The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing (PC) Preview

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The son of the legendary monster hunter takes up arms.

I recently had the chance to get a nice preview of the upcoming action dungeon crawler by Neocore called The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing. I had never heard of the title before, but after putting some hours into it, I can see this is a very deep, hardcore dungeon crawling game.

Players take the role of Abraham Van Helsing’s son. He has assumed the role of monster hunter and travels the world killing all the spawns of evil. With the help of his spectral companion, Katarina, he takes on the hordes of werewolves, harpies and other creatures of the night.

Much like other dungeon crawlers, the game takes place in an isometric view where players control Van Helsing with mouse clicks on the screen, or by holding down the mouse click. If anyone has played Diablo or Torchlight in the past couple of years, they will feel right at home. Van Helsing has swords and firearms at his disposal, and can switch to either on the fly with a simple key press.

Left and right mouse clicks are the main buttons, and either can be equipped with any attack he has in his arsenal. The game utilizes a very unique system that revolves around using rage. Rage is obtained by killing enemies. Players can then use it to modify their attacks. Each one has special modifiers that can be unlocked using skill points. These can make attacks stronger, create debuffs, or a number of other effects. Queuing up modifiers is as simple as clicking on them on the bottom of the screen. Combinations can also be set up in the menus for which modifiers can be activated with a press of the spacebar. Having three of these activated and hitting a huge group of enemies at one time can result in some devastating damage.

Much like other dungeon crawlers, Van Helsing is a loot gathering game. Players can equip Helsing and his ghost companion with weapons and armor for better stats. Some equipment can have special items attached to them such as gemstones that can garner even better stats.

Your purple fence cannot stop me!


There is a ton of customization when looking at the skills for Van Helsing and even Katarina. They both level up and are able learn new abilities and skills. Players can put points into skills as well as main attributes like body, dexterity, luck and willpower.

The game is very much story driven and, from what I have played, goes deep into the lore of Van Helsing. It offers a co-op mode as well, but unfortunately, the preview build I played did not have that included. From what I can see with the customization options, even though there is technically only one class, players will still have a very unique character from others.

My full review will hit when the game launches, and I think any fan of the dungeon crawler genre may want to keep their eye out for this game. Luckily, you won’t have to wait very long, as The Adventures of Van Helsing is set for a May 22nd release.

Preview copy of game provided by publisher.
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Written by
Drew is the Community Manager here at ZTGD and his accent simply woos the ladies. His rage is only surpassed by the great one himself and no one should stand between him and his Twizzlers.