12-13-2006, 10:12 AM
With the advent of ScrewAttack.com's Angry Video Game Nerd, a whole new genre of video game reviewing has come around: bashing the fuck out of games that we can all agree suck really hard. All this leaves you with, though, is a list of games to avoid, leaving you with little direction on how to find games that you should pick up and play if you haven't already.
I've long considered myself a bit of an old school videogame afficionado, so I feel it's my duty to dust off the shelves of video game history and review some older titles.
The first on my list is from one of my favorite franchises in the video gaming world: Konami's Castlevania.
A game based on Gothic Romanian legend, you guide members of the Belmont family against the hordes of Dracula, eventually slaying him and returning peace to the land until his next return. The concept is so beautifully simple that there's almost no way to screw it up.
Castlevania was a brilliant classic. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest was a somewhat unpopular departure from the original gameplay. Despite the second's poor reception, Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse (a prequel to the first two) was released. This game was killer. Awesome music, pretty tight controls, and now you could play as multiple characters!
Then comes one of the best games in the whole franchise: Super Castlevania IV. This game kicks so much ass that I'm squirming in my seat as I'm typing this. Though it's really just a huge graphical and gameplay overhaul of the original Castlevania game (and therefore shouldn't have the IV label), it's so different from its predecessors that it may as well be a different game.
So here's a rundown on it:
======
Graphics
======
Despite being a relatively early SNES game, this game is a great example of the great graphical effects the SNES was capable of. The animation is pretty smooth and fluid. Simon has a lot of frames of animation for just about every action (except for crouching, which happens in one frame). Most enemies have distinct dying animations. Some crumble to the ground; some explode into flames, sending their pieces everywhere; some keel over, turn into flames and drift offscreen. All of the nice little touches are there to make it look like Konami really cared about making a pretty looking game, and they succeeded mightily.
There are transparency effects as well as use of Mode 7, color shifting, and sprite resizing/rotation. The most visually pleasing area would have to be Dracula's Treasury. Not only a great place to get loads of points, the whole place shines and sparkles, chests bursting open with gold coins when you jump on them.
The enemies are crisp and unambiguous: everything looks like what it actually is. The backgrounds are detailed, multilayerd, and some are even animated!
In all, a fantastic effort that came across well. I score it an 8 out of 10. The color palette is a bit drab sometimes and more cutscenes would've been nice, but I'm not complaining with what I got.
======
Sound
======
Here is where this game totally rocks out hardcore. You've got your classic Castlevania tunes in there like "Bloody Tears," "Vampire Killer," and "Beginning." You've also got lots of new tunes in there, too. The music in the Sunken City, the Treasury, and the Main Hall is all fantastic and memorable and really fits the area you're fighting evil in.
The sound effects all sound pretty good. The lashing of Simon's whip gets a little tiresome, but other than that, no real comments. Certainly better than the bleeps and boops of its predecessors.
I give the sound score a 9 out of 10. The music is just so awesome. I'm glad there's a sound test in the options menu so you can just listen to the awesomeness without having to worry about getting killed. The detraction is for how annoying Simon's whip sound gets.
======
Gameplay
======
The controls are pretty tight and responsive, which is a must for a successful platformer. If Simon ends up dying, it's generally because you botched a jump or ran out of health. The learning curve is pretty shallow: you'll pretty much master the controls by the end of the first level. From then, you just fine tune your accuracy with the whip and do more jumping maneuvers. Also, figuring out which subweapon works best for you is something you can establish in the first level as well, since you can pick up each one of the Knife, Stopwatch, Axe, Cross, and Holy Water.
The difficulty scales up gradually as you go. When you reach the entryway to Dracula's castle, most of the enemies now take an extra hit to kill. Those skeletons that used to fly apart at one lash now take two, and so on. By the time you get to the later levels, however, some of the bosses are really fucking hard. In the last level you have to fight Slogra, Gaibon, and Death all in a row. It gets pretty frustrating after several failed attempts, but if you manage to take them down, then Dracula himself will be a cakewalk.
When you finish the game, you start back at the first level with your powered up whip with your score and all your items carried over, and all the enemies now have this power boost, with new enemy positions in some levels.
The game also features a password, which is really the only way you could even come close to maxing out the score. After one and a half times through the game currently, my score is only 225,790, and there are three more digits on the score meter. So with a score of, say, 200,000 per completion, you'd need to finish it about 500 times to break the 100,000,000 mark. There's a goal for you!
I give the gameplay a solid 10 out of 10. Simon does exactly what you tell him to, the difficulty eases you into the game, and there are lots of different tactics you can use to take care of your enemies.
Graphics: 8
Sound: 9
Gameplay: 10
= 27 out of 30 = 90%
An all around solid game. If you've only heard about the Castlevania franchise and never played it, this is a great place to start. Go pick it up and give it a try! I doubt you'll be disappointed.
I've long considered myself a bit of an old school videogame afficionado, so I feel it's my duty to dust off the shelves of video game history and review some older titles.
The first on my list is from one of my favorite franchises in the video gaming world: Konami's Castlevania.
A game based on Gothic Romanian legend, you guide members of the Belmont family against the hordes of Dracula, eventually slaying him and returning peace to the land until his next return. The concept is so beautifully simple that there's almost no way to screw it up.
Castlevania was a brilliant classic. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest was a somewhat unpopular departure from the original gameplay. Despite the second's poor reception, Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse (a prequel to the first two) was released. This game was killer. Awesome music, pretty tight controls, and now you could play as multiple characters!
Then comes one of the best games in the whole franchise: Super Castlevania IV. This game kicks so much ass that I'm squirming in my seat as I'm typing this. Though it's really just a huge graphical and gameplay overhaul of the original Castlevania game (and therefore shouldn't have the IV label), it's so different from its predecessors that it may as well be a different game.
So here's a rundown on it:
======
Graphics
======
Despite being a relatively early SNES game, this game is a great example of the great graphical effects the SNES was capable of. The animation is pretty smooth and fluid. Simon has a lot of frames of animation for just about every action (except for crouching, which happens in one frame). Most enemies have distinct dying animations. Some crumble to the ground; some explode into flames, sending their pieces everywhere; some keel over, turn into flames and drift offscreen. All of the nice little touches are there to make it look like Konami really cared about making a pretty looking game, and they succeeded mightily.
There are transparency effects as well as use of Mode 7, color shifting, and sprite resizing/rotation. The most visually pleasing area would have to be Dracula's Treasury. Not only a great place to get loads of points, the whole place shines and sparkles, chests bursting open with gold coins when you jump on them.
The enemies are crisp and unambiguous: everything looks like what it actually is. The backgrounds are detailed, multilayerd, and some are even animated!
In all, a fantastic effort that came across well. I score it an 8 out of 10. The color palette is a bit drab sometimes and more cutscenes would've been nice, but I'm not complaining with what I got.
======
Sound
======
Here is where this game totally rocks out hardcore. You've got your classic Castlevania tunes in there like "Bloody Tears," "Vampire Killer," and "Beginning." You've also got lots of new tunes in there, too. The music in the Sunken City, the Treasury, and the Main Hall is all fantastic and memorable and really fits the area you're fighting evil in.
The sound effects all sound pretty good. The lashing of Simon's whip gets a little tiresome, but other than that, no real comments. Certainly better than the bleeps and boops of its predecessors.
I give the sound score a 9 out of 10. The music is just so awesome. I'm glad there's a sound test in the options menu so you can just listen to the awesomeness without having to worry about getting killed. The detraction is for how annoying Simon's whip sound gets.
======
Gameplay
======
The controls are pretty tight and responsive, which is a must for a successful platformer. If Simon ends up dying, it's generally because you botched a jump or ran out of health. The learning curve is pretty shallow: you'll pretty much master the controls by the end of the first level. From then, you just fine tune your accuracy with the whip and do more jumping maneuvers. Also, figuring out which subweapon works best for you is something you can establish in the first level as well, since you can pick up each one of the Knife, Stopwatch, Axe, Cross, and Holy Water.
The difficulty scales up gradually as you go. When you reach the entryway to Dracula's castle, most of the enemies now take an extra hit to kill. Those skeletons that used to fly apart at one lash now take two, and so on. By the time you get to the later levels, however, some of the bosses are really fucking hard. In the last level you have to fight Slogra, Gaibon, and Death all in a row. It gets pretty frustrating after several failed attempts, but if you manage to take them down, then Dracula himself will be a cakewalk.
When you finish the game, you start back at the first level with your powered up whip with your score and all your items carried over, and all the enemies now have this power boost, with new enemy positions in some levels.
The game also features a password, which is really the only way you could even come close to maxing out the score. After one and a half times through the game currently, my score is only 225,790, and there are three more digits on the score meter. So with a score of, say, 200,000 per completion, you'd need to finish it about 500 times to break the 100,000,000 mark. There's a goal for you!
I give the gameplay a solid 10 out of 10. Simon does exactly what you tell him to, the difficulty eases you into the game, and there are lots of different tactics you can use to take care of your enemies.
Graphics: 8
Sound: 9
Gameplay: 10
= 27 out of 30 = 90%
An all around solid game. If you've only heard about the Castlevania franchise and never played it, this is a great place to start. Go pick it up and give it a try! I doubt you'll be disappointed.