Godamn this game was an hard one, it was the first DS castlevania i played, about 2/3 years ago and i could not finish it for the life of me, just got hard stuck.

Well after playing almost all of the gba and ds games i came back and still got my ass whooped, it was only after finishing dawn of sorrow that i decided to restart again and this time i would pay attention to everything and try hard. I soon realized why it was so hard for me, i was not paying any attention to the enemy weakness and just played as i was used to, but this game really made me look at enemy weakness and movements at times it really felt like a 2D dark souls with the magic/mana system now with a stamina like meter for attacks and magics. The game really made an 180 turn, once it clicked it was so satisfying, all of the glyphs made sense the bosses where enjoyable but hard it was amazing. The visuals where by far one of the best in all castlevania, Shanoa is one of the coolest main characters.

The game really felt like the pinnacle of everything done so far since SOTN, visuals, story and gameplay. The story is pretty decent with a good twist that doesn't feel forced and out of place.
The main gimmick of this game is the different world design, being a little different from the usual metroidvania, this game is separated in different levels and even has a main village where the player can return. I found that to be one of the best additions to the game giving it personality over the other titles, and even improving at the quest system in portrait of ruin. The game being so hard also plays into every upgrade you get in the village really helping out in the end.

Overall the game is really good but one of the hardest to get into, really needing to get invested and taking it seriously, and the end game surprise really is special and the final battle one of the hardest, quite the fitting end of castlevania as a series.

dropei no final com o drácula mas como ja zerei antes, vou deixar como Completed

Um dos melhores jogos da franquia, trilha sonora impecável, história interessante, sistema de combate único e criativo, fases divertidas e difíceis, muito bom mesmo... até chegar na porta do castelo do Drácula.

A partir daí se torna uma experiência frustrante com chefes inacreditáveis de chatos, todo inimigo te dá 2050 de dano não importa o que tu tiver usando e você sempre tem que ficar estocado de poções senão vai pro caixão. A exploração? Insuportável, você não tem prazer de explorar o castelo justamente por estar sempre procurando um save point senão todo teu progresso foi pra casa do caralho. De verdade eu nunca vi um jogo da franquia ter um nose dive tão absurdo em qualidade quanto esse. Que negócio insano.

Ainda sim é um sólido jogo mas essa dificuldade absurda não é pra mim.

On my first time finishing this i gave 4 stars because the linearity kinda anoyed me, but replaying it i mostly didn't care about it, glyph mechanic is by far the most fun mechanic i've seen on this series so far(since i didn't played lament of innocence and curse of darkness too much yet), almost everything you get has it's utilities, from magic to physical, you can play this game in a lot of different ways with this, and i love the boss fights, probably my favorites from the series. Perhaps the only thing that really bugs me in the gameplay is how you can only get some equips if you get lucky and the chest spawns, i also don't care too much about the village side-quests, but the 2 extra locations, one being an enemies rush challenge, and other a platform challenge, are really awesome, by far my favorite extra from any castlevania game. Albus mode unfortunately is kinda boring for me, i didn't felt like it to finish. Visuals are pretty and OST as always with Castlevania has some amazing tunes, Dracula Castle theme being by far my favorite, and Shanoa isn't my favorite protagonist from the series because there's Alucard, but she's awesome, her speech when entering Dracula's castle is based as fuck

Tiene una dinámica diferente a otros castlevania menos la parte final a la hora de jugar los niveles que esta bien .

El sistema de gliphos esta ok pero es una copia del sistema de coger almas, no entiendo lo de separar las armas.

Musica ok para mi gusto ninguna destacable y buen gameplay, hay otros castlevania mejores.

um dos castlevania mais diferentes da série, inovou com protagonista feminina, sistema novo de glifos, e ousou não ser ambientado o tempo todo no castelo do dracula, tendo várias fases retornáveis. O jogo ainda tem uma direção de arte lindissima, que somado ao tópico anterior tira a mesmice do castelo do cramunhão.

os únicos fracos desse jogo é a dificuldade, que não é muito justa quando se joga com glifos de ataque físico, a aproximação dos inimigos é MUITO chata e parece até que foi pensado pra jogar com magia de distância. Por fim a adição das quest, que apesar de ter gostado, caem na repetição de "vá em tal lugar e pegue tal coisa pra mim". Porém isso nao estraga o jogo nem um pouco masterpiece slk

I went into this immediately after playing Harmony of Dissonance.
I didn't really like this one all too much tbh. The level based system felt extremely limiting and felt like you're just fucking about and waiting for Dracula's castle to show. With it not feeling like progression was tied to abilities like the other did.
I do like the characters, the villagers, Shanoa, Albus and Dracula himself are all really good.

The villager quests take too much grinding and a lot of the bosses feel like bullshit. Shanoa feels extremely slow, especially the back dash. It's just a game that annoyed me until I got to Dracula's castle

Symphony of the Night is still my favorite metvania, but Order of Ecclesia is almost objectively the best.

It's another entry solidly on one end of the Metroid-to-Castlevania spectrum: less focused on platforming and a fine-tuned linear weapon/ability upgrades, much more on throwing lots of ideas at the wall and letting the player find out what sticks. But this time, Igarashi & Co get pretty close to having the best of both worlds; namely, the Glyph weapons present some compelling strategic choices, and the overall difficulty is steep enough that you need to make the most of those choices.

There are other nice features. The quest system is more compelling than the previous game (Portrait of Ruin) and yields better rewards; for example, running errands for the Chef earns you better healing item options than the standard Potions you can buy at game start. The character art by Masaki Hirooka is a stunning shift from the generic anime art we saw in Portrait of Ruin or Dawn of Sorrow, much more like Ayami Kojima's gorgeous designs dating back to Symphony, but bringing their own unique energy. And of course the Michiru Yamane OST absolutely rules.

Perhaps most surprising is that Order of Ecclesia's story is interesting from beginning to end. Whereas previous Castlevania plots dragged out or got cliché, Shanoa and Albus' tale has some genuinely interesting twists and big emotional moments throughout the whole runtime. Bonus: it's more self-contained and less reliant on wider Castlevania lore than almost any other in the series. Great place to jump in if you're new to the series or genre.

To put it plainly, Order of Ecclesia is exceptional - well worth going out of your way to get a DS (or an emulator) just to play it.

My ranking of the GBA/DS Castlevanias:
1. Order of Ecclesia
2. Aria of Sorrow
3. Portrait of Ruin
4. Dawn of Sorrow
5. Circle of the Moon
6. Harmony of Dissonance

If this forever remains the final Metroidvania entry by Koji Igarashi and his team for the Castlevania series, what an incredible swan song it is.

Order of Ecclesia is a breath of fresh air when it comes to difficulty, especially compared to the previous games which were a piece of cake. The boss fights in this game are genuinely some of the toughest in the entire series, but they are challenging in a fair way, unlike the bosses in Circle of the Moon.

The weaknesses for enemies and bosses in Order of Ecclesia are now much more important, which means I have to constantly switch between my equipment slots. This, combined with the glyph system that has been streamlined compared to the souls' system from the Sorrow duology but still has layers to it, adds a whole new level of strategy to the game and makes combat the most engaging in all of 2D Castlevania for me.

The game's structure pleasantly surprised me, especially the hub village that gradually becomes more alive as you rescue villagers from different areas. It reminded me of Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest, but with a way better execution. Moving from one area to another feels like embarking on a journey through a vast land. The stunning visuals and incredible soundtrack, which is already a trademark of this series, further enhance the experience.

This journey is made even better by the emotional tale between Shanoa and Albus. Their story isn’t mind-blowing, but it's enough to make these two some of my favorite characters in the whole series. I genuinely care about their personal journey, even if the mystery surrounding it is predictable. Despite that, the end game is still incredibly satisfying.

I really believe that Order of Ecclesia is in my top 3 favorites in the series. However, I'm constantly debating whether this or Aria of Sorrow is my favorite Metroidvania game in the entire series. But one thing is for sure, it will go down as my favorite Metroidvania game on the Nintendo DS, and it's the perfect way to wrap up my Castlevania journey that I went through for over 2 years

Unreal game, much more difficult than the other DS releases and entirely rewarding. The music is beautiful from start to finish and the enemy designs are so imaginative and fun, each one offering new ways to take advantage of the glyphs. The artistry is amazing and unique monsters like the jersey devil, references to bubba sawyer etc from minds that understand the unique aesthetics and hallmarks of horror and folklore.

Order of Ecclesia, as the rest of the Castlevania games, holds a distinct gothic aesthetic and feel with a great stand alone story which was engaging both in character and lore. Very fun side quests too which helped the world building.

My favorite castlevania and one of my favorite games ever. I can’t properly describe what this game did that the others didn’t because all the ds games are spectacular.

I will say tho, the fast paced action, the carefully curated music and sound design, the story and characters, the pixel art…everything just fits and works perfectly.

Gameplay wise, I loved the fact that Shanoa, the mc, is a magic user and thus, the player has to carefully keep an eye on magic and hearts to keep the action going. Everything she does uses magic, so you have to be completely prepared and equip the adequate souls and items.

The bosses of this game are hard, challenging and rewarding, and combat is fluid, quick, and some people might get tired of mashing the attack buttons but to me, that just added to the experience.

As for the map thing, sure, it uses the map system to drop in instead of having a single, huge map. But is it that weird? Other castlevania games used this system and they were fine. Some levels are easier than others because they’re not quite that, but passages or roads to get to the main levels. Those are used, imo, more for grinding than anything.

Overall, this game is still a bit underrated, just like PoR, but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad game. If anything, it might be the greatest igavania representation together with Aria of Sorrow