Announced as the sequel to one of the greatest RPGs of all time, Bloodlines 2 promised to keep the core idea of The Masquerade series and expand it with new characters, factions, RPG elements, and a new location set in Seattle that shared the same universe with the World of Darkness. The only thing the title has shared so far, however, is that it’s received an ill-fated development cycle similar to its predecessor. Developed by original creators of the Fallout series after separating from Interplay, Troika Game hastily released the original Bloodlines incomplete after multiple deadlines and cost overruns. This lead to the studio’s demise, as the vampire RPG received criticism for its technical problems and extremely underperformed during its initial release, before becoming a cult favorite years later.

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In a new interview with Swedish website Avanza earlier this month, (via PC Gamer) CEO Fredrik Wester revealed that Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 was almost canceled by Paradox Interactive earlier this year. Wester stated there was a long discussion within the company if development should continue and after Hardsuit Labs was removed from the title the publisher was prepared to permanently shut down the project. Fortunately, another team made a promising pitch with formidable ideas for the sequel. Although the executive chairman hasn’t publicly announced which studio is developing Bloodlines 2 at the moment, he noted that the new developer was “very reputable and talented” and that Paradox Interactive had faith that the new studio would meet fan expectations even if the title “has a while left.“

Vampire: The Masquerade originally started as a tabletop role-playing game and spawned numerous adaptations including novels, collectible cards, and live-action role-playing games, as well as numerous video games developed by different studios. Besides the Bloodlines series, The Masquerade franchise has seen a handful of more games, with the latest, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodhunt introducing Battle Royale and tasking players to exterminate other vampires to survive the sect war.

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It’s not clear when Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 will be released but players can now raise their expectations once again. What once started as a sequel quickly became unfortunate, luckily a new competent studio has taken over and could make the long-awaited sequel superior to its predecessor.

Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 is currently in development for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

Source: PC Gamer

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Samed Kadirogullari
(281 Articles Published)

Sam is a narrative designer and writer from Florida. Having studied game design and comms, he loves to keep up with industry news, work on indie projects and talk about retro gaming. You can follow him on Twitter @scriptslash

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