I mean, why not? When Nobunaga ruled part of Japan, and was asked for his reasoning to go after the rest, he simply went "because it's there". I'm pretty sure he said that, I was alive for it. It was essentially the same mindset I had with finishing the Advance Collection.
Known as "Vampire's Kiss" for our PALs, "Dracula X" could only be assumed to be meant as "Dracula's Hug" rather than some attempt at the 2Xtreme movement of the 90s. You see, because in here Dracula gives you a nice little hug and a peck on the cheek, all before he kicks you down a hole in his dilapidated humble abode. It makes one wonder why Dracula would even bother with floors in general when he's more than capable of flying everywhere, especially if he's already figured out that the best defense against Belmonts is to simply either make them walk up stairs, or dare them to hop with their cement-infused boots across magical levitating platforms. Where these platforms are coming from is a mystery, but I assume it's where all those holes in Dracula's throne room came from, or perhaps that's the origin of all the gaps in the grand hallway where one slip up means Richter falling into an alternate stage that denies him the ability to rescue Maria's now completely useless ass.
"Wow, thanks Richter! Good luck on your quest, I'll make my way out now."
Bitch.
It's really intriguing how a final boss fight can completely overtake discussion, and it's quite telling what the legacy of the Dracula's Smooch version of the climactic finale leaves behind when there exists an entire guide on GameFAQs dedicated to it. A useful one at that. Part of me wishes the Game Gear version of Sonic 2 would have something like that for it's first boss, but I guess there's not much to be helped there beyond "I sure hope the balls don't hit me". To say that the fight with Dracula X is a slog would be shorting it a few hundred didgeridoos, because man I could've made some tasty pancakes in the time it took trying to wait out his ass to get into an advantageous position to hit his godawful hitbox along the pillar system he installed in his throne room prior to him calling in an assist from Devil Kazuya. Kaiser Sigma from X3 would puke at all the times I uselessly cracked my whip across Dracula X's forehead and had it not register, because Konami designed this game from the ground up with anti-blockbuster rental countermeasures instead of waiting for it to come out to us, thus destroying all potential goodwill it could have found as a demake later during the age of emulation, with an audience less upset at being bamboozled out of a more faithful and less mean-spirited retelling of the beloved PC Engine classic. Instead, Switch owners will be annoyed they have to deal with this while Requiem continues chilling as a PS4 exclusive nearly six years later.
Baffling, though not quite as baffling as the censorship where they kept the blood on the title screen, but got rid of Death's Mortal Kombat Deception-style Hara Kiri where he decapitates himself with his own scythe, meanwhile Richter in our version apparently explodes into a pile of flour for Dracula X to make his cookies from.
What cookie would Richter be? Puzzling...
My opinion was ever so slightly improved from forcing myself to replay this for completion-sake, but the most heartwarming thing I get out of Dracula's Kiss personally is seeing the font used at the bottom of the title screen for the copyright, and being reminded of a childhood banger in Konami's Biker Mice From Mars which uses the same thing, so I guess I'll go play that now instead. Ciao.
Known as "Vampire's Kiss" for our PALs, "Dracula X" could only be assumed to be meant as "Dracula's Hug" rather than some attempt at the 2Xtreme movement of the 90s. You see, because in here Dracula gives you a nice little hug and a peck on the cheek, all before he kicks you down a hole in his dilapidated humble abode. It makes one wonder why Dracula would even bother with floors in general when he's more than capable of flying everywhere, especially if he's already figured out that the best defense against Belmonts is to simply either make them walk up stairs, or dare them to hop with their cement-infused boots across magical levitating platforms. Where these platforms are coming from is a mystery, but I assume it's where all those holes in Dracula's throne room came from, or perhaps that's the origin of all the gaps in the grand hallway where one slip up means Richter falling into an alternate stage that denies him the ability to rescue Maria's now completely useless ass.
"Wow, thanks Richter! Good luck on your quest, I'll make my way out now."
Bitch.
It's really intriguing how a final boss fight can completely overtake discussion, and it's quite telling what the legacy of the Dracula's Smooch version of the climactic finale leaves behind when there exists an entire guide on GameFAQs dedicated to it. A useful one at that. Part of me wishes the Game Gear version of Sonic 2 would have something like that for it's first boss, but I guess there's not much to be helped there beyond "I sure hope the balls don't hit me". To say that the fight with Dracula X is a slog would be shorting it a few hundred didgeridoos, because man I could've made some tasty pancakes in the time it took trying to wait out his ass to get into an advantageous position to hit his godawful hitbox along the pillar system he installed in his throne room prior to him calling in an assist from Devil Kazuya. Kaiser Sigma from X3 would puke at all the times I uselessly cracked my whip across Dracula X's forehead and had it not register, because Konami designed this game from the ground up with anti-blockbuster rental countermeasures instead of waiting for it to come out to us, thus destroying all potential goodwill it could have found as a demake later during the age of emulation, with an audience less upset at being bamboozled out of a more faithful and less mean-spirited retelling of the beloved PC Engine classic. Instead, Switch owners will be annoyed they have to deal with this while Requiem continues chilling as a PS4 exclusive nearly six years later.
Baffling, though not quite as baffling as the censorship where they kept the blood on the title screen, but got rid of Death's Mortal Kombat Deception-style Hara Kiri where he decapitates himself with his own scythe, meanwhile Richter in our version apparently explodes into a pile of flour for Dracula X to make his cookies from.
What cookie would Richter be? Puzzling...
My opinion was ever so slightly improved from forcing myself to replay this for completion-sake, but the most heartwarming thing I get out of Dracula's Kiss personally is seeing the font used at the bottom of the title screen for the copyright, and being reminded of a childhood banger in Konami's Biker Mice From Mars which uses the same thing, so I guess I'll go play that now instead. Ciao.
Castlevania Dracula X is the infamous reversion of Rondo of Blood that the rest of the world outside of Japan got instead of Rondo of Blood itself. Here the meme of “mom, can we have Rondo of Blood? -Mom: we already have Rondo of Blood at home” totally applies.
It's actually a different game, though it's also definitely a big downgrade from the quality of the original game, but I still think it's not too bad all things considered... or maybe I'm just being masochistic.
The plot is the same, it's a retelling of Richter's story, with minor variations like Maria and Anette being sisters, or that the other damsels don't exist (no cutscenes either). The level design is also totally different, and it is also the case for the stage graphics, in this aspect I can say that Konami did a really great job, because everything looks spectacular, it is one of the best looking Castlevania games of the 16-bit era and in my opinion surpasses the original Rondo of Blood. As for the characters and enemies, here the sprites are reused from Rondo of Blood, so they look equally good, although there are also a couple of new bosses. The music is also reused, and the sound team did a great job converting the music, because despite not being CD quality, it is impressive how well it was translated.
So, let's get to the heart of the matter; the gameplay. I have to say that this game plays pretty well, the gameplay from Rondo of Blood is almost 100% translated, although the control doesn't feel quite as good, as it's a little bit clunkier (try doing the backflip or crouching too many times in a row), but it's almost identical to the original installment, and as such, it plays better than most classic Castlevanias for that fact alone (or at least it will if you have mastered the Rondo of Blood gameplay). However, the real problem with this game stems from the balancing that was given to the difficulty. Because the field of view is smaller compared to the PC-Engine game, the development team made some adjustments, like everything moves at a slower speed, they reduced the knockback that enemies generate when they hit you, and they also decreased the invincibility time they give you after being hit, so in other words, with these small changes they foolishly increased the difficulty of the game, so now it's more punishing. For example, if a medusa head hits you, it may not hit you once, but twice in a row, and this may cause you to fall into a bottomless pit and die, a cheap defeat.
Another thing is that the level design is more similar to the NES installments, so in that sense it's a step backwards. It contrasts a lot with Rondo of Blood, because that game had a perfectly balanced difficulty and level design, instead this one is a bit more challenging and punishing, so if you are not very skilled playing this kind of games you are going to have a very bad time and I don't recommend you even try it.
Things I like is how not saving Annette makes her become a boss, a concept that would be brought back for the PSP remake of Rondo of Blood. And I must say the infamous Dracula battle as well. Everyone knows that the original installment has an overly easy battle, but this time around they made it quite a bit harder, although it's not that hard if you know what you're doing. If you're equipped with the axe as sub-weapon and stay in a certain position, the first phase is like taking candy from a child, and the second phase isn't that hard, but if you're not careful you can get insta-killed.
Conclusion
Yes, the game is not that bad, except that it has a little cruel difficulty. Obviously with respect to the original Rondo of Blood it pales, because while that game felt like a premium quality Castlevania game, this one feels like an attempt to mimic that greatness, but falls short in many ways, and the fact that it wants to be a more challenging version plays against it because some parameters are not as well adjusted as they should be, making the result not so great.
However, if you are someone who enjoys the gameplay of Rondo of Blood and you are looking forward to a bigger challenge, trying this game might be a good idea, but if you are not such a fan of the classic formula, don't even dare to play this game or you will totally regret it.
It's actually a different game, though it's also definitely a big downgrade from the quality of the original game, but I still think it's not too bad all things considered... or maybe I'm just being masochistic.
The plot is the same, it's a retelling of Richter's story, with minor variations like Maria and Anette being sisters, or that the other damsels don't exist (no cutscenes either). The level design is also totally different, and it is also the case for the stage graphics, in this aspect I can say that Konami did a really great job, because everything looks spectacular, it is one of the best looking Castlevania games of the 16-bit era and in my opinion surpasses the original Rondo of Blood. As for the characters and enemies, here the sprites are reused from Rondo of Blood, so they look equally good, although there are also a couple of new bosses. The music is also reused, and the sound team did a great job converting the music, because despite not being CD quality, it is impressive how well it was translated.
So, let's get to the heart of the matter; the gameplay. I have to say that this game plays pretty well, the gameplay from Rondo of Blood is almost 100% translated, although the control doesn't feel quite as good, as it's a little bit clunkier (try doing the backflip or crouching too many times in a row), but it's almost identical to the original installment, and as such, it plays better than most classic Castlevanias for that fact alone (or at least it will if you have mastered the Rondo of Blood gameplay). However, the real problem with this game stems from the balancing that was given to the difficulty. Because the field of view is smaller compared to the PC-Engine game, the development team made some adjustments, like everything moves at a slower speed, they reduced the knockback that enemies generate when they hit you, and they also decreased the invincibility time they give you after being hit, so in other words, with these small changes they foolishly increased the difficulty of the game, so now it's more punishing. For example, if a medusa head hits you, it may not hit you once, but twice in a row, and this may cause you to fall into a bottomless pit and die, a cheap defeat.
Another thing is that the level design is more similar to the NES installments, so in that sense it's a step backwards. It contrasts a lot with Rondo of Blood, because that game had a perfectly balanced difficulty and level design, instead this one is a bit more challenging and punishing, so if you are not very skilled playing this kind of games you are going to have a very bad time and I don't recommend you even try it.
Things I like is how not saving Annette makes her become a boss, a concept that would be brought back for the PSP remake of Rondo of Blood. And I must say the infamous Dracula battle as well. Everyone knows that the original installment has an overly easy battle, but this time around they made it quite a bit harder, although it's not that hard if you know what you're doing. If you're equipped with the axe as sub-weapon and stay in a certain position, the first phase is like taking candy from a child, and the second phase isn't that hard, but if you're not careful you can get insta-killed.
Conclusion
Yes, the game is not that bad, except that it has a little cruel difficulty. Obviously with respect to the original Rondo of Blood it pales, because while that game felt like a premium quality Castlevania game, this one feels like an attempt to mimic that greatness, but falls short in many ways, and the fact that it wants to be a more challenging version plays against it because some parameters are not as well adjusted as they should be, making the result not so great.
However, if you are someone who enjoys the gameplay of Rondo of Blood and you are looking forward to a bigger challenge, trying this game might be a good idea, but if you are not such a fan of the classic formula, don't even dare to play this game or you will totally regret it.
People usually speak of this game as if it were the worst thing since the holocaust, and while I see how they would think that, I had some fun playing through it.
OBVIOUSLY its not better than rondo, the movement is really slow (i'm pretty sure the back-flip lasts about 2 seconds), the difficulty can get out of hand at place (that fucking final boss), and it also has a fetish for putting enemies right next to bottomless pits, but for what it is, its decently enjoyable.
OBVIOUSLY its not better than rondo, the movement is really slow (i'm pretty sure the back-flip lasts about 2 seconds), the difficulty can get out of hand at place (that fucking final boss), and it also has a fetish for putting enemies right next to bottomless pits, but for what it is, its decently enjoyable.
castelo mais furado q a porra do lazaro vsf💔
Dracula X is a soft remake of Rondo of Blood made for the SNES, a relic from a time when game code was entirely specific to a platform and porting over a game meant rewriting everything from scratch. In adapting to the limitations of the new platform compared to the PC Engine, the port was made much lighter on content than the original game, featuring less stages, characters and types of enemies, and also removing the animated cutscenes that told Rondo's story.
Taken as what it is, it's... passable. It's an SNES platformer, like so many others at the time, and can last through a couple hours of enjoyment -- if that's your thing, that is. Personally, clunky combat and instant death pits are not my favorite features in a game, and Dracula X sure is packed with those, even bastardizing the iconic Dracula fight to include a bunch of pitfalls. However, I can see an SNES owner getting this game as a kid and loving it.
In 2024, though, a more pressing question than "why would one play this" is "why would anyone play this instead of Rondo of Blood itself". Even for those craving some classicvania, there's not much to see here that's not already in Rondo. Dracula X's inclusion in the Advance Collection is thus, puzzling.
Taken as what it is, it's... passable. It's an SNES platformer, like so many others at the time, and can last through a couple hours of enjoyment -- if that's your thing, that is. Personally, clunky combat and instant death pits are not my favorite features in a game, and Dracula X sure is packed with those, even bastardizing the iconic Dracula fight to include a bunch of pitfalls. However, I can see an SNES owner getting this game as a kid and loving it.
In 2024, though, a more pressing question than "why would one play this" is "why would anyone play this instead of Rondo of Blood itself". Even for those craving some classicvania, there's not much to see here that's not already in Rondo. Dracula X's inclusion in the Advance Collection is thus, puzzling.
This game answers a question nobody asked: What if Rondo of Blood sucked?
It is wrong to say it's a lesser version of Rondo of Blood, while they are meant to be the same events, they are clearly very different games. What's not wrong is to say this game sucks.
The levels are frustating, with a lot of them being to corridors with enemies on the top who CAN attack you while you cannot. The screens barely flow into one another making it feel like you just teleported places. On the topic of screens, a few of them are lifted from older Castlevania titles and end up being ust worst version of those screens.
Richter controls terrible, he feels slow and heavy, and has really short invincibility frames, making it that you could get stun locked by some enemies.
On the topic of enemies, it has the worst Dracula fight of the Castlevanias i've played, just a bore.
With all that you could wonder why i didn't score the game lower? At the end of the day is still a Castlevania game, and has its good parts, when not being an extremely frustating game i had fun with it, as some parts of it display effort and competence, it's just a shame those parts are not that many.
The levels are frustating, with a lot of them being to corridors with enemies on the top who CAN attack you while you cannot. The screens barely flow into one another making it feel like you just teleported places. On the topic of screens, a few of them are lifted from older Castlevania titles and end up being ust worst version of those screens.
Richter controls terrible, he feels slow and heavy, and has really short invincibility frames, making it that you could get stun locked by some enemies.
On the topic of enemies, it has the worst Dracula fight of the Castlevanias i've played, just a bore.
With all that you could wonder why i didn't score the game lower? At the end of the day is still a Castlevania game, and has its good parts, when not being an extremely frustating game i had fun with it, as some parts of it display effort and competence, it's just a shame those parts are not that many.
MY BAD GAME JOURNEY WITH FRIENDS IN VOICE CHAT
MARATHON PART 1: DRACULA X
this game isn't nessesarily bad despite the title, but as a CASTLEVANIA game its a huge letdown, this isn't even like a watered down port of Rondo, its pretty much in terms of its level design is completely different, in a very bad way, the bosses were OKAY until dracula. the dracula fight is slow and every time i think about it i can only think about the sonic jam ost on the game.com specifically because my friend put that on the bot on loop.
its such a dissapointment that it caused my autistic brain to come up with a new vocal stim, every time i took an unfair hit all i could think or speak was "awesome sauce" so imagine being with me in the voice chat where every time i got hit from some bullshit or had to deal with any bullshit in the game (which happened quite often) you'd have to hear me exclaim "thats so awesome sauce".
and its not like this game is like the worst either its just that if you've al;ready played rondo then you wont have a fun time with this game.
MARATHON PART 1: DRACULA X
this game isn't nessesarily bad despite the title, but as a CASTLEVANIA game its a huge letdown, this isn't even like a watered down port of Rondo, its pretty much in terms of its level design is completely different, in a very bad way, the bosses were OKAY until dracula. the dracula fight is slow and every time i think about it i can only think about the sonic jam ost on the game.com specifically because my friend put that on the bot on loop.
its such a dissapointment that it caused my autistic brain to come up with a new vocal stim, every time i took an unfair hit all i could think or speak was "awesome sauce" so imagine being with me in the voice chat where every time i got hit from some bullshit or had to deal with any bullshit in the game (which happened quite often) you'd have to hear me exclaim "thats so awesome sauce".
and its not like this game is like the worst either its just that if you've al;ready played rondo then you wont have a fun time with this game.
I'm a huge fan of Rando of Blood, and had always heard horror stories about this version of it.
Overall, I don't think it's bad and I actually had more fun than I anticipated I would. But some it's level design is so rough.
A lot of vertical rooms with very uncertain enemy patterns. They love doing this thing where if you miss a jump, you have to go outside your current room and back around to get back to it, respawning all of the enemies and making the punishment much more annoying as a result.
I kept saying "wow this game is mean." Rather than feeling it was a more deliberate challenge they wanted me to figure out.
It's been a minute since I've played the original Rando, but I can't recall having that many moments like that.
I ended up using a few save states towards the end, just to save me the pain and time of retreading an entire stage to learn one obnoxious vertical section of the level design.
But the worst offender of this is the final boss. A shit show of a boss fight. Small hurtbox windows, a lot of RNG and littered with pits to, invetibility, get tossed into by some attack from offscreen you couldn't react to.
And that's just the first phase. The second phase is an onslaught of barley reactable projectiles. With such small platforms to keep yourself on, it makes almost impossible to get right your first time; meaning you're playing through that tedious first phase with each attempt to learn.
It's obnoxious and shudder to imagine that 10 year old kid in 1995 slaving over this for hours on a school night.
Even a perfect run of this fight on youtube takes 5 full minutes.
I absolutely did not have the patience for this,
Ended up amusing save states heavily, and felt extremely underwhelmed as a result.
Just a real wet fart to end the game on.
And the lack of Maria kinda stings. She is huge part of why I love that original game so much.
I guess that's why this game has this reputation, it doesn't do its own thing at all, so it just ends up being in the shadow of its older, cooler, brother.
Overall, I don't think it's bad and I actually had more fun than I anticipated I would. But some it's level design is so rough.
A lot of vertical rooms with very uncertain enemy patterns. They love doing this thing where if you miss a jump, you have to go outside your current room and back around to get back to it, respawning all of the enemies and making the punishment much more annoying as a result.
I kept saying "wow this game is mean." Rather than feeling it was a more deliberate challenge they wanted me to figure out.
It's been a minute since I've played the original Rando, but I can't recall having that many moments like that.
I ended up using a few save states towards the end, just to save me the pain and time of retreading an entire stage to learn one obnoxious vertical section of the level design.
But the worst offender of this is the final boss. A shit show of a boss fight. Small hurtbox windows, a lot of RNG and littered with pits to, invetibility, get tossed into by some attack from offscreen you couldn't react to.
And that's just the first phase. The second phase is an onslaught of barley reactable projectiles. With such small platforms to keep yourself on, it makes almost impossible to get right your first time; meaning you're playing through that tedious first phase with each attempt to learn.
It's obnoxious and shudder to imagine that 10 year old kid in 1995 slaving over this for hours on a school night.
Even a perfect run of this fight on youtube takes 5 full minutes.
I absolutely did not have the patience for this,
Ended up amusing save states heavily, and felt extremely underwhelmed as a result.
Just a real wet fart to end the game on.
And the lack of Maria kinda stings. She is huge part of why I love that original game so much.
I guess that's why this game has this reputation, it doesn't do its own thing at all, so it just ends up being in the shadow of its older, cooler, brother.
Já temos o Rondo em casa
Really good and just short of perfection. Unfortunately, Richter Belmont plays very sluggishly, the direction of the jump cannot be changed after jumping, only the direction of view, which seems somehow unintentionally funny^^ The backgrounds and general graphic design are really well done, on a par with the 4th game. The music is also very good, although not quite as convincing as in some other games of the series. Boss battles are really tough, sometimes a bit frustrating due to the slow pace, but definitely motivating and exciting. The optional areas and various endings are also very well done. I liked it very much throughout.
Richter controls like a massive block of concrete and the level design is atrocious
Taking Rondo of Blood and squeezing it into the constraints of the SNES couldn't have been easy... but I can't buy for one second that it had to be this lacking in quality either. Dracula X is more than just a Rondo port with necessary cutbacks, it is also one that neglected to replace these cutbacks with anything of even remotely equal worth. Even Super Castlevania IV was more impressive through its frequent use of setpieces, and the way it danced around the limitations of the console to deliver some truly impressive moments.
Dracula X strips away most setpieces, and replaces them with arbitrary level design changes that hover somewhere between the most barebones shit you'll ever play in a Castlevania game, versus frustrating and frequent use of insta-death traps. Somebody thought the final boss in Rondo wasn't exciting enough, so here they added 4 bottomless pits for you to get knocked into when you get hit once. (unless you're crouching, which can negate the knockback) The spritework has also seen some very strange changes, with certain backgrounds being replaced to resemble something closer to a comic book art style. This clashes against the spritework from Rondo that does still remain here, let alone against the whole gothic aesthetic that Castlevania is supposed to be embodying.
There's no 2nd playable character here, there's less routes, there's no save system other than passwords, the cutscenes have been mostly removed altogether... along with most of the essence and soul of the game that this is based on. At most, the soundtrack has seen the most graceful conversion and still holds up very well. Either way, for newcomers to the series, I would strongly advise playing Rondo of Blood instead, as you're guaranteed to get a richer amount of content and a much better designed experience. Dracula X is an unfortunate little oddity in the series, which back in '95, gave the exciting impression to fans that Rondo of Blood was finally going to make it over to western audiences. Instead, showed up its chain-smoking cousin, Blondo of Roond.
Dracula X strips away most setpieces, and replaces them with arbitrary level design changes that hover somewhere between the most barebones shit you'll ever play in a Castlevania game, versus frustrating and frequent use of insta-death traps. Somebody thought the final boss in Rondo wasn't exciting enough, so here they added 4 bottomless pits for you to get knocked into when you get hit once. (unless you're crouching, which can negate the knockback) The spritework has also seen some very strange changes, with certain backgrounds being replaced to resemble something closer to a comic book art style. This clashes against the spritework from Rondo that does still remain here, let alone against the whole gothic aesthetic that Castlevania is supposed to be embodying.
There's no 2nd playable character here, there's less routes, there's no save system other than passwords, the cutscenes have been mostly removed altogether... along with most of the essence and soul of the game that this is based on. At most, the soundtrack has seen the most graceful conversion and still holds up very well. Either way, for newcomers to the series, I would strongly advise playing Rondo of Blood instead, as you're guaranteed to get a richer amount of content and a much better designed experience. Dracula X is an unfortunate little oddity in the series, which back in '95, gave the exciting impression to fans that Rondo of Blood was finally going to make it over to western audiences. Instead, showed up its chain-smoking cousin, Blondo of Roond.
More like Castlevania: Dracula Twitter
É uma bosta comparado ao rondo of blood mas ainda faz oq era esperado.
Renders the original obsolete
Um downgrade monstruoso do Rondo of Blood, a nível de ser ofensivo com a versão original.
Mesmo tendo sido lançado 2 anos após o Rondo of Blood, todos os aspectos do jogo são inferiores - o que era algo de se imaginar, já que o jogo estava sendo adaptado de PC Engine para SNES - mas não apenas isso como a gameplay foi muito mal adaptada. Há diversos problemas irritantes de hitbox, a movimentação está mais limitada e muitas áreas e fases foram remodeladas de uma maneira ruim e chata de passar. Isso sem falar do aumento desequilibrado de dificuldade de várias partes do jogo.
O mais divertido de tudo, é que esse jogo foi lançado 4 anos DEPOIS do Super Castlevania IV (também de SNES) e ainda assim conseguiu ser inferior e mais limitado que ele na grande maioria dos aspectos.
AH, E MAIS UM DETALHE MUITO IMPORTANTE: NÃO DÁ PRA JOGAR COM A MARIA RENARD NESSA VERSÃO!!!
NA MORAL, COMO DEIXAR PASSAR IMPUNE UM VACILO DESSE NÍVEL???
Sério, recomendo fortemente passar reto desse versão, pq, vou ser bem sincero, essa é uma versão do Rondo of Blood que ninguém iria sentir a mínima falta se não tivesse existido.
Mesmo tendo sido lançado 2 anos após o Rondo of Blood, todos os aspectos do jogo são inferiores - o que era algo de se imaginar, já que o jogo estava sendo adaptado de PC Engine para SNES - mas não apenas isso como a gameplay foi muito mal adaptada. Há diversos problemas irritantes de hitbox, a movimentação está mais limitada e muitas áreas e fases foram remodeladas de uma maneira ruim e chata de passar. Isso sem falar do aumento desequilibrado de dificuldade de várias partes do jogo.
O mais divertido de tudo, é que esse jogo foi lançado 4 anos DEPOIS do Super Castlevania IV (também de SNES) e ainda assim conseguiu ser inferior e mais limitado que ele na grande maioria dos aspectos.
AH, E MAIS UM DETALHE MUITO IMPORTANTE: NÃO DÁ PRA JOGAR COM A MARIA RENARD NESSA VERSÃO!!!
NA MORAL, COMO DEIXAR PASSAR IMPUNE UM VACILO DESSE NÍVEL???
Sério, recomendo fortemente passar reto desse versão, pq, vou ser bem sincero, essa é uma versão do Rondo of Blood que ninguém iria sentir a mínima falta se não tivesse existido.
Estava um tanto quanto relutante de jogar o tal do Rondo of Blood Júnior, não vou mentir. Após ouvir umas várias críticas controversas sobre Castlevania: Dracula X, achei que seria um joguinho bem do mal feito e amador, porém, em minha teimosia de querer zerar todos os classicvanias, e em minha recente obsessão pelo Richter Belmont, não podia deixar esse rapazinho de fora, e olha, esse jogo não promete nada, e entrega tudo.
Primeiro de tudo, joguei essa bomba com save states, se isso é uma redflag pra você, nem termine esse review; enfim, sendo um classicvania, a jogabilidade segue sendo a mesma de sempre, ande pra frente, e bata em tudo o que se move, a esse ponto já to tão acostumado, com as escadas, movimentação travada, e dificuldade cuzona dessa franquia, que já nem reclamo mais, afinal, esse jogo não inova em nada, assim sendo, o game é bastante divertido, oferece bons visuais pro SNES (dá-lhe chip mode 7), e uma excelente trilha sonora, além de bosses muitos bacanas e que não enchem o saco além da conta (exceto, claro, o Drácula, aquilo é de fato o pior ponto dessa experiência).
Não resgatei as donzelas.
Primeiro de tudo, joguei essa bomba com save states, se isso é uma redflag pra você, nem termine esse review; enfim, sendo um classicvania, a jogabilidade segue sendo a mesma de sempre, ande pra frente, e bata em tudo o que se move, a esse ponto já to tão acostumado, com as escadas, movimentação travada, e dificuldade cuzona dessa franquia, que já nem reclamo mais, afinal, esse jogo não inova em nada, assim sendo, o game é bastante divertido, oferece bons visuais pro SNES (dá-lhe chip mode 7), e uma excelente trilha sonora, além de bosses muitos bacanas e que não enchem o saco além da conta (exceto, claro, o Drácula, aquilo é de fato o pior ponto dessa experiência).
Não resgatei as donzelas.
Watching the credits for this game and realizing there were no play testers made me the most vindicated I’ve ever felt
um remake de rondo of blood só que ruim lixo e ruim. em um mundo justo o turbografx teria descido tanto a porrada no super nintendo que eles não teriam outra opção senão renomear super mario world para super waluigi sexy time. eu não sei onde eu tô indo com esse exercício mental
If all you had was a Super Nintendo back in the day, this game would be alright. Now? Especially when playing it right after Rondo? Good lord. Slowdown when walking, anyone?
In all fairness, it's not like this game is a "lesser Rondo of Blood". There's tons of different things going on here, especially the levels. It's all new from what I could tell, but I didn't take all routes in the game so maybe there's some copy pasting, who knows.
Now, all Castlevanias have issues with enemy placement, it's nothing new. But MAN did Drac X give me a hard time with it; spears coming out the edge of the screen, bats cropping up ONE MILLIMETER before entering a door, the list goes on. Don't even get me started on those jumps where you have to be basically off the edge to land.
And how about that Death fight with the one move you're basically forced to Item Crash to avoid? Fun times. You know what's even more fun? A VERY slow, very tedious Dracula fight where you have like... A SECOND to hit his face before he disappears. Oh yeah, and make sure to wait until his "poofing in" animation is fully over, otherwise you'll be hitting jack and shit.
Unless you're going for a full series retrospective, don't bother. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I won't lie, it got me a bit tilted.
OH YEAH, no playable Maria. Immediate 0/5
In all fairness, it's not like this game is a "lesser Rondo of Blood". There's tons of different things going on here, especially the levels. It's all new from what I could tell, but I didn't take all routes in the game so maybe there's some copy pasting, who knows.
Now, all Castlevanias have issues with enemy placement, it's nothing new. But MAN did Drac X give me a hard time with it; spears coming out the edge of the screen, bats cropping up ONE MILLIMETER before entering a door, the list goes on. Don't even get me started on those jumps where you have to be basically off the edge to land.
And how about that Death fight with the one move you're basically forced to Item Crash to avoid? Fun times. You know what's even more fun? A VERY slow, very tedious Dracula fight where you have like... A SECOND to hit his face before he disappears. Oh yeah, and make sure to wait until his "poofing in" animation is fully over, otherwise you'll be hitting jack and shit.
Unless you're going for a full series retrospective, don't bother. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I won't lie, it got me a bit tilted.
OH YEAH, no playable Maria. Immediate 0/5
Vou considerar zerado, pois o final boss é simplesmente impossível.
It's been said a million times before, but it's true: this is simply just Rondo of Blood but much, much worse.
(This is the 110th game in my challenge to go through many known games in chronological order starting in 1990. The spreadsheet/blog is in my bio.)
The Castlevania series is among the few series I'm looking forward to the most as part of this challenge, which is something I wasn't expecting to say after I had a bit of a falling out with Castlevania 3 you could say. But after Super Castlevania IV and Castlevania Bloodlines, you can definitely call me a Castlevania fan. I haven't played any other Castlevania games before in my life, so all of these releases are new to me. Does Castlevania: Dracula X deserve to be praised as highly as the previous two games I've mentioned?
Released in 1995 exclusively for the SNES, Dracula X is supposedly a remake for Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, which I didn't play yet (but should according to Castlevania fans everywhere) but based on what I've seen from Rondo of Blood, Dracula X looks like a lite version of it for some reason. The wikipedia entry for Dracula X does say that there were limits of the SNES cartridge format to think in mind as part of this port, so I'm assuming stuff was cut out here. With that in mind, remake seems like an odd term for this game. It seems like a port with updated visuals.
STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 2/10
The Belmont family v Dracula Round #854. This time it's Richter Belmont, who fights Dracula Reborn hundreds of years after Simon Belmont defeated him initially. Dracula lures Richter in by kidnapping his girlfriend and sister, who you can save in Dracula's castle, if you can find them. In Rondo of Blood, the sister I believe becomes a playable character when you find her, while here, only Richter Belmont is playable. That's pretty much it to the story, it's the same as with all Castlevania games up to this point pretty much. You just got Richter, who is added to the Belmont Clan of vampire/Dracula slayers.
GAMEPLAY | 14/20
Castlevania: Dracula X goes back to the two-directions only approach with Richter Belmont. There also is no other playable character, so you only have access to a character who feels lacking in ability compared to his relatives as a result. Richter brings something new to the table however, which is called "Item Crash", which is basically a super attack. Instead of using one heart to use your normal sub-weapon attack, you can use up many of them at the same time (I believe 10 are used for the axe Item Crash) for one attack that deals more damage. These attacks kind of felt weaker than I would have thought however.
As far as the weapons and sub-weapons go, Richter is equipped with the whip and the sub-weapons he can collect are the same that the other games have also had pretty much. Incidentally, enemies, both normal and bosses, are also re-used from other Castlevania games. Basically it's more 90s Castlevania, which fans will like and people who dislike Castlevania already won't.
There are a total of seven stages (perhaps more if you can find the kidnapped girls, I didn't find them), and each ends with a boss. Boss fights are pretty cool as per usual with the Castlevania series, at least in terms of design and variety in how you have to tackle them, but some of them are pretty unfair. The Dracula boss fight would have been impossible for me to beat if it wasn't for save states on my emulator. You have less than 10 platforms that you can stand on and pretty much every time you get hit, you will drop down into the pit and die. Considering that the final Dracula fight is hard enough usually, you definitely do not need this extra challenge. There also is just not enough space to reliably dodge the attacks and worst of all, Dracula has a targeted fireball attack that you can't reliably time against at all, so I pretty much had to be lucky whenever I whipped to hit the fireballs and make them disappear. Dracula's design was definitely hilarious (absolutely shredded and only wearing a thong) but in a positive way I'd say.
Among the normal enemies, I want to say fuck you to the spear-flipping soldiers who have stupid range and can seemingly block all sub-weapons.
Overall however, as someone who enjoys the Castlevania gameplay loop, this game has one of the more fun gameplay experiences you can have on the SNES (JRPGs excluded) and proves that the Castlevania formula alone can make your game at least somewhat enjoyable. There is the typical SNES / Castlevania / 90s gaming BS moments in this game here, but that's what you have to expect with all Castlevania games that released, at least up until 1995. I'll return to Castlevania with Symphony of the Night, which I've heard lots of positive things about, so maybe the BS meter is lower there.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 9/10
The Castlevania series seems to be one where songs are reused regularly and simply remixed in each iteration. As someone who loves Castlevania soundtracks, I'm actually fond of listening to the classics again after a while. Dracula X does have some new songs, at least I didn't recognize every single one, and the ones that were reused are great, so I'm not gonna complain. Whether this is your first or 5th Castlevania game, I'm sure you'll have a great time listening to the soundtrack here. Shoutout to Divine Bloodlines, the first stage song. Just fantastic.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 8/10
I really like the visuals in Dracula X. Backgrounds are detailed and set the atmosphere, there are some nice visual effects, enemy design is repeated from many other Castlevania games but looks good, environments are varied, and level of detail is pretty good overall. It's a step back from Super Castlevania IV, which is understandable for a glorified port like this, but it's still one of the more graphically appealing games for its time, both in quality and art design.
ATMOSPHERE/IMMERSION | 8/10
Atmospherically the game places itself right in the middle of all prior Castlevania entries. The gothic-medieval art style that Castlevania is famous for sets the scene in Dracula X just as it always has, and the soundtrack for Castlevania games are probably the best examples the 90s have for music that tells the player to go be a hero. Castlevania has the gameplay to pull the epic music off and not have it awkwardly run counter to the gameplay itself, even if Dracula X is not the prime example for this, but it still works well here.
CONTENT | 5/10
Dracula X's content is, based on my understanding, the same as in Rondo of Blood, just worse and with plenty of content cut. That's certainly a disappointment. The content in this game is certainly enjoyable enough, and the short length does not necessarily work in its detriment, the fact that the original was longer probably does. Because the way the game is set up, you constantly see unique areas and fight bosses pretty quickly after one another, so it flows pretty nicely, although bosses can ruin the fun for sure.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 6/10
Levels don't feel repetitive as far as the game itself goes, though obviously you've seen these designs in other Castlevania games already. The difference to a game like Super Castlevania IV is that the game lacks some of the more clever levels like those that made use of SNES' Mode 7. Other than that, you have the typical dangers and challenges to overcome, which is certainly still fun, and as mentioned, they always feel fresh because the number of stages and areas is not on the high side.
That said, some levels have entirely too many enemies that keep spawning and annoying you to no end and too many bosses are not well designed in terms of their fairness.
You can, however, find different routes that lead you to find two of the kidnapped individuals, and with that, find optional bosses, which is pretty nice.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 4/10
A game full of FMV scenes that is not a Night Trap-like game but rather a horror adventure game was conceptually unexplored at the time, and looking at how the game turned out, I don't think D managed to get it quite right. That said, I can tell that with the start of the 5th generation of consoles, experimentation is a big theme, so I can appreciate that about D, as well as the fact that it atmospherically did plenty right.
REPLAYABILITY | 3/5
There isn't as much replayability here as in previous Castlevania games. Only one playable character, no real multiple paths to use and not all that many sub-weapons to try. What you do have are 3 different endings depending on how many of the girls you find and a few optional bosses to fight, which adds some replayability.
PLAYABILITY | 5/5
Works well at all times.
OVERALL | 64/100
Castlevania: Dracula X is another enjoyable Castlevania game but two factors that work against it is that it is a remake/port of a superior game and that some of the bosses, especially the final one, are ridiculously hard. Overall though, if you don't go into this thinking it should be Rondo of Blood, the soundtrack and the typical Castlevania gameplay loop is still challenging and fun for at least a few hours.
The Castlevania series is among the few series I'm looking forward to the most as part of this challenge, which is something I wasn't expecting to say after I had a bit of a falling out with Castlevania 3 you could say. But after Super Castlevania IV and Castlevania Bloodlines, you can definitely call me a Castlevania fan. I haven't played any other Castlevania games before in my life, so all of these releases are new to me. Does Castlevania: Dracula X deserve to be praised as highly as the previous two games I've mentioned?
Released in 1995 exclusively for the SNES, Dracula X is supposedly a remake for Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, which I didn't play yet (but should according to Castlevania fans everywhere) but based on what I've seen from Rondo of Blood, Dracula X looks like a lite version of it for some reason. The wikipedia entry for Dracula X does say that there were limits of the SNES cartridge format to think in mind as part of this port, so I'm assuming stuff was cut out here. With that in mind, remake seems like an odd term for this game. It seems like a port with updated visuals.
STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 2/10
The Belmont family v Dracula Round #854. This time it's Richter Belmont, who fights Dracula Reborn hundreds of years after Simon Belmont defeated him initially. Dracula lures Richter in by kidnapping his girlfriend and sister, who you can save in Dracula's castle, if you can find them. In Rondo of Blood, the sister I believe becomes a playable character when you find her, while here, only Richter Belmont is playable. That's pretty much it to the story, it's the same as with all Castlevania games up to this point pretty much. You just got Richter, who is added to the Belmont Clan of vampire/Dracula slayers.
GAMEPLAY | 14/20
Castlevania: Dracula X goes back to the two-directions only approach with Richter Belmont. There also is no other playable character, so you only have access to a character who feels lacking in ability compared to his relatives as a result. Richter brings something new to the table however, which is called "Item Crash", which is basically a super attack. Instead of using one heart to use your normal sub-weapon attack, you can use up many of them at the same time (I believe 10 are used for the axe Item Crash) for one attack that deals more damage. These attacks kind of felt weaker than I would have thought however.
As far as the weapons and sub-weapons go, Richter is equipped with the whip and the sub-weapons he can collect are the same that the other games have also had pretty much. Incidentally, enemies, both normal and bosses, are also re-used from other Castlevania games. Basically it's more 90s Castlevania, which fans will like and people who dislike Castlevania already won't.
There are a total of seven stages (perhaps more if you can find the kidnapped girls, I didn't find them), and each ends with a boss. Boss fights are pretty cool as per usual with the Castlevania series, at least in terms of design and variety in how you have to tackle them, but some of them are pretty unfair. The Dracula boss fight would have been impossible for me to beat if it wasn't for save states on my emulator. You have less than 10 platforms that you can stand on and pretty much every time you get hit, you will drop down into the pit and die. Considering that the final Dracula fight is hard enough usually, you definitely do not need this extra challenge. There also is just not enough space to reliably dodge the attacks and worst of all, Dracula has a targeted fireball attack that you can't reliably time against at all, so I pretty much had to be lucky whenever I whipped to hit the fireballs and make them disappear. Dracula's design was definitely hilarious (absolutely shredded and only wearing a thong) but in a positive way I'd say.
Among the normal enemies, I want to say fuck you to the spear-flipping soldiers who have stupid range and can seemingly block all sub-weapons.
Overall however, as someone who enjoys the Castlevania gameplay loop, this game has one of the more fun gameplay experiences you can have on the SNES (JRPGs excluded) and proves that the Castlevania formula alone can make your game at least somewhat enjoyable. There is the typical SNES / Castlevania / 90s gaming BS moments in this game here, but that's what you have to expect with all Castlevania games that released, at least up until 1995. I'll return to Castlevania with Symphony of the Night, which I've heard lots of positive things about, so maybe the BS meter is lower there.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 9/10
The Castlevania series seems to be one where songs are reused regularly and simply remixed in each iteration. As someone who loves Castlevania soundtracks, I'm actually fond of listening to the classics again after a while. Dracula X does have some new songs, at least I didn't recognize every single one, and the ones that were reused are great, so I'm not gonna complain. Whether this is your first or 5th Castlevania game, I'm sure you'll have a great time listening to the soundtrack here. Shoutout to Divine Bloodlines, the first stage song. Just fantastic.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 8/10
I really like the visuals in Dracula X. Backgrounds are detailed and set the atmosphere, there are some nice visual effects, enemy design is repeated from many other Castlevania games but looks good, environments are varied, and level of detail is pretty good overall. It's a step back from Super Castlevania IV, which is understandable for a glorified port like this, but it's still one of the more graphically appealing games for its time, both in quality and art design.
ATMOSPHERE/IMMERSION | 8/10
Atmospherically the game places itself right in the middle of all prior Castlevania entries. The gothic-medieval art style that Castlevania is famous for sets the scene in Dracula X just as it always has, and the soundtrack for Castlevania games are probably the best examples the 90s have for music that tells the player to go be a hero. Castlevania has the gameplay to pull the epic music off and not have it awkwardly run counter to the gameplay itself, even if Dracula X is not the prime example for this, but it still works well here.
CONTENT | 5/10
Dracula X's content is, based on my understanding, the same as in Rondo of Blood, just worse and with plenty of content cut. That's certainly a disappointment. The content in this game is certainly enjoyable enough, and the short length does not necessarily work in its detriment, the fact that the original was longer probably does. Because the way the game is set up, you constantly see unique areas and fight bosses pretty quickly after one another, so it flows pretty nicely, although bosses can ruin the fun for sure.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 6/10
Levels don't feel repetitive as far as the game itself goes, though obviously you've seen these designs in other Castlevania games already. The difference to a game like Super Castlevania IV is that the game lacks some of the more clever levels like those that made use of SNES' Mode 7. Other than that, you have the typical dangers and challenges to overcome, which is certainly still fun, and as mentioned, they always feel fresh because the number of stages and areas is not on the high side.
That said, some levels have entirely too many enemies that keep spawning and annoying you to no end and too many bosses are not well designed in terms of their fairness.
You can, however, find different routes that lead you to find two of the kidnapped individuals, and with that, find optional bosses, which is pretty nice.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 4/10
A game full of FMV scenes that is not a Night Trap-like game but rather a horror adventure game was conceptually unexplored at the time, and looking at how the game turned out, I don't think D managed to get it quite right. That said, I can tell that with the start of the 5th generation of consoles, experimentation is a big theme, so I can appreciate that about D, as well as the fact that it atmospherically did plenty right.
REPLAYABILITY | 3/5
There isn't as much replayability here as in previous Castlevania games. Only one playable character, no real multiple paths to use and not all that many sub-weapons to try. What you do have are 3 different endings depending on how many of the girls you find and a few optional bosses to fight, which adds some replayability.
PLAYABILITY | 5/5
Works well at all times.
OVERALL | 64/100
Castlevania: Dracula X is another enjoyable Castlevania game but two factors that work against it is that it is a remake/port of a superior game and that some of the bosses, especially the final one, are ridiculously hard. Overall though, if you don't go into this thinking it should be Rondo of Blood, the soundtrack and the typical Castlevania gameplay loop is still challenging and fun for at least a few hours.
I would say "we have rondo of blood at home"
But at least your heated up leftovers taste kinda alright
But at least your heated up leftovers taste kinda alright
it was decent not the best of the Castlevania games by far it was good though.
CASTLEVANIA MARATHON- 9/22
Rondo of Blood but worse in literally every aspect.
Looks worse, sounds worse, plays much worse. Less player choice and the final Dracula fight is like pouring Pop Rocks down my pisshole. It's such a shame that this is how Western audiences experienced Richter's story because it fucking blows. I don't think it's as bad as The Adventure or even Simon's Quest but it made me much angrier than either of them could have ever done with its bullshit final boss fight.
Next- Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Previous- Castlevania: Bloodlines
Rondo of Blood but worse in literally every aspect.
Looks worse, sounds worse, plays much worse. Less player choice and the final Dracula fight is like pouring Pop Rocks down my pisshole. It's such a shame that this is how Western audiences experienced Richter's story because it fucking blows. I don't think it's as bad as The Adventure or even Simon's Quest but it made me much angrier than either of them could have ever done with its bullshit final boss fight.
Next- Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Previous- Castlevania: Bloodlines
Залупный Снесовский платформер 90-ых с дерьмовым управлением и самим перемещением персонажа. Мега простые боссы, ублюдские уровни и противники. Ну и последний босс-Дракула ваншотит, заставляя перепроходить весь уровень. Ваще огонь.
Disappointing.
تستحق اللعب حتى لو لعبت روندو سابقًأ لكنها مب بنفس المستوى أبدًا
الصعوبة غير عادلة لكن لقيت نفسي مستمتع معها
الصعوبة غير عادلة لكن لقيت نفسي مستمتع معها