If the Naughty Dogs of the world have their way, the action in video games will become indistinguishable from real life with all those beautiful, individually crafted frames of animation blended and sanded down until the spaces between them can only be distinguished in the quantum realm. Granted, I had only high praise for what I saw of the brutal realism of The Last of Us Part II and its second to none lip sticking kiss to say nothing of the new seamless God of War, one of my favorite games of the PS4 era, but if the goal is to flatten all the edges going forward, it’s gonna get old.
Luckily, for those of us who need a little funk in their burgers and a little jank in their video games there’s Vampyr. Life is Strange developer Dontnod’s imperfect love letter to the perpetually rain drenched labyrinthine streets, twisty politics and moral quandaries of period London bloodsuckers makes a good case for why we should preserve the janky ways of yore.
A GOOD STIFF DRINK
There’s a stiff, unfinished quality to the game’s combat, which is a dizzying mixture of stun attacks, blood draining, fire arms with limited ammo and range, and powerful vampire special moves. At times it feels like your character, the stalwart undead doctor, Jonathan Reid, is on wheelies as he swings and misses with a series of very short range melee attacks, including a quick but easy to miscalculate jab with a wooden stake that wears down your opponent’s stamina bar but leaves you open to retaliation.
In order to survive these increasingly difficult encounters, Jonathan will have to gain experience points that can be used to raise his combat stats. XP can be collected by solving the problems of the denizens of London. Early examples include; fetching a lost knife for a shady ally, gathering medical supplies from an infested morgue or exterminating a nest of vampire underlings in a nearby abandoned building. This serves two purposes in Vampyr; it provides enough XP to get going but also acts as a kind of seasoning for the blood of the colorful characters Jonathan meets.
By helping them with their problems, curing their ails, getting to know them, even stalking and then eavesdropping on their private moments from afar, Jonathan can raise the profile of their blood, maturing it and preparing it like a fine wine or a gourmet meal. Embrace (the game’s word for chowing down) the scumbag slumlord upon first meeting and you will gain far less experience than if you hang around and divulge his secrets first.
It’s deliciously cruel.
DAMNED IF YOU DON’T
Jonathan may be the one cursed to roam the Earth as a vampire but it’s the player who will initially feel blighted by the constant combat encounters which serve to cordon off tougher sections of London and gently nudge gamers towards making rash meal decisions. Clay Cox, the very first unsavory individual who crosses your path seems like he comes gift wrapped with a bow and a tag that says “Eat me!”
He is literally in the act of murdering someone when you meet him. He’s been stabbed and is bleeding out in a dark alley. The game takes this moment to teach you how to mesmerize and embrace NPCs leaving his fate down to a multiple choice, tick the box moment. The world would clearly be better off without him in it and he could be made a quick snack of without all those pesky moral entanglements that snag the player through the rest of game. Most of all, that extra experience boost might help the player survive more of these combat encounters which at the outset are daunting.
DAMNED IF YOU DO
Hippocratic oath aside, eat Clay on the spot and you farm significantly less XP than if you fully explore his hint tree which is often the difference between opening up stronger vampire attacks, like that sweet claw swipe, or not. Spending XP will also level up Jonathan which comes with no additional benefits aside from allowing him to buy more powerful spells and enhancements.
Be aware though that for every time you sleep to upgrade the undead doctor, the world will suffer the repercussions of his dining decisions. Kill key characters and you’ll see the fallout of their deaths play out amongst their closest ties within the community and your actions might plunge the area further towards chaos; a state in which the streets are overrun with vampires and vampire hunters resulting in the death of its inhabitants. Showing too much restraint, however, will lock you out of the most powerful upgrades and make the fights tougher. Some of the boss fights, one which takes place in a cemetery in particular, will give you a good challenge if you’re grossly under leveled.
ADAPTING TO YOUR NEW CIRCUMSTANCES
There’s a fun variety of bad guys to dispatch from vampire hunters with flaming crossbows and gas grenades to teleporting, shadow conjuring skal (Vampyr’s word for ghouls). Some of them are immune or resistant to weapon based attack, others to vampire attacks presenting each encounter as a new challenge. Once you gain options like blood shield and ultra moves, my favorite of which, boils the blood of a target until it explodes, causing nearby opponents to take a hit, the player can really hold their own against the hordes. But getting over the initial stickiness and paradoxically, looseness, can be a real pain in the n… ass.
I described the stake attack as a kind of jab earlier and at first I hated it because I was always coming up short of my target. Also, there have been times when whittling away a hunter’s stamina, one jab at a time, would take forever. Some twenty hours into the game, however, it has become part of my flurry of attacks; jab, jab, dodge, jab, blood shield, ultra, hack, hack, hack, drain, claw, dodge, jab, claw, switch weapon, shotgun blast. You get the point. What at first seemed imprecise, at best, has settled into a kind of primal rhythm that expertly balances, stamina, cool down times, weapon effects and countable attack animation frames to dazzling effect. While I still wouldn’t describe the combat as great (and maybe not even good), I have adapted to its quirks, found solutions to its puzzles, and learned to succeed within its roughly sketched system just as I did in the good old days of Super Nintendo when I somehow mastered the ultra floaty controls of Road Runner’s Death Valley Rally.
Honestly, it’s a kind of stockholm syndrome but that doesn’t mean I didn’t, as my Dad used to say, “find the fun.”
THE GREATER GOOD
This is going to sound like I’m making excuses for the game, but if Vampyr had buttery smooth combat from the beginning, if Jonathan responded exactly how the players wanted, then there wouldn’t be as much of a learning curve and thus less temptation to devour people as a shortcut to power. Although I tend to try to play games like Vampyr as a “good guy” and despite what Yahtzee says about going the no kill route, I feel like Vampyr has a decent reward versus risk balance which makes the occasional late night snack not only permissible but recommended.
There are certain stories that I became so invested in (that lady should adopt that homeless kid!) that I felt pretty good about taking a life to improve the lives of others. I wish the game took that more into account in regards to the conditions of an area, which I saw drop precipitously from healthy to serious despite only removing disruptive or dangerous elements from play. In the end, the game makes a good case not so much for “thou shalt not kill” but for “the greater good to serve the greater number.” I found it very pragmatic and the combat and upgrade system plays right into the idea. After all, if Jonathan can’t overcome the odds against him then he won’t cure the plague that’s befell London and everyone will be pushing up daisies anyway. Might as well, enjoy a nurse or two in the backroom to save the monarchy.
IN CONCLUSION
As I make my way through Vampyr each morning, by night my buddy and I are teaming up to tackle Monster Hunter World which has an incredible selection of unique monsters and an array of weapons to choose from. It’s also janky as fuck. It commits the player to wild swings and pokes many of which have long Dark Soulsian attack animations that can’t be easily cancelled out of. Like Vampyr though, these quirks give the game a jolt of personality and texture.
I liken jank in video games to the rock band Weezer. You can adore the Blue album for all its slick production and shimmer but there’s something delightfully jagged and personal about Pinkerton’s haphazardness. There’s room for both in anyone’s collection.
