Out of all the mythological creatures out there, vampires are by far one of the most popular. Of course, since the very first years of gaming, bloodsuckers have provided a fertile source of material for developers. There have been many amazing Vampire games such as the Legacy of Kain series, Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines (despite its issues) and more recently the excellent Vampyr. 

Sometimes a developer will see an emerging trend and strike while the iron is hot. Ideally, this inspiration should seek to capture that same magic while also adding something new to distinguish itself from the crowd. Last year the indie world was set on fire by a humble open-world survival game called Valheim. This success was down to refreshing game systems, engaging construction and a beautifully simple aesthetic. The game I want to talk about today is one that many have compared to Valheim as the boss hunting backbone seems very similar. Yet this wonderful indie game is also doing some very special things of its own.  

Bloody Amazing

V Rising is an action survival game that runs in a rotating isometric viewpoint. This title is from Swedish indie developer Stunlock Studios and for me came out of nowhere. You move your character around with the WASD and shift the view by holding the right mouse button. In this way, it immediately reminded me of Weird West, which is no bad thing. Like the aforementioned Western, the environments are designed to elevate gameplay beyond what you might normally expect from this genre. You start the game with dash skill, ranged attack and block. These skills do have some subtle bonuses even at this early stage. The dash for example makes your next attack more powerful for a short amount of time, teaching the player that good timing will be key for success later on.

The amount of attack slots open is fairly lean and this means that as you unlock new skills you must make some tough choices. However, as you gain new tiers of weapons, each class also gain a first and then a second unique attack. Smart use of these skills and weapons will be vital for taking on certain enemies, like acquiring a scythe that does more damage to the undead. The combat is one of the stand out elements in V Rising as it is fast, well designed and very satisfying. Due to the awesome ragdoll physics, the bodies of your enemies will do some pretty spectacular things as you dispatch them. In fact, the game world in general looks incredible as trees are felled and rocks are obliterated by the awesome destructive abilities these creatures have. 

Big Boss

I would say the strongest comparison to Valheim comes from the similar boss progression system. In both games finding and defeating boss characters is integral to the acquisition of new powers and tools. In the current version of the game, there are thirty-seven with more to come in the full game. I love how much range there is in these bosses, from the simple Alpha wolf to some really well-designed bullet hell encounters. These fights often take place in the open world and it’s incredible seeing these destructive forces level entire forests. As you finish feasting on your beaten quarry a shockwave erupts, reminiscent of when the predator sets off his spiteful self destruct device. Of course, the real prize is the skills, structures and abilities that unlock with each one you defeat.  

I like how some of these boss fights have has some creative thought put in, such as a powerful werewolf transforming into human form in the daytime. The Putrid rat is also found in a very unexpected place which may surprise some players. As you progress toward the last few encounters you will need to put everything you have learned to the test as they are formidable challenges

Hunter Gatherer

Right from the off you are set loose on the brittle environment around you. Almost everything will crumble into core resources under the incessant whacking of your vampiric attacks. Trees, rocks, grass, walls, fences… every bloody thing seems to hide stuff to hoover up. Your initial weapons and armour can be crafted with no structures in place and this lets the game lead you pretty quickly through the basic systems. You will also learn that many things make sense here, like axes being better for chopping trees and consuming worker blood will buff your overall gathering.

One of my favourite things about V Rising so far has to be the NPC behaviour. It seems like such a basic thing to get right and yet so many game developers get it wrong. Here you will see wolves attacking deer, bears attacking wolves and so on. Also, rival factions will not tolerate each other’s presence when roaming the many lanes. Often you will come across piles of resources from a recent fight. Even the boss characters will lay into another boss if they happen to cross paths, which can be advantageous for the wise vampire hiding in the shadows. The game world itself also seems to show some surprising details, from small creatures scurrying through the bushes to the sumptuous details on interior locations.

There are currently four main zones in the game and each one has many unique locations containing specific resources. One of the things that will stand out after a few hours of play is how well the resource gathering loop has been designed. The basic materials like rock, stone, animal hides etc will be gathered from the obvious places. You may also want to gather cotton from a local farm or grave dust from a cemetery. Of course, the locals will never react well to seeing a vampire sizing up their crops (and necks). It is another excellent sign of how many different reactions you get from unarmed villagers: some beg for their lives and some pick up a pitchfork. Very soon your inventory will be bulging with a litany of items and it is here you will be promoted to drop your castle heart in a suitable location.

Location Location Location

What self-respecting Vampire would consider themselves a true undead predator without his or her towering castle. This building is one of the main elements in the game and among other things offers reliable refuge from the sun. Your first settlement will have wooden walls and as you drop new structures down it will in all likelihood be a bit haphazard. A sawmill here, a foundry there and soon you will be processing your raw materials into the stuff of dreams. As soon as you get a solid castle wall and floor in place a roof will magically appear over your head; a somewhat reassuring boon for someone who bursts into flames in the sun. 

The building system is nowhere near as complex or free form as games like Valheim and initially seems a little limited. However, as you unlock new books (blueprints) the amount of choice you have is very impressive, especially considering this is an early access game. A castle heart can be plonked down on any of the free land in the game and this will be your vampiric base of operations: just make sure you keep feeding it blood essence. Soon you will realise that specific floor types boost certain structures, the forge room for example will be where you smelt ore down and craft new weapons. On top of the functional side of things, there are also a surprising amount of cosmetic options from glowing fireplaces, opulent red leather chairs and so much more. There really is enough here to keep all those budding interior decorators out there happy.

One way that vampires often protect themselves while they sleep in the daylight hours is by taking on a familiar or servant. As I will cover, you can place any human in a trance in order to imprison them for a good supply of blood. However, if you have made an empty coffin you can also convert them to become a fully functioning flunkey. Once the conversion process is complete these minions will defend your castle against all hostile forces, including other players not in your clan. As with many systems in V Rising, this is also incredibly well fleshed out with the option to send them on missions to places you have uncovered in the game world. You can kit them out in whatever gear you wish and there are even traits that will allow higher success in certain places. I mean, it makes total sense if you want to infiltrate a holy monastery why not convert one of the local priests. 

Sanguineous Shenanigans 

As you might imagine, blood will filter into many aspects of the gameplay systems and again, Stunlock has done a great job here. At the bottom of the screen you see your blood pool swishing around and you will want to keep this topped up whenever possible. As you hover over animals and humans alike you will see a percentage and this indicates the quality of blood they have. Once you have reduced that entity's health down to a low level you can feed and absorb their blood. The higher the percentage is, the more buffs you will unlock while that blood courses through your veins. The best part is that there are different types of blood and they all offer a different set of buffs depending on your requirements.

I love how many different options you have open to you in this liquid economy. For example, if a fellow vampire is running low on the red stuff you can open a vein and let them feed on you. You can also feed on cattle, wild deer and many other creatures you come across and animal blood also comes with its own benefits. It is also wise to keep a few rats in your pocket when caught in a pinch. You can even build cages and keep people with high-quality blood to snack on or bottle some for a later time.

Sun Block

As any Vampire buff will know, the one universal vampire killer is sunlight (we don’t talk about those sparkly ones here). V Rising might have my favourite sunlight simulation ever. In the night air, you will be safe to explore but as the morning mist fades the real-time day/night cycle will push that yellow orb of death high into the sky. You can still leave the cool safety of your castle during daylight hours but you must then avoid any direct beams of sunlight and remain in the shadows. What is really awesome about this system is that shadows are very accurately rendered and move in real-time. 

I’ve been in situations when moving across farmland, hiding in rat form to take advantage of the thin shadows cast by fence posts. In one boss fight, we were fairly well covered until the shockwave felled all surrounding trees which left us all getting crispy with no shade in sight. I’ve even had situations where I’ve gone afk for a few minutes in my castle and come back to a smouldering pile of ash as the afternoon sun was now casting long corridors of death through the open windows. 

While on the subject of accurate world systems, I also love how well-implemented line of sight is in V Rising. Basically, if your character can't see an enemy, you can’t see them either. As you run through the forest this will become obvious as woodland creatures flit in and out of view. I’ve been in situations where I’ve thought I’d escaped a mob of angry soldiers, only to run right into them as I rounded a corner. 

All the Damn Vampires

So as the short but sweet cut scene ends you are presented with your first choice, the type of game you wish to play. Stunlock Studios have done a great initial job here providing space for both PVP folks and those who just want to plod through the game as a solo PVE jaunt. On my first game, I jumped into a PVP server with a few friends and we immediately formed a four-man guild. The standard limit for each server is around forty people which right now seems about right. As you go about your business you will come across other players and the castles they have erected.

So far I have been ignored, attacked and even spoken to once with the VOIP (player voices when in range) feature. When you do get killed on a PVP server the resources you drop are open for looting, after a long gathering session this can be devastating. Your castles can also be attacked and raided by other players at certain phases in the day. So when making a character on a PVP server just be aware of what you are signing up for. There is even a hardcore PVP server where all your gear can be stolen after death and your entire castle can be wiped out: not for the faint of heart. 

The majority of my time so far has been on a private PVE server. This allowed us to change a few of the server parameters, such as making the guild size ten which lets all our community join in. We also removed the restrictions on carrying resources through way gates, which makes life a hell of a lot easier. While the PVP aspect of the game is certainly very popular with live-streamers, there is more than enough PVE content in the game to keep you going for weeks. 

Summary 

I could gush about how amazing V Rising is all day. It has taken so much of the established vampire lore out there and honoured it perfectly. They have also captured so much of what makes being a vampire so dangerous, holy powers, garlic, sunlight is all here to make draining the locals a fair challenge. Right now there are performance issues on lower-end systems which of course are being worked on by the developers. On our 3080ti system, the game runs beautifully at 1440p and is a good indication of what is to come. In terms of bugs and glitches, I really haven’t come across any as this game already feels unbelievably well polished.

It has been sad to see all the buzz around Valheim fade away due to the developers taking a long time in between updates. With such a great reception and plenty of goodwill, I hope the developers at Stunlock can keep this momentum going towards a full release. With sales nearing two million at the time of writing, V Rising has well and truly secured itself as one of the best games of 2022. It is even more incredible that you can still pick up the early access version of the game for £15. I always advise caution when jumping into games that are still being developed but even if I had paid £50, I would already have been happy with the time I’ve gotten out of the game. I wish all the team at Stunlock Studios the very best for the rest of this game's development and I hope we see it continue to do well.