This review goes out to the playtesters and potential focus groups of people who were hypnotized out of their minds and dumped in poncle’s derelict basement after helping finetune Vampire Crawlers until it was so addicting, governments had to meet to discuss classifying it as a drug.
…At least that’s the headcanon I have for how this game is going to go over once the masses get their hands on it.
That’s right, it’s that game (now franchise?) that has so much Castlevania-like stuff in it that even Konami was like, “yeah, here you go, just use the actual characters and weapons and all that for a DLC.” Vampire Survivors was veritable lightning in a bottle, a game that probably shouldn’t have worked, but proved that the world was ready to walk a cute little sprite around a 2D fantasy world as it attacks automatically and powers up exponentially.
It established, for better or worse, the action roguelike or bullet heaven genre, whatever you want to call it. Many new games and franchises have tried their hand at this formula, iterating on it of course, but it was very rare for those to capture the straight up black magic Vampire Survivors did. I think I can count on one hand the games that did it close to or just as well. So, how do you iterate on a formula like that, one that’s informed by quaint action and the golden glitz of casinos, especially if you’re the originator? Well, I guess you don’t, instead pivoting to a whole new combination of genres that still allows you to feel something every handful of seconds.
Where we dropping, boys?
Vampire Crawlers is a dungeon crawler deckbuilder game, a combo that’s been done before here and there, but, in true poncle fashion, never like this. Not only are production values higher this time, enough to justify a whole new dimension, but this game tests you in ways that Vampire Survivors never could. Where in Survivors, you mechanically had to consider movement and enemy placement with the strategy coming from what items and weapons you pick to survive longer, Crawlers sets things up so strategy is at the forefront.
If you’ve ever played a deckbuilder before, Vampire Crawlers will feel immediately familiar, even if you didn’t play Vampire Survivors before it. You pick a character, or Crawler, to dive into a dungeon map with, they have a specific starting deck to play with, and you have to wrestle with luck a bit as you’re dealt cards with which you defeat enemies, defend yourself, and alter the playing field (hopefully) in your favor.
But some card games are slow, and maybe that’s what’s kept you from playing or enjoying many of them. poncle of course thought of that and developed the TurboTurn™ for Vampire Crawlers. This is basically just a fancy term for how the gameplay process has been streamlined with speed and accessibility in mind. Instead of putting in an outright speed up button or something, you can just play the cards in your hand as fast as you wish and lose none of the pomp. You still see flourishes of animations depending on the cards played, enemy pixels are nuked off the screen by your attacks, and, most importantly, the game sequences it in order so none of your actions are forgotten or lessened. Play five cards quickly in a row that are suppose to decimate the entire board of enemies if played one by one during your turn? You’ll get the same results, but turbo! I put some moderate stress on this system myself and it seemed to work impressively well.
One time I walked in here to change my party and there was a disco going on
The mobs of enemies aren’t playing by the same rules as you. They simply attack and defend for much of the game and you either kill them before they can do any of that or you will the next turn. They don’t play card decks of their own, although bosses later on in the game are capable of feeding cards into your deck that are supposed to hinder you, but honestly don’t always.
There’s also many, many more of them than you, like a concerning amount of enemies sometimes. Vampire Survivors fans (hi!) will know that feeling all too well with plant monsters appearing out of the ground without notice (rude), or seeing waves of skeletons or bats descend on your little pixel dude(ette) from the corner of the screen. Here, you’re besieged by rows and rows of up to five enemies at once, some varied, some not. Many encounters involve anywhere from one to three rows of enemies, where blasting the first row’s inhabitants makes room for the second row’s monsters to jump up for a bonking and so on, but some are quite a bit more numerous especially during boss fights. This keeps the pressure on you for sure, but it also provides consistent card fodder.
Cards are the lifeblood of the game of course. Depending on what Crawler you pick to play as, you vary your starting deck, but they’re all relatively basic and meagerly sized. Even Crawlers you unlock near the end of the game aren’t substantially more powerful than ones from early in the game, but the trick to building your deck in this deckbuilder is to find cards during crawls, or level up to get them or gems to emboss on your existing cards. This is where the customization really comes in – your starting decks might be limited as expected, but if RNGesus is on your side, you pull good, complementary cards and gems to fit your playstyle.
I’m about to ruin this fishman’s whole career
Luck and randomization will make or break a run. I feel this is one of the more kind games you could play in that regard, but it will absolutely hang you with enough rope. Get your deck into the 30s as far as the number of cards and you’ll find yourself scrambling, hoping, and praying for that one card that can save your ass in a particular moment. I actually just lost a run because my Clock Lancet card that freezes enemies and prevents them from attacking was at the back of my deck. “Too bad,” said RNGesus, and a demon proceeded to smack me in the forehead with 32 damage. You can get into some real Icarus-esque situations, flying too close to that sun in search of handfuls of power only to be stonewalled by a monster more favored than you. Moderation is key for some playstyles, that’s for sure.
But you know what? Dying is cool. It may stop your run, but it also shows you all the rewards you reaped from your card-throwing sowing. Your first several runs are flush (pun violently intended) with unlocks. New cards, new Crawlers, new dungeons to tackle, new gems; it’s not uncommon to snag more than five unlocks for each run early on. You’re sent back to your village hub to spend collected gold on permanent upgrades, buying new Crawlers, and more once you unlock certain services. Experimenting is fun, even if you don’t understand everything being thrown at you. If you’ve played a lot of Vampire Survivors though, you’ll have a leg up as far as what certain stats mean and, perhaps most importantly, what combinations of cards you’ll need in order to have a chance to evolve them into more powerful ones.
Slight spoilers, but as you play on, there’s relics you unlock that allow you to bring multiple Crawlers out on a run. This is where it really starts to get fun. Not only is your starting deck bolstered and varied (a necessity on later levels) but you have multiple Crawler abilities to depend on. Each Crawler is its own card. You get it in your hand and play it, it activates something immediately, and stays active on the left side of your screen. Meet that Crawler’s specific conditions, like playing a red attack card, or blue defensive one, and it’ll do something else for a set time. Stacking these is outrageously satisfying, and upping your duration stat allows them to stay at your side longer. No worries though, if they expire, their card simply goes to your discard pile and will reshuffle to your deck proper once you use up all your cards in an encounter or start a new one.
Ah, yes… YES. MORE!
Once you start to get the hang of these colliding systems, it all just clicks. You start throwing cards with greater purpose, capitalizing on your TurboTurn™ by playing them in ascending order of mana cost to build combo, using a wild card to strategically allow you to restart or continue your mana usage without losing combo, and vaporizing whatever is in your path. It gets to a point where bosses practically quiver at the sight of you, waiting to be blinded by dazzling special effects, knives flying across the screen, fire wands flashing scorching hell in their eyes, cats dancing from left to right (yes, really). Play it right, and plan ahead adequately, and you’re rewarded with the ability to perform total blitzes on enemies.
This all goes into the production values I mentioned earlier. Dungeons are explored in 3D, one more whole D than before in Vampire Survivors. You navigate them just as you would most any other dungeon crawler: in first person, down and up choking corridors as you fight (or avoid) hoards of foes, and finding chests and secrets along the way. I’m very thankful for the map you get for each dungeon, even if it’s a little loose with what it shows. Doing this blind would be a different sort of challenge and exhilaration, but not one I’d take to as well.
All the areas you visit are from Vampire Survivors as well. The Mad Forest, Inlaid Library, Dairy Plant, and much more. They’re 3Dified very well, with lots of dressing and accouterments from the last game that past players will recognize, but the new perspective and some new stuff here and there freshen it up, like they were renovated rather than remade. It’s homely! Enemy sprites, which are the things you see the most, still pop very well against these backdrops, and all the explosive visual effects you can wield will light any place up like a dying star.
The more you overkill a boss, the more comically zoomed in the sprite gets, so enjoy golem crotch
As I mentioned in my demo preview, I wasn’t sure how much I’d take to the voice acting. It’s not very intrusive, you only hear it when interacting with the Crawlers or playing their cards, and they just say a little quip or something. In the full game, and hearing all the different voices, I’m still not fully sold on it. It seems like a perceived improvement from Vampire Survivors that doesn’t feel as such for me. Don’t get me wrong, the limited performances from all the actors are totally fine and serviceable! I just don’t know if I needed this addition. I didn’t ever mute the dialogue though, so clearly it wasn’t a make-or-break deal for me.
One other thing nagged at me gameplay-wise too. Playing a game like this without a way to sort the cards in your hand or deck is kind of wild (pun not intended this time). Often, when my hands reach eight or more cards, they all get squished a bit on the screen. You can manually reorganize your hand at will, but I wanted a way to automatically sort by mana cost or the color/suit of them. Sometimes I’d play the wrong cards and while I don’t blame the game for my dumb fingers, sorting would help assuage that issue. Balatro has one up on Vampire Crawlers in that regard.
I do also miss a lot of the personality the writing gave in Vampire Survivors. Here, there’s some flavor text for relics or the places you visit; it’s still humorous and cool, but the amount is lacking. I will say, it took Survivors some time to add a lot of that kind of stuff in after launch, much of it written by James Stephanie Sterling, who I think absolutely killed it with their cheeky wit. Hopefully, we get some more bestiary stuff and extended writing like that in the future.
Red numbers on enemies means they’re about to explode if I play the card I’m hovering on
I did hit a few walls during my playthrough that required me to grind a bit, but asking me to replay levels in this game is like asking me to eat the same decadent piece of cake two nights in a row. I’m fat, of course I’m going to do it. I’m sure I went about things in the dumbest way possible as I explored and tested the game (and myself), so your mileage may vary. Regardless, the fun never ended – it still hasn’t ended as I threaten to log my first full calendar day worth of hours into it. I still have quite a lot to do, tacking some of the game’s more specific and challenging tasks, but I’ve made a hell of a mark so far with 134 out of 153 unlocks done. The final 19 will be tougher than much else I’ve seen so far, but I’m willing to put in the time even if it means some papercuts on my hands from all the cards I’m slinging.
All that to say, damn, poncle’s done it again. Vampire Crawlers is a wickedly crafted, addicting, original game with enough potential depth to rival the Mariana Trench. If, or hopefully when, DLC is added to this game, it’s only going to expand the possibilities even more. Still, the base game is incontrovertibly worth a purchase and play as one of the best value-to-money investments you could make in 2026. Just don’t be surprised when it has your family and friends luring you to a get-together, only to give you an intervention for too much crawling. Parents just don’t understand.
Damn, poncle’s done it again. Vampire Crawlers is a wickedly-crafted, addicting, original game with enough potential depth to rival the Mariana Trench.
This review goes out to the playtesters and potential focus groups of people who were hypnotized out of their minds and dumped in poncle’s derelict basement after helping finetune Vampire Crawlers until it was so addicting, governments had to meet to discuss classifying it as a drug.
…At least that’s the headcanon I have for how this game is going to go over once the masses get their hands on it.
That’s right, it’s that game (now franchise?) that has so much Castlevania-like stuff in it that even Konami was like, “yeah, here you go, just use the actual characters and weapons and all that for a DLC.” Vampire Survivors was veritable lightning in a bottle, a game that probably shouldn’t have worked, but proved that the world was ready to walk a cute little sprite around a 2D fantasy world as it attacks automatically and powers up exponentially.
It established, for better or worse, the action roguelike or bullet heaven genre, whatever you want to call it. Many new games and franchises have tried their hand at this formula, iterating on it of course, but it was very rare for those to capture the straight up black magic Vampire Survivors did. I think I can count on one hand the games that did it close to or just as well. So, how do you iterate on a formula like that, one that’s informed by quaint action and the golden glitz of casinos, especially if you’re the originator? Well, I guess you don’t, instead pivoting to a whole new combination of genres that still allows you to feel something every handful of seconds.
Where we dropping, boys?
Vampire Crawlers is a dungeon crawler deckbuilder game, a combo that’s been done before here and there, but, in true poncle fashion, never like this. Not only are production values higher this time, enough to justify a whole new dimension, but this game tests you in ways that Vampire Survivors never could. Where in Survivors, you mechanically had to consider movement and enemy placement with the strategy coming from what items and weapons you pick to survive longer, Crawlers sets things up so strategy is at the forefront.
If you’ve ever played a deckbuilder before, Vampire Crawlers will feel immediately familiar, even if you didn’t play Vampire Survivors before it. You pick a character, or Crawler, to dive into a dungeon map with, they have a specific starting deck to play with, and you have to wrestle with luck a bit as you’re dealt cards with which you defeat enemies, defend yourself, and alter the playing field (hopefully) in your favor.
But some card games are slow, and maybe that’s what’s kept you from playing or enjoying many of them. poncle of course thought of that and developed the TurboTurn™ for Vampire Crawlers. This is basically just a fancy term for how the gameplay process has been streamlined with speed and accessibility in mind. Instead of putting in an outright speed up button or something, you can just play the cards in your hand as fast as you wish and lose none of the pomp. You still see flourishes of animations depending on the cards played, enemy pixels are nuked off the screen by your attacks, and, most importantly, the game sequences it in order so none of your actions are forgotten or lessened. Play five cards quickly in a row that are suppose to decimate the entire board of enemies if played one by one during your turn? You’ll get the same results, but turbo! I put some moderate stress on this system myself and it seemed to work impressively well.
One time I walked in here to change my party and there was a disco going on
The mobs of enemies aren’t playing by the same rules as you. They simply attack and defend for much of the game and you either kill them before they can do any of that or you will the next turn. They don’t play card decks of their own, although bosses later on in the game are capable of feeding cards into your deck that are supposed to hinder you, but honestly don’t always.
There’s also many, many more of them than you, like a concerning amount of enemies sometimes. Vampire Survivors fans (hi!) will know that feeling all too well with plant monsters appearing out of the ground without notice (rude), or seeing waves of skeletons or bats descend on your little pixel dude(ette) from the corner of the screen. Here, you’re besieged by rows and rows of up to five enemies at once, some varied, some not. Many encounters involve anywhere from one to three rows of enemies, where blasting the first row’s inhabitants makes room for the second row’s monsters to jump up for a bonking and so on, but some are quite a bit more numerous especially during boss fights. This keeps the pressure on you for sure, but it also provides consistent card fodder.
Cards are the lifeblood of the game of course. Depending on what Crawler you pick to play as, you vary your starting deck, but they’re all relatively basic and meagerly sized. Even Crawlers you unlock near the end of the game aren’t substantially more powerful than ones from early in the game, but the trick to building your deck in this deckbuilder is to find cards during crawls, or level up to get them or gems to emboss on your existing cards. This is where the customization really comes in – your starting decks might be limited as expected, but if RNGesus is on your side, you pull good, complementary cards and gems to fit your playstyle.
I’m about to ruin this fishman’s whole career
Luck and randomization will make or break a run. I feel this is one of the more kind games you could play in that regard, but it will absolutely hang you with enough rope. Get your deck into the 30s as far as the number of cards and you’ll find yourself scrambling, hoping, and praying for that one card that can save your ass in a particular moment. I actually just lost a run because my Clock Lancet card that freezes enemies and prevents them from attacking was at the back of my deck. “Too bad,” said RNGesus, and a demon proceeded to smack me in the forehead with 32 damage. You can get into some real Icarus-esque situations, flying too close to that sun in search of handfuls of power only to be stonewalled by a monster more favored than you. Moderation is key for some playstyles, that’s for sure.
But you know what? Dying is cool. It may stop your run, but it also shows you all the rewards you reaped from your card-throwing sowing. Your first several runs are flush (pun violently intended) with unlocks. New cards, new Crawlers, new dungeons to tackle, new gems; it’s not uncommon to snag more than five unlocks for each run early on. You’re sent back to your village hub to spend collected gold on permanent upgrades, buying new Crawlers, and more once you unlock certain services. Experimenting is fun, even if you don’t understand everything being thrown at you. If you’ve played a lot of Vampire Survivors though, you’ll have a leg up as far as what certain stats mean and, perhaps most importantly, what combinations of cards you’ll need in order to have a chance to evolve them into more powerful ones.
Slight spoilers, but as you play on, there’s relics you unlock that allow you to bring multiple Crawlers out on a run. This is where it really starts to get fun. Not only is your starting deck bolstered and varied (a necessity on later levels) but you have multiple Crawler abilities to depend on. Each Crawler is its own card. You get it in your hand and play it, it activates something immediately, and stays active on the left side of your screen. Meet that Crawler’s specific conditions, like playing a red attack card, or blue defensive one, and it’ll do something else for a set time. Stacking these is outrageously satisfying, and upping your duration stat allows them to stay at your side longer. No worries though, if they expire, their card simply goes to your discard pile and will reshuffle to your deck proper once you use up all your cards in an encounter or start a new one.
Ah, yes… YES. MORE!
Once you start to get the hang of these colliding systems, it all just clicks. You start throwing cards with greater purpose, capitalizing on your TurboTurn™ by playing them in ascending order of mana cost to build combo, using a wild card to strategically allow you to restart or continue your mana usage without losing combo, and vaporizing whatever is in your path. It gets to a point where bosses practically quiver at the sight of you, waiting to be blinded by dazzling special effects, knives flying across the screen, fire wands flashing scorching hell in their eyes, cats dancing from left to right (yes, really). Play it right, and plan ahead adequately, and you’re rewarded with the ability to perform total blitzes on enemies.
This all goes into the production values I mentioned earlier. Dungeons are explored in 3D, one more whole D than before in Vampire Survivors. You navigate them just as you would most any other dungeon crawler: in first person, down and up choking corridors as you fight (or avoid) hoards of foes, and finding chests and secrets along the way. I’m very thankful for the map you get for each dungeon, even if it’s a little loose with what it shows. Doing this blind would be a different sort of challenge and exhilaration, but not one I’d take to as well.
All the areas you visit are from Vampire Survivors as well. The Mad Forest, Inlaid Library, Dairy Plant, and much more. They’re 3Dified very well, with lots of dressing and accouterments from the last game that past players will recognize, but the new perspective and some new stuff here and there freshen it up, like they were renovated rather than remade. It’s homely! Enemy sprites, which are the things you see the most, still pop very well against these backdrops, and all the explosive visual effects you can wield will light any place up like a dying star.
The more you overkill a boss, the more comically zoomed in the sprite gets, so enjoy golem crotch
As I mentioned in my demo preview, I wasn’t sure how much I’d take to the voice acting. It’s not very intrusive, you only hear it when interacting with the Crawlers or playing their cards, and they just say a little quip or something. In the full game, and hearing all the different voices, I’m still not fully sold on it. It seems like a perceived improvement from Vampire Survivors that doesn’t feel as such for me. Don’t get me wrong, the limited performances from all the actors are totally fine and serviceable! I just don’t know if I needed this addition. I didn’t ever mute the dialogue though, so clearly it wasn’t a make-or-break deal for me.
One other thing nagged at me gameplay-wise too. Playing a game like this without a way to sort the cards in your hand or deck is kind of wild (pun not intended this time). Often, when my hands reach eight or more cards, they all get squished a bit on the screen. You can manually reorganize your hand at will, but I wanted a way to automatically sort by mana cost or the color/suit of them. Sometimes I’d play the wrong cards and while I don’t blame the game for my dumb fingers, sorting would help assuage that issue. Balatro has one up on Vampire Crawlers in that regard.
I do also miss a lot of the personality the writing gave in Vampire Survivors. Here, there’s some flavor text for relics or the places you visit; it’s still humorous and cool, but the amount is lacking. I will say, it took Survivors some time to add a lot of that kind of stuff in after launch, much of it written by James Stephanie Sterling, who I think absolutely killed it with their cheeky wit. Hopefully, we get some more bestiary stuff and extended writing like that in the future.
Red numbers on enemies means they’re about to explode if I play the card I’m hovering on
I did hit a few walls during my playthrough that required me to grind a bit, but asking me to replay levels in this game is like asking me to eat the same decadent piece of cake two nights in a row. I’m fat, of course I’m going to do it. I’m sure I went about things in the dumbest way possible as I explored and tested the game (and myself), so your mileage may vary. Regardless, the fun never ended – it still hasn’t ended as I threaten to log my first full calendar day worth of hours into it. I still have quite a lot to do, tacking some of the game’s more specific and challenging tasks, but I’ve made a hell of a mark so far with 134 out of 153 unlocks done. The final 19 will be tougher than much else I’ve seen so far, but I’m willing to put in the time even if it means some papercuts on my hands from all the cards I’m slinging.
All that to say, damn, poncle’s done it again. Vampire Crawlers is a wickedly crafted, addicting, original game with enough potential depth to rival the Mariana Trench. If, or hopefully when, DLC is added to this game, it’s only going to expand the possibilities even more. Still, the base game is incontrovertibly worth a purchase and play as one of the best value-to-money investments you could make in 2026. Just don’t be surprised when it has your family and friends luring you to a get-together, only to give you an intervention for too much crawling. Parents just don’t understand.
by David Rodriguez
