Overall 9/10

Good:
- Amazing And Intricately detailed sprite art. Especially for 1993, with some great enhanced special effects on the PS1 Arranged Mode of the game.
- Fantastic musical compositions on both Original/Arranged Mode. Thrashard in the Cave, Wicked Child, Tower of Dolls, and Moon Fight are my personal original tracks.
- Original Mode also contains the option to use 3 different Sound Chips, basically extending the game’s soundtrack since different sound chips make the music sound different/add extra flourishes.
- There are many different stages, and almost all of them have entirely different enemies, which makes each stage feel very fresh compared to others. The stages also don’t usually harp on specific gimmicks, so they constantly flip through new things and makes the game feel more memorable.
- Simon has a unique control style that works for his type of game. Jumps feel satisfying, and he’s not overly floaty so it makes the platforming quick and responsive. Being able to whip downwards/downwards diagonally in the air is definitely something hard to use, but can have some genuinely fun use in more advanced play.
- Game contains many different Easter eggs, and finding them makes the game a lot more replayable.
- Though Cross is the best sub weapon in the game, I find having each Sub Weapon can be very useful. Cross is great for screen killing, Axe is the best at hitting things in more vertical sections of the game, Knife is good for consistent damage, Stop Watch is very helpful in sections where the game blends platforming/enemies, and the Medicinal Herb is a rare but fun to keep around weapon to heal yourself if you’ve played well enough to collect enough hearts to use.
- The Whip is fast acting, and is satisfying to hear its sound when it connects against a group of enemies. Making the combat feel fast, and fluid in comparison to other Vania games where the whip does feel a bit slow.
- Chronicles also contains some interesting bosses that all feel pretty distinct, though I would argue that not a lot of them push the mold in terms of boss design games like Rondo of Blood did.
- Stages also find that perfect length of being long, but not over staying their welcome like some 4 stages, while also having a pretty good quantity of unique stages to go through.
- Getting 1-Up’s through getting higher scores is much faster in this game. Which in turn, makes you excited and builds the momentum of a run where you haven’t yet used a continue.
- Sometimes subweapons can drop off of enemies, which adds to replays as you can never know what you’re going to get and makes each playthrough somewhat unique.

Bad:
- Game is filled with too much bullshit. Several traps in the game are designed around you getting hit and then learning about what exactly the trap is. Things such as Stage 5’s Gear Room is definitely a highlight of this, as random gears will fall off the wall and hit the player without any warning. There’s no distinction between a safe gear/a gear that will fall, so that causes the player to play extra careful in order to get around this part. Especially since the player is expected to fight She-Wolf, the games hardest boss after this room without any checkpoint. Coupled with the fact Simon can only be hit 4 times, this makes this section in particular hell. There are other examples such as Spikes coming up to hit you without much knowledge, or the ice pillar into spikes you can’t make unless you get onto it and then jump off. Overall, this sort of game design only exists to pad the run time, and can severely piss me off.
- Certain secrets having to crouch in a specific tile without any cue is just bad design. Basically forcing the player to look up a guide to find out where to get 1-UP’s and other sort of treasure items are.
- While the bosses are conceptually and visually interesting, they usually are pretty weak in terms of the actual gameplay design. Giant Bat, Wizard, and Bone Dragon are all painfully easy. Mirror Simon, Medusa, and Death are all these games highlights, and even then the bosses have very recognizable patterns and can be killed without any real struggle on Arranged Mode. Dracula is sort of standard for the series, and besides the claw attack in his second phase, doesn’t do much to make him unique outside of CV1’s.
- Certain jumps basically require you to be at the edge of the platform, which can usually hurt the overall flow of the platforming. Having to inch your way to the very end of a platform to get the most out of your jump, ends up just feeling like the designers did not plan out some of these jumps correctly. One that I see everyone falls for is the Bat Bridge in the last stage, where everything is pretty simple, but there’s a deceptively long jump that basically requires the player to slow down and take that jump. The problem is, the game also has bats chasing you during that section, which just makes it feel like they intentionally wanted you to hurry and die. No other jump on the bridge is like this, so it just feels like an intentional “gotcha” moment for first time players.
- For Vertical segments, the designers also loved placing certain gaps in the level design, which if you fall into, can make you start the whole vertical section all over again. Since you only have 4 hits permitted in this game, this can basically be a death sentence, as the enemies respawn as you exit off screen in some cases. Tower of Dolls especially insidious since it has a meat in a wall halfway up, but then falls down to the very beginning of the stage.
- Though already mentioned, the respawning enemies often feel cheap. In some cases, you can fall off a section and land back on a respawned enemy with nothing you can do since you have limited control in the air.
- Some Smaller enemies like the Dolls which hover at angles your whip can’t reach can be brutal to play against. Though there are not many in this game, Tower of Dolls especially is a section where small enemies taking you at very poor angles can cause some frustration.
- The extra loops can just compound some of the game’s shortcomings rather then being a fun alternative hard mode to the game. The speeding up of bats in Stage 2 can make them horrible to platform around, they added more enemies that come at angles you aren’t equipped to handle unless you have the right sub weapon, add more falling gears to the gear room, and just overall add more of those gotcha type moments to the game. Overall, I’d suggest to steer clear of these extra loops.

In conclusion, this is a tight platformer that gets a lot of things right. Presentation-wise, it’s up there with games like Rondo of Blood and Bloodlines. Arguably, it can even be said that this game even has a better soundtrack, and with the many different ways to listen to each composition, there’s bound to be a particular favorite.

Control Wise, this game also controls really really well. Letting the player have more movement in air doesn’t necessarily mean it has better control to more “fixed Jump” control schemes, it definitely works to this games enemy/stage design. The extra whip mobility can be useful, but it’s not overcentralizing/overpowered like it is in games like Super Castlevania 4 due to the whip’s restrictions.

Stage Design in this game can be a hit or a miss. Often times this game has a fantastic pace, with enough levels to make the game feel like it has a lot of content, while also not skimping on the actual length of the stage.

However, the games insistence on “gotcha moments” designed to hurt you first and then make you learn about the obstacle after you’ve already been damaged/killed can make a first playthrough feel really horrid. Especially in Stage 5’s clock tower on Original Mode, coupled with the fact that then you have to fight the hardest boss in the game.

Checkpoints are usually fair, however I feel like sending you back to the bottom of the gear room before She-Wolf was a bad decision. Especially since even when you know where the dangerous gears are, it’s still a very boring part of the game. The Torture Room Stage also contains a very oddly placed checkpoint in the third room, however they place the next checkpoint in the 5th room. Which wouldn’t be that bad, if both the third room and fourth room were not as long as it is, with a mini boss blocking your way to the next checkpoint.

Bosses in this game are overall pretty weak. Presentation-wise, it could be argued that a lot of these bosses are way more unique/interesting to look at compared to other Classicvania bosses, but they are often too simplistic. They don’t really touch any of the highs that Rondo, Dracula X, or Bloodlines really touch in terms of their bosses.

Enemies are definitely a highlight of this game. With new enemies being introduced in almost every level, and these new enemies usually being fun to fight with Simon’s kit. I do find somethings annoying like the Medusa Heads on the Falling bridge, the Dolls in Tower of Dolls, and and Peeping eyes as I think getting hit by them punishes you too much, while not really complimenting Simon’s kit.

Overall, I find this game very enjoyable. It has some hiccups from time to time, and I think players will not really have a high opinion of this game on their first go around. However, playing the new Arranged mode allows the player to get more accustomed to this games stage design, and then they can play the harder Original mode if they so choose. I personally enjoy the Arranged Mode more, as I’m given more leeway in some of the games less fair moments.

The Presentation is utterly fantastic on almost every level, the inherent replayability offered by the games alternate modes/unique mechanics, the mostly fun stage design coupled with some of the best enemy design in the series, and with a Simon who I believe is the best controlling Simon that we have ever gotten in where he almost fully compliments all of the game design.

I definitely would say that this is the best version of Simon’s tale, and would urge anyone who is a fan of the series to pick this up. However, I would recommend to start with Arranged mode before trying to do Original mode if you’re a first time player.

Unas de las experiencias más agobiantes que puedes tener en el modo clásico.
Es puro castlevania de antaño.
El posicionamiento es muy bueno y hace que la dificultad sea aún mayor ya que nunca nos la deja fácil.
Sin embargo el plataforma falla debes en cuando por qué Saimon se mueve muy lento, la sección de la torre del reloj es horrible ya que te llena de porqueria y no contento con eso su jefe es una mierda durísima por qué nuestras habilidades pegan muy poco. Algunas otras secciones también están jodidas como el famoso enemigo espejo, la sección para llegar a la pelea con la muerte y el tramo final antes de Drácula.
Sin embargo el reto recompensa es muy bueno y hasta cierto punto le coges cariño.
Pero para ser una primera vez con castlevania es muy jodida en el modo clásico.

El modo normal es divertido pese a los problemas que mencioné y si es más digerible que el clásico ya que Saimon no se mueve lento, los enemigos no te quitan tanta vida y el látigo pega más duro.

this is one of those games i probably couldve beaten without save states but just for the sake of not really feeling like repeating some annoying areas i just ended up using them. overall though, pretty solid classicvania. definitely not the best but not bad either. i was honestly expecting it to just be a castlevania 1 remake entirely and in some areas it definitely was, especially level 1, but as i kept playing it felt fresh enough and i had a pretty enjoyable time. just the same good classicvania gameplay with a little bit of polish, reminds me a lot of super castlevania 4 but not as freeing in terms of things like whip swinging. some parts were pretty not fun to play through, mainly the clock tower level and the one level with the section where you have to climb up and fight all the little toy enemies, and there are definitely some other things that sucked but they were pretty minor so they didnt come to memory right away. also the ost went kinda crazy on this one?? like castlevania is obviously known for good music but this one was just different because it didnt really feel like a castlevania ost, more like a later megaman/megaman x entry ost, but still really really good. i could probably see myself going back and listening to some of these tracks

Um dos castles mais difíceis, é bizarro o tanto de desafio injusto que te destrói completamente, sem falar dos bosses que são insanos nesse jogo, morrer com 4 pauladas é sacanagem. E bom, é mais uma reimaginação de Castlevania 1, o mais fiel diga-se de passagem, a jogabilidade é bem padrão da série e ele não busca muito se diferenciar, o que não é um problema. A maior adição na minha visão é a famosa ervinha, que é de longe a melhor subweapon do jogo. O visual e ambientação são ótimos, padrão castle, particularmente não sou fã dos remixes do jogo, mas gosto MUITO das músicas novas, os efeitos de som são bem gostosinhos de ouvir.

Não lembro se a história se difere do original, mas não importa muito pra falar a verdade.

Agora, falando do modo arrange, ele é a experiência justa do original, o Simon tanka mais e não tem o knockback do original, o Simon tem um novo design que eu particularmente gosto mais, e as músicas foram refeitas. Gosto mais das músicas originais aliás. Recomendo? Sim, se gosta de um desafio jogue a versão original e aproveite, se quiser se divertir jogue o arrange.