Delightful little NES platformer that's hard but not as hard as other games of its kind. Feel like a good entry into that genre of game, which are often very intimidating while this one has the appeal of looking like a playable old school gag manga. Not that the difficulty ever relents, good god those last three stages are evil. Managed to beat it with no save states though, which felt pretty good (OK well I used save states to load back where I started when I had to leave the game, but I didn't use save states to start in the middle of levels!) I also really like the bonus games in the middle of stages, but the way they're set up meant I didn't get to play one of them. I haven't explored most of the NES library outside of first-party stuff and I really should, this was a lot of fun, I'm now someone who wants a new Kid Dracula, until I remember this is a fucking Konami thing so never mind.

As a Mega Man copycat, it gets the job done. You get a new special ability after completing each stage, some of which are necessary to traverse certain obstacles and make some bosses easier (most of which are easy enough as is, though). You can also find heart containers to increase your hit points from 3 to a maximum of 5. The game overall is fairly easy until you get to Stage 7, and that's where you really start to notice the cracks in the level design and mechanics.

Stage 7 is straight up broken. A vertically scrolling level of platform jumping that seems longer than it actually is because of annoyingly difficult it is. Like with a lot of other platformers of this era, there is a knockback effect when you take damage, which basically requires you to get through this level without getting hit because that knockback will just knock you off the platform and out of bounds. Trying to hit enemies while making some of these jumps is way harder than it should be. To add insult to injury, they later add these rockets that come from below which explode and also damage you. If you somehow manage to make it to the top without save states, prepare to do it all over again, because the boss will probably destroy you on your first few attempts as you try to learn its attack patterns. There's a password system, but it only takes you to level 7, so good luck trying to beat this game legit. Losing to the final boss in Stage 9 just takes you back to the start of the level, which is probably the second hardest stage in the game. So yeah, fun... But what about lives?

This game has a very strange way of earning lives. Instead of having them placed in certain spots in each level like Mega Man, you have to win them in these mini games at the end of each stage. Sounds simple in concept, but you can only take a crack at these mini games if you have enough coins. These coins can only be earned from defeating enemies with a charged shot. You basically just gotta play each stage holding that fire button waiting for an enemy to pop up. And playing these mini games doesn't guarantee that you will win anything. It's just a gambling system and it sucks. I only ever managed to play any of these mini games three times. The first two times won me nothing. Then I got 6 lives on my third attempt. I would have had more coins to try more times, but I was too busy trying to survive by spamming my attack sometimes that I didn't want to risk trying to land charged shots on most enemies.

Also tangent, but why in the unholy mother of Alucard does touching any surface when in bat form cause you to revert back? I can't tell you how many times I died just trying to fly over some obstacles only to touch a wall and fall to my death because bat form controls like you're on invisible ice. Also, would have been nice to select abilities from a pause menu like Mega Man, because sometimes you want to switch in the middle of battle, and you'll take damage trying to scroll through it.

At least levels 1-6 are mostly fair. Some still have some annoying sections, but nothing too bad. I would say I enjoyed these levels. They're not great, but they're competent enough. But all the issues I had with its design, along with the rage factor that comes with the stages afterwards, downgrades this game from what would otherwise be a solid Mega Man clone to a mediocre platformer.

this really is just diet Mega Man

not that it's a bad thing of course I do love me my Mega Man, though I will say that this game doesn't have as much polish when it comes to the gameplay. Kid Dracula moves pretty slow, his weapon shots don't really stick out too much, and his bat power up stops after making contact with anything, which can get a little annoying. on top of that the last three stages were a pain, especially the last one. 7 is this dumb vertical scrolling platforming segment with rockets and robots that'll knock you to your death, 8 has this insta-kill laser near the end that you're just suppose to know that it's there, and the entirety of 9 is just a huge difficulty spike as well as having no checkpoints whatsoever. I get that it's the final level but come on, a gradual buildup in difficulty couldn't have hurt.

everything else before that was good though, I had a fun time with the quirky enemy designs and being able to shoot them you can never go wrong with shooting. the minigames at the end of each level were charming too, well two of them were just roulettes and the skeleton one I could never figure out what it was about. I'll let you find out the fourth one on your own. oh yeah I liked seeing Dracula's castle in a new light that the game has. interesting enough I don't really remember how any of the music went even though I just got done with this game an hour ago, I guess it just wasn't that memorable to me. the game could have used some cutscenes too. I checked and it turns out the Game Boy sequel does have a few of them and even Death makes an appearance there, so I have no idea why this game doesn't have any outside of three boss dialogues.

this was alright though it's a neat and silly game that you wouldn't expect to see from the same company that has Contra and Metal Gear in their hands. in this day and age where a good portion of video games are trying their best to be dramatic and thought provoking, it's good to wind back and play a game that's nothing more than some good old goofy fun.

(Played via the Castlevania Collection)

Fantastic! Absolutely loved this Castlevania parody being done in a mega man styled game. Lots of goofs when it comes to some of the enemies here being designed after some familiar franchise characters along with some settings I did not expect here!

Very glad this got an official English patch 30+ years after its release.

Played this primarily because it was on the Castlevania Switch collection, but it's really only a Castlevania game by Konami's decision alone. Kid Dracula carries almost none of the features of the franchise typically has, beyond a few aesthetic similarities and the use of Dracula, a character not created by Konami, as a plot-relevant character. It plays more like a Mega Man game than anything else, which should be fine, but it isn't as tight. Like, nowhere close. Platforming is floaty, combat is slow, your character sprite is far too big, hit detection is wonky, stage design is creatively minimal, etc. The combination of Mega Man and Castlevania should at least provide some solid jams, but there aren't even any notable song selections. What a shame. 2/6

This one is a bummer for me because it has so much charm and is actually quite a fun parody of the castlevania series. So what went wrong for me? simply put the last 3 levels. And to be even more precise its level 7 in particular that ruined a good chunk of the experience for me. Level 7 was such a ruthless level for absolutely NO reason with annoying platforming due to the fact you have a knockback animation so if you get hit even ONCE you are dead and start from the beginning of the level. Past that level 9 was brutal with its checkpoints and sadly it was just becoming more annoying for me to finish the game by that point.

But I don't want to let that make people run away from trying this game out because despite the annoying last few levels this game is still very fun and has so much cute charm to it which is why I am going to leave it at a 6.

Kid Dracula for the Famicom is a weird and light-hearted spinoff of the Castlevania series, and it's cool that we finally got this localized inside the Castlevania Anniversary Collection back in 2019, which is where I'll be reviewing

Kid Dracula stars, well, Kid Dracula (obviously) as he traverses through nine wacky levels to defeat the almighty Galamoth. Kid Dracula is sort of akin to Mega Man. At every level you clear, you'll get a new power-up that can be used throughout your journey. My favorite is the homing attack, which sends multiple balls of destruction to enemies and deals crazy damage. Unlike Mega Man, Kid Dracula can shoot fireballs from his finger in four directions. The music and bosses are decent enough; my favorite boss is the Statue of Liberty. Seriously, we need more trivia-based bosses in video games instead of resorting to violence

I wouldn't call this game an excellent platformer for a few reasons. First off, most platforms have tricky and quite finicky platforming sections that sometimes leave me feeling frustrated. An infamous example is Level 7, where you're supposed to climb to the tower with platforms descending, but you have to be early to make it, or else you die. The final level is easily the worst because there are no checkpoints, meaning you must do the two mini-bosses and make your way to Galamoth again. Thankfully I restarted the game to get more lives instead of using the save state feature

Overall, Kid Dracula is a decent platformer with lots of charm behind it. It won't be anything amazing, but it's something worth checking out if you're a Castlevania fan

I've played a lot of Castlevania this year, played Adventure Rebirth, Bloodlines, Circle of the Moon, and Legends. I thought why not, let's try out the Famicom game called Akumajou Special: Boku Dracula-Kun. This is basically a parody game similar to when they would make Parodius which was a parody on Gradius. I'm not too sure why they made this? Maybe it was because Akumajou Densetsu (Castlevania III) supposedly did poorly in Japan? Well regardless of that, how is the game? Well, it exists.

This game is is your simple action game with some themes you would never really expect from the series. It's even got some high action thrills which again is something that is pretty different for the series. Sadly that's about as interesting as the game gets. Don't get me wrong, it is fun but it's not like amazing fun.

You can also get new powers after the first 6 stages but a lot of them are situational and the only one I got a lot of use from was the homing orbs ability. Maybe I just wasn't testing them enough. I really want to like the bat ability but it feels too situational. There's also bonus stages at the end of each stage with stuff like doing the lottery and guessing the girls...shorts? Are they shorts? You can get a lot of extra lives doing this like I had 12 lives at the beginning of Stage 2.

The bosses are nothing to write home about (wait is that how you say that?) They are just your standard hit them till they go down and avoid easy to dodge patterns. Even the final boss is a joke, why is he so easy? Also whatever you do, do not play the game without knowing japanese unless you're playing a translated version because one of the bosses is a quiz section and it's all in Japanese. Though if you don't feel bad you could just spam save states too if you have the option.

This game looks fine but Idk I'm not really impressed by it either if I'm being honest. I like a lot of the cute sprites but none of the environments do it for me. The music is also your typical Konami polish but far from their best work. I do like the remix of Beginning for the first Stage.

While this game won't amaze you in any way, it's still good and not something to pass up. There is also a GB game though idk how different it is so maybe I'll play it someday. Sadly he never caught on though maybe that was never intended, who knows. Maybe casuals could get into this more but I think there are better games to play. It's hard to compete with the polish the other games in the series had.