As a sequel, this game is fantastic because it addresses nearly every major complaint I had about Castlevania: The Adventure. The most notable improvement is that this actually feels like a video game instead of something you'd get with a Happy Meal. The game runs much better, has greatly improved level design, and you no longer lose your whip upgrades when you get hit.

Judging the game on its own merits and not just in the context of its predecessor, it's not quite as impressive. The entire first half of the game is almost trivially easy, although it does pick up slightly towards the end. The level design is pretty decent, but I don't find most of the bosses to be particularly fun or interesting fights.

Overall, it's an alright experience. If you're a fan of the series, I'd say it's worth checking out at least once. That being said, I don't think it really holds up to some other entries in the series, and it's not something I'm in a rush to replay.

As opposed to the completely linear Castlevania 1, Simon's Quest places a lot of emphasis on exploration and puzzle-solving. Your objective is to find the five body parts of Dracula, which are hidden in five different mansions around the world. This is fine at first, but eventually you will realize that most of these mansions are extremely well-hidden. The "puzzles" you have to solve in order to get to them are incredibly obscure and would take ages to solve without a guide. There ARE hint books that give you at least some clues for what to do, but someone at Konami had the bright idea of hiding all of them in completely unmarked walls that you have to throw holy water at. At least the NPCs bless you with such helpful dialogue as "LAURELS IN YOUR SOUP WILL ENHANCE ITS AROMA" and "DON'T LOOK INTO THE DEATH STAR, OR YOU WILL DIE."

Without a guide, this game blows and I wouldn't recommend playing it. If you do use a guide, it's not the worst thing ever, but it's still kind of a slog. Once you know where you're supposed to go, the game isn't even particularly difficult. There are only three bosses and they're all pushovers, even Dracula himself. The best thing I can say about this game is that it does at least have a killer soundtrack, with Bloody Tears going on to become one of the most iconic tracks in the series.

In the end, this is just another bad NES sequel that randomly decided to be a different genre than the first game. I wish I had a dollar for every time that happened.