Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York

 PC
User Score
7.3

Mixed or average reviews- based on 81 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 51 out of 81
  2. Mixed: 15 out of 81
  3. Negative: 15 out of 81

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  1. PEnchan707
    Dec 16, 2019
    5
    TL;DR What's here is well done and is enjoyable to play through; wondering what's in store for all the characters you meet and how you will interact with them. However, it's so short and, in the end, unfulfilling that I felt like I'd wasted my time. It's like someone giving you a good book but halfway through you turn the page, eager to read on, only to realise the rest of the pages areTL;DR What's here is well done and is enjoyable to play through; wondering what's in store for all the characters you meet and how you will interact with them. However, it's so short and, in the end, unfulfilling that I felt like I'd wasted my time. It's like someone giving you a good book but halfway through you turn the page, eager to read on, only to realise the rest of the pages are blank.

    Ok, if you want more detail then here it is. The 5/10 score might indicate that this is a distinctly mediocre game, but that's not the whole picture. The trouble is that it's one of those mixed bag games where some elements shine and others fall flat. The main problem is that it's VERY short. This has a ripple effect that unfortunately washes over virtually every great aspect the game offers.

    For example, it has some tantalising characters that I wanted to discover more about. I wanted to have an impact on their part of the story and for them to have an impact on mine. I wanted to make hard decisions that would leave me wondering how it would effect my relationship with them. The game hints that many have much more under their surface to discover as the story unfolds. Several also have mini-stories to go through.

    The trouble is, the game ends before you actually develop any real sort of relationship with most of them. In fact, the main storyline can actually be moved forward without you realising how close you are to completing it, the result being you never get to finish some of the sideline stories. The game autosaves, so when you can't go back and try to complete them.

    The examples of characters never developing into anything are many. The character Mia hints that you will have to work hard to earn back her trust, she also suggests that maybe you can join her community at a later date. You never meet her again.

    Her boss suggests you may want to join them too. It makes you ponder a storyline that branches off and has you choosing sides midway, a situation that would make for two very different playthroughs. Well, you never make a choice about allegiance and most of the game is largely the same, as far as I know.

    The Sheriff has an interesting history to discover and it's hinted the two of you might either become allies or enemies. Or perhaps that you'll have tough decisions to make that'll put him in conflict with you, but maybe by that time you've earned his good graces by solving a problem he has. It sets up interesting possibilities except that, once again, you never see them again. It just happens over and over.

    The game simply starts lots of enticing, intriguing plotlines and character development that simply never goes anywhere.

    The main story ends abruptly, you never discover what happens to several of the main players or whether your choices effected things. In fact, you don't even really find out what happens to YOU, let alone anyone else.

    Speaking of choices, very few seem to make any difference.

    If I had to guess, the developers simply started an ambitious project but the scope was too much for their time and budget. I think the game was about 5 hours long but may be shorter for some people and it ends just when things get truly interesting and promise to expand. Just when the game should have really opened up...it just fizzles out.

    The game also teaches you its one real gaming mechanic, 'the hunger', fairly early on. The game implies that you need to feed or else The Beast will take you over. Presumably this would lead to a Game Over screen. In practice, it's pretty much meaningless. You hardly ever need to feed and the game gives you opportunities on a fairly regular basis. I kept expecting the choices to become more difficult and complex, but it never happened.

    Things that can't be diminished though are the mostly well written passages and, especially, the beautiful, atmospheric artwork and ambient music. The latter two truly added to the game, so well done to those responsible :)    … Expand
  2. Moromete
    Mar 26, 2020
    5
    There are some interesting characters and engaging side-quests but the main narrative is so railroaded and ends so abruptly that the game cannot make it engaging or satisfying once the entire narrative is experienced once. I initially planned two or even three playthroughs but after seeing the end once I no longer have any wish to try it again.
  3. hello_world
    Feb 7, 2021
    5
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Let's start off with the good first. The game is decently written and the plot threads that you will encounter are at times quite compelling. It also serves as an okay introduction to the World of Darkness (WOD) (with some caveats I will explain later.) Considering the shoestring budget what they managed to achieve is impressive, though its shortcomings are hard to ignore.

    The first issue I have is the inconsistency of which information is explained to the player. The game starts with the player as a newly minted Vampire. WOD has a lot of lore attached to it and at the start the game does a nice job of introducing the concepts to the player at a steady pace as to not overwhelm the player. But after a certain point, it's as if the game just goes "screw it" and just have the playable character inexplicably know things that was never explained for them. A good example of this appears in one of the side missions where the playable character knows what a thin-blood is, despite never being told what they are. This isn't just a problem for players new to the WOD, but even if you are a veteran as this screws up the narrative. The game takes place over a few consecutive nights so there was no time skip in order for our character to learn information about the world other than what is explicitly told to them.

    a second issue is how many of the plot threads go nowhere. If you choose the Ventrue Clan, the start will make it seem like they will commit to having us struggle with the clan's bane and have feeding be an issue where not all prey will have blood that the player character can keep down. But after the first 2 nights that is dropped entirely and every single feeding opportunity you come across won't have incompatible blood. There are multiple side quests that tell a pretty basic plot and then they end and very little of it is relevant to the plot. Maybe it'll introduce a minor character that will pop in during the climax of story or reveals some background information that will be mentioned once as a offhand comment. These stories were not very compelling to begin with and the payoff is still somehow managed to disappoint.

    Lastly and this is the biggest missed opportunity, is how little player agency there is in the game. Even considering their budget this is disappointing. The game presents the idea of forming your own coterie and they took effort in explaining the talents of each of the potential members (some of them have skills in gathering information, others have connections in high places, skillsets and assets that could be beneficial to you) however, all of this amounts to is you helping them with their plot and then they make a cameo near the end to help you once in a generic way before taking their leave. It would have been much more compelling if the game ditched the other side quests that go nowhere and fleshed out the coterie building aspect of the game. Separate the game into the companion quests and main plot quests. Give the player the ability to call upon their coteries for main plot quests which could give them more options on how to deal with the challenges of the main plot. (The Nosferatu could sneak past a guard, the Malkavian could size up NPCs to give you information about them, etc) This would make your choices feel more meaningful without added that much to cost to development. The ending also came abruptly and felt like there was very little build up to any of the revelations. The issue of characters keeping you in the dark is that once the plot twists come, they have little impact beyond the initial shock as there was no foreshadowing other than revealing that a character exists. You don't know anything about them and they said nothing related to the main plot at all. They are just a character that exists until it was revealed at the end that they were the masterminds behind everything and then the game ends. This would have been more forgivable if the game gave you more agency, but since very little of what you do have any effect on the plot, the least the writers could have done was make sure that the story that you are forced into had a decent payoff. As it stands, you are forced into an ending and that ending isn't very well written.    … Expand
  4. Interitus
    Dec 21, 2019
    5
    The game is done well and written well. But similar things like telltale games your options don't really mean anything. Regardless if you do what they say or you don't. You are still rebuked in the exact same way. The game is too short and the price too high. I was looking forward to this, but it ended up being quite disappointing.
  5. RedPanda_94
    Jul 20, 2020
    6
    I honestly don't know how to feel about this game, on one part i'm a huge fan of the World of Darkness while on the other i don't know how they managed to start a visual novel so well and end it so badly.

    The game costs 20 bucks and while a full run will take around 4 hours the game is designed to be replayed with the different clans and spending your nights with different people to    I honestly don't know how to feel about this game, on one part i'm a huge fan of the World of Darkness while on the other i don't know how they managed to start a visual novel so well and end it so badly.

    The game costs 20 bucks and while a full run will take around 4 hours the game is designed to be replayed with the different clans and spending your nights with different people to discover different stories, and while this is a perfectly valid mode of storytelling reminiscing a bit of Taro's work on NieR Automata seeing each playthrought through the eyes of different characters, the way the game limits your number of nights to take you to the end of the story is complete doodoo. On your first playthrought you will end up with most likely NO storylines completed and those that are will most likely have gotten a bad ending as well as some characters characters will show up and act in a way that doesn't make any sense considering how advanced you are with their story.

    It saddens me to give the game such a low score, the sound design, the music, the beautiful art, some of the stories are so good and well written that i wish they would end up on like a tv show about Vampire to see them come to life. It is without a doubt the best way to get someone into the Vampire universe and introduce a great city to play on the pen and paper rpg as is New York considering they're going to meet a ton of canon characters from the metaplot, but the way it abruptly takes control from you to force you to see an ending you didn't really worked for... it's just sad to see so much potential not properly used    … Expand
  6. sagittaries
    Jul 29, 2020
    6
    As a long time player of the Vampire: The Masquerade pen and paper RPG game, as well as a big fan of Troika's Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines (2004), I was really excited to see what a visual novel type game set in the World of Darkness could be. I had a lot of hope for this game and was impressed my many facets of it, none of which were the storytelling - the pinnacle of any visualAs a long time player of the Vampire: The Masquerade pen and paper RPG game, as well as a big fan of Troika's Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines (2004), I was really excited to see what a visual novel type game set in the World of Darkness could be. I had a lot of hope for this game and was impressed my many facets of it, none of which were the storytelling - the pinnacle of any visual novel. Coteries of New York has a lot of strengths, and in these aspects the game is solid. I can't find a single complaint about the better aspects of this game. Each of the three playable characters feels unique, and playing as each of them offers the player the experience that the person they play as is different each time. The experiences playing as each of the three offered clans was enough to warrant three plays of this game out of me. The visual aspects are incredible. The art direction is stunning, I loved the appearance of every one of these characters, and the atmosphere this game sets is perfect for the setting and the franchise down to all the little details.
    Though for what it has in visual intrigue, it severely lacks in writing. It feels like too much emphasis is given on characters the player hadn't been given any reason to care about, meanwhile much more interesting and better written characters are pushed to the side and not given the opportunity to be expanded upon. The game presents you with the illusion of choice through dialogue options, however for the most part the story is very linear with little chance to be influenced in any way by the choices you, as the player, make in the game. The worst of it shows at the end of this game, when the narrative comes to a hard stop with an odd twist ending that feels unsatisfying, due to no real build up or interest in any of the characters involved. The alliances you make throughout the game lead to virtually nothing as the player is presented with a narrative conclusion which involved none of them. The playable character is presented with an offer before the credits roll, and the player themselves sits behind their computer scratching their head at the events which had just unfolded. To say the conclusion is disappointing would be an understatement.
    Considering both the richness of the source material, and the setting of New York City, I feel like so much more could have been done with this game. Instead I was left feeling dissatisfied with the conclusion that the game offered, and hungry for more from the aspects of the story that I was intrigued by but did not get to explore further because of the marching pace encouraged by the main story. I hope that if there will be another WoD visual novel, that it feels less like the underwhelming experience of Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York.    … Expand
  7. AR_2218
    Sep 18, 2020
    7
    The ending could have been better, and it could have more importantance given to the coteries

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
70

Mixed or average reviews - based on 28 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 9 out of 28
  2. Mixed: 19 out of 28
  3. Negative: 0 out of 28
  1. TheSixthAxis
    Apr 16, 2020
    70
    While clearly not as impressive in gaming terms as the Bloodlines series, Coteries of New York is a welcome addition to the digital world of The Masquerade. Offering up an immersive and atmospheric take on the politics and personalities of the undead Big Apple, it seduces with it’s quality of writing and characterisation, proving to be more than a mere snack to tide the Hunger over until the main course of Bloodlines 2. If you have any taste for the Gothic you should give yourself over to the vampiric delights of Coteries.
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  2. Games.cz
    Feb 28, 2020
    70
    A well-written interactive visual novel aimed primarily at the newcomers to the world of the Masquerade. The progress is, however, a bit too linear and you can’t really change the outcome of the story.
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  3. GameCritics
    Feb 28, 2020
    75
    Exploring and appreciating a visual novel with writing as good as this one shouldn’t be tiresome. With luck, future patches and updates will address these minor concerns because Coteries of New York is something well worth sinking one’s fangs into.
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