Many elements that would be commonplace in later editions like the Sabbat and the ruling structures of cities were still in flux. If focused on official settings in cities around the American midwest including Gary, Indiana, Milwaukee, Wisconsin and finally coming into the city that would be its home setting for many years: Chicago, Illinois. This edition of the game is remarkable for just how much of the world is shrouded in darkness. Many of the ideas seen in modern urban fantasy like The Dresden Files or True Blood can be traced back to the setup for this game. What would become the World of Darkness was riff on media the time, such as Interview With The Vampire, The Hunger or Near Dark. The game was also set in a world like ours, only darker.

Some clans were allies while others bickered like siblings. Players were divided into clans, which functioned like character classes, but also offered a social dynamic as part of the game world. Most evil games assumed players would revel in cackling villainy, but Vampire made it clear that drinking blood to live was bad and that characters should feel bad for doing it. Other RPGs had been doing “evil” campaigns for a while, but the struggle between the bad things players had to do to survive and hanging on to their humanity was a new concept. The book’s hook at the time was revolutionary. The first edition of Vampire: The Masquerade was released in a softcover rulebook in 1991. We won’t be able to cover everything in a single article (sorry, fans of Kindred: The Embraced!) but we hope this article sparks fond memories and piques curiosities of gamers who never got to experience it the first time around.

To celebrate, we decided to look at the various editions over the years and how they influenced the hobby as a whole. Vampire never truly went away, but the new edition certainly looks poised to bring some new blood into the hobby. It changed so many things about RPGs during its run how games were played, how they looked, who they appealed to and more. Game publisher Modiphius scored the coup of the summer by announcing it would be publishing a new edition of one of the most influential RPGs of all time: Vampire: The Masquerade.įor the uninitiated, Vampire: The Masquerade was a shock to the system when it was released in 1991. With the sleeping giant known at Dungeons & Dragons once again awakening, it was only a matter of time before other RPGs returned with new editions.

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