PC Critic Reviews

Blood Dungeon is a frantic platformer twist on that familiar Survivors formula, with fast paced action and death waiting around every corner.

Blood Dungeon is a refreshing take on the genre Vampire Survivors popularized only four years ago, and it effectively establishes its own identity both with its art style and platformer-focused mentality. It is fun to play, whereas many of these games are ultimately fun to experience passively – a build to the point where you can put the controller down and watch chaos blaze across the screen. You can’t ever put the controller down in Blood Dungeon, and that’s why it’s so easy to spend your bones (if you haven’t already purchased everything) and jump right back in for another run.

The best thing that Blood Dungeon has to offer is its unique take on the survivor-like gameplay. Bringing the experience to a 2D platformer with insane visuals and characters you’ll just chuckle and shake your head at is awesome. There is still a lot of been-there-done-that here, but the minute-to-minute gameplay is still a whole lot of fun.

Blood Dungeon is an addictive roguelike with fast-paced action and tons of charm. The crude drawings mix extremely well with the gameplay loop, which is frantic and has fantastic mechanics. Not all of the upgrades feel impactful, but it’s enough to keep me hooked and wanting to keep playing more and more.

Even though Blood Dungeon occasionally stumbles when it comes to its platforming or its hub world, it’s hard to deny just how effectively it sinks its teeth into you, convincing you to do “just one more run,” even though that’s the exact same thing you said to yourself over an hour ago. The slow drip feed of new unlocks, completed quests, and bosses to conquer is more than worth the price of admission, and I don’t see myself uninstalling this one any time soon.

I keep going back and forth with how I feel about Blood Dungeon in its entirety. It’s fun to play, has a cool aesthetic, and its emphasis on score-chasing feels distinct in this genre. But its lack of interest in expression and build-crafting really hurts that momentum, and makes playing long-term feel more and more like a chore. These games sing when you can have fun with how you put your character together each run, and when they give you space to experiment and succeed even if you play outside the dotted lines a little. Such a rigid insistence on DPS optimization puts a limit on what you’re allowed to do, and makes me wonder why the “pick three” stuff is in there in the first place. No amount of wiggly genitals and twitchy platforming can fix that.

It's a chaotic, throwaway delight, which is probably the intention. [Issue#428, p.123]

A thorough assault on the senses, Blood Dungeon’s platforming take on the bullet heaven genre is a welcome albeit ultimately shallow one.

Blood Dungeon sees a distinctive indie studio apply its design smarts to an exhausted modern genre, with surprisingly conservative but enjoyable results.

Blood Dungeon asks the player for a little more patience then I expected. Its biggest weakness is the slow speed at which runs can build towards that wonderful bullet-heaven feeling of becoming hilariously overpowered. With some genuinely great platforming, and a decent number of unlocks, it eventually delivers a decent amount of fun. I just wish it got there a little quicker.