Hoo boy, where to start? Haunted Castle is rough, to put it that way. The game is more of a retelling of the first Castlevania, with Simon having to rescue his wife from Dracula, whom he just married; what a dick
The game has six stages to go through, and visually, it looks fine for a 1987/1988 arcade game, but I wouldn't say it's the best Castlevania aesthetic-wise. Simon's walk animation looks weird; it looks like he's carrying a cramp while fighting classic movie monster enemies. The music in this game is solid, with the bridge theme being my favorite out of the entire soundtrack. I wouldn't say it's my favorite out of the games I've played so far, but this is the best thing to come out of Haunted Castle, in my opinion.
The sub-weapons here are a bit different compared to a traditional Castlevania game. Some do return, like the stopwatch (which is easily the best weapon in the game), and it can freeze everything, including bosses, making the whole Dracula fight piss easy. There is new stuff like the mini crosses, bombs, and "boomerangs" that can be similar to the cross and holy water from previous games. Like with the last two games, you can upgrade your whip from a standard whip to a mace and a sword for some reason. Hearts can be scarce, with no candles to hit. Instead, you rely on killing enemies to collect the hearts, whether they land on the ground or in a bottomless pit
The game is concise, and it'll probably take about half an hour to beat. But if you thought that this game would be easy? Oh, think again. This game is the definition of unbalanced. I hit a literal brick wall, which dealt half of my damage, and I got a game over because of it. You will see a lot of bullshit once you progress further into the game.
But the most befuddling this about all of this is that, in the original arcade release, players had limited continues. Once they're gone, it's back to the beginning, which is honestly punishing for an arcade game. I did some research, and I found that Haunted Castle had a development cycle of around six months, and those who've worked on the game were short-staffed. Ex-Konami staffer Masaaki Kukino revealed that debugging the game was needed and, unfortunately, didn't have time to balance it properly, and it definitely shows and is likely the reason why it failed
Haunted Castle is not a good Castlevania game, though I say it's worth at least one playthrough for those curious about trying it out. If you want to play this game, I highly suggest you pick up the Arcade Archives version available on Switch and PS4. There you will have modern conveniences like infinite quarters and the option to play the Japanese and European versions, which from what I heard, can deal less damage than the North American version. That begs the question, why is North American version harder in the first place? Isn't it supposed to be the opposite, with the Japanese version being the more difficult one? I say without these modern conveniences, the game would be nearly unbeatable for me
It's my least favorite Castlevania game so far; so, moving on
The game has six stages to go through, and visually, it looks fine for a 1987/1988 arcade game, but I wouldn't say it's the best Castlevania aesthetic-wise. Simon's walk animation looks weird; it looks like he's carrying a cramp while fighting classic movie monster enemies. The music in this game is solid, with the bridge theme being my favorite out of the entire soundtrack. I wouldn't say it's my favorite out of the games I've played so far, but this is the best thing to come out of Haunted Castle, in my opinion.
The sub-weapons here are a bit different compared to a traditional Castlevania game. Some do return, like the stopwatch (which is easily the best weapon in the game), and it can freeze everything, including bosses, making the whole Dracula fight piss easy. There is new stuff like the mini crosses, bombs, and "boomerangs" that can be similar to the cross and holy water from previous games. Like with the last two games, you can upgrade your whip from a standard whip to a mace and a sword for some reason. Hearts can be scarce, with no candles to hit. Instead, you rely on killing enemies to collect the hearts, whether they land on the ground or in a bottomless pit
The game is concise, and it'll probably take about half an hour to beat. But if you thought that this game would be easy? Oh, think again. This game is the definition of unbalanced. I hit a literal brick wall, which dealt half of my damage, and I got a game over because of it. You will see a lot of bullshit once you progress further into the game.
But the most befuddling this about all of this is that, in the original arcade release, players had limited continues. Once they're gone, it's back to the beginning, which is honestly punishing for an arcade game. I did some research, and I found that Haunted Castle had a development cycle of around six months, and those who've worked on the game were short-staffed. Ex-Konami staffer Masaaki Kukino revealed that debugging the game was needed and, unfortunately, didn't have time to balance it properly, and it definitely shows and is likely the reason why it failed
Haunted Castle is not a good Castlevania game, though I say it's worth at least one playthrough for those curious about trying it out. If you want to play this game, I highly suggest you pick up the Arcade Archives version available on Switch and PS4. There you will have modern conveniences like infinite quarters and the option to play the Japanese and European versions, which from what I heard, can deal less damage than the North American version. That begs the question, why is North American version harder in the first place? Isn't it supposed to be the opposite, with the Japanese version being the more difficult one? I say without these modern conveniences, the game would be nearly unbeatable for me
It's my least favorite Castlevania game so far; so, moving on