Castlevania Appreciation Thread

[MrPopo]

Castlevania 1; is there any point to trying to continue after losing a life? Or are you pretty much boned and better off restarting?

Why would you be boned after dieing? There's infinite continues, so the worst that'll happen is you start at the beginning of a level instead of a checkpoint.

It feels like the game is rather unforgiving of losing your powered up whip. I forgot there were infinite continues; restarting from the level beginning feels like it'd be better than some of the checkpoints.

I was giving it a bit of a playthrough last night and got killed on the big bridge because I kept failing at not taking damage from the skull towers. Trying to go from that checkpoint was all kinds of nasty.

[Xeogred]

Ziggy, if you somewhat enjoyed Dracula X but don't have good things to say about Chronicles...

Ack: I'm not giving you my vote for Dracula X. Unless you've played and beaten all the others, the overlooked Chronicles as well (from what I've seen elsewhere and over the years nobody talks about this one)... then okay, you can play Dracula X. Otherwise ... yikes, do you really want Countdown Vampires over Resident Evil?

Popo: I never saw that as a problem, whenever you respawn after a death the first 1-3 candles usually has the first whip powerup. It can be a handicap not having the second powerup for that extra length... but this is hardly Gradius we're talking. Anyways, I was glad Rondo of Blood didn't even bother with it. That's how badass Richter is, he has the biggest, longest, and strongest whip. Yes, I went there.

[MrPopo]

I kept getting to the hallway right before Death and got nailed by the damn medusa heads. I really really really need to make it to there with my holy water intact.

[KalessinDB]

Medusa heads are the bane of my existance in any CV ever.

[MrPopo]

Simon Belmondo is victorious!

[Ack]

yikes, do you really want Countdown Vampires over Resident Evil?

...yes?

[Ziggy]

Ziggy, if you somewhat enjoyed Dracula X but don't have good things to say about Chronicles...

Well, for example, I got RE4 on the Wii when it first came out. I hated it. A couple months back I decided to give it another try and I ended up *loving* it. So I have no problem giving games another shot, and with a fresh attitude. I'm really in the CV mood right now, so who knows, maybe I'll end up beating it this time!

I kept getting to the hallway right before Death and got nailed by the damn medusa heads. I really really really need to make it to there with my holy water intact.

The only thing that sucks about dying there is if you're relying on holy water for the bosses. You'll lose the holy water and you'd have to get a continue to get it back.

That part is a little tricky. I came up with a good method, but it would be hard to explain. Maybe if I get a minute tonight I'll see if I can make a video to better explain my strategy. I've died at that part SO many times, and had to play through it after getting my ass handed to me by death even more times.

[MrPopo]

I figured out how to make it through; throw holy water at ALL the enemies and don't noob out and accidentally grab the stopwatch after the second set of throwing skeletons (that was embarrassing that one time). Since holy water pretty much one-shots the axe knights it turns the medusa head hallway into a nice simple walk, as medusa heads only suck when you're doing things like jumping or not just walking in a straight line with no interruptions.

[Ziggy]

I was playing some Rondo of Blood last night. Man, playing Rondo after SNES Dracula X really puts into perspective just how much the SNES game sucks. Still, I stand by what I said. The SNES game has great graphics. For example, the first level looks loads better in the SNES version. The SNES doesn't have the CD quality audio, but it's really not bad at all. But the game play just isn't there, Rondo completely blows it away.

[Xeogred]

I was playing some Rondo of Blood last night. Man, playing Rondo after SNES Dracula X really puts into perspective just how much the SNES game sucks. Still, I stand by what I said. The SNES game has great graphics. For example, the first level looks loads better in the SNES version. The SNES doesn't have the CD quality audio, but it's really not bad at all. But the game play just isn't there, Rondo completely blows it away.

I still don't think the graphics are quite justified. It's 4 years newer than Super IV... but looks worse to me. Definitely doesn't look bad, but the SNES was looking way better in 1995...

Making this game my punching bag.

Popo makes me want to bring this up, am I the only one that thinks the bats were far worse than Medusa Heads? The bats in CV1 and CV3 were ludicrous!

For another potentially interesting discussion, which subweapon(s) do you guys like the most in the classic games? I always like having the dagger around, but I honestly think the axe comes in handy the most against bosses and such. Holy fire or whatever it was... has its moments here and there, haha.

With Bloodlines however, the boomerang was boss! Absolutely loved that subweapon.