Is That Castlevania in Your Pocket?

[Canadamus Prime]

I have never really been into Castlevania, but I think I did play Dawn of Sorrow. Didn't get very far though.

 

[Sheo_Dagana]

I have to say, I was extremely unimpressed with Order of Ecclesia. I was happy for the return to a more traditional Castlevania art-style, but everything else about the game was just insanely boring. I also stopped playing once Dracula's castle - which, while not as large as previous iterations, was still no small map - made it's eventual appearence, and at that point I was kind of ready for the game to just be over. Then there was so much more.

To be perfectly fair, Harmony of Dissonance also lost my interests quickly. I did enjoy Circle of the Moon, after all, it was the reason I got a GBA, but Aria of Sorrow was just fantastic. By Order of Ecclesia, I was tired of Metroidvania titles. Now, after Mirror of Fate, I long to see another one. It's sad when one game can be so terrible it makes you want to be bored again.

 

[SmallHatLogan]

I have to say while the first play throughs of each of the SoTN clones were somewhat enjoyable I found them all to be fairly derivative and uninspired for the most part. Order of Ecclesia is the only one that I can distinctly remember things about (areas, bosses, powers, etc) and for me it's definitely the stand out of the SoTN type games.

 

[RedmistSM]

It's gratifying to hear Dawn of Sorrow might be your favorite if not for the boring art style and the terrible little drawings you have to do to put away a boss. It's my favorite, despite those flaws. Frankly, whether the portraits have five expressions and are a very boring anime-y style or have one expression and is a pretty, detailed drawing doesn't matter that much to me.
Ecclesia didn't disappoint me with its main character(though she's certainly not very likeable), but wit the level design. So many of the small stages are very linear and flat and uninteresting. When I finally entered Dracula's castle and the design got intricate again, I was psyched.

Cool to finally hear your opinion on the DS offerings of Castlevania, feel like I heard you talk about it ages ago on a Let's drown out.

 

[Arcane Azmadi]

I actually believe Aria of Sorrow was THE best game in the entire Castlevania franchise, primitive GBA graphics aside. It had by far the best plot of the entire series (Dawn of Sorrow was too much of a retread) with the setting and "your character is the reincarnation of Dracula" twist in particular really impressing, the level and boss design was fantastic and the soul drop rate was just right (in DoS, as well as needing to grind multiple copies of a soul to max it out, the drop rate in general was just ABYSMALLY low).

I also still haven't beaten Order of Ecclesia, although in my case I know EXACTLY why- because it's a return to the classic pre-Symphony series tradition of being hard as bollocks and I got a bit frustrated with it, which is death for a game when I have literally dozens of other, easier games clamouring for my attention at the same time. I do intend to go back and finish it sometime.

 

[Wilco86]

I also still haven't beaten Order of Ecclesia, although in my case I know EXACTLY why- because it's a return to the classic pre-Symphony series tradition of being hard as bollocks and I got a bit frustrated with it, which is death for a game when I have literally dozens of other, easier games clamouring for my attention at the same time.

At least you can grind levels in the previous levels etc. that wasn't an option "in the oldie days".

A few years ago I played Bloodlines with an emulator, and Death made a friggin' Mega Man -style boss rush during the battle. I sooo wished I had a chance to grind my stats up before that fight like in Metroidvanias (SotN's Death is a joke, BTW)... No big surprise I had to use save states to beat the bastard.

 

[Lazule]

Thanks for this.
I heard you talking about Yahtzee using Castevania games as Dark Souls substitute, which got me curious since I find myself in a similar position also looking for games similar Dark Souls.

Now I'm only wondering which podcasts he listens to.

Play Castlevania: Symphony of The Night if you haven't. Its NOT as hard as Dark Souls but the gameplay is kick-ass just like Dark Souls.

It can be a little harder if you play on Luck mode which gives you a high starting Luck but all your other stats are low. Also you'll feel like a bad-ass playing as Alucard even if you don't know much about the character, he controls quite nicely.

 

[RolandOfGilead]

I loved all six portable 2d Cv's.
I think I finished Albus mode on Ecclesia, but haven't gone back and finished Hard Mode for Shanoa.