Let me start by saying I know very little about Vampire: The Masquerade and I don’t play visual novels. But all three Vampire: The Masquerade visual novels went on sale as a bundle for $5 so I figured I could give them a try. Now I want to share my thoughts.

The first game, Coteries of New York was a good introduction to the trilogy for me. I think it set the right expectations. I got to enter a name I wanted my character to be called and I got to pick between 3 different vampire clans. I don’t know how much variation there really was in the story, but the game made me feel like I was roleplaying. That is, the game might give me a choice between “be a jerk” and “be polite” and even though either answer would result in me obtaining the same information, it felt like I had agency. The game also ended on a bit of a cliffhanger so I was curious to see where the story would go next. I was surprisingly impressed by my first visual novel experience and was interested to continue.

The next game, Shadows of New York was a total letdown in comparison. Suddenly I don’t get to pick a name, I don’t get to pick a clan, and instead I have to follow this one specific character’s story. Also, rather than giving me a choice between three dialog options anytime a character talked to me, this character always responded on her own. Most of the time when I was given a choice, the result didn’t even matter. Like, I’d get to choose what she said to herself as inner monologue but not what she said out loud. Or when given a choice for what to say out loud, my choices were: “What?”, “…What?”, or “Huh?”. So my decision was irrelevant. At the end of the story, my character left the city behind to start her new life with her girlfriend. And I got the “Bad Ending” achievement. I wasn’t sure how “they lived happily ever after” was a bad ending so I had to google what I did wrong. Apparently during the game I was given 3 actual choices of what to do. If I chose to hold onto my humanity, this resulted in the “bad” ending. Instead, if I decided to be a jerk and step on everyone in my path, the girlfriend would die but the main character would gain a seat of power. And since I was told her vampire clan were a bunch of back-stabbing self-centered jerks, I apparently didn’t roleplay the character “correctly”. Bullshit. I don’t know much about V:tM but I’m pretty sure a major aspect of it is how long you can hold onto your humanity. So I didn’t like this game. The story was fine, but it felt like I had less agency in the game.

The third game, Reckoning of New York, was a bit of a mix between the two. The character’s name and clan was picked for me again, but I was given more actual choices that once again made me feel like I had agency. Except there’s only one ending to this game so my choices didn’t actually matter. Weird. The story is about two characters who were assigned to each other at the beginning of the game and after you finish it, you unlock the ability to play the game again as the other character. I read online that apparently this other character’s storyline can have two endings but I didn’t feel like replaying the entire game from someone else’s perspective just to see how it could turn out differently. I guess I could watch a youtube video of the endings, but I don’t actually care that much.

Overall, I have mixed feelings about the trilogy. I very quickly got used to a text-only adventure (no voice work at all) and I liked the artwork shown as you moved through the story. Plus, the stories were engaging enough that I was interested in finishing all three games. They’re only loosely connected though. In the second game, they mention a weird vampire from a year ago who did some things then disappeared. And that’s all the resolution we get from the first game’s storyline. Then in the third game, they apparently took the “Good Ending” of the second game because the character you played as is now at a seat of power. That’s fine I guess; they had to pick one of the endings to stick with. But this means the only real connection between the games were basically easter eggs so you could play any of the three games in isolation and not lose anything. The first game is definitely the best though.

You can buy the entire trilogy as a bundle, which regularly goes on sale for 85% off. At 4-5 hours of gameplay per game, I don’t regret my time (or money) spent. Also, it looks like a new V:tM visual novel will be released later this year, Oaths & Ashes. I’ll probably play that too when it goes on sale. So despite my mixed feelings on this trilogy as a whole, I’m still interested in V:tM and visual novels in general to play more of them.