Haha Jonathan, we're in metroidvania. After a surprisingly good Despicable Me: The Game: Minion Mayhem for DS, I had to write down more games from Wayforward Technologies and see if they're just as good. Meet Hotel Transylvania. It makes me curious if they went out of their way to get this license as their next project and make it into what it is, ot it was just another job and it just made sense to make it a metroidvania that has huge Castlevania vibes.
You heard me right, Hotel Transylvania is a metroidvania game. You obtain abilities to progress through the game and unlock new ways to get the crystals scattered around. The plot doesn't really follow the game. Though you don't get to play as Dracula himself, instead you play as his daughter Mavis. You must rescue Jonny from being eaten, though to do that you have to do a bunch of back and forth chores and fetch quests. Cooking sure takes a lot of prep time if Jonathan is about to be eaten only after around 3 hours. It feels like Dracula can't get shit done for his daughter's Birthday Party, since he asks her to do stuff, like... how did he handle all 117 birthdays prior to this one? Also, everyone's out to get her. There are zombies and skeletons and walking suits of armor everywhere, ready to obliterate our heroine. Is it a Birthday or a Murday (the day of murder)?
Anyway, the obtained abilities open new areas for exploration and, of course, to get the plot going. These include running on marked walls, freezing enemies and using them as platforms, electricity attack, which is used to power machines and attack enemies, but is rather underutilized for platforming purposes, transforming into a puff of cloud to phase through grates and tight areas, and lastly, the ability to transform into a bat to fly, which is unlocked towards the end, since it’s pretty OP. Admittedly, the platforming itself is pretty generic, it’s mostly just platforms and enemies everywhere, with few clever moments. It feels like the abilities chosen are restrictive on creative setups. Take running on walls. All you do is… run on walls. You can jump off the wall, potentially onto another, but that’s it, can’t have many interesting things with this ability. At the same time, I didn’t find myself too bored with the game’s platforming, so… success? Although, the enemy placement isn’t always great. Like the jumping skeletons that can jump at you from offscreen, or zombie servants that throw fish bones at you.
The exploration is pretty much non-existent. From what I can tell, while the game does feature a percentage completion, it doesn’t care for all the crystals you collect, you are guaranteed to get 100% by simply beating the game. All those crystals do is increase your health max by 1 for every 200. Useful, but otherwise I think the game does fail in making exploration particularly interesting or satisfying. It's not helped by the fact that the game doesn't even show how many crystals are left in a particular area.
The graphics are solid, using pixel art style and smooth animations. The backgrounds and foregrounds are more detailed. I checked the 3DS version out of curiosity, the graphics are more detailed in that version, and it has other changes like higher resolution that makes enemies easier to see, and it seems to have more content in a form of hidden entrances that are like extra levels. Also, the map actually displays where you have been in, unlike the DS version. The music… well, it’s Jake Kaufman, so it’s pretty good… mostly. Some tracks give heavy Castlevania vibes, or boss battle themes that of course are way more epic than the battles themselves, but there are also tracks like the generic piano that doesn’t even loop properly. The OST is mostly a hit, so I can recommend checking what’s on YouTube.
In the end, I do respect the game for what it tried to attempt, and I would still consider this above average for a licensed game. It’s far from an amazing Metroidvania, but for it’s decent for what it is. Not bad, Wayforward.
You heard me right, Hotel Transylvania is a metroidvania game. You obtain abilities to progress through the game and unlock new ways to get the crystals scattered around. The plot doesn't really follow the game. Though you don't get to play as Dracula himself, instead you play as his daughter Mavis. You must rescue Jonny from being eaten, though to do that you have to do a bunch of back and forth chores and fetch quests. Cooking sure takes a lot of prep time if Jonathan is about to be eaten only after around 3 hours. It feels like Dracula can't get shit done for his daughter's Birthday Party, since he asks her to do stuff, like... how did he handle all 117 birthdays prior to this one? Also, everyone's out to get her. There are zombies and skeletons and walking suits of armor everywhere, ready to obliterate our heroine. Is it a Birthday or a Murday (the day of murder)?
Anyway, the obtained abilities open new areas for exploration and, of course, to get the plot going. These include running on marked walls, freezing enemies and using them as platforms, electricity attack, which is used to power machines and attack enemies, but is rather underutilized for platforming purposes, transforming into a puff of cloud to phase through grates and tight areas, and lastly, the ability to transform into a bat to fly, which is unlocked towards the end, since it’s pretty OP. Admittedly, the platforming itself is pretty generic, it’s mostly just platforms and enemies everywhere, with few clever moments. It feels like the abilities chosen are restrictive on creative setups. Take running on walls. All you do is… run on walls. You can jump off the wall, potentially onto another, but that’s it, can’t have many interesting things with this ability. At the same time, I didn’t find myself too bored with the game’s platforming, so… success? Although, the enemy placement isn’t always great. Like the jumping skeletons that can jump at you from offscreen, or zombie servants that throw fish bones at you.
The exploration is pretty much non-existent. From what I can tell, while the game does feature a percentage completion, it doesn’t care for all the crystals you collect, you are guaranteed to get 100% by simply beating the game. All those crystals do is increase your health max by 1 for every 200. Useful, but otherwise I think the game does fail in making exploration particularly interesting or satisfying. It's not helped by the fact that the game doesn't even show how many crystals are left in a particular area.
The graphics are solid, using pixel art style and smooth animations. The backgrounds and foregrounds are more detailed. I checked the 3DS version out of curiosity, the graphics are more detailed in that version, and it has other changes like higher resolution that makes enemies easier to see, and it seems to have more content in a form of hidden entrances that are like extra levels. Also, the map actually displays where you have been in, unlike the DS version. The music… well, it’s Jake Kaufman, so it’s pretty good… mostly. Some tracks give heavy Castlevania vibes, or boss battle themes that of course are way more epic than the battles themselves, but there are also tracks like the generic piano that doesn’t even loop properly. The OST is mostly a hit, so I can recommend checking what’s on YouTube.
In the end, I do respect the game for what it tried to attempt, and I would still consider this above average for a licensed game. It’s far from an amazing Metroidvania, but for it’s decent for what it is. Not bad, Wayforward.