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1 week ago
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The compelling wave-based survival and upgrade loop of Vampire Survivors won all our hearts throughout 2022, but I couldn’t help wondering how it might fit a more active hack-and-slash style of action game. Enter Hordes of Hunger, a new Steam roguelike from Polish developer Hyperstrange and published by Kwalee that infuses gameplay somewhere between Diablo and Dark Souls into a Vampire Survivors style structure. My curiosity most certainly piqued by its initial reveal, I recently sat down to take a closer look at Gamescom 2024.
In a world ravaged by the ravenous hordes of The Beast, even food comes in short supply. As Mirah, the daughter of a mysterious, blindfolded old man and a beefy butcher, it’s left to you to try and save innocents from the invasion, reclaim food stores to feed the hungry, and discover the origins of the curse plaguing your homeland. Standing in your way are the eponymous Hordes of Hunger – hundreds upon thousands of monsters who will happily snack on your flesh.
Carve through them and you’ll earn regular upgrades in a manner akin to the best roguelikes, with a Vampire Survivors style experience bar racking up with every enemy you slay. Each time it fills, you’ll be presented with the familiar three-option selection of upgrades we’ve come to expect from the likes of VS or Hades, allowing you to choose how you build. Various elemental options come into play here – you can opt to lean into a fire or a lightning build, for example, with each boon you take having the potential to receive further potency upgrades.
The core combat of Hordes of Hunger actually reminds me most of Diablo 4’s recently introduced wave-based survival mode, Infernal Hordes. You have the option to push the camera up close to your character, at which point it almost resembles a curious halfway house between the action of Dark Souls and the enemy masses of Dynasty Warriors, or pull out to a wide view that much more closely resembles games like Diablo.
To help you keep track of the flood of incoming threats, enemy attacks are indicated by yellow circles that close around them as they prepare to strike. You can run out of the way or make use of either a short sidestep or longer dash – the former is faster and has more ways to upgrade it with potential buffs, but the latter offers some invincibility frames to help you survive when things get especially dangerous. You can also opt to parry, and there are upgrades that can unleash powerful counterattacks if you pull that off successfully.
Beyond that, upgrades can take all manner of forms. Some will simply apply additional damage or elemental effects to your basic attacks, while others might be specific to certain skills such as parrying or jump attacks. Some are also more automated; I see one that deals a periodic burst of holy damage around our protagonist, and another that applies a constant burn effect on anyone that gets too close. If you want to be a bit more laid-back in your playstyle, you can also hold down the attack button to keep swinging, giving proceedings slightly more of a Vampire Survivors vibe, though you’ll still have to watch out for incoming damage.
Progression through Hordes of Hunger follows a quest-based structure. Initially, this might involve clearing out an incoming wave of enemies, but you’ll start to get more specific objectives such as destroying several cranes that are holding food stores you need to reclaim. Finish enough quests and a wave of light washes over the world, freezing everything in place, and offering you the chance to either continue and push your luck, or bank your earned materials and return to a hub known as the Sanctum, where your parents are based. Quite how this plays into the story remains a mystery for now, but I’m teased with the promise of some “real world” shenanigans in the vein of The Matrix and Assassin’s Creed.
Rescue NPCs in the world and they’ll also head back to the hub, where they can introduce new gameplay elements. Your mother, the aforementioned butcher, has the ability to cook meals that can offer single-run buffs, for example. Later, you’ll unlock a workshop allowing you to pick a weapon and a special ability to use with it. I’m told Hyperstrange plans to have five of each of these eventually, although the early access launch will likely feature just two of the weapons to begin with.
Ultimately your goal will be to finish every quest in a single run, which will carry you across nine arenas over three separate biomes before you tackle the final encounter. Hyperstrange also emphasizes its focus on the story, which it describes as “a reasonably deep narrative that goes into some fairly dark places” and also features full voice acting. This will play both into the quests you complete and the NPCs you meet.
Hordes of Hunger is set to launch on Steam in early access, with the first three arenas and two weapons planned at release. There’s no confirmed date yet, but you can wishlist it on Steam if you’re eager to check it out. As someone who spent plenty of hours with Vampire Survivors and is a long-time Diablo enjoyer, I’m certainly planning to do just that.
Be sure to browse all the upcoming PC games in 2024 and beyond to see what else lies ahead in our future. For something you can jump into right now, here are the best action games on PC.
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