Completing this without savestates (and aiming for the best ending as well because of Death, but even without that) was HELL.
I recorded every time I played this game. One hour and 23 minutes to get through Stage 1 to Stage 5' (rescuing Maria and Annette on the way), spending a chunky 40-50 minutes approximately on retrying Stage 5'. 30 minutes of Stage 6 and failing to beat it on October 10. A total of 1 hour and 50 minutes
Then I played in two separate occasions trying to beat Stage 6 (and Death) again.
October 12 - 58 minutes
October 18 - 36 minutes
- And both came up unfruitful.
October 24 - 1h33min + 1h39min
It's 12am as of writing this which is why this might appear written at October 25, but I finished this session BEFORE 12am. But in any case, this fresh session...
Spent 1 hour and 33 minutes ONLY in the Stage 6 and Death fight, then 1 hour and 39 minutes repeating Stage 7 in order to beat Dracula.
This made for a game that I ended up playing for a total of 6.6 hours, and HALF THAT TIME WAS SPENT IN THE DEATH AND DRACULA FIGHTS.
This is a game that was clearly made to be difficult, very likely for Rondo players that thought that game was too easy (I think on both the Japanese name being "Akumajou Dracula XX" and the interview of the developer that stated Rondo being 5 times more difficult before being adjusted), and there's a lot of good that carries from Rondo (Item Crashes, Richter, the music) and even some of the first half does some few interesting ideas with their stages.
But it is limited in enemy variety because of the cartridge space, telegraphs less often enemies so it will be a lot of trial-and-error until you memorize certain stages (Stage 5' onwards for me), Death is a bastard and a half to defeat with how one of his attacks is unavoidable if you were too far from him before he executes it (the spinning one) unless you item crash for invuln, and Dracula is less demonic and more so of a CHEAP boss: It would be easier to keep track of the fireballs and whack his face in if it was on even ground, but the pits make it so that one wrong hit on the wrong side on the ledge means an instant death.
Oh, and RetroAchievements didn't recognize what I did today because apparently those cheevos don't unlock if you complete stages/clear the game from a password. Having gone through the entire game state-less and only reloading with my passwords when I didn't want to keep playing in one ginormous session because I was too angry only to result in that is...insulting. But not enough to deter me from the fact that I completed this forsaken game.
3 stars which I would say its...average or good? I say that if the difficulty wasn't so wack at the very end (Dracula pits), I would rate it higher, but it does comply with what some would expect to be a hardcore challenging Castlevania game that requires you to stay alert at all times and remember where to whip spawning enemies. And it has that cheeky pass of having half of Rondo's DNA with the presentation.
Not playing this ever again without savestates though. No way. Quoting @Gibdorf from their review:
"Watching the credits for this game and realizing there were no play testers made me the most vindicated I've ever felt"
And I didn't notice that myself (was too busy listening to victory music)...but that sure is insanely relatable right now.
I recorded every time I played this game. One hour and 23 minutes to get through Stage 1 to Stage 5' (rescuing Maria and Annette on the way), spending a chunky 40-50 minutes approximately on retrying Stage 5'. 30 minutes of Stage 6 and failing to beat it on October 10. A total of 1 hour and 50 minutes
Then I played in two separate occasions trying to beat Stage 6 (and Death) again.
October 12 - 58 minutes
October 18 - 36 minutes
- And both came up unfruitful.
October 24 - 1h33min + 1h39min
It's 12am as of writing this which is why this might appear written at October 25, but I finished this session BEFORE 12am. But in any case, this fresh session...
Spent 1 hour and 33 minutes ONLY in the Stage 6 and Death fight, then 1 hour and 39 minutes repeating Stage 7 in order to beat Dracula.
This made for a game that I ended up playing for a total of 6.6 hours, and HALF THAT TIME WAS SPENT IN THE DEATH AND DRACULA FIGHTS.
This is a game that was clearly made to be difficult, very likely for Rondo players that thought that game was too easy (I think on both the Japanese name being "Akumajou Dracula XX" and the interview of the developer that stated Rondo being 5 times more difficult before being adjusted), and there's a lot of good that carries from Rondo (Item Crashes, Richter, the music) and even some of the first half does some few interesting ideas with their stages.
But it is limited in enemy variety because of the cartridge space, telegraphs less often enemies so it will be a lot of trial-and-error until you memorize certain stages (Stage 5' onwards for me), Death is a bastard and a half to defeat with how one of his attacks is unavoidable if you were too far from him before he executes it (the spinning one) unless you item crash for invuln, and Dracula is less demonic and more so of a CHEAP boss: It would be easier to keep track of the fireballs and whack his face in if it was on even ground, but the pits make it so that one wrong hit on the wrong side on the ledge means an instant death.
Oh, and RetroAchievements didn't recognize what I did today because apparently those cheevos don't unlock if you complete stages/clear the game from a password. Having gone through the entire game state-less and only reloading with my passwords when I didn't want to keep playing in one ginormous session because I was too angry only to result in that is...insulting. But not enough to deter me from the fact that I completed this forsaken game.
3 stars which I would say its...average or good? I say that if the difficulty wasn't so wack at the very end (Dracula pits), I would rate it higher, but it does comply with what some would expect to be a hardcore challenging Castlevania game that requires you to stay alert at all times and remember where to whip spawning enemies. And it has that cheeky pass of having half of Rondo's DNA with the presentation.
Not playing this ever again without savestates though. No way. Quoting @Gibdorf from their review:
"Watching the credits for this game and realizing there were no play testers made me the most vindicated I've ever felt"
And I didn't notice that myself (was too busy listening to victory music)...but that sure is insanely relatable right now.