The Cruel Angel's Shrine

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Okay. I've had it up to here with these Sci-Fantasy games Squeenix is tube-feeding us of late.

Final Fantasy VII RUINED the series. Now it's all flashy lights and high technology. It's been ruined.

I hate this.

Here's the deal. I got into Final Fantasy when I was just a little girl. I played the first game, and fell in love with it. When I played IV (then released as Final Fantasy II), and fell in love with the brave story of Cecil and the Knights and Damsels gameplay. And then came Final Fantasy III (or VI, if you're Japanese like my husband and Mai), with its introduction of high tech. It was okay, because it still felt like a fantasy game. Then came VII, and the world was changed forever. From that point on, the series felt less and less like a fantasy game. Now it's gone. That feeling is gone. I watch the trailers to the XIII games, and all I see is another sci-fi game. Where's the magic? Where's the nobilty? Where's the FANTASY?

In Final Fantasy IV, we had a simple, clean cut tale of good vs evil. No political intrigue, no guns. Hell, we had MIND FLAYERS! It was a fantasy fan's dream come true. To this day, IV is my absolute favorite. Compare that to what Squeenix is pumping out now. Guns. Lots of them. Blood. No knights, no damsels in distress; all of the former trappings of a fantasy game have been discarded in favor of a technological masterpiece meant to cater solely to a society that increasingly favors a technological solution to a simple problem. And maybe that's why the games are changing; they have been reflecting what's important to us deep down.

I must say, I have lost all faith and loyalty to this series. Dissidea will be the last Final Fantasy I ever buy, and merely because it serves as a broken reminder of one child's dream of being a knight and saving the world with nothing but a sword and the help of her friends.

These new Final Fantasy heroes aren't fantasy heroes. They're super soldiers, and their kind belongs in games like Halo, not Final Fantasy.

The Fantasy is dead. Maybe it's time the series died with it.

Well, Order of Ecclesia has been released, some hate it, others love it. But wait! There's always more in this crazy waltz of Castlevania Marketing!

Iga has, in my humble opinion, gone plumb loco of late. 2008 is definitely the year of Castlevania. We've just recieved Order of Ecclesia, we have Judgment coming up, but I've already covered that in a previous entry.

So, why bother purtting up a new Brigade Report? I'm glad you wondered that.

Iga, in his god-like delusions of grandeur, has seen fit to expand Castlevania into other venues of entertainment.

First up, we have Akumajou Dracula: THE MEDAL; which is a Slot Machine with a PLOT focusing on Richter Belmont. And next up is a PACHINKO MACHINE starring Trevor Belmont.

Now, I'm of Japanese origin, sure. I lived the first six years of my life there. But I'm now 22. I've lived in America since age seven. So, I'm pretty goddamn American, and to those wackos living in my country of origin, I ask, "WHAT THE FUCK?!"

Is there no low to which these people will not stoop? Is Konami SO strapped for cash that they are willing to shell out to casinos? You'd think with Metal Gear Solid 4 selling like it was the Jesus of Action Games, they wouldn't need that. Which means something else: Iga is putting out these two games not because they're needed or wanted, but simply because he can. And that friends, is bad business. The More You Know...

Next up, we have something truly awesome: Akumajou Dracula: The Arcade. This is a "Rail Based Shooter", only, instead of guns, you shoot with whips. Yahoo! But still, "Akumajou Dracula: The Arcade".... kind of a boring title, if you think about it. Still, with a title like that, you know the market they're shooting for, at least. Unfortunately for us here in the States, the death of video arcades is proceeding as planned, so it is highly unlikely that we will EVER see it in english (unless monsieur EEGUH decides to port it to Wii, which technically shouldn't be possible given the Wii's graphical restraints).

Finally, we have a new, as yet unnamed, Castlevania project, likely for the PS3 and/or Xbox 360. All we know is that there's a guy who looks like Alucard, and we know that much thanks to some lucky sneaky photos taken at a recent convention. Hell, we don't even know if it IS a Castlevania project. We just know that it definitely looks like one.

Well, my Chiptunes remixes have finally arrived, so it's time to say goodbye. But, before I quit writing and get back to my feverish "360 Degrees of Symphony of the Night" Youtube project, I would like to announce that on Halloween, I will be going to my nightguard job dressed as Trevor Belmont from Castlevania: Curse of Darkness. You're welcome, internet.

It won’t be long now. November 18^th for me and my friends in the States. I can already smell the sweat of me and my friends beating the shit out of each other on Judgment, something we can really only do well right now on Brawl. What a fantastic game this is turning out to be. Wicked combos, decent graphics, and best of all, costume designs by Takeshi Obata.

Great. Simon looks like Light Yagami. I suppose the holy book subweapon will involve him pulling out the Death Note and writing his opponent’s name in it, killing them with a heart attack. Yes indeed kiddies, this will be fun.

We have been promised remixes of classic Castlevania tunes. This does sound promising. I just have one request: please, just for the fans, include an unlockable chiptune version of the soundtrack. I miss my NES synth.

In all seriousness, this game will indeed be awesome. And if you don’t like it when you buy it, you can sell it to somebody who does like it, and route the money garnered from this sale through to my PayPal account. Daddy needs a new PSP game.

I for one will buy it. I will love it. And I’ll have to re-buy it within three months because I played the disc to death.

“Why is Alucard so hot?”
The real question is, “Should he not be?”
He’s the son of a vampire, creatures known for their endless stamina, and eternal youth. Two things I would like to have.

Moving on to the actual article now...

Anyway, as we all know, Castlevania was plagued by Conan-ish character design. This simply is not acceptable in the modern era. In the 70’s and 80’s, maybe. BUT NOW?! Give me a break! I mean, what the F**K? The only instance of my liking a big burly man in leather underwear was the movie 300, and that’s only because it was GERARD BUTLER IN THE LEATHER UNDERPANTS.

Rondo of Blood tried to break this trend, by making Richter a young studly man and attempting to fix Dracula up to be pretty.

And then Vampire Killer (Bloodlines in US) came out on the Genesis, and all of Rondo’s efforts FAILED. What the hell was up with Johnny Morris? HE WAS THE HULK IN A WHITE T-SHIRT, JEAMS, AND SUSPENDERS!! Yeah. Tell me how that’s hot. It isn’t. And then Eric Lecarde seemed to have misplaced his pants somewhere, so he went off in a skimpy pink shirt and hoped it would hide his “spear”, if you know what I mean. Given the length of his weapon, I think he’s overcompensating for something too.

Then, Ayami Kojima graced us with her fabulous work in Symphony of the Night, beginning many happy years of bishies in Castlevania, driving the fangirls wild, and challenging the heterosexuality of straight male gamers worldwide. In case you haven’t seen his CVIII artwork, Alucard was HIDEOUS in Densetsu (Dracula’s Curse), and Ayami sexied him up in Symphony.

Her portrait of him for that game is enough to make a girl drool. Yup.

Then, in Cross of the Blue Moon (Dawn of Sorrow), she was scrapped for some guy/girl/thing who obviously can’t draw. I’m sure I’ve seen his/her/its name before, but I honestly don’t care. He/she/it shouldn’t exist.

The art style got better in Gallery of Labyrinth (Portrait of Ruin), and Jonathan is admittedly kind of cute. But still, there’s not a proper bishie in the game,though Wind comes the closest! On that note, Eric Lecarde FINALLY found his pants (probably ripping them off a corpse), and managed to get a spiffy trench coat and hat (VAN HELSING DUDS?!) in the process. Too bad he died.

Iga apparently figured out that the anime style was a VERY BAD THING, because he brought Ayami back for the designs in Dracula X Chronicles. Finally. The raw, unfettered fangirlism is allowed to continue!

Let’s all hope it stays that way.

So, I was playing Castlevania: Lament of Innocence the other day, and I decided to do something I’ve surprisingly NEVER done. Play as Pumpkin.
Suddenly, I’m this little sprite-sized trick-or-treater wielding a fluorescent whip made of what appears to be red licorice, and killing things by chucking pumpkins of all sizes at them.

As fun as this is, I must ask: “WHAT THE HELL?!”
Was Iga OUT OF HIS MIND?!

Yes. Yes. We shall kill the LORD OF ALL EVIL WITH A LICORICE-WIELDING TRICK OR TREATER!
The concept is certainly good for some lulz. I love it.

Don’t believe me?
Just run up to Walter as Pumpkin, jump up, and smack him in the face with a huge string of glowing red licorice. Trust me. It never gets old.

But seriously, what the hell?
I mean, he has a ragged voodoo doll for a body, a Jack-o’-lantern for a head, candy for arms, and his tiny little feet make a constant squeaking noise. Is it not ADORABLE?

If you play World of Warcraft or Second Life, expect to see little carbon copies of this tiny caramel and jolly-rancher flavored sucker available as pets, hacked characters, costumes, etc. quite soon, assuming they’re not there already.

No. This is not about time travel in CV.

Digging up an old topic for a new generation of members, I would like to draw attention to the similarities between Richter and Leon Belmont.

Of course, Richter came first. We all know that.
But if you look, there's some SERIOUS similarities.

*Both had their girlfriend/fiancee kidnapped by big bad.

*Both have odd trench coats (asthetic similarity, I know)

*Both of their girlfriend/fiancees are turned into a critter of the night in at least one ending

*Both have overly melodramatic dialogue. (Leon: "I'LL KILL YOU AND THE NIGHT!!"; Richter: *every line he uttered in the original english dub of SOTN*)

*Both have a close relationship to Dracula (More so than the other Belmonts)

*Both are capable of Item Crashes (Or Item Crash-like abilities)

I'm sure you can find other similarities as well, but these are just the ones that came up in the last discussion, and a few I discovered myself.

So, the evidence is before you. What does it all mean? Does it mean Iga is again guilty of COPYPASTA?

Nope.

Sure, they have PLENTY of similarities. But Iga took what was best about Richter and spun a new tale using that as its base. Here's the deal. The Belmonts themselves may have plenty of similarities, but the games they belong to are worlds apart. Richter's Rondo of Blood/ Dracula XX is a almost TOTALLY different style game than Lament of Innnocence. One is a linear game, albeit with some room for exploration, but the layout is completely sealed off; you can't go back to stages you've already cleared without replaying them. The other game is an open ended castle, you are free to explore it to the limits of your current ablities, and you can backtrack as well. The villains are VERY different; Walter would have made a HORRIBLE Dracula.

So even though the characters may be similar, there is enough differences in the events unfolding around them to keep them markedly different.

Some of us (including me, most of all) don't always appreciate Iga, but this is one area where he deserves a cheer.

I look at the concern voiced in threads on other forums like "Do you think we will see any new stories with the classic gameplay?", and "Is there anything more for Castlevania in 2-D to evolve into?", and I wonder, "Is Castlevania dead?"

It seems to me that there hasn't been a great amount of new ideas in a CV game for YEARS, at least since Aria of Sorrow's Tactical Soul System, and I now believe that, no matter what IGA does, he is simply making Castlevania's death longer, more painful, and all the more inevitable.

What the series desperately needs is either a complete return to the original gameplay style and elements, or a new director who can offer up new ideas worth using. IGA is overstaying his welcome, having used up all his good ideas, which began to really show in Dawn of Sorrow, and was thrust before our collective eyes in Portrait of Ruin.

If Castlevania dies, it will most likely be buried with other long running game series such as Final Fantasy; which after 21 good years of excellent quality games is also running out of steam, with releases such as Crisis Core and Final Fantasy Tactics A2 being made up of a great deal of fanservice relating to previous popular games in the franchise, rather than experimenting with completely new ideas for characters.

Returning to Castlevania, even Dracula X Chronicles was purely fanservice. Konami dressed up the original Rondo of Blood with better graphics, higher quality sound, and throwing in a repackaged port of the original game and a (barely) enhanced port of Symphony of the Night in an attempt to sell more copies.

A game series CANNOT run on fanservice, and I can not stress that point enough. However, the difference between Final Fantasy and Castlevania in this regard is that Final Fantasy has a BACKUP PLAN: Kingdom Hearts, which faithfully carries over all the things that made Final Fantasy great, and can succeed it's great predecessor with ease if need be..

Castlevania has no such insurance policy. If Castlevania falls, it does so with out a heir to it's name. Konami has no other series, planned or already made, that can back up what some of us may consider their finest work. When Castlevania dies, and I guarantee that it will, and maybe soon, it will be finished. Done. Over with. Never to return, save in maybe a "Classic Compilation" release with other famous titles.

Castlevania can be saved, but what that calls for is more innovation and less fan service.

I ask you: "What made Symphony of the Night such a great game?"

In the end, it wasn't graphics. It wasn't music. It sure as hell wasn't fanservice (though there was a generous helping of that too). The game was DIFFEERENT. It offered gameplay almost totally unlike anything the series had ever known before then. Why? Because at that point, Castlevania was beginning to be in the same schtick it's in now, and IGA and the rest of Symphony's crew dealt with it wonderfully.

But it seems that eleven years later they expect the SAME forula to still work. the four 3D titles aside, nothing really new was done after Symphony. Sure, you had a good game like Harmony and Aria of Sorrow released here and there, but Spell Fusion and Tactical Soul System aside, what else is new about them?

This repitition is what kills a game series, when an unwillingness to take a risk and do something completely original keeps the series repeating past formulas, leading to an unimpressed, disgruntled, and somewhat less than thrilled fan base.

I cried tears of joy (in my head) when Dracula X Chronicles was released, because by returning to an old favorite, Konami broke their own mold. But it wasn't anything inspired, and I quickly grew bored with the game.

If Castlevania is to survive, I feel it needs something new, original, and more than anything, DARING about it. It's a quality that made the series last so long, but along the way, it lost that quality.

Konami needs to realize this, or Castlevania WILL die, and I know every one of us will rue that day.

It really should have. Julius mode was really the only good thing the game had going for it.

Iga had a great opportunity to tie off the series, and deliver an ending to the series worth recognition as one of the most powerful moments in the franchise, full of desparation, emotion, and a sense of conclusion.

Instead, what we got was a horrid, mashed together, rushed, and on a whole depressingly cheesy game to finish the saga of Dracula.

The art was bad, the dialogue was worse, the gameplay was okay (at best), the graphics were sub-par, the music was at least decent, the plot was predictable and OH MY GOD, WHAT HAPPENED TO SOMA?!

On a whole, I was unimpressed by the forced in touch screen functions, which were far more hindering than interesting.

The sprites for the enemies were okay, but many of them were taken from Rondo, so they had no way of keeping up with the movements of whatever character you were playing as.

The game lacked challenge, save the Death boss battle, but more than one good boss battle is needed to make a good game.

It was a mistake for IGA to release the game in the form he released it in, and it began a downward spiral of quality in castlevania games that only now is ending.

All in all, this is a sub-par game only worth mentioning because it successfully ruined everything that made Aria of Sorrow good.

Rondo of Blood has been released on the Japanese Virtual Console. Which means in all likelyhood that we'll be getting it in the states shortly.

As fun as Rondo is, I think Konami is overcapitalizing on the Dracula X series.

First, they put Alucard in Dawn of Sorrow for Julius mode.

Then, Richter is both a boss and a playable character in PoR, along with Maria being playable.

Then the rereleases started coming out. Symphony of the Night was put on Xbox Live and then rereleased in the Dracula X Chronicles in short succession, plus is is also now available on the Playstation Network. Now they're doing the same with Rondo.

The remake it and rerelease it in a single set, and scarcely a few months later, they rerelease it again.

Konami is putting too much stock in the buzz they created surrounding DXC.

It will die out, and Dracula X's massive popularity will die out soon if they keep doing this.

If they love the Dracula X series of games so much, add a title to the series that maybe focuses on Maria herself , or perhaps explains the events by which Alucard felt compelled to become Genya Arikado. There's a huge time gap between Symphony, which is the last important game in the Chronology, and the events of Aria of Sorrow, and I would like to know what happened there.

As for the current trend, assuming it continues, we'll probably see either a somewhat tinkered with port of SOTN on the DS, or a remake of Symphony a la Dracula X Chronicles on either the PSP or the DS.

A remake would be cool, but there's no way it would be good unless the same amount of care and devotion that went into making the original was applied in the remake.

Konami should just quit the metroidvania style and go for more "adventurey" backgrounds, where you slog through swamps, crawl through cramped tunnels in dungeons, climb the walls of the castle, explore hidden passageways; and for once, make escaping the collapsing castle a player controlled event, where getting crushed because you weren't fast enough unlocks an alternate ending.

Running and platforming with the frequent whipping is boring me. Castlevania should evolve and become something more high-octane, more thrilling. It should keep you on the edge of your seat like it did over 20 years ago.

Whipping skeletons is not how this is done.

If we're going to have more Castlevania, then the Castle itself should be more involved. There should be traps, obstacles, and MORE PUZZLES.

At this point, a Belmont with an IQ of 65 could probably make it to Dracula.

The games don't require much thought or skill, but IGA seems to make a passing effort at this (play HoD if you don't believe me), so why not go the whole nine yards?

With all the concern regarding the fate of 2D games in the series, I wonder "Is 2D doomed? And if it is, then can 3D succeed it?"

I believe it CAN suceed the legacy of the 2D Castlevanias, but the real question is "will the fans LET 3D succeed the 2D games?"

It's a difficult question, and very controversial among hardcore fans. fans of the 3D games seem to be vastly outnumbered, but then again, so are the 3D games themselves.

Lament of Innocence seems to be the most highly regarded of the 3D games, so let's take a look at what it had going for it:

1. Lush character designs
2. a well developed combat system that played to the PS2's strengths
3. Great Voice acting, personalities, and a fantastic story unlike what we'd seen before
4. Detailed environments with various objects to smash (statues that break away to reveal hidden rooms, candles that drop money and subweapons)

By comparison, it's successor, Curse of Darkness had:

1. Lush (if a bit over the top) character designs
2. A somewhat clunkier combat system than Lament's
3. FANTASTIC voice acting, a decently original story concerning characters that (apart from Trevor, Dracula, and Death) were completely unconnected to previous titles.
4. Detailed environments, though lacking in any sort of "fullness" (nothing to smash, just empty rooms with enemies)

Lament is considered the better game. I can see why, by just glancing at these lists. Curse came close, but didn't quite get there. And after Curse's almost-but-not-quite success, Konami seems afraid to put out another fully 3D title, instead putting out  rushed and unoriginal games like Portrait of Ruin and also putting out repolished diamonds like the interesting, but uninspired, Dracula X Chronicles.

But, should they HAVE TO repolish old diamonds?

There is a great amount to a 3D castlevania that can be explored. The whip slinging from Castlevania 4 could be done ever more realistically in 3D, spells would be ever more colorful and impressive, the castles can be MUCH larger, bosses more varied in attacks, and numerous other positives could result from tapping the 3D arena.

One of the reasons hardcore fans don't readily accept the 3D games is the relative lack of experience we've had with them, and most of that limited experience hearkens memories of failures like Castlevania 64 and the glory that Curse of darkness could have acheived, but barely failed to obtain. HOWEVER, these failures are not the fault of the 3D arena. They lie in poor planning, development, and production, and the 2D games have had their fair share of these same faults, but because the 2D arena is more experienced, they seem to be critiqued less harshly.

But, 2D is getting old. It may not ever die, but it will become unpopular, relegating itself to a cult phenomenon. 3D is becoming more popular, and if you look carefully, the Nintendo DS is the last toehold 2D gaming has. True, the Wii has the virtual console, but that is reserved for classic games brought back by popular demand.

I think 3D deserves another shot. Lament of Innocence was great, but can be EASILY trumped by many other games on the same console, such as Devil May Cry 3, and even (depending on who you ask) Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII.

If the PS2 became the king of it's console generation (which it did, according to the polls) with almost exclusively 3D games, it stands to reason that Castlevania can be successful in the 3D arena, given how many other series have managed that feat. Sure, the games will be clunky for a few years, but let's just give Konami the time to figure out how to do it right, rather than chopping their head of for student failures.

I really love this game. I hold it as my personal favorite of the games. Go ahead. Laugh. Are you done yet? Yes, Tidus was whiny. That's why I love him. He's not emo. He's not depressed. He's more human than Cloud is. He didn't play the role of the tough guy. He was a newb to combat, and needed to learn his skills as he encountered them, which was a change of pace the series really needed.

Auron=Vincent with a sword. What's not to like?

The gameplay was perfect for me, as this was my first Final Fantasy that I ever played. The setup was very user friendly, and thankfully I didn't take me too long to figure everything out, which was VERY handy, but they included enough features in the game to keep it interesting.

On my second playthrough, I had become aware that there was a "card game" of sorts in previous games, and upon hearing descriptions of the card game, I was VERY thankful it wasn't in X.

The game was paced well, and nothing happened too slowly or too quickly in my opinion.



...Or maybe I'm just a deranged lunatic who needs to be locked up for all time.

I have played several Final Fantasy's, but afer I played IV Advance, I fell in love with the game. Granted, most of the games in the series have brought something special to the series, and while IV wasn't exactly ONE of those games, it took what HAD been brought forward in the previous three and made a GREAT game out of it.

Let me start with the gameplay. It plays out like you would expect a FF game to play, because up until FFXII and DoC, they never really did much to change the gameplay; although VII's materia and junctioning your characters in VIII could make them so god-like that it was a blast to play the game as them, but these are just tacked-on conviniences. Some stuff was ADDED to the games, but nothing that was already there actually changed much. But, I have allowed myself to get sidetracked.

The gameplay is simple; you move your character around a world map via the following methods: Walking, Yellow or Black Chocobos (black ones fly), hovercraft, and airship (while you DO get a spaceship, it still functions almost the exact same way as an airship). When you come to a dungeon, town, or some other important location, the map zooms in and you get a Super Deformed close up view of your locale with some pretty bad proportioning (standard RPG...). Here you take your party and walk around, shop around, sleep around in inns, and talk to the idiot locals (who may or may not give you a quest), and in the case of dungeons, fight LOTS of random battles. LOTS OF THEM.

Suffice to say, most of the game takes place in dungeons and towns, as the world map seems to only function as a method of getting from point A to point B... with LOTS OF RANDOM BATTLES.

The battles are less than thrilling, except around boss battles (and even then only a smidge), due to the frighteningly boring combat system that, unlike the other titles, offers no innovation whatsoever, save the introduction of the pathetically annoying ATB gauge, which is the aspect of Final Fantasy that I hate the most, as it can give your opponent the opportunity to strike three times before you can manage one hit. It is slow, tedious, and the amount of time it takes to level your characters up just so they get some spells that MIGHT entertain you is staggeringly long, and you will never want to hear the fight theme again by the time you finish playing.

If it seems like I am describing a terrible game, you need to finish reading. I have, of course, saved my favorite bits for last.

The characters are what makes every Final Fantasy so enduring, and IV has more than it's fair share of lovable and hateable characters. Some of you have played the game yourselves may think I'm crazy for giving a largely unloved title THIS much credit, but if you've played the game already, then why are you reading this? Shouldn't you be writing you OWN reviews?

Cecil (main good guy) had a HUGE struggle early on between his loyalties and his personal values, a confilict which resolves itself about a third of the way through the game, after which he's a generic hero.

Rosa (Cecil's girlfriend and your best White mage) is kind of a Mary Sue, and I don't like her that much. She didn't really have much a struggle in the game besides the "EEK! I'VE BEEN KIDNAPPED!! SAVE ME!!" Struggle, hence my dislike of her.

Sage Tellah (who is pretty useless for most of the time you play him) does have an interesting personality, and he's one of the first characters you'll grow to love.

Palom and Porom become your primary spellcasters at about a third of the way into the game, and remain such for a LONG time. I love these two. They're bickering siblings, one of which has a ego bigger than his body.

Kain is an intersting twist: the heroes best friend and also his greatest enemy. I'm mum as to the details to avoid spoilers, but you'll love him and hate him both.

Cid is... like a lot of the Cids I know. He's tough, and trash talks a LOT, though his cussing is not as prominent as Cid Highwind in VII.

Edge is a ninja, and is a bit of a lech in my opinion. I like him a lot because he's lazy and funny.

And my personal favorite: Rydia. She's your summoner, and she joins your party as a child who can also use black and white magic, and after a departure, rejoins as an adult who is VERY POWERFUL with botth black magic and summoning. How she leaves and ages so quickly is another spoiler, so my lips are sealed. I love Rydia because as a child she's adorable, and then as an adult becomes one of your most powerful characters (and she gets GORGEOUS when she rejoins as an adult too!).

The villains are standard though, which was a shame. Square could have made this a five star game with the addition of some more original villains, but they were apparently fine with three or four.

As for the changes between the original release and the GBA version, there's a MUCH better translation, which does wonders for the game by itself, some new enemies, the ability to change your party members late in the game (which will alter the final dialogue at the end depending on who you have in your party), and a brand new dungeon unlocked by beating the game once which explores (kind of) the characters personalities and why they are the way they are. Primarily, the purpose of the extra dungeon is to make you REALLY annoyed by all the puzzles and to throw in a new FINAL final boss, who I must say, is WICKED AWESOME!! Also, the soundtrack has been rearranged, which makes it sound a LOT better and now its takes almost full advantage of the GBA sound synths (Golbez's theme now rises to the position of my favorite FF Villain theme of all time).

Now for the grading (out of five):

1) Gameplay: 3
2) Battle system: 2
3) Music: 5
4) Story: 4
5) Characters: 4

TOTAL: 18/25

This isn't the best Final Fantasy, but it is worth buying and playing. I think you'll like it.

"One man's compost heap is another man's potpourris." 

~Jim Carrey (as The Grinch)

There have been a couple games that are almost universally reviled by everyone. Then there are those that are reviled by most. And then, there are the games that individuals consider the worst.

And yet, for some reason, often we keep playing them.

Why is this?

For instance, I think Castlevania 64 is about as terrible a game as can be imagined. And yet I still play it like a maniac, which results in poor Reinhardt falling to his death thousands of times because of missed jumps.

Why do I do this?

Personally, I love playing badly designed games.

Castlevania 64 is VERY poorly planned, and too often I die from missed jumps. But I enjoy the challenge this poor design presents.

Now, as for Super Castlevania IV, it's almost perfectly designed, and an awesome game to be sure (though I enjoy Castlevania: Dracula X to a FAR greater degree). The whip swings were an excellent addition, and perfectly designed in their placement. The game is almost perfect.

But I hate it. I never play it.

Why? Because I miss my timing for the swings so often, plummeting down a bottomless pit to poor Simon's death.

In this case, my bad performance is not due to faulty design, which presents an inherent challenge to the game, but due instead to my own faulty timing in my swing. This takes a lot of fun out of the game for me, because it's still a challenge, but the WRONG KIND of challenge. I don't enjoy wrestling with myself when playing a game, especially Castlevania. I prefer the challenge to be a poorly designed stage rather than a poorly designed ME.

So, I prefer games like Castlevania 64 and Castlevania: Dracula X to games like Super Castlevania IV.

Bad=good (in it's own wacky way).

So, even though a game may be bad, I still play it despite the fact.

Released stateside as Castlevania: Dracula X, this was basically a SNES port of Akumajou Dracula X: Chi no Rondo (or Rondo of Blood). They made the game a lot shorter when they ported it. Wheras it could very well take you three hours to beat Rondo in one stretch, it took me only an hour to beat Dracula XX in comparison (if you know how to solve the challenges ahead of time).

The graphics were downgraded with the move to the cartridge based SNES from the CD based PC Engine, and so was the music (though the arrangements were kept intact for 90% of the songs). The gameplay doesn't have as many options as Rondo, and given how long you have to keep wailing on many enemies with your whip midway to the end of the game, it sometimes feels less like an action adventure game and more like a beat 'em up.

So why bother with it?

Because as much as people have flogged this game for not even being half the game that Rondo is, it still is a great stand alone game when you remove it from the shadow of it's predecessor.

It plays well, has decent enough graphics and music (especially for a SNES game of that period!), and soundly beats the crap out of Super Castlevania IV in replay value. I am speaking from experience here folks. I've beaten both SCV4 and Dracula XX, and Dracula XX really is better. It's more colorful, faster paced, and WAAY less frustrating to play if you know what you're doing (I can't count the number of times I have died in SCV4 due to missed jumps. Stupid whip slinging.), which shouldn't take very long either.

My thoughts? I love this game. Sure, it's definitely not Rondo of Blood, but it's a good game that preserves the attitudes and themes of Rondo. I'll be playing this one even after I get DX: Chronicles.

It seems to me that Dracula has lost his path in life. Granted, he had motives, but Lament of Innocence and Symphony of the Night were the only games where his motives were actually referenced, really (I can't remember if Dracula's Curse referenced them or not, but I don't think it went into much detail with it if it did. Correct me if I'm wrong on this.). Even so, that makes maybe... 3 games where Drac's motives are discussed and used as a story element.

So, let's have a quick history lesson.

 In the 11th century, his wife, Elizabetha, dies. Drac (then Mathias) feels awful. He's so depressed that his mind conjures a disease that leaves him bedridden. Then, he gets an idea (albeit a foolish and quite stupid one, but it's rather interesting regardless). If he fought as a warrior for God only to have "God" take his wife away (although in all honesty, it was probably Death's fault. Probably), he would defy God in an (*cough*IDIOTIC*cough*) attempt to get revenge So, just to show God how much he hates Him and the fact that nature works the way it's supposed to, he gets Walter to kidnap Sara, leading to Leon killing Walter, and Mathias inheriting Walter's power and becoming Dracula.

Okay. So, his motive has now been established. It's revenge against something he never had any control over to begin with (I personally call it a tantrum).

Then, he lives and broods for centuries, and then he meets Lisa, who reminds Dracula of Elizabetha, causing him to fall in love with her, marry her, and have a child with her. He lives happily for a time, but then Lisa is accused of witchcraft, and burned at teh stake, while her son, Adrian, watches. Lisa utters her famous last words, but Dracula was not present, and did not hear them. He vows revenge on the humans, and starts killing them. Cue Adrian becoming Alucard and Trevor Belmont opening a can of whoop-ass on Dracula.

But still, Dracula had a good motive for what he was doing. His wife was MURDERED. I think that would make anyone want revenge, and Dracula had the power and the ability to get his revenge. So he did.

That was in 1476.

Three years later, he revives. He's almost a totally generic villain, except for these words:

"The Powerful ALWAYS judge the weak! The humans made their judgment of me as well. Thus, I sentenced them to extinction."

Okay. He's a madman. We get it. But, madmen have feelings too, and Dracula had been hurt so much by Lisa's murder that his rage carried over into his new reincarnation. In that shred of dialogue,  we can see the hurt in his soul, the pain and emptiness that drives him further into his madness.

Then, in 1576, he revives again. He's almost totally different now. He has no motive, other than the fact that he's evil, mad, and powerful. It wouldn't be until 1797 that we begin to see the old Dracula again, and when he hears his wife's last words, he says, "Lisa... forgive me...", which gave most people the impression that he saw the error of his ways, and had started to repent.

Then, he revives in 1830 (with a reference that he had revived before that), and he's back to his "Bleeah! I'm a evil Vampire! I'm going to suck your blood!" routine.

....what happened? He has no motive anymore. Again. Any shred of humanity he displayed in 1797 is completely gone now. From that point on, Dracula is the same, generic evil villain he is so often portrayed as. It seems as if from 1576 to 1797 he forgot why he was fighting against mankind in the first place (revenge), and then from the pre-1830/ post-1797 period, he forgot again, and apparently never remembered.

If he did forget, then I weep for him.

However, there is the possibility that, while he started with vengeance, that's not why he fights anymore; he could be killing mankind for the fun of it. But, that still doesn't jibe with his last words in Symphony, which carried a sense of regret and penitence.

I think he's forgotten, and that makes him all the more tragic. Nothing is more tragic than a warrior who fights without a cause.

Belmonts: Great Monster/Vampire/Demon slayers, right? Well, supposedly, yes. But I would argue that they really aren't all that great, and that Dracula simply isn't as strong as he says he is. After all, he gets slaughtered by people other than the Belmonts: Hector, Alucard (bad example), Sypha Belnades, Maria Renard, Nathan Graves, Carrie Fernandez, blah blah blah. Clearly, Dracula can be killed by others who are not Belmonts. So, why do we need the Belmonts? Who knows?

In order to determine the strength of the Belmont Clan, I would argue that we would have to see them fight against a major enemy who was not something they had experience dealing with before, which effectively rules out every recurring boss in the game series. Dracula? Out the window, at least for a few games. Bring a new big bad in. Say, maybe (as I mentioned in a different post) an Incubus, or maybe some sort of  sealed demon who is using an unwitting Dracula to ensure its own resurrection, maybe through a process similar to how Mathias became Dracula; when Dracula dies, the resulting explosion of energy breaks the seal the demon, who was sealed hundreds of years ago, resulting in a second segment of the game, where the Belmont  wanders through either a transformed Castlevania or an entirely new castle, with a new map and everything.

I know there are some of you who might hate this idea, and I do understand how you feel. But, there is so much more that needs to be explained in the series, like, "what do the Belmonts do when Dracula isn't around?" Surely there are monsters besides him wandering Europe! I'd be shocked if there weren't!

Although, I will give Konami this nod. In the Sorrow games, they established that humans could be even more sinister than any monster. Graham was almost PERFECT as an original villain in this regard; but, we don't see Julius fight him (Julius mode of AoS is non canonical), and also, his boss fight was basically an old school Dracula fight. So, an original villain became not so original.

Dmitrii, and I hate to say it, was actually a decent idea for a villain. No Dracula powers, just Menace to deal with. That was cool. But, once again, NO BELMONT CONFRONTATION, so we have no idea how a Belmont might fare against Menace.

Still, I think Konami had the right idea with Graham and Dmitrii. I think they should expand on that, but place it during a pre-established time period, for instance, a year or so after Harmony of Dissonance.

Humans are immensely difficult opponents, and other monsters would be a refreshing touch. It would be interesting to see more done with these ideas.

I wouldn't exactly call Chronicles a "series" (I would need more than two remakes for that), but given that there's two titles under the belt of Chronicles, I can only assume there's going to be more.

I'm torn.

On one hand, it shows Konami (and IGA) respect the old releases enough to give them additional attention, but on the other hand, Konami could very well fall into the trap of wallowing in past glory and forget the future of Castlevania.

So, what should be done with Chronicles?

Do the awesome games NEED to be tinkered with? Okay. I'll admit it. A Dracula's Curse remake would be great.

But why mess first with the great titles, and neglect those that were more poorly made?

Personally, I think "Dawn of Sorrow Chronicles" would be almost REQUIRED in order to make the game less horrible. Don't get me wrong, it's a decent game. But it's so sub-par compared to what came before it that it gives the impression of a bad game, especially if you just finished a play through of Harmony of Dissonance or Aria of Sorrow.

Couple of reasons for this:

Too many sprites were re-used/palette swapped (Soma looks almost the same, same goes for Yoko and Julius).
Weapon enhancement was pointless.
The dialogue was SHAMEFULLY BAD.
Much of the game's color seemed bleached out to me.
Artwork was AWFUL (although Alucard's honestly didn't offend me that much).
the villains, as terrific an idea as it was to put humans in as the ultimate villains, were AWFUL.
Any and all stylus functions were completely unecesarry, and merely thrown in because the feature could be used.

A Chronicles release in 2.5D would fix the reused sprites/palette swaps, would offer the opportunity to remove weapon enhancement or give it a reason to be used in the first place, fix the terribly broken dialogue, and re-do the artwork, and maybe make the villains less stupid somehow (like giving Celia hair that would actually HAPPEN). Also, the stupid stylus functions would be GONE.

Castlevania Legends, and this is an academic statement at best given the non-canon staus of the game, could have REALLY used a Chronicles touch up. The art was horrible, the story poorly explained (try not at all), the dialogue was crap, the sprites unoriginal, and the music less than acceptable (save the Opening stage theme and the menu theme). A Chronicles release would have benefited this release immensely.

My point is, I think Chronicles is a fantastic opportunity for Konami to cover their tracks and fix some of the low points in the series. Many of the problems we gripe about in a respective release might never be fixed because that's the only version we'll ever get. Instead of remaking titles that don't need to be remade like Rondo of Blood, games like The Castlevania Adventure and Circle of the Moon should be remade, to fix what should have been fixed YEARS ago.

That's not to say Chronicles couldn't remake some of the good titles, but why fix what isn't broken? I think the priority should be doctoring up the poorer titles and remaking the obscure ones first, so that these forgotten and often disliked games have the chance to finally shine with the brilliance they should have had at the outset.