During the Q&A section of Paradox Interactive's Q3 interim report (opens in new tab), the topic of Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 inevitably came up. The question asked was simply: "Any news on Bloodlines 2 or its developer?" To which Paradox CFO Alexander Bricca replied, "The new developer is doing quite well and we are happy with the progress of the project now, but it's still quite some time before we can start to talk about release dates."
When Bloodlines 2 was announced in 2019 it was being developed by Hardsuit Labs, but after the sudden firing of two key team members and the departure of another, it was delayed indefinitely and handed to a different studio. Paradox has yet to announce which studio, and that's not going to change any time soon according to Bricca.
"We prefer to give the studio a situation where they can focus fully on the game development," he continued, "and not having to address fans reaching out to them. So therefore we have so far not disclosed the name of the studio and we are very happy to keep it that way for still some time."
Prior to this, Paradox CEO Fredrik Wester has said Bloodlines 2 was almost canceled completely, until "we got a pitch that we thought was convincing enough to run". He described the replacement studio as "a very reputable and talented developer" that has shipped a number of games previously.
There are plenty of studios that could be, but if you'll bear with me as I power up the speculation engines for a second, Paradox did acquire Harebrained Schemes in 2018. The studio behind BattleTech and Shadowrun: Dragonfall has experience with licensed games and RPGs, is based in Seattle just like Hardsuit Labs, and senior game designer Kevin Maloney lists it as his current employer (opens in new tab) after previously bouncing from Harebrained to join Hardsuit as a senior content designer on Bloodlines 2 in 2020 (opens in new tab).
If all this vampire talk has you itching to play or replay the original, here's how to have the best Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines experience today.
