Recent reviews by Venuminostrates

This game is definitely worth a buy.

The core of Vran is a classic dungeon crawler. Kill monsters, take loot, upgrade equipment, and experience the story. The action is fantastic, and there are countless ways to be creative with your builds. There's enough depth to this game that people are still creating unique, competitive builds 3 years after release.

Voice acting is excellent, but the campaigns are short and full of tropes, although they do the tropes well. Motorhead is a really cool, original idea in many ways, but still pretty tropey.

If you play games for story, I would suggest you buy the core game and Motorhead. They are worth playing and worth the price.

If you love to tinker and experiment, min/max, and master complex gameplay, then I would suggest you buy Fractured Worlds as well.


Vran is pretty standard in the isometric, hack & slash, action rpg department. You have spammable abilities, abilities with cool-downs, and abilities that activate when you spend resources that accumulate as you play. Don't be fooled. The developers have polished these into something really fun and engaging.

This is some of the best action around. It's fast paced and tactical. Split second decisions must be made about which attacks to avoid by dodging or jumping, and which attacks to soak. Then you either exploit openings left by monsters or create openings based on your build.

Builds change gameplay. You may be a quick hitting teleporter, a slow moving tank, a glass cannon, a ranged electrical storm, a magelike spellcaster, and so many more...


3 story campaigns (all expansions)

167 Secrets across 58 maps. (including Secret Pumpkin)

Challenges: 290 normal / 290 elite. 5 each per map (doesn't include Cauldron of Chaos)

Treasure / Bounty Hunts

Cauldron of Chaos: a hard rotating dungeon

The Bottomless Pit: climbs in difficulty with each level; resets when you die

The Fracture: an infinite dungeon that also climbs in difficulty, but remembers your place. Has its own Challenges

Secret Pumpkin Level: I'll say no more


2 swappable weapons

Up to 3 different weapon properties per weapon

6-7 destiny cards (skill tree)

6-7 wicked or divine properties. 1 per destiny card

1 outfit

2 consumables

1 talisman

2 demon powers


You can equip 2 swappable weapons with no cooldown on swap. They have one basic, spammable attack and 2 cooldown abilities.

Several weapons have extra effects when SPLIT-TIMING. To do it, time your basic attacks to a rhythm.

There are 10 weapon types: Sword, Shotgun, Hammer, Rapier, Lightning Gun, Scythe, Hand Mortar, Tome, Guitar, and Revolvers.

There are 28 craftable weapon properties, and more that pop up randomly on loot. Weapon properties give passive bonuses. Some of them will heal you, reduce cooldowns, etc. Each weapon can have up to 3 different ones.

LEGENDARY WEAPONS: You cannot craft new properties on these, but they have abilities that transcend normal weapons. Example: a sword that shoots projectiles. There are 55 total.


Destiny cards provide mostly passive effects. There are 57 different types. At max level you have have 6-7 card slots and 24-32 points. Each card takes varying points to equip. This is functionally a skill tree if I've ever seen one.

There's no punishment or cost for swapping cards. This game has a robust skill tree system and it encourages you to experiment.


These are optional properties found on destiny cards for further customization. They are mostly smaller passive effects, but they have a huge amount of depth. There are 16 total.


Outfits give armor and passive abilities, usually centered around overdrive. Overdrive is a resource that accumulates while you play. Outfits can also give you more card slots, points, health, etc. There are 11 total.


Demon powers use overdrive to create interesting effects: slow time, burst damage, condition application, etc. They add a lot of depth. There are 19 total.


These look like health potions at first, but there are a lot of different types. Examples: 100% crit chance for 5 seconds, Brutality (+50% damage) for 20 seconds, life-steal on your attacks for 45 seconds, etc. There are 18 total.


These come with Fractured Worlds. They are similar to demon powers in that they accumulate energy to release an effect. Generally speaking, they build up slower than demon powers but have more powerful effects. Each one comes with a random way of building energy. There are 15 total.


Knowing monsters is what makes a really good Vran player. There are 75 unique types (not including Secret Pumpkin monsters), 11 of which are bosses. The rest can be divided into categories of Spiders, Wraiths, Undead, Essences, Gargoyles, Thralls, Vampires, Hellhounds, Scorpions, and Succubi.

Vran's monsters scale with your level. It's not uncommon to hear people complaining about how their character feels weaker at higher levels. I'll let development team explain:

Originally posted by Mnementh:

Mobs don't level up in the traditional sense. A Frostcrawler (the nasty ranged blue spiders) is always the same mob - same health, damage, everything. If you get better gear you will naturally kill them faster. However, to keep all areas interesting, mobs get additional modifiers. At some point you will start meeting Deadly Frostcrawlers. Deadly mobs have more damage and a bit more health. Later on you will meet Crippling Frostcrawlers. Crippling monsters do even more damage and cripple (slow down) your character on hit. Each monster has its own progression that is true to its core idea - not all monsters become crippling.

These are buffs and debuffs. They may not seem important, but there's a really robust system here that's rewarding to master. There are 41 total. It's not neccessary to know them on a 1st playthrough, but knowing them will elevate your gameplay to the next level.

Just to highlight a few: Vulnerability (Next attack is a critical hit), Cripple (Movement Speed decreased by 66%), Frost (Movement and Attack Speeds decreased by 33%). They stack with each other and they stack duration.


Victor Vran has a pretty good online interface. When you join, it defaults you to the International Room. I suggest staying there. People share Treasure / Bounty hunts here.

There are two chats: GAME & ROOM. People talk in ROOM. Be prepared to switch to GAME if this annoys you.

To play with others, go to BROWSE GAMES. If you want people to join you, go to GAME VISIBILITY and pick OPEN TO EVERYONE.

NOTE Games scale to the highest level player. Don't join a game that has a character more than 10 levels below or above you. Ask others who join you to change characters if they are too high.


You need not worry about grind if you're playing for the story. Otherwise, this is a very grindy game. All of your gear will come from random drops and Gambling. Gambling takes 3 items of the same type and morphs them into another random one of the same rarity or better.

NOTE: There is NO TRADING! I don't agree with it, but it is what it is. Try to embrace it, I guess. The randomness of loot drops allows for equipment combinations that wouldn't be so obvious if you didn't have a limited selection. With that said, it still sucks.

The grind is real. I've seen people spend anywhere from 200 to 600 hours getting everything they wanted. Smart play and a little luck can shorten this.


There's nothing really new here, but all of the components are really well polished, and that is what sets it aside. It is endlessly fun to experiment and master new ways of gameplay that you essentially get to invent yourself. If that sounds like fun, then you should pick up this game.

Happy Hunting,
V

It's a simple action game. You can beat the campaign in an afternoon, but it's deceptively complex. Endless mode ramps up the difficulty, requiring you to have good screen awareness, pattern recognition, and quick reflexes. The game is best experienced in co-op. And as a bonus, it's easy to pick up and put down, which makes it great for college students. I recommend the Wizard.

With that said:
1. Don't take the last skull coin. Leave it for the host, or wait for the host to ask someone to take it.

2. Don't camera lock other players. Watch your screen edges.

3. Don't be greedy: Share the gold. Share the food. Share the potions.

4. Don't rush. Move with the group. Even on the levels that have Death.

5. Don't fall behind. Especially on Death levels.

6. Use your potions. Don't sit on them. Use them in rooms that are giving you and your team trouble.

7. Work with the group: Protect your team. Attack their targets. Don't wander off.

8. Default to the host's preferences. It's their game.

9. Have fun! :)