No game this decade has put me in a trance like Vampire Survivors did in 2022. It delivered a constant dopamine hit of endless unlockables, dizzying visuals and pumping music. The distracting thrill of a pokies machine, but only requiring one small purchase. This, paired with a gameplay style that oscillates from passive mindlessness into sudden edge-of-your-seat excitement; It’s no surprise that Vampire Survivors spawned a genre of imitators.
Upon the announcement of Vampire Crawlers: The Turbo Wildcard from Vampire Survivors, I felt somewhat like the leaders were becoming the followers, that poncle might be jumping on the deck-building bandwagon after successes like Slay the Spire and Balatro.
Having now rolled credits on Vampire Crawlers, my fears are abated. This new entry brings a fresh spin on a well-worn formula, perfectly recreating the sense of wonder I felt starting the original.
High Stakes Card Game
In Vampire Crawlers, you move across a world map from dungeon to dungeon, clearing out mobs of enemies using a card battling system. Cards deal damage, collect armor and implement status effects, limited through a pool of mana. By playing cards of increasing mana costs sequentially, you’ll build a combo multiplier that greatly enhances each card’s effects.
As you progress to lower floors, you’ll face a boss that clears the stage, moving you to the next area.
Instead of playing as characters like in the original Vampire Survivors, you instead form a party of cards called Crawlers, which you add to your deck. By the end of the game, you can choose up to three Crawlers. They have different buffs and abilities, as well as significantly altering your starting load-out of cards.
This is such a basic overview of the game’s mechanics, because you rapidly unlock new features that blow the game’s possibilities wide open. Gems found during runs can add bonuses to your cards. Arcanas introduce gameplay modifiers for strategic advantages. And of course, you can purchase stats upgrades from the shop.
By tying new gameplay features to the progression of the main campaign, you’ll shift strategies throughout. This makes what could have been a repetitive gameplay loop always feel fresh and stimulating.
Make no mistake, this is a quintessential ‘podcast game’ much like the original. And you’ll definitely hit walls where you’ll have to grind earlier levels for gold and upgrades to grow stronger. But despite this, my enjoyment of the game only grew higher and higher the closer to the end I got.
Love At First Bite
I rolled credits after a little over 20 hours, but this will vary from player to player. I was certainly in no rush to finish my time with this game.
As with Vampire Survivors, completing the campaign still leaves you with plenty to do. There are oodles of achievements and upgrades to unlock. However, making characters merely cards in your deck instead of avatars that you embody means the cycle of replaying levels with new Crawlers doesn’t feel as satisfying.
The developers have suggested a full endless mode will be coming soon after launch. Though perhaps it is a good thing that it wasn’t available yet, as it may have been impossible to pry my hands free to write this review!
A good run-based game should feel like a power fantasy, where you find combinations of effects and attacks that make you feel like you’ve broken the game (even though they’re clearly built into the design). Vampire Crawlers consistently achieves this.
There were so many times where a new feature would pop up and I audibly said, “Wait, this changes everything!”
I can only hope that Vampire Crawlers is as well-supported as its progenitor, as this is an outstanding base to add on to.
Original Fang-ster
If you’re familiar with the aesthetic of its predecessor, there’s little in Vampire Crawlers that will surprise you. The soundtrack doesn’t need to go as hard it does, but it will leave you revved up throughout. There’s also plenty of charming soundbites, voice lines and sound effects that recreate the ecstatic rush you’ve come to expect.
The visual style of Vampire Survivors — and I use the word ‘style’ incredulously — is recreated so well in this new perspective. Walking around these familiar pixellated environments in 3D remains an entertaining novelty from start to finish.
The game’s flavour text follows the same pun-based and self-referential humour found in Vampire Survivors and is equally charming. That being said, there were often moments where item and card descriptions left me scratching my head. Vending machines would promise ‘permanent’ stat boosts, but they only last for the run you’re currently on. The differences between the status effects Knockback and Disarm are initially unclear because of the way they’re described. These sorts of confusing explanations pop up throughout the game and aren’t surprising given the depth of these gameplay features. I can easily see them being clarified in future updates with more player feedback.
Vampire Survivors was often near the top of the charts for most-played Steam Deck games, so I’m happy to report that Vampire Crawlers runs wonderfully on the handheld device. I played from start to finish on my Steam Deck OLED and never ran into an issue.
Standing in the Crawl of Fame
With its extremely basic opening feature set, Vampire Crawlers doesn’t make the strongest first impression. Vampire Survivors didn’t either.
It’s when the game continually opens up with more unlockables, gameplay mechanics and mind-boggling combinations of powers that the depth and creativity on offer reveals itself.
The original Vampire Survivors is still a joy to play, but it felt like nothing else would match the excitement and discovery of the early hours of that game. By adapting that loop to the deck-building genre so faithfully, Vampire Crawlers has found that magic formula, and looks to be a fixture in gaming rotation for years to come.
Quest Daily scores Vampire Crawlers:
9/10
Vampire Crawlers: The Turbo Wildcard from Vampire Survivors is available April 22nd on PC, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch, and Xbox Series X|S.
A review code for Vampire Crawlers was supplied to Quest Daily for the purpose of this review.
