At first I was hesitant to say this was better than Harmony because I can't wavedash everywhere as Soma and the Spellbook system was gone, dive kick wasn't there from the start...Soma's new abilities with the Soul system clicked after some time and I was really accustomed to him, and he was even fun without the wavedashing (even if wavedashing felt incredible)

But unlike Harmony the Castle here is actually good outside the Floating Garden which thankfully isn't long in any capacity, just confusing. The rest of the castle is intuitive to navigate with no padding gimmicks for once (even if I enjoyed Inverted Castle, it did feel like padding after a bit) and the story, while not what I hop into Castlevania for, is the best it's ever been here, and they do some really interesting things at the end and this is a great Castlevania easily worth the play.

I'd say it's about as good as Symphony, even if it wasn't the game responsible for the -vania of Metroidvania like Symphony was, this one for sure roughs out some of its edges and finally lives up to its name!