When Vampire Survivors first started going viral in early 2022, it seemingly came out of nowhere. Of course, that wasn’t exactly the case. Developer poncle was inspired by a 2019 mobile game called Magic Survival along with the Castlevania series, and the resulting game actually hung around for a few months unnoticed before it started picking up in a big way. Since then, poncle has grown Vampire Survivors beyond anyone’s wildest dreams with updates and expansions. No one can doubt the developer’s ability to build on a good thing, but what about making another game whole cloth?
Enter Vampire Crawlers: The Turbo Wildcard from Vampire Survivors, a title I am only writing in full this one time. This spin-off was co-developed by poncle and Nosebleed Interactive, who were responsible for the delightful Arcade Paradise. One of poncle’s goals with a Vampire Survivors spin-off was to take an existing genre and take out all of the frustrating elements, and you can see that thinking in action in Vampire Crawlers. In much the same way that Vampire Survivors was an easy game to fire up and just kind of chill with, Vampire Crawlers is almost immediately comfortable. It’s made all the more weird when you consider how crunchy the average game in the dungeon-crawling genre is.
Naturally, there’s a deckbuilding component to the game. Hard to get away from that idea these days. Since this is a Vampire Survivors spin-off, it’s probably not all that surprising that it’s also a roguelite. Tons of unlockables; poncle knows what the fans want. It’s all wrapped up in the familiar iconography of Vampire Survivors, something that shouldn’t be as effective as it is at transferring over those warm and cozy feelings to a completely different game. If you loved Vampire Survivors, you’re going to be right at home here until the game does its thing to get its own hooks into you.
So what is that thing? Dungeon crawling! You’ve got a base to work from where you can check on your unlocks, buy goodies, and hire help, but once you hop into a dungeon, it’s first-person step-by-step exploration, just like Werdna and Trebor used to make. Well, sort of. You’ve got a map that shows the floor layout and enemy locations, so there’s not a whole ton of exploration involved. There is some loot to find on each floor, but it’s mostly a matter of picking your fights. Risk and reward, all that. Early on, there’s not much stopping you from fighting everyone you see, but you might want to play things more strategically as the dungeons get more difficult.
The battle system is the meat of the game, such as it is. When you engage in combat with an enemy, you are presented with some cards to choose from. There are different types, with attack cards, armor cards, modifiers, Hunter cards, and so on. You’ve got a set amount of mana you can spend in each turn, and each card uses a specific amount. Once you’ve spent all your mana, the enemies will take their swing at you. First, they chip away at any armor you’ve built up, then at your precious hit points. Run out of hit points, and you’ll end up back in town, with some gold and hopefully a few new unlocks to show for your pain. The boss enemies in particular can cause some trouble, and if you delve far enough into any given dungeon, you’ll meet your end one way or the other.
There’s a little bit more to it than all of that, though. Not a whole ton, but enough to make Vampire Crawlers nice and grippy. You can set up some simple combos simply by playing your cards in order from lowest-cost to highest, for starters. You can modify cards with gems that will give them extra benefits, and even evolve cards into more powerful forms. Leveling up and opening treasure boxes will give you new cards for your deck, and you’ll occasionally be called upon to sacrifice some cards to get something in return. As you play the game and unlock more things, you’ll get access to new cards and abilities that increase your strategic options.
There’s nothing too fancy or complicated going on here, but that’s probably a big part of the secret sauce that makes Vampire Crawlers so enjoyable. It’s a really breezy game to play, and the familiar bells and whistles in its presentation add to the fun atmosphere. The runs get longer as you go, but there’s such a nice speed to everything that it never feels tiresome. Sheer video game popcorn, but in some sense, that’s probably the kind of game that people who loved Vampire Survivors are looking for. I think that’s really the key point here, though. This is a game primarily for those who enjoyed poncle’s previous game, rather than deckbuilding die-hards or dungeon crawler enthusiasts. That’s not to say others won’t find enjoyment in it, but Vampire Crawlers makes its priorities clear fairly quickly.
I tried this game out in both its Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 form. If you own the former, you can claim the latter for free, and you can even move your save game from the Switch version to the Switch 2 version. That’s one way, though. The differences mainly come down to performance, as you would probably expect. Vampire Crawlers isn’t exactly scraping the bleeding edge of technology or anything, but it can get pretty busy at times with its various effects. If you’re playing on original Switch hardware, you’re going to run into some framerate funkiness when the particle effects pop off, while the Switch 2 generally runs more consistently and smoothly. You’ll also have to deal with noticeably longer load times on the original Switch. I don’t think the game plays badly on either platform, all things considered, but Switch 2 offers a better experience to be sure.
Only time will tell if Vampire Crawlers will meet a similar level of success as the game it spun out of, but I think, at the very least, that it should be of interest to anyone who enjoyed Vampire Survivors. Despite being in a completely different genre, you can feel the shared design sensibility in every aspect of the game. It’s incredibly easy to lose hours upon hours in its garish warmth, with the credits likely to be the only thing that stops you once it has pulled you in. This Nintendo Switch 2 version is a fine way to enjoy the game, especially if you’re looking to enjoy it on the go. Don’t come to it looking for anything too hardcore, though. It knows its audience, and it’s playing its melody for them more than anyone else.
Version Tested: Nintendo Switch 2
Review Copy Provided by poncle
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