I knew from inescapable reputation that Rondo was the one where Castlevania first dipped into Full Anime for its style of presentation, but nobody had prepared me for the fact that this is not the the Dragon Ball ass Slam Dunk ass 90s shonen extreme hard shit jump treatment I was expecting. Rather Rondo of Blood swerves hard into shoujo aesthetics and this is endlessly infinitely more delightful to me as someone who likes that side of the industry way more and as an American has to work harder to find my shit a lot of the time.

It would be easy to say that Rondo is just giving Sailor Moon, specifically its anime adaptation, and that’s not NOT true. You can hear it in the ethereal jazz pop of most of the arrangements, you can see it in the way characters are framed and in the intense and bright color choices used in the cutscenes, you can see it in the shape of Richter’s face even. But there are details all over these cutscenes and voice performances and castle designs and everything that harken not only to Takahashi’s 90s behemoth but as far back as stuff like Rose of Versailles and Moto Hagio’s European-set works. The VIBE is just more akin to the DRAMA and INTENSITY and FORCE of classic shoujo, where feeling is empowerment but not the same as power, and tragedy mars beauty around every corner. Really unexpected, really delightful.

Delightful is the name of the game, and it’s so so cool to see that of the three main branches of sixteen bit Castlevania, each of the first two have sought to be radically different visions of what the franchise could evolve to be and both are equally exciting and worthwhile. Rondo is not quite as immediately game changing as Super IV; in terms of game feel it’s much closer to tradition, but it starts to differentiate itself i subtle ways. Unlike the NES games you do get a LITTLE leeway midair in jump control, and Richter Belmont can execute a sick backflip in midair from a flat jump. He can’t whip in all directions or swing around but he DOES have fuck off stupid super moves tied to his subweapons. These things are really important because while otherwise the player is as slow and tanky as they’ve ever been in Castlevania (and without any of the slick movement or combat options that other characters afforded in Dracula’s Curse), enemies are way more fast and maneuverable and generally aggressive. If the axe knights on the NES used to throw one or two axes at a time, now they throw three or four and toss out a vertical throw just like you do in the middle of it, and you can’t dodge it anymore. Spear skeletons stab through the floor layers, they’re assholes! It makes for easily the hardest game in the series so far and I had a much harder time getting a handle on it, my longest runtime and most deaths for sure. You NEED that backflip and those special moves to keep pace. It’s not an unfair challenge though, nor unbalanced, and the ever-present infinite continues and generous checkpointing of the series are welcome as ever. Unlike a lot of its peers and despite its appearances Castlevania never wants you to fail.

The appearances are sick tho. The game is absolutely gorgeous, top to bottom, some of the slickest uses of parallax layers I’ve ever seen. Full of little touches. Every boss has a little intro cutscene that happens during gameplay where they come in from the background element. You’re revisiting locations from past games, even Simon’s Quest! Flames look bright, spirits look properly ghostly, dungeons look dingy, you only see that the boss who chases you through that one level is just a torso if you let him catch up enough to fully enter the screen. It’s so cool, a game that really never stops giving.

And there’s Maria!! An entire second character who plays completely differently and is so fun and cool! She’s also hilarious, nobody in this game knows what to do with her. She gets the same like morale-breaking speech from Dracula that Richter does in the ending but she’s like eight years old and a badass so she’s like shut the fuck up Dracula you loser and he’s just like yeah fair enough I guess you’re not a weenie like Richter. I love her she’s so fuckin sick dude make Maria the Star these Belmont guys all suck ass and fail constantly. I don’t think Richter even kills Dracula in this ending?? Kind of hard to tell???? I’m not sure if I just can’t read the cutscene or if it’s ambiguous on purpose or I’m supposed to understand that he got away. I guess Symphony is a sequel to this one and I’ll find out in a couple games.

Regardless I get it I’m on board I’m not gonna be a contrarian here dude Rondo is sick as fuck just a rowdy ass game, good ass time, every five minutes I saw something that had me hooting and hollering. This is gaming for real, doesn’t get any better than this.

PREVIOUSLY: SUPER CASTLEVANIA IV

NEXT TIME: BLOODLINES