The good folks over a poncle continue to keep cooking away at Vampire Survivors, the genre-defining action-roguelike that is already overflowing with things to do.
Following on from the studio’s collaboration with Japanese giants Konami (for Contra), the two are teaming up once more, this time to honour another genre-defining game series: Castlevania.
The Ode to Castlevania content update is going to be the biggest expansion yet, according to the announcement. We’re getting 20+ characters with access to 40+ weapons, and a new pathway to start unlocking the new content.
We’re also getting the biggest stage in the game so far, which has multiple biomes that are no doubt reverent to Konami’s classic. There’s not going to be a new Adventure, however, but they “might add one in the future if we get the chance.”
That’s a whole bunch of content to unpack, but for many of us, it’s the characters and their weapons that are the most interesting addition.
As noted in the blog post that confirmed the update, poncle has “tried to reach a balance between referencing, reinterpreting, remixing, and straight up converting weapons of the Castlevania series.”
“We have also added themed Weapon Selectors that will make all characters very flexible, so that they won’t get stuck using their default weapon if you prefer to use something different”.
The expansion is set to cost a bit less than previous content updates, which is a bit absurd when you think about it. As for when? Ode to Castlevania is due to drop on October 31st, the year’s spookiest release date.
What’s more, the new content will arrive alongside Patch. 1.12, which brings the following improvements:
- Advanced Music Selection: when even that one weirdo that knows by memory the order of the music tracks in the game (me) has trouble choosing the right one, you know it’s time to revamp the UI!
- Mega Seal: you are now able to seal a whole “content pack”, (including “Base Game”, or “Extra”.. who needs weapons anyway?) from the Collection menu
- ZOOM: you can now zoom in and out on the pause-menu map.
- Arcana effect reminder in pause menu: just when you thought this list had peaked at ZOOM.
- New Passives in Preview mode: we needed 2 passives to make the list of new evos feel complete, so we’re adding them to the game ahead of time through special means
- Memory usage improvements: probably invisible on PC, but on other platforms this should help better sustain insane end-game runs
Below you can see the announcement trailer, that is if you need more reasons to be excited about an expansion that poncle says will add a “stupidly gigantic amount of content” to the game.
Finally, if you’re a big fan of VS, then check out my article about the best survivors-likes and games like Vampire Survivors – maybe you’ll find something fun to play while you wait for Ode to Castlevania…
