Your journey in Tears of Vanfell starts with an enormous, looming mountain waiting for you to climb it. Launching today on Steam, the game introduces a dungeon‑crawling journey built around exploration, fast combat, and a cast of characters who grow alongside you as you push deeper into its shifting paths.
Developed by Lazy Cat Games, your life begins at the foot of this mountain, and everything that follows depends on how far you’re willing to go.
A Dungeon Crawler That Moves With You
At its core, Tears of Vanfell is an action‑heavy dungeon crawler with roguelike elements. The mountain you’re climbing isn’t static, it’s procedurally generated, reshaping itself every time you begin a new run. Enemy placements shift, bosses appear in different spots, and the route you take is never quite the same.
You’re not locked into a single hero, either. The game lets you choose from a wide cast of characters, each with their own strengths and quirks. Some hit hard, others support the team, and some thrive when the fight gets messy. As the game supports up to four‑player online co‑op, you can climb the mountain with friends or tackle it solo with a companion from your camp.
That camp becomes your home base between expeditions, a place where you regroup, prepare, and slowly gather new allies who join your cause. At first, it’s just you. However, as you explore, you’ll meet others with unique skills and specialists who help behind the scenes, giving each run a sense of progression that carries beyond the climb itself.
Combat That Keeps You Thinking
Combat in Tears of Vanfell leans into movement, weapon swapping, and adapting on the fly. It’s not a slow, methodical RPG, it’s closer to a hack‑and‑slash roguelite where your build shifts constantly based on what you find. New weapons, abilities, and equipment show up throughout each run, and the game expects you to use all of it if you want to survive.
Bosses act as major checkpoints, testing whether your current setup can handle the pressure. Some runs give you incredible synergy. Others force you to improvise. But because the mountain changes every time, even familiar enemies feel different depending on the tools you’ve picked up.
The game’s hand‑drawn, top‑down art style gives each area a distinct look. It’s dark fantasy mixed with medieval themes, atmospheric without being heavy. You’ll also find it visually clear even in the midst of all the action, which helps when enemies swarm and abilities fire off in every direction.
As you climb, you’ll uncover pieces of a larger story tied to the aftermath of a century‑old war. It’s not the kind of game that stops to deliver long monologues, but the world has history, and the characters you meet carry their own motivations and scars.
A World That Grows With Every Run
One of the most interesting parts of Tears of Vanfell is how your camp evolves. Early on, it’s empty. There’s no allies, no support, and no guidance. But as you explore, you’ll find people willing to help, each adding something new to your preparations. It makes each run feel like it contributes to something bigger than just another attempt at climbing.
The game supports full controller play, online co‑op, Steam Cloud, and multiple languages, making it accessible to a wide audience right from launch. While today marks the official release, the developers have made it clear that community feedback will continue shaping the game as it grows.
Some journeys begin with a single step. This one begins with a mountain.