Recent reviews by Zet

There's a lot of misinformation being perpetuated about this game, particularly around its anti-cheat. Not that it'll dissuade some people in their crusade to hate train this game, but we'll address that first before going into the actual review.

ACE (Expert Anti-Cheat) is not spyware any more than Battleye or Easy Anti-Cheat can be considered spyware.

You may recognize those latter two because hundreds of popular games utilize them as their anti-cheat. Both operate at the kernel level, and both functionally do the same thing. All three are less oppressive than Vanguard for Valorant used to be.

You can read more about the information it collects and what it does here if you're curious. If you "don't trust" that information because it's from the company that makes the software, you can read up more about kernel level anti-cheat systems with a quick Google search. If you are not comfortable with using these anti-cheat services, then that is completely understandable. But that is not a valid reason to slander or review bomb this game.

If you are comfortable playing Rainbow Six Siege, Apex Legends, etc, etc. then you should be just as comfortable playing this game because the anti-cheat utilized here is functionally the same.

To clarify, yes there was a bug with the game where it would not close properly when the game was closed (the game was technically 'crashing' when it closed before) and it left remnants of the anti-cheat software on the computer when the game was uninstalled. Both of these issues have been fixed. If you still have remnants of the anti-cheat on your computer and have no interest in playing the game, again, a quick Google search will show you what you need to remove said remnants.

Now that all of the shenanigans are out of the way: the review.

Bloodhunt is a battle royale, so go in expecting it to play like one with a few major caveats.
1. Verticality plays a huge role in this game and movement is incredibly important.
2. You can be resurrected potentially several times after you die if you are playing with a coterie.
3. Health consumables are still a thing, but feeding on civilians is arguably more important and useful.

If you're unfamiliar with Vampire the Masquerade, the quick and dirty is that you're a vampire and you don't want society to know about it. Thus, using your vampiric abilities, feeding on civilians, or essentially acting unnatural will cause a bloodhunt to be called on you. For sixty seconds you can be seen through walls and you show up consistently on the map. You can understand how this is a problem in a battle royale setting. It's one of the main hooks of the game and it's something that will be a constant presence throughout every match.

Outside of that, if you've played a third person shooter before you should be relatively comfortable with how Bloodhunt plays. Weapons have accuracy bloom, reload speeds, and ammo capacity that increase or decrease depending on the rarity of the weapon. All things that are relatively standard for a battle royale setting. There's also health consumables as mentioned before, and armor pickups which grant you an extra fifty health. You can carry three sets of armor at once, but can only wear one set at a time until it's destroyed.

Regardless of which clan and archetype you pick, everyone has 200 health without armor. Each clan has it's own movement ability, and each archetype has its own unique ability. For instance, if you pick Clan Brujah, both archetypes have the same movement ability which is a super jump. The Vandal archtype can do a ground slam and passively take less damage when close to enemies, and the Brute can release a shockwave that can knock enemies back and block bullets while passively they regenerate up to 100 health when not in combat. To summarize, your movement ability is the same across both archetypes in a clan, but each archetype has their own unique ability and passive.

There is also enemy AI soldiers on the map called "The Entity". They're trained vampire hunters and will actively chase and shoot anyone that exposes themselves as a vampire. The Entity is way less forgiving about this than civilians are. If you climb a building, get too close to them, use your movement ability, etc. they will actively start tracking you and open fire on you. They are very accurate and very deadly if you are unprepared. Likewise, if you are actively engaging another team, they can be very lethal. That being said, if you can down a member of The Entity, you can feed on them and gain another trait slot much like if you diablerized an enemy player. More on that later.

Every vampire has an ability called Heightened Vision which can be activated on a cooldown that will highlight loot zones, audio disturbances (gunshots, alarms), civilians, The Entity, and in certain circumstances enemy players. You will also notice that said highlighted civilians may have different colors associated with them. These are called blood resonance and they are your buffs you can acquire in a match.

To start, you only get three trait slots in which to acquire blood resonance. As you feed on The Entity or diablerize enemy players, you will unlock additional trait slots. It's easy to just max yourself out at the three resonance slots and then forget about it, but maxing out multiple resonance types can make you incredibly powerful.

The three resonance types are as follows:
1. Phlegmatic (Teal/Cyan) which reduces the cooldown of your archetype ability by 10%, 25%, then 50%.
2. Melancholic (Purple/Magenta) which reduces the cooldown of your movement ability by 10%, 25%, then 50%.
3. Sanguine (Pink) which increases the health you gain per second by .5, 1.5, then 3.
4. Choleric (Orange with particles) which increases your melee damage by 10%, 25%, then 50%.

Obviously, these are incredibly powerful buffs and it's typically smarter to max one or two out as opposed to spreading them across multiple types. Decide how you intend to play prior to the match starting and plan your build around that playstyle. If you're playing with a coterie, much like when you ping equipment or weapons, you can ping civilians with resonance for your team, so if you know your teammate is building something specific be sure to call it out if you see it.

Lastly, and it's something that is only mentioned in a loading screen tooltip, you can resurrect your teammates if they die. On your minimap and full map, you'll notice white cross looking symbols with a ring around them. These are resurrection points and after you use one, it denies its use to another team while also bringing back your teammates (albeit with no gear, they do keep their traits). As the red mist closes around the map, it will also deny you resurrection points so be aware of these as you move about.

Overall it's a refreshing take on the battle royale genre and is less punishing to those who may be unfamiliar with the genre or aren't super competitive. It rewards movement and outsmarting your enemy and allows many different ways to recover from an ambush or getting caught out. If you're a fan of Vampire the Masquerade, you may be a little disappointed with this game as while it is a pretty good implementation of the system into a battle royale it largely doesn't utilize a lot of what VtM has to offer. That being said, if you're looking for a slightly more laid back battle royale experience in a pretty unique wrapper that is Vampire the Masquerade then this one is definitely worth checking out. It has solid gunplay, great animations and sound, tons of movement options, and great opportunities for clever play and synergy with your coterie (or solo, if you prefer).

TL;DR - The anti-cheat is no different than what tons of other games use, you're just overreacting. It's a fresh take on the BR genre and worth your time.

Good Game