Major problems in the development of the vampire action role-playing game Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 have been emerging for a long time, now the previous negative climax has been reached.
The entire development team from Hardsuit Labs has been fired, like the manufacturer Paradox Interactive in the context of the current financial report of the company now made it public.
Completion work and, given the obvious dissatisfaction with progress so far, probably major revisions, will now take place at a different developer studio. It is not yet known what it is.
“It was a tough decision, but we are sure that this is the right way to live up to the demands placed on the game,” said Paradox.
As expected, this drastic decision also has an impact beyond the hapless original development team: The release date of Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 has been postponed significantly, the planned launch in 2021 for PS, PS4 and Xbox One will definitely not work anymore.
Paradox Interactive doesn’t even mention the year 2022 as a fixed target period, so fans will probably have to wait a very, very long time.
In a further statement, which is currently not available, it is pointed out that due to the current situation, no further pre-orders for the game will be accepted. The extent to which the postponement will affect existing pre-orders is not clear from the statement.
Recently, Hardsuit Labs have been gradually losing more and more employees who have voluntarily left the studio. Before the 2021 date, which has now been canceled, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 was actually planned for 2020.
Most recently, Paradox Interactive announced a battle royale game in the series universe. The recently released Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Earthblood, also playing in the same world, unfortunately failed to meet expectations.
Two years ago Nintendo went public with a similar decision, when the development of Metroid Prime 4 started again at Retro Studios after they were not satisfied with the work of the previously responsible, unknown development team. The internal release date was postponed indefinitely, until today nothing has been seen from the game.