Belmont’s Revenge at first glance makes my spirited defense of The Adventure look uhh kinda stupid, with its extremely successful transliteration of the feel and stylistic trappings of NES Castlevania. But I do think it’s worth keeping in mind that this game was made two years into the Gameboy’s life cycle rather than six months, when we were seeing a lot of second-try sequels or games that had longer development times to begin with making stronger use of the hardware. I would also point out that this game was made by a team of experienced Gameboy developers who were hot off of GB adaptations of two other popular Konami franchises, Skate or Die and Contra, and that this team included future Castlevania superstar Toru Hagihara, who is less famous than Kogi Igarashi but is the actual credited director on Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night. Belmont’s Revenge has a lot going for it, and frankly, I think it delivers.

Fifteen years after The Adventure, Christopher Belmont’s son Soleil (I don’t know how he knew his son would grow up to be gay either) is having a cool coming of age ceremony where apparently vampire killers are granted magical powers (???) and during this ritual DRACULA STRIKES and possesses Soleil and summons not one but FIVE evil castles that Christopher must now tromp through to go save his son before Dracula can use his evil powers to resurrect. Some sort of Castlevania The Adventure 2. Perhaps Christopher will take some sort of revenge upon Dracula idk I’m just spitballing here.

The game feels good. They solved the hitbox problem from The Adventure and the movement is pretty much pitch perfect to the NES games now, which I didn’t miss but I’m surely happy to have – these games just feel good to move about in. Subweapons are back in the form of the holy water and the axe which gives you a good amount of coverage, but importantly they didn’t just throw away everything from the weird unpopular first game that made that one unique. The fireball whip upgrade returns and doesn’t leave you if you take a single hit, so it brings with it a lot more active utility rather than feeling like a rewarding bonus for hyper-skilled play. Most importantly, the rope-climbing mechanic from that game returns and sees a much more active incorporation into the level design.

Each of the four castles, which you can choose from the game’s hub menu like Mega Man levels (both of these games’ screen-based level designs feel a lot like Mega Man, as much as Castlevania actually), have strong themes and gimmicks, from Cloud Castle’s intense vertical pulley systems to Crystal Castle’s swift waterways to The Underground One That I Forgot The Name Of’s clever use of Castlevania’s iconic candles, the source of all upgrades and ammunition. That’s still true in that level but because you’re in an underground cave, destroying the candles visible on a given screen makes the screen go entirely black except for your sprite and those of the insectoid enemies you’ve activated who would otherwise be inert and acting as platforms in the light.

It’s another sleight of entirely original bosses in this game, free from the already entrenched traditions of its console cousins, and only two of the six of them are bullshit, I think? One of these is a standard level boss and unfortunately the other one is Dracula himself but this is the first time I’ve ever felt like the final boss was blatantly unfair across five famously difficult 8-bit games so I’ll count my blessings. But they’re all cool designs. The obvious standout is the possessed Soleil, fought directly before Dracula, because he marks what feels like a momentous occasion for the series. Not only is it the first time there’s actual dialogue within one of the games vs just featuring opening and ending text, but he’s also the first time in the series you duel a guy with a roughly similar moveset to your own. This game isn’t particularly well equipped to make this duel exciting, and his AI is not terribly clever or well-suited to the room you fight him in, but he’s threatening in the huge damage he deals per hit, and his own secondary weapon gives him big coverage that forces you to get within range of his whip if you want to avoid its damage. You need to make smart use of your own secondary weapon to be able to beat him and that’s clever fight design that makes up for any other shortcomings the character himself might have.

This has been the biggest surprise of Ina’s Big Weekend Of Castlevania so far. Like I said in my writeup for The Adventure, I didn’t even know these Gameboy games existed until very recently and this one has really impressed me with its creative level design, and not just because it’s unique within the series. I think there’s a real creative spark here, and it’s easy to see why one of the programmers on this one would have a brief but incredibly acclaimed and influential run in the near future of the series.

PREVIOUSLY: DRACULA'S CURSE

NEXT TIME: SUPER CASTLEVANIA IV