A Vampyre Story

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Description

Mona de Laffite led a successful life. As a famous opera singer in Paris she had it all. Fame, fortune and countless admirers. One of them was Baron Shrowdy von Kiefer - a vampire. But he didn't love and admire her just because of her beauty and voice. She also reminded him of his own mother who left him behind in the castle to go on the search for a powerful book. Shrowdy tried and tried to win over Mona's heart but she dared to send him away. So he did the only thing he could do: Bite Mona, transform her into a vampire and take her with him to his castle in Draxsylvania.

Several years have gone by and there is no day where Mona doesn't wish to be free and back in Paris. Also trying to ignore the fact that she is a vampire, she became friends with a cheeky bat named Froderick and when one day Shrowdy is slain by a monk while on a hunt for more blood, she sees her chance to escape the castle once and for all.

In a classic point 'n click adventure way, the player takes over the control of Mona and directs her actions through a pop-up menu. This way she explores the various locations, talks to people, creatures and some times even machines in multiple-choice dialogues and picks up everything that isn't nailed to the wall - or almost everything. If Mona thinks an item may be useful in the future but doesn't want to carry it around because it's too heavy, she places a memory imprint in her inventory. This way the player doesn't need to remember where it was and can just access it like every other item from the inventory. To help the player even more with finding every clue and item to solve the countless puzzles, a button press shows every hotspot in the room.

As a vampire, Mona of course also has the ability to turn herself into a bat and reach points too high for her to access in human form. But during the course of the game she will learn additional useful skills.

Screenshots

Promo Images

Alternate Titles

• "A Vampyre Story: Кровавый роман" -- Russian spelling
• "A Vampyre Story: Chapter One" -- In-game title

Part of the Following Groups

• 3D Engine: Panda3D
• A Vampyre Story series
• Covermount: Level (Romania)
• Protagonist: Female
• Protagonist: Vampire
• Theme: Vampires

User Reviews

Draxsylvania's Demise	Windows	Kayburt (15827)
A Ghoulishly Fun Adventure Game	Windows	browned (126)
Stay away from it as far as possible	Windows	micnictic (391)

Critic Reviews

RPGFan	Windows	Dec 15, 2008	89 out of 100	89
Gameswelt	Windows	Nov 18, 2008	88 out of 100	88
Onlinewelten.de	Windows	Dec 04, 2008	88 out of 100	88
Looki	Windows	Nov 28, 2008	87 out of 100	87
GameBoomers	Windows	Jan 04, 2009	B+	83
4Players.de	Windows	Nov 14, 2008	83 out of 100	83
Meristation	Windows	Mar 26, 2009	8 out of 10	80
PC Games (Germany)	Windows	Nov 14, 2008	79 out of 100	79
Adventure Gamers	Windows	Dec 20, 2008		70
1UP	Windows	Jan 05, 2009	C+	58

Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
STUCK	2	Sciere (780240) Feb 21, 2009

Trivia

Art style

The game's art direction was largely inspired by Edward Gorey illustrations. As such, the game was originally planned to be drawn in Gorey's black-and-white pen-and-ink style.

Namesakes

• The game's distinctive spelling of "vampire" as "vampyre" is a tribute to the first western vampire tale, The Vampyre by John Polidori.
• Mona de Laffite takes her surname from Laffite's Landing, a loading dock in the Pirates of the Caribbean theme park ride at Disneyland. Froderick's name was similarly borrowed from the popular 1974 Mel Brooks film Young Frankenstein.

Related Web Sites

• A Vampyre Story (Official website.)
• Bill Tiller about A Vampyre Story and beyond (Just before its release, the game's creator talks about A Vampyre Story and its future sequel, focusing on his artistic and storytelling choices (Adventure Classic Gaming - 19.09.2008))
• Gothic Humor (An Apple Games article discussing the Macintosh version of A Vampyre Story.)
• Von Kiefer Journal (The journal of Von Kiefer, referenced as a website in-game)