Castlevania is one of the gaming industry's most popular and influential titles boasting a library of over 40 titles since 1986. The franchise's first release was Castlevania for the FamiCom and has evolved to many different but closely related gameplay mechanics while still retaining the series' core - to defeat Dracula (unless you're him).
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I grew up playing all the Castlevania releases for Nintendo handhelds raiding castles with the likes of Juste Belmont and Soma Cruz.
The first title that I played was Circle of the Moon way back in my elementary days, and though I felt badass playing a game with an ESRB rating of T for Toddler (oh wait...) it was a short lived first playthrough since I only borrowed the copy for like thirty minutes.
The GBA title that followed after CotM, Harmony of Dissonance was the first Castlevania title that I owned and I still love it to this day. Since Harmony of Dissonance I have played nine titles with Castlevania Lords of Shadow: Mirror of Fate being the latest.
Well...the franchise sure did grow in the wrong direction after Mr. Igarashi left Konami.
Anyway before anyone gets the wrong idea, this list is a ranking of the nine games I played in the franchise and not the Top 9 of the whole Castlevania library. Expect all of the titles here to be a handheld console title, or if not, a port of the original.
I have three categories in my ranking: Plot, gameplay, and my personal experience playing the game. Alright I know, you guys must be asking why I'm not considering music since the Castlevania franchise boasts one of the most magnificent soundtracks in video games, the answer to that is simple - I seldom play with the volume on. Needless to say, I enjoyed most of the BGM and themes used in all the games that I've played.
Also included per title are some of my favorite enemies, characters, etc.
Anyway, here we go:
9. Castlevania Lords of Shadow: Mirror of Fate
Platform: Nintendo 3DS
Difficulty: 5/5
(To save space I won't be including any of my favorites in this game since I have none)
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To the readers who frequent my blog, they should know that I have a deep hatred over this particular title in the Castlevania franchise and the whole N3DS library. First of all, it changed the history that the series had built upon starting from the early games to the era of Koji Igarashi, how? Well let's see shall we - Dracula is a Belmont, Alucard is Trevor, (just wtf?) completely re-imagining two characters at once (and ruining them) and Simon, well Simon has become more barbaric but ultimately less impressive as a character than his counterpart in the original franchise. I ultimately didn't pay attention to the story even if it did try the ambitious take of storytelling in different timelines. It just didn't click for me.
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| I mean c'mon, melding Alucard and Trevor into one character is not the way to go |
Aside from the complete re-imagining of Castlevania's history it is also, for the most part, a complete departure of the Metroidvania style of gameplay that became the series' standard after the success of Symphony of the Night. Still, I did enjoy exploring the castle thanks to its wonderful and more grotesque design creating a creepier atmosphere compared to the cartoonish design of previous titles, however there's really no enjoyment in going back to explored areas since most places are one-hit wonders, then dull on the next.
The combat system in Lords of Shadow was also a fresh take in Castlevania vampire hunting. While past games focused on hack-and-slash using equipped weapons (mainly the Vampire Hunter), sub-weapons, and magic LoS:MoF focuses more on well timed combos, guarding, dodging, and smart use of magic with an easily depleted magic gauge, and smart use of scarce sub-weapons. The combat system plays similar to God of War and Dante's Inferno having ability upgrades, collecting purple orbs to unlock new abilities, and acquiring new magic support along the journy, but as Los:MoF is still practically a side-scroller the combat system felt out of place in the 2D environment, and to make it even worse movement is done using the Circle Pad, not the D-Pad even if it is the obvious choice in a game which requires you to move either right or left most of the time.
Perhaps the only good selling point of Mirror of Fate is its difficulty. Yes, I die a lot in Castlevania games but no, not as much as I have died in Mirror of Fate. There are no potions, mind-ups and save points to replenish health in the game, only a few chests and fountains located at some points around the castle are there to save you from restarting the level by replenishing either your health or magic bar. Though the difficulty is a nice touch to the series giving combat a boost, having to replay the same area again and again with lackluster cutscenes (cutscenes can be skipped by the way) is more tedious than fun.
I never finished my copy of Mirror of Fate (it's for sale, by the way) and probably never will. It just doesn't have the same charm as past titles that have simple yet addicting combat systems, and have a great emphasis in exploration. Castlevania Lords of Shadow: Mirror of Fate is anything except Castlevania.
8. Castlevania: Circle of the Moon
Platform: Game Boy Advanced
Difficulty: 4/5
Fav. DSS: Apollo + Thunderbird (everybody loves the Thunderbird)
Fav. Ability: Wall jump
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Despite CotM being the title that introduced me to the Castlevania franchise I didn't get to play it completely until my sophomore year in high school. As I stated above, when I first played this it was only for thirty minutes since I only borrowed the game cart, and since 2009 was a year where early titles for the GBA were nearly extinct my only option was to play this game using an emulator.
The first thing I noticed upon starting the game was that it was really dark - not just the theme and setting but also the design. In a way, the dark design was a perfect fit to the game since candles can only go so far in the illumination of a gigantic castle, unlike the other titles that followed wherein Dracula seemed to have installed a hundred Philips light bulbs in every room. But since this is a game and not a firsthand experience inside Dracula's castle I do think that a brighter environment is better (as if it wasn't obvious enough that I still had to say it).
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| not in a dark castle, we're not |
Anyway, despite the dark environment Circle of the Moon boasts a dynamic combat system thanks to the DSS, and sub-weapons returning from Symphony of the Night. Although, the complete combinations of the DSS are not readily available at the start of the game, it makes beating enemies and exploring the castle more compelling.
This is also one of the more challenging Castlevania titles that I've played thanks to the rarity of potions, slow regeneration of MP, and insufficient save points. The difficulty of the game is close to insane but its hesitance to kill you immediately makes you rely more in survival than actual combat. Most of the time when I have acquired a new ability and new routes open up for exploration, the enemies within those new areas tend to be more challenging strictly implying a certain level cap per new area (most titles that followed didn't enforce such a heavy burden) prompting me to repeatedly whip to oblivion all the enemies in a particular area with a nearby save point to increase that stiff EXP count. But even with a high level, some enemies are just hard hitters that takes up a lot of health points.
The castle in Circle of the Moon was simplistic in design (and dark...alright I'll stop now) but certain roadblocks prevent further exploration of areas you think you already have the necessary abilities to progress with. Some areas are also very spacious that it's hard to see what's further down, up, left or right on that certain area without taking a big leap, and then, in worst possible cases suddenly you find yourself back at the lowest part of the castle. The map doesn't really help in navigating through the castle since it's not well detailed and often times following said map got me lost more times than without looking at it.
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| see those big blue spaces? those aren't spacious at all! |
While CotM excel in most parts that defines Castlevania I just don't find the story appealing. It doesn't have any appropriate place in the timeline and the story is pretty much self-contained. But probably the greatest set back that I can think of in Circle of the Moon is that the story is incredibly shorter than what the whole gameplay presents - for short exploration > progression of the story, and because of that I just can't bring myself to fully embrace this title's story since it puts exploration above plot.
7. Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles
Platform: Sony PSP
Difficulty: 4/5
Fav. Character: Maria Renard
Fav. Item: Turkey on the Wall, Symphony of the Night disk...something
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This game was my first experience playing with the original game mechanics of Castlevania - single HP bar, no items, incredibly hard to control player thanks to slippery and almost unresponsive controls, and unpredictable enemies. Now before you guys say it's just as how I see Mirror of Fate, this game ranks higher because I actually had fun playing this (and it includes Symphony of the Night, so yeah +50 for that).
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| playing through until chapter 3.5 or 4 just to get the game was worth it |
The oldest Castlevania game that I've played is Symphony of the Night, any Castlevania title before that were legends untouchable to me. But thanks to this remake of Rondo of Blood I got to experience at least a bit of the pre-SotN era - it was hard. Playing as Richter (my favorite Belmont) was a long time wish of mine since I fought him as the Whip's Memory in Portrait of Ruin. While his appearance has changed from his original hunter look to a more bishounen heart-throb who had the time to shower before approaching the castle, once I got to control him it turned me off real fast. Before I got my hands on Dracula X Chronicles I'm already used to the post-Symphony era so I had the culture shock coming but I never imagined it would be such a slippery gameplay. Heck, I died trying to kill the last Axe Armor before the drawbridge leading to the castle, even the Black Crows the moment I entered the garden gave me a hard time.
Once I was inside the castle an endless stream of zombies approached me in thrilla' fashion and an annoying Peeping Eye keeps stalking me, and if that wasn't enough a Behemoth suddenly appears chasing after you until you get to the next room. I was frustrated in this part since this was a key event in the game where I had to pick up a key (yes pun intended) and drop down a particular pit full of annoying Mermans just to rescue my favorite character in this game - Maria Renard.
Richter becomes an irrelevant character real fast in his own game once Maria has been unlocked. Maria is faster, she can jump higher, she has a longer range, she has cute little animals as sub-weapons, she uses two birds as main weapons, and she's a loli.
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| well, she could be sleeping while standing so we're never too sure, ain't that right Richter? |
But despite her excellent combat abilities, she doesn't have the most impressive offense and she only excels in defense when she's hiding under her shell.
The level design was gorgeous mainly because everything from Rondo of Blood has been remodeled here. Certain areas of each level where it requires the smart use of sub-weapons with just a few hearts were actually more fun than they were frustrating, but once these areas have been crossed they have little to no replay value going back.
The story of Dracula X Chronicles is divided by chapters and has particular events per chapter that mainly focus on the girls of Richter's harem. No, really this game is just full of ladies who wants to get their hands on Richter, but only when some events have been fulfilled can these ladies be saved from the castle, otherwise I'm pretty sure they'd turn into mid-bosses of their own chapters.
I managed to play as Maria until the boss fight with Death, and like I said before it was D.I.F.F.I.C.U.L.T.
You guys might hate me for this but I didn't challenge myself any further than Death since I've already unlocked Symphony of the Night by that time so I just kinda left Dracula X Chronicles and only played it for Symphony.
If there's one thing I really enjoyed in Dracula X Chronicles, it has to be the Boss Rush Mode.
6. Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance
Platform: Game Boy Advance
Difficulty: 2/5
Fav. Character: Maxim Kischine
Fav. Boss: Death
Fav. Spell Book: Wind Book
Fav. Item: Cross
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I don't understand why most people bash Harmony of Dissonance for being a weak entry to the GBA Castlevania titles because I see it as a complete improvement of Circle of the Moon. The castle is definitely brighter, and it's definitely bigger, boss fights were more complex, and characters were more involved, but overall Harmony of Dissonance was really easy...now I can see why it's weak.
Aside from Mario titles and some third-party titles that I've played in the GBA when I was a kid Harmony of Dissonance was the first game that introduced me to long hours of gameplay with emphasis on exploration, story and plenty of backtracking.
I play as Juste Belmont who entered the castle with the intention of saving his friend, Lydie Erlanger, and not to vanquish Dracula, what a gentleman.
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| Lydie Erlanger |
But as Death and Mr. Possessed (Maxim) had other plans, Juste was eventually dragged on to his responsibilities as a Belmont. While the story seems wide when I played it as a child, looking back it's actually similar to Circle of the Moon because it plays on envy and jealousy as the main driving force of the bigger part of the plot. Just as Hugh was jealous of Nathan, the same goes for Maxim and Juste. But unlike Circle of the Moon, Harmony of Dissonance expanded the plot well by taking advantage of the characters, and their situation, it even went as far as involving bosses in the fray such as Shadow, Death and Dracula himself.
What I enjoyed most in this game was covering all the areas in Castle A and Castle B. Since the game employs the search and collection of necessary relics to get the best ending, there's a real need to cover every inch of the castle and backtrack a lot since you'll never know which areas actually have hidden passages. My only problem with exploration is that Castle B is just a remodeled Castle A, both are essentially the same in design but the reason behind the similarities kinda makes up for it - one is the reflection of Maxim while he's possessed. Yeah, I don't really understand either but whatever fits the user specs, all is good.
To maintain the interesting combat system of CotM's DSS without replicating it, HoD has the spell book system, and though it's less complex than the DSS the effects of combining spell books to sub-weapons are actually more useful compared to the almost repetitive effects of DSS combinations, plus there's a factor of nostalgia most notably the Thousand Blades and Grand Cruz taking effect when using the Wind book to the Dagger, and Bolt book to the Cross. Personally, my favorite was the Wind Book + Cross combination as it creates several crosses acting as a barrier surrounding the player - it just goes to show that a best defense is a good offense.
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| Cross + Wind Book = Flying crosses...yeah. It's cooler in the game. |
But I still had to go through all sorts of rage-inducing in-game mini-games especially chasing after that damn ball just to acquire the Bolt Book, also finding the Summoning Tome was a stroke of luck on my side.
Harmony of Dissonance is also filled with plenty of puzzle solving (particularly moving blocks) to progress in certain areas, a factor in this game not present in Circle of the Moon, but it's not entirely that fun.
I enjoyed fighting the many bosses of Harmony of Dissonance especially the two variations of Legion, but definitely on my number one is Death - just when you know you've beaten him, boom skeleton Death rushes towards you. However, one can't deny that most of the bosses weren't very imaginative, and most of these bosses were too easy as well. Apparently upsizing regular enemies such as the slime into Max Slimer but still keeping their usual movements doesn't translate into an interesting boss fight.
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| they took a gigantic blob and made it into a boss |
This game also has great replay value with the Boss Rush mode and MAXIM mode which lets you play as Maxim and raid through the castle without any constraints - the offside here is that unlike the other player modes that followed, this one has no story.
5. Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia
Platform: Nintendo DS
Difficulty: 4/5
Fav. Character: Albus
Fav. Boss: Rusalka
Fav. Arm Glyph: Melio Falcis
Fav. Back Glyph: Volaticus
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Finally! A female vampire hunter who's a solo player unlike that Aulin kid back in Portrait of Ruin. Shanoa is a total badass with such a beautiful design and role in the story, you could tell from the gameplay that plenty of thought was put into her design so as to make it meaningful to the mechanics of the game and not just ultra sexy. As with previous Castlevania games with an inventory involved it usually means there's a merchant and there are probably potions and other restoration items, these items aren't cheap and collecting money is actually a real challenge. You have to spend plenty of time hitting candles just to farm money. That's right, farm some big ka-ching. Because of the heart system, the game sorta doesn't want to give you any coins when hitting candles unless your hearts are at max. So yeah, using Glyph Union has more risk than rewards...yeah.
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| Shanoa |
Order of Ecclesia features the Glyph System - a combat mechanic unique to the game which uses MP for every attack. So basically Shanoa fights with magic in the form of weapons or spells that are found in the Glyphs she collects. There are over 100 glyph combinations depending on what's equipped on the left and right arm of Shanoa, sometimes the back glyph also has an effect to the union. Using Glyph Union takes up plenty of hearts which can be replenished by hitting candles and collecting the hearts, or through a heart fountain (whatever that's called). However, despite the interesting combat system it's actually the very reason why the game is just damn difficult. Because attacking consumes MP there's always a limit to how long you can continue spamming the same attack against an enemy, once the gauge has been depleted you either wait for it to completely replenish or just make do with one attack at a time.
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| Glyph Union |
The annoying/interesting combat system aside, I especially enjoyed Konami's new take on vampire hunting when they started the adventure outside and far from the premises of Dracula's castle. In fact, you don't enter the castle until halfway through the game. But even with the numerous places Shanoa visits during the first part of the game searching for villagers and chasing after Albus, I gotta say they weren't that enjoyable since most of these dungeons/caves/forests/oceans were pretty straightforward. Want an example? Just take a look at Ruvas Forest and see how incredibly straight that forest is.
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| Ruvas Forest map...yep |
The lack of exploration in the game turned me off but at least there were some puzzles...if you can call navigating through a dark room full of moving spikes just to get a Glyph a puzzle. Obviously the biggest place to explore in this game is *drum roll* Dracula's castle which has an over the top interior design. At least Dracula is finally learning how to make his dead castle more livelier.
Anyway, this one big castle where the last half of the game takes place is basically there just so the game could justify the Castlevania in its title. In reality, this bulk of the game has the smallest part in the story. The bosses in the castle were tough hitters and hard quitters but they were there just for the heck of it, no stories for them. Basically, the plot twist in the middle of the game was the last compelling part of the story. And once I finally got to the infamous throne room where Dracula enjoys his bottomless wine only to throw the glass to the ground later, I was suddenly in for the hardest Dracula boss fight ever.
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| he just sits all day waiting for someone to witness him throwing wine |
I always die during my first fight with the final boss of any Castlevania games but not as much as I have died here against Dracula in Order of Ecclesia. Dracula is hella big and most of his attacks are hard to avoid, and to make it worse Dracula doesn't like it if you jump over him (even Volaticus doesn't work). But I guess strategic fighting in OoE was a given since most of the boss that I've previously encountered all had patterns to them and it's more difficult to beat them head on...just great.
Alright, so it took me three days to craft this very segmented entry but I am proud that I still managed to write a post this long. Part 2 will be my top 4 and [SPOILER ALERT] Symphony of the Night isn't number 1.
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