If I'm being honest, Simon's Quest isn't that bad. There are really only two major moments where I had to look up a guide, which was surprising. Unsurprisingly, both moments were caused due to the game's poor translation. There was no way for me to know that the holy water broke certain blocks, or that crouching activated the magic crystals. Once I know that those were two elements of the game, I was able to intuit when and where to use them, which is proof to me that Castlevania II isn't as bad as it's made out to be.