‘Vampire Survivors’ Developer Purposely Made Co-Op With Families In Mind
When the game launched, people wrote its developer with heartwarming stories about playing the game with friends, families, and children. Those stories stuck with him.
Recently, I wrote that “Vampire Survivors In Co-Op Is a Shockingly Good Family Video Game,” and it’s true. My kid and I haven’t returned to Vampire Survivors because Starfield has been dominating my time recently and we were prepping for a PAX trip, but given how family friendly the co-op mode was, I wondered how much was intent.
“Partners were the first type of players that came to mind when we decided to do local co-op, followed by families, finally by friends,” said Vampire Survivors designer Luca Galante in an email, after reminding me that my Waypoint article on the launch of Vampire Survivors was, in fact, his first interview talking about the game’s success.
A lot has changed for both of us since then!
“When the game became successful,” said Galante, “we received a lot of wholesome thank you messages from the players, and the ones that stuck the most were from people saying how Vampire Survivors was the first video game their partner was curious to try, or how they could let their kids play because the game was easy enough if they would just give them some tips about how to level up.”
Last Christmas, Galante was with family and watched as his own nephews would take turns passing around a Steam Deck, delighting in unlocking a new power and showing everyone else in the room, including the designer of game they were playing!
“Having the game to somehow connect people not only in online communities, but also in life, is one more thing in the long list of things that I really wasn't expecting from Vampire Survivors,” he said. “I think it's inevitable: it probably happens to any game that ends up reaching so many people.“
Adding local multiplayer to Vampire Survivors is part of a long term hope to add proper online multiplayer to Vampire Survivors, which Galante called “a big challenge.”
“We got several negative reviews for adding local co-op instead of online haha!” He said. “It's fine, hopefully we can make those players happy too when, and if, we manage to add online.”
Beyond the technical challenges, from a design perspective, it would have been easy and straightforward to simply allow multiple players at once, but because of Galante’s personal experiences with family and the personal notes from fans, they went further and dedicated more time to interface changes, supporting multiple input devices, etc.
“Despite playtesting it for months,” he said, “I wasn't sure it would work until we organised a local co-op party in London and invited players to play. It wasn't huge, maybe around 100 people in total, but seeing people laughing and smiling (even before the free drinks) while playing the game, and staying well over the time slot they were allocated, cleared all doubts.“
Galante clarified that the studio’s time on local co-op isn’t entirely behind them yet, with “some work to do in terms of balancing the game with the early characters.”
Have a story idea? Want to share a tip? Got a funny parenting story? Drop Patrick an email.
Also:
If you’re a developer who changed their game, or approach to design, because of something similar, please write in. I’m always looking to hear from more people.
What other games have surprised you as being good for families? It’s cool to see the intention behind Vampire Survivors, but often, there are happy accidents.
I’d love to sit in on a family play test for a game sometime. A goal for Crossplay!