Jeffery Cohen’s Monster Culture (Seven Theses) reminded me of a video game I played around a year ago, called Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines. It is an older game that takes the concept of the vampire and throws out all the pre-established lore in order to make its own. The game was fun to play through, the characters and lore playing off each other so well that I found myself invested in almost everything the game had to offer.
The reason I believe this is relevant is because the developers of this game took the culture of the vampire and redesigned it to create their own story. In a previous post, I complained how I believe creating vampires into a sexually desired monster was baffling to me, yet here I am praising this game that seemingly did the same. However, there is one distinct aspect that this game held onto: the vampires were not the good guys.
Throughout the game, you as the player will make choices that determine what kind of monster you are: driven by greed, lust, sadism, or many more. The decisions the player makes will affect how the other vampires will respond to you, however, humans are always considered to be inferior. Multiple times throughout the game, humans are put in danger by the supernatural, yet the vampires only want to intervene to ensure that their presence is not exposed.
Monstrous Poetry 