Mortismal Gaming reviewed Vampyr:

Vampyr - Review After 100%

loading...

Thanks Redglyph!

DSOGaming reports that Vampyr has sold more than 1 million copies.

Focus Home Interactive and DONTNOD Entertainment have announced that Vampyr, the first game of their partnership, has sold more than a million copies to this date. As such, the companies have decided to renew their partnership.

[...]

According to the press release, DONTNOD will be working on a really ambitious new project (which will be obviously published by Focus Home).

Gopher checked out the adventure RPG Vampyr:

Vampyr Review

loading...

A story mode review for Vampyr from The Indie Game Website.

...

It’s nice to know the game hasn’t been forgotten considering DONTNOD’s flagship Life is Strange 2 just released. Last year they made it clear that if Vampyr was successful they would only make a sequel, not DLC. Hopefully, their continued updates are a sign of enough interest in the title that a sequel is a possibility.

Regardless of DONTNOD’s original intention, it should be commended when a developer adds more options for their game to be enjoyed by as many people as possible. They could have simply moved on and forgotten about it. Vampyr still has its problems, but it’s regularly available on sale now so there’s no better time to pick it up.

Thanks Farflame!

Some new difficulty modes for Vampyr.

Vampyr - Difficulty modes update announcement

21 September - chaton

 

Vampyr: Difficulty modes update out next week on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC

DONTNOD Entertainment’s narrative-driven action-RPG Vampyr continues to receive ongoing support, as the difficulty modes update releases next week, September 26, on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. There’s never been a better time for players to sink their teeth in, as a special discount on Steam for Vampyr is now live in celebration of the Focus Home Publisher’s weekend.

https://store.steampowered.com/sale/focus_weekend

Tuesday’s update includes two new game difficulty modes which add further replayability for existing players, and more options for those who haven’t yet sunk their teeth into this dark adventure through 1918 London.

Story Mode de-emphasizes combat, placing a greater focus on narrative so players can enjoy Dr. Jonathan Reid’s journey with less challenging gameplay. On the other end of the scale, Hard Mode makes combat much more difficult. Players will receive less experience from killing enemies too, forcing them to rely even more on embracing citizens to grow in power. Upon starting a new game, players will be given the option to choose from these two new modes or a third ‘Normal Mode’ if they wish to play the original Vampyr experience.

In addition to the new difficulty modes, the upcoming update introduces a host of optimization tweaks and fixes. Nvidia Ansel will also be made available for PC, which allows players to capture beautiful in-game screenshots, viewing and sharing them in 3D on mobile phone, PC or VR Headset. View the full patchnotes here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/427290/discussions/0/1735462352502320808

 

Lasting 5 days, from September 20 until September 24, enjoy a special discount on Steam for Vampyr, along with over 50 other original Focus Home titles at up to 85% off!

Vampyr is out now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. To order the game and for more details, visit http://vampyr-game.com/

Thanks Couchpotato!

PCGamesN reports that Vampyr will be getting new difficulty modes in an upcoming content update. Vampyr is currently 25% off on Steam until 30th July.

Whether you like your vampires hard or soft, Vampyr is about to have you covered with a new set of difficulty options. A content update coming later in the summer will offer new modes at both ends of the difficulty spectrum, giving you a way to either dive deeper into the game systems or step back from the mechanics in order to better focus on the narrative.

[...]

PCGamesN reports that Vampyr has sold close to half a million in a month.

Vampyr, the gothic action-RPG from Life is Strange developer Dontnod, has sold 450,000 copies since its release on June 4. That figure is across all formats - so Xbox One, PS4, and PC via Steam - but it's still pretty good going for a mid-sized game from a studio whose biggest hit until now was a quirky episodic adventure.

[...]

Thanks Farflame!

Pro Gamer has reviewed Vampyr:

Vampyr Review

Around in the gaming scene, we do tend to get a lot of RPG games however not many that are vampire related. A lot of vampire games tend to die quickly without much thought and forgotten about but a fair few do shine through and have a cult following. You have the Legacy of Kain series, a massive series and a fan favourite for sure. Me being one of those fanboys and will be biased saying this is the best vampire games, however, a lot will say you have Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines. A lot of back and forth but you get the idea of not many vampire games out there to shine through. Now we have Vampyr, a new take on a vampire game on modern consoles with up to scratch graphics.

The first time I had seen Vampyr was actually a Facebook advert and this is where I see a lot of games that tend to go under the radar but actually have a lot of potential. One look at the trailer for Vampyr I was sold so I followed it all the way up to release hoping, maybe getting my hopes up, about Vampyr.

[...]

Vampyr is legit a vampire simulator. It’s a game about living life as a vampire fighting in a war of 2 worlds. You manage your blood levels, your stamina and others to become the ultimate vampire really. While on paper, Vampyr is an RPG vampire game, it’s literally just that but a good one. A lot of vampire games lose this and create their own originally but let’s be honest, we’ve waited a long time for a great vampire game and we finally have one. No over dramatics, no new origins stories. Everything we know and love as a kid of having a fear of vampires is here and you can play it. Vampyr could actually be the best vampire game out there.

Score: 8/10

MrMattyPlays checked out Vampyr:

Vampyr REVIEW - Hope For Single Player RPGs

loading...

After chipping through two playthroughs since the game dropped, I'm here to tell you this is another game restoring my hope in single player RPGs.

Vampyr has received its first patch.

We're happy to release Vampyr's first update!

Thanks for your help last week with the Beta patch to ensure a smooth release today. This first update mainly contains bug fixes of issues you reported in the past weeks, as well as a few features suggested here.

We continue to read your feedback and suggestions in forums and social networks and you can expect bigger patches in the coming months.

Please find the changelog below:

New Features:

• Walk can now be used as a held input or a toggled input.
• The Recovering Icon is now properly displayed when a citizen is healing

Fixes:

• Switching targets can now be done with the mouse wheel.
• During the cutscene between Dorothy and Darius, Dorothy will now properly be shown. A new playthrough is needed for this.
• Fixed an issue where Sean Hampton was stuck in a chair while reloading during certain dialogues.
• Fixed an issue where spoiler characters would incorrectly spawn.
• Fixed an issue where Tom Watts’s sidequest would be blocked while performing a medical checkup mid-choice
• Fixed an issue where players were able to escape the map in Southwark
• Optimised the in-game menus
• Fixed an issue where in-game and in-menu serum icons were inverted.
• Fixed an issue where players were unable to change inventory page using KB/M
• Green flickering should no longer occur
• Fixed an issue where Camelia’s dialogue would stay locked, even with all hints unlocked.
• Various other fixes

City A.M. checked out Vampyr:

Vampyr review: Dontnod's open world action RPG shows a more sociable side to the creatures of the night

Vampyr is an open world action RPG in which you, a doctor specialising in blood transfusions, are unexpectedly turned into a vampire. It’s a painfully ironic transformation that every character in the game can’t help but repeatedly comment on.

The setting is a Victorian-ish London crippled by the outbreak of Spanish Flu – all cobbled streets, jellied eels and corpse piles – and your goal is to find the vampire who turned you, in the hopes of returning to some kind of normal life. And if along the way you happen to become embroiled in a war between London’s secret paranormal factions, all the better.

[...]

Combat is clunky, and the environments – while necessarily dark given your character’s aversion to sunlight – are grey and lacklustre. Look past the rough edges and there’s an interesting game to be found here, one about a chatty Nosferatu and a city full of unexpectedly deep characters.

Score: 3/5

Some more reviews for Vampyr:

• IndianNoob: Vampyr Review (PC) Noobreview - Warm Blood, Cold Heart Score: 8/10
• Redbrick: Review: Vampyr
• Capsule Computers: Vampyr review Score: 8/10

Geek Dad checked out Vampyr:

[...]

My Thoughts on Vampyr

I am a lover of atmospheric games, so Vampyr is right up my alley. (Pun intended.) After playing Bloodborne for over a hundred hours, I have been searching for a game that would put me into a similar world, and Vampyr has done so. During play, you can build your character through a sophisticated collection of skill trees. Players will also craft weapons to help them stave off a large group of beasts. Some reviewers have complained the graphics in Vampyr feel as though they came from the previous generation of consoles, but I felt that they were simply an artistic choice and did not affect my enjoyment of the game at all.

There are some slow load times, but, once again, I felt that it was a minor issue. For an AA game, it has a lot of polish and sophistication and can compete with many AAA games when you compare gameplay and mood. The music in Vampyr also adds to the immersive experience. There are roughly 30 hours of gameplay to complete the main storyline, but there is an abundance of side quests to expand gameplay. With all of the side quests, I never felt as if I was mired in fetch quests that felt hollow and were used to pad out the game time. Learning and using vampiric powers made me feel like a dark superhero, which was fun and satisfying.

[...]

Score: 8.5

Some more reviews for Vampyr.

TrustedReviews

Vampyr might not be what many wanted after Life Is Strange, but it’s still an enjoyable – well, as enjoyable as its grim nature allows – game nonetheless. It follows the modern action RPG template almost to a fault, but the agency the player has in shaping the districts by disease control and straight up murder is a lot more interesting than some of the moments in other games within the genre, where they present you a binary choice that pushes the plot forward. It’s a decent idea holding up an otherwise solid game, but overall Vampyr is worth a look if you’re looking for something to plug the gap in your life in this post- Witcher 3 world.

Quillstreak

As reluctant as I am to suggest yet another game should just do what Assassin’s Creed does, I’m inclined to say that if you swapped all the neck-stabbing animations in Syndicate for neck-biting ones you’d end up with something more like what Vampyr feels like it should be. I don’t feel like a vampire playing this game. I feel like a wooden doll trudging through the world, having fixed-eye-contact conversations with half the other dolls (we didn’t ditch that after Oblivion?) and bouncing off the rest with a hatchet. There’s room in the market for a game like Vampyr, but this game isn’t it. This one could do with staying put in the coffin.

Screenrant

Vampyr, though, is an extremely ambitious game from an independent developer who strived to do something different. And in that, it succeeded: Vampyr isn't really like any other title out there. Sure, players won't make any emotional connections to the characters of this game like they did with Life Is Strange. There is also just too much going on for it to feel cohesive. But the game itself, in its novelty, still often proves entertaining. And who doesn't like stepping into the shoes of a creature of the night?

Thanks Farflame!

The Verge has reviewed Vampyr:

Vampyr is a gothic RPG that makes you feel guilty for killing

Sacrifice strength for stories

Vampyr is the rare game that encouraged me not to kill its virtual denizens. It’s not that it isn’t tempting at times, but their deaths mean I’ll miss out on some amazing stories.

The game puts you in the role of a World War I-era surgeon named Jonathan Reid, back home in London after serving in France, only to discover that he has become a vampire. He happens upon this discovery in the most unfortunate fashion: his thirst for blood causes him to attack the first person he sees — his sister, come to welcome him home from the war.

Eventually Reid gets a job on the night shift at a hospital, where he’s able to cloak his undead identity, search for answers about his new status, and also continue to help people as he did before. But as a bloodthirsty vampire, this creates a dilemma: everyone in London is also a source of food. As Jonathan you have to decide whether to kill people around you and become more powerful, or spare them to alleviate your conscious, but make the game harder. It turns out I’m a bad vampire — despite the benefits, I don’t want to kill anybody.
[...]
It’s not the state of London or the sense of guilt that keeps me from killing people, though. When you end someone’s life, you also end their stories, which means you’re missing out on the best part of Vampyr. I need to find out the mysterious backstory of the barmaid Sabrina Cavendish, and what happens with the torrid relationship between the gruff ambulance driver and a perpetually sick nurse. I’m not really enjoying the combat in Vampyr, or its needlessly fussy crafting system, or the unyielding gloom that can make it feel stressful just to walk around. Those narratives are what keep me going. Even if it means the game will be a little bit harder, I’m not going to lose them.

TechRaptor has reviewed Vampyr:

Vampyr Review - A Penny Dreadful (PlayStation 4)

Morality in games is something of an old trick by now. Especially in RPGs, the days of a binary choice system are long gone. Many players look for something more complex and dynamic, but most games fail to deliver on that promise. Worse still, fewer games can provide that complexity through game mechanics. Vampyr, the latest game by Dontnod Entertainment, tries to marry that proposition together. You play Dr. Jonathan Reid, a WWI army doctor who recently returned to London during the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic. Unfortunately, Reid was also turned into a vampire. Through the course of the game, you begin to unravel the horrific origins of the epidemic in a desperate struggle to cure those of the disease, while you hunger for blood.

The big selling point of Vampyr is the moral quandary Reid finds himself in. Reid’s inner conflict sees him pulled between two worlds; his humane, doctor side and his now monstrous, vampiric side. The game cleverly makes Reid a doctor to uphold a sense of authority in investigating the epidemic and give players a chance to heal and help the sick.

[...]

Summary

Vampyr has a lot of good ideas, but its execution is sorely lacking in most areas. It is a game that is competent in terms of its systems, but ultimately fairly boring to play.

Pros

• Excellent Morality/Mechanics Implementation...
• Interesting Premise...
• Strong Musical Score...
• Doesn't Do Anything Wrong...

Cons

• ...That Can Be Exploited Too Easily.
• ...With a Mediocre Narrative.
• ...Bland Graphics.
• ...But It is Really Boring to Play Through.

Vampyr has now been released on Steam and the reviews have started showing up.

PCGamesN

What’s struck me most about my time with Vampyr is that it manages to turn you into a predator through its mechanics as much as it does with its storytelling. It does collapse under its own weight by the end, but the fact that it so effectively seduces you, almost trance-like, into roleplaying a villain makes it worth biting into.

RockPaperShotgun

I’m frustrated that Vampyr falls just short of truly combining a smart choose-your-own-adventure game with a meaty action one. It’ll never happen, but a director’s cut that thins the sombre exposition and eases the medical busywork, injects more pep, and makes decisions decisions, rather than often either a roulette wheel or a railroaded path, would create a dream combination of darkness and light. Nonetheless, as a sprawling midnight world of tight fights and atmospheric exploration, this is a fat vein I keep returning to.

Eurogamer

Pressing in the left stick on consoles triggers Jonathan Reid's Vampire Sense, which renders the world as he sees it, in black and white save for the liberal splashings of blood that line London's darkened streets, and the bright beating hearts of the everyday folk he has promised to protect. But had Vampyr taken time to fully flesh out all those moral grey areas for the rich narrative vein they presented, rather than treat them as a resource to prop up an unremarkable combat system, it could have been a pretty special game. As it is, even with lashings of the red stuff, Vampyr ends up decidedly beige.

PC Gamer

There’s a lot of interesting, high concept stuff in Vampyr, and I love how Dontnod has used the tropes of vampire fiction to create a simulation of life as a vampire. London makes for an atmospheric setting, with buildings looming ominously through the fog and a dark, oppressive feel to the cobbled streets. But it feels like a game at odds with itself, veering wildly from compelling, dialogue-driven storytelling, to flat, uninspiring action, and back again. I never really fell in love with Reid either, a grim, relentlessly self-serious chap whose charisma seems to have been sucked out of him along with his humanity.

DSOGaming reports that Vampyr has a launch trailer.

Focus Home Interactive has released the launch trailer for its narrative-driven action-RPG, Vampyr, which releases next week on June 5th. In Vampyr you play as Dr. Jonathan Reid, a famous surgeon and blood transfusion specialist freshly turned into a vampire after arriving back in his home city of London following the Great War.

[...]

loading...

DSOGaming reports that Vampyr will not have Denuvo.

Focus Home Interactive and DONTNOD have confirmed – via the game’s official Twitter account – that Vampyr will not be using the Denuvo anti-tamper tech. The game has already gone Gold and will release as scheduled, on June 5th.

[...]

DSOGaming reports that Vampyr has gone gold.

Focus Home Interactive has announced that DONTNOD’s action RPG, Vampyr, has gone Gold and will release as scheduled, on June 5th. Players will assume the role of Jonathan Reid; a doctor in 1918 London newly-turned into a vampire following his return from the Great War.

[...]

A new trailer for Vampyr about becoming the monster.

loading...

Thanks Farflame!

@well-played Interview with a Vampyr developer.

WP: In 2017 the game was delayed due to ‘technical issues’. Are you able to expand on that at all? How much of a benefit has the extra development time been?

SB: This delay allowed us enough time to finish up the polishing and balancing phase, much needed for a game of Vampyr’s scope.

WP: Both of your previous games featured female leads, was there a particular reason for going with a male lead in Vampyr?

SB: Yes. It was illegal at the time for a woman to be a doctor in England. Since our main character was an English surgeon and blood transfusion specialist who just came back from the war, he had to be male.

WP: From a writing perspective, what are the major differences in writing for a male lead as opposed to a female lead? If any.

SB: I don’t see any major difference. In a narrative game, consistency is the key feature to create an interesting character: consistency of flaws, attitudes and psychological traits. Otherwise you are just creating cliché or archetypal characters, and that’s almost never a good option for a lead. Thus, when you write down the character sheet of a hero or heroine, it is less a question of gender than a question of inner coherence and resonance.

WP: We see that Reid is conflicted between his desire for blood and his upholding of the Hippocratic Oath, so as a player we get to choose whether to do no harm or do a lot of harm. What are the benefits of playing as a saviour versus playing as a sinner? Is one playstyle harder than the other or do they both offer balanced rewards?

SB: Due to one of our core gameplay mechanics, it will be far more difficult to play as a compassionate vampire. To incentivise the player to take lives, the largest source of XP comes from the blood of London’s citizens. This means if you want to level up quickly and more easily defeat your enemies, the game incites you to drink blood. However, when you do this, you alter the delicate balance of London’s districts, already made fragile by the epidemic – you may even lose an entire district of the game (since everybody died, you lose the merchants, the secondary quests, etc.) if you kill too many people, too quickly.

[...]

Thanks Farflame!

Gamingbolt reports that NPCs won't come back once you have ended their lives in Vampyr.

Vampyr, Dontnod’s upcoming vampire RPG, is going to make your actions in game count. For instance, while it lets you take the lives of NPCs, each of your actions have very real and meaningful consequence. If you kill an NPC in game, that’s it for them- they’re gone for the rest of the game, the game autosaves at that point, you can’t revert to an older game to get them back. In that regard, it works a lot like From Software’s Souls games.

[...]

@Wccftech A new story trailer for Vampyr tells the tale of Jonathan Reid.

loading...

Vampyr, the upcoming action-RPG from DONTNOD Entertainment, will release June 5 on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. The game's wider narrative arcs are unveiled today in a captivating Story Trailer, brought together with an eerie cover of (Don’t Fear) the Reaper. Returning from the frontlines to a London devastated by war and disease, Dr. Jonathan Reid awakens to a once-hidden world of ungodly creatures, secret societies and vampire hunts.

Eurogamer checked out Vampyr:

Vampyr's parasitic promise is plagued by conflict

Ludonarrative dissofangs.

Disease has always been joined at the hip to superstition and fantasy - the term "influenza" once referred to the influence of unfriendly stars - but there's something especially, horribly otherworldly about the flu epidemic of 1918-1920, which claimed over 50 million lives. Invisible to the microscopes of the era, the Spanish flu was a phantom terror, its spread censored to shore up morale in the closing stages of the Great War. Where other outbreaks had ravaged children and the elderly, this one bizarrely reserved its worst excesses for hearty young adults: its effects included "cytokine storms" that turned stronger immune systems against themselves, drowning the afflicted in their own bodily fluids. With no cure forthcoming, many sufferers fell back on folk remedies and occult treatments, lining their nostrils with salt, tying ribbons to their arms and burning brown sugar or sulfur to chase away evil miasmas. It's from this tangle of science and myth, monsters of the imagination versus the monsters of the laboratory, that Dontnod's long-in-development Vampyr takes its cue.

[...]

Thanks Farflame!

@Gamesworld Gameplay A new gameplay video for Vampyr.

loading...

Vampyrs everywhere - Farflame spotted some previews:

Rock Paper Shotgun: Vampyr isn’t the afterlife of the party just yet

PCGamesN: Vampyr is a game torn between character and combat

Daily Star: Vampyr preview - A fantastically flawed moral dilemma of a game

Gamereactor: Vampyr "doesn't judge you" regardless of the death count

The Vampyr webseries concludes with a release date of June 5th 2018. 

loading...

'Episode IV: Stories from the Dark' – in the final episode of the series, discover how Vampyr blends story and gameplay

DONTNOD Entertainment brings fans into the studio one last time for a final look at the creative process behind upcoming action-RPG, Vampyr. Dontnod Presents Vampyr - Episode IV: Stories from the Dark reveals yet more exclusive gameplay footage, plus the release date. Also, dive into the story of Vampyr and how the Parisian studio builds a narrative with the player at the center. The four-part webseries, produced and realized by the video department of Focus Home Interactive, is now complete after a month of reveals, with every episode available on YouTube.

Here's the next Vampyr episode:

Webseries : DONTNOD Presents Vampyr Episode 3 - Human After All

loading...

Thanks henriquejr!

Gamezone likes Vampyr already:

Why you should take notice of Vampyr

After watching Dontnod's first webseries episode, Vampyr: Making Monsters, I am hooked. Hauntingly beautiful music, stunning graphics, and a fascinating tale; Vampyr might just be the Vampire game we've been waiting for.

Dontnod's explanation of what makes vampires different than other monsters sets the stage for creating a very interesting monster. "What interests me about vampires. compared with other supernatural creatures (like werewolves or ghouls), is that the vampire is self-aware of their nature as a creature, a predator, " explains Game Director Phillipe Moreau. "They are intelligent. This is intriguing for me because we can use this notion of dilemma of moral choice, with the vampire figure."

In Vampyr, you play as Jonathan, a brilliant doctor conducting research on blood transfusion techniques. How fitting. Jonathan returns to England after the war and is turned into a vampire. The details of that incident remains a mystery for now. Poor Jonathan has no idea that his life has been changed forever. What makes his specific situation even more complex, is that Jonathan believes science to be the answer and explanation for everything - until he becomes a supernatural creature.

[...]

Thanks Farflame!

DONTNOD present episode 2 of a webseries for Vampyr. Episode 2 explains how 1918 London was made.

loading...

'DONTNOD Presents Vampyr' webseries launches its second episode

'Episode 2: Architects of the Obscure' – discover how DONTNOD coupled Vampyr's music and visuals to bring 1918 London to life

DONTNOD Entertainment invites fans to their studio for a second time, further revealing the creative process behind their upcoming action-RPG, Vampyr. Dontnod Presents Vampyr - Episode 2: Architects of the Obscure unveils more exclusive gameplay footage, while the creative team delves into the visuals and music that bring 1918 London to life. Two more episodes of this four-part webseries, produced and realized by the video department of Focus Home Interactive, will release weekly each Thursday.

DONTNOD present episode 1 of a webseries for Vampyr that explores its creation. Episode 1 explains how the monsters were made.

loading...

'DONTNOD Presents Vampyr' webseries launches today

'Episode I: Making Monsters' – get an insight into the studio's signature approach and creative process!

DONTNOD Entertainment, developers of Vampyr, invites fans to their studio for a first insight into the creative process behind their upcoming action-RPG. In the first episode of this original weekly four-part webseries, produced and realized by the video department of Focus Home Interactive, DONTNOD unveils exclusive gameplay footage while delving into their signature approach and reasons behind putting players in the role of a predator. The three following webseries’ episodes will release weekly every Thursday.

@DONTNOD A four part webseries for Vampyr.

loading...

Teaser released for "DONTNOD Presents Vampyr", a unique four-part webseries.

[...]

Episode I: Making Monsters on January 18.

In the first episode, Making Monsters, DONTNOD delves into their signature identity and reasons behind putting players into the role of a conflicted predator. The studio will make players feel the duality that torments doctor-turned-vampire Jonathan Reid, giving them the freedom to choose who to sacrifice and who to save. Every killing has consequences, and it’s up to players to balance their need to feed and grow stronger, with the rapidly deteriorating city of London.

Four episodes are planned in total for the weekly series:

_Episode I: Making Monsters
_Episode II: Architects of the Obscure
_Episode III: Human After All
_Episode IV: Stories From the Dark

Vampyr releases Spring 2018 on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC.

Gameinformer previews Vampyr.

DontNod Talks Morality, Inspiration, And More

The wait for Vampyr may have been pushed into next year, but it’s allowed Dontnod to ensure they capitalize on their past experiences and explore a new kind of video game vampire.

Originally planned for release in October of 2017, Dontnod delayed their newest project into spring of 2018 to ensure the game could be polished and made into the best experience possible. And for good reason: In addition to being a new I.P., Vampyr represents a realization of their experience gained from both the Life is Strange series and Remember Me.

“In a way, we can consider that Vampyr is the child of Dontnod's first two projects: We return to a game mechanic based on fighting and confrontation, as in Remember Me, and at the same time we return to the mechanics of the choices and consequences freely left to the players, as in Life is Strange,” says game director Philippe Moreau.

[...]

A MCVUK interview with the developers of Vampyr brings news that the game will not receive any DLC.

...

What features of the game are you most proud about?

The ‘Citizens' system, which fits the curse aspect of the vampire, is very original. The player is doomed to kill in order to survive and become stronger. Players won't just feed on unnamed prey. They will make difficult choices, as the main character is a doctor as much as a vampire. They save lives, but also kill to survive. By investigating potential victims, it's up to the player to inform themselves on whether a character ‘deserves' to be fed on or not. The impact of every choice will be felt through the story and the game's various districts. It is very captivating and adds a lot to the experience.

How long are you going to support the title?

This is a purely solo experience; we did not plan DLC. We would prefer, if the reception of the game justifies it, to think about a sequel. We and Dontnod already have some ideas, as there's so many incredible things to offer in such a universe.

TechRaptor reports that the Action RPG Vampyr is delayed to spring 2018:

DontNod's Vampyr Delayed to Spring 2018

DontNod’s anticipated RPG Vampyr has been officially delayed.

According to a recent press release, the game will be delayed to Spring of 2018 due to a major technical issue that has set the team back at the end of the game’s development, according to DontNod CEO, Oskar Guilbert.

“This delay allows us enough time for all the polishing and balancing phase, much needed for a game of Vampyr’s scope,” stated Guilbert.

Vampyr will have the player explore early 20th century London during the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic as Dr. Jonathan Reid, a newly turned Vampire who struggles with his new affliction. The game boasts a semi-open world based on the streets of London, where your moral decisions will determine the fate of the city, district by district.

[...]

Next in line in our series of Gamescom articles is Vampyr, which as the title indicates features vampires and is set in Londen 1918 during the Spanish flu.

Vampyr is a narrative action RPG set in London, in the year 1918. The Great War is over and the Spanish flu is killing millions all around the world, including in London. You play as Doctor Jonathan Reid a physician who has been turned into a vampire at the end of the war and now, next to saving lives, also needs to kill in order to survive and grow stronger.

The demo starts in the Pembroke hospital where you were invited to work there by the hospital administrator, who knows you are a vampire, but accepts that because of your skills in medicine. He needs your help in a case where two patients are missing. The demo also teaches us that there is a secret faction at work, the guards of Prewin, who's aim it is to kill all vampires, but hospitals are secret grounds where no blood, by or to vampires, is to be shed, which is also why the administrator feels it is safe to have a vampire work in his hospital.

Gamereactor checked out Vampyr at the E3:

Vampyr

Living as a vampire in 1918 London ain't easy.

If you've ever dreamed yourself back to those good old days when Vampire: The Masquerade was the hottest thing you could play on your PC, then you might have been starving for another experience like that, and you might have also been disappointed by the vampire-themed games that you've played since. If that's you then you might want to keep an eye out for Vampyr, a game from the Paris-based studio Dontnod which not only lets you become a bloodthirsty night crawler, but also lets you decide the fate of a whole community of innocent people.

[...]

Vampyr puts a fresh spin on the vampire experience, and the mechanics that revolve around the lives of the people of London look especially interesting. With an intriguing story, a large open world to explore, fun combat, and family tragedies waiting to happen, we came away from the presentation wanting to feed on some poor souls even more than we did before, and that's a good sign. Vampyr will be released on PC, Playstation 4, and Xbox One this November.

GameWatcher interviewed Florent Guillaume about Vampyr at the E3:

Vampyr: An Interview With DONTNOD Entertainment’s Florent Guillaume [E3 2017]

Being a doctor can’t be an easy life. You are responsible for the health and well-being of the sick people you vow to help cure. However, what if the same people you wanted to protect were also the only thing that could sustain your life? That’s where Doctor Jonathan Reed finds himself in early 19th Century London in Focus Home Interactive and DONTNOD Entertainment’s upcoming role-playing game, Vampyr. Reed has become a vampire, and he must split himself between his vow to help the sick and his need to feed on the blood of those he swore to protect.

Dr. Acula jokes aside, Vampyr contains a story with a vast web of interaction and consequences. Who you save and who you feed upon will not just affect you, but the people around that person. To help untangle this web of intrigue, GameWatcher caught up to DONTNOD’s Lead Level Designer Florent Guillaume at E3 to guide us into the life of this doctor in a vampire’s world. He took us through the dark corners of London to find out what kind of man Jonathan Reed is, how players will choose between doctor and vampire, and what consequences those choices will have for the fall or salvation of London in Vampyr.

GameWatcher: Where do we find ourselves starting off in Vampyr? Who is Jonathan Reed?

Florent Guillaume: So you start Vampyr waking up in a mass grave, and quickly find you’ve been afflicted with vampirism. You’ve been transformed. The game is set in London in 1918. Reed is a doctor that was fighting in France during World War I as a combat medic and doctor. When he returns home, his journey takes an unfortunate turn and that’s when he is transformed.

[...]

Thanks Farflame!

Here's new gameplay video for Vampyr:

Vampyr PS4 Gameplay Tour | E3 2017

loading...

Developer Dontnod shows off the story, combat, and difficult choices players will make in Vampyr - a dark action RPG on PS4. Take up the cloak and curse of Dr. Jonathan Reid, a man sworn to save the sick yet still forced to hunt for survival. As a vampire, Reid must balance his supernatural urges with his oath. See the game for yourself in this extended gameplay demo, complete with developer narration.

Thanks Farflame!

The Vampyr trailer for E3 has been released.

loading...

Preorder now: http://www.vampyr-game.com/shop
Website: http://www.vampyr-game.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/VampyrGame
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/VampyrGame
Song: "Devil" by Ida Maria (https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/kat...) – Facebook page of Ida Maria: https://www.facebook.com/IdaMaria/

Journey into 1918 London with the Ascalon Club in Vampyr’s bumper E3 trailer

Fly through the streets as imagined by DONTNOD Entertainment, in the bumper E3 trailer for their upcoming narrative driven action-RPG Vampyr. Witness deep into the heart of a flu-stricken London, where secret societies operate in the shadows.

Accompanied by the rock song Devil by DA MARIA, set out on an exciting journey with an uncut sequence shot throughout the city’s dark alleys, deadly underground passages and corrupt neighbourhoods and get a first glimpse at The Ascalon Club, a society formed from the richest vampires, unbeknownst to the mortals.

Farflame spotted two Vampyr interviews:

WCCFTech:

Dontnod’s Vampyr Lets You Decide What Kind of Bloodsucker You Want To Be

[...]

As a vampire the player will have the choice to drink innocent blood in the game, but how will that affect the story and the city?

There are no nameless civilians in the game. They all have their own stories and interests and friends and enemies. Each time to decide to kill one of them you’ll have to see the consequences for the rest of the city. There will be an impact on the local scale.

When you decide to kill some gang member in the East End, it will not change the fate of the city of London, but it will change the people that knew him. Each time you kill a civilian you will see some consequences on the local scale.

And then the main storyline will regularly ask you to make a major kill choice. This will make you decide what to do with a very important NPC. They might be community pillars or people who are very famous in a specific district of the city. When you decide what to do with them, kill them, spare them or make them a vampire, it will have a huge impact.

[...]

GodisaGeek:

Interview with the Vampyr: DONTNOD’s Narrative Director, Stéphane Beauverger

[...]

While this sounds really interesting and could provide some difficult emotional dilemmas, will decisions be made in the main campaign too?

“The main storyline will provide you with opportunities to perform what we call a “major killing choice”. It’s when you have been asked to make a move against what we call a “community pillar” – someone who is very important in a specific community. You can decide to kill them, to spare them, or to make them a vampire perhaps. You always have different options. Whatever you decide to do will impact the people inside the district of the town in which this specific target was living. This is how the main storyline will impact the citizens. It does not work from down to up, but up to down.”

“In a boss fight, fight against someone and finally decide to spare them or make them into a vampire. Just because you have defeated someone you do not always have to kill them. There will be different factions in the game and you will have to choose a side and this will affect how the game evolves right up to the end. There are four different endings according to what you did in the game.”

[...]

@DSOGaming New screenshots of Vampyr have been released.

Morrandir spotted that Vampyr is now listed for a release in Q4 2017.

@IGN show us a new trailer for Vampyr titled 'Darkness Within'.

loading...

Watch the dark new trailer showing one doctor's duty to help the plague-infected people of London, while struggling with the desire to feed on them.

Vampyr Gameplay Showcase
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeeXU...

Here are some new screenshots from Vampyr and the acoompanying press release.

The violent side of Vampyr's Jonathan Reid explored in screenshots detailing combat.

Vampyr, the new Action-RPG from acclaimed game-development studio Dontnod, explores combat on the flu-ridden streets of 1918's London. All manner of dangers prowl London during a bout of the lethal Spanish Flu. From Vampire hunters to mutated abominations, Jonathan Reid will face foes as well as friends on his mission to discover the truth behind his new affliction. 

Armed with an array of conventional melee and ranged weaponry, attack and dodge foes to fill up Jonathan's Blood Gauge, required to unleash powerful vampire attacks. From impaling enemies on a spike, to draining them of blood at a distance, as Jonathan's Blood Gauge fills during a combat situation, his Vampire affliction will start to overtake his more human side, unleashing destructive spells and abilities against those who try to stop him. 

A non-linear skill tree will unlock through experience gained new, more powerful attacks and abilities. Jonathan is able to equip these abilities in any order, effectively allowing players to create their own archetypes to match their play-styles. Play aggressively and deal greater damage, or more securely, focusing on crowd-control and keeping enemies at bay. Skills can be evolved two different ways, for example, Spring, a skill that allows you to rush instantly to a distant enemy, can be developed to either deal area-of-effect damage or grant temporary invincibility. The choice is yours. 

Combat difficulty can be affected by player actions out of combat. Feeding on civilians provides a huge XP boost, which will make combat situations easier - but that comes with caveats; an increased danger on the streets, and narrative consequences for the world's citizens, to name a few. Full brawls are not the only options open to Doctor Reid, he can also stalk his prey, or even utilize his vampire speed and agility to avoid combat entirely. 

Players will have to investigate who to feed from, and who to spare, conscious of their need to increase their strength. Jonathan's Vampire impulses will always be working against his human side. 

Take up the plight of Jonathan Reid when Vampyr releases in 2017 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC.

We had this Gamescom news post before, but it went into limbo. The article is back, so we also have a news post for it. Here is the Gamescom article for Vampyr.

GameBanshee's got a whole lot of impressions (and fifteen minutes of footage and interviews) from the upcoming dark ARPG Vampyr.

We've put together a new round-up of impressions for Vampyr, DONTNOD's latest upcoming title and their first action-RPG, still courtesy of last month's E3 expo. While it's not the Bloodlines successor some people were hoping for, it does sound like Vampyr might be a title worth keeping an eye on.

We Got This Covered:

Of course, what would a vampire game be without enemies? Vampyr seems to have a decent amount of those, in the form of vampire hunters who’ve returned to the city after hearing about its worsening infestation. Combat between Dr. Reid and said hunters was briefly shown, and it involved some stealth (including bat-based teleportation mechanics) and some more in-your-face attacking, through a decent-looking system that promotes timing and verticality.

One of the best ways to accomplish your goals is to mesmerize a human and have him follow you into the shadows before you feast. Before you do that, though, you’ll want to try your best to gain intelligence about each and every person you encounter, in order to figure out who’s best for eating. Generally speaking, doing research helps you find out who the scumbags are, and can make your choices easier for that reason. You have to eat, after all, and it’s not always easy, especially since vampires must be invited into someone’s home before they can enter.

Kotaku:

Many game designers have intertwined the moral opportunities in their games with rewards systems, though the most prominent examples tend to balance the consequences of making either choice. Ruthlessly “harvesting” the “little sisters” in 2007's BioShock may have netted twice the immediate reward as rescuing them did, but other rewards for the rescue option made both options similarly viable. The Paragon/Renegade morality system of the Mass Effect games gave players distinct but balanced options, offering the greatest rewards to people who went far in either direction.

In Vampyr, much of the gameplay advantage will come from killing civilians. The reason not to do so will simply be because it might feel wrong. That’s the idea behind giving each of the game’s civilians a backstory. You might feel bad about the families you’re hurting or, say, the child you’re leaving without a dad.

“Each time you kill someone you have access to his last thought,” Beauverger said. “We want this to impact the player. We want them to not just feel like each kill gives them an amount of blood but that they’ve destroyed a life, [a person] who was worrying about something.”

Brainy and Nerdy:

Stephane Beauverger, the writer of the story said that the game is more about a tragic figure than about a horror setting. The creators only wanted the gothic atmosphere but you won’t get jumpscares here. Instead, you get to develop the character and make choices that are always going to be difficult.

The way the vampires appear here is inspired from the gothic novels more than from contemporary sources like the Twilight saga or similar things, so you get many of the tropes we were used to. For example you cannot enter into someone’s home without being invited there and this limits the things you can do in the beginning.

ZAM:

And it seems like one of the major themes in that system of choices is the self-loathing inspired by the protagonist's need to feed. He's a doctor, actually (he fights with what seems to be a comedically gigantic doctor's bonesaw) and he views his vampirism as a disease that needs to be cured. His chief quest in the game is to research the origins of vampirism so that he can figure out how to eradicate it. Meanwhile, the Spanish flu epidemic is in full swing, and people who are exposed to both vampirism and the flu are transforming into wild, feral vampires.

I'm not going to lie: this looks like a game where the protagonist will spend a lot of time agonizing over his vampire guilt and misery. And frankly, since it's a game about vampires, that's what I hoped for: some super dark and overwrought emotions. The demo opened with our hero gazing down at the funeral of a young girl-- a relative of his whom he'd actually killed. Afterwards, a woman vampire in a snazzy Victorian suit asked him how he felt; when he refused to be honest with her, she told him he'd need to open up emotionally or he'd turn into a ravenous fiend. Nice!!

The game features a dialogue wheel pretty similar to the ones in Bioware games-- but this one doesn't seem to have any kind of icon-system telling you what category your choices belong in. To this I also say: nice!! I am a huge fan of unlabelled choices in RPGs-- and for a game where you spend all your time deciding who to unwillingly murder for their XP, morally-ambiguous choice systems seem like a good idea.

GamesRadar:

Your actions or inaction can also contribute to a district's stability rating, similar to Dishonored's chaos rating. Kill too many and you'll lose your humanity as the streets pool with blood and more ravenous monsters. Save too few and the plague will likewise devour the population, leaving bloated corpses rotting in the streets.

It's not enough to be a doctor trying to save everyone, nor is it enough to be a creature of the night growing in power - in Vampyr, you are the giver of life and the bringer of death. You'll need to heal and harm strategically, not just to earn arbitrary good guy points and/or bad guy points.

The complex web of relationships between NPCs also makes the decisions you make infinitely more interesting than choosing between mustache-twirling evil and halo-on-head good. Who deserves to be spared, and who deserves to be food? Do you sacrifice someone with the intention of using your dark powers to save the city, or do you hold onto your humanity as tightly as possible, even if it means dooming those around you?

Entertainium:

The hands-off demo started out at a funeral of a girl, seemingly buried after dying under mysterious circumstances. Jonathan Reid, former surgeon turned vampire, watches from afar, hiding in the shadows, before approaching the casket and questioning his life choices and eventual fate.

Things aren’t just hinged on drama, though, placing a heavy load on fighting against enemies such as vampire hunters, members of an ancient order hell bent on eliminating the fanged treat from the face of the earth. From watching the pre-alpha demo being shown, the combat seemed very fluid, making use of the fiction in order to infuse some vampiric excuses for some ridiculous moves, like turning into mist in between combos and such.

In their upcoming title Dontnod wants to encourage evil choices but not without implications. Feeding will make you stronger, but you'll have to deal with consequences and moral decisions. Kotaku goes into more detail on how dontnod's Vampyr wants the decision to be more than just a simple choice.

As players explore early 20th century London and engage in the game's central conflict of reluctant vampire vs. vampire hunters and monsters, they'll be able to learn more about the civilians around them. Reid is a former doctor, and the idea is that he doesn't want to give in to his thirst for blood, but the reward for doing so will just be so tempting. Kill too many civilians, though, and the districts of London will plunge into chaos. The developers want you to tempt you to be the bad guy, but they don't really want you to go too far.

 

By gathering clues about the civilians, players may find the occasional justification for the next person they take out. "You could discover that someone who seems to be very gentle is beating his wife," Beauverger said. Then again: "You could discover that someone who seems to be a very shady character used his money to help his poor in the streets."

GameRevolution wrote a bit about the E3 presentation of Vampyr.

Dr. Jonathan Reid has returned from the Great War changed, his will weathered by the war and his soul cursed by death. Although we do not know (for now) what turned Jonathan into the monster he is in Vampyr, we know that he is not taking his new role as a child of the night lightly.

Like many stories dealing with vampirism, we find our hero struggling with the craving to kill and what little remains of his humanity. Since this is a game about vampires developed by Dontnod, we should expect no less than a moral journey to take place here. I was surprised by the depth of the narrative showcased in the brief demo I saw at E3 as well as the intricate combat that was on display.

The year is 1918, and the London flu epidemic is in full swing as Jonathan Reid stalks the funeral of his latest kill, conflicted over what he has had to do to survive. Shortly after he is approached by Lady Ashbury, another centuries-old vampire, who has a brief conversation with Jonathan about his inability to balance his newfound need to feed with his instinct to help people. It was at this point that the dialogue wheel was shown off, giving players the ability to choose how to respond in different situations. As a man with a medical background, it is not easy for Jonathan to process the fact that he must kill to survive while there is already so much death around him.

It is Jonathan’s crisis of conscious that adds a unique element to Vampyr's take on the newly-turned vampire tale. The more I saw Jonathan interact with NPCs and think to himself about his own humanity, the more invested I became, something I certainly wasn’t expecting to feel after watching less than twenty minutes of gameplay. Unlike previous Dontnod games the world is open for you to explore with numerous side quests to complete along with the main story.

Courtesy of IGN Live Vampyr gameplay in action. IGN interview the developers while the game is demoed.

loading...

The team behind Vampyr talk to us about the game.

Choices and consequences are built into Vampyr according to PcGamesN meaning you can kill anyone you wish or no-one but it will have meaningful consequences.

"This is the golden rule - you can take the lives of everybody in the game," explains narrative director Stéphane Beauverger. "There is no exception, even if it's your own family. You have a mesmerise ability that allows you to lead someone into the shadows to do so. [To do that] the mesmerise level of your character has to be equal or more the mind resistance level of your target. So you can't kill everyone at the beginning of the game."

But as you progress and level up, your lethality increases along with your other stats. "At the end of the game, you have the possibility to kill everyone" explains Beauverger, also saying that your character is not a very nice guy. "You are a predator that has to take lives. You are not the real hero, the real heroes are the vampire hunters that try to take you down. You have to deal with the fact they consider you a beast, a monster, you have to face that, you have to prove to them by your actions that you can be trusted, that you are not someone who is completely heartless."

Art director Grégory Szucs adds that "You are very much in charge, you are not watching a TV show and being disgusted at the heroes actions - if you do something disgusting it's because you chose to do it." That's where the options come in. If you want, you can complete the whole game without killing anyone - but it won't be easy.

"You have the right to feed on the rats if you want," says Beauverger. "You will get no experience points, you will just get blood, so you will stay very weak, but you can try to do that."

Which do you think you'll go for?

Zam has a more comprehensive preview here.

I'm not going to lie: this looks like a game where the protagonist will spend a lot of time agonizing over his vampire guilt and misery. And frankly, since it's a game about vampires, that's what I hoped for: some super dark and overwrought emotions. The demo opened with our hero gazing down at the funeral of a young girl-- a relative of his whom he'd actually killed. Afterwards, a woman vampire in a snazzy Victorian suit asked him how he felt; when he refused to be honest with her, she told him he'd need to open up emotionally or he'd turn into a ravenous fiend. Nice!!

The game features a dialogue wheel pretty similar to the ones in Bioware games-- but this one doesn't seem to have any kind of icon-system telling you what category your choices belong in. To this I also say: nice!! I am a huge fan of unlabelled choices in RPGs-- and for a game where you spend all your time deciding who to unwillingly murder for their XP, morally-ambiguous choice systems seem like a good idea.

But although the choices are all pretty much ambiguous-- and although the game seems pretty much all about making you do objectionable things you don't want to do-- there are "bad outcomes" for the various districts of London which you prowl. Killing too many citizens in a given district, or allowing its infection by the flu to rise, will decrease its overall health score; let it get too low and the district will turn into a charred and disease-ridden feral wasteland full of prowling vampire mutants. I assume this will make more trouble for you, since your character is gonna have to fight them.

The horror action rpg Vampyr has a new trailer for E3.

loading...

Three, not so high-res, screenshots have been made available for DontNod's Vampyr.

VAMPYR IMAGES REVEAL THE PROTAGONIST'S DUALITY: CAN YOU BE BOTH SAVIOUR AND MONSTER?

Vampyr, the new action-RPG from acclaimed game-development studio DontNod, releases new images today depicting the duality of the central character. Set in London, 1918, Vampyr promises to offer a unique and deeply immersive experience, and a strong and engaging narrative steeped in vampire mythology. 

In Vampyr, players take control of Dr. Jonathan Reid, a newly formed vampire who is torn between the Hippocratic Oath he swore as a doctor, and the bloodthirsty need to kill due to the monster within. While London suffers from the Spanish Flu pandemic, your first reflex as a doctor would be to help and heal people... but it will be impossible for you to ignore your inner, violent, nature of Vampyr - first and foremost, you are a lethal predator. 

As a Vampyr, you have to accept your need to sacrifice people to survive. Feeding on people will be the basis of your character progression, as it will allow you to learn supernatural Vampyr powers and talents that will be useful in persuasion, locomotion, survivability, and combat. So the dilemma that's offered to you isn't "should I kill people?"" but more "who will I kill"? And this decision won't be without consequences. Killing one person will create a rippling effect on London's ecosystem and you will have to live with both the repercussions and their death on your conscience. Decide to feed on a renowned doctor from the city hospital, and progressively see the health condition of the patients drop. 

Every life saved and every life taken by Reid will have deadly ramifications to London and the people around it. When Vampyr releases in 2017, players will be asked: how far are you ready to go? 

Examiner reports that Vampyr tries to confound the gamer with a lot of exploring, secrets and many choices and consequences:

DONTNOD exclusive: Vampyr is setting up to profoundly confound RPG fans & gamers

What do you get when you take a studio that has made the games Remember Me and Life is Strange? You get something entirely different and unique, much like the aforementioned games are from each other. DONTNOD Entertainment is creating their next, new IP called Vampyr, and it will be quite different from the first two games they've created.

We've heard developers talk about wanting to do different things before, and when it comes to a creative mind, the unknown and unexpected is far more engaging than the known and expected. If there's nothing else DONTNOD's three games have in common, then it is that they are foundationally unique and original.

[...]

"It’s also about the discovery of a new world: that of the immortals, with their mysterious rules, codes and secrets. Much like our precedent games, we’re want to focus on what makes someone human: our joys, our sadness, the way we face adversity, and how we express our own free will," Beauverger said.

[...]

This won't just be a game that you cruise through without emotion or thought. Vampyr feels like it will be more real than any other game out there. "Our objective is to put players in a vampire’s shoes, and let them weigh up the pros and cons of their situation. Immortality is cool for sure, but how about killing a human every night, just to survive? How would you handle that? It’s all about choices and sacrifices, and it’s all part of the experience we’ve created in Vampyr," Moreau said.

Kotaku have written a piece about Vampyr, based on a talk with Stéphane Beauverger last month in Paris.

Set in post-First World War London, with Spanish Flu killing off the city's citizens far faster than the war ever did, Vampyr puts you into the shoes of surgeon Jonathan Reid. Shortly after the game begins, Reid is bitten and turned into a vampire by a night-creature using the confusion of the plague to feed on the vulnerable.

In your search to find out what you've become, you travel through different areas of London. Each hub has groups of characters to meet and interact with. Unlike other RPGs, where NPCs stand and wait for you and have little relation to the other NPCs around them, in Vampyr the characters in each hub are linked—they're friends, enemies, family members. In the demo I was shown, Reid comes across two men arguing in the street. The older of the two pulls a gun, fires on the younger, and runs off into the night. The demo-er talked to the boy, who was tight-lipped about the argument, except to say 'He's not been the same since he came back.' The demo-er had Reid track the older man in the dark streets and feed on him—as the older man died we were privy to his final thought: 'It's okay, I died a long time ago in France.'

Examiner has interviewed Game Director Philippe Moreau about the combat in Vampyr:

[...]

"On one hand, the combat uses conventional, low-level mechanics that players will be familiar with. It is based on movement and weapon move sets (with different ranges and timing), which requires positioning and anticipation to be used efficiently. The pacing is quite slow, letting the player read enemies’ patterns and strike when they are vulnerable," Moreau said.

This is the foundation of the combat system in Vampyr, but that will not be all that is included in it, since a player's abilities will play a major role as well. Playing as a Vampyr has some immediate assumptions that many cannot ignore, and Moreau talked about several things that will use up your blood stock, something you should be mindful of.

"On the other hand, we’ve developed a very unique gameplay system to bring the Vampire side of your hero to light. For instance, the blood gauge is a 2 in 1 tool: it manages both your health and your 'mana'. Using Vampire powers and taking damage will both consume your blood stock. The Embrace is also a very Vampire-ish ability that allows you to bite an enemy in order to recover blood. These are two essential, intrinsic features of Vampyr’s gameplay," Moreau said.

[...]

Dontnod's Grégory Szucs (Art Director) and Stéphane Beauverger (Narrative Director) have been interviewed by The Sixts Axis, about Vampyr.

TSA: So, obviously, you’ve set Vampyr in London in 1918, but how have you gone about reconstructing the city? Have you aimed for something that’s very accurate or more the feeling of London and the essence of Whitechapel at that time?

Grégory: We started from historical reference, definitely, but we actually […] take London at that point in time and then we digress just how much we need to tell our story.

Stéphane: It will not be like in GTAV, where it looks like you’re really in Los Angeles. It looks like London, but as you said, it’s the essence of London.

TSA: Yeah, I feel you have some common ground with The Order: 1886?

Stéphane: Yes, and the tricky part for us was to avoid the Victorian era feeling, because we are 30 years after. We are just after the First World War, so now there is no more gas lighting, there is electricity.

Grégory: Some people still use gas lights though. Not everyone [has moved on].

Stéphane: There are cars, even if very old ones, there are cars and the trolley bus, and things like that. The metro…

TSA: I think it’s still a tricky time period to get a distinctive look for, though.

Grégory: The architecture is still a lot like Victorian and Georgian.

Stéphane: But the technology is very different.

Grégory: That’s where you can get those relatable moment, where there is a steamroller or something using electricity. There’s all the advances in medicine and the tools brought back from warfare, which are very distinctive to the time period and definitely not Victorian.

Stéphane: We have a lot of historical research on scientific information, to precisely see what the medical knowledge was at this time. Personally, I’m very glad to show in the game that, yes, in 1918 they had X-rays, they had microscopes. I’m sure people will say, “X-rays? They had those?”

Thanks Eye.

GameWatcher interviewed Stephane Beauverger, Vampyr’s Narrative Director:

Vampyr is a dark action RPG set in gloomy Whitechapel, 1918. London is gripped by the Spanish Flu, and thousands of lives have been claimed as the virus tightens its grip on the city. You play Jonathon Reid, a doctor who is trying to solve the mystery of the virus, and also – possibly more importantly - discover who it was that turned him into a vampire…

Developed by Dontnod Entertainment, who have previously been responsible for Remember Me and Life is Strange, Vampyr certainly heralds from a rich bloodline. GameWatcher met with Stephane Beauverger, Vampyr’s Narrative Director, recently in Paris to discuss the trials and tribulations of bringing the creatures of the night to life.

GameWatcher: Why did you decide use London as Vampyr’s location? Did you consider any other cities?

Stephane Beauverger: No, one of the reasons why we decided to create a storyline in London is because it’s a gothic city. There are so many legends and mythological creatures associated with the city, with a background as rich as London has, it was easy to imagine a vampire lurking there.

GameWatcher: In the game you play a vampire, an undead creature of the night. How much of the vampire mythology - such as stakes, running water and so forth – is conveyed in the game?

Stephane Beauverger: The vampire figure is very complex because it is such a huge architype; there are many, many versions of this creature. Can it be affected by holy water? Can it be affected by crosses? Does it sparkle in the sun? We had to decide on the specifics, and once we had that, we had our own unique type of vampire. So in a way we created our own lore. For example, they are not ghosts, they have bodies and they can see themselves in mirrors, but they cannot enter a house without being invited. We created all the rules and then decided how to use them.

[...]

Gameplay:

loading...

Thanks Couch!

Four new screenshots have been released for Vampyr.

The new action-RPG Vampyr from Dontnod showcased in first screenshots 

Vampyr, the new RPG from acclaimed game-development studio Dontnod, today was showcased in its first screenshots. Set in 1918 London, Vampyr promises to offer a unique, deeply immersive action role-playing experience steeped in vampire mythology, with a strong narrative. 

The first screenshots of the game showcase the game's world, as the Spanish flu laid waste to London's once bustling population. Every character in the game has his or her own unique back-story and will affect the world. Be careful who you choose to hunt, as they will be gone forever, and their death will impact in a meaningful way the world that surrounds you. Feeding on human blood will not just keep you "alive", it will also unlock new vampiric powers to use. As a Doctor, and a Vampyr who used to be human, you may also choose to heal your potential prey, crafting medicines from items collected in the game world. 

There will be times when exploration and seduction will only get you so far, and you'll need to resort to engaging in Vampyr's dynamic, melee-focused real-time combat. It blends hard-hitting melee combat with supernatural vampire powers. Find and loot materials and components from the fresh corpses of your victims or during exploration, in order to craft and improve tools, melee and ranged weapons, as well as special ammunitions and coating to exploit the weaknesses of your enemies.

As you cling to what remains of your humanity, your decisions will ultimately shape the fate of your hero while searching for answers in the coughing, foggy aftermath of the Spanish Flu.

Nice article about Vampyr from PCGamesN. This RPG is scheduled for 2017:

Making it in Unreal: Dontnod swap teen trials for Victorian monster fiction in action-RPG Vampyr

Vamp-Y-R. Whether it’s from the Swedish or the 1932 German-French horror film of the same name, there’s a certain flourish and edge to Dontnod’s title not found in the traditional spelling. That’s indicative of the approach the Life is Strange alumni are taking to vampire fiction in their next game, a blood-sucking action-RPG.

 

The Parisian studio behind Life is Strange have made every effort to dodge the stakes and silver bullets of vampiric pop culture. Determined to return the pallid, pouting undead archetype to its roots in gothic literature, but keen to avoid the Victorian era already well-mined in contemporary games and cinema, Dontnod have plumped for 1918 London - a city on its back as Spanish Flu rips through a population weakened by four years of war. Across Europe, the pandemic killed more people than the conflict.

[...]

Gamespot talked to narrative director Stéphane Beauverger, art director Grégory Szucs, and game director Philippe Moreauabout their game Vampyr.

We haven't seen much of Vampyr outside of the brief teaser and some images; how would you describe the art style you're going for and what are your influences?

Grégory Szucs: We've created a dark and brutal world, realized with state-of-the-art lighting, post processes and an Impressionistic twist. The paintings of Phil Hale were definitely an inspiration, for their haunting mood and beautifully sculpted renderings of their figures.

What more can you tell us about Jonathan Reid, the high-ranking military surgeon who becomes a vampire. How did that happen and what are the consequences?

Beauverger: Jonathan E. Reid is a brilliant doctor who served during the war and became familiar with a brand new blood transfusion technique that's saved many lives. When the game begins, he's just returned from the war, waking up after an attack by a mysterious assailant. This attack was the cause of his transformation into a vampire. We can't reveal all of the consequences but his status as a specialist of human blood is of interest to the vampire society that hides in the shadows.

Thanks Eye.

Here are three new pieces of artwork for Dontnod's Vampyr.

Some details about Vampyr have popped up, since our last news post on it in June. In a Playstation blog Vampyr's Game Director Philippe Moreau provides these details.

What can you tell us about the gameplay of Vampyr?

Vampyr is an action RPG with tight, visceral combat mechanics, exploration, and investigation – you’ll have to collect many clues, and talk to many people as you prowl the streets of London.

With the use of vampiric powers – as you’d expect! – and authentic ‘make-shift’ weapons, such as a saw (our protagonist is a surgeon, after all!) you’ll be fighting both mythical terrors and human foes.

You’ll also be able to make use of different ranged weapons, and there’s more to the combat, but we’re not ready to reveal that yet.

One of the most interesting things is that everyone you meet in Vampyr could be a target, if you want. But each kill will have consequences on the fragile streets of London. You’ll both see those consequences, and feel them. They’ll have an effect on the story, often immediately, and in the long-run. Vampires have to eat, after-all. But as the saying goes, ‘you are what you eat’ – at least, in Reid’s mind. He’s a very human vampire… at least, he hasn’t forgotten where he came from. Do not think that makes him ‘good’, though. You’ll see.

What role does player choice have in Vampyr?

Killing innocent people is unfortunately the price of immortality. Besides, in the eyes of a vampire, how do you define innocent? You’ll have to kill people, that’s for sure… but how do you decide who? The information you gather, the things that you see, and the relationships your nurture will all define your decisions. But you will have to feed. You cannot escape that you are a vampire.

I hope this short Q&A has piqued your curiosity, and if you want some more info do not hesitate to visit our website! We’re working on the first in-game assets so stay tuned, there will be more coming your way very soon !

Thanks Edgy

We had the news about Vampyr being announced in January, but here is a new announcement with a video to go along with it.

Focus Home Interactive and Dontnod Partner for New RPG, Vampyr

The next great game from the creators of Remember Me and Life Is Strange unveiled in concept video 

Acclaimed game-development studio Dontnod and publisher Focus Home Interactive are pleased to officially announce their partnership for the development of Vampyr, a new role-playing gamepowered by Unreal Engine 4 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC.

The studio behind Remember Me and Life is Strange unveils a concept trailer for Vampyr, which sets the mood and universe of this new license, which promises to offer a unique, deeply immersive role-playing experience steeped in vampire mythology. 

Vampyr is set in early 20th century Britain as the country is gripped by the lethal Spanish flu and the streets of London are crippled by disease, violence and fear. In a disorganized and ghostly city, those foolish, desperate, or unlucky enough to walk the streets lay prey to Britain’s most elusive predators: the vampires. Emerging from the chaos, a tormented figure awakens. You are Jonathan E. Reid, a high-ranking military surgeon transformed into a vampire upon his return home from the frontline. 

Explore the darkly atmospheric streets of early 20th century London, and interact with a multitude of characters with their own identities and importance. Accept and fulfill the missions they give you, but don’t forget: sooner or later, you will have to feed, and make a difficult choice... who will be your prey? Absolutely all characters in the game are potential victims of your vampiric lust. Carefully study the habits of your next victim, his or her relationships with other characters, and set up your strategy to feed, unnoticed: seduce them, change their daily habits, or make sure they end up alone in a dark street... 

Be careful who you choose to hunt, as they will be gone forever, and their death will impact in a meaningful way the world that surrounds you. Feeding on human blood will not just keep you "alive"; it will also unlock new vampiric powers to use. 

There will be times when exploration and seduction will only get you so far, and you'll need to resort to engaging in Vampyr's dynamic real-time combat. It blends hard-hitting melee combat with ranged shooting mechanics and the supernatural vampire powers. You'll face many types of enemies: different species of vampires and creatures, as well as vampire hunters who want to hunt you down with their weapons, tools and traps. In Vampyr, your health and the "energy" that drives your supernatural powers are one and same! Using powers will drain your own blood, giving you an edge in battle but also leaving you weaker. You will have to find a way to feed during combat to replenish your strength. 

Vampyr also offers a deep crafting system. Find and loot materials and components from the fresh corpses of your victims or during exploration, in order to craft and improve tools, melee and ranged weapons, as well as special ammunitions and coating to exploit the weaknesses of your enemies. 

As you cling to what remains of your humanity, your decisions will ultimately shape the fate of your hero while searching for answers in the coughing, foggy aftermath of the Spanish Flu. 

Vampyr will release in 2017 on PS4, Xbox One and PC. 

According to TheSixthAxis.com, Focus Home Interactive and Dontnod Entertainment have announced a new action-RPG called Vampyr.  It will apparently be set after World War 1, during the Spanish flu epidemic.  The main character is a doctor-turned vampire who has to make moral choices about embracing this new found vampirism or doing a doctor's work and helping the vulnerable.  No other details have been released.  In fact, the platforms for the game have yet to be revealed.  If the game is any good, here's hoping it comes to PC.