Vampire: Bloodlines

[Barinthus]

Thanks. I was looking for more of along the lines of whether if everything (at least crucial dialogues) are subtitled (either by options settings or by default, it doesn't matter - as long it's available). I'm profound deaf so games that do not offer subtitling for important dialogues are moot for me.

[Apocalypse]

Oh, I see. It's a shame, because some of the sound effects are really good and the voice acting is very good much of the time.

[LDiCesare]

Even though I'm not deaf, I always play with sounds off. Some games rely entirely on sound for some purposes, sometimes things as essential as alerting you when something goes wrong or explaining things in a tutorial, and that's a real pain. And relying on sound effects to give atmosphere makes a game very poor when you have to play it without...

[Barinthus]

Originally posted by Apocalypse
Oh, I see. It's a shame, because some of the sound effects are really good and the voice acting is very good much of the time.

:shrug: c'est la vie. Thanks for the info, it looks like I will be buying this game.

[Apocalypse]

I ended up beating the game...it's really good. The story ended up being fairly unique and rapping up nicely. It's nice to have an RPG not be the same old same old fantasy thing. The story isn't as good as say, Arcanum, but it's still really good.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by LDiCesare
Even though I'm not deaf, I always play with sounds off. Some games rely entirely on sound for some purposes, sometimes things as essential as alerting you when something goes wrong or explaining things in a tutorial, and that's a real pain. And relying on sound effects to give atmosphere makes a game very poor when you have to play it without...

Why would you play without sound? It is an integral part of making an immersive game.

[ravagon]

Hmm. Patch is out. Somehow I cleverly managed to miss this. A week old now too.

http://www.vampirebloodlines.com/patch/

Originally posted by LDiCesare
Even though I'm not deaf, I always play with sounds off. Some games rely entirely on sound for some purposes, sometimes things as essential as alerting you when something goes wrong or explaining things in a tutorial, and that's a real pain. And relying on sound effects to give atmosphere makes a game very poor when you have to play it without...

I generally tend to regard sound effects as a secondary consideration too - being primarily a strategy gamer at heart.
I do think they have their place though - as long as they're used to enhance or add to an atmosphere rather than having said atmosphere consist of pretty much the sound effects alone.
I also find warning/alert sound effects useful in some situations - particularly when focussing on a complex interface or somesuch when you can alleviate the need for yet another popup with an easily recognizable omnidirectional alert of some sort.
It isn't really so much of a problem in most tbs games (ie: the genre that really matters ) but I can sometimes be a sucker for punishment.
To this day I occasionally fire up 'star wars : rebellion' for yet another attempt to try and like it.

[Mmmm. Perhaps I should've used the , or there instead ... ]

[vovan]

Originally posted by ravagon
Hmm. Patch is out. Somehow I cleverly managed to miss this. A week old now too.

http://www.vampirebloodlines.com/patch/

Ah, thanks for the heads-up, ravagon! I missed the patch as well.

Vovan

[DrSpike]

Cool. I haven't got around to this yet, but I will, and now it should be relatively bug free.

[Apocalypse]

There had actually been a rather good fan made patch for a while...

[LDiCesare]

Why would you play without sound? It is an integral part of making an immersive game.

I happen to have a family. I play and have my kids and wife around. If they are watching a silly thing on TV while I play and I switch sound on, do you imagine the result? If my son is doing his homework while I play, I don't want him to be unsettled by sounds from the computer, as there's already his sister who's disturbing him. etc. And I don't want to plug something in my ears either as I want to be able to stop playing if anyone calls me and asks me something, which means I must hear them.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by LDiCesare

I happen to have a family. I play and have my kids and wife around. If they are watching a silly thing on TV while I play and I switch sound on, do you imagine the result? If my son is doing his homework while I play, I don't want him to be unsettled by sounds from the computer, as there's already his sister who's disturbing him. etc. And I don't want to plug something in my ears either as I want to be able to stop playing if anyone calls me and asks me something, which means I must hear them.

Well each to his own I guess. With Civ you can get away with no sound, but for games like Vampires the sound is so integral to the experience. Personally I don't see why you don't use headphones, and keep the volume low enough so you can hear people if necessary.

[LDiCesare]

If the sounds are needed for the experience, then to me it's a bad game. I just don't like headphones. YMMV.

[Apocalypse]

The sounds aren't needed, but they do add quite a bit.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by LDiCesare
If the sounds are needed for the experience, then to me it's a bad game.

That's just plain wrong, in my opinion anyway.