#game-review #finishedgame2023 # Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow `="![]("+this.imgURL+")"` ## Data: - Console: `=this.Console` - Play Status: `=this.Status` - Start Date: `=this.start-date` - Finish Date: `=this.finish-date` - Clear Time: `=this.clear-time` - Total Play Time: `=this.total-play-time` ## Tiering: `=this.Tiering` This would've been one of my favorite games ever if I first played it as a kid. Despite the age jump, It has become one of my favorite games in adult age, simply because it's everything I want out of a maze-type game with combat. The mechanics are simple yet make for dynamic fights in each screen, not too much of the game feels truly unfair bar a couple small sections, and the Soul mechanic is an incredibly cool and effective way of introducing many different sub-weapons. Having played basically no Castlevania games before this one, I cannot say how well the Soul system integrates sub weapons, upgrades, and other facets of gameplay compared to other entries, but what I can say is that the Soul system made the game much deeper and fun (bar moments of true grinding). I expect this game to age well in this ranking and review system, and that's saying something considering anything above a 90 is well into my favorite games of all time list. I now understand why this game tops so many lists of "Greatest GBA games of all time" and why some people consider it one of the best portable games of all time. I expect to playthrough it against very soon, perhaps in other gameplay modes if they exist, and the only true barrier to returning would be the Clocktower and Death section of the game. # Playthrough Notes Playing in the Castlevania Advanced Collection on the Switch which has all the GBA Castlevanias and a few SNES ones. Attempted to minimize as many save states and rewinds used as possible, but this wasn't always the case (see Death and the Worst Room in the game). Got through the game in 6:31:48 (which might be pre-save fighting Chaos, hard to say), and got 7:31:98 on the Boss Rush Mode :] I got 98.9% of the entire castle discovered on my first playthrough without a guide. Not sure if I'll go back for that last 1.2% # My Thoughts ## Story The story is kind of basic? Soma and Mina end up inside of an eclipse that houses Dracula's Castle and also there's a couple other people there, including one "definitely not evil" missionary Graham Jones. Soma is kind of naive but apparently has some kind of power? I dunno. It's not a very compelling plot until the twist is revealed that Soma is actually the person who is to inherit Dracula's power, that's pretty cool. ## Gameplay The game is really fun to play but it can be really tense since foes do not drop any healing items whatsoever. You have to buy items from the shop a lot of the time, only finding MP-restoring items every once in a while. This makes some sections of the game harder to traverse, but I'd still say it's reasonably fair in difficulty, at least in the early sections of the game. ### Soul Collecting as Weapon Upgrades The idea of collecting Monster Souls and being able to use them as your own is really cool, I just wish that it weren't a random drop since it means that runs are really really dependent on getting a good Soul drop early in the game it seems like. All the same, I think that the combination of buyable weapons plus the combinations of souls makes for a really dynamic battle system, and it really gives each enemy interaction some weight behind them. Not to say that souls break, but that you might be able to try out a new set of combinations based on the encounter. Since you can pause anywhere in the game, it makes sense that you might want to change your weapons and souls if a few things "change" in the middle of a fight. ## Death (Boss) Death, as a boss, is hard. Genuinely one of the more harder fights I've faced in a video game in a while. I think it might be because of the giant scythe with its attacks that are hard to predict? I initially attempted the fight at the top of the Clocktower with only about a single potion and got my ass handed to me over and over. Definitely memorable in its difficulty, but I'm annoyed by all the tiny scythes floating around. I was able to eventually beat Death with the help of some extra grinding and *rewinds, egads*. This was before I realized that the Fresh Melon was a full heal (the flavor text didn't really imply it at all), and before I realized that Death himself doesn't do damage, just his scythe. And then when I finally killed Death, the scythe flipping away got one last hit on me and killed me. If not for rewinds I may have quit on the spot, lol. It was the first time in a while that, while playing a game, my palms got so sweaty I had to wipe them on my pants. ## Secret Books There's two secret books I've found (as of [[2023-01-09]]) that were hidden in very obscure spots in the castle that talk about having specific souls (the "King of Bats" and "Sweet Nightmare"), which I assume is needed to get some kind of true ending sequence. I think I have at least two of the needed ones, so I'm scouring the castle looking for the third book before I go off towards the "Top Floor", where monsters get real freaking tough. ## Worst Room in the Game The worst room in the game is in the Arena, the second one on the elevator which has the conveyor belts and Medusa Heads. The Medusa Heads freeze you in place and the conveyor belts have way too much velocity that push you into spikes which do at minimum 150 damage (which is roughly a quarter to a fifth of my health, which is fucked up). Such a frustrating room for what is ultimately a not-very-valuable piece of gear. Genuinely infuriating room that I would hate even more if I didn't have souls that healed me from standing still and the more obvious "rewind" capabilities of the port. ## Final Boss Sequence Graham is a pretty predictable final boss but I admire that his fight is still a fair challenge. I wouldn't consider it ultimately that difficult since the first part of his fight is just memorizing and reacting to attack patterns and the second stage is just that but with more things to keep track of on screen. I think Cuphead has a couple bosses like these where you just aren't allowed to stand in one place, but so long as you know where to stand you're going to be just fine. Pretty fitting end to Graham, though I never really considered him a threat that much? He seemed like obviously a bad guy, but not *Dracula*. Of course, Soma's Dracula! That's what happened when I used the souls implied by the three books (Flame demon, Giant Bat, and Succubus), I was left to once again explore the castle to my own devices and head to the Floating Gardens to enter that one weird dark room that I couldn't before. ### Julius Belmont Julius was a cool-ass boss fight, one I'm sure I would've appreciated even more if I had been a die-hard Castlevania fan, the way it likely referenced many old Castlevania games. I know that Vampire Killer was playing and that Julius started throwing all kinds of weapons that Simon Belmont uses in the original Castlevania. It's a HARD fight too, and a long one. Definitely much harder than any of the specified final bosses (Graham and Chaos) and easily the "hey, you can't go to the final boss until you're strong enough to be beating Julius". I think this works well as a fake level-gate since they really want the fight against Chaos to be difficult, but not insurmountable, which is how that fight ended up feeling to me. ### Chaotic Realm and Chaos as the True Final Boss Kinda like a last little stretch like Soma peering into himself and everything. I initially got stuck in the very beginning since I didn't see that I could fly upwards towards more rooms, and wasn't sure if the space room was hiding one thing or another. Once I got past that little part, then I was able to follow along pretty easily, considering the Realm is a long hallway with dead-end branches with little treasures or monsters to encounter. Chaos itself is a fight that wasn't too horrid, I managed to beat it fist try, but I think the second form of Chaos is really busy and it can be a lot to handle all at once. At least every attack on screen is distinguishable from the very chaotic monochrome background. # Favorite Moments / Memories - The music is all really solid and mysterious. I quite enjoy a lot of the more "action-y" songs. - Legion, though easy, is a really neat boss. # What were you doing when not playing this? - Started this on New Years Eve in Virginia at the Beach House # Relevant Links