Vampire Survivors 1.0 Review
Sometimes the simplest, silliest games sink their hooks into me and don’t let go even while bigger, flashier options cry out for my attention – and then they reveal themselves to be not quite so simple after all, exposing layer upon layer of challenges, secrets, and even more silliness. That was what happened with Vampire Survivors, which despite looking very much like hundreds of other tiny pixel-art games on Steam that come and go every day, enthralled me and countless others nearly a year ago when it came out in early access and has kept me coming back ever since. What’s novel about it is that it’s basically a twin-stick shooter that does away with one of said sticks and all other buttons, leaving you to worry exclusively about positioning yourself while it takes care of firing your ever-escalating collection of weapons at the thousands of increasingly spongy enemies that flood the screen. It’s a clever idea that’s stayed entertaining infinitely longer than I expected it to, and even when it does descend into routine and tedium I can feel its pull compelling me to crank up another challenge mode and see how long I can last again.
There’s no sugarcoating it: Vampire Survivors sure doesn’t look like much. The barely animated pixelated 2D character sprites seem torn out of a generic and long-forgotten fantasy game from the early ‘90s, with the most interesting part being that some of them do have a nice disintegration effect as they die. It’s as simple as it can be while managing to stay as readable as it needs to be so that you can mostly tell what’s going on during the utter chaos that’s about to ensue. It cannot be understated: if you survive long enough, your screen will be flooded with enough enemies and psychedelic
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