Released very shortly after the original Famicom Disk System release of the original Castlevania, "Vampire Killer", as it's also known, is an adaptation of the Famicom game made for the MSX home computer system. It's never been released outside of Japan, and this game also is the only one in this post not on the Anniversary Collection. This is one that I bought on the Japanese Wii U Virtual Console to play on Twitch, and I ended up beating it in a little over 2 hours in one sitting.

While this will be uncannily familiar in many respects to anyone who has played the NES game, the MSX version of Castlevania is a completely different game in just about every respect. Some of that is down to the differences in the programming realities of building a game for the Famicom vs building one or the MSX, but there is a broader design philosophy that makes the bridge between the two far far wider. While still a stage-based linear game, MSX Castlevania is much more of an adventure game than its predecessor. In many ways, it's a kind of missing link between the first two Famicom game, and playing this explains a lot of why Castlevania II was just apparently an adventure game for no reason when the first entry was a straight-up action platformer.

Some elements of this game are just like its Famicom counterpart. Your whip upgrades when you collect power ups and that power resets on death, there are six stages with generally the same bosses at the end of each, and you collect hearts as you go through the castle. However, there is a LOT here that is utterly alien to the original Castlevania experience. You have hearts to collect, sure, but they don't power your subweapons (not like the other games, at least). In fact, this game doesn't even have subweapons at all. You use these hearts at merchants in the castle to buy things like health refills, new weapons, maps of the areas you're in, or even a shield to block incoming projectiles. There are more weapons, yes, but they replace your old one. If you get the knives (which are REALLY good), they replace your whip, but you can throw those things infinitely and they take no ammo to fire. The only subweapons that are here are the holy water and stop watch, which are both very very finicky to use, and seemed to require jumping in the air and then holding up and then pressing B to actually use. I could never get them to work reliably.

Additionally, each of the six stages are separated into three areas, and in each area you need to find a silver key to open up the gate at the end to access the next area. There are also normal keys to collect to open chests that hide everything from passive items to maps to just bundles of hearts you can use to buy stuff. The keys you need to progress are often hidden very well, and some are eventually even outright fakes or red herrings that are only there to try and get you to kill yourself trying to get them.

That brings me to my ultimate gripe with this game. While the first Castlevania is difficult to the point of not being very fun, I wouldn't call it outright unfair more often than not. Its level design is unforgiving, absolutely, but it's never meanspirited. MSX Castlevania, on the other hand, is a VERY vindictive and unfair game. It is riddled with traps to kill you like the aforementioned false door keys, and that's not to mention the slimes that are hidden in ever so many candle sticks, the enemies that are so close to the edge of the screen that you cannot enter that screen without getting hit, or how if you miss the return on boomerang weapons like the axe or cross that weapon is just GONE and you have nothing but your weak default whip again. Even your map has limited uses for some inexplicable reason. And this is all on top of how this game has no continues, no passwords, and no extra lives. You have THREE whole lives to get through the entirety of a very labyrinthine Castlevania and kill Dracula with, and should you lose those lives, it's back to the start of the entire game for you. Thankfully, Simon is pretty beefy and he can take a lot of punishment, but even with save states it was pretty difficult at times to not die before getting to the bosses.

The bosses, paradoxically enough, are super duper easy, but this mostly revolves around how this is an MSX game and not a Famicom game. Like most MSX games, the screen doesn't scroll with you as you move. Like in Zelda 1, when Simon gets to the edge of the screen, the next screen forms ahead of him as he transitions to it. It doesn't move along with you as you move like the Famicom version of Castlevania does. Another interesting thing is that, while Simon himself has a knockback SO huge that it actually knocks you farther than you can physically jump forwards, enemies themselves don't freeze upon being hit and have no invincibility frames at all. Simon can also whip his whip REALLY fast, so if you just get close to a boss, you can let it hit you, tank the hit and just lay into them while your invincibility frames keep you protected. While this is otherwise a very difficult game, the bosses are easily one of the least difficult aspects of it. This also has one of the easiest Dracula fights by far (at least if you buy the very cheap knife weapon being sold right near his boss door), although it does drag on and gets a little boring after a while. All that said, the most unfortunate thing about this being an MSX game is that the slowdown affects the gameplay far more than in the NES games, meaning there were a lot of times where the game simply didn't recognize an input because it was stuttering so badly and I ended up getting hit or dying as a result.

As far as the presentation is concerned, it's still pretty decent. The music hardware of the MSX isn't exactly up to the standard the Famicom could produce, but they're still quite good renditions of the tracks from the Famicom game. The graphics are also good recreations of that, although I wouldn't say it's quite as pretty as the Famicom game. There are some quite odd aspects to the presentation though. Particularly, that not only is the epilogue to this Japan-exclusive game all in English, is also doesn't even call you Simon Belmont O_o

Verdict: Not Recommended. I can say very safely that this is the worst Castlevania game I've ever played and almost certainly the worst in the series. It honestly wouldn't be quite so bad if it weren't for the lack of continues or extra lives, but even then it'd just be a below average adventure game. Even with save states, this game is really only ever worth playing if you're just THAT curious about how it fits into the overall evolution of the series, and even then, I'd advise just watching a playthrough on YouTube before spending any money on it (let alone 800 yen like I did XP).

Vampire Killer reuses a lot of assets from its NES counterpart, and presentation wise, it looks quite nice, but this is all to lure you into a false sense of security. Real quick, you'll realize what makes Vampire Killer so different from Castlevania. Hearts serve two purposes here: one is for your sub-weapons (standard stuff), and secondly, currency, kind of like Castlevania II. You use these hearts to buy from merchants who are sometimes in plain sight or behind a breakable wall. You have to hit these merchants a few times before they sell you anything, and after you're done with them, you can keep hitting them, and they'll eventually die. Free points!!! Speaking of breakable walls, they're everywhere in this game, and hitting at walls is vital as they can hide chests that can be opened with regular keys you find scattered throughout the levels, but more importantly, you might also find white keys. These white keys are required to progress to the next level. Unlike NES Castlevania, there's no boss at the end of every level; instead, they're at the end of every third level. There are 18 levels in total, which means a lot of hitting at walls and hoping you find those white keys.

You start off with your classic whip, but from the previously mentioned merchants, you can replace your whip and have, for example, an axe or a knife as your main weapon. They don't consume hearts, so spam to your heart's content. Although if you have the cross or the axe, which acts like the cross in this game, make sure to catch it on the rebound or you'll lose it and you'll be stuck with your shitty whip. You might find a merchant selling a candle; this will highlight which walls are breakable. Don't matter though, since your entire inventory, besides hearts, resets after beating a boss.

So truth be told, I was actually having an okay time with this up until stage 17, where I managed to softlock myself. See this block I subtly highlighted (this screenshot is not from my playthrough; I took this from a longplay on YouTube)? I got here after picking up the white key, but for some reason this block wouldn't break, so I checked a longplay on YouTube, and it seems to only break with holy water? Which I didn't have, so I had to jump off a pit and restart the level. This also reset my hearts, so I had to grind hearts to buy the holy water. Turns out there's another white key in this level close to the exit, so I didn't actually need to do any of that. The fun doesn't end there; Dracula in level 18 has a completely unique second form compared to his NES counterpart. He has a jewel on the top of his head, and to hit it you have to jump up these small platforms and attack from the top. The best method of attack is the knife. Luckily, the very first merchant you see on this level sells them for uhhhh 90 hearts. I didn't exactly get that many hearts back after spending most of them on the previous level, so once again, I grinded for these fucking things. Here's a very useful hint: you'll occasionally find red and white bibles. White bibles make merchant items cheaper, while red ones make them more expensive, so don't accidentally pick one up while you already happen to be holding a white bible, completely screwing yourself over. Play with save states if you really want to play this.