Much like everyone else, my first reaction to Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodhunt was one of confusion. I’m a big fan of the battle royale genre, but creating one based on Vampire: The Masquerade seemed like a weird decision considering how little of it focuses on combat. Combine that with the current oversaturation of battle royale and live service games, and you could say I was more than a little sceptical.
After getting the chance to play a few hours of Bloodhunt at the Sharkmob studios in Malmö, I can confidently say that it’s a surprisingly great battle royale with a clear reverence for its source material, stunning presentation, and smart tweaks to the formula that help to set it apart from the likes of Fortnite and PUBG.
Bloodhunt takes place in a virtual recreation of Prague just as a war between the different Vampire factions that inhabit the city is breaking out. My play session was mainly about getting to experience the gameplay, but Sharkmob made it clear how seriously it takes the series’ lore. Guns and parkour might seem like it’s going against the point of the Masquerade, but it was considered carefully enough that references are now made to it in the official fifth rulebook for the tabletop game, so it seems to be in good hands.
Being set in Prague immediately sets Bloodhunt apart from the rest of the pack. Rather than having one huge map set across several biomes, you’ve instead got one singular area that feels much more densely packed with an increased focus on verticality compared to others in the genre. The size and detail of the city combined with impressive animations, textures, and particle effects make Bloodhunt what Sharkmob likes to call “the first triple-A free-to-play”, and as rain floods down your vampire’s face as they leap through a cathedral window, it’s easy to see why.
All the pretty graphics in the world wouldn’t matter if Bloodhunt’s gameplay wasn’t up to the task, but thankfully that’s not the case. Rather than just running around with an AK47 and some potions, each player has different skills they can use depending on their class. There are seven at launch, including the Brute which acts as the base class with a skill that lets them leap forward, the Saboteur with the ability to vanish on command, and the Enforcer, a tank-like class that focuses on dealing damage up close.
Although some of these skills, like being able to leap long distances, do crossover between a few classes, on the whole, they do feel very distinct from one another. I had the most luck with the Enforcer, whose ability to shield themselves to tank any damage coming their way made them very dangerous at close range with a melee weapon. With these skills I’m excited to see where the meta goes and to see more skilled players take on some of the more unique classes like the Siren, a support class that can blind enemies and run away when the fight gets too much. Or at least, that’s what I tried to do with it.
Having characters with unique usable skills might seem like the big thing that sets Bloodhunt apart from the competition, but by far its strongest element is its movement systems. I’ve raved about how Fortnite recently let you mantle and slide, but Bloodhunt is on another level, letting you climb any surface you see by simply holding the jump button down next to it. Beyond just feeling really cool, being able to scope out the whole city from a rooftop before diving down into the streets below with zero fall damage is a great twist on things.
Bloodhunt makes a few changes to the battle royale that make it feel distinct from the rest outside of movement to boot. Rather than having a circle that slowly closes in on the map in a set pattern, Bloodhunt features red gas that twists and turns in different shapes around the arena, which keeps matches feeling distinct. There’s also the clever implementation of NPCs that can have their blood sucked to restore health and provide perks to the player like buffs to health, but at the risk of being spotted by other NPCs and causing everyone to be able to see the player on the map.
Another difference is that players can revive themselves when playing solo. Once knocked down, you’re given 15 seconds to recover and get back into the action. If you get killed whilst knocked, you’re also given another chance to fight through at least one respawn, which lets you be a bit more aggressive and experimental instead of admitting defeat after a single failure.
“Experimental” is the perfect word to describe Bloodhunt overall, and what made it feel so special when I got to play it – rather than just being a slightly darker battle royale, Sharkmob has altered the core tenets of the genre. I’m not sure things like self-reviving and the way the map changes here would work elsewhere, but from what I’ve played so far, I think they work for Bloodhunt.
Having said that, the main worries with live service games are whether they have enough content to sustain the player base and if the battle pass is worth the purchase. As someone who has experienced the highs of battle passes like Fortnite, as well as the absolute lows like Halo Infinite, Bloodhunt strikes a happy middle ground. You’re not going to be finding licensed characters anytime soon, but there are enough cool outfits and costumes in here to keep you going before the first big seasonal update rolls around.
As for whether Bloodhunt has enough meat on its bones, that’s incredibly tough to tell from only a few hours of play. Sharkmob is already developing content for the second season, days before the launch of the first, so I like to think it has a good idea of things to come, but the big worry comes from Prague. As greatly detailed and unique as Prague is, the amount of time and work that went into the city makes it feel like players who want a new map or map updates are going to be waiting a while.
Bloodhunt’s survival is going to depend on if a community rallies behind it and keeps playing. We’ve seen enough games try to enter the genre over the years to be a bit cautious, but Bloodhunt does enough differently and has its own niche crowd that I think it might be one to keep a close eye on. The best thing I can say about Bloodhunt is that I didn’t want to stop playing when my time with it was up. Even with a good few hours put into it, I still feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface of what it has to offer, which is a rare feeling for a genre that feels like it was cornered many years ago.
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