Just when you thought it was safe to turn on the Xbox, just when you thought you had finally gotten that Vampire Survivors monkey off your back, poncle go and do it again. They go and release new DLC for Vampire Survivors, and just to add a little spice, they include characters from the Contra series of games.
I reviewed Contra: Operation Galuga just a few short weeks ago, and so I was well in the mood for a little more, especially as it gave an excuse to play Vampire Survivors some more. So, without further ado, let’s prepare to have our lives mercilessly taken over again…
As we all know, the story is not important in Vampire Survivors, but there has been an attempt made with Operation Guns and so we should mention it. I think it is best to quote directly from the store page, in fact: “Are you a bad enough Vampire Survivor to save the President’s cousin’s sister’s dog from the traitor squadrons of Red Falcon?”. Well, are you? That is pretty much the setup, and if you feel sorry for the poor bats that these guns will shred, then you may be playing the wrong game.
In Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns comes two new maps, Neo Galuga and Hectic Highway (which has to be unlocked using the usual Vampire Survivors tortuous and twisted logic). In addition to this are eleven new heroes from the world of Contra, and a similar number of new weapons, each with an evolution, making twenty-two in total. And of course, these aren’t available from the get go, as the majority of the new characters need to be unlocked and purchased as per usual. Maybe you’ll find a couple in coffins…
Presentation is exactly as it was before, with the added twist of some classic Konami characters and enemies to batter. The new Neo Galuga level is built around classic Contra themes, with three separate biomes in a horizontally scrolling level: a jungle, a ruined city and the scary sounding Alien Zone. The Hectic Highway level is based around the Contra staple of jet bikes, and sees you driving down a highway, shooting enemies as you go. All in all, it is all very much business as usual, and everything in the presentation of the new DLC really is as good as it ever was.
The same can be said of the gameplay which is just as addictive as ever. Rather than wibble on about something that everyone knows, I thought I’d detail who is found in Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns as new characters.
From the top, we have the classic Contra heroes, Bill Rizer and Lance Bean, armed with big muscles, big guns and a can-do attitude! Next up is Ariana, a young girl who has been fighting the Red Falcon in her home, evasiveness being her forte. Lucia is a bit of an unknown, a clone, a cyborg, no one knows, but she is a card carrying killer, so who cares! Brad Fang is, and I quote, “Half man, half wolf, half cyborg and 150% supersoldier”. What else needs to be said? Browny, the next character, is a robot designed for battle, and while his programming leads him to party a lot, he can bring it when he needs to. Sheena Etranzi is a guerilla combat expert, used to dealing with overwhelming odds, and so will fit right in here. Lastly, we have Probotector, which is a hyper advanced recon robot that shouldn’t be phased by a screen full of baddies. So, that is the team, and they have a slew of new weapons as well.
Those weapons are a varied lot, all based on Contra mythology. There are machine guns, homing missiles, even shotguns and lasers, and as I mentioned above, each weapon can also be evolved to make new ones. There is no shortage of new characters and weapons to get to grips with, that is for sure.
The end result of all this is even more Vampire Survivors goodness, and the end of any kind of social life you may have developed since the release of Vampire Survivors: Emergency Meeting. The gameplay is as good as it ever was, and – whisper it – it may be even better, as the new weapons are a great deal of fun and completely over the top. Indeed, I sometimes had problems seeing where to go with the amount of firepower on the screen, which is a nice problem to have.
Also, don’t miss the optional boss on the Neo Galuga stage – towards the end of the time, you’ll get an alert and if you investigate it, you may just meet a familiar face from Contra history!
With a low asking price, poncle have done it again. There is a lot of content included in Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns and it is all extremely lovely. I think Vampire Survivors is the only game in which I struggle to find any form of issue, and that streak continues here. This is insane value for money, with lots of new content and even more Vampire Survivors fun – who could ask for more?
