Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York

An interesting visual novel from a World of Darkness universe - that I really enjoy. As a visual novel, its quite niche and something I do not generally play. Still, it kept me hooked and interested in the story to finish the game and feel like it wasn't a waste of time. Especially at the start of the game when you were forced to role-play as someone who doesn't know what is happening. The dialogues were not a masterpiece, but they did deliver. The music was fine and art as well, at least as much as you can expect from very simple visual novel game. The gameplay... well… you are just reading... mostly. Occasionally deciding, whether to drink from someone or not, or use one of your powers or not. Very simple promise, that drove me crazy. Why? The indication how much I can use my powers wasn't clear at all, I never knew when I would have another opportunity to drink, so most of the time I was just worrying and saving my powers and therefore basically role-played a human. Someone might say, its a me problem, but I would say: [i]"No. Its game design issue. The game should let me know what I can and can't do and control, without having to play the whole game first. If I can just lean, as the game progresses its fine to have some learning curve. But here I just had no idea for the entirety of the game. The blood indicator on the screen was definitely not enough for me."[/i] Fortunately, even though it bothered me, it didn't take away from story too much and I generally enjoyed it reading and experiencing. It wasn't anything groundbreaking, but it delivered the enjoyment that I was satisfied with, even though it fell short near the climax. Its a shame though that you couldn't finish all side stories, as there is a limit of how many turns you can play the game. That sucked, because I started with stories of characters that I had least interest in, thinking that I will just finish those first before I get to the good ones. However, I hit the limit and then I was stuck with what I had done and no way to go back unless I want to start the game from scratch. That really sucked, but fortunately, those side stories that I chose to finish first weren't all that bad and in the end, I think I enjoyed them. But it still pisses me off. In the end, the game was fine. The most telling statement from my review, that reflects what I think, is [b]"feel like it [the game] wasn't a waste of time"[/b]. Take it a as a recommendation or not, but it generally more for World of Darkness fans then anyone else.