Bloodstained’s campaign is a truly epic Metroidvania experience. Just rushing to the end will take about 15 hours, but you’ll get more than 30 hours if you hunt down all the shards and complete every quest. The campaign has the aforementioned additional characters, multiple difficulty levels, and a “New Game Plus” option to further extend its playtime. There are even a whopping six additional modes found under the Extra Mode menu: Speed Run, Randomizer, Boss Revenge, Chaos, Versus, and Classic. Disappointingly, none of these extra modes offers any Achievements or Trophies (though the “Classic II: Dominique’s Curse” DLC does add some). Why not give gamers some incentives to play the extras?
Chaos Mode
Among the extra modes, the one we’re naturally focused on is Chaos Mode, which supports 2-player local and online co-op. Chaos and Versus Mode even have online matchmaking, but you’re unlikely to find partners that way since Chaos and Versus are small extra modes in a years-old game.
At the start of a Chaos game, players have the option of customizing their characters. Only Miriam is playable at present, which makes no sense and limits the replayability of the mode. Both players have to be the same character, and that’s that. Customization options include randomizing Miriam’s colors or loading her appearance from a campaign save file. Players can also pick from three starting weapons: a sword, a whip, or shoes.
Chaos Mode tasks players with progressing through a randomized series of rooms and boss encounters from the main game. In each room, our heroes will face enemies and other hazards on their way to the exit. Enemies will sometimes drop random shards (not enemy-specific ones), and the team can find weapons and armor in chests as well. Shards and gear must be equipped on the spot; there’s no inventory management in Chaos Mode.
Each non-boss room has a quest that will award a random piece of gear to keep or reject when completed. These quests include killing all enemies, not killing any enemies, not using shard powers, reaching the exit within a time limit, and more. Co-op players can’t heal each other, but a downed player will be revived with a small amount of health if the other player reaches the next area. Bosses become increasingly powerful in this mode, so a partner can certainly increase one’s chances for survival.
Clearing rooms, completing quests, and defeating bosses is a decent foundation, but there’s not much more to Chaos Mode than that. If you finish the mode by defeating 8 bosses during a run, there’s absolutely no reward. Chaos Mode is set up like a roguelite with randomized rooms, quests, and gear, but the developers neglected to add any metagame elements or rewards to keep players coming back for more.
Don’t miss this Metroidvania
While Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night’s undercooked co-op mode is disappointing (especially after five years of waiting for it), the main game more than warrants a purchase. This is a beautifully made Metroidvania with ample depth, great writing, fully voiced cinematics, and plenty of extra content. Exploring the castle while hunting and upgrading shards is addictive and fun. It’s easy to see why Bloodstained already has two spin-off games and a sequel in development; the tight gameplay and gothic charm of Castlevania live on in this series.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night sells for $39.99 on Xbox, PlayStation, Switch, and Steam. The Steam version is fully Steam Deck compatible.
An Xbox download code was provided by the publisher for this review.
Verdict
Co-Op Score
Overall
The Co-Op Experience: Chaos Mode is local or online co-op action that you can play with a friend or be matched with other players on the same system. Fight through a series of randomized rooms to defeat demons and bosses. Complete challenges before each boss to get powerful upgrades!
Co-Optimus game reviews focus on the cooperative experience of a game, our final score graphic represents this experience along with an average score for the game overall. For an explanation of our scores please check our Review Score Explanation Guide.