It drew far greater sales than Galante expected, leading to him bringing on additional developers to improve the engine and expand the game.

The game has since had several free and paid expansions, including an official pack based on Castlevania, a series Galante had used for inspiration.

Players select one of multiple characters, each with different starting weapons and bonuses, and control them on an endless stage featuring an auto-generated, repeating layout.

The player's weapons attack automatically, and the goal is to survive as long as possible against constant waves of monsters that inflict damage upon contact.

Once players have collected six weapons and six power-ups and upgraded them fully, any further levels gained will offer only gold coins or floor chicken.

A session that meets or exceeds the stage's time limit is considered a successful completion and rewards bonus gold coins.

Players can obtain golden eggs by defeating certain enemies or purchasing them from an in-game vendor, which provide permanent attribute improvements to their currently selected character.

[4][5] He aimed to create Vampire Survivors to manage a community, drawing from his past experience as an administrator for an Ultima Online server.

[8] Prior to developing Vampire Survivors, Galante worked in the gambling industry, using his knowledge of flashy graphics for slot machines as part of the appeal for the game's chest-opening animations.

In addition to outlining the scope of the promised new content with a roadmap, he explained that a major milestone slated for mid-2022 would be porting Vampire Survivors to an "industry-standard" game engine to improve its overall performance.

Inspired by Japanese folklore and anime, it adds thirteen weapons, eight characters, and a new stage featuring enemies designed after yōkai and oni.

[27] An animated Vampire Survivors television series was announced in April 2023, to be produced by Story Kitchen in partnership with Luca Galante.

[30] While Vampire Survivors was initially obscure upon its release, it became a hit by late January 2022, reaching over 30,000 concurrent players on Steam.

[47] Due to the success of Vampire Survivors, Galante was estimated by The Sunday Times in August 2024 to have accumulated £40 million, making him one of the wealthiest game developers in the United Kingdom.

[32][33] Ian Walker of Kotaku and Graham Smith of Rock Paper Shotgun praised the game, both comparing it to dopamine.

[49] Marie Dealessandri of GamesIndustry.biz also selected Vampire Survivors as her game of the year, highlighting its excellent performance on the handheld Steam Deck, which also released in 2022.