Vampire Survivors | 2023 Guide for Complete Beginners | Episode 1

Vampire Survivors is an amazing, arcade style roguelite that was such a surprise hit that it spawned a genre. In this complete beginners guide to Vampire Survivors, I will explain to you the basics from the ground up by starting a brand new game so you can watch and even play along. I will explain the controls, the UI, the mechanics, how to survive, spend gold, choose weapons, and some basic strategy. I detail my thought process, sharing tips and tricks along the way but I spoil nothing about the game or the story. I don't force a particular path or tell you to min/max, but rather help by providing the fundamentals so you can enjoy Vampire Survivors at your own pace. If you are thinking of buying the game and want to see early gameplay, or have purchased it but would like some pointers on the basics, this is the guide for you!
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Dr. Incompetent aims to teach you how to get better at games while having a blast and maybe exposing you to a game you haven't yet tried--or even heard of by producing gaming guides, tutorials, let's plays, and tips, tricks, and strategies. He also tries out recent hits to determine if they are worth buying. He is more than happy to answer any questions you have about the games covered, either live during his Twitch Stream or in the YT comments below.
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[@Zelinkondorf]

Wow a game guide that explains from scratch instead of already being overpowered and saying "just do this" like it's some easy feat. Props

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, awesome! I am so glad you have found this useful. It is such a good game--I hope you are enjoying it! :D

[@Gallacant]

Most addictive game of 2022

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, no doubt! ;D

[@luvergod69]

Still is that's why I'm here

[@LSOK38]

Brotato is better!

[@rocketboy5172]

2024*

[@Darkkfated]

The maximum "equipment" is as follows: 6 Weapons (the upper boxes) and 6 Accessories (the lower boxes) There are ways around this and ways to get more than 6 weapons or accessories, but that's all late-game stuff you'll learn about and unlock eventually. Don't worry about it early on; just assume you're limited to 6 weapons and 6 weapon/stat boosting accessories. Other notes: If you wander too far from the XP gems on the ground, they will consolidate into one "super" Red Gem... but this happens a ways offscreen, so if you never retrace your steps, you'll never be able to collect it. But any XP on the ground will kinda sorta follow you via this consolidation method, so if you need to wander around - say, to find more Torches to break in search of Floor Chicken, money, or power ups, or even just because you had to flee for a long time in a single direction - you have a way to maybe still get most of the XP Gems you had to abandon. Not to be too contradictory, but early on it's actually better to focus on 2 or 3 weapons and get them upgraded as much as you can, as opposed to having 5-6 weapons at a low level. Same with most Accessories; having a few key things boosted way up is better than small bonuses to a bunch of stuff. The enemies get stronger at a fixed rate, so if you don't keep your DPS up, it's a surefire road to getting surrounded and killed by the 12-15 minute mark. Related to this, the Crown is a trap - the XP gain is pointless if you're not keeping your DPS up! 8% more XP on fewer kills is not actually a benefit at all. There are uses for the Crown but again, it's late game, advanced-strat stuff, so ignore it for now. Regarding the Ring of Flower Monsters, they appear every 5 minutes and disappear automatically after a set amount of time has gone by - it's 30 seconds for the first one, but each one after that takes longer and longer to disappear. And while they're really hard to kill, they DO ALMOST NO DAMAGE, so unless you're really low on health, you can just force your way through them to escape the Ring if you feel you need to. Until you do a few runs, amass some Gold Coins, and start buying new Characters and Permanent Upgrades, the Ghost/Werewolf wave at the 13 minute mark is almost always going to be Game Over, so don't feel bad if you lose to it a few times - it's the first real hurdle, and you need some power boosts to overcome it and make it further along in the Mad Forest. You'll also unlock a new Stage sooner rather than later, and you can do runs on that one instead (it has different gimmicks and is generally easier than the Forest is). As for what to buy in the Power Up screen early on, Might is the best hands down, but if you got lucky with chests and have the cash, Cooldown is also good. A point or two in Movement Speed and Recovery is also useful (Recovery gives you HP Regen so you don't have to rely solely on Floor Chickens to heal up, it's a lot handier than it looks like at a glance!) Max Health is also reasonable choice. Once you have a few points in a handful of these "must have" perks, consider saving up to get that point in Amount, which is just a stupidly good upgrade and one you want to unlock as soon as you can.

[@DrIncompetent]

Oh wonderful! Thank you for all of these tips and suggestions! ^_^

[@Fenrir_8]

Thanks for the tips! Fairly new player here. I personally get power-ups when I can afford at least 2 of them, and I would always go for Greed and one or more other upgrades (Might and Cooldown for DPS). This way I invest part of the money in getting more coins on future runs to then invest part of them in more Greed and slowball from there. Then I buy Amount as soon as I can afford it.

[@Newuxtreme]

Awesome tips man as an absolute beginner found this very helpful!

[@chubsy]

This helped me more than any other beginners guide in this game. Thank you!

[@DrIncompetent]

Great! I am so glad you found this helpful and I hope you are enjoying the game!

[@treykrause9716]

You're an amazing guide man seriously, thank you.

[@DrIncompetent]

You are so welcome! I am glad you are finding it helpful!

[@jil88]

Wish I came across this video before I binged through the game over the weekend, just wanted to say thank you for the amount of thought/care put into this walkthrough

[@DrIncompetent]

You are so welcome! This is such a fun game :D

[@panique365]

Just got this game on Switch and loving it so far. Thanks for the very helpful video!

[@DrIncompetent]

Awesome! So glad you are enjoying it and finding this useful :D This is such a fun game!

[@joeygranato8104]

Nice video! I just got a steam deck and decided to grab Vampire Survivors for 3.99 and i'm loving it so far. Keep up the great work!

[@DrIncompetent]

Ooo, I bet this game is fantastic on the Steam Deck! :D

[@rosetintved]

just bought the game, this is an amazing guide and i can't wait to play it myself :] thank you!

[@DrIncompetent]

You are so welcome! I hope you have fun with the game! It's such a good time haha

[@FetchTheCow]

Very good beginners guide! Thanks!

[@DrIncompetent]

I am so glad you found it useful ^_^ Have fun playing the game! It's a good one ;)

[@positivelife3034]

I just started playing this yesterday, sat at work thinking about playing it.

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, I am with you! It is so fun!

[@codymiller-jz2rq]

Love this game so much fun and everytime I think I found everything I get some sort of suprise

[@DrIncompetent]

It's such a fun game! I love finding new stuff!

[@codymiller-jz2rq]

@@DrIncompetent the hidden levels and challenge stages are fun as well

[@Openreality]

My game of the year. I just have fun and am not worried how i mix the weapons or combine them. This game and army of ruin are the best at the swarm survivor genre.

[@DrIncompetent]

It's so good! I agree!

[@blissfulbrain80]

Nice video! Gracia!!

[@DrIncompetent]

You are so welcome ^_^ I hope you are having fun with the game!

[@user-ev6no4lx1k]

good job man.

[@DrIncompetent]

Thank you! I'm so glad you enjoy this :) This is such a fun game.

[@satyricon420]

The mantis super chest isn’t random he always drops it. It’s best to focus him when the flower ring spawns at 5min.

[@DrIncompetent]

Okay, great! Thank you for clarifying this!

[@Patricio4Christ]

At 17:00, in other words, the best defense is the offense. At 23:04, it can be helpful when you're in trouble.

[@DrIncompetent]

Good points!

[@stevenbutchart]

I only ever see the falling jewels animation when I level up the first time, I notice it happens everytime in your video. Is there an option to turn it on and off or something ?

[@DrIncompetent]

That's a great question! I don't know, sadly, but I like it. It's a party 🥳 haha

[@Patricio4Christ]

At 3:33, you move to the "beat" of your weapon; therefore, you hit an enemy.

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, good one ;D

[@Gersberms]

Hit Escape to speed up the chest, after you hit Enter to open it.

[@DrIncompetent]

Oh that's awesome! I had no idea you could do that. Thank you for sharing this tip!

[@Gersberms]

@@DrIncompetent Honestly it seems like an error for the chest to take 10-15 seconds. In a game as high paced as this, who wants to wait that long?

[@Owlr4ider]

I strongly disagree with your initial gold purchases in this guide. To me the most important thing early on is to make it to the later stages of the game, which means surviving long enough until you unlock yourself. Experience therefore is incredibly underrated and is the thing I would focus on with your initial gold purchases as leveling up faster, and thus unlocking new abilities, will increase your power level a lot more than a few points in might ever could. Similarly quality of life items like move speed(very play style dependent), magnet, luck(though not too early as you need to unlock a bunch of things first for luck to begin to be worthwhile), etc, are highly valuable early on both before you unlock the abilities/characters that provide the same bonuses and to not be forced to use said characters/abilities in order to enjoy said quality of life. I actually find the top 8 items on the list to be a massive trap and should be bought later after those initial things and than the key expensive items like amount.

[@DrIncompetent]

Interesting take!

[@eply995]

How do you start over? I can't reset my progress

[@DrIncompetent]

That is a great question! You probably have to delete your save files? I played the game on XBOX gamepass for my Let's Play of this, then just bought a new copy on Steam to start a new account as the game is rather cheap. Not a free solution haha ;)

[@pilotreg]

i don't get an option for stage selection 😕

[@DrIncompetent]

You need to have unlocked more levels first!

[@Eagles_Eye]

I thought the ones with outline just meant it had a shield. Didn’t know they dropped the chests 🤦‍♂️

[@DrIncompetent]

Yes! I thought they were just tougher enemies too, but they always drop a chest so they are great!

[@Eagles_Eye]

@@DrIncompetent thanks imma target them from now on, picked up the game yesterday, * insert the dog meme* “ I have no idea what I’m doing” edit, just had a run 28:24 minutes thanks to some tips. received 3797 gold because now i knew what monsters to look for. 10 achievements in 1 round too. now its gonna be "easier"

[@anoobplays386]

Anyone else prefer the earlier patches where there weren't so many items?

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, they really are adding a lot ;D

[@anoobplays386]

@@DrIncompetent it's just so much. Like the game went from simple masterpiece to bloated overdone shit real fast

[@Gallacant]

Crazy that this game still gets free updates

[@DrIncompetent]

I know! It's such a good game!

[@jacobwaits3559]

It'd be funny to see a mobile gps based version of the game I know there's a mobile version just saying though

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, that would be funny for sure!

[@xSTR8xRECONx]

Why am I unable to ever see the "Stage Selection" screen??

[@DrIncompetent]

I'm not sure! Have you cleared more than one level?

[@xSTR8xRECONx]

That was the reason, thanks.@@DrIncompetent

[@metalflameful]

Have played for 10 hours and still cant make it past 20 minutes on the first stage. Hardest game ever made

[@DrIncompetent]

It can be really tough! I'd level up on that second level if you haven't tried it yet--you may not last 20 minutes, but you'll get a lot of gold ;D

[@chiueplays5157]

Not trynna be wowed but I don’t know why people like this game I got it but I don’t see why people like it so much.

[@DrIncompetent]

I can see that. I don't know why it works so well for me, but it does haha

[@ChristianSmith-ei8yp]

Might be the simplicity until you dive further into gameplay mechanics. I got it on my steam deck because it’s cheap and runs really well, easy to pick up and play for a bit and not kill the battery

[@JoeblowForever]

Me my wife and 2 kids have a blast with the 4 player co op

[@DrIncompetent]

Haha, that sounds super fun!