Coming back After a long break, any advice on mods?

[Beast_of_Bray_Rd]

Have not played VTMB in about 3 years and was wondering what the best mods to are to install.

[Vepar]

Unofficial patch plus could be considered "modified", although, it's all in the spirit of what the devs wanted for the game, so it introduces cut content and rebalances a few things. Also now adds a new game mode where you play as a vampire hunter. Pretty cool!

Clan Quest Mod is pretty great! Lets you play as a Sabbat and adds an entire new hub.

There's also Antitribu, but i have no idea if it's been maintained or not, same with Final Nights.

Don't mix and match, only install one, and don't mix the unofficial patch with the big mods like CQM, they all come with their UP version bundled in, otherwise they won't work, or will break.

Now, regardless of the above mods you can install texture mods like VTMB AI upscaled textures, those are pretty vanilla friendly, but add to visual fidelity. And of course, slap on some ReShade and make it look the way you want. I usually add some clarity, sharpness and curves filters, and a very subtle bloom.

You can also install character replacements, but don't go overboard with any texture mods because the engine can only handle a limited amount of textures in memory, and if it exceeds that number it will become unstable and crash. So pick your stuff, don't just add all in.

Usually you can add AI upscaled textures and some character textures without any issues. Anything above that is a gamble, but i haven't tried how far it'll go.

[Beast_of_Bray_Rd]

Originally posted by Vepar:

Unofficial patch plus could be considered "modified", although, it's all in the spirit of what the devs wanted for the game, so it introduces cut content and rebalances a few things. Also now adds a new game mode where you play as a vampire hunter. Pretty cool!

Clan Quest Mod is pretty great! Lets you play as a Sabbat and adds an entire new hub.

There's also Antitribu, but i have no idea if it's been maintained or not, same with Final Nights.

Don't mix and match, only install one, and don't mix the unofficial patch with the big mods like CQM, they all come with their UP version bundled in, otherwise they won't work, or will break.

Now, regardless of the above mods you can install texture mods like VTMB AI upscaled textures, those are pretty vanilla friendly, but add to visual fidelity. And of course, slap on some ReShade and make it look the way you want. I usually add some clarity, sharpness and curves filters, and a very subtle bloom.

You can also install character replacements, but don't go overboard with any texture mods because the engine can only handle a limited amount of textures in memory, and if it exceeds that number it will become unstable and crash. So pick your stuff, don't just add all in.

Usually you can add AI upscaled textures and some character textures without any issues. Anything above that is a gamble, but i haven't tried how far it'll go.

TY! great info!

[Vepar]

You're welcome! Have fun!

[Monk]

Is there any way to play this game via Steam? Currently it loads only from "unnoffical patch", not via Steam

[Ratty]

Originally posted by Monk:

Is there any way to play this game via Steam? Currently it loads only from "unnoffical patch", not via Steam

My advice would be to just make an unofficial patch desktop shortcut. The game launches for me on steam without any patches and I have played it a little bit, but I wouldn't recommend doing this as it was notoriously unstable on launch and Troika barely got out a patch to address just some of the problems before they shut down.

The game was built on an early pre-Half-Life 2 version of the source engine. And even if it wasn't held together with duct tape and bubble gum as it is, it was made for a 20 year old version of windows so at this point a fan patch is the way to go.

[Wesp5]

To start the patch from the Steam library, add -game Unofficial_Patch as a launch option.

[Vepar]

Originally posted by Ratty:

Originally posted by Monk:

Is there any way to play this game via Steam? Currently it loads only from "unnoffical patch", not via Steam

My advice would be to just make an unofficial patch desktop shortcut. The game launches for me on steam without any patches and I have played it a little bit, but I wouldn't recommend doing this as it was notoriously unstable on launch and Troika barely got out a patch to address just some of the problems before they shut down.

The game was built on an early pre-Half-Life 2 version of the source engine. And even if it wasn't held together with duct tape and bubble gum as it is, it was made for a 20 year old version of windows so at this point a fan patch is the way to go.

Yeah, you can run the game patched from steam, just do what wesp5 said.

Running the game unpatched is not recommended, i agree. Tried it not too long ago, it was horrible.

But there's no reason you need to use the desktop shortcut if you don't want to. Just add those lines into launch options for the game.

[Ratty]

Originally posted by Vepar:

Originally posted by Ratty:

My advice would be to just make an unofficial patch desktop shortcut. The game launches for me on steam without any patches and I have played it a little bit, but I wouldn't recommend doing this as it was notoriously unstable on launch and Troika barely got out a patch to address just some of the problems before they shut down.

The game was built on an early pre-Half-Life 2 version of the source engine. And even if it wasn't held together with duct tape and bubble gum as it is, it was made for a 20 year old version of windows so at this point a fan patch is the way to go.

Yeah, you can run the game patched from steam, just do what wesp5 said.

Running the game i patched is not recommended, i agree. Tried it not too long ago, it was horrible.

But there's no reason you need to use the desktop shortcut if you don't want to. Just add those lines into launch options for the game.

True true. I also thought about mentioning that you could probably add it as a 3rd party game to the launcher and probably should have. I didn't because when I did that back years ago (for games I had on disc or from GoG) I never wound up opening from the steam launcher anyway. But I should have considered there are people who'd still want access to the steam overlay features in game.

[Vepar]

Originally posted by Ratty:

True true. I also thought about mentioning that you could probably add it as a 3rd party game to the launcher and probably should have. I didn't because when I did that back years ago (for games I had on disc or from GoG) I never wound up opening from the steam launcher anyway. But I should have considered there are people who'd still want access to the steam overlay features in game.

Not only that, but if you run it from the shotrtcut, it doesn't log your hours.

Besides, there's nothing wrong with either approach, neither is better than the other if you don't need Steam features. Both do the same thing.