Capcom’s no stranger to top of the range action platformers and Demon’s Crest is no exception, which makes it all the more unfortunate that it was so overlooked in its day. I think you could release it today almost totally unaltered and it would gel quite well with the tastes of certain modern audiences, albeit probably at a relatively low price. From its good degree of non-linear exploration, gloomy atmosphere and reasonably tough difficulty level it has a lot of hallmarks of recent hits big and small, and yet it still feels like we have a lot to learn from it.
It’s impressive that Demon’s Crest manages to live up to Ghosts ‘n Goblins’ challenge despite how much more versatile its movement is. Explore a bit to find some crests and Firebrand can fly in any direction, cling to or climb up walls, shoulder bash his way through heavy objects, the works. The reason you can’t just dance around everything all willy nilly is because Capcom employed some sensible restraint. Firebrand has to position himself to push away from a wall before you can jump off of it (think Super Metroid), his shoulder bash has a hefty amount of start up before it kicks in and he can only jump so high before flying, a bit like in Kirby & The Forgotten Land. This is all great because, while Firebrand has enough weird and wonderful abilities to give you some semblance of a devilish power fantasy, you still have to be patient when using them. There’ll be plenty of moments where you have to stop and really analyse your surroundings, lest you subject yourself to repeated clumsy deaths and Firebrand’s “AH!” that seems to become more maddening each time.
Dying itself never becomes annoying thanks to the surprisingly generous double whammy of infinite retries and pretty brief levels. Don’t let the levels’ shortness trick you into thinking that Demon’s Crest doesn’t have some bang for your buck, though. Whether to find hidden levels and bosses by clearing obstacles with upgrades you didn’t have before, collect indispensably useful life upgrades or to unlock the true ending & final boss, there’s plenty of reasons to revisit each area. Action platformers had had branching paths and secret alternate levels before this, Rondo of Blood being my favourite example, but they didn’t let you crisscross between them all in whatever order you please on a quest to become the coolest demon on the block. Progression-wise I suppose the closest thing would probably be Mega Man, but even it’s not quite the same.
What would be truly demonic is if I didn’t draw attention to the soundtrack or the art. Cartoony horror tickles my fancy like you wouldn’t believe, and the only other game I can think of that does it so effectively is the also superb MediEvil. As with MediEvil, you’re in for a lot of moody church organs, and to that end, one of the first tracks you hear in Demon’s Crest is a masterclass in tone setting. Melancholic as befits a world where demons rule the roost and humans are all gone, dilapidated buildings littering the backgrounds of the game’s gorgeous sprite work, but there’s hints of vengefulness in there too, maybe even hope. Definitely piles on the atmosphere something fierce.
As excellent as Demon’s Crest is, I did say ‘almost’ unaltered, and there’s at least one niggle that you’re bound to notice – you can only switch between crests through the pause menu. It’s really quick in the grand scheme of things, but still. If it were ever to get the Ghosts ‘n Goblins Resurrection treatment, it’d be great if you could switch crests in real time, probably with the shoulder buttons considering they go unused. There’s also a more minor issue of the fact that one or two crests are a bit redundant, one in particular being a high damage weapon for Firebrand’s base form which you’ll probably only get after already having obtained his ultimate form that does higher damage anyway.
Neither of those are egregious, though, definitely not enough to be offputting. With Capcom throwing so many well handled franchise revivals our way in the past few years, I’d love to see Demon’s Crest join them sometime (I did buy two copies of DMC5 like the good little pay piggy I am, so y’know, throw me a bone, lads). There’s plenty else to love about it that I haven’t covered, but you should really try it and see for yourself. Just make sure to keep exploring if you get the bad ending in the span of, like, an hour.
It’s impressive that Demon’s Crest manages to live up to Ghosts ‘n Goblins’ challenge despite how much more versatile its movement is. Explore a bit to find some crests and Firebrand can fly in any direction, cling to or climb up walls, shoulder bash his way through heavy objects, the works. The reason you can’t just dance around everything all willy nilly is because Capcom employed some sensible restraint. Firebrand has to position himself to push away from a wall before you can jump off of it (think Super Metroid), his shoulder bash has a hefty amount of start up before it kicks in and he can only jump so high before flying, a bit like in Kirby & The Forgotten Land. This is all great because, while Firebrand has enough weird and wonderful abilities to give you some semblance of a devilish power fantasy, you still have to be patient when using them. There’ll be plenty of moments where you have to stop and really analyse your surroundings, lest you subject yourself to repeated clumsy deaths and Firebrand’s “AH!” that seems to become more maddening each time.
Dying itself never becomes annoying thanks to the surprisingly generous double whammy of infinite retries and pretty brief levels. Don’t let the levels’ shortness trick you into thinking that Demon’s Crest doesn’t have some bang for your buck, though. Whether to find hidden levels and bosses by clearing obstacles with upgrades you didn’t have before, collect indispensably useful life upgrades or to unlock the true ending & final boss, there’s plenty of reasons to revisit each area. Action platformers had had branching paths and secret alternate levels before this, Rondo of Blood being my favourite example, but they didn’t let you crisscross between them all in whatever order you please on a quest to become the coolest demon on the block. Progression-wise I suppose the closest thing would probably be Mega Man, but even it’s not quite the same.
What would be truly demonic is if I didn’t draw attention to the soundtrack or the art. Cartoony horror tickles my fancy like you wouldn’t believe, and the only other game I can think of that does it so effectively is the also superb MediEvil. As with MediEvil, you’re in for a lot of moody church organs, and to that end, one of the first tracks you hear in Demon’s Crest is a masterclass in tone setting. Melancholic as befits a world where demons rule the roost and humans are all gone, dilapidated buildings littering the backgrounds of the game’s gorgeous sprite work, but there’s hints of vengefulness in there too, maybe even hope. Definitely piles on the atmosphere something fierce.
As excellent as Demon’s Crest is, I did say ‘almost’ unaltered, and there’s at least one niggle that you’re bound to notice – you can only switch between crests through the pause menu. It’s really quick in the grand scheme of things, but still. If it were ever to get the Ghosts ‘n Goblins Resurrection treatment, it’d be great if you could switch crests in real time, probably with the shoulder buttons considering they go unused. There’s also a more minor issue of the fact that one or two crests are a bit redundant, one in particular being a high damage weapon for Firebrand’s base form which you’ll probably only get after already having obtained his ultimate form that does higher damage anyway.
Neither of those are egregious, though, definitely not enough to be offputting. With Capcom throwing so many well handled franchise revivals our way in the past few years, I’d love to see Demon’s Crest join them sometime (I did buy two copies of DMC5 like the good little pay piggy I am, so y’know, throw me a bone, lads). There’s plenty else to love about it that I haven’t covered, but you should really try it and see for yourself. Just make sure to keep exploring if you get the bad ending in the span of, like, an hour.
Firebrand is one of the most iconic enemies from 80's gaming: A blood-red demon who seethes with snarled aggression and makes short work of you with cunning movement tactics. He's the biggest douchebag inside what's already considered one of the hardest games of its era. So I can't help but be puzzled that the direction Capcom went for his solo outings were low-difficulty platformers with minimal combat.
There's lots of odd choices abound here. Like Quackshot, the game has linear levels but requires you to revisit them with keycard abilities in a metroidvania-esque setup. There's alternate attacks and transformations required for progression that take constant menu-ing to switch between - it was 94, why no shoulder button toggles ala MMX? There's an attempt at a hub world but it just amounts to 1 NPC and a few shops, was really wishing there'd be more to justify 100% exploration. You also get a lot of money to spend on 1-time items that I mostly didn't use. Bosses have really bloated HP bars and excessive i-frames.
And yet for all its weird choices, they rarely inhibit the core appeal. Vibes carry Demon's Crest very hard: The beautiful world, snappy movement and haunting orchestral music are great. I couldn't tell you a hook or mechanic I was really invested in, but the feeling of playing it is just as strong as any other Capcom game. A very low-key, sobering platform experience with a good edge to it. Oddly relaxing, moreso than something child-friendly like Magical Quest.
There's also three endings depending on how many items you get before confronting Phalanx, the final boss. I only got the first two, but I was content with that. It's really funny to me that in the 2nd ending, Phalanx just pussies out, screaming "I'm not owned! I'm not owned!" with his tail between his legs. I'm sure most people see it as an unsatisfactory victory because you don't get to finish him off with your own hands, but like, nothing's more empowering than knowing your nemesis is scared shitless by you.
There's lots of odd choices abound here. Like Quackshot, the game has linear levels but requires you to revisit them with keycard abilities in a metroidvania-esque setup. There's alternate attacks and transformations required for progression that take constant menu-ing to switch between - it was 94, why no shoulder button toggles ala MMX? There's an attempt at a hub world but it just amounts to 1 NPC and a few shops, was really wishing there'd be more to justify 100% exploration. You also get a lot of money to spend on 1-time items that I mostly didn't use. Bosses have really bloated HP bars and excessive i-frames.
And yet for all its weird choices, they rarely inhibit the core appeal. Vibes carry Demon's Crest very hard: The beautiful world, snappy movement and haunting orchestral music are great. I couldn't tell you a hook or mechanic I was really invested in, but the feeling of playing it is just as strong as any other Capcom game. A very low-key, sobering platform experience with a good edge to it. Oddly relaxing, moreso than something child-friendly like Magical Quest.
There's also three endings depending on how many items you get before confronting Phalanx, the final boss. I only got the first two, but I was content with that. It's really funny to me that in the 2nd ending, Phalanx just pussies out, screaming "I'm not owned! I'm not owned!" with his tail between his legs. I'm sure most people see it as an unsatisfactory victory because you don't get to finish him off with your own hands, but like, nothing's more empowering than knowing your nemesis is scared shitless by you.
Mf`s be named after McDonald`s dipping sauces.
Who fucked up the boxart
Tried this at a few people's suggestion and yeah, this is quite a gem. This one doesn't seem to be too well known compared to other SNES highlights, which is a shame. It's very hard, but tons of fun, especially as you get more abilities and learn to curb the difficulty a little with them. You'll be able to go back to previous sections and reach areas you couldn't before, all that kinda jazz. It's very satisfying and very well put together, and I would definitely recommend it.
As a fan of the first two Gargoyle's Quest games, I was always left with the feeling that something could be done to take advantage of all the potential that these two games posed. And well, the game that came to fulfill that fantasy has been Demon's Crest, a game that is a masterpiece, one of the best platform adventure games, not only of the Super Nintendo era, but of all time.
Demon's Crest begins with an epic introduction; flames that cover the entire screen revealing little by little a demon in the title, after that if we stay without pressing any button for a while the introduction of the story of this game will begin.
I'll talk about the improvements and changes of how this game improves over the previous two, and wow, its transition from GB/NES to SNES has been more than perfect. The gameplay feels more agile and responsive, although the mobility is still not very fast, as it is reminiscent of classic Castlevania. The graphics and music now create an atmosphere that in my opinion surpasses that of the SNES Castlevanias, but I will talk about these two sections in more depth later. The system of lives was eliminated, so now we can retry the levels as many times as we want, and this change has been made with good reason, because another difference is that the difficulty has increased, but for the better, because the enemies now have more elaborate designs and patterns.
In this game we have Firebrand as the main character again, a demon that has the ability to fly indefinitely, although only being able to move back and forth, you can also stick to the walls similar to Mega Man X, and of course, you can shoot fire projectiles. As we advance in the game and defeat bosses, we will get other types of projectiles, one that can break blocks, one that creates platforms temporarily, and another that when colliding with spikes creates a small barrier to climb it, and finally, a projectile like the first, only much stronger. All these types of shots are the same that we already found in the previous Gargoyle's Quest I and II, being one of my favorite things in this game to have retaken all the basic skills of these games.
And well, let's talk about the new things that this game presents, starting with its map, in which we will move with a pseudo-3D view very characteristic of some SNES games, where we can access different levels in the order that we choose.
There are 6 Crests, whose function is to transform Firebrand into another type of Gargoyle, and these transformations will have unique abilities and qualities. The levels know how to take advantage of each of these forms very well, as each one is useful in its own way, they will help us to advance and explore different paths that were previously inaccessible, which will lead us to have to pass the levels more than once to discover all the secrets. Also now there are bottles that are hidden in the levels, which will help us to buy potions, and there are also some scrolls that help us to buy spells. These two additions make the game never feel too unfair, and can save you on more than one occasion.
With regards to the levels found here, each and every one is great, with good level design. Each one has its own theme and mechanics that made it stand out from the others, not to mention that each of these stages are full of details in the backgrounds. The art and music in this game are truly sublime. In addition, all levels have objects and secret routes that encourage the exploration of these, with secrets like the bottles and scrolls that I mentioned earlier.
Something that also encourages us to explore, is the fact that this game has 3 endings, although I will not talk much in detail about this, but it is worth seeing all three, although the last ending is unlocked through a battle with a secret boss that is very difficult.
Despite everything, the game also has its negative aspects, such as suffering from some slowdowns, the fact that the way to save the game is through passwords, or that to switch between powers and crests we have to access the pause menu constantly. However I think these aspects do not ruin the experience at all.
Conclusion
A very memorable game, albeit short, but one that makes up for it by having great quality. I dare say it's unfairly underrated, and that's the reason I've gone to such length in this review, to try and encourage more people to play it. Maybe right now I'm being too over the top, but I dare say that this has become one of my favorite games.
I recommend it if you like retro Super Nintendo games, like Mega Man and Castlevania.
Demon's Crest begins with an epic introduction; flames that cover the entire screen revealing little by little a demon in the title, after that if we stay without pressing any button for a while the introduction of the story of this game will begin.
I'll talk about the improvements and changes of how this game improves over the previous two, and wow, its transition from GB/NES to SNES has been more than perfect. The gameplay feels more agile and responsive, although the mobility is still not very fast, as it is reminiscent of classic Castlevania. The graphics and music now create an atmosphere that in my opinion surpasses that of the SNES Castlevanias, but I will talk about these two sections in more depth later. The system of lives was eliminated, so now we can retry the levels as many times as we want, and this change has been made with good reason, because another difference is that the difficulty has increased, but for the better, because the enemies now have more elaborate designs and patterns.
In this game we have Firebrand as the main character again, a demon that has the ability to fly indefinitely, although only being able to move back and forth, you can also stick to the walls similar to Mega Man X, and of course, you can shoot fire projectiles. As we advance in the game and defeat bosses, we will get other types of projectiles, one that can break blocks, one that creates platforms temporarily, and another that when colliding with spikes creates a small barrier to climb it, and finally, a projectile like the first, only much stronger. All these types of shots are the same that we already found in the previous Gargoyle's Quest I and II, being one of my favorite things in this game to have retaken all the basic skills of these games.
And well, let's talk about the new things that this game presents, starting with its map, in which we will move with a pseudo-3D view very characteristic of some SNES games, where we can access different levels in the order that we choose.
There are 6 Crests, whose function is to transform Firebrand into another type of Gargoyle, and these transformations will have unique abilities and qualities. The levels know how to take advantage of each of these forms very well, as each one is useful in its own way, they will help us to advance and explore different paths that were previously inaccessible, which will lead us to have to pass the levels more than once to discover all the secrets. Also now there are bottles that are hidden in the levels, which will help us to buy potions, and there are also some scrolls that help us to buy spells. These two additions make the game never feel too unfair, and can save you on more than one occasion.
With regards to the levels found here, each and every one is great, with good level design. Each one has its own theme and mechanics that made it stand out from the others, not to mention that each of these stages are full of details in the backgrounds. The art and music in this game are truly sublime. In addition, all levels have objects and secret routes that encourage the exploration of these, with secrets like the bottles and scrolls that I mentioned earlier.
Something that also encourages us to explore, is the fact that this game has 3 endings, although I will not talk much in detail about this, but it is worth seeing all three, although the last ending is unlocked through a battle with a secret boss that is very difficult.
Despite everything, the game also has its negative aspects, such as suffering from some slowdowns, the fact that the way to save the game is through passwords, or that to switch between powers and crests we have to access the pause menu constantly. However I think these aspects do not ruin the experience at all.
Conclusion
A very memorable game, albeit short, but one that makes up for it by having great quality. I dare say it's unfairly underrated, and that's the reason I've gone to such length in this review, to try and encourage more people to play it. Maybe right now I'm being too over the top, but I dare say that this has become one of my favorite games.
I recommend it if you like retro Super Nintendo games, like Mega Man and Castlevania.
Demon's Crest, being the third game in the Gargoyles Quest series, which are platformers with RPG progression, decides to open up the formula and let you tackle levels in your own order, Mega Man style. The difference being, in the Gargoyle's Quest games, they had linear structure. So, what's the issue here?
This game was not designed around the upgrades it gives you. Even from the very start the game gives you the ability to infinitely hover which allows you to bypass a lot of the level design. This, and other abilities give many sections no challenge. The only instances of this game I remember being a fun challenge was when I did not have a lot of health at the beginning and was forced to learn boss patterns. The bosses are well designed and fun but you can just tank through a lot of them later on. The soundtrack is also pretty boring and repetitive. It's a shame because Gargoyle's Quest 1 and 2 each are designed well and have you utilize your abilities equally throughout the games, instead of this games lack of thought out upgrade distribution.
This game's worth trying if you like permanent character upgrades. Not an awful game, but it still has glaring issues.
This game was not designed around the upgrades it gives you. Even from the very start the game gives you the ability to infinitely hover which allows you to bypass a lot of the level design. This, and other abilities give many sections no challenge. The only instances of this game I remember being a fun challenge was when I did not have a lot of health at the beginning and was forced to learn boss patterns. The bosses are well designed and fun but you can just tank through a lot of them later on. The soundtrack is also pretty boring and repetitive. It's a shame because Gargoyle's Quest 1 and 2 each are designed well and have you utilize your abilities equally throughout the games, instead of this games lack of thought out upgrade distribution.
This game's worth trying if you like permanent character upgrades. Not an awful game, but it still has glaring issues.
Good music
This game is pretty rad. The presentation is great all around, with some of the best sprites on the SNES, with a solid soundtrack to boot. The nonlinearity of progression is satisfying and fun, and backtracking never gets obnoxious. The variety of forms are fun to use, but I found myself never using the earth form much at all. The pacing is buttery smooth, and keeps things fresh and fun the entire (pretty short) runtime. This took me about two and a half hours, and was a very enjoyable ride. Some stage obstacles and levels are kinda tedious, and the difficulty curve is all over the place. Some early bosses can be damage sponges until the game's difficulty is kinda broken by finding the legendary crest. It's still quite fun, and is strongly bolstered by it's presentation and solid level design. I'd recommend it.
Fantastic but brutally difficult game, technically the third in the Gargoyle's Quest franchise. A series that I would love to see welcome a fourth episode.
Bonito e com gameplay divertida do jeito que o diabo gosta
Remember when UMvC3 introduced FIrebrand as a playable character and everyone went "WHY TF THEY ADDED THE GHOSTS & GOBLINS GOOMBA INSTEAD OF X????"
Well turns out that Firebrand is the protagonists of some more obscure titles in Capcom's library. I didn't know at the time about that, so I decided to check out one of them out of curiosity. And I wasn't expecting it to be this solid.
Demon crest was a surprise: a title where you play as an actual imp witht ehability to fly, as you explore some hellish levels and grim environments is a metroidvania-like style, with lots of explorations and abilities.
The enemies are terrifying, tbosses are challenging, the levels are tense and the soundtrack fits the mood perfectly.
Overall it is a great time, though I don't deny it has some issues. Primarily I feel that, while Firebrand himself is a cool character with a lot of combat and movement options, it can move a bit too slow, and the often forced backtracking of the different levels can make the experience a bit too annoying sometimes.
Regardless, a neat surprise, for sure one of the biggest surprised in Capcom's catalogue.
Well turns out that Firebrand is the protagonists of some more obscure titles in Capcom's library. I didn't know at the time about that, so I decided to check out one of them out of curiosity. And I wasn't expecting it to be this solid.
Demon crest was a surprise: a title where you play as an actual imp witht ehability to fly, as you explore some hellish levels and grim environments is a metroidvania-like style, with lots of explorations and abilities.
The enemies are terrifying, tbosses are challenging, the levels are tense and the soundtrack fits the mood perfectly.
Overall it is a great time, though I don't deny it has some issues. Primarily I feel that, while Firebrand himself is a cool character with a lot of combat and movement options, it can move a bit too slow, and the often forced backtracking of the different levels can make the experience a bit too annoying sometimes.
Regardless, a neat surprise, for sure one of the biggest surprised in Capcom's catalogue.
Loved playing as a demon tho this game makes you a bit too overpowered, there was backtracking but it wasn't as good as I hoped since you can quite literally fly over everything and it just makes the experience and exploration less fun. Cool music and bosses but altogether... a slight above average experience.
Firebrand is so cool and hes my friend
This review contains spoilers
Giving one of the mightier enemies from Ghosts N’ Goblins their own game is bizarre enough. Extending that game to a full-blown trilogy that spans three different consoles is something to behold. That is what became of Capcom’s menacing, flying devil Firebrand as the Gargoyle’s Quest trilogy closed out with Demon’s Crest on the SNES in 1994. Demon’s Crest is by and large considered to be the best installment of this trilogy. With the added flair of being featured on the graphically superior SNES, this common assessment is understandable. While this game garnered more praise than its predecessors, Demon’s Crest still flew under the radar throughout the SNES’s lifespan, giving it a “hidden gem” reputation. This could be attributed to the fact that Demon’s Crest doesn’t bear the same namesake as the previous games, but it’s not as if the previous two entries are highly regarded. Demon’s Crest is the shining example to those few who have played this franchise. It’s a shame, really, because Demon’s Crest holds so many exemplary features to just be confined to cult status.
The narrative of Demon’s Crest is a simple enough premise that establishes the game's lore. In the Demon Realm that makes up the setting, six crests with different elemental properties are scattered across the land. If combined, the six crests accumulate enough power for someone to conquer entire worlds like the Chaos Emeralds. Firebrand has all of the crests at the beginning, but the crests are stolen by another demon named Phalanx. Firebrand must adventure across the land of Demons to recover the six crests and defeat Phalanx before he harnesses their power and takes over the realm.
For being condemned to relative obscurity, Demon’s Crest blows many other SNES titles out of the water in many aspects. For one, the presentation here is fantastic. The grandiose fantasy world of Demon’s Crest is depicted with a range of lurid colors with an impressive amount of detail. As early as the first level, the misty water surrounding the dark bog with leafless trees evokes a spooky atmosphere. Skeletons can also be found entombed in dirt casings to give off the impression that this is an ancient land with a horrific history behind it. One section of a level has Firebrand soar over a platformless sky, and the color scheme between the layers of clouds with the sun setting over them is utterly sublime. The submerged ruins consist of towering columns with gothic gargoyles pouring green water from the tops of them, flooding the ruins with the remains of a city in the background. These are a few major examples, but every level of this game has the same consistent, A-grade attention to detail and graphical output. The gothic spectacle presented here makes the one in Super Castlevania IV look half-assed and amateurish by comparison. It’s a high compliment considering Super Castlevania IV is one of my favorite games on the SNES. The character animations also uphold the same impressive attention to detail as one can hardly detect the 16-bit pixels behind the animated sprites. One example is the dragon boss that chases Firebrand at the very beginning. It’s a marvel of detailed animation. The player can discern every fissure of flesh deteriorating from its bones.
Playing as Firebrand is also quite the spectacle. He’s a muscular demon that can fly and shoot fire from his mouth, so I can’t imagine anyone wouldn’t want to play as him. Those few with some discrepancies might feel like playing as an imposing beast wouldn’t offer the player any challenge. He’s a big red pain in the ass in the Ghost’s N’ Goblins series, so one might assume that he’s overpowered, resulting in a facile experience. Admittedly, Demon’s Crest is not as hard as Ghosts N’ Goblins, but what is? It’s not as if Firebrand is continually perched in the sky, breathing fire down at knights that take a mere two hits to die. He’s in the demon realm now and an even more hostile place that Arthur probably couldn’t endure for more than two seconds. The environment has been upscaled to appropriately fit Firebrand’s stature. His standard offensive power is shooting fire from his mouth. While it’s fairly effective against enemies, the player has to be somewhat accurate with their shots due to the less-than-firepower speed of flaming spurts. Firebrand also has a headbutt move, but it’s only used to destroy objects in the immediate background. Firebrand can also hover in the air after jumping for as long as the player desires. In the previous games, the ability to hover was finite, making platforming challenges perilous in some cases. One could argue that being able to hover in the air forever may make the game easier, but the game opts for something else completely. Instead of platforming challenges, the game tries to overwhelm the player with enemies from all angles. Firebrand’s hovering will often be interrupted by flying enemies careening towards him, or an ax lobbed at him from below. Firebrand can only also hover over heights he can jump, which aren’t far off the ground.
As his base level, Firebrand still has one of the most versatile movesets of the 16-bit era. The main objective of finding the crests even increases Firebrand’s versatility even further. With each crest obtained, Firebrand gains another form that coincides with the element it’s named after. The earth crest form allows him to break large obstacles by charging into them and spit a wave of energy that ripples on the ground. The air crest allows him to fly upward. One would think this would complete Firebrand’s flight range, making him unstoppable, but the air form only flies upward incrementally instead of continually, making it somewhat awkward. The water crest allows Firebrand to swim. It’s the lamest crest in terms of offense but considering all other forms take damage from water, it’s made incredibly useful. The one crest that does complete Firebrand’s move set is the time crest. The form is essentially a stronger base Firebrand rendering the initial Firebrand form obsolete. Once I received this form, the game did start to feel much easier. The challenging boss battles that were once tests of endurance went down in seconds thanks to this form, and I’m not sure I benefited from this.
Each of the crests in this game is retrieved from thoroughly exploring each level. This is also how the player finds health upgrades, urns to carry potions, and talismans that give Firebrand specific perks. With all this exploration-intensive progression, Demon’s Crest should’ve been a Metroidvania game. Sure, Demon's Crest came out in 1994. Super Metroid hadn’t laid the foundation for the genre yet, and Symphony of the Night hadn’t popularized the genre. However, there were already games before Demon’s Crest that had a vague understanding of seamless world design and a Metroidvania-esque sense of progression (Ufouria: The Saga, Wonder Kid), so I can surmise that possibility for Demon’s Crest appropriately. I don’t expect the developers of Demon’s Crest to be visionaries. All the same, I wish they had done something different with the overall cohesion between levels because what they came up with isn’t great. The previous game opted for a traversable hub world for Firebrand to walk around with the sublevels. It kind of came across like the towns from Zelda II. The main map in Demon’s Crest is a tiny mode 7 maps that Firebrand flies around in, swooping down to start the levels. The world map is easily the least attractive part of the game, and controlling Firebrand here is nauseating. He mostly misses the marked areas, and directing him back to the areas feels like using tank controls. A seamless design between these levels would’ve been a giant improvement. Considering the game already has the player backtracking between them to uncover items and crests they couldn’t get to before, a Metroidvania-styled world would fit this game like a glove.
The world map also makes progression confusing to follow. The player can access the first four levels of this game at any time, giving the illusion that they can be completed in any order like in Mega Man. The game does not make it clear that while this is true, each level has different paths that need to be searched to progress through the game. I had gone through the first four levels thinking I had beat them, but I still felt like something was wrong, and I wasn’t ready to fight Phalanx yet. Upon discovering that sometimes crests and essential items were found off the beaten path in each level, more levels were unlocked, giving me the impression that I was finally on the right track. How was I supposed to know this without a map or any direction from the game? The progression in this game isn’t free-flowing and non-linear as it seems; it’s actually obtuse and sloppy. Fighting Phalanx is also available right from the start, and defeating him without receiving all the crests will prematurely end the game, also giving the player the “bad ending.” Let me ask you this: if Dr. Wily’s castle was available from the start and the player was able to defeat him, why would the player be punished for doing this when the game gives them a chance to? It’s like putting a steak in front of a dog and batting them with a newspaper when they start to eat it. The dog will be upset and confused like any player in this game. It’s not like the directive to not do this was apparent.
Demon’s Crest is a prime example of a hidden gem in the SNES library. It may not be as readily recognized or lauded as Super Mario World, A Link to the Past, or Chrono Trigger, but it’s a game that’s worth the effort to uncover and play. However, does it deserve to be ranked among the greatest in the system despite its lack of notoriety? Sadly, no. The strengths of this game cannot be overstated. It’s a gorgeous 16-bit platformer that offers a lot with its short playtime. Plus, Firebrand is a delightful character to play due to his eclectic moveset. However, I cannot excuse the progression of this game as I find it unfair to the player. The world here had a potential that the developers were too near-sighted to see. As a result, Demon’s Crest had the potential to be one of the greatest games on the SNES but falters due to its shortcomings. Maybe this game is best suited as a suitable alternative to play when they get tired of Mario and Zelda. However, I think this game should at least have more acclaim than its parent franchise, Ghosts N’ Goblins.
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Attribution: https://erockreviews.blogspot.com
The narrative of Demon’s Crest is a simple enough premise that establishes the game's lore. In the Demon Realm that makes up the setting, six crests with different elemental properties are scattered across the land. If combined, the six crests accumulate enough power for someone to conquer entire worlds like the Chaos Emeralds. Firebrand has all of the crests at the beginning, but the crests are stolen by another demon named Phalanx. Firebrand must adventure across the land of Demons to recover the six crests and defeat Phalanx before he harnesses their power and takes over the realm.
For being condemned to relative obscurity, Demon’s Crest blows many other SNES titles out of the water in many aspects. For one, the presentation here is fantastic. The grandiose fantasy world of Demon’s Crest is depicted with a range of lurid colors with an impressive amount of detail. As early as the first level, the misty water surrounding the dark bog with leafless trees evokes a spooky atmosphere. Skeletons can also be found entombed in dirt casings to give off the impression that this is an ancient land with a horrific history behind it. One section of a level has Firebrand soar over a platformless sky, and the color scheme between the layers of clouds with the sun setting over them is utterly sublime. The submerged ruins consist of towering columns with gothic gargoyles pouring green water from the tops of them, flooding the ruins with the remains of a city in the background. These are a few major examples, but every level of this game has the same consistent, A-grade attention to detail and graphical output. The gothic spectacle presented here makes the one in Super Castlevania IV look half-assed and amateurish by comparison. It’s a high compliment considering Super Castlevania IV is one of my favorite games on the SNES. The character animations also uphold the same impressive attention to detail as one can hardly detect the 16-bit pixels behind the animated sprites. One example is the dragon boss that chases Firebrand at the very beginning. It’s a marvel of detailed animation. The player can discern every fissure of flesh deteriorating from its bones.
Playing as Firebrand is also quite the spectacle. He’s a muscular demon that can fly and shoot fire from his mouth, so I can’t imagine anyone wouldn’t want to play as him. Those few with some discrepancies might feel like playing as an imposing beast wouldn’t offer the player any challenge. He’s a big red pain in the ass in the Ghost’s N’ Goblins series, so one might assume that he’s overpowered, resulting in a facile experience. Admittedly, Demon’s Crest is not as hard as Ghosts N’ Goblins, but what is? It’s not as if Firebrand is continually perched in the sky, breathing fire down at knights that take a mere two hits to die. He’s in the demon realm now and an even more hostile place that Arthur probably couldn’t endure for more than two seconds. The environment has been upscaled to appropriately fit Firebrand’s stature. His standard offensive power is shooting fire from his mouth. While it’s fairly effective against enemies, the player has to be somewhat accurate with their shots due to the less-than-firepower speed of flaming spurts. Firebrand also has a headbutt move, but it’s only used to destroy objects in the immediate background. Firebrand can also hover in the air after jumping for as long as the player desires. In the previous games, the ability to hover was finite, making platforming challenges perilous in some cases. One could argue that being able to hover in the air forever may make the game easier, but the game opts for something else completely. Instead of platforming challenges, the game tries to overwhelm the player with enemies from all angles. Firebrand’s hovering will often be interrupted by flying enemies careening towards him, or an ax lobbed at him from below. Firebrand can only also hover over heights he can jump, which aren’t far off the ground.
As his base level, Firebrand still has one of the most versatile movesets of the 16-bit era. The main objective of finding the crests even increases Firebrand’s versatility even further. With each crest obtained, Firebrand gains another form that coincides with the element it’s named after. The earth crest form allows him to break large obstacles by charging into them and spit a wave of energy that ripples on the ground. The air crest allows him to fly upward. One would think this would complete Firebrand’s flight range, making him unstoppable, but the air form only flies upward incrementally instead of continually, making it somewhat awkward. The water crest allows Firebrand to swim. It’s the lamest crest in terms of offense but considering all other forms take damage from water, it’s made incredibly useful. The one crest that does complete Firebrand’s move set is the time crest. The form is essentially a stronger base Firebrand rendering the initial Firebrand form obsolete. Once I received this form, the game did start to feel much easier. The challenging boss battles that were once tests of endurance went down in seconds thanks to this form, and I’m not sure I benefited from this.
Each of the crests in this game is retrieved from thoroughly exploring each level. This is also how the player finds health upgrades, urns to carry potions, and talismans that give Firebrand specific perks. With all this exploration-intensive progression, Demon’s Crest should’ve been a Metroidvania game. Sure, Demon's Crest came out in 1994. Super Metroid hadn’t laid the foundation for the genre yet, and Symphony of the Night hadn’t popularized the genre. However, there were already games before Demon’s Crest that had a vague understanding of seamless world design and a Metroidvania-esque sense of progression (Ufouria: The Saga, Wonder Kid), so I can surmise that possibility for Demon’s Crest appropriately. I don’t expect the developers of Demon’s Crest to be visionaries. All the same, I wish they had done something different with the overall cohesion between levels because what they came up with isn’t great. The previous game opted for a traversable hub world for Firebrand to walk around with the sublevels. It kind of came across like the towns from Zelda II. The main map in Demon’s Crest is a tiny mode 7 maps that Firebrand flies around in, swooping down to start the levels. The world map is easily the least attractive part of the game, and controlling Firebrand here is nauseating. He mostly misses the marked areas, and directing him back to the areas feels like using tank controls. A seamless design between these levels would’ve been a giant improvement. Considering the game already has the player backtracking between them to uncover items and crests they couldn’t get to before, a Metroidvania-styled world would fit this game like a glove.
The world map also makes progression confusing to follow. The player can access the first four levels of this game at any time, giving the illusion that they can be completed in any order like in Mega Man. The game does not make it clear that while this is true, each level has different paths that need to be searched to progress through the game. I had gone through the first four levels thinking I had beat them, but I still felt like something was wrong, and I wasn’t ready to fight Phalanx yet. Upon discovering that sometimes crests and essential items were found off the beaten path in each level, more levels were unlocked, giving me the impression that I was finally on the right track. How was I supposed to know this without a map or any direction from the game? The progression in this game isn’t free-flowing and non-linear as it seems; it’s actually obtuse and sloppy. Fighting Phalanx is also available right from the start, and defeating him without receiving all the crests will prematurely end the game, also giving the player the “bad ending.” Let me ask you this: if Dr. Wily’s castle was available from the start and the player was able to defeat him, why would the player be punished for doing this when the game gives them a chance to? It’s like putting a steak in front of a dog and batting them with a newspaper when they start to eat it. The dog will be upset and confused like any player in this game. It’s not like the directive to not do this was apparent.
Demon’s Crest is a prime example of a hidden gem in the SNES library. It may not be as readily recognized or lauded as Super Mario World, A Link to the Past, or Chrono Trigger, but it’s a game that’s worth the effort to uncover and play. However, does it deserve to be ranked among the greatest in the system despite its lack of notoriety? Sadly, no. The strengths of this game cannot be overstated. It’s a gorgeous 16-bit platformer that offers a lot with its short playtime. Plus, Firebrand is a delightful character to play due to his eclectic moveset. However, I cannot excuse the progression of this game as I find it unfair to the player. The world here had a potential that the developers were too near-sighted to see. As a result, Demon’s Crest had the potential to be one of the greatest games on the SNES but falters due to its shortcomings. Maybe this game is best suited as a suitable alternative to play when they get tired of Mario and Zelda. However, I think this game should at least have more acclaim than its parent franchise, Ghosts N’ Goblins.
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Attribution: https://erockreviews.blogspot.com
The most likely scenario for a sub-series like this is that, after one attempt, it would just fade away while the main series would take over, and yet, this was not the case with Gargoyle’s Quest. These titles wouldn’t go onto being as widely talked about as the main Ghosts ‘n Goblins series, but they would still hold up in terms of quality quite a bit, with each game being very fun, simple platformers with interesting gimmicks that made them interesting to check out, despite their faults. But naturally, every demon has to die at some point, and thus, the series would be concluded after only a four year run, while the main GNG series would continue to go on for… not long at all initially, but hey, that would also come back eventually too. However, before the series could die off, there was one more title that would release for the series: one that doesn’t bear the Gargoyle’s Quest name, but one that would continue the same gameplay, while innovating on it beyond anything it had resembled before. This game would be known as Demon’s Crest.
Just like with the other two Gargoyle’s Quest games, I had never played Demon’s Crest until not too long ago, even though I had seen it in action before. Unsurprisingly, the game is the best looking and most impressive of the bunch, which definitely left an impression on me when I first saw it, as I love this type of gothic-horror shit, especially from this era of gaming. Seriously, how can you not at least be impressed by some of the sprites in the game, like the dragon corpse you fight at the beginning of the game? But anyway, I decided to give it a shot, and yeah, I’d have to agree with most when they say that this is the best game in the series, and one of the hidden gems of the franchise as a whole. It does have its faults, ones that I haven’t seen many others touch upon, but it still stands as one of the best titles in this series as a whole.
The story is typical enough for this series, where the Demon Realm is in a war over who will claim ownership of the Crests, six magical artifacts that, when combined, can give you the powers of a god, and after plenty of fighting, Firebrand manages to gain all of them, only to have them then stolen by the evil Phalanx to use to take over the realm, so it is up to Firebrand to gather all of the crests once again and take him down for good. It is a simple enough scenario, but one that is presented in a, for lack of a better word, epic way, and it does make you more curious then before to give the game a shot. The graphics are fantastic, having that gothic style that I mentioned earlier, while also having fantastic sprites for Firebrand and his forms, the enemies you find, and especially the bosses, the music is pretty great, having that gothic, organ-y tone throughout most of the entire game, making the tracks great to listen to as you trek forward, and the control/gameplay is very similar to that of the previous game, but changed up plenty in terms of how you approach playing the game.
The game is a 2D action platformer, where you take control of Firebrand one more time, go through plenty of different gothic locations all across the realm, defeat plenty of enemies using your various gargoyle abilities while taking on plenty of tricky platforming segments, gather plenty of different items to help you get other items from shops, as well as plenty of upgrades throughout the land that can boost your abilities in plenty of ways, and take on plenty of large, grotesque creatures that will give you quite a challenge if you aren’t up to the task. When taking into account several different aspects of the game, it is very similar to that of the previous games, but then there are all the new elements brought into this game, as well as all of the elements that were changed around, and it almost feels like it came from a completely different series.
When you first start the game, it feels like your typical Gargoyle’s Quest affair, going through a linear level, defeating enemies, getting items and fighting several different bosses: nothing you haven’t seen from this set of games before. But then, when you defeat the final boss of that opening stage, you are then given a new powerup that allows you to transform into a different form, which catches your interest immediately. This is then followed by you being thrown into the overworld, and from there on out, almost the entire game opens up for you. You can now fly to plenty of other different locations throughout the map, take on plenty of new stages, fight bigger and badder foes, and find shops to buy more items or to get more money. These elements aren’t anything particularly new for video games, but to see the series being evolved from what it was before, a game trying to be an RPG, to this, is something to behold.
Another thing to appreciate about this approach is that, upon beating that first level, you now have this sense of freedom that not too many other games at that time had. Yeah, some of the levels are closed off until you complete certain objectives, but that can’t stop you from going to plenty of other levels, taking different routes, seeing what else is available to do, or even beating the whole game immediately. Seriously, you can just go straight to Phalanx to take him out if you want to, without playing through any other level, which may seem pretty anti-climatic, but the fact that the game gives you this option at all is something you don’t see every day, and is something I really appreciate. But even then, if you do decide to go beat the game already, you would then miss out on where this game truly shines: the upgrades.
Throughout the game, you can find many different items throughout the stages, each one either helping you carry something to use on your journey, or ones that will make you stronger as you keep going. These items can range from simple health upgrades, potion bottles, or scraps of paper for spells, but then there are the talisman that you can find, each one giving you a new ability to use, such as being able to break blocks, climb up walls, and take less damage. None of these compare to the crests though, for when you get them, you are able to turn into different gargoyle forms, such as one that allows you to break heavy objects on the ground, one that will let you fly high to the skies, and one that lets you swim underwater. Each one of these forms can be very helpful in plenty of situations, not only for defeating your foes, but also for exploring around the stages more to find new items, as well as new paths to take which can lead to extra pathways, bosses, and rewards. There may not be that many stages in the game, but they make up for it by making these stages meaty, and you will wanna see every corner of them before your journey is all over.
All of that is well and good, but there are some elements that do hold it back, such as the fact that this is still Ghosts ‘n Goblins, which means it will not be afraid to jam that fleshy head of yours straight into a vat of spikes. It is easy enough at the beginning, but it can get hard pretty quickly, and you will need to bring your A-game to take on some of these challenges. Although, even that may not be enough at some points, as I swear, there are just some parts in this game where it seems impossible to get through without getting hit, even though I tried plenty of times to make that the case. It’s not that big of a deal, I’ll take the hit like a man and move on, but still, that does kinda suck. And speaking of things that kinda suck (stop thinking that), this may be a personal peeve that I have with this game, but it is a peeve nonetheless: why can’t you crouch? There are plenty of moments in the game where you will have these pots or enemies that you can’t normally hit on the ground, all because you are too goddamn tall, so your fire goes over them, and you have to position yourself to where you can actually hit these things. Sure, you do have different forms and tools to take care of that for you, but then that requires going into the menu, going to select the form, leaving the menu, and uggggggggggggh……… it could’ve gone by so much faster.
Overall, despite some gripes that I have with the game, personal or otherwise, this is definitely one of the best ways that this sub-series of games could’ve ended out, managing to retain the same basic gameplay that fans have come to know and love from this series, while also expanding on it tremendously to where it could never go back to what it did before… at least, if it had the chance to. I would definitely recommend it for those who were fans of the previous Gargoyle’s Quest titles, as well as those who are a fan of more open-ended platformers like this, because this game will give you plenty of what you want and love out of these types of games, and you will feel satisfied by the end of it. Unless, you know, you do end up going to fight Phalanx right away, in which case you end up throwing the Demon Realm into chaos anyway… so, way to go there, ya demonic dickhead.
Game #520
Just like with the other two Gargoyle’s Quest games, I had never played Demon’s Crest until not too long ago, even though I had seen it in action before. Unsurprisingly, the game is the best looking and most impressive of the bunch, which definitely left an impression on me when I first saw it, as I love this type of gothic-horror shit, especially from this era of gaming. Seriously, how can you not at least be impressed by some of the sprites in the game, like the dragon corpse you fight at the beginning of the game? But anyway, I decided to give it a shot, and yeah, I’d have to agree with most when they say that this is the best game in the series, and one of the hidden gems of the franchise as a whole. It does have its faults, ones that I haven’t seen many others touch upon, but it still stands as one of the best titles in this series as a whole.
The story is typical enough for this series, where the Demon Realm is in a war over who will claim ownership of the Crests, six magical artifacts that, when combined, can give you the powers of a god, and after plenty of fighting, Firebrand manages to gain all of them, only to have them then stolen by the evil Phalanx to use to take over the realm, so it is up to Firebrand to gather all of the crests once again and take him down for good. It is a simple enough scenario, but one that is presented in a, for lack of a better word, epic way, and it does make you more curious then before to give the game a shot. The graphics are fantastic, having that gothic style that I mentioned earlier, while also having fantastic sprites for Firebrand and his forms, the enemies you find, and especially the bosses, the music is pretty great, having that gothic, organ-y tone throughout most of the entire game, making the tracks great to listen to as you trek forward, and the control/gameplay is very similar to that of the previous game, but changed up plenty in terms of how you approach playing the game.
The game is a 2D action platformer, where you take control of Firebrand one more time, go through plenty of different gothic locations all across the realm, defeat plenty of enemies using your various gargoyle abilities while taking on plenty of tricky platforming segments, gather plenty of different items to help you get other items from shops, as well as plenty of upgrades throughout the land that can boost your abilities in plenty of ways, and take on plenty of large, grotesque creatures that will give you quite a challenge if you aren’t up to the task. When taking into account several different aspects of the game, it is very similar to that of the previous games, but then there are all the new elements brought into this game, as well as all of the elements that were changed around, and it almost feels like it came from a completely different series.
When you first start the game, it feels like your typical Gargoyle’s Quest affair, going through a linear level, defeating enemies, getting items and fighting several different bosses: nothing you haven’t seen from this set of games before. But then, when you defeat the final boss of that opening stage, you are then given a new powerup that allows you to transform into a different form, which catches your interest immediately. This is then followed by you being thrown into the overworld, and from there on out, almost the entire game opens up for you. You can now fly to plenty of other different locations throughout the map, take on plenty of new stages, fight bigger and badder foes, and find shops to buy more items or to get more money. These elements aren’t anything particularly new for video games, but to see the series being evolved from what it was before, a game trying to be an RPG, to this, is something to behold.
Another thing to appreciate about this approach is that, upon beating that first level, you now have this sense of freedom that not too many other games at that time had. Yeah, some of the levels are closed off until you complete certain objectives, but that can’t stop you from going to plenty of other levels, taking different routes, seeing what else is available to do, or even beating the whole game immediately. Seriously, you can just go straight to Phalanx to take him out if you want to, without playing through any other level, which may seem pretty anti-climatic, but the fact that the game gives you this option at all is something you don’t see every day, and is something I really appreciate. But even then, if you do decide to go beat the game already, you would then miss out on where this game truly shines: the upgrades.
Throughout the game, you can find many different items throughout the stages, each one either helping you carry something to use on your journey, or ones that will make you stronger as you keep going. These items can range from simple health upgrades, potion bottles, or scraps of paper for spells, but then there are the talisman that you can find, each one giving you a new ability to use, such as being able to break blocks, climb up walls, and take less damage. None of these compare to the crests though, for when you get them, you are able to turn into different gargoyle forms, such as one that allows you to break heavy objects on the ground, one that will let you fly high to the skies, and one that lets you swim underwater. Each one of these forms can be very helpful in plenty of situations, not only for defeating your foes, but also for exploring around the stages more to find new items, as well as new paths to take which can lead to extra pathways, bosses, and rewards. There may not be that many stages in the game, but they make up for it by making these stages meaty, and you will wanna see every corner of them before your journey is all over.
All of that is well and good, but there are some elements that do hold it back, such as the fact that this is still Ghosts ‘n Goblins, which means it will not be afraid to jam that fleshy head of yours straight into a vat of spikes. It is easy enough at the beginning, but it can get hard pretty quickly, and you will need to bring your A-game to take on some of these challenges. Although, even that may not be enough at some points, as I swear, there are just some parts in this game where it seems impossible to get through without getting hit, even though I tried plenty of times to make that the case. It’s not that big of a deal, I’ll take the hit like a man and move on, but still, that does kinda suck. And speaking of things that kinda suck (stop thinking that), this may be a personal peeve that I have with this game, but it is a peeve nonetheless: why can’t you crouch? There are plenty of moments in the game where you will have these pots or enemies that you can’t normally hit on the ground, all because you are too goddamn tall, so your fire goes over them, and you have to position yourself to where you can actually hit these things. Sure, you do have different forms and tools to take care of that for you, but then that requires going into the menu, going to select the form, leaving the menu, and uggggggggggggh……… it could’ve gone by so much faster.
Overall, despite some gripes that I have with the game, personal or otherwise, this is definitely one of the best ways that this sub-series of games could’ve ended out, managing to retain the same basic gameplay that fans have come to know and love from this series, while also expanding on it tremendously to where it could never go back to what it did before… at least, if it had the chance to. I would definitely recommend it for those who were fans of the previous Gargoyle’s Quest titles, as well as those who are a fan of more open-ended platformers like this, because this game will give you plenty of what you want and love out of these types of games, and you will feel satisfied by the end of it. Unless, you know, you do end up going to fight Phalanx right away, in which case you end up throwing the Demon Realm into chaos anyway… so, way to go there, ya demonic dickhead.
Game #520
Demon's Crest is often held up as a gem, but I mostly just find it to be a solid little action-platformer. It plays well, has good sound design, and it's nice to look at. Some good use of Mode 7 when you're out in the overworld, too. But the actual level-to-level gameplay didn't really impress me. It didn't let me down either. I just think it's good, and I would rub oil all over Firebrand's pecs if given the opportunity. Three out of five.
Wizards and Warriors 2, then Actraiser, now Demon's Crest... what is it with me playing all these games lately that throw enemies and projectiles that approach you from above and below but give you no way to hit upwards/downwards? I think I finally kinda understand the younger players who complain about RE4's tank controls; I don't agree, but I understand. Because while RE4's challenges are perfectly curated for your stiff moveset (and Demon's Crest does it too, albeit less elegantly), so many times while playing this I kept thinking "This mf clings to walls Spidey-style, the bloody box art shows him bending his knees, why can't he just crouch and shoot?!"
Anyways this is a perfectly fine action-platformer; it feels rather stiff, but it boasts a unique moveset that centers around using walljumps and hovering to give you more control over your vertical positioning, and throws you some truly evil bosses to force you to learn its ins and outs. But it stumbles a bit in its execution of the Metroidvania elements - while you gradually discover new abilities that will help you unlock new areas, these take the form of new demon forms you can take rather than adding new moves to your base form. This subtle difference, combined with the fact that you can only switch forms from the pause menu, makes some sections of the game extremely tedious. One in particular forces you to switch back and forth between the Earth form (to break barriers and kill enemies on the ground), Fire form (to light torches that need to stay lit or more enemies will appear) and Buster form (fastest attack rate), and I spent more time in the menu than ingame because I was having to switch forms every 3 seconds or so! It's quite mystifying to me why they built the mechanics around switching back and forth between forms but didn't allow you to quick-switch via the shoulder buttons a la Mega Man X. This had the unwanted side effect of making the game feel clunkier and more tedious the more forms I unlocked, making the discovery of new abilities feel more annoying than liberating.
While this fire-breathing red demon game left me feeling a bit lukewarm, I do concede there's a lot to love here. A spooky aesthetic and sinister plot that somehow made it past the '94 censors, top-tier graphics and music, and some really good boss encounters. Definitely worth a play for anyone searching for decent lesser-known SNES games, and a really good time if you can get past the clunky form-switching mechanics.
Anyways this is a perfectly fine action-platformer; it feels rather stiff, but it boasts a unique moveset that centers around using walljumps and hovering to give you more control over your vertical positioning, and throws you some truly evil bosses to force you to learn its ins and outs. But it stumbles a bit in its execution of the Metroidvania elements - while you gradually discover new abilities that will help you unlock new areas, these take the form of new demon forms you can take rather than adding new moves to your base form. This subtle difference, combined with the fact that you can only switch forms from the pause menu, makes some sections of the game extremely tedious. One in particular forces you to switch back and forth between the Earth form (to break barriers and kill enemies on the ground), Fire form (to light torches that need to stay lit or more enemies will appear) and Buster form (fastest attack rate), and I spent more time in the menu than ingame because I was having to switch forms every 3 seconds or so! It's quite mystifying to me why they built the mechanics around switching back and forth between forms but didn't allow you to quick-switch via the shoulder buttons a la Mega Man X. This had the unwanted side effect of making the game feel clunkier and more tedious the more forms I unlocked, making the discovery of new abilities feel more annoying than liberating.
While this fire-breathing red demon game left me feeling a bit lukewarm, I do concede there's a lot to love here. A spooky aesthetic and sinister plot that somehow made it past the '94 censors, top-tier graphics and music, and some really good boss encounters. Definitely worth a play for anyone searching for decent lesser-known SNES games, and a really good time if you can get past the clunky form-switching mechanics.
good but no arthur
this game sucked
>be Fire Brand
>kill everyone for some magical fruit snacks
>get mugged because you're a manlet
>kill everyone again for some magical fruit snacks
>become a god
>get bored
>throw away the fruit snacks and move to detroit
What did he mean by this?
(fr tho amazing game)
>kill everyone for some magical fruit snacks
>get mugged because you're a manlet
>kill everyone again for some magical fruit snacks
>become a god
>get bored
>throw away the fruit snacks and move to detroit
What did he mean by this?
(fr tho amazing game)
With its dark design, the variety of actions available, the balance between quest and exploration phases, and the more intense parts of boss fights, it represents a great improvement in every aspect of the Gargoyle's Quest series. At the same time it proves to be more innovative, long-lived and exciting than the games of the inspiring series released at that time: we refer to Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts, which appeared 3 years earlier for the same console, and which ultimately offered nothing particularly different from its predecessors and was perhaps penalized by an overly "old-school arcade" gaming experience that on the home machines of the early 1990s was in danger of no longer pleasing. Probably the character of Sir Arthur himself does not allow much room for change, while instead giving a "villain" the role of protagonist turned out to be a winning and promising idea; unfortunately, however, while the bearded knight has reappeared on the screens of last-generation consoles, Red Arremer (apart from a few appearances as in a "SNK vs. Capcom" series fighting game) now seems resigned to play only the role of the latter's nemesis. Let's hope that in the future some willing game designer will return to give us a jump into the land of demons, and not on the side of good!"
Another SNES masterpiece!
Hard as hell, amazing graphic style, and with some Metroidvania elements, even before Metroidvanias were a thing.
Be ready for some heavy, slow character mobility, similar to the classic Castlevanias.
Hard as hell, amazing graphic style, and with some Metroidvania elements, even before Metroidvanias were a thing.
Be ready for some heavy, slow character mobility, similar to the classic Castlevanias.
I like how different this game feels from other platformers of the era. It dabbles a bit into the Metroidvania style by requiring you to revisit areas to unlock all the upgrades. Every level has various paths each with their own visual style and bosses. It does a poor job of explaining a lot of this stuff, including the fact that you can beat the game pretty soon after you finish the first level, since the final boss is just kinda right on the world map. I was confused when I beat the game after like, 30 minutes. But all the extra levels and abilities you unlock make the exploration worth it, and the game opens up quite nicely when you have everything under your belt. I will say they kinda botched the platforming by giving you the ability to fly endlessly. Gargoyle's Quest did this a lot better by having you slowly gain better air time, and the moment you actually did gain infinite flight was wonderful. Here, it just exists as a way to disengage from basically every obstacle. But this game is more about the exploration than anything. It's not even all that hard, at least until you get to the ridiculously cheap final boss, which is probably the most egregious difficulty spike I've ever seen. Fuck that thing. Still, great game! 4/6
Underrated Game of the SNES era.
It looks a bit shallow on the first view but damn, there is actually a good bunch in this. Most levels have an alternate way with an alternate boss, rewarding you with diverse items that will either boss you a bit or a gem that changes what ype of demon you are which you use depenig on the situation.
100% this game for the first time is hard, there are enough bosses that do not joke around. The levels are mostly also neatly done but there are a few annoying places.
The presentation of how everything looks and to that the Music makes it really an unique game and is also fun to speedrun for fun.
Please give this game a chance somehow. It really deserves it.
It looks a bit shallow on the first view but damn, there is actually a good bunch in this. Most levels have an alternate way with an alternate boss, rewarding you with diverse items that will either boss you a bit or a gem that changes what ype of demon you are which you use depenig on the situation.
100% this game for the first time is hard, there are enough bosses that do not joke around. The levels are mostly also neatly done but there are a few annoying places.
The presentation of how everything looks and to that the Music makes it really an unique game and is also fun to speedrun for fun.
Please give this game a chance somehow. It really deserves it.
Just 100%ed this and holy moly this game rules. Challenging at times but never too hard and goddamn the atmosphere and art is amazing. Huge fan of this series. I’m now in my gargoyle era.
the beginning was kinda rough without knowing some of the stuff to get better/stronger before meeting some bosses but overall it was great once you get the hang of it.
it's the best of the Firebrand Trilogy and honestly the best Ghost'n Goblins game in the series.
also the gargoyles in these games are hot like GODDAMN, Capcom
it's the best of the Firebrand Trilogy and honestly the best Ghost'n Goblins game in the series.
also the gargoyles in these games are hot like GODDAMN, Capcom
Really outstanding but done a disservice by an incredibly short playtime. It's so full of mechanics and unique presentations of time-tested game basics, and the player just isn't given enough time to play around with its toybox.
Aesthetically it's staggering though, presenting incredibly menacing sprite work, a truly charming bestiary, and a gloomy soundtrack. On this alone it's worth checking out, but know that playing through to see multiple endings is the best way to get the content for your time, but will only extend the short experience so much.
Aesthetically it's staggering though, presenting incredibly menacing sprite work, a truly charming bestiary, and a gloomy soundtrack. On this alone it's worth checking out, but know that playing through to see multiple endings is the best way to get the content for your time, but will only extend the short experience so much.
no dude im good
Oh shit it’s over, that was actually too quick because I didn’t get all the secret stuff but I’m gonna keep playing and try to 100% it. This game fucking rules. Amazing visuals and atmosphere and like everything honestly. Big fan.