Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood preview - A bloodbath of chaos and confusion

Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood is a game that oozes familiarity in more than one way. For starters, it is based on the recently released Dracula successor movie, Renfield. The second aspect is that it is a rogue-like title in the vein of developer Poncle's smash-hit Vampire Survivors. This means players will weave around swarms of spawning enemies to try and kill them with rapid auto-attacks. The final point of interest is that it is an early-access title.

In other words, Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood is out for the public while still in active development. This is so that the team at Mega Cat Studios can polish and refine the experience as per player feedback.

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Is Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood worth checking out at the moment or are players better off waiting?

Starting with the premise, Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood puts players in the shoes of Dracula's underappreciated servant. As the titular Renfield, players go about the city of New Orleans and harvest lives to please their master, which is where the real fun begins. Anyone who has played Vampire Survivors will be familiar with the game's core design.

Gameplay takes place across set levels, with players in control of Renfield from a top-down perspective. The final game is expected to have various characters, but here they start off with Renfield himself, who is played by actor Nicholas Hoult in the movie.

Expectedly, each character has their own health, stats, and a unique perk to aid in combat. After selecting a level, the first of which is a graveyard, players are thrown right into the carnage.

There are many ideas for varied builds here (Screenshot from Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood)

Renfield can be moved around the sizable levels, but that is it. He attacks on his own with a slashing move that hits enemies in an arc in the direction he is facing. All the while, they will spawn around the map and try to take him down. Defeating foes in a "room" unlocks other segments of the map to go and face another wave.

This process must be repeated until they reach the Extraction phase, which sees them escape the map while on a timer. As per the first mission brief, Renfield must track down the cheerleader being hunted by the Lobo Gang, which is followed by an option to either save her or not. Depending on what players pick, the Extraction phase can be harder or easier.

The first level sees the hero contend with thugs and fire-arm weilding goons who approach his direction from all sides. As is the norm with this genre, players must skirt around and carve a path through these mounds of flesh. Killing foes not only makes them explode into a gnarly veil of red, but also drops a bunch of bugs from their insides. These are the only methods of in-combat progression as they grant EXP.

Take your pick (Screenshot from Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood)

Maxing out the blue gage at the top of the screen will allow players to pick from one of three random skills. These can range from spawning a friendly bat that peridoically launches an orb at the nearest enemy, to simply boosting the amount of coins gained. As they play through the game, one thing is clear - it is in need of further balancing.

For one, Snickerdoodle is an ability that does too little damage and fires infrequently to do any significant harm. On the other hand, Fleur-de-Lys is by far the most useful as it deals heavy damage to all enemies on screen. Given how slow Renfield's attack and movement speed is at the start, it is a massive blessing as it annihilates 95% of foes on screen in one go.

Completionsits are in for a ride (Screenshot from Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood)

There are achievements as well, many of which will appeal to those seeking a challenge. Obtained by reaching certain in-game milestones, these also unlock new skills and reward players with gold.

On that note, coins are the permanent type of progression as they carry over after the run is over. These can be spent on purchasing permanent upgrades and consumables from the Shop. Players can upgrade aspects like Armor and Range of their attacks, all of which persist between runs.

On the other hand, there is only one consumable item at the moment, Coffin, which revives players after they fall in battle. The third most significant type of purchase are new skills, which will then be unlocked and can appear during runs. These include the useful Mist Form, which makes gamers temporarily invincible after taking damage. While the gameplay fundamentals are fine, other aspects of the title are not.

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A gorefest of confusion and frustration

A sea of chaos (Screenshot from Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood)

Visually, the game boasts a pixel-art aesthetic, with detailed spritework across the board. This is supplemented by dynamic lighting and bloom, to make the graphics further pop. Unfortunately, this design seems to negatively affect gameplay.

The varying lighting can often affect the visibility of enemies, especially if they are obscured by tree branches or worse, by enemy projectiles. The amount of visual noise on screen with the projectiles, EXP bugs, gore, and so on is overwhelming to say the least.

Projectiles include bright red orbs shot with enemy guns, which further help camoflage enemies against unlit backgrounds. Certain mobs also soak up way too much damage given how early they are introduced. Sure, some of this can be alievated by purchasing upgrades, but that only helps to an extent. The Options menu is lacking, without key bindings or any controls options - an odd decision even for Early Access.

But its not all doom and gloom. The music is surprisingly excellent with chiptune beats and the overall vibe is stylish to say the least. Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood may have had a rough start, but it does look like it has a bright future ahead if things play out right. There is not much content right now, so unless players are big fans of the genre, I would recommend waiting until full release.

The game was released on PC through Early Access via Steam on April 14, 2023.