This game is pure bliss. If Dissonance was a step in the right direction after Circle of the Moon, then Aria is a space shuttle in full ignition. Exploration feels so rewarding and natural, not once did I think to myself "Oh shit, where do I go now?", things just clicked one after another. Who knew that having one really well designed castle to explore is better than two castles that are basically the same!

The Soul system is so damn fun. Sure, it's RNG drops from monsters just like Circle of the Moon, but guess what? EVERY monster in the game can drop a soul, not just a few of 'em, which means you're free to explore and you'll most certainly grab a wide range of souls even if you're not actively hunting them down. Not to mention, you don't need to experiment with mixing souls just to see what they do; you get a Soul, and you immediately know what it does by the description. You still have to enter the menu to swap souls, but even that got an upgrade; cycling through menus is so much faster than CotM/HoD.

And best of all? You can equip multiple Souls. So you don't need to choose between an offensive/utility/buff skill; you can have all three at once!

I like the new cast, the spritework is vastly improved across the board(just look at those animation frames on Soma, mm-mmm), the weapons are pretty varied considering the limitations of the system, this game just does SO much right. It's great.

The only downside to me is the console it was released on. I love Aria's soundtrack but the GBA's sound chip is so muffled and noisy it's hard to enjoy it, and while the graphics got a huge facelift, it's obviously not going to look as pristine as SotN. If Aria was released as a sequel to SotN on the PS1? It wouldn't even be a fair fight.

Advance Collection is worth it for this game alone. Please give it a shot.

I was going to wait until I finished the game to write a review for it as I've done with every other game in my profile so far, but I don't care anymore. Curse of Darkness is a game that had me smiling from cheek to cheek thanks to its soul.

It has issues, like areas that are very flat with long corridors since the team insisted on trying the 3D search action thing again, combat not being as polished or versatile compared to its contemporaries, or the story just being kinda there; but man, it does. not. matter.

This is a game where you can tell the whole team was having fun in the process. You can use your Giant familiar to play bowling with some statues and clear a secret path, you need to sit on every chair in the game in order to achieve 100% completion and there's an entire room dedicated to showcasing said chairs, you can craft a special weapon that QUITE LITERALLY lets you become Bomberman, dozens upon dozens of joke weapons that may not be very useful but BY GOD they're there! They're there. The world of modern gaming NEEDS more joke weapons, please.

The soundtrack is easily one of the best in the franchise, the voice acting and cutscene direction got a huge upgrade from Lament, the stealing system adds a nice layer of interaction with enemies that rewards you for approaching fights in different ways... There's so much soul here. So much love and ambition. Even if it's not the most carefully designed game ever, it has a burning passion that you'd be hard pressed to find in so many other titles, old or new.

And that ultimately decides how you'll feel about Curse of Darkness. If you're looking for a polished action-exploration game with deep, intricate mechanics and a compelling narrative, you won't find it here; but if you just wanna sit back, relax, button mash your way through hordes of demons with your pet buddies, checking off all sorts of silly shit from the crafting and chair lists, all while listening to some of Michiru Yamane's most underrated compositions? This is absolutely the game for you.

Now if you'll excuse me, I gotta go back to working my way to 100%, god damn is this game fun.

Little update (18/10): 100%'d it! All I'll say is: Pumpkin for life.

Full disclosure, I revisited this one through an 1000% save file I had from my previous playthrough. But honestly, there's a good reason why I went all the way with this one. Portrait of Ruin is SO GOOD. I mean, Yuzo Koshiro is in the soundtrack, how couldn't it be.

The Mario 64 setup was a PERFECT idea to freshen up the series' setting. I love Symphony and Aria, but spending all your playtime in the castle was getting kind of old. Not a problem with Portrait though, here you can enter different paintings scattered all over the castle, meaning you'll get to explore deserts, pyramids, Victorian streets, a chaotic circus, and more. This easily puts Portrait up there as one of the most varied Castlevanias in terms of visuals.

Speaking of visuals, the "anime" look is back again from Dawn of Sorrow, but this time I feel it's not as bad. Maybe the characters themselves helped a lot because I actually really like the story here.

Dawn's plot was very safe and the dialogue in that game is pretty monotone. Portrait actually shakes things up by having the main villain be a different Vampire, and one that's not interested in reviving Dracula or "the Dark Lord" at all. Of course, Drac comes back by the end, but Brauner and his daughters were fun to watch. He even says something like "Dracula has been trying to end humanity for hundreds of years and he fails every time, now I'll do something about it", which is honestly very appropriate for the series at this point.
Not only that, Jonathan and Charlotte are SUPER fun together. You even get a "Talk" option in the pause menu to see their banter over the course of the game, they have such a nice chemistry.

On that topic, this game has a two character set up. You solve puzzles and fight your way through the castle by using Jonathan and Charlotte, and it was very well implemented imo. It's nice to see them completely ignoring the touch screen and instead coming up with a new mechanic that actually feels fun to use.
There's also quests you can complete by accessing certain areas of the paintings, executing special commands or picking up items, giving you an extra incentive to go out and explore the castle.

I don't need to comment on the soundtrack; it's Yuzo Koshiro and Michiru Yamane together. It sweeps 90% of the DS library's soundtracks, and I firmly stand by that. (The other 10% are taken by Etrian Odyssey, Professor Layton, Phoenix Wright and the other two Castlevanias lmao)

It's also not very long! Before reloading my 1000% save file to start a New Game+, I checked my original play time and it only took me 8 hours to get absolutely everything.

This is such a good game. I haven't replayed Ecclesia yet, and while I also have a 100% save file for it, something tells me that Portrait may just be my favorite DSvania entry. Play this game.

... JONATHAN! CHARLOTTE! JONATHAN! CHARLOTTE! JONATHAN! CHARLOTTE!

Now this is my prime example of a quintessential videogame. It has EVERYTHING I want: Beautiful pixel art, outstanding music, replay value through alternate routes, and just the right length to not wear out its welcome.

Although I love Castlevania 4, Rondo is easily my favorite Classicvania, bar none. Richter is my Belmont of choice, I LOVE item crashes as a mechanic, Divine Bloodlines is my favorite theme in the series, and it has a style in its presentation that no other CV except SotN can match.

I really can't think of any negatives or anything else to say without sounding redundant. I could pop this motherfucker in any day of the week, any week of the year.

Holy hell, this was SO good! STUPID good!
I can't believe a remake of my least favorite Classicvania ended up in my Top 3. If it had 8-way whipping, it could honestly topple CV4 for me.

Though, ReBirth's simplicity is what makes it special. Only two buttons; it's you and your whip, no gimmicks, no nonsense. And despite that, I had 0 issues using items on stairs, or any other jank from all other games that came before it. Christopher here controls like a dream. (I LOVE that the whip has a hitbox on the back. Finally some jank in OUR favor!)

Also, can I get an amen for the absence of ropes? They're gone! Losing your fireball powerup is also not a thing, the game uses a timer to dictate how long it'll last instead. While I prefer permanent powerups, this actually encouraged me to try and speedrun through the stages; I don't wanna waste them fireballs!

Visuals here are great, like a PS1 Classicavania we never got or something. I did notice some sprites from Aria of Sorrow cropping up, got a chuckle out of me more than anything.

And how about that KONAMI ORCHESTRA HIT on the soundtrack? I was tapping my feet the whole time, they absolutely nailed the music selection here. Reincarnated Soul, Aquarius, New Messiah, and even the Load BGM got upgraded to stage BGM!

And that Death fight! The red lines before the scythe cut! The big ass scythe covering the whole stage then grinding back on the ground! EASILY my favorite Death fight in any Classicvania, if not the whole series. (Stage 4 mini boss also gets a mention for being a baddie 🙏)

This is pure Classicvania gold. This is sidescrolling gold. If you want to get into the older games, you play Rondo, Castlevania 4, and this. The absolute triad.

As a remake? It's good, but certainly not perfect. The colors are muted(although I personally think it kinda fits), some of the remixes are inferior compared to the original soundtrack, and the completion requirements are a bit overblown. Thank god I already had a nearly 100% completed save before revisiting it.
Replacing the Stage 7 theme with Moon Fight was an A+ choice though. The original theme wasn't bad, but c'mon! It's Moon Fight!

As a package? Simply stellar. It has the original Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night, all in one bundle! Who cares if the actual remake isn't perfect? You got two of the best games in the series, and an alright remake to go with it. You really can't go wrong here.

Yeah, the voice acting in SotN was replaced, but it's still SotN. On the go, no less!

Easy recommendation for any PSP owner. Even though the main dish is a bit undercooked, both of the side dishes MORE than make up for it.

Even better than the first one. It's shocking how these games somehow have better controls than like, 95% of all indie Metroidvanias out there in the market. I'm not fucking around, I mean it.

Soundtrack slaps even harder, flying is now limited meaning risk/reward choices are constant, "subweapons" are a lot better, boss fights are just as good, Reimu parallels Richter's role and vibe in SotN, this is just taking what worked in the first game and polishing it all up.

I REALLY wish these games kept coming out. I'd KILL for an actual Metroidvania in this style. For now, this Classicvania inspired duology will do just fine.

Now we're talking videogames, son.

Castlevania 3 is a great game that sadly stumbled thanks to its clunky controls not meshing well with the increased difficulty and level design challenges. On the other hand, CV4 maintains the difficulty, adds new level gimmicks(flexing some of that newly attained SNES power), and finally elevates the controls to match everything else, making for one hell of a game. Simon controls like a dream, no longer having to commit to one direction when jumping, able to whip in 8 directions and wiggle the whip to deal with birds and bats, not to mention HAVING A DEDICATED ITEM BUTTON! HALLELUJAH!

It also features one of the most unique soundtracks in the series, a real "love it or hate it" kinda deal. I personally love it; it's very experimental, almost relaxing in certain cases. "The Library" being one my favorite examples.

The visuals fully lean into the "Barbarian-esque" vibe that early Castlevania games had going on, from Simon's design all the way to enemies and even locations. It doesn't get very gothy until the last few stages, but honestly, I dig it. We're still ways off from Rondo of Blood's early 90's anime vibe or Symphony of the Night's Ayami Kojima designed gothic goodness, though.

All in all, a superb experience. My favorite SNES game, and second favorite classicvania. The dedicated item button alone makes it a 5/5 lmao

FUCK THE THIRD STAGE BOSS

Ok, with that out of the way...

Great game! REALLY great, actually. I don't know why it took so long for me to play it. That said, I do have a couple of grievances.

Limited continues, the return of "Commit to your jump arc, dammit!", and the poor SFX quality sadly put this game just a bit behind Castlevania IV for me. Don't get me wrong though! There's a ton this game does better.

First, the visuals are amazing. CV4 was a very early SNES release, and while I love that game and appreciate its visuals on their own right, it kind of shows. On the other hand, Bloodlines came out 5 years after the Mega Drive released, and the devs made sure to put their experience with the system to use. So many cool setpieces, like the rotating tower in stage 3, the light shining through the windows in stage 5, and the weird mirror-thingamabob in stage 6 are just some examples of great VFX at play here.

The soundtrack is A+, too. Definitely feels a lot more like "Actual Castlevania" when compared to CV4, though I love that game's more experimental qualities.

The approach to alternate characters works a lot better here. Instead of switching on the fly like CV3, Bloodlines has a character select screen at the start of the game. That may sound worse, but I feel like it allows each character to shine a lot more. On that topic, I LOVE Eric; I had a much easier time with him compared to John.

All in all, Bloodlines is really good. As someone who doesn't really care about the Mega Drive, this game alone makes me want to go out and buy one. It's that good.

PLEASE just put this on Steam already, Konami. All you're doing with Castlevania lately is porting collections anyway, what's one more game? Give it to M2! Let em bring it to PC! You don't even have to add anything, just let us play this!

My brother and I were OBSSESSED with this game back in the day. I'm not kidding when I say that I used to go hungry at school just so I could keep my lunch money and buy the DLCs instead. We turned this shit upside down, did absolutely EVERYTHING there was to do.

That was like, 7 years ago though. Picking it up for this marathon, I was kind of hoping to get RPCS3 running and bring some friends along for the ride through RPCN. It worked!
... For about 20 minutes, then the game crashed for everyone. So we tried changing hosts, fiddling with network settings in the Emu, but nothing worked. After completing one stage, the next one would surely crash. So I went ahead and finished the game by myself.

And it's such a shame because we were having a BLAST when it was working! This game is dumb, dumb fun. It looks kind of crusty, with wildly different styles of sprites roaming around a chaotic mess of past Castlevania assets, but MAN it brings a smile to my face, especially after playing through every single game up to this point.

Tying everything together is probably the best soundtrack in the series. Sure, it's 95% music from other games, but every single one of these arrangements wipe the floor with the originals, 0 exceptions. Not that the OGs were bad, far from it, but these tracks are transcendental. They were INSPIRED in that recording studio, I'll tell you that.

That said, I only finished the base game, no DLC chapters. It just feels... Cold and lonely without other players. If RPCS3 multiplayer ever gets stable, or if by some miracle HoD gets ported to PC, I'll be there to 100% this all over again in a heartbeat, you can bet on it.

I remember beating this game for the first time while working on my first Customer Support job before the pandemic hit. We had these shitty all-in-one PCs and the workflow was slow as molasses, so there was a lot of downtime between e-mails. It was through one of those AIOs that I finished Dawn of Sorrow, Portrait of Ruin and Order of Ecclesia on good ol' DesMuMe while no one was looking.

Replaying Ecclesia for this marathon and reaching the credits had me feeling VERY nostalgic. The ending sequence, with "Requiem of Star-Crossed Nights" playing in the background got me to think a lot about those times and how things changed since then.

The relationship between Shanoa and Albus and their final conversation left me especially contemplative. I often try not to get too personal when writing reviews, but I can't help it in this case. Like many others, I lost someone very precious to me at the beginning of the decade: a big brother. The very same who introduced me to Castlevania and so many other amazing works. Pretty much responsible for who I am nowadays when it comes to taste in any media, really.

Like Albus, he shielded me even if it ended up as an inconvenience to him. Like Albus, he walked out at one point in my life, leaving me confused and often alone. And like Shanoa, I couldn't help him with his own struggles before it was too late.

Ecclesia has this melancholic tone to it. A subtle sadness that permeates through the experience, culminating in a finale that, although simple and straightforward, left me reminiscing about so much.

Oh, and uh, game's great! I revisited it through my original 100% save file. Yep, the same one from those work PCs. Kept it all this time! Although it was much nicer playing on actual hardware now. Shaving half a star off because of those stupid baloon-bomb sections, and Eligor pissed me off lmao

Shanoa may be a very basic, sometimes bland character, but beautiful character design, a fun gimmick, a SICK theme and cool one-off moments come together to make one of my favorite Castlevania protagonists, sending off the final IGAvania game with a beautiful smile.

I am the morning sun, come to vanquish this horrible night!

And here I thought my 2023 Castlevaniathon was over! Nuh uh, we're extending it! ... By one game.

It's SotN, on the go, on your phone! Being portable is nothing new, Dracula X Chronicles already took care of that. What IS new is a dedicated spell button, which feels amazing. I'm no stranger to fighting game inputs mind you, I know my pretzel motions, but doing them over and over on top of moving all over the place can get pretty tiring. Mobile SotN gives you a dedicated button to cast spells, meaning you can throw out Tetra Spirits and Soul Steals anytime in between attacks without having to stop for Hold motions.

That saaaaaaaaid... The shop glitch no longer works here, since it's based off of Dracula X Chronicles. Even if it worked in DXC, the Pause button disappears when you talk to the old man, so 0/10, mobile game ruins everything yet again.

In all seriousness, this isn't a bad way to play SotN at all, you could do MUCH worse. It's one of the best smartphone ports I've seen, so that's something.

this game fucks dude idc

I only ever played Touhou once with a couple of friends at home, and that was years after I played this for the first time. The original 2009 version that is, not the Steam re-release. Don't even remember how I found out about it, maybe my brother downloaded it from somewhere way back when.

The obvious problem is the pricing. LIke yeah, it's way too expensive for what it is. But that aside, it's super fun!

I love the character sprites. It's not exactly Classicvania-esque, it actually reminds me a lot more of the DS games. Environments don't look as graceful as the ones you'd find in the CV games but they get the job done.

What really elevates this game to me(besides nostalgia obviously, I'd be lying if I said my childhood memories aren't responsible for me looking past some of the bullshit here) is the soundtrack, and the boss fights. Gensokyo Overture, The Lost Forest, Divine Shrine Maiden, Dollhouse, Scarlet Tears and the final boss theme are all outstanding.
And the boss fights may seem unfair at first, but once you get their pattern down after a couple of tries, it feels SO good to dodge shit and maximize your damage with each opening. Full honesty, these fights had me in the zone way more than a lot of actual Classicvania bosses.

It's overpriced, the upscaled sprites look blurry, the arial ass font is horrendous and they somehow managed to misspell Remilia's name in a game with a script shorter than a kid's book, but I don't care. 10/10 would drink with Suika again

Final game for Castlevaniathon 2023, let's go!

Man, why didn't they release a "Director's Cut" version of SotN on the PS1 with all the Saturn content? orz

There's tons of cool things here! You get a dedicated item button so you don't have to open the menu and swap out weapons everytime you wanna use something, infinite Wing Smash without having to re-do the input(patches for the PS1 version don't count, shh), a really good playable Maria instead of whatever the hell happened in DXC/Requiem, two new areas that aren't THAT crazy but they have some really good music, and even a sprint powerup! Sure, it requires double tapping a direction to use it and I'd rather staple my ballsack to the ceiling after what I had to go through with Circle of the Moon, but it's there!

It's a shame this version looks fucking abysmal. Uneven pixels as far as the eye can see, no transparency, lower audio quality for some sound effects, TONS of loading in menus and areas that didn't take any longer than 3 seconds to load in the PS1, and I SWEAR the input detection for spells is busted. I've been casting Soul Steals for 18 years, Saturn SotN! I know what I'm doing!

Probably won't revisit this in the future but it was really cool checking out all this extra stuff. I haven't read anything about the development of this version, but this really does feel like the team had the opportunity to add features they always wanted to get in the game, but didn't have enough time to do so with the PS1 version.

If only we had a truly definitive version of SotN... (Psst, M2. Get on that, put it on Steam. I can guarantee people will pay for that shit.)

Update: I forgot to mention one thing! The final fight with Dracula actually has a cooler background in this version.
That's it lmao

Oh this is some fun stuff. It's Castlevania 3, but better!

Gone are the stiff controls, and instead we have a tightly paced and challenging Classicvania that's more than just a wannabe. Taking inspiration is one thing, but to surpass it? Now that's praiseworthy. And it's not hard to see how they pulled it off; Igarashi stated on multiple occasions that Castlevania III is one of his favorite games. Having the chance to improve upon it after years working on the series, the stage was set for a great reimagining.

Now, when I say it "surpasses its inspiration", I'm talking about the gameplay and visuals. Curse of the Moon's controls and presentation are leagues ahead of Dracula's Curse, but when it comes to its setting/lore and especially its music, Bloodstained and its spinoffs will never measure up to Castlevania.

That's not to say the music here is bad, mind you! I especially love Moonlight Temptation, a very gritty opening stage theme that contrasts the heroic tone found in Castlevania's opening stages.

My main gripe stems from Zangetsu. I won't dance around it: I think he kinda sucks lmao
Not his controls or anything, but this guy is chuuni to the extreme. Igarashi commented on how he wanted to try doing something different with Zangetsu, since he never added a "traditionally" Japanese character to his games before, but I think he went overboard here. Having the option to kill your potential allies, his struggle with darkness, his boss fight design/moves, and that post-credits shot of him in a futuristic setting, none of it clicked with me and honestly got me to chuckle at him instead of finding any of it really cool.

Speaking of which: Zangetsu as the final boss on Nightmare mode/the second playthrough. I don't feel like this was necessary. Sure, it's a cool fight and the presentation is sick, but replaying the same game again for one extra stage and one different boss felt unnecessary. Hopefully they'll trim that down next time.

Very solid game! On to the sequel now.

Always a blast to play through.
Old and dated? Yeah, of course. Still cool, especially on Halloween😎

AVGN was absolutely LYING about this one, what the hell. Castlevania 64 is great! Tons of fun and charm.

It does have its shortcomings, of course. Textures look a little rough, some heavy slowdown in certain areas, cutscenes tend to go on for a little long with nothing happening, and respawning enemies can get sort of annoying. That said, CV64 has motorcycle skeletons, so It's a 5/5 by default.

In all seriousness, I love that this game isn't trying to be a 3D Metroidvania; you progress through stages, mowing down skeletons, zombies and vampires in a pretty linear fashion. There are a few instances of backtracking like the infamous Nitro+Mandragora section(which is NOT NEARLY AS BAD as the aforementioned nerd made them out to be), but for the most part things keep moving forward. After leaving an area you never really visit it again, indicated by a pause and your health refilling before the screen transition. It doesn't take very long to beat either; short but sweet, offering a bit of variety with exclusive levels for both characters.

Combat takes a little bit of time to learn, but once you do, it works pretty well considering the tech at the time. Some people say that Carrie is the easier character to play as since she has a homing projectile, but I had no issues with Reinhardt.

Despite the super blurry textures, CV64 has atmosphere for days. This game perfectly captures the kind of "spooky vibe" that early Castlevania games were going for. The same could be said for the music; like CV4, it's very lowkey instead bringing the energetic vibe usually found in the other games.

If you're willing to put up with its janky spots, Castlevania 64 is a keeper.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention the time mechanic! CV64 works on a day/night cycle. It's.............. unnecessary. I feel like the game would be better off without it.

Nice ports! Although sadly Circle of the Moon is a part of it, as well as "We got Rondo of Blood at home". Doesn't matter! Aria of Sorrow makes this a must buy by itself, and Harmony of Dissonance is a nice bonus to throw in there.

Taking one star off because stupid ass Nathan Graves is all over the presentation for the menus n shit when we all know it should've been everyone's favorite exchange student 来須 蒼真 instead. (Yes I'm that petty, fuck CotM)

As others have said, pretty solid collection! CV1, 3, 4, Kid Dracula and Bloodlines are reason enough to get it imo.

I did have some weird sound skipping issues in 4, though. Not sure what was up with that.

Now, why did they choose Adventure and Belmont's Revenge to represent the Gameboy titles, I have NO idea. Out of the 3 GB games, only Legends really feels unique at all when compared to the rest of the collection. The Christopher titles just feel like EXTREMELY lesser versions of better games. Those two games alone are enough for me to bump the rating down a bit, my god are they bad.

Still! I don't wanna end this review on a bummer note. Castlevania is great, and this collection is worth your time.

Not sure if me playing tons of other CVs before this had any effect, but I could swear Chronicles was a lot harder!

Played it all the time on my modchipped PS1 lmao, I think it was my first Classicvania. And not a bad one to start with!

Chronicles isn't exactly a remake of CV1 per se; more like, a "best of Simon Belmont" sorta deal, with elements from CV1 and CV4 showing up here. You got stages straight from 1, one stage from 4, and some original ones.

Simon can whip in 5 directions, sadly missing 3 angles from CV4, but at least we have VERTICAL KNOCKBACK! GLORY BE! This alone makes Chronicles a much smoother experience compared to a lot of its more celebrated brothers.
That said, the werelady on the Clock Tower stage kicked my ASS to oblivion. Dracula should turn more girls into wolves cause that fight was probably the most fast paced non-final boss so far in this retrospective.

Originally a X6800 game, Chronicles may not look as sharp as SotN, but it has a very gritty and spooky atmosphere. It even has some really cool visual effects, like the flowery field that crumbles, revealing that it was actually a painting all along! It's nothing to scoff at.

The arranged soundtrack is NUTS though, god damn. Disco Vampire Killer, Thrashard in The Cave, Wicked Child, Moon Fight(there it is again!) and the Load BGM, all amazing tunes. They were INSPIRED arranging these tracks, I'll tell you what.

Chronicles is a good time! Tough as usual, but surprisingly fair.

We're back to reusing Rondo/SotN sprites baby! Woohoo!

Dawn of Sorrow kicks off the DS trilogy with a bang, expanding on Aria's gameplay additions and brushing up the presentation across the board. In my Aria review, I commented on how the only thing holding that game back from being my favorite Castlevania is the hardware it was released on.

Dawn of Sorrow looks, feels and sounds EXACTLY like what I had in mind. I mean, in some ways the DS is basically a portable PS1 in terms of power, right? Perhaps this is a glimpse of what Aria would've looked like on that system. I especially love the 2D areas with 3D backgrounds, like the village houses and the iconic clock tower.

Now, not everything hits the mark. The art is a SEVERE downgrade from previous games. I realize that it made sense for the time, but Ayami Kojima's works can never be replaced, especially not by this.
The dual screen was also a huge missed opportunity. Instead of adding gimmicks like breaking blocks or drawing seals to finish off bosses, they could have added something like a marker system to the map, where you'd be able to add memos to certain areas so you remember what to do in them later. "Small gap here", "high jump here", etc. Sadly they didn't quite see it that way, so hope you played enough Trauma Center before this.

The dialogue is also pretty bad at points. Characters constantly say things like "It's too dangerous, you should step back" to each other, and Hammer creeping over Yoko/Yoko creeping over Soma's relationship with Mina over the course of their shop dialogues got real old, real fast. The alternate endings were pretty cool though.

Beyond that, there's... Something about the design here that feels less focused than Aria's. I can't quite put my finger on what, but after finishing the game earlier today, I didn't quite feel like going back to 100% it.

Still a great game, don't get me wrong, but better visuals and soundtrack aside, Aria still comes out on top for me.

GOD that soundtrack is good.
But "best game in the NES trilogy"? I don't know about that.

I love the visuals, the branching paths and the extra characters, but the difficulty shot up to 11 while leaving much to be desired in terms of mechanical polish.

Trevor is just as stiff to control as Simon, but CV3 requires a lot more precision from the player when compared to CV1. Trying to use items while going up stairs? It was already a problem in the first game, but it's 10x more noticeable and intrusive here. The side characters alleviate this issue a bit; Sypha can freeze enemies, Alucard can fly, and Grant can climb shit. That helps, but the stiffness is still there.

Still a great game though, filled to the BRIM with some of the best music in the series. A shame that it went on to inspire the animated series, but what you do. We can't all be winners ¯\(ツ)/¯

(... Why does a crow deal 3 bars of damage early on, but then deals 5 bars in the late game??? It's the same bird! At least palette swap the damn chicken!)

Any game with an Item Duplication glitch is an immediate 10/10, so yeah. That's the review.

Ok, for real though. It's fun! And a nice origin story for the Belmont clan.

We're back in 3D land, and in a post Symphony of the Night world, it's only natural they would try to replicate the search-action formula in the third dimension.
It obviously doesn't work as well as it did for SotN. This is one area in which I feel Castlevania 64 actually one-ups this game, the level-to-level structure and platform-heavy design of CV64 just worked for me. Lament's approach to exploration isn't exactly bad, but I'd be lying if the multiple repeated rooms in each area and the long corridors with fuck all in them didn't have me thinking of Reinhardt and Carrie's adventure instead.

That said, in all other aspects, Lament comes out on top compared to its 3D predecessors. It obviously looks better, both in terms of 3D models and character design, the music has Michiru Yamane's fingerprints all over it, and the combat is far more elaborate than the 1-hit max slapfest of CV64. It's not Devil May Cry 3 levels of intricate, but considering it's their first attempt at something like this, it does a fine job.

Lament serves as an origin point for the Castlevania timeline, so there's more emphasis on story this time around, meaning lots of voice acting and cutscenes after each boss.
The voice performance is... Alright. It's clear that the voice cast is talented, and the script is much better than SotN's, but the voice direction is a little stilted. Since most of the cutscenes are pre-rendered, I assume the voice actors had no choice but to talk as fast as the cutscene runtime demanded. That doesn't mean it lacks cool lines though; Leon's speech to Death at the end comes to mind, very badass.

Overall, a very accessible entry in the series. It really doesn't ask a lot from the player and it's not very long either, which might be a downside to some, but as someone who's marathoning a whole bunch of Castlevania games in one go and also appreciates short games a lot more nowadays, I like that about it.

It's Castlevania 64, expanded!

Legacy of Darkness isn't exactly a new game, just the original N64 title with extra features, and they absolutely make this the better version.

Better lock on, higher resolution with the expansion pack, faster climbing, upgradeable subweapons, actual camera controls, new levels, new layouts for the original levels, and two new characters: Cornell and Hunk-- I mean, Henry.

Cornell is the star of the show. He's in the box art, and is the only playable character at first. This game takes place years before CV64, detailing how that game's Dracula came to be.
Completing the campaign as Cornell will unlock Henry, WHO HAS A GUN!
Henry's mode is pretty straightforward: Rescue the kidnapped children from 6 levels before time runs out. Not nearly as much puzzle solving or time-card using, just blast through the hordes of evil while looking for the missing kids. Finishing his mode while rescuing everyone will unlock Reinhardt and Carrie, Hard mode, and everyone's alt costumes.

I didn't replay the game with Reinhardt and Carrie but from what I looked up, their campaigns are largely the same, with some new layouts.

Legacy of Darkness is simply a better Castlevania 64. Play both if you're a nerd, or stick to LoD if you only have time for one.

Miriam, shut up. Please, shut up. Just shut the fuck up. Jesus Christ.
This isn't the first time that an Igavania has the protagonist shouting spell names, but it's easily the worst one of them all. Thankfully I managed to find some shards I enjoyed using that had alright voice lines, but still, just don't do this. It baffles me that there are dozens of tiddy mods out there but not a single one that disables the spell shouting. Easily the most egregious thing in the game.

Okay, with that out of the way...

I played this for the first time back in 2020. Explored a bit, got the bad ending and then... Dropped it. Literally never touched it again since. Couldn't tell you why, it just kinda happened.
However, this October, I set off on a journey to finish every Castlevania game. Bloodstained may not carry the title, but make no mistake: It's got plenty of Castlevania DNA in it, so I included it in the marathon.

I don't know what changed but this time, I couldn't put it down. Any game that has me ignoring my sleep schedule to stay up till 5AM is doing something right, and Bloodstained did just that.
Bringing back the Soul system from Aria of Sorrow was the right decision. Loved it in that game and I love it here. Tons of variety and spells to experiment with, I ended up playing around with a lot of them until I couldn't stand Miriam shouting any longer I found a set of shards I REALLY liked.
Exploration felt very natural, though I'll admit it took me quite some time to figure out how to drain the blood from the entrance pool, even after defeating the umbrella girl. Maybe playing so many games back to back dimmed my critical thinking lmao

I also really like these areas. The ones that play around with camera angles were some of my favorites, like the clock tower and the sandy tombs. It's also the first time we got a fully Japanese themed area in the series! Torii gates, tons of candles, a really neat effect where killing an enemy behind a paper door will splatter some blood on it, and a shamisen going nuts in the soundtrack. All great stuff.

Speaking of the soundtrack: It's good! It's not on my top 3 Castlevania OSTs, but it has some really good tracks. Galleon Minerva, the Church and the Underground Caverns are all A+. (The Church reminded me a lot of Aria of Sorrow specifically. A bit of "House of Sacred Remains" in there too.)

The story is nothing to write home about. It's about what I expected for a "this is totally not Castlevania, don't worry about it" sort of deal. Saw the twist villain coming almost immediately. There's plenty of lore books scattered around the castle, and it almost felt like playing a Resident Evil game at one point. You know the deal. "We're researching this messed up stuff. I don't care if there are risks, I'm doing it!" [A couple bookshelves later] "Oh no. Dozens are dying. Did I do this? Now there's no turning back..."
Also, Zangetsu being a major pushover in both of his fights, then going "h-heh, I was holding back..." just reinforces the disdain I've had for the dude since Curse of the Moon. Doesn't matter if it's that game or this, he's so lame to me.

It has some problems, obviously. The Quest system from Order of Ecclesia is back, but there's waaaaaaaay too many of them. By the time the old lady was asking me to make her some fucking Katsudon after 20 other meal requests, I just dropped her. Same for the church girl who asked for keepsake items. These kind of quests are fine, Ecclesia had them as well, but that was like 35 quests. Bloodstained has nearly 60 of them, and on top of finding the ingredients(some can have an abysmal drop rate), you need to actually craft the meals, not just deliver ingredients. It takes so long, I just lost interest.
On that topic: Crafting. There's waaaaaaay too much of it here. It was fun in Curse of Darkness, Dawn of Sorrow was a bit on the grindy side but still bearable, but Bloodstained goes overboard with the mechanic. When I found my favorite Shards and upgraded them to Max, and once I figured out you could equip and summon your Sword familiar at the same time, I never looked back on it.
Environments look good, but cutscenes, 3D models and some VFX are very rough. The cutscene where Miriam extends her hand to Zangetsu in the final boss comes to mind, good lord was that goofy.
Conversations also reminded my a LOT of Castlevania Judgment. Idle breathing animations while the characters talk, and that's it. Every now and then Miriam has one different pose where she's angry, but every other time is idle_anim.000 city for everyone.
I won't lie, I would rather have a 2D game. Especially if Bloodstained is supposed to be a culmination of IGA's best works, why opt for 3D models? I get it, pixel art takes a lot of time and effort, but this was also one of the most successful Kickstarter projects at the time. People still praise Symphony of the Night's visuals to this day, because that shit is timeless, like digital paintings you can traverse. Miriam(and everyone else)'s dead fish-esque 3D face is not the upgrade from Ayami Kojima's static portraits that they seem to think it is. 3-4 static images for each character would've been so much easier on the eyes.

Last and probably least since it didn't bother me much at the end of the day: I don't really care for any of the stretch goal extra modes. Boss Rush and playing as Zangetsu are good additions, standard stuff for Castlevania really, but everything else is just kind of there. Not a bad thing at all, especially if you loved your time with it, but...

I didn't. Don't get me wrong, I had tons of fun. Like I said, kept playing all the way to the ass crack of dawn. But I didn't love it.

Maybe this is what made me drop the game on my first time through. Maybe I was expecting to be enamored with it instantly, to finally have a game that has me feeling how Symphony of the Night made me feel when I first played it.
Bloodstained is not that game. And I guess that in this second playthrough, that was my new perspective. "Let's play and enjoy it for its own merits". Enjoy it I did, but not nearly as much as most of the games I've played for this Castlevania marathon.

It's bittersweet, really. I had fun. But I expected so much more out of it.

See, now THIS feels like a portable, lower budget take on the SotN formula, instead of whatever the hell Circle of the Moon was trying to be.

Yeah sure it looks kind of crusty, the soundtrack ranges from "hey this is pretty good" to calculator music and the story is yet another "protagonist's friend/acquaintance goes bonkers from too much Dracula juice" deal, but I actually had fun this time.

The spellbook system is neat and it actually rewards exploration instead of having you farm them from enemy drops, there's a lot more variety in terms of equipment, and Juste makes me feel like fucking Sonic Olgilvie Maurice Hedgehog when compared to Nathan's movement speed/options.

There are two things that pissed me off though. First: the merchant system.
Why in the unholy name of Vlad did they think having a merchant that only spawns under certain conditions was a good idea? And he doesn't even carry anything THAT mind blowing to make up for it! (Shop theme is pretty funky though)
Second, and this is me going full hypocrite mode: Two castles.

Now, SotN is one of my favorite games of all time. Yet even I will admit that I'm 1000% biased because it was part of my childhood. The inverted castle blows tremendously, and it's a gigantic shitstain on what would otherwise be an actual perfect game.
Dissonance brings back the two castle shenanigans, and actually does it MUCH better than SotN. The two castles exist "at the same time", meaning that things that you do in one version of the castle will affect the other. So if there's an impassable boulder in Castle A, you can go to Castle B and find that the same room now has a giant Armor dude that you can knock back to break the boulder on Castle B, then boom! Boulder A will be gone.
It's a VASTLY superior system to SotN's, and yet... I still groaned like a zombie when Death explained that there were two castles to explore.

Look, I get it. These games were made on a shoestring budget, so they had to compromise and find ways to expand the game. But I GUARANTEE that more people would be satisfied with like, 2 extra areas that are unique, instead of an entire castle that's just the first one with a few layout changes and new enemies. Would that make the game shorter? Possibly, yeah, but I personally think it would make for a more enjoyable and rewarding experience.

It's still a big step in the right direction though, don't get me wrong. Rewarding exploration, busted subweapons, fun movement options, Lydie is a baddie, and furniture collecting is a thing. Dissonance may not be my first choice if I'm ever in a Castlevania mood, but it's far from the last either.

Leveling system, a permanent inventory of items, weapon upgrades, a non-linear structure, a KILLER soundtrack, even multiple endings depending on your playtime à la Resident Evil ranks...

Is this game actually a masterpiece?

... No, but playing it with a guide makes it easy to see how they tried to do a LOT of cool stuff here. Keyword being "tried", as the shoddy translation and lack of an in-game map fail to elevate its non-linear aspirations.

Without a guide? Anal fissure!

Truly the Megaman of Castlevania games.

Really cute and really fun! Last few levels were a bit ruthless but that wasn't enough to ruin what is a super charming game. I shouldn't have to toggle weapons to use the Bat transformation tho orz

Kinda wish we got more games like this! Kid Dracula on the SNES! Kid Dracula 64! Over time, the Castlevania games got a bit grittier; that's not a bad thing, of course, but Kid Dracula as a spinoff series could've easily taken things to the opposite extreme. Alas...

(Lady Liberty lookin fine also 👀)

Now THIS is an improvement! Adventure was hot garbage, Belmont's Revenge was smoldering garbage, but Legends manages to close the Gameboy trilogy with moderate success.

The ropes are still around, walking is still slow, and it doesn't look particularly great thanks to the hardware. But this time around, I actually had fun!
The jump got upgraded to Castlevania IV levels of control, meaning you don't need to propose to your jump arc anymore; after a jump, you can move back and forth as necessary. Instead of subweapons, you have spells that you obtain after each boss à la Megaman and they're all useful, just poorly ordered. (Why is the 1-Heart dagger-esque spell the fourth one you acquire instead of being the first? Hmm.)

Alternate paths are now a thing but not in the Castlevania III sense. There's still only one correct path to the Stage boss, but in order to obtain the best ending, you need to collect 5 relics located in these alternate paths. Exploring was nice, but if you ended up taking the correct path and crossed a door, you wouldn't be able to backtrack to get the relic. That's pretty dumb, but I can appreciate the attempt.

The music is MUCH better compared to its Gameboy siblings. Battle with Alucard, Clock Tower and this very snazzy Vampire Killer arrange are my favorite examples. It's a shame the Gameboy soundfont really doesn't do it justice.
... Thankfully, there's a VRC6 version of the OST available! Man, do some of these compositions really shine here.

Honestly, if Simon's Quest was structured like this back in the NES, I think its reputation wouldn't be nearly as bad as it is, as Legends' real problems (at least to me) come from the hardware it was released on. The slow movement, the sound quality, the simple visuals... If this was a late NES game instead, we would've had a pretty sick game.

As it is, Castlevania Legends is a good game, sadly hindered by the Gameboy's lack of power.

More Curse of the Moon! New characters! New stages! Beautiful animations! The same ending gimmick!

No, literally. Episode 1 ends the exact same way CotM1's first playthrough ended, except Dominique is the one jumping in front of her allies to protect them from a big orb of darkness, before we get a shot of the castle with the party determined to rescue her. Verbatim.

"Oh, okay. CotM1 had a second playthrough too. Sure, it's kinda stupid they used the same excuse for it here, but I had fun. Let's go."
Then I selected a new file. A menu pops up with the options Episode 1, Episode 2, ?????? and ??????. I looked it up. "Same stages, but there's new final bosses, and you can access some paths that were previously inaccessible since you have other characters earlier". I shut down the game.

This actually soured my opinion of the game to an absurd degree. Are they that insecure about the game's length? Do they really want me to replay this shit four fucking times just so I can get the "True" ending? This multiple ending bullshit has no business being a thing in Classicvania anyway, the only game to really do it right was Rondo of Blood and that's because A) Instead of "different paths through the same stage", it gave you entirely new stages, and B) almost NOTHING changed if you failed to rescue the maidens. It literally just changes the credits scene a bit. Woo, it's sunset instead of sunny and Richter is riding on a carriage instead of a lone horse!

And sorry if what I'm about to say is a bit blunt, but the world and lore of Bloodstained established in these spinoff games simply aren't interesting or deep enough to warrant such an overdesigned multiple ending structure.
Castlevania games didn't start having multiple endings like this until Symphony of the Night where they were pretending to give a shit about story and narrative. Not only that, but this kind of structure actually fits Metroidvania far better than it does Classicvania because the whole "exploring every nook and cranny for upgrades and items" naturally benefits the "you need to do and so you can get the true ending" design philosophy. Those games encourage you to check everything, so why not reward the player for going the extra mile with different outcomes at the end? Not the case in Classicvania. These games are about going left to right while killing shit and choosing whether to spend weapon energy or life to get through obstacles, beating the final boss, then game over. That's it.

It's a fun game. I like all the new characters, the levels and bosses were fun, the difficulty felt just right; but this multiple Episode shit is dumb. If I ever come back to this, i'll just play Episode 1 again.

If all you had was a Super Nintendo back in the day, this game would be alright. Now? Especially when playing it right after Rondo? Good lord. Slowdown when walking, anyone?

In all fairness, it's not like this game is a "lesser Rondo of Blood". There's tons of different things going on here, especially the levels. It's all new from what I could tell, but I didn't take all routes in the game so maybe there's some copy pasting, who knows.

Now, all Castlevanias have issues with enemy placement, it's nothing new. But MAN did Drac X give me a hard time with it; spears coming out the edge of the screen, bats cropping up ONE MILLIMETER before entering a door, the list goes on. Don't even get me started on those jumps where you have to be basically off the edge to land.

And how about that Death fight with the one move you're basically forced to Item Crash to avoid? Fun times. You know what's even more fun? A VERY slow, very tedious Dracula fight where you have like... A SECOND to hit his face before he disappears. Oh yeah, and make sure to wait until his "poofing in" animation is fully over, otherwise you'll be hitting jack and shit.

Unless you're going for a full series retrospective, don't bother. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I won't lie, it got me a bit tilted.

OH YEAH, no playable Maria. Immediate 0/5

Very dull. And like the first game, 0 reason to play this when ANY other entry in the series does this but better. There's one REALLY good stage theme there at least.

Also: WHAT'S WITH ALL THE ROPES? GOOD LORD

It's an improvement, in the same way that eating salted dog shit is an improvement from eating regular dog shit.

Behold! Our very own Gothic Kusoge!

Nope, not pushing through with this. I finished Simon and Alucard's stories, that was it for me. There's NOTHING to see here.

All the cool stuff about this game, you can just check out on Google or YouTube.
Love the art, LOVE the music. Everything else is a trainwreck of the highest caliber.

Models look rough up close, eyes are just a flat texture so they don't animate during cutscenes(though that's not a big deal anyway since there's ZERO animation when characters talk to each other during Story Mode except for blinking. I'm not kidding.), the menu effects are following in the footsteps of Ehrgeiz, etc, etc.

I love how you can tell the dev team was like "Oh shit, we need a grappler character. Fighting games have grapplers, right? What do we do?" so they just added a random ass Golem enemy to the roster. Sorry Soma, maybe you should have lifted more weights instead of collecting souls.

It truly is a shame because there's a ton of potential for a Castlevania fighting game, but it was thoroughly squandered here. If only Konami wasn't morphing into a gargantuan mass of bullshit around that time, perhaps they could've eventually collabed with Arc System Works in the future for a truly fun fighting game spinoff. Sadly, that isn't the world we live in.

The Obata designs fuck tremendously and the soundtrack is peak, so check those out.

Rampant slowdown? Check! Dropped inputs that would put Monster Hunter Freedom to shame? Check! One of the worst jump arcs in any 8 bit platformer? Check! Enemies that punish you for taking advantage of the new whip powerup? Check, check, check!

This is worthless. Its only defining feature, being a portable Castlevania, is now utterly obsolete in 2023. You know what else is portable? Symphony of the Night, the Aria duology, Rondo of Blood. You can skip this and lose nothing.

Actual sludge. From beginning to end, playing Circle of the Moon felt like trodding neck deep through a swamp.

Where to start? The abysmal walking speed that's somehow less bearable than Adventure/Belmont's Revenge, which is then remedied by the most dumbfounding addition to any game with an interconnected map: Running by means of double tapping a direction. Double tap, then double jump to reach a ledge. Whoops, there's another ledge to your back. Time to double tap on the opposite direction, then double jump again. Whoops, there's another ledge to your back. Over and over again.

The most soul draining, depressing rewards ever placed behind breakable walls. Do you like getting an HP up for your troubles? How about an MP up? How does a Heart Max up sound? And how do you feel about an HP up now? MP up tonight, baby? Over and over again.

It's not like there's any kind of different rewards they could've placed on those hidden rooms-- Hold up...

Pretty interesting card system right? You can mix and match different cards to get unique skills. What's that? You want to add more cards to your collection? Hope you like grinding the same enemies to get a card to drop, only to find that the effects you get from it aren't even that impressive. Or, you know, you could just use the card swap glitch to use whichever combination you want, whenever. In either case, get ready to bring up that main menu, over and over again.

And hey! They even brought back some classic tracks like Sinking Old Sanctuary! It's a little shitty that it plays during a portion of the game where you have little to no movement skills, meaning it'll feel as if it's looping infinitely. It's even weirder that it plays on the literal final room in the game, too. And in some area transitions. Over and over again.

Over and over and over and over and over. Everything in this game circles back around itself making for an ouroboros of bullshit.

Attacks don't cancel when you land, exploring feels like a slog even after unlocking movement relics, the story-- which is something I don't really care about in most Castlevania games-- actually had me rolling my eyes with the one(01) twist it had, character design feels flat across the board except for Camilla, animations look stiff, good GOD this is awful.

This fucking game ACTUALLY had me looking up how to do TWO frame perfect glitches so I could instantly nuke everything on my second playthrough to get all achievements before dropping it and never touching it again.

This is inexcusable. It's so painfully obvious that a B team worked on this. No wonder it was taken off the official timeline; the fact they plastered Nathan's dumbass face all over the Advance Collection is baffling, simply inconceivable. GBA Castlevania is known for Aria of Sorrow, and for a DAMN good reason.

Maybe if I played this when I was little I could see past its flaws thanks to nostalgia, but as it stands, Circle of the Moon is not only the worst Castlevania game in my personal totem pole, it's one of my least favorite games period, and the first 0,5 rating in my profile. Never would have guessed that a CV title would get that honor, but here we are. Fuck this game.

Let me just start by saying that this rating is from the perspective of a hardcore Castlevania fan only. If all you want is an alright hack'n'slash, you'll find worse things out there, I guess.

I couldn't. After playing through every single game in the series up to this point, I couldn't continue playing through Lords of Shadow any longer than Chapter 2. It's not a Castlevania game.

And I don't even mean that from a story/style perspective, although it does apply there as well. This kind of gameplay doesn't resemble a Castlevania game in any way, shape or form. Look up a video or boot up the demo, and forget about the game's title for a second. If you're like me, Castlevania is the LAST thing that'll run through your head.

Constantly being interrupted and told HEY LOOK AT THIS, MAYBE YOU SHOULD FIND A WAY TO BLOW THIS UP. MAYBE YOU SHOULD TRY TO LIGHT UP THESE RUNES.
The game QUITE LITERALLY goes "You can't do anything about this obstacle yet. Come back later once you've upgraded your skills" at one point. After playing through dozens of games that actually respected my intelligence and let me figure things out myself, Lords of Shadow zooming the camera on a ledge and making the edge super shiny just to make sure I wouldn't miss it felt like having a prank played on me.

I hate the way this game looks, I absolutely despise it. It blends in with literally any western fantasy action game imaginable. But you know what's funny? What pissed me off the most wasn't the visuals. It wasn't the gameplay. It wasn't the story. All of those things have gargantuan problems if you're looking at them from the lenses of a Castlevania game, but they're passable if what you want is a cheap God of War knockoff.

What sucked my soul and dragged it to hell was the music. No joke.
The soundtrack in this game is genuine, corrosive slop. It's unacceptable. I JUST finished Harmony of Despair hours before starting this, and it felt like I was committing a felony to my ears. The most generic, uninspired "epic fantasy" score you could ever conceive in your imagination. Ask Chat GPT to generate you a fantasy score, you'll end up with tracks far more remarkable. I couldn't take any of what I was looking at seriously because every scene was presented with the epitome of "soulless" in the background.

I won't waste any more time with Lords of Shadow or its sequels when I have much better games to check out before October ends. Truly a shame that these are the last games to bear the "Castlevania" title. A proper death would've been preferable.