Every RPG is behind D&D by huge margins. D&D is the big money maker of RPGs and everyone else makes chump change in comparison.

Most book stores have closed down in the past decade and a half due to competition with online ordering and ebooks.

Even then, by all indications CoD has shown itself able to compete comfortably with WoD. If only because people buy it to use with the translation guides and/or to create their own campaign settings.

WoD might be experiencing a slight surge in interest due to the sudden big changes made by Paradox, but that's hardly indicative of a long-term boost or outshining their heyday in the 90s.

I find any statements that WW is bigger now than in the 90s to be highly suspect, bordering on propaganda. I don't think you realize how big WW was in the 90s and even the early 2000s when they entered the d20 bubble. World of Darkness, Street Fighter, Trinity Universe, Sword & Sorcery, card games, board games, magazines, various collectibles, and more were all being published by WW.

Right now their biggest offerings are a handful of underwhelming visual novels on Steam. They promise a sequel to Bloodlines that shows no indication of being thematically similar in terms of black comedy and scenery-chewing character personalities.

WW is a pale shadow of itself at best. At worst, they're just another one of the many independent hobby companies that were snatched up by a video game publisher to be mined for video games and then rendered down for parts.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1130893Every RPG is behind D&D by huge margins. D&D is the big money maker of RPGs and everyone else makes chump change in comparison.

Most book stores have closed down in the past decade and a half due to competition with online ordering and ebooks.

Even then, by all indications CoD has shown itself able to compete comfortably with WoD. If only because people buy it to use with the translation guides and/or to create their own campaign settings.

WoD might be experiencing a slight surge in interest due to the sudden big changes made by Paradox, but that's hardly indicative of a long-term boost or outshining their heyday in the 90s.

I find any statements that WW is bigger now than in the 90s to be highly suspect, bordering on propaganda. I don't think you realize how big WW was in the 90s and even the early 2000s when they entered the d20 bubble. World of Darkness, Street Fighter, Trinity Universe, Sword & Sorcery, card games, board games, magazines, various collectibles, and more were all being published by WW.

Right now their biggest offerings are a handful of underwhelming visual novels on Steam. They promise a sequel to Bloodlines that shows no indication of being thematically similar in terms of black comedy and scenery-chewing character personalities.

WW is a pale shadow of itself at best. At worst, they're just another one of the many independent hobby companies that were snatched up by a video game publisher to be mined for video games and then rendered down for parts.

Honestly, I think you seem to have missed just how popular it's become with things like LA By Night on Geek and Sundry and the beginning of the White Wolf channel. There's hundreds of Twitch games with thousands of fans to them.

Plus, we've got VAMPIRE: THE MASQUERADE: BLOODLINES 2 as the 2nd most highly anticipated game of 2020.

[video=youtube_share;eN448PFGtX0]https://youtu.be/eN448PFGtX0[/youtube]

It also had an incredibly successful release with COTERIES OF NEW YORK and planned mobile games. White Wolf has modernized and adapted.

I know how to spot fads and "how do you do fellow kids" when I see it. Social media promotes fads in lieu of long-term gains. There might be a few thousand viewers, but how many are going to become invested in the brand?

WW modernized and adapted back in 2004 when they released Vampire: The Requiem. That didn't change their fate.

Coteries of New York released to underwhelming critical reception. I doubt it will change WW's fate either.

There's nothing special about the brand that will protect it from the pitfalls that defeat so many promising IPs.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1130880Then White Wolf is full of shit. Disparaging a decade and a half of their own work and fan investment as a mistake? Seriously, fuck them. I was right to leave this shitty fandom all those years ago.

I can't believe you still like those shitheads. There is something very wrong with you.

Street Fighter fans are so much more chill, man. Make a Street Fighter that was taught the Dragon Punch by bottle-nosed dolphins when he got lost during a SEAL operation against Shadoloo, then go kick a Yeti's ass. Like a real roleplayer!

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1130896I know how to spot fads and "how do you do fellow kids" when I see it. Social media promotes fads in lieu of long-term gains. There might be a few thousand viewers, but how many are going to become invested in the brand?

WW modernized and adapted back in 2004 when they released Vampire: The Requiem. That didn't change their fate.

Coteries of New York released to underwhelming critical reception. I doubt it will change WW's fate either.

There's nothing special about the brand that will protect it from the pitfalls that defeat so many promising IPs.

Right now they're translating the game into like 5 new languages and discussing other expansions.

But if you want to believe it's somehow not doing great, sure, that's on you. I'm happy to imagine what it's like if it was a failing brand.

Are you if it's not?

Edit:

FYI - Coteries of New York received middling critical reception but was the best seller on Steam during its release month and recouped its costs within a week.

https://drawdistance.dev/being-a-pure-evil-business-developer-what-a-year-it-was/

QuoteLaunching Vampire: The Masquerade – Coteries of New York. Our first ever created fully licensed narrative experience (text-based adventure, Visual Novel-like game, you choose) released on December 11th. Great (and a little stressful) cooperation with Paradox, the IP holder on this – there were always doubts in our minds, are we following the licensing guidelines properly, is this being true to Vampire spirit? And despite some minor issues, such as some bugs and stuff, the launch was really successful. Both the development and marketing costs recouped in less than a week, Paradox is pleased, players and journalists are moderately pleased – all in all it was a good launch, but also extremely important in terms of acquiring new skills by our developers.

They immediately set out to make a sequel that is coming out this year and White Wolf is now doing 3 text based mobile and computer novels.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1279630/Vampire_The_Masquerade__Shadows_of_New_York/

[video=youtube_share;lJXiOLMUw5I]https://youtu.be/lJXiOLMUw5I[/youtube]

Quote from: CTPhipps;1130910Right now they're translating the game into like 5 new languages and discussing other expansions.

But if you want to believe it's somehow not doing great, sure, that's on you. I'm happy to imagine what it's like if it was a failing brand.

Are you if it's not?

They translated the game into multiple languages back in the 90s too. Some supplements were only released in foreign markets.

"Failing" is a relative term. Is it making a profit? Seems like it, sure. Is it as big as it was in the 90s? No, it's definitely not the phenomenon it was.

Compare M20 Technocracy with Blades in the Dark and the French RPG Nephilim Legend. Blades in the Dark was a completely new game, and Nephilim is a game that was dead for years since the original publisher went out of business in 2004. Both were able to match or exceed the supporter numbers and funds that WW is able to at the best of times.

Quote from: CTPhipps;1130910FYI - Coteries of New York received middling critical reception but was the best seller on Steam during its release month and recouped its costs within a week.

https://drawdistance.dev/being-a-pure-evil-business-developer-what-a-year-it-was/



They immediately set out to make a sequel that is coming out this year and White Wolf is now doing 3 text based mobile and computer novels.

Those products were very cheap to make, so I'm not surprised. That's the same strategy used by typical mobile shovelware companies. It may be successful, but at the end of the day it's still shovelware riding on brand recognition. Furthermore, since it's made for casuals, it's unlikely to convert a lot of new people to brand loyalty. Even the first Bloodlines game wasn't able to pull in a lot of new tabletop players, and it's pretty much the most talked about WW product despite being a commercial failure upon release. WW products nowadays seem to be mostly advertising for Bloodlines 2.

The gameplay previews of BL2 feel really bland, especially compared to the colorful characters of BL1. The thing about Troika was that they had good writers with years of experience. They knew the premise of the setting was inherently silly, so they leaned on that in their writing. BL2 doesn't feel nearly as fun.

I think comparing games is unimportant and doesn't benefit them to do so. A person can buy multiple RPGs in their lifespan, you know, like books or card games, so the success of one doesn't mean the failure of the other.

So it doesn't matter what the success of the ones you reference are. You can like both.

QuoteThe gameplay previews of BL2 feel really bland, especially compared to the colorful characters of BL1. The thing about Troika was that they had good writers with years of experience. They knew the premise of the setting was inherently silly, so they leaned on that in their writing. BL2 doesn't feel nearly as fun.

Bloodlines 2 is being written by the same writer, Brian Mitsoda.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1130829I try to keep my complaints focused on my creative disagreements with the setting and rules design, but eventually it's impossible not to criticize the attitudes of the company and the fandom.

Hence why I prefer to focus on constructive pursuits like world building the various fictional settings I want to play with.

The companies and fans are one of the two main factors why I left World of Darkness.  I want to make both suffer just like how Disney made the Star Wars fans suffer.  Which by the way I think out of respect for the Star Wars fans we should have a moment of silence before we cuss out Disney for destroying the IP.

Requiem included a lot of changes that people probably would have said that they wanted, or at least they changed lots of things people complained about regarding V:tM. Many people liked it. Though maybe it fell flat for some because in a way, the original had so much character from its many quirks and flaws. I like many aspects of it, with Clan changes being perhaps my biggest objection. I'm really skeptical that V5 is outselling 2nd edition from the 90's, I'd need to see some evidence for that. Though I wouldn't be surprised if they are selling better than they have in a while. There was a certain zeitgeist of the 90's that meshed well with Vampire and some of the subversive feel of WW games, it's something that I don't think that can really be recaptured.

Quote from: ShieldWife;1130956I'm really skeptical that V5 is outselling 2nd edition from the 90's, I'd need to see some evidence for that. Though I wouldn't be surprised if they are selling better than they have in a while. There was a certain zeitgeist of the 90's that meshed well with Vampire and some of the subversive feel of WW games, it's something that I don't think that can really be recaptured.

Agreed.

I'm pretty sure 2nd Edition Vampire is still the best selling product White Wolf ever released at least in the United States anyway.

From what I gather, V5 bombed in the United States outside of pre-orders and most of its sales are international, mainly in Northern and Eastern Europe.

Still, I'm pretty sure 2nd Edition outsold 5th Edition overall outside of a few foreign markets

FYI, here's where it listed Vampire was the 4th best selling RPG of Spring 2019.

https://icv2.com/articles/markets/view/43732/top-5-roleplaying-games-spring-2019

I think the issue is a lot of fans keep trying to equate ubiquity with the modern realities of marketing. They keep thinking back to the 90s as the heyday of Vampire because it was everywhere in the holiday. They can't really wrap their heads around that the international market just utterly blows the domestic market of the 90s away. It's an international game now and so when someone says, "It made most of its profits overseas" that doesn't mean anything because the European and South American gamers playing vampires are the same as any other geek.

That's just my take at least.

Quote from: CTPhipps;1130978FYI, here's where it listed Vampire was the 4th best selling RPG of Spring 2019.

https://icv2.com/articles/markets/view/43732/top-5-roleplaying-games-spring-2019

I think the issue is a lot of fans keep trying to equate ubiquity with the modern realities of marketing. They keep thinking back to the 90s as the heyday of Vampire because it was everywhere in the holiday. They can't really wrap their heads around that the international market just utterly blows the domestic market of the 90s away. It's an international game now and so when someone says, "It made most of its profits overseas" that doesn't mean anything because the European and South American gamers playing vampires are the same as any other geek.

That's just my take at least.

I get that it's a sales success overall when you factor in the foreign market. Nobody's debating that. I get that European gamers love V5, but even among geeks, there are some cultural differences when it comes to taste.

While Vampire and World of Darkness is beloved in Europe, nowadays it is largely reviled among American geeks outside of the core Nu-WW and Onyx Path fandoms, and a lot of it has to do with the pretentiousness and toxicity of the wider fandom from the Revised era onward.

Granted, the older editions of Vampire and Werewolf and the first Bloodlines game do get a pass and are well-liked to this day among American geeks, mainly out of nostalgia. This is probably why V20 did so well. It was the best of all worlds, and was explicitly metaplot-neutral. You could include the old metaplot or throw it in the trash and play your own WoD chronicle. You weren't bound to it like in V5, and sneering WW writers didn't insult you and chide you for "playing the game wrong" like in Revised.

While you may have positive experiences with the Goth and Punk subcultures, a lot of people don't, and they find their sneering pretentiousness and overall snobbery to be very off-putting. I know not all Goths are like that, but the terrible attitude and purity spirals of both the Goth and Punk subcultures are infamous, and the punks in particular are the far worse of the two.

The "culture wars" of the past decade or so has intensified this polarizing view on goth and punk culture since the extremist Millennial Left often associates itself with punk culture and the 2010's American punk subculture is mired in communist and anarchist extremism. The neon dyed hair and piercings didn't come from nowhere, after all.

Places like RPG.net and Onyx Path Forums do not help matters at all.

I say fuck that metaplot punk shit and let's reset the clock to the beginning. Start all over and act like V5 was nothing more than a very bad dream. Forge our own counter-canon and counter-themes.

Controversial opinion here, but I sincerely believe that "Vampions" is not "playing the game wrong" and in my honest opinion, it's the superior way to play as opposed to pretentious personal horror.

There is a difference between horror and personal horror.

"Personal horror" is more along the lines of pretentious pseudo-intellectual wangst. Crybaby goths and punks who mope around bitching and whining about their lost humanity and acting like snobs.

Fuck that shit. I say kill those crybabies with a katana. If you use a katana specifically, it adds insult to injury for the goth and punk assholes. And those guyliner-wearing fake intellectual snobs deserve that.*

*-(Figuratively speaking, of course.)

I should note my bias since I was recently appointed a moderator for Onyx Path's forums.



http://forum.theonyxpath.com/forum/main-category/main-forum/the-classic-world-of-darkness/vampire-the-masquerade/1388414-v5-wir-the-chicago-folios-and-let-the-streets-run-red

Quote from: CTPhipps;1130997I should note my bias since I was recently appointed a moderator for Onyx Path's forums.



http://forum.theonyxpath.com/forum/main-category/main-forum/the-classic-world-of-darkness/vampire-the-masquerade/1388414-v5-wir-the-chicago-folios-and-let-the-streets-run-red

Congrats your a fucking Zeev.

Quote from: Snowman0147;1130999Congrats your a fucking Zeev.

Alas, I don't know what that means. I admit to being a fantastic White Wolf fanboy, though.

I arranged for my publishers to license and reprint the Clan Novels of the OWOD.

https://crossroadpress.com/product-category/white-wolf/

It really makes me sad they won't reprint ALL of the books.

THE WORLD MUST KNOW THE WONDERS OF THE WORLD OF DARKNESS!