Vampire Crawlers: The Turbo Wildcard from Vampire Survivors

I can’t quite believe how incredible Vampire Crawlers is. This fast paced deck builder is almost impossible to put down, and might be the best the genre has to offer full stop. With so many builds and synergies to uncover, unlockables to tick off, and combat that just never gets old, Vampire Crawlers is an effortlessly compelling, fever dream of a game. Even if you don’t particularly like Vampire Survivors this game has to be played, just try to put it down sometimes to touch some grass: it’s just that addictive.

Vampire Crawlers is a successful spin-off that goes beyond its name, translating the core of Vampire Survivors into a deckbuilder with light dungeon-crawling and surprising depth. The slower pace doesn’t hurt the tension, as the mix of cards, mana, and sequencing remains consistently engaging, especially for fans who will recognize many familiar elements. Minor flaws like a clunky deck overview hold it back from perfection, but it still stands as a strong and distinctive game with plenty to offer.

Vampire Crawlers is nothing short of outstanding and its possibilities are dizzying. Play at your own risk, for this is, if possible, even better and more polished than its predecessor.

The task was difficult, but Vampire Crawlers: The Turbo Wildcard from Vampire Survivors managed to deliver another fun, challenging, and addictive experience. The game competently combines the roguelike and deck-builder genres, with many interesting gameplay mechanics to face all types of enemies. I'm hoping for more content in future updates, especially in the form of DLCs, so that the title becomes even bigger and better.

Vampire Crawlers is a game that goes straight for the jugular and doesn’t let go until your schedule’s bled dry. Although it is indirect with its storytelling and isn’t as visually and aurally unique as I would’ve wanted, the gameplay hard carries by being innovative, exhilarating, and concerningly addictive. There’s no deckbuilder or dungeon crawler like this out there, at least not yet. No doubt every other dev will want a bite when Vampire Crawlers pioneers a new sub-genre as its predecessor did.

While it can't quite live up to the cult status of its older sibling, Vampire Crawlers is a surprisingly robust adaptation of the visuals, charme and gameplay feel of its predecessor. Especially the twist of trying to build your deck around seamlessly flowing cheap cards into expensive cards is both original and enough to carry the weight of the otherwise very familiar experience.

There are moments of fun, especially towards the end, but too often I just wanted to ram a garlic-flavoured stake through Vampire Crawlers repetitive, grindy heart.

Poncle proves that changing genre is no challenge for one of the developers that perfected the formula for "the best addictive game".

A perfect sequel to Vampire Survivors. If they did the same thing again, I wouldn't have hit as hard. This is a great feeling card dungeon crawler with super satisfying combos. The evolution in gameplay from just doing a 2-4 card combo in the beginning runs to 10-20+ combos later feels real good. There is a nice curve in unlocks they dull out and once you beat the last level and get your hand on some gold using that last unlock, you can modify your cards to the max to really go nuts with it. The game is just super smart with how it works and it was a joy throughout. It does only take about 20 hours or so to 100% all achievements which is a lot less than Survivors, but that's ok for now. If it is anything like its predecessor, then free DLC/support could be on the way. Not that I EXPECT that, but I could see them supporting this for awhile.

Had fun, once you get the hang its pretty easy to put the puzzle together. Definitely got repetitive quickly, but managed to get credits.

It’s a fun game, the combo mechanic is easy to grasp and there’s some good cards to evolve (upgrade) during play. I also like the idea of a simple first person crawler in the ‘modern 16 bit’ style. The levels are a bit repetitive, and the playtime to complete a single stage could do with a bit of trimming. It’s not as deep as the best in the genre (obviously Slay the Spire, Monster Train, Balatro) but it’s decent and a worthy successor to Vampire Survivors and a bold take on a new direction for that series.