Posted in: Board Games, Card Games, Games, Renegade Game Studios, Review, Tabletop | Tagged: GenCon 2020, preview, Rivals, vampire, Vampire the Masquerade

Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals Is Shaping Up To Be Epic

Published Mon, 27 Jul 2020 17:10:40 -0500

by Joshua Nelson

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Greetings, horror buffs, LARPers, and other fans of Vampire: The Masquerade! Renegade Game Studios, the tabletop game design company responsible for such games as the Gudetama trick-taking card game, Power Rangers: Heroes of the Grid, and Clank!, have their sights set on releasing a new Vampire card game called Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals. We here at Bleeding Cool got the chance to preview it in demos in advance of GenCon 2020, and here's what we think of it!

The bloodied, intriguing key art for the new upcoming card game by Renegade Game Studios, Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals. — The bloodied, intriguing key art for the new upcoming card game by Renegade Game Studios, *Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals*.

We got a chance to play Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals in a demo guided by Renegade Game Studios. What we have extrapolated by the early information is the following, noting that the game is not finalized yet and some things are still subject to changes:

The game is an asymmetrical card game, with four different starter decks in the core release: one for each of the major vampire houses of Brujah, Ventrue, Toreador, and Malkavian. (Our tabletop writer, Josh Nelson, used Brujah.)
Each of the vampire houses uses a different set of agendas and playstyles to secure victory in the game. For example, Brujah is the brawler faction, relying on combat prowess to win, while Malkavians use Conspiracies to win under their gameplan.
Each vampire house has a rival house that they need to clear of active vampires as an alternate means of winning. Josh's Brujah vampires had to vanquish the Ventrues while the Toreadors had to take down the Brujahs, for example. This led to an interesting dance of defending while maintaining a steady offensive. It also meant that, in a four-player game, each player has a tentative ally in the player uninvolved in either of those rivalries. It was very elegant.

The Brujah vampire leader Hydra, who Josh made good use of in the demo game of Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals, hosted by Renegade Game Studios. There will be more demos remotely at GenCon! — The Brujah vampire leader Hydra, who Josh made good use of in the demo game of *Vampire: The Masquerade: Rivals*, hosted by Renegade Game Studios. There will be more demos remotely at GenCon!

There's plenty more to this game but as it were, demos are going on publicly on GenCon's Discord, via Tabletopia, once that convention begins remotely. It is recommended that you get an account with them to demo this game because it's honestly lots of fun!