It’s a little weird to talk about a game that helped define a genre and spawn a hundred clones back in 2022. Especially because the only reason we’re even talking about it, again, is because of the recent PlayStation 4 and 5 release. On August 29th, Vampire Survivors and its DLC finally released on Sony platforms and I took it as an opportunity to revisit a game that I had largely abandoned about a month after it was initially released. Much of what I got to experience was brand new to me, as the trip from Early Access release to where we are now was a considerable distance. Whether you, like me, haven’t played in some time or are considering a first-time purchase, let me give you an understanding of where we are now with Vampire Survivors and what to expect.
Vampire Survivors
Developer: poncle
Price: $5
Platforms: PlayStation 4/5 (reviewed), Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, PC
MonsterVine was provided with a PS5 code for review.
Much of the hype around Vampire Survivors was the bending of genres, often being referred to as a ‘reverse bullet-hell.’ That description has always irked me as Vampire Survivors is most assuredly a bullet-hell, just not traditional. In Vampire Survivors you play a character on a 2D plane as enemies spawn around you. There are many characters to unlock and each character has a unique passive ability as well as a different starting weapon. The weapons vary but the one thing they all have in common is that the player does not control when they fire off. Meaning, the weapon has a set interval, usually able to be reduced by upgrading the weapon, for when it fires off and the only control given to the player is that they can direct a few of the weapons.
Vampire Survivors is the Reverse Bullet-Hell Experience
As enemies spawn and invariably come after you, your weapons fire off and kill them, dropping an experience crystal if you’re lucky. As you collect experience crystals you’ll level up resulting in a slightly more powerful character and a choice of items. The choice consists of three (or four if you have enough luck) weapons or items to choose from. Weapons give you a new weapon to automatically shoot or pulse around you as a new option for killing enemies. Items are passive buffs that do things like improve experience gain, make projectiles fire faster, and reduce cooldown, but the important thing is that items pair with weapons. If you have the correct item for a weapon, when the weapon maxes out and you find a treasure chest, dropped by boss enemies, you’ll evolve your weapon.
Weapon evolution gives an incredible upgrade to the existing powerful weapon. For example, the magic wand shoots blue magic missiles at the enemy closest to the player character. As you upgrade the magic wand, it will increase the damage and reduce the fire rate cooldown. Pair that magic wand with an empty tome, an item that passively reduces weapon cooldown, and that magic wand evolves into a holy wand. A holy wand is a magic wand with no cooldown affecting its fire rate, it just continually shoots at the enemy closest to the player. All of the evolved weapons are extremely powerful and necessary for making it through each stage of Vampire Survivors. Even if you pick a few weapons you’re not particularly fond of, they will be a boon if you evolve them.
Since its initial release in 2022, Vampire Survivors has added a considerable amount of content to an already loaded game. Adding in new characters, new weapons, adventure mode, stages, skins, along with four DLCs. Vampire Survivors, for me, has always been about the unlocks. Fulfilling special objectives to unlock a new character or a new stage. That’s what I’ll spend the lion’s share of my time doing whenever I play the game, looking for objectives to fulfill for the sole purpose of unlocking new things for me to play with. Vampire Survivors has a strong roguelike influence, not just in unlocks, but upgrades as well. In-game gold pickups carry over into the main menu and allow you to buy global upgrades for all of your characters.
Adventure Mode: Expanding the Universe
Adventure Mode is a mode specifically for three of the four DLCs offered currently. In Adventure Mode, you play a themed side-story with new characters, stages, and weapons that will carry over into the main game. Legacy of the Moonspell is an Eastern inspired DLC with yokai and oni enemies, Eastern inspired weapons, new music, and stages. Primarily, Vampire Survivors stages are just a large open area that goes forever in one direction or another, or a hallway with the same effect. Legacy of the Moonspell is a departure in that regard as the stages in Moonspell have actual landmarks, caves, and are designed to be navigated in a specific way.
Emergency Meeting DLC is Among-Us themed and features a set of characters and weapons that are directly pulled and inspired from Among Us. If you’ve played Among Us, a lot of the weapons are callbacks from tasks you perform in the game, including the Report! weapon, the Lucky Swipe ID card, and getting mini-crewmates as passive items to upgrade the main weapons. One of the weapon evolutions places a 3×3 grid of buttons on the ground and if you walk over them in the correct numerical order, a large after-burner engine will appear at the top of the screen and torch all the enemies. I had a lot of fun with this DLC.
Operation Guns DLC is Contra themed. Considering Vampire Survivor’s main game is Castlevania themed, this isn’t much of a surprise. However, I had a lot of fun with all the weapons they added to the game and the stages are all inspired by the first couple of Contra games. My favorite addition to this DLC is the winged capsules that littered the first few games with weapon upgrades. Another fun addition is the remixed Contra tracks that added an extra level of fun and nostalgia to the experience.
Even without the DLC, Vampire Survivors has an extreme amount of content to unlock within the game. Free updates alone have added in modifiers for the base game and a ton of weapon combos, unions, stage variances, and things to collect. The DLC not only includes a separate side-story but also adds content to the base game, a surprising feature, that makes Vampire Survivors an incredible bang for your buck.
The Final Word
I loved Vampire Survivors on release but with everything added since Vampire Survivors is just as addictive and enjoyable as it was on release and well worth the buy now that you can enjoy it on any platform of your choosing.
MonsterVine Rating: 4.5 out of 5 – Great
