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Yep, the Vampire Survivors crossover DLC with Among Us is out, and yep, it’s fantastic

2K View2023-12-19

Vampire Survivors

8.9

Pixel GraphicsRetroVampireSurvivalActionBullet HellRoguelikeAdventure

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SHOULD I PLAY VAMPIRE SURVIVORS: EMERGENCY MEETING?

If you’ve already sunk dozens or even hundreds of hours into Vampire Survivors, then you’ve probably already bought this add-on. But just in case you were wondering, yes, the new Vampire Survivors: Emergency Meeting DLC is excellent. It doesn’t seem like this game’s intense, mostly single-player action would be a great match with the social deduction stylings of Among Us, but that combo actually works shockingly well. And most importantly, it provides an excuse to waste even more of our limited time on Earth playing Vampire Survivors.

TIME PLAYED

My total time played for Vampire Survivors is now well over sixty hours, but only the last five or so was with the Emergency Meeting DLC. Still, that’s been enough time to unlock several of the new playable characters and weapons, as well as briefly dipping into the new DLC’s adventure mode.

WHAT’S AWESOME ABOUT VAMPIRE SURVIVORS: EMERGENCY MEETING?

• It’s, you know, more Vampire Survivors. Just when I thought I was almost caught up with my completion, here’s one new map, nine new playable characters, and fifteen new weapons (including evolutions). If you love crushing legions of enemies and unlocking new secrets in Vampire Survivors, you’ll love doing it all over again in a new sci-fi setting and against creepy alien tentacle monsters.

• Some of the new weapons are extremely wild. For example, the Lifesign Scan is a new weapon pick-up that occasionally heals your character. Nothing too fancy. But evolve it into the Paranormal Scan, and suddenly you have an item that’s regularly healing you and occasionally providing stat boosts that last for the rest of your run. After twenty minutes with the Paranormal Scan, I had a completely overpowered survivor, and there’s nothing more fun than that.

• Fun, stressful new map mechanics. Polus Replica is one of the most interesting Vampire Survivors levels added to the game so far, and it also comes with a fun unique mechanic. Mirroring the emergencies you run into while playing Among Us, the surface of Polus will sometimes undergo tectonic plate shifts. When that happened, I had to zoom over to specific areas to hit a switch. Failing to hit the switch in time didn’t end my run, but it did make things a lot harder by forcing me to deal with bursts of lava shooting up from the ground. It’s a fun little wrinkle that adds moments of sudden panic to the game’s formula.

• Great new enemy models. The sprites in Emergency Meeting are the best Vampire Survivors has had so far and really showcase how far the game has come from its initial Castlevania rip-off pixel art. I especially loved the gigantic boss that shows up near the end of Polus Replica runs. I hope to see more grotesque monstrosities like that in the future.

WHAT SUCKS ABOUT VAMPIRE SURVIVORS: EMERGENCY MEETING?

• The new passive items are hard to keep straight. While I enjoyed the new weapons, Emergency Meeting’s seven new passive items are all based on different colors of the classic Among Us crewmates. They each have unique abilities—such as the Mini Engineer occasionally electrocuting enemies, or the Mini Impostor occasionally stabbing enemies—and they each match up with one of the new weapon types to help evolve it. Because they’re just different color swaps of the same little guy, though, I’ve had a lot of trouble remembering what each one does and also (especially) which weapon each one matches with for evolutions. Then again, by the time I have two or three dozen more hours in this game, maybe it’ll be drilled into my brain.

• Adventure mode is a little light on stuff. This is less an issue with Emergency Meeting specifically than it is with Vampire Survivors’ approach to adventure mode in general. Rather than a proper story campaign, the game’s adventures basically serve as unique progress resets, allowing players who’ve already played way too much (i.e. me) to unlock everything all over again in a slightly different way. That’s fine for what it is, but seeing it attached to new DLC really made me realize how much I wish adventure mode was actually a little more unique and varied compared to the regular game.