Well it's in every sense of the word a downgraded version of Rondo of Blood, cutscenes are removed, maria is no longer playable, alternate paths are gone, level select is gone, basically anything that made the original rondo so great is gone. What we have is a Richter who has a mid air control jump but also feels pretty stiff to control in general. Level design has seen a big hit in how they spam every level with those spear enemies and if you were to do a drinking game based on how many spear guys they plaster on the levels you'd probably die. The final dracula fight sucks, bottomless pits everywhere for the sake of making the boss challenging when in reality its just annoying.

Yeah this one just kinda sucks maybe don't play it.

I mean, why not? When Nobunaga ruled part of Japan, and was asked for his reasoning to go after the rest, he simply went "because it's there". I'm pretty sure he said that, I was alive for it. It was essentially the same mindset I had with finishing the Advance Collection.

Known as "Vampire's Kiss" for our PALs, "Dracula X" could only be assumed to be meant as "Dracula's Hug" rather than some attempt at the 2Xtreme movement of the 90s. You see, because in here Dracula gives you a nice little hug and a peck on the cheek, all before he kicks you down a hole in his dilapidated humble abode. It makes one wonder why Dracula would even bother with floors in general when he's more than capable of flying everywhere, especially if he's already figured out that the best defense against Belmonts is to simply either make them walk up stairs, or dare them to hop with their cement-infused boots across magical levitating platforms. Where these platforms are coming from is a mystery, but I assume it's where all those holes in Dracula's throne room came from, or perhaps that's the origin of all the gaps in the grand hallway where one slip up means Richter falling into an alternate stage that denies him the ability to rescue Maria's now completely useless ass.

"Wow, thanks Richter! Good luck on your quest, I'll make my way out now."

Bitch.

It's really intriguing how a final boss fight can completely overtake discussion, and it's quite telling what the legacy of the Dracula's Smooch version of the climactic finale leaves behind when there exists an entire guide on GameFAQs dedicated to it. A useful one at that. Part of me wishes the Game Gear version of Sonic 2 would have something like that for it's first boss, but I guess there's not much to be helped there beyond "I sure hope the balls don't hit me". To say that the fight with Dracula X is a slog would be shorting it a few hundred didgeridoos, because man I could've made some tasty pancakes in the time it took trying to wait out his ass to get into an advantageous position to hit his godawful hitbox along the pillar system he installed in his throne room prior to him calling in an assist from Devil Kazuya. Kaiser Sigma from X3 would puke at all the times I uselessly cracked my whip across Dracula X's forehead and had it not register, because Konami designed this game from the ground up with anti-blockbuster rental countermeasures instead of waiting for it to come out to us, thus destroying all potential goodwill it could have found as a demake later during the age of emulation, with an audience less upset at being bamboozled out of a more faithful and less mean-spirited retelling of the beloved PC Engine classic. Instead, Switch owners will be annoyed they have to deal with this while Requiem continues chilling as a PS4 exclusive nearly six years later.

Baffling, though not quite as baffling as the censorship where they kept the blood on the title screen, but got rid of Death's Mortal Kombat Deception-style Hara Kiri where he decapitates himself with his own scythe, meanwhile Richter in our version apparently explodes into a pile of flour for Dracula X to make his cookies from.

What cookie would Richter be? Puzzling...

My opinion was ever so slightly improved from forcing myself to replay this for completion-sake, but the most heartwarming thing I get out of Dracula's Kiss personally is seeing the font used at the bottom of the title screen for the copyright, and being reminded of a childhood banger in Konami's Biker Mice From Mars which uses the same thing, so I guess I'll go play that now instead. Ciao.

Really good and just short of perfection. Unfortunately, Richter Belmont plays very sluggishly, the direction of the jump cannot be changed after jumping, only the direction of view, which seems somehow unintentionally funny^^ The backgrounds and general graphic design are really well done, on a par with the 4th game. The music is also very good, although not quite as convincing as in some other games of the series. Boss battles are really tough, sometimes a bit frustrating due to the slow pace, but definitely motivating and exciting. The optional areas and various endings are also very well done. I liked it very much throughout.

Estava um tanto quanto relutante de jogar o tal do Rondo of Blood Júnior, não vou mentir. Após ouvir umas várias críticas controversas sobre Castlevania: Dracula X, achei que seria um joguinho bem do mal feito e amador, porém, em minha teimosia de querer zerar todos os classicvanias, e em minha recente obsessão pelo Richter Belmont, não podia deixar esse rapazinho de fora, e olha, esse jogo não promete nada, e entrega tudo.
Primeiro de tudo, joguei essa bomba com save states, se isso é uma redflag pra você, nem termine esse review; enfim, sendo um classicvania, a jogabilidade segue sendo a mesma de sempre, ande pra frente, e bata em tudo o que se move, a esse ponto já to tão acostumado, com as escadas, movimentação travada, e dificuldade cuzona dessa franquia, que já nem reclamo mais, afinal, esse jogo não inova em nada, assim sendo, o game é bastante divertido, oferece bons visuais pro SNES (dá-lhe chip mode 7), e uma excelente trilha sonora, além de bosses muitos bacanas e que não enchem o saco além da conta (exceto, claro, o Drácula, aquilo é de fato o pior ponto dessa experiência).
Não resgatei as donzelas.

Dracula X is a soft remake of Rondo of Blood made for the SNES, a relic from a time when game code was entirely specific to a platform and porting over a game meant rewriting everything from scratch. In adapting to the limitations of the new platform compared to the PC Engine, the port was made much lighter on content than the original game, featuring less stages, characters and types of enemies, and also removing the animated cutscenes that told Rondo's story.

Taken as what it is, it's... passable. It's an SNES platformer, like so many others at the time, and can last through a couple hours of enjoyment -- if that's your thing, that is. Personally, clunky combat and instant death pits are not my favorite features in a game, and Dracula X sure is packed with those, even bastardizing the iconic Dracula fight to include a bunch of pitfalls. However, I can see an SNES owner getting this game as a kid and loving it.

In 2024, though, a more pressing question than "why would one play this" is "why would anyone play this instead of Rondo of Blood itself". Even for those craving some classicvania, there's not much to see here that's not already in Rondo. Dracula X's inclusion in the Advance Collection is thus, puzzling.

Taking Rondo of Blood and squeezing it into the constraints of the SNES couldn't have been easy... but I can't buy for one second that it had to be this lacking in quality either. Dracula X is more than just a Rondo port with necessary cutbacks, it is also one that neglected to replace these cutbacks with anything of even remotely equal worth. Even Super Castlevania IV was more impressive through its frequent use of setpieces, and the way it danced around the limitations of the console to deliver some truly impressive moments.

Dracula X strips away most setpieces, and replaces them with arbitrary level design changes that hover somewhere between the most barebones shit you'll ever play in a Castlevania game, versus frustrating and frequent use of insta-death traps. Somebody thought the final boss in Rondo wasn't exciting enough, so here they added 4 bottomless pits for you to get knocked into when you get hit once. (unless you're crouching, which can negate the knockback) The spritework has also seen some very strange changes, with certain backgrounds being replaced to resemble something closer to a comic book art style. This clashes against the spritework from Rondo that does still remain here, let alone against the whole gothic aesthetic that Castlevania is supposed to be embodying.

There's no 2nd playable character here, there's less routes, there's no save system other than passwords, the cutscenes have been mostly removed altogether... along with most of the essence and soul of the game that this is based on. At most, the soundtrack has seen the most graceful conversion and still holds up very well. Either way, for newcomers to the series, I would strongly advise playing Rondo of Blood instead, as you're guaranteed to get a richer amount of content and a much better designed experience. Dracula X is an unfortunate little oddity in the series, which back in '95, gave the exciting impression to fans that Rondo of Blood was finally going to make it over to western audiences. Instead, showed up its chain-smoking cousin, Blondo of Roond.