When Vampire Survivors released to almost unfathomable success, it was only a matter of time before the genre it created grew. Whether you think they should be called Survivaton games, Survivorslikes, Bullet Heavens, or auto shooters, I know I’ll be a happy little gamer if I’m playing one. It’s a divisive new genre that not everybody enjoys though, often because there’s not always a whole lot of input needed (especially as you power up to ludicrous levels). If this describes you then Blood Dungeon might be the game that helps you get into this new nook of gaming, because it adds a lot of frantic jumping around.
Like all Survivors style games, Blood Dungeon has you playing as a character who automatically attacks while you control their movement. The big difference though is that this game isn’t played from a top down perspective, and this means it has more of an action platformer twist. You can jump, go up ladders and climb on walls and ceilings, and you’ll need to do all this and more to avoid all the foes and their bullets packed into each stage. Despite a pretty fleshed out set of movement controls it’s easy to get trapped and overwhelmed though, especially as you’re getting to grips with everything.
The best way to survive waves of enemies is to blast or slice them down, and the range of weapons you can automatically use for this is great. There’s the sword spins around you to deal with the closest foes, a machine gun that fires a volley of bullets at anyone nearby, and a shotgun that spreads pain across a stage. There are more creative weapons too, like the spiderweb that damages opponents over time while giving you an area to climb on. These can all of course be made stronger too, in a lovely variety of ways.
In Blood Dungeon you level up by collecting blood orbs from your enemies, and when you do you’ll be given three options to upgrade. This could mean making your gun deal more damage or fire more regularly, giving you a passive boost to all damage or speed, or even grabbing a second weapon to help deal with crowds. You never know what you’re going to get, and with only an expensive reroll to risk for better options you’ll often have to take what the gods grant you.
As hard as you try you’ll undoubtedly lose a lot of runs in Blood Dungeon before even beating the first boss of an area, but fortunately there are ways to get stronger between runs. You’ll earn bones based on your score each time you die, and these can be spent on permanent stat boosts. On top of this you’ll also unlock all sorts of new weapons, perks and characters by beating challenges, and these are easy enough to unlock that especially early on you’ll gain two or three new things each time. It makes jumping in for one more run all the more tantalising, and I struggled to put the game down most evenings.
With only six stages and a handful of characters to unlock (with different starting weapons and passive skills) I was worried Blood Dungeon would get old a little too quickly. The randomness absolutely ensures this doesn’t happen, as do the stages themselves. These are more than just the different backgrounds with new enemies in them too, with water levels featuring oxygen management and even a mining level among the ones you unlock. It may not sound like much but these shake ups are exactly what you’ll need during a frantic session of survival.
As much as I loved Blood Dungeon, there are many elements that others will struggle with. For some the visuals will just be too hard to stomach, with a style that I’d describe as “placeholder art chic”. The difficulty is also way more brutal than I’m used to in the genre, especially while you’re waiting to unlock new upgrades between runs. You’ll frequently die before the very first boss of the very first level, and even if you manage to beat it you’ll perish soon after. This is made more frustrating by how incredibly slowly you level up in a run, which makes it feel less fair when you’re beaten into oblivion for the tenth time in a row due to a handful of naff upgrades.
Blood Dungeon is an interesting take on the Survivors formula, with breakneck platforming that ensures full concentration is needed. Especially early on it’s particularly brutal which not everyone will appreciate, but with some practice and a few upgrades you’ll soon never want it to end.
