Hear me out: I looked at Vampire Survivors' screenshots when the game originally released back in 2022 and had a sort of "meh" reaction. Not because of graphics or anything, but because it looked so overwhelming and not really what I was into at the time. I love roguelikes and bullet hells like Hades and Enter The Gungeon, but this game just didn't appeal to me. I really cannot explain it.
Enter: Xbox Game Pass. Everyone knows about this so I won't do too much explaining here. But as I was checking out my rewards quests (play a game pass game for x amount of points), I wanted something I could earn a quick achievement in. So Vampire Survivors came across my screen. "Okay I guess" I thought to myself. "We'll get in, get an achievement, and get out."
I was wrong. So. So. Wrong. I COMPLETELY see why this game got everyone hooked. I played one round thinking it would be enough and now all I want to do is play more.
It's such a simple concept. Roguelike. You enter, you kill some baddies, you die, you upgrade, you get back in. But there is a certain magic to Vampire Survivors. Whether the nostalgic art style or the fact that sometimes you can get so powerful you mow down literally hundreds of enemies on screen at once, Vampire Survivors has that "just one more" factor to it.
Before I knew it I was hitting (or close to it) each stage's time limit of 30 minutes per round. Even when I unlocked a new stage I would still play the previous in different ways. There are plenty of secrets to find scattered through the level even if it seems to repeat the same pattern over and over. I also really liked trying out different styles and building the stats of the few starting characters to choose from. Obviously there are characters that you can unlock and pick according to your style. One has a permanent damage buff with a whip as a starting weapon, one has a wand that shoots at enemies and gives you more EXP percentages every few levels and so on. Some unlocks le characters have really awesome weapons later in.
As I said before, it really is a simple concept but feels like so much more. Saving up your gold between rounds to increase your max health or let you revive once is so satisfying. Oh, and being able to find a treasure chest that gives you either 1- 5 upgrades to your run is a heck of a time as well. When you find a chest that gives you 5 upgrades and a bunch of gold, wooo boy. The excitement is real. This allows you to max your weapon stats, evolve your weapon to a new version or add more stats to any buffs you may have picked up.
Honestly, it took something as silly as a Game Pass reward to even make me play the game, but I am sure glad I did. Here is to many, many more hours of unlocking multiple characters, weapon combos, stages and more!
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