This review contains spoilers
The Good:
- Mostly engaging central gameplay loop
- Very impressive visuals
- Good movement
The Ok:
- Mixed bag of music
The Bad:
- Too much backtracking
Conclusion:
Harmony of Dissonance is my second Castlevania game, and I quite enjoyed it for the most part. In many ways, it admittedly does feel like ‘Symphony of the Night but not as good’, but few things are as good as that game. In terms of the presentation, the visual style is honestly amazing for a GBA; I never found myself bothered by the saturated environments others have complained about. Character and enemy sprites look nice, and the fact that it doesn’t look bad on a big tv is impressive. The music, though, is something I’m less positive on. While there are a few catchy tracks, I’d say at least half of the soundtrack is at least slightly grating and repetitive (perhaps not a surprise given the title). Now, in terms of gameplay, Harmony is mostly really solid. The core promise of the metroidvania is here, and I truly enjoy discovering new ways to get to new places and secret rooms and whatnot. However, this is honestly the first metroidvania I’ve ever played where I found myself actively annoyed at the amount of backtracking I had to do. This wouldn’t have been such an issue if it weren’t for the dual castle layout, which appears to copy the idea from Symphony without understanding why that worked. In that game, it was an awesome inversion (literally) of what you’d grown familiar with, and it unlocked late game. Here, it unlocks much earlier, and the layout is literally exactly the same. This (plus the fact that the waypoints are ludicrously far apart) means that a decent amount of the latter half of Harmony is just filled with bloat. Still, that said, I did enjoy my time with this game, even with its issues.
- Mostly engaging central gameplay loop
- Very impressive visuals
- Good movement
The Ok:
- Mixed bag of music
The Bad:
- Too much backtracking
Conclusion:
Harmony of Dissonance is my second Castlevania game, and I quite enjoyed it for the most part. In many ways, it admittedly does feel like ‘Symphony of the Night but not as good’, but few things are as good as that game. In terms of the presentation, the visual style is honestly amazing for a GBA; I never found myself bothered by the saturated environments others have complained about. Character and enemy sprites look nice, and the fact that it doesn’t look bad on a big tv is impressive. The music, though, is something I’m less positive on. While there are a few catchy tracks, I’d say at least half of the soundtrack is at least slightly grating and repetitive (perhaps not a surprise given the title). Now, in terms of gameplay, Harmony is mostly really solid. The core promise of the metroidvania is here, and I truly enjoy discovering new ways to get to new places and secret rooms and whatnot. However, this is honestly the first metroidvania I’ve ever played where I found myself actively annoyed at the amount of backtracking I had to do. This wouldn’t have been such an issue if it weren’t for the dual castle layout, which appears to copy the idea from Symphony without understanding why that worked. In that game, it was an awesome inversion (literally) of what you’d grown familiar with, and it unlocked late game. Here, it unlocks much earlier, and the layout is literally exactly the same. This (plus the fact that the waypoints are ludicrously far apart) means that a decent amount of the latter half of Harmony is just filled with bloat. Still, that said, I did enjoy my time with this game, even with its issues.