We’ve all got our favorites when it comes to Steam Early Access games, and we’ve also seen some releases never make out of Early Access. However, just as you think all hope is lost, that one game gets a release date with some major finishing touches that just make everything great. Well, meet V Rising, the biggest and best creation from Stunlock Studios and their beast is finally getting a full release on 8 May. This Swedish studio has been around the block since 2010 and they’ve had previous MOBA releases like Bloodline Champions in 2011 and Battlerite in 2016. However, their current creation, V Rising, still takes the top spot for popularity and creativity.

Now, V Rising has been around for quite some time and the story hasn’t really changed but the Early Access version didn’t have the full story content. For those who are new – Vampires used to rule the land long ago, but the humans rose and overthrew them. This led to the vampires being drained and their blood being shared among the human champions, all while you lay dormant in a coffin… Practically starving to rise and reclaim what is yours. This is where you also take on a more active role as a vampire to reclaim your lost power and rule the land once more, with a few precautions this time around.

Reclaiming your lost power is all fine and well but you’re going to need a fair bit of time and preparation, your first move will be to gather resources and start building your castle. This is somewhat simple and also easier said than done, mostly because your initial castle will likely consist of simple flooring and walls, maybe even a mist brazier to protect you from the sun. However, you’ll need to upgrade your castle and your tools to get any form of progress in the long run, though you have to start somewhere.

Starting with resources, you’ll likely find out quite early on that you can never have enough wood or stone, simply because it’s used in almost everything for your castle and you’re going to need a metric ton of both. Granted, you’ll also need to refine your resources, wood into wooden planks or stone into stone blocks for the slightly more advanced construction options. You can probably see where this is going, naturally, things become a little stale if it was easy or if there weren’t any extra steps to building your dream castle.

Getting a basic castle built will get you started, but you’ll need to refine resources and craft better gear while you’re at it to raise your gear level. However, this will once again come with some work in the form of adding the right crafting benches to your castle. Though life in V Rising isn’t just an endless slew of building and crafting, while you’ll need to craft better gear, you’ll also have to keep your main objective in mind – Reclaiming your lost power. Luckily, this open-world survival has you covered with the ability to track the aforementioned champions. From there, it’s just a matter of following the trail and crushing your target to drain them. On the plus side, successfully taking your target down and draining them also rewards you with new gear you can craft or resources you can gather.

There is one other thing to keep in mind when hunting down the champions in question, while they’ll usually give you building options or access to new resources, they’ll also give you spell points and sometimes a new transformation you can use. Naturally, as a vampire, you’ll have unique powers you can use and they come in the form of spells and there are several elemental trees to explore. Sadly, you can’t just string up every new spell you get, you’ll be limited to a Dash ability, two attack spells, and an Ultimate ability, all of which can be swapped out with different abilities from the various trees.

On the other hand, transformations are going to be your best friend simply because of how much they can change things in the long run. For example: The Wolf transformation is great for getting around faster than on foot while attracting other wolves to attack for you, while the Bear transformation will allow you to gather more resources or even deal some explosive damage to gates and such. However, there are transformations for those who prefer a stealthier approach such as Rat or Human, both of which will allow you to get closer to the humans for a surprise attack or to slip past them without causing a fight. This might sound odd but not all battles can be won at first and you’ll need to choose your fights carefully.

Now, where V Rising shines isn’t necessarily with progression or the building aspects, it’s more that there’s never really a dull moment once you start exploring the various biomes. You’ll initially start off in the Farbane Woods but things become a lot more interesting once you get to the Silverlight Hills and Dunley Farmlands where you’ll need to avoid garlic and holy attacks. However, Gloomrot is the place to be if you want something a little freakier and steampunk-themed. Though there is also a whole new addition with the full release of V Rising, the Ruins of Mortium, nobody likes spoilers but let’s just say… You’ll be going up against vampiric beings and they don’t plan on taking prisoners.

On the matter of the different biomes, this also means that the world is pretty big as a whole and it can become really tedious going on foot the whole time. Luckily, everything seems to have been thought of in development as you’ll also have access to the Vampire Waygates. These are essentially fast travel points and they are absolutely invaluable while getting around. There is a slight drawback though, some items can’t be teleported with you, leaving you with no choice but to drop those items or run the long way home.

As can be expected, you’ll need to prepare for some of the other dangers that await you. As a vampire, garlic might not hurt you, it will instead give you a debuff that lowers your damage and your damage reduction. On the other side of the coin, you’ll also have a severe weakness towards sunlight, holy damage, and even sunlight. Welcome to the wonderful world of alchemy, you’ll need various potions to boost your resistance and even heal up when needed. You’ll need to prepare early on to buff your resistance for survival’s sake.

To save the best for last, you’ll also need to deal with the possible caveat of being a vampire in V Rising, the constant need for blood. However, you don’t just need blood to survive, blood also comes with a wide range of other benefits in the form of a blood type. While out exploring, you’ll encounter a wide variety of different humans and beasts and they all come with their own blood type ranging from Creature to Ranger, and each type comes with buffs. Granted, there is also the matter of how pure the blood is. Less pure blood will sadly give you fewer buffs while purer blood will give you more. You’ll have to experiment to see what works best for your playstyle but you’ll definitely find what suits you.

On the visual front, V Rising has seen major improvements since its initial release into Early Access, and it looks like the visual elements got a lot more polished with the full release as well. There’s never really a dull moment with just how vastly different each biome is from one another, and you can simply pack up and move your castle to a new location if you want a change of scenery. However, where V Rising really shines is with how customizable everything is when it comes to your castle.

With so much visual appeal, you can likely expect the same quality from the sound engineering and just how much work went into it. There’s still that same somber gloomy background music we know and love, and it all just fits well into the world as a whole. We have to give kudos where it’s due since V Rising sure as hell doesn’t skip a beat with sound effects either. When you’re not out hunting for more V Blood, you might end up just enjoying a relaxed exploration run with some great music to go with it.

Overall, V Rising is without a doubt the best Open World Survival release for 2024 so far, with a great story and a gigantic world to explore, there’s endless potential to be found. If you’re not that big on exploring just yet, you’ll also have a ton of fun just building your castle while upgrading it, though it does come with the downside of having to hunt for resources. The only thing V Rising is missing is possibly a sandbox mode for those who want to explore their creativity.
 

Jay Claassen (@R3GR3T_3NVY)
Senior Editor, NoobFeed