Dark: The Vampire Game Nobody Played - Just Bad Games 

Fun fact: You see that quote from Eurogamer on the game's cover? It's from a preview. The actual REVIEW gave it a 3/10.

The "vampires can't be photographed" thing comes from the fact that old-timey photography involved silver while developing the negative. And since silver rejects the image of a vampire, they don't show up on photographs! For the same reason they "don't show up in mirrors"... mirrors used to be lined with silver. Interestingly, they'd all show up in modern cameras and mirrors since there's no silver involved.

"Sorry, Eric, but the blood you need is in another vampire".

This feels like the videogame equivalent of someone going "Now i don't like X, but THIS is X done well" and then they show you the absolute worst bastardized version of X

My favorite part is that each vampire getting their own unique power is a... twilight... thing

Trivia fact: The reason for the stereotype of vampires saying "bleh" comes from imitators making fun of the way Bela Lugosi pronounced the word "blood" when he played Dracula.

I just realized, Rose has all this vast vampire lore but she sends you after Steiner only moments from daybreak and tells you vampires are weak to sunlight, all while forgetting to mention that Steiner is the only vampire who becomes stronger in sunlight? She has Tom shoot you without knowing if you’d survive. She gets mad when the elder vampires she sent you to aren’t the one you’re looking for, Rose is actually the main antagonist 😂

I just can't get over the Geralt voice. I keep expecting him to say the fog's thick as curdled milk.

Imagine being a vampire at some point in the distant past. You try and figure out what your powers are. Nothing works, frustration builds and you are mocked for not having powers. Then one day, hundreds of years into the future. Someone sits you down in front of a keyboard and somehow you know how to program. A skill that you could have learned in a couple of years.

"Going back to the origins of the Vampire stories." Main character looks like the edgiest edgelord to ever edge.

Eric dragging a corpse up stairs looks like he's puppeteering the body.

Not gonna lie, I thought the twist ending was going to be that Rose is the one that sired you and Tom was in on it and they were both either testing you or screwing with you for their amusement.

"It tastes like a taco peed on my tongue." For years I've been trying to describe what a bloody Mary tastes like to me, and you did it in one sentence.

Total Biscuit gave probably the most accurate appraisal of this game when it released: "You play as a fledgling vampire who is completely useless at pretty much everything."

Eric's the type of vampire who'd be afraid of taking walks in the woods lest he run into a certain red clad vampire who likes taking very enthusiastic walks.

"This's guys neck has so many holes, it could play the song of time." I fucking died there

Didn’t they say “if a vampire drinks someone’s blood and kills them, they become a vampire”? So, all those people Eric slurped are going to come back as vampires, and if they don’t get Eric’s blood, they’ll all become mindless killing machine ghouls. So there’s gonna be a ton of ghouls roaming the streets pretty soon, right?

Just putting this out there: vampires getting completely randomized X-Men powers? Twilight did that too. Not sure how many other vampire stories do that, but *literally* how it works in Twilight. Just to make their instruction manual rant funnier.

You see Vlad has a gun and say, "Look at that vampires can use guns". Did you forget about Tom shooting you at the beginning?

The writing in the manual and the game dialogue leads me to believe this was written by r/niceguys. Also, in the book Bram Stoker's Dracula, vampires are not killed by sunlight. Dracula himself is seen walking about in the day stalking his victims. All that happens is his powers are weak or cease altogether and he can only transform at dawn, noon or dusk

I literally thought of a better ending twist than what this game did. Rose is your sire and was using your amnesia to make you kill her rivals

Oh yeah, I remember seeing this title on the shelf at GameStop. Thank God I asked the store clerk if it was any good. He said "absolutely not", and that was the best advice ever.

This game really shows why attention to detail is important. Because it’s not here and they definitely didn’t care. A poker game where everyone has the same card, really!?

1 single vampire man slaying hundreds of other vampires to save himself... amazing game plot.

The contrast between the developers´message and Count Duckula, Bunnycula and Nielsen´s Dracula is just gold!

When it comes to the whole sunlight thing with vampires, the original Dracula novel specified that Dracula didn't die in sunlight. In fact, that bit came from misinterpreting the ending of Nosferatu where he died due to the lack of blood, not the sunlight. Still, great episode

The wild thing about the "we're not like Twilight" vibe is the fact that vampires each having unique random abilities is legit *a thing directly from Twilight* I'm sure it wasn't the first or the last but that was like. A major thing in the series.

A few fun facts 1.) The reason vampires go "Bleh" is because when Bela Legosi played Dracula in the classic film, his accent caused the word Blood to sound like that 2.) Vampires originally were not killed by sunlight, only weakened. It wasn't until Nosfaratu that sunlight was used as a way to kill vampires. 3.) The part where Shane and Adam have a bit of conflicting lore in the game about "abilities being different between vampires" is partially misguided because the character says that some abilities are similar but generally they're different. Meaning that your characters teleport mist ability might be a shared ability between all vampires

Like a great vampire once said: "Morb or be Morbed"

“I want to play Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines!” “Honey, we have Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines at home.” Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines at home:

The main character's narration sure is the epitome of "Dark" as written by a 14 year old.

It's so funny when in 27:16 the guard yells "OOGH! A VAMPIRE!! ARGH!! OOOGH!!" to just "OOOGH!" XD

My only complaint is that you didnt have the ghost of the money we wasted on Dark in the cemetery.

Drinking a non alcoholic Bloody Mary is like ordering a burger that’s just lettuce and tomato.

As odd as having a nightclub look like a church is, it's not unheard of for old churches to be turned into nightclubs or other venues while retaining their church-like shape and structure. It happens in Europe. Though I'm not sure if the game designers knew this, or were just going with a gothic architectural theme for the club.

There's really a big problem as well with the fact that in order not to turn into a goul you need to drink the blood of your creator. Everyone that Eric drank the blood and killed now has crazy vampire powers and are coming after him to keep from turning into gouls. It also makes me wonder how there is even more than one vampire at a time when everyone they bit now needs their blood.

Oh my God! I’m actually the one who sent this in to you! I never thought I’d actually see this episode ever come out! But, God, it feels so surreal to see it actually be here! Thanks so much for making this!

Man, this game's plot is so finicky. I mean, right from the get go, the girl goes "You're a half vampire and clearly you don't remember who you are and there's absolutely no chance you'll ever find the vampire who turned you or any of their lineage, which you need to know to drink their blood so you don't turn into a dangerous mindless ghoul... But go ahead and walk around the city, try to drink random vampires' blood!" Like how are they not terminating him on sight?? He's a walking time bomb! Those vampires are clearly not powerful creatures of the night or immortal beings or anything! Ghouls are clearly a threat to vampires! And if they're not, they're a threat to their existence! I imagine everyone would've already known vampires existed if Ghouls keep popping up every once in a while cause vampires keep seeing doomed half vampires and refuse to assassinate them! Of course, not to mention that you apparently need to drink *all* the vampire's blood, which means there's no feasible way for vampires to exist. As soon as you turn a human into a vampire, they either eventually turn into ghouls or kill you and take your place! Those guys didn't 'recall the origins of vampire lore'! They threw it out the window and crapped a random mess! I mean, for a game to be this shoddy right from the get go! This game isn't JUST BAD. It's gotta be deserving of the number one spot on the JUST BAD list!

"We don't know how to animate Eric dragging bodies around! What do we do?" "Eh, just make it go to first-person when you're dragging, that'll save a bunch of time." Great move, devs.

Wait so this game has 4 levels? The Museum, Vlad's Level, Atlantis and the Lab? That's it... Lord. Also Vampire the Masquerade has the benefit of being developed by folks who worked at Black Isle Studios who worked on Fallout and Icewind Dale. They knew how to do Narratives.

Usually in these “incomplete vampire” stories it’s as simple as letting the transformation carry through or just drink blood for the first time.

Careful Rerez, the developers are going to want to put you on their hitlist next after this review

All of the images used for the intro were hilarious enough, but it was Count Chocula being used for "metrosexual vampire" at the start was the best.

So the camera thing actually makes sense, since the reason camera's couldn't see vampires is because real old ones used silver in the photographing process, like how silver is used in mirrors, and digital cameras wouldn't have that problem. Not that the devs thought about that when making the game.

Something worth noting is that vampjres don't actually get killed by sunlight in traditional lore. Even in Bram Stoker's Dracula! If they really cared about the origins, the sun would be meaningless!

How could his voice in the Witcher sound so good but in this game he’s making the original resident evil voice acting look amazing

Dark's art style reminds me of TellTale's comic book style but worse and without the charm. I have no idea if anyone else shares the same thought but even while TellTale's games are jank, I still loved playing it.

No no! You don't understand! Vlad's vampiric power was- using a gun, so clearly, that is the reason Eric can't use a gun. Genius game design!

Thank god. I'm one of the contributors to VTM Bloodlines' Unofficial Patch, so I was planning out a big WELL ACKTCHULLY comment about their obvious inspiration, but then you finally got there in the end. :) If you look at some of the early trailers for DARK, the inspirations are even more obvious: the blood meter in the upper-left is labelled "Vitae." The term doesn't get used much in Bloodlines specifically, but it's the term used in the Vampire: The Masquerade source material for a vampire's blood. DARK also had a series of four trailers showing off vampire powers, three of which were "Obfuscation," "Domination," and "Presence." No relation at all to VTM's Obfuscate, Dominate, and Presence, I'm sure. I've never played it but those names seem to be absent in what little gameplay I've seen, so they probably changed them after they got rightly dogpiled. I'm giggling thinking about "the ORIGINS of the vampire myth" as meaning "we played Vampire: The Masquerade in college."

I know people make fun of the dancing animations in Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, but at least they look like they're kinda having fun, geez. Thank you for once again making a video on a game I've never heard of, always fun to see! Your team is awesome!

Had this game on a bootleg DVD in Syria when I was 13 or 14 years old... Seeing it here is absolutely insane!

Making a vampire game because you hate Twilight, is like making a game about Mario because you hate italians

Ah, a 45 minute episode from Rerez. "Man, it always takes a while waiting for th-" And then I remember they have to play *through* these tedious games, so they probably have a lot less downtime than one would expect. Your patience is much greater than ours.

"Hey, Jimmy, y'know that dark gritty game we're making?" "Yeah, Paul?" "Y'know what would make it even darker and gritter? CEL SHADING BUT ONLY ON CHARACTERS!"

A vampire stealth game could be a cool idea taking inspiration from Dishonored would be a great start maybe even a similar chaos mechanic to encourage a pacifist run.

1:10 The Regret he had after drinking it is pure gold comedy

I love when you guys cover games that are very obscure. Gives them a good and kind of almost creepy vibe in my opinion.

How are there so many elder vamps with horrifically extensive facial scars? Aren't they supposed to....idk heal, keeping them ageless with eternally flawless looking skin.

If you would like to play an actual cool vampire game, give Vampyr a try. Has you playing as a skilled surgeon back from war to help deal with the plague. You return, are turned, and end up spending the game either working towards being a powerful vampire, or resisting your urges while you try to solve the mystery behind why you were turned and what happened to you and it's really cool

Well the guards could be using silver bullets, unlike tom, who could've used regular lead ones, since silver bullets tend to actually harm vampires

This game kinda reminds me of 'ride to hell' both in appearance, gameplay & writing. The most interesting part about this game was honestly the developers. I was constantly hoping they would bring up more weird stuff about them. XD

Thanks for mentioning Vampire: The Masquerade at the End, because this game really feels like the Bargain Bin Mockbuster version of Masquerade, but without the character, world building or the compelling story. Speaking of story, when I saw the premise I through the twist was going to be that Rose (or someone she's working for) knows who bite Eric, but is pretending to not know so he will kill her enemies for her so she can get more power. Which would've been a pretty cliche story ngl, but still leagues better than the convoluted crap we actually got.

It’s insane that this game has such a terrible depiction of vampires it actually makes the twilight vampires look more thoughtful and interesting

This game needed another 6months to a year of dedicated, grueling, hard work to get to "not broken."

Here I am, sitting in my room, thinking to myself “Man, I could go for some Just Bad Games right about now.” And behold, you have gifted us another video. Stellar job as always.

You know what’s a funny coincidence? Eric’s voiced by Doug Cockle, the actor of Geralt, and you say that he seems to be modelled after Channing Tatum, who played Superman in The Lego Movie. And Henry Cavil, who also played Superman in films also played Geralt in The Witcher Netflix series, and so Eric, The Witcher and Superman are all linked in some way!

Holy crap. Y'all unlocked a repressed memory with this video. I went into it not knowing anything about this game. But when it got to the club, I got this weird deja vu-like feeling that steadily kept increasing with each new bit of information. And finally, the floodgates opened when you showed that it was a stealth game. It's crazy to me how deep in my memory this game was buried.

5:51 another is disco elysium, your character has his memories DESTROYED after a drinking binge, so while his past informs the plot, you build the rest.

To give credit where it's due, about the skydome, the legend that vampires die when exposed to sunlight appeared in cinema. In older legends, vampires can't stand sunlight but it doesn't kill them, or it weaken them to the point they can't use their surnatural powers, but they remain able to behave normally. Also, the older a vampire get, the more powerful it get. So it does make sense that Steiner seems unnaffected by the sunligt but Eric is. There's a few other details in game the developers got "right", which make me suppose at least one of them did read Bram Stoker's Dracula or some documents about "original" vampires (although post-Dracula vampires, as earlier legends are more varied and vague, with vampires sometime appears more as demons or some kind of ghouls rather than the pale, intelligent monster of Bram Stoker). However it's still poorly applied, explained or written.

That's what happens when the game is directed by the Ventrue, PR is handled by the Gangrel, visuals designed by the Toreador, physics done by the Tzimisce, gameplay mechanics done by the Brujas, and a Malkavian writes the plot.

During all the video I was thinking that Rose was going to be the bad guy, and she was sending Eric to kill her vampire rivals so she could become the leader, or something like that.

What gets me is that stealth games where you're encouraged to leave no one alive can work, Manhunt being the best example, the whole point of that game is to execute every one in the level to get the best rank per level.

"It tastes like taco peed on my tongue!!" honestly sounds the most accurate explanation ever

So Steiner's Vampiric power is that he is immune to the Sun? Does he need to drink blood to keep this power active? If not then he is basically an immortal human, if he does then that is not much a downside.

Sometimes when I'm on the middle of watching one of these "Just Bad Games" videos I start to feel really bad for the guys who had to sit through the game they're reviewing, thanks for your sacrifice.

Rose sounds like the narrator of one of those books that you could have the computer read to you. Those picture books, the ones you would read and then click around the screen.

Nothing like an vampire in the Christmas season.

A Virgin Bloody Mary? That’s an ill omen to start this review. And yet Shane downed it for our collective entertainment this holiday season. Your sacrifice is appreciated.

I hope these guys keep releasing content. Their humor and commentary stands out from the rest of the RU-vidrs .

Stephanie Meyer put more love and care into Twilight than the Devs did for this game

The first thing I thought about when I looked at this game cover was "It wants to be Thief" I was correct, it seems. Sometimes we can judge a game by its cover I guess.

Speaking of Twilight, When Breaking Dawn Part One came out my girlfriend at the time wanted me to go see it with her and I had to disappoint her cause I had made plans to see Disney’s The Muppets and she broke up with me cause of that I’m sorry but if I have a choice between a vampire that sparkles and a frog and his group of misfits I’m going with The Frog!

It feels like every mechanic in this game was implemented separately and all work against each other.

I Love DARK's Intro, the moment the Speech started, I had Linkin Park in my head on repeat. His wounds will never heal.

I remember this game! It was from that same era in the 7th gen as Ride to Hell where they tried to kill off the 7th gen consoles by releasing the worse games possible for them!

3:30 Ah yes, Eric of Rivia. So surreal to see his VA in this game lmao.

When I first saw you guys do “It’s just bad” for Duke Nukem Forever, I thought: “Yeah, this is worth 30 minutes of my time.” And it’s still worth watching your series keep up the work guys!

11:18 that "oh no!" sounded exactly like something I'd hear sonic say in sonic adventure

Wow, a new Just Bad Games before Christmas? What a great early present!

Finally. The Morbius video game i always wanted. Now EVERYONE can Morb!!!

"It tastes like a taco peed on my tongue!!!" Probably one of the best and most accurate descriptions of a Bloody Mary out there.

Dear god, this game…I found this randomly at GameStop one day when I had a bunch of left over store credit and has played everything that was out that I wanted so I saw a vampire stealth game and went “sure, why not? Can’t hurt?” It’s how I found great gems like Vanquished, Binary Domain, Bayonetta, and the like. Ironically I bought a used version, they went through their drawers, handed me an unwrapped version and went “they’re all like that” and so I took home a brand new version for under $10 and stopped playing within two hours, it’s truly just bad….just horrible.

I hate myself for this, but since it's a vampire game... My favorite part of the game is when Erick says it's darkin' time and the proceeds to dark all over the place. Truly one of the games of all time.

Also, Malkavians and Nosferatu have stealth-based powers to make you feel like a bad-ass ninja. ... and the rewards for pacifism and genocide are the same.

I appreciate the inclusion of Count Duckula among the vampire montage.

Calling it after the first boss; Rose is the one who turned Eric, and she's sending him on wild goose chases in order to eliminate her competition.

I swear this looks like a GameCube game souped up as an HD remaster the way it looks, plays and animates! It was made in 2013 as well! Remember by then we had so many great looking games!

you two manage to make me laugh at a time when not much does. the Just Bad series is like a really good cheese that has to be aged; you always want more than what's available but you understand why it can't be rushed and that makes it precious and something to be savored when more does come.

I've always thought vampires were undead monsters made from having your head pierced by an ancient stone mask crafted by subterranean Aztec body builder

27:16 I spent too long laughing at that jank. Worth the price if every enemy does that.