How to Defeat and Unlock Red Death - Vampire Survivors Guide - IGN (2024)

If you're lucky enough to survive long enough to reach the 30-minute mark in Vampire Survivors you'll inevitably come face to face with Red Death. While Red Death might seem invincible at first, you kill the Grim Reaper himself if you're equipped with the correct weaponry and passive items. Once you've slain Red Death, they're instantly unlocked as a playable Character, so long as you have the coins needed to purchase them.

In this Vampire Survivors guide, we'll cover how you can defeat and unlock Mask of the Red Death, briefly discuss White Death, and provide an overview of Red Death's base stats and starter weapon.

Click on any of the links below to fast travel to a specific section in this guide:

• PowerUps, Character Selection, and Arcana
• Best Way to Defeat Red Death
  • White Death
• Red Death Description

How to Defeat and Unlock Red Death

PowerUps, Character Selection, and Arcana

The first step in defeating and unlocking Red Death is trying your best to max out as many PowerUps as possible to buff your stats before entering a run. To maximize the number of PowerUps you can afford, remember that prioritizing the purchase of PowerUps with the highest initial cost is the most cost-effective spending plan as discussed in detail in our PowerUp Order guide. When spending your coins in preparation to take on Red Death, feel free to ignore the Greed and Curse PowerUps as they're not relevant to your current goal and thus would be a waste of much-needed funds.

If you can afford it you should also consider investing in Revival because, despite the PowerUps exorbitant price point, the second life it provides could be the difference between defeating Red Death and needing to start your run from scratch. However, if Revival is out of your price range or if it'll severely limit any additional spending, ignore it and start by purchasing the Amount PowerUp instead.

Next, you'll need to choose a Character whose starting weapon and attributes won't be a liability during your duel with Red Death. While most Characters are capable of taking down Red Death with the correct loadout, Exdash and Toastie have some significant weaknesses that will make your bout with the Reaper unnecessarily difficult. Even though their starting weapon, Cross, is far from the best weapon in Vampire Survivors, Krochi can be an asset during your run because they start with +1 Revival and they'll gain an additional Revival when your reach Level 33.

Last but certainly not least, if you're looking to defeat Red Death you should always select the IV - Awake Arcana so it can provide you with +3 Revivals. If you have the Awake Arcana equipped every Revival used, even if it's an additional Revival provided by Krochi or PowerUps, will increase your Max Health by 10%, your Armor by 1, and your Might, Area, Duration, and Projectile Speed by 5%.

Best Way to Defeat Red Death

Crimson Shroud + Infinite Corridor

As of patch 0.6.1, the best and all but guaranteed way to defeat Red Death is to obtain both the Infinite Corridor and Crimson Shroud Evolved Weapons. To unlock these immensely powerful weapons you'll need to obtain the Yellow Sign Relic to gain the ability to find hidden items on all stages. Once you've found the Yellow Sign you'll be able to see and collect the Gold Ring, Silver Ring, Metaglio Left, and Metaglio Right which are the main ingredients for their respective evolutions.

To create Infinite Corridor you'll need to collect the Clock Lancet weapon, the Silver Ring, and the Gold Ring. While the Clock Lancet can only be obtained through Level Up selection screens, the Silver and Gold Ring will only appear as floor loot. Because of this, we recommend that you pursue the Silver Ring before the Gold Ring because it provides some stat buffs while the Gold Ring only augments your enemies. To evolve the Clock Lancet into Infinite Corridor you'll need to upgrade the Clock Lancet, Silver Ring, and Gold Ring to max level and then defeat a high-tier enemy after the 10-minute mark and they'll drop a Chest containing Infinite Corridor.

Infinite Corridor is an unbelievably strong weapon that halves the health of all enemies on screen in a single attack rotation, meaning, that even Red Death's 600,000+ HP pool will be decimated if you can find a way to outlast their devastating attacks.

Meanwhile, the Crimson Shroud can be created by collecting the Laurel weapon, Metaglio Left and Metaglio Right, and upgrading them to max level. Again, once all three have reached max level, you'll need to defeat a boss-level enemy, after the 10-minute mark and collect the contents of the chest they'll drop to add Crimson Shroud to your inventory. We suggest that you seek out the Metaglio Left prior to Metaglio Right because Metaglio Left provides increases to several of your stats while Metaglio Right will only strengthen the incoming horde.

Crimson Shroud is by far the strongest defensive weapon currently available in Vampire Survivors and it'll cap all incoming damage to 10 HP per strike. This insane level of damage mitigation will help you endure Red Death's otherwise unsurvivable attacks.

When you have Infinite Corridor and Crimson Shroud working in unison, Red Death doesn't stand a chance but these Evolved Weapons are so powerful in their own right that, if paired with a competent loadout, they can help you take out Death on their own. For instance, the two loadouts listed below are often more than enough to take out the Red Reaper if you have a high enough DPS output from the other weapons in your inventory:

• Infinite Corridor + Awake Arcana + 2 Additional Evolved Weapons
• Crimson Shroud + Awake Arcana + High-Level Clock Lancet (unevolved)

Of course, these are just a few of the many loadouts capable of taking down Red Death so don't stifle your creativity. You'd be surprised how quickly some kits can tear down your seemingly unkillable foe.

After you've killed Red Death, they'll immediately be unlocked and they'll appear in your Character Selection screen for the base price of 1665 coins.

White Death

If this is your first time defeating Red Death you may be wondering what happens after you've slain what seemed like a game-ending level threat. Once Red Death is killed, you'll have no time to celebrate as you'll quickly find yourself being swarmed by several Red Death duplicates. If you possess the Infinite Corridor and Crimson Shroud combo and have some Revivals in your back pocket, you should defeat the onslaught of Red Deaths with relative ease, that is until the screen begins to slowly zoom in and the clanging of a clock tower rings in your ears.

When the screen stops zooming in, White Death, the true final boss in Vampire Survivors, will appear to end your run.

White Death is unkillable, takes no damage, and their unsurvivable attack will wipe you out in an instant.

Red Death Description

Red Death's starting weapon is Death Spiral and their enhanced MoveSpeed makes them the perfect Character to select if your goal is to quickly obtain a Relic or take down a secret boss. With over 250 Max Health, Red Death is also incredibly tanky which makes him a great choice on nearly all stages. However, as a Secret Character, Red Death cannot complete certain achievements such as unlocking Holy Forbidden, likely because their MoveSpeed would allow them to breeze through the stage to collect the Yellow Sign.