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Castlevania is a series rich with history. Created back in 1986, these action platforming titles have have gone through numerous changes, including characters, gameplay, as well as systems, yet at their core have changed very little. This format is part of what has made them so successful, Castlevania titles are always something new, yet something oh so familiar.

Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow is the first title of the series to arrive on the DS and is a sequel to the GBA title, Aria of Sorrow, which I never played. Fortunately that is not actually a prerequisite to playing, and can be enjoyed on it's own with no prior knowledge required.

The hero to this title is a young man known as Soma Cruz, the rebirth of Dracula. Having learned he was destined to become the dark lord he rebelled, quelling the chaos within him. Now however, a cult is trying to resurrect their evil lord once more with new candidates, and Soma must use his powers with the help of his friends to stop them.

The key point to almost all Castlevania games is the exploration of Dracula's Castle, and the main point all Castlevania games have in common. The layout of the average Castlevania title is as follows: Start at the main castle gate, work their way through the Castle beating bosses and solving puzzles to eventually progress to either the top floor or the basement the whole while fighting a horde of enemies in between.

While knowing what to expect is a staple of the Castlevania fan, things are consistently different in how the Castle is explored. Souls are the key to Dawn of Sorrow, monsters souls to be precise, for Soma has the power to absorb the souls of his enemies and use their skills. These include giving him extra moves including double jumping, flying, extra attacks and various other unique abilities. The souls of bosses that Soma defeats grant the biggest benefit as they often allow Soma access to other parts of the Castle he previously couldn't reach.

These souls can also be used to combine with weapons either bought or found in the castle to create more powerful versions of the same type, some with unique abilities or stat increases. This is not the only RPG like gameplay involved however, armour and accessories can also be equipped, and when defeating enemies experience is gained leveling Soma up and increasing his stats from attack down to luck.

Visually Dawn of Sorrow looks fantastic. Though in 2D the game uses multiple layers in detailed backgrounds to give an almost 3D effect. The designs throughout the game are brilliant matching the Gothic atmosphere perfectly with plenty of zombies, skeletons and demons not to mention some gigantic bosses to fight along the way. I will say however I absolutely hate the anime cover art, why they would use that over the more traditional art style the series is known for since Symphony of the Night is beyond me.

The sound is also top notch with some older themes here and there for Castlevania veterans as well as plenty of new tracks to spruce things up. The sound comes through brilliantly clear on the DS with some also surprisingly good sound effects, though a lot of which come across as pretty old school.

Dawn of Sorrow is a surprisingly big game taking me a good 16 hours to finish including quite a bit of leveling up and soul hunting along the way. It might have been shorter had it been a bit more obvious occasionally about where to go, but that is the fun of Castlevania titles, the exploration. Getting 100% of the castle map, fighting all enemies and collecting all souls will take a while for the collector. There are also added modes playing as a different character as well as boss rush after the game is finished bringing quite a bit of value to the game should you wish.

Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow is simply a fun game, fans of the series will feel right at home yet it's got more then enough variety to offer a new experience, and a welcome one to those new to the games. If you own a DS you owe it to yourself to pick up Dawn of Sorrow and give it a blast, you may be pleasantly surprised.

+ Using souls is an excellent way of mixing things up.
+ Exploring the castle is fun.
+ Fairly good value.

- Cover art is hideous.

It can even be expressed as....

if you wanna enjoy the game, you have to beat once...

playin with julius belmont way more fun then main game....

also belmont/female magic/alucard, trio remind me castlevania 3

My first ever Castlevania! Yeah, this was pretty good! I think the RPG elements and upgrade system are fun to play around with, I particularly like how much choice you have in your weapons and souls (abilities) and how it feels like you can customise your build in a lot of meaningfully different ways. I went through with a Spear which was upgraded to a Trident by the end of the game and used the Killer Clown (long-range projectile) and Alastor (giant flying sword guy who hovers around me) souls throughout most of the game and was a total distance demon. Felt good.

I also like the world design, though this is almost a given in a Metroidvania. Lots of cool little nooks & crannies and the way the world loops back on itself, as always, is neat. However, my fundamental beef with Metroidvania remains in tact. It feels like these games kinda demand you play them to completion in a few consecutive sessions and never take time off or do something else, because god forbid you forget this one random ass progress gate that's actually key to the critical path but you can only get past once you get an upgrade 8 hours after you first see it. Noting these things down, remembering them and progressing because you paid attention to the game world is cool! But having to waste hours of your time backtracking through the same places just to find out where you actually need to go because you decided to take a break is not. Metroidvanias feel like they practically necessitate a walkthrough at times in my opinion and I just don't enjoy that, I think these games would hugely benefit from a system like the Sheikah Stone Visions in Ocarina Of Time 3D. If I've lost my way - don't tell me where to go, but give me a hint! Show me a brief snippet of gameplay that suggests a general idea of where I should be.

I very much appreciated Dawn Of Sorrow's variety in enemies, visuals and music! Though it has to be said that whilst every area gets a new coat of paint, they all play pretty much the same. I think some kind of change of pace a la the blackout sequence in Metroid Fusion would have gone a long way. The only areas that felt particularly different imo were Subterranean Hell (which was a kinda lame water level) and the Demon Guest House because of its sliding room puzzle (my favourite area in the game.)

So, yeah! I liked it well enough - I have some gripes but I'm also reminding myself that this is a game from 2005, ahaha. Video games have come a long way since then and I admit it is a bit hard - even as someone who isn't a huge Metroidvania fan to go back to a game like this knowing how much it's inspired the likes of, almost objectively superior games like Hollow Knight and Dark Souls. They, of course have the benefit of years of game development understanding and industry progress over Dawn Of Sorrow! But going back today is less like playing a really good game on its own merits, and more like looking at an interesting starting point for some of the better stuff of the past decade. It still holds up just fine, but said industry progress has rendered it a bit obsolete, I think. Were the story or worldbuilding a bit more interesting, that might not be the case - but this game's biggest strength is definitely its gameplay and that's been bettered since.

just a disclaimer before you read: I went through this game by playing the Definitive Edition+ hack which changes up some of the gameplay features, meaning I technically didn’t play the vanilla game as it was meant to be intended, that said I’ll still bring up some stuff about the vanilla game and compare it to how the DE+ version handles them, oh yeah spoilers for Aria of Sorrow since this game is a direct continuation of that

so Dawn of Sorrow, looks like Konami wanted to continue the 2035 storyline so Soma and his friends are back again for a second round. I don’t know, I thought Aria of Sorrow ended off on a good note with the whole Dark Lord rejecting his fate and confronting the Chaos inside of him, but I guess there’s still some more story to tell somehow.

a year after escaping the eclipse, Soma and Mina are just chilling around talking about their day when all of a sudden they get jumpscared by a woman. she sends some monsters to beat the crap out of Soma but unsurprisingly he takes care of them rather easily before the woman goes “blah blah blah they must be a Dark Lord blah blah blah” before disappearing. her name’s Celia Fortner, a member of a cult (different cult than the one in Aria btw, yeah another cult just popped out of nowhere) that wants Soma dead so the title of the Dark Lord can be succeeded by her two cronies: Dario Bossi, a criminal who has history with arson due to his ability to control fire, and Dmitrii Blinov, who can copy the magical abilities of his opponents as well as having an extremely punchable face. Soma’s pretty pissed about the whole situation so he decides to take the initiative and makes his way to their headquarters himself, going as far as ditching the fur coat in exchange for the Seto Kaiba attire, that’s when you know he’s serious. of course, all of Soma buddies such as Yoko, Hammer, Julius, and Arikado are there as well as they proceed to repeatedly tell Soma that he shouldn’t be there and that they will handle it while Soma replies with “shut up, just let me do my thing”. the story’s a bit odd this time and a few of the characters act ever so slightly differently this time around, especially Hammer with how down bad he is for Yoko in this game, not that I blame him really. despite the very minor hiccups, I think it’s a worthy followup to Aria of Sorrow’s storyline, in a few instances I actually like some stuff about it more, such as how Yoko doesn’t nearly die halfway through so she actually has something to do this time around. I also do enjoy the villains even if they aren’t the most menacing ones compared to what we’ve seen in the past. they really are just a bunch of losers attempting to fill in Dracula’s big shoes. I’ll at least acknowledge that they gave out a few plot twists I didn’t see coming, so they’re neat in my book.

there’s no Dracula’s Castle in this one since it got permanently destroyed last time so instead you have to settle with the Diet Coke version. there’s a lot of cool areas here like an abandoned snowy village you have to go through to enter the castle, a mysterious magic lab with a secret underground area, a chapel that has some ghosts forever dancing for eternity, a guest house with waiter skeletons, not one but two towers, and some old runned down similar to the castle entrances of a lot of Castlevania games. oh yeah, there’s also a bunch of random ice blocks cluttered around in some areas, how did they even get there? I get that the castle is located near a cold climate but what benefit is there to place a bunch of ice blocks in these rooms other than to annoy Soma even further? they must be made out of some tough ice too because the only way to get rid of them is via an upgrade that lets you destroy them with the touch screen, which leads to this next segway.

Touch Screen!!! what year was this released? 2005? yep, here’s your touch screen gimmicks. you want to play the game? sign your name with your finger. you need those ice blocks gone? place your finger on them. need to defeat a boss? swing your finger around like a dork. alright joking aside, this game’s going to make you use your touch screen sometimes. all of those ice blocks areas I’ve mentioned? most of them are really only in the Wizardly Lab so you don’t have to concern too much, no worries. then you got the Magic Seals. to enter a boss room, you need to collect a magic seal somewhere in the castle that’ll let you gain access to it. now boss doors, that’s ok. does it take up a couple of seconds to watch it open? yes it does, but, it’s mostly harmless. then they bring them into boss battles. right after you deplete all of a boss’s HP, you need to actually draw the magic seal in order to properly defeat it. why do you have to do this when you could have defeated the bosses in Aria without it just fine? idk. gotta find some use for that touch screen. is this bad? no, well not at first. the first few magic seals aren’t that difficult to draw, the first one is just a simple “V” pattern, easy to understand. then they get a bit more complicated and that when things change. now the actual patterns, they’re a bit annoying, but not too much. the problem here is getting those patterns down right after potentially finishing off a boss. did I mention there’s a time limit? fail to get the pattern correctly in time and all of a sudden, the boss gains more HP and you have to whittle them down again. usually getting them down again isn’t too hard, but for later bosses like Aguni and Death, a failed pattern is likely going to get you a Game Over in return. a clutch kill in any other Castlevania game is turned into a “no u” if you screw up the magic seal. the Definitive+ hack I’ve played actually removes the requirement for dealing with this at the end of a boss battle, so I can’t actually say that I gone through this experience myself outside of watching YouTube videos of other people failing, but I can guarantee I would have screwed up those later seals a lot if I had to do so. I will at least acknowledge that they give you the option to practice the seals via an option in the menu, so you can pretty much teach yourself to get better at them wherever you are in the game.

I’m assuming you’ve probably already played Aria of Sorrow before reading this review so I won’t go into detail about the Soul mechanic, but if you haven’t, why are you playing Dawn before Aria in this day and age? just like Aria, every enemy in the game has a soul you can obtain which is still really impressive. combine that with the new Doppleganger soul that lets you have two different sets of souls and equipment you can switch between anytime and you got yourself a lot of versatility. speaking of equipment, you have the option to make the weapons you obtain more powerful. Yoko’s here to help upgrade them with her weapon synthesis, free at cost unless you count souls as currency. yeah, you need to acquire specific souls to upgrade specific weapons, so you better go and save your cash for that Soul Eater Ring this time around! grinding for souls this time around wasn’t as time consuming as it was in Aria for me as the Definitive+ hack fixed how the Luck stat works so it can actually provide a significant boost to the soul drop rate. having the Soul Eater Ring, Three 7s, as well as the Ghost Dancer soul (provides a boost to your Luck stat) equipped meant that the longest it ever took for me to grind a soul was about 10 or so minutes, not too bad. as for the vanilla game, I’d imagine it’d take a bit longer to get those souls. how much longer? not sure, but if you want my advice: just try to be patient and maybe play some music in the background while you’re grinding for those souls. this does lead to a bit of a negative unfortunately and it’s that weapon synthesis is your only convenient way of getting good weapons in this game. “but can’t you find some good ones hidden in the castle?”, nope lmao. this ain’t like Aria where you can find the most broken weapon by breaking a hidden wall, the cultists at With Light are stingy when it comes to giving you good equipment as all you’ll be finding inside there are beginner and mid-tier weapons. Hammer’s shop doesn’t fair much better, ironic since he’s supposed to be an arms dealer, so if you don’t want to get your butt kicked during the endgame, you absolutely need to grind souls so Yoko can upgrade your weapons, at least you’ll get some new dialogue whenever you talk to her. if you’re really desperate though, just equip a Mandragora soul and stock up on High Mind Ups and you’ll probably destroy most of the bosses.

I forgot to bring this up in my Aria review, but that game had some pretty great bosses, and Dawn continues to throw some more cool ones at you. it starts off with the Flying Armor that flies around and flings his two swords about, then Balore the giant returns albeit much more easier to face off against since he’s the only second boss this time. there’s this weird looking Puppet Master that’s a giant head and four arms that puts marionettes into iron maidens which switch places with you if you don’t destroy them quickly. there’s also some fish monster called Rehab that’s admittedly a little annoying to fight since Soma doesn’t get the ability to sink underwater until after you defeat it. I also have to bring up Zephyr, probably the most memorable fight for some people due to all the DIO nods (stops time, throws knives, fought near a clock tower), which somehow flew past my head when I fought him myself, do not ask me how I have no clue why I didn’t get the hint either. if I have to pick a personal favorite though, it’s probably Gergoth. not only does he look like Shin Godzilla (I know Gergoth came first but you get what I’m saying) but before you face him you have to climb up this tall tower to even reach the guy. right before his second phase, he destroys the floor you’re standing on and crashes down every room you climbed earlier before the two of you reach the bottom floor where the rest of the fight continues, with the destroyed rooms remaining like that for the rest of the game, pure kino. special shoutouts go to Dario and Dmitrii, especially Dmitrii since he has the ability to copy whatever soul you throw at him. normally he’ll defeat you easily if you throw all your good stuff at him, but if you were to use something such as the Student Witch soul on Dmitrii, he’ll be reduced to flinging cats at you for most of the fight, what a jobber. I appreciate how the handheld Castlevanias have been slowly improving their bosses over time, and I’m looking forward to seeing how cool they’ll be in the next two games.

Julius Mode is back, now in the flavor of Castlevania III! you got a Belmont, a Belnades, and an Alucard, all to your own luxure! unfortunately it’s not a true Castlevania III experience because there’s no playable DaNasty so I have to give this mode a 0/10. that time in Dracula’s Castle last year must have done a number to him because he’s not nearly as broken as was in Aria. he moves slightly slower, he lost the Omnia Vantias, and his uppercut barely reaches that much distance. thankfully Yoko and Alucard are here to aid old boomer Julius’s apparent weaknesses as Yoko has a backdash that covers a lot of ground while Alucard can fly around as a bat like he could in Castlevania III, all three characters have their uses so you’ll for sure be using all of them during your playthrough. overall it’s pretty similar to the one in Aria, even down to having little to no cutscenes, which admittedly is a bit disappointing since this game’s Julius Mode is supposed to take place right after the bad ending so it’s kind of a missed opportunity to have some dialogue here. that said it’s not really a major problem and the mode is still fun to go through so I’d recommend it if you want more Julius as well as Yoko and Alucard.

the game looks great, it’s pretty much a continuation of how Aria looked except with bigger character sprites, nothing to really say much here it’s just really nice. of course I have to address that elephant in the room, and that’s the new artstyle for all the characters. Ayami Kojima who did the artwork for most of the Castlevanias since Symphony of the Night is noticeably absent in this game. as far as I can gather, IGA had a new artist with a much more anime-inspired artstyle to take over for this game as he wanted to start marketing the handheld Castlevanias towards a younger playerbase. as for the new artstyle, it looks….fine. I’m not going to go into a rant about how the new artwork is bad because it’s not Kojima or how it looks way too anime, on its own it works and in one case it’s actually better as the new portraits are a lot more expressive than the ones in the previous game. if anything, the biggest problem with the art is that they’re directly following off of Aria, which can be a big whiplash if you’re playing the two games back-to-back. I really think IGA should have at least let Kojima stick around for Dawn so the jump wouldn’t be so jarring; you wouldn’t make a sequel to Xenoblade Chronicles and have a completely new person make all the character artwork, right? the Definitive+ hack implements the Kojima portraits from Aria in as well as giving the new characters their own styled portraits as well so if want to have them in Dawn then the hack has you covered. on the flip side for the people that actually prefer the vanilla art (I know you’re out there and that’s okay I’m not judging you) there’s an optional patch to keep the original portraits alongside all the improvements that come from Definitive+.

probably going to be a hot take, but I’m not feeling the music in this one as much as I’d like to. Obviously the soundtrack isn’t bad, quite good actually, but interestingly I found the tracks in Aria to be more memorable and catchy tracks despite Dawn having better audio capabilities. that said, I still enjoyed what I got to hear so I’ll go through the tracks I’d like to mention. A Fleeting Respite is the prologue for this game and as well as the theme that plays whenever you meet up with Yoko and it’s a fine soothing track to hear when you want to rest and get those weapons upgraded. Pitch Black Intrusion is a great piece to suit your infiltration of the hideout you’re heading towards, elevated by taking place in the cool Lost Village. Dracula’s Tears is a very groovy track for a spooky magic lab, I’ll be disappointed if I don’t find any jazz remixes of it online. Scarlet Battle Soul might be my second favorite track in the game, it really gives Dario and Dmitrii more of a threatening vibe unless we’re taking the cat ammo into consideration. Condemned Tower continues the trend of the tower areas having great music and has a similar thing going like Aria’s Clock Tower with it starting sinister at the beginning but becoming bombastic later on. Cursed Clock Tower is pretty alright at first but that second half gets pretty intense and foreboding, I enjoy. Into the Dark Night is definitely my favorite track, this is without a doubt the “time to kick ass” theme, and to no surprise one of the bosses that gets this theme is my main man Gergoth, another epic win. did you know there’s an unused track called Amber Scenery? it’s pretty much a remixed arrangement of Subterranean Hell and hoo boy what an arrangement. the track already starts off excellently but it just keeps better the longer it continues, and god man they even went and brought in that PIANO near the end. me when the best track doesn’t even get used in the actual game

what’s there left to say? great sequel, great game, great Soma. I will surely miss seeing these goofballs but it’s not everyday you get a second game to appear in so they definitely ate good. Dawn is a bit flawed in some areas but I’d still say it’s an excellent Metroidvania, even if I’ve pretty much enjoyed every single one I’ve played so far. if you’ve played Aria of Sorrow yet somehow haven’t played this one yet, go and fix that because this should be high on your to-do-list. apparently though the next two Castlevania games are peak. maybe. well I hope they are so yeah, I’m just gonna stop typing and move on to those ones now. bye

in the end, Hammer never scored….

I'm getting a little tired of having to google "how to get the best ending" every time I boot up one of these fuckin things. Just tell your story! No one wants to spend hours on a game, especially a non-linear one that encourages exploration, only to be penalized with a bullshit non-final boss because you didn't arbitrarily explore the right way. I don't really follow the games discourse nowadays but I really hope it has gotten to "abolish the bad ending" and moved beyond "game bad if there a tiddy y/n?"

Bullet point thoughts:

- Very nearly great. but ultimately it's a step down from Aria in terms of level-design and story, brought down even further by some annoying mechanics.

- The touch-screen use is an unfortunate relic of the early DS era, and while I'm aware fan-made mods can remove this, until an official version is released without this feature it will have to factor into my assessment.

-The Souls system is still very enjoyable, however requiring some randomly dropped Souls at certain points in the game still feels like the wrong move.

- The requirements for the true ending are far more reasonable this time. I figured it out by myself for the first time since SotN.

- Music and visuals are lovely as always.

- Weapon animations are a big improvement over Aria, which had rather bad ones for large swords.

- Some boss designs are inspired.

- Overall Dawn of Sorrow is a very strong explorative Castlevania title, albeit one that is less strong than its predecessor. I'm very much looking forward to continuing with the DS games now I have a laptop capable of DS emulation.

This series has the most fun Metroidvania gameplay in my opinion and Dawn is simply more of that. The movement and combat are still sick, and so is the feeling of progression absorbing abilities from every enemy and becoming a total killing machine. Being able to switch between 2 sets of fused weapons and stats with a button press made those mechanics even more interesting. Sadly it's an early DS title which means there's some very forced gimmicks in there. Getting a boss to 0 health, messing up drawing the symbol and then dying after is the most frustrating thing. Also one of the worst art style choices I've ever seen... the character portraits are ugly and a massive downgrade from Ayami Kojima's distinctive look. At least the spritework is still really smooth and there are some cool 3D backgrounds. Aria is the better game but this is really worth playing.

AAAAAAA the final boss of this game took me like 5 hours and that is no exaggeration. Holy fuck, it was horrible. I was probably underleveled or using wrong items or something but holy fuck I did it and I'm so happy.

That being said, this is a great game! I don't think it's as good as Aria of Sorrow, mainly for those awful touch screen gimmicks. But still this maintains the spirit of that game and even adds some new stuff to the soul system that's welcome. Amazing and memorable map and (for the most part) great boss battles. I don't really care much about the stories in these games, but that's ok, the gameplay makes up for it.

What an impressive transition into the Nintendo DS but I’m not that surprised. By Aria of Sorrow, IGA & his team were getting back into their groove of making consistent quality Castlevania games after their bit of rocky reintroduction with Harmony of Dissonance.

Dawn of Sorrow is just taking the formula that Aria of Sorrow has refined at this point and cranking it up with upgraded visuals & soundtrack whiles improving on the combat due to having 2 load-outs to customize your equipment or souls that you switch on the fly that makes the combat flow less intrusive and boss fights aren’t as piss easy as Aria of Sorrow at times. Due to the upgraded presentation and more out of the box themes, Dawn of Sorrow's Castle somehow surpasses Aria of Sorrow's Castle by a bit, which is impressive.

Once again, the story isn’t anything mind-blowing, nor are the villains that great, but they make the plot work & it is nice to see more of Soma, Julius, Genya, Yoko, and Hammer which who I have grown to appreciate by the end of Aria of Sorrow, but this game elevates them to my favorite cast of characters in the series so far.

I do want to get my few complaints out of the way. The magic seal system is unsurprisingly not a fun gimmick that gets on your nerves, your luck stat doesn't work, and I really dislike the anime-style art.

However, this game is still an excellent Metroidvania that I enjoyed from start to finish and even beat Julius mode, which is by far the best unlockable mode in the series so far. A very strong start for Castlevania on the DS. I'm curious to see how Portrait of Ruin & Order of Ecclesia stack up since I have heard nothing but good things about these ones

A fun side effect of writing about games, even on an amateur level, is that one ends up reflecting and researching on games a bit deeper and thus getting to know more about them than if they just hop from game to game. I originally planned to open this review by talking about the early days of the DS and PSP, how despite the DS being the best selling (and arguably best) portable in history, the two portables being presented in 2004 left audiences puzzled as to what Nintendo was thinking, and why anyone would want that quirky thing instead of the much slicker PSP. That's because I believed that to be the cause for Konami opting to play it safe and make the first DS Castlevania a sequel -- an assumption which proved incorrect.

No, Iga was pretty much sold on the DS from the start, and Aria of Sorrow's great sales on a Nintendo platform sealed the deal on the DS as the host for the next portable entry in the Castlevania series. As for why make a direct sequel, in particular, that is owed to Iga knowing that he and his team had accomplished something special with Aria, both in terms of storyline and gameplay. Iga truly loves the soul system from that game, and that would become even more evident years later, with Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, but I digress.

As a direct sequel to Aria, Dawn of Sorrow might get criticised for being a rethreading of known ground, but the fact of the matter is, it's rethreading some damn solid ground. Most of what I mention in my Aria of Sorrow review applies to its sequel as well, from the robust gameplay systems to the beautiful sprite art. There are some areas in which Dawn attempts to stand out from its prequel, some of which are successful, some of which, not so much.

Immediately apparent from the cover of the game is that the art style for character art was changed, moving away from Ayami Kojima's (gorgeous) character portraits to... somewhat generic anime art. This change is said to be a result of demographics, with portable gamers being mainly children and, as such, it making sense to use character art that appealed more to that age group. Unfortunately, none of us happened to be in the room when that decision was taken to loudly point out that Aria was a success among that very demographic and that aging down the brand identity so suddenly might be a bad idea, so this is what we got stuck with.

It's not that the character art is terrible -- it reminds me of Rondo, which also used anime art and is still widely beloved by the fanbase -- but Dawn is trying to tell a story from a handicapped position and nailing the gothic horror vibes right from the cover would have helped its case by a lot. See, the position of a sequel to a work that was never written in a way to have one is a difficult one: the big twists have already happened and characters have experienced their respective growths, so what do we work with to make a new story?

(Incidentally, Dawn opens by spoiling the big twist in Aria, so absolutely play Aria first if you can.)

What immediately springs to mind are those Disney direct-to-VHS sequels that were mostly pretty forgettable, when not antithetical to the original work, as that's absolutely the vibe one gets when one mischievous gang of troublemakers shows up in the opening in Dawn to oppose Soma and his crew. The generic cartoon aesthetic makes for a poor first impression even though the storyline is actually quite competent and, for a game ostensibly marketed at children, it shows some rather dark imagery.

The idea is that, with Dracula being forever gone, a cult forms from people that desire a new Dark Lord, and a few of its head figures step forward as candidates to fill the power vacuula. They decide to have a go at Soma, attacking him and his girlfriend when the two are hanging out in town, and our boy doesn't take too kindly to that, setting out in pursuit of the group, pulling the whole crew from Aria in with him. What follows is a metroidvania romp just like Aria, which has Soma claiming monsters' souls as he brings down the Dark Lord wannabes.

Where Dawn successfully improves on Aria is in quality of life features as well as better tuning. On the former front, Soma can now use two different equipment sets that can be swapped at the press of the X button, a very welcome feature as it switching souls without entering the menu, thus letting the player adapt to each situation faster. The game also makes good use of the DS's top screen, displaying either the castle map or a screen with Soma's and enemy's stats. While having the map always visible is a godsend in this genre, having enemy info readily available is great when farming souls, as it does exactly the same thing the gadget from the Advance Collection does in Aria.

As for tuning, weapons have been rebalanced, emphasizing their variety. There's even a system through which, by imbuing weapons with certain souls, they can be upgraded, a nice addition that unfortunately ends up underutilized due to the rarity of some of the souls it requires. Having a use for excess souls, however, is a nice thought, and again I point to Bloodstained as the unofficial successor to Dawn, with Iga further refining this idea in that game.

Incidentally, while Aria already had souls that powered up with their count, Dawn brings this feature to the forefront explicitly calling it the Soul Level -- this is also a key feature in Bloodstained, where it exists for all souls-- uh, all shards. Souls have also been retooled in Dawn: while a lot of them are reskins from those from Aria, there are a handful of interesting new additions to the roster, and the player can expect to work with different toolsets than the ones the prequel gives. Of note is that late game souls are absolutely stacked, making them really gratifying to use.

And they have to be, because the best part of Dawn is its extremely challenging bosses. Aria's were great, but Dawn takes it to a new level: every boss is a unique enemy with a carefully crafted moveset, and their hits are extremely punishing. Even when spamming items, playing sloppily ultimately ends up in Soma getting overwhelmed, so instead, the player is expected to learn each tell and carefully avoid each attack. The magic seal mechanic is the cherry on top, forcing the player to remain vigilant for the prompt while adding flavor to finishing off the boss.

(Admittedly, if playing on an emulator, magic seals are an absolutely cursed mechanic, practically serving as an accidental form of anti-piracy . In that case, use the mod that removes them from the game.)

But is it better than Aria? Probably not: it will never be able to count on the simplicity and novelty factor that that game presented. However, even if it doesn't surpass its predecessor, it is a thoroughly enjoyable game that proudly stands at its prequel's side. Fans of Aria willing to look past a horrid first impression will find themselves a fiercely challenging game that brings back many of the original's boons.

About on par with Aria, or maybe a little bit better. Dawn pretty much plays like Aria, except with improved visuals and music. The Magic Seal mechanic is also new, but it's really just a gimmick that uses the DS touch screen, and didn't need to be there.

Yoko's new weapon upgrade shop sounds good on the surface, letting you spend souls in order to improve weapons that aren't very good at first. However, the drop rate for enemy souls in this game is extremely low, and it's not worth trying to grind for the specific souls you need, so she ends up not being very useful. She and Hammer at least have funny/interesting stuff to say when you talk to them.

Also, I do kind of like the anime-styled portraits. They're very expressive, and they fit the aesthetic of this game well enough. Still, I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss the Ayami Kojima art from Aria and the older games.

Esse jogo não é ruim, longe disso. Mas é um downgrade absurdo em relação ao seu antecessor, que é indiscutivelmente um dos melhores jogos da saga.
Todas as mudanças que esse jogo fez, foram pra pior, enquanto nada além da tecnologia e o tamanho do castelo parecem ter progredido.

O traço gótico perfeito da Ayami Kojima foi trocado por um traço de anime genérico que mais parece um isekai ruim de temporada.
Os vilões não tem sal nenhum, e nem os 3 juntos tem a presença do Grahan. que já não era muita.
O sistema de selos foi a pior adição que poderiam ter feito. É insuportável e responde super mal, te fazendo perder tempo e paciência.

O novo sistema de armas também não gostei. No jogo anterior você achava todo tipo de arma única e poderosa explorando o castelo, o que recompensava o jogador por explorar e progredir. Aqui só existem versões genéricas de armas, que você precisa upar em formas novas usando almas, gerando um grind super repetitivo toda vez que você quiser upar sua bendita arma. É um saco.

Eu fiz parecer que o jogo é uma bosta, coisa que ele não é. Ele mantém a maioria das qualidades do Aria, como alto conteúdo, variedade de estilos de combate e almas, etc.
O ponto é que ele é uma sequência que ao mesmo tempo é um passo pra trás gigante, com nenhuma mudança realmente boa, o que me impede de dar uma nota melhor.
No geral, é um jogo competente e bom, porém fica MUITO atrás do jogo maravilhoso que foi Aria of Sorrow

We're back to reusing Rondo/SotN sprites baby! Woohoo!

Dawn of Sorrow kicks off the DS trilogy with a bang, expanding on Aria's gameplay additions and brushing up the presentation across the board. In my Aria review, I commented on how the only thing holding that game back from being my favorite Castlevania is the hardware it was released on.

Dawn of Sorrow looks, feels and sounds EXACTLY like what I had in mind. I mean, in some ways the DS is basically a portable PS1 in terms of power, right? Perhaps this is a glimpse of what Aria would've looked like on that system. I especially love the 2D areas with 3D backgrounds, like the village houses and the iconic clock tower.

Now, not everything hits the mark. The art is a SEVERE downgrade from previous games. I realize that it made sense for the time, but Ayami Kojima's works can never be replaced, especially not by this.
The dual screen was also a huge missed opportunity. Instead of adding gimmicks like breaking blocks or drawing seals to finish off bosses, they could have added something like a marker system to the map, where you'd be able to add memos to certain areas so you remember what to do in them later. "Small gap here", "high jump here", etc. Sadly they didn't quite see it that way, so hope you played enough Trauma Center before this.

The dialogue is also pretty bad at points. Characters constantly say things like "It's too dangerous, you should step back" to each other, and Hammer creeping over Yoko/Yoko creeping over Soma's relationship with Mina over the course of their shop dialogues got real old, real fast. The alternate endings were pretty cool though.

Beyond that, there's... Something about the design here that feels less focused than Aria's. I can't quite put my finger on what, but after finishing the game earlier today, I didn't quite feel like going back to 100% it.

Still a great game, don't get me wrong, but better visuals and soundtrack aside, Aria still comes out on top for me.

Fifth time's the stumble.

For the first time since Symphony of the Night's release, the newest Castlevania entry could not just approximate, but surpass the technical standards set by the PlayStation game back in 1997. Even from the opening set of rooms, low-poly 3D elements and vivid parallax backgrounds establish the setting and sense of adventure with a degree of fidelity that the GBA titles just were not able to display. The areas that compose Dracula's titular castle are both striking and visually distinct, and it cannot be overemphasized how the ever-present map helps making sense making sense of the castle as a building. The sense of exploring a logically planned space is at the strongest it has ever been, and even somewhat sloppy background work in a specific mid-to-late level is not enough to break this illusion.

Beyond presentation, however, the main issues arise from a nasty bug present in the shipped version of the game, and how it affects the Tactical Soul System. Increasing Soma's luck stat does not make a meaningful difference in whether enemies drop their powers for him to use. Couple that with souls having drop rates as low as 2%, and chances are most players will never see the vast majority of abilities in the game unless they dedicate half their playtime to grinding. Among these optional abilities, attacks and mobility upgrades far more interesting and versatile than those obtainable through normal progression can be found. Annoyingly, there is a roadblock in one area that can only be removed by gathering three specific souls with drop rates of 24%, 16%, and 8%, so grinding is somewhat mandatory if luck is not on one's side.

While the impact of this programming error might seem fairly minimal for non-completionists, it also limits a player's kit on a regular playthrough severely. Having access to fewer souls means having access to fewer builds and strategies, and the game becomes more monotonous than its immediate predecessor as a result. Fewer souls also means fewer and weaker weapons, since specific souls need to be infused into specific weapons to transmute them into more powerful ones. In cases in which a weapon can be infused with more than one soul, upgrade paths turn into upgrade trees, which only adds to the tedium for those who like to explore different combat options. Rewarding players with souls more liberally would not only diversify builds, but would also allow players to engage with the elemental weakness system by crafting specific weapons to use against specific foes.

The tension in the game's systems caused by this bug builds up steadily until the final third of the game, in which the snowball effect can be felt in the final boss encounters. Due to the limited combat options, lateral thinking is disincentivized in favor of attack pattern recognition, oddly more in line with traditional Classicvania fights of old. Chances are this is near the top of the Igavanias in terms of difficulty, which is not necessarily something to lament, but it is a shame that it happened unintentionally and at the cost of other systems.

A prettier, more rigid version of what came before, in dire need of some oil for it to run smoothly.

Sendo a sequência de Aria of Sorrow, acredito que seja difícil não ter expectativas que este aqui seja tão bom ou até melhor que o jogo que começou a história do nosso Soma Cruz. Infelizmente o Dawn of Sorrow não consegue ser melhor que o seu antecessor, tendo um problema importado daquele jogo e também vindo com um que pode quebrar um pouco a experiência hoje em dia(julgando que todos aqui vão jogar com um emulador), este sendo o uso do touchpad do DS para fazer alguns símbolos. Taís símbolos são usados especialmente em bosses, sendo algo como selar eles, entretanto é bem difícil os fazer num emulador e também é preciso fazer eles rápido mesmo que algum deles seja muito difícil de fazer.

Mesmo que permaneça como problema, isto pode ser retirado com um mod na iso, não causando tanto problema e deixando as lutas do jogo muito menos estressantes. O outro problema, este sendo o importado, é de que antes grindavamos por certas almas no jogo para nos ajudar, agora tal mecânica foi expandida para não só o uso contra inimigos, mas também para a evolução de todo armamento do jogo, indo de soqueiras á katanas. O em si não é ruim, fazer armamentos melhores é legal e, com este sistema, eles se livraram daquele bagulho de termos muitas almas e não usarmos.

As almas incluem também as de bosses, mas tirando a deles, ainda existe o problema de ter de entrar e sair de uma sala só para respawnar um bicho e matar ele. Meio chatinho, poderia haver uma maneira diferente, algo como colocar peças/artefatos por cantos do castelo, fazendo assim o jogador querer explorar ele. Tirando essas coisas, Dawn of Sorrow ainda é divertido e bom, as boss fights são divertidas e não me recordo de sentir que estavam sendo injustas. Dawn é um jogo que vale a pena sim jogar, principalmente se você gosta do Aria.

O castle de DS mais fraco, com maior potencial, e com as melhores ideias, mas que infelizmente foram desperdiçadas

Dawn of Sorrow se manteve bem estável pra mim ate o final, e foi super divertido em todos os momentos, mas também bem frustrante. Eu sou um cara que gosta de explorar, mas puta que pariu cara, aquele mapa é um inferno de prosseguir, o level design decaiu muito da prequel pra cá. Tipo, você enfrenta aquele penis com pernas la, mata ele, desce coisa pra caralho, ai precisa subir TUDO DE NOVO pega a chave, e ai descer. Porque não botaram um elevador ali? ou alguma coisa que ja te mandasse la pra cima saca

E o sistema de armas também me deixou bem meh. Temos muitas armas de muitos tipos, mas isso acaba criando modos de dificuldades pra gameplay:
Great Sword = Modo facil
Lança e demasiados = Medio
Katana e Dagger = Dificil
A great Sword tem um dano enorme e o cowdow dela é o mesmo que o das armas medianas, ou seja, se você é como eu e jogou o jogo inteiro de lança, parabéns, você é um otario que poderia dar 150 de dano ao em vez de 60 ou 80.

E o pior de tudo, o sistema de selos é CANCERIGENO. Ele é desnecessário, não adiciona em PORRA NENHUMA e é SUPER irritante. Os desenvolvedores realmente jogaram o jogo? eles realmente pensaram "Botar um desafio de paciência após um momento de ação com certeza é uma boa ideia"? Porque puta merda, você so vai saber o que é ódio quando morrer pro boss que você matou umas 100 vezes, mas não foi de base definitivamente porque você errou o selo. É um sistema tão inútil que sinceramente eu não me incomodaria se não existisse, acho que o jogo ficaria ate mais divertido, ate porque as lutas de bosses são muito fodas (tirando a morte)

Mas em geral, o jogo é realmente muito gostossinho, e genuinamente curti ficar dando upgrade na minha arma, ir atrás de almas e ficar matando demonios enquanto ia atrás dos bosses (mesmo que o level design me fode-se)

Recomendo fortissimo, um baita jogo, mesmo com os pesares

A great Castlevania game that builds well upon the first Sorrow game in many areas while stumbling over a few.

While this game's spritework is a ton more detailed than the first, the promotional art and portraits have taken a huge hit due to Ayami Kojima solely focusing on Curse of Darkness during its development period. In the gameplay department; accompanying a slew of gameplay improvements like weapon crafting and being able to have 2 loadouts you can interchange on the go, the movement does feel a tad bit more sluggish (something you'll definitely recognize if you played the first). The negatives I've listed are definitely minor compared to the positives, but they have somewhat impacted my enjoyment of the game at times, although not to a crucial degree as my score would like to imply.

This game's extra mode is godlike however, and is a must-play for anyone who gives this game a try. All in all, one of the greater Castlevania games - and you owe it to yourself to experience it if you played Aria of Sorrow.