Rondo of Blood is included in the Castlevania Requiem collection, which I bought for the sake of playing SoTN. I'm not fond of the series pre-Igavania, and I went into Rondo of Blood out of curiosity, expecting to loathe playing it. In the end, I was positively surprised. I often hear it being considered the best traditional Castlevania, and while I'm still not that fond of it, I can see what those people are saying.
Okay, let's get the ugly part out of the way: controlling the playable character feels like controlling a brick. Jumping controls feel stilted, while attack animations are long and stick you in place. Basic action-platformer stuff, like landing on a narrow platform, turning around to attack or jumping in to attack an enemy are made incredibly tough in Rondo of Blood. To make it worse, characters suffer lengthy knockback animations when damaged, after which there are no iframes and you're likely to get hit again.
The game has two playable characters, Richter and Maria, and everyone will tell you to switch to Maria as soon as she's unlocked since, while not free from the game's issues, her moveset features a more flexible default attack, a double jump and a slide move, which beats Richter by a mile. I guess she might have been an experiment with breaking off from traditional series mechanics, but I haven't played CV3 with its multiple characters, so I wouldn't know how much of a step forward she is.
But yes, in terms of character control and playability, the game feels like it's behind many platformers that came before it, and SoTN, which came right after it. And that is weird, because that's the only way in which the game feels particularly dated. Everything else seems pretty smartly designed: for instance, enemies and bosses all have well-telegraphed attacks and discernible patterns you can learn. There are some cheap enemy placements here and there, but I couldn't name any cheap enemies.
Plus, the game features intricate level design: stages are complex and have multiple paths you can take to the end, and in some cases, multiple bosses. The "world map" itself, so to speak, also features more than one path you can take to get to Dracula's Castle. And none of it is the bullcrap kind of secret that requires a guide, it's all possible to find on your own.
Ultimately, playing Rondo of Blood was an interesting trip into video game history, and while it's not my style of game, I can appreciate what it does and I can see how it would please people with certain affinities.
Okay, let's get the ugly part out of the way: controlling the playable character feels like controlling a brick. Jumping controls feel stilted, while attack animations are long and stick you in place. Basic action-platformer stuff, like landing on a narrow platform, turning around to attack or jumping in to attack an enemy are made incredibly tough in Rondo of Blood. To make it worse, characters suffer lengthy knockback animations when damaged, after which there are no iframes and you're likely to get hit again.
The game has two playable characters, Richter and Maria, and everyone will tell you to switch to Maria as soon as she's unlocked since, while not free from the game's issues, her moveset features a more flexible default attack, a double jump and a slide move, which beats Richter by a mile. I guess she might have been an experiment with breaking off from traditional series mechanics, but I haven't played CV3 with its multiple characters, so I wouldn't know how much of a step forward she is.
But yes, in terms of character control and playability, the game feels like it's behind many platformers that came before it, and SoTN, which came right after it. And that is weird, because that's the only way in which the game feels particularly dated. Everything else seems pretty smartly designed: for instance, enemies and bosses all have well-telegraphed attacks and discernible patterns you can learn. There are some cheap enemy placements here and there, but I couldn't name any cheap enemies.
Plus, the game features intricate level design: stages are complex and have multiple paths you can take to the end, and in some cases, multiple bosses. The "world map" itself, so to speak, also features more than one path you can take to get to Dracula's Castle. And none of it is the bullcrap kind of secret that requires a guide, it's all possible to find on your own.
Ultimately, playing Rondo of Blood was an interesting trip into video game history, and while it's not my style of game, I can appreciate what it does and I can see how it would please people with certain affinities.
2 Comments
I wouldn't say the main character in SoTN, or any of the later games in the series that it influenced, is overpowered. True, they're much more mobile than their Rondo of Blood colleagues, but the game is designed with that mobility in mind. But it's true, it's two different styles of games. Rondo of Blood deservedly has its fans.
Buo
1 year ago