In 2015 a collective of developers from Cyanide, Blizzard Entertainment, and Ubisoft formed a new studio focused on mature, inward-looking narrative-based RPGs. Their first effort was The Council, an episodic interactive mystery adventure RPG set in 1793 and its delivery cemented the team's love of the genre. It’s also what led Big Bad Wolf to try its hand at expanding the narrative of Vampire: The Masquerade in a new video game: Vampire: The Masquerade - Swansong.

“Our last game, The Council, was also a Narrative RPG game, meaning a game where the player's actions have consequences that can dramatically change the outcome of the story, whether via dialogues and direct actions, or by the way the player chooses to build his/her/their character sheet,” said Eliott Hipeau, lead quest designer at the studio. “We knew we wanted to continue iterating on this genre, as it’s really core to the DNA of the studio. We also have big fans of Vampire: The Masquerade in the team, and we quickly discovered that a social, political and story based roleplaying game like Vampire was the perfect fit for our next project.”

Next, the studio had to settle on a location for its game. They selected Boston because, while it plays a role in the tabletop games, it hadn’t been visited recently by the slew of games coming out set in the wider universe of World of Darkness.

“There was a lot of room to be explored, both in the aftermath of the last chronicles and the recent developments in the meta story of the World of Darkness,” Hipeau said. “It all clicked together really nicely.”

Vampire: The Masquerade is inherently a storytelling game, one in which the players take on the role of a vampire hiding among humans. This deception is called ‘The Masquerade’. It’s this need to deceive, outweighing almost all else, that creates the balance so intriguing inside the game world. Vampires can’t brute force through a problem; they have to be social, subtle, seductive, about how they interact with the world.

So making Vampire: The Masquerade - Swansong into a detective game made a lot of sense for the team.

“Talking to someone is often the best way to get a new clue, but as a Vampire, it’s also a risky move,” Hipeau said. “This is perfectly aligned with the dialog based games Big Bad Wolf is specialized in. Also, the dark realism sets the tone for mature themes. It’s the perfect setting for a thriller and detective game.

“In addition to that, having access to the different disciplines of the blood—the vampiric powers—allows for a very interesting and varied gameplay. Both these constraints and supernatural possibilities allow us to create unique and interesting situations that we’re sure players will love.”

In Swansong, players need to rely on their own instincts as they work to unravel the mystery behind the attack on Boston's vampiric Camarilla clan in true whodunit fashion, but they also can carefully rely on the protagonists’ vampiric abilities.

Hipeau said finding the right balance, the best way to weave those two skills together in crafting the game’s mechanics, required a lot of trial and order.

“We tried a lot of different recipes before finding one that we felt confident about,” he said. “One of the guidelines we tried to follow during the development of each quest was: Skills and Disciplines grants players new information, not the solution. Players have to find it on their own.”

That process included making sure there were also multiple ways to achieve any one objective—some harder to achieve than others.

The team also wanted to avoid any user interface when it came to checking players’ understanding of an investigation.

“For each quest, we had to find ways to allow players to express an opinion, by acting on the world,” Hipeau said. “And we tried our best to make these decisions as integrated, varied and impactful as possible.”

This garden of forking paths applies not just to the way through the game, to the solution, but also to what players find once they get there. It’s an interesting approach, especially for a game set in so expansive a fictional universe.

“One of the nice parts about the World of Darkness is that everything is connected,” Hipeau said. “So the events of the Fall of London, Bloodhunt, Bloodlines, LA By Night, there’s a continuous thread running through all these different pieces of media and it’s really cool that Swansong will be a part of that.

“Obviously, Swansong is a game heavily based on choice, the experience and endings you get can change wildly based on the decisions you’ve made. It will be interesting to see which of these will become the official canon story for Boston.”

Swansong is just one of a number of titles that are coming or have recently hit. Just earlier this month, Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodhunt brought the world of hidden vampires to the battle royale genre.

“We’re seeing a bit of a renaissance for Vampire: The Masquerade and the wider World of Darkness with new TTRPGs, comics, games and a TV show in the works. It’s an exciting time to be a fan, I think,” Hipeau said. “Bloodhunt is a very different sort of experience than Swansong, with a focus on frenetic action and that’s reflected in its action heavy gameplay. The city of Prague going through its own upheaval, but in a much more violent way. Swansong is slower, more methodical, more political. There’s a focus on being able to read between the lines and discover (or not) the secrets behind the attack on the Boston Camarilla.

“It’s great to see more games set in this amazing universe and in the same way that Bloodlines and Redemption were some gamers first taste of Vampire: The Masquerade, I hope that we too can introduce more people to the World of Darkness.”

And for those planning to drop into Vampire: The Masquerade - Swansong, Hipeau has some advice.

“In the world of Vampire: the Masquerade - Swansong, all characters have hidden agendas and can lie. They can and will use their own skills, and disciplines if they have some, to try to protect their secrets and keep you off their trail. Doubt everything, pay attention to details, keep your Beast in check by drinking blood and most importantly, do not reveal your true nature, you MUST protect the Masquerade!”

Pick up Vampire: The Masquerade-Swansong Primogen Edition on Epic Games Store. The Primogen Edition comes with two exclusive bonuses: the original soundtrack and Boston, a 90-page source book for Vampire: The Masquerade storytelling experience.