The vampiric world has always been a fascinating tale to underline for video games’ narrative. Numerous games have attempted and had their perspective in displaying and narrating the world around the infamous entity, Dracula. Among those titles, I highly relish Castlevania: Lords Of Shadow 2, published by Konami.
The game delivered engaging story-driven content with 3D world dynamics. The game had fast-paced combat mechanics, similar to Devil May Cry, and was enriched with story content.
Key Takeaways
- V Rising is an open-world RPG where players role-play as vampires.
- Despite revolving around the tales of the infamous Dracula, the game focuses on bringing immersive gameplay rather than narrative.
- Still, players can explore the lore to entertain their curiosities without affecting their gameplay in any way.
Following this, I relentlessly awaited the release of V Rising, plainly expecting the game to be another lore-driven vampiric tale scenario. Yet, upon playing the game, I realized that the story had a minor standing because the game was entirely gameplay-focused.
At first glance, I was disappointed, but as the game progressed, I became aware that no other game has ever focused on making the actual gameplay feel like you are role-playing as a vampire.
Gameplay That Immerses You As The Very Being You Are
It’s not hard to indulge yourself deeply with the vampiric tales when the game’s purpose is solely to deliver an engaging storyline. However, if we discard the narrative aspect, what remains for a player to experience as a blood-thirsty being?
V Rising delivered a simulation-like hack-and-slash gameplay in which one can experience what it is like to roam endlessly in a world with vampire-like traits. The blood-leeching, shapeshifting, controlling elements, and immersive day and night cycle are the top-notch gameplay features I have relished.
There are tons of boss fights to progress through. Defeating each boss earns you unique combat skills to unlock, items to craft, or even grants you special abilities that benefit your overall gameplay, such as leeching blood out of enemies to gain their special stats.
The AI of the world seems pretty straightforward in responding to players’ actions. I enjoy the part where shapeshifting effects now usual NPCs react to your presence. Explicitly, shapeshifting into a wolf will change the stance of every wolf around you as your ally, so the wild beasts will aid you in battle rather than attack you.
Apart from reveling in the gameplay features, acquainting yourself from them is a real challenge. The first few hours of my playthrough were mindless, venturing in the wild, attempting to find meaning in the expedition. Regarding this, I find the game’s tutorial quite clunky as it is easy to overlook, and sometimes, it assigns unfamiliar tasks with no hint to follow as a lead. Moreover, completing these tasks is made compulsory as it unlocks various items and abilities that enhance your vampire traits.
The gameplay undoubtedly offers an immersive vampiric world overhaul. Despite being gameplay-focused, there is puzzle-solving that reveals secrets of the game’s unattended narrative.
World Setting That Portraits Narrative Without Emphasizing It
At first, the world might appear to be a mystical forest that upholds challenges in every corner. It is true to some extent; however, I later discovered that the narrative was always present in V Rising. Indeed, the game does not have a main storyline to focus on, but the world design is the perfect follow-up to the aftermath of a war that happened ages ago.
Explicitly, the lore of Gloomrot, where Henry Blackbrew resides after being exiled, intrigued me the moment I discovered that gruesome area on the North side of the map. His exile isolated him to an unknown place where he began conducting various twisted experiments to fend off the reign of Dracula. This lore became the very reason we had to fight Adam The Firstborn.
Following this, various bosses have inspiring background stories for us to unravel. The game has a fair number of bosses, creating an enticing journey for players who cherish feature-rich gameplay and those who love to unravel story events. Yet, it is also to be noted that exploring the story events is not mandatory to progress the game; it is only there to enhance the player’s exploration of Vardoran (V Rising’s world).
This is a major fact I admire about this game; it is enriched with narrative aspects throughout its massive world but is hidden from the sight of those who find it unwanted. From my perspective, V Rising has displayed an exceptional world of vampires by focusing on immersion rather than redeveloping the prevalent vampiric tales.
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An enthusiastic writer who loves art and gaming, you can find Maaz casually spending his day either behind the keyboard or the canvas. Maaz holds a major in Electronics and has over 5 years of experience working as a freelance blog and content writer. He loves to talk about all things gaming and help other gamers through his guides. He’s an expert when it comes to Diablo 4, Elden Ring, Dark Souls, Starfield and Baldur’s Gate 3.
Maaz mostly plays games on PC, you can check out his library on Steam attached below:
