Oh man, VTM bloodlines was made infinitely better by turning on godmode so you can to an extent ignore the awful combat and focus on the plot.
Yeah, that's exactly what I did. A lot of the game's second-half scenes looked ready for more interesting gameplay but it had pretty much turned into an albeit still fairly narrative shooter by that point. But not how it started out. I should really replay it (or at least its first half!) with the other character types.