The original game's enemies were simple, as they combat scenarios with them had to work for players who valued stealth, others who preferred melee combat, those who wanted to get in gunfights, and other types of gameplay. While Hardsuit Labs is trying to have a more focused approach to combat, by keeping it limited to a first-person perspective, they still want to offer the variety the original game had. Schwarzer mentioned having different strategies and some approaches wouldn't be as effective to certain enemy types, like using ranged weapons against other vampires, but the player could always default to some of their vampire abilities, including the ability to drain an enemy's blood. 'But it isn't immediately as effective as going into close range, for example, and cutting them.' 'So attacking a vampire enemy with a ranged weapon is good for slowing them down,' Schwarzer said. Dealing with humans, who often come in numbers, will be different than fighting another vampire. Vampires absorb a set amount of damage before they start to get hurt. You'll deal more damage with melee weapons, like a crowbar, than humans and ranged weapons deal less damage to you due to an inherent capability called soak. Vampires are more durable and much stronger than humans, and the combat design reflects that.

Coupling your characters strength with quick movements based on forward motion, helped instill a feeling of power in the player. Playing a vampire, even a weak one when you first begin your adventure, should make fighting humans somewhat trivial. Schwarzer said that that mindset led to a focus on forward motion, speed of movement, and the power imbalance between humans and vampires. 'You are not a counter-terrorism specialist that needs to strap on a lot of gear, you are the badass.'

'The combat system in the sequel is primarily focused on the idea that you are the weapon,' Schwarzer said, adding that the feeling of being a vampire is the whole point of the game. While the writing is still the primary focus for a big part of the fandom, the teams at developer Hardsuit Labs and publisher Paradox Interactive are trying to rework the combat into something better while still keeping in line with the essence of the original game. Now, more than 15 years later, a sequel to Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines is coming in 2020. I think back then it was almost impossible.' I think if you do something like this today, you're going to have a hard time. 'That was on top of what this essentially a short distance wrestling system with the feeding mechanic on top of a fully articulate stealth game. Thanks to the Source engine, there was a rather competent shooter laid on top of this third-person type of perspective, which I think they had a hard time getting right,' Florian Schwarzer, senior producer at Paradox Interactive tells Gamasutra. 'They tried to do many things at the same time. Truncated development timelines, which also led to a hefty amount of bugs, didn't help the situation. Ranged weapons felt frustrating since accuracy was based on skill points instead of the player's actual aim, knockback felt unfair and happened often, and combat scenarios with multiple targets often ended in death for the player.

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