Warhammer Survivors Review: Despite Promising Heady Mix, a Slog
Warhammer Survivors, the officially licensed Vampire Survivors-style game from Auroch Digital, is out now on Xbox Game Pass. A review published November 10 finds slow movement, slow upgrades and a grind that never lifts, even across its two Warhammer settings.
Warhammer Survivors, the officially licensed action-roguelike from developer Auroch Digital, is out now on Xbox Game Pass, and a review published November 10 says that, despite promising a heady mix of Vampire Survivors and Warhammer fan-service, it is less than the sum of its parts.
The reviewer's core complaint is pace. "It's all so slow," the review says, listing slow characters, slow upgrades and a slow unlock for the mode that speeds things up.
What the game offers
Auroch Digital also made Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun 2. Warhammer Survivors takes the formula of Poncle's Vampire Survivors and moves it into the Warhammer universe.
More than 40 characters from Warhammer lore get the roguelike treatment. Crossbows replace clock lancets, rocket launchers replace fire wands, and bomb Squids stand in for skeletons.
The game also splits into two settings: the grimdark future of Warhammer 40,000 and the old-school fantasy of Age of Sigmar. The review calls each "a full game in its own right", which means players must grind and level up on both sides.
Where the review says it falls short
The review compares it with Vampire Survivors, which hooked players with a steady pull toward new power-ups. Here, it says, hour 10 feels as much of a slog as hour one. "Every inch feels like a mile," it says.
The genre, sometimes called bullet heaven, depends on overpowered chaos as weapons and evolutions start working together. The reviewer says Warhammer Survivors is reluctant to let players reach that point. Even 30 hours in, some runs end before they properly start, regardless of the skips, rerolls and other upgrades already unlocked.
Other criticisms are listed in the review:
The worst weapons are the only ones available at the start, so unlocking new characters and armaments is a requirement rather than a bonus. The maps are large and awkward to navigate, and collecting every item in a location feels like a chore.
Some synergies between items and their evolutions "don't really make sense", according to the review. It also calls the lore paper thin, noting that Warhammer is steeped in its own mythos but the game treats it as set dressing.
The reviewer concedes the game has moments of payoff. Now and then a run comes together, and the pixel heroes burn through hordes of Orks, Skaven, Tyranids and Nurgle forces.
