A spectacular game that helped define a genre for decades to come but maybe felt more perfect in 1997 than it does in 2023.

When playing an old game for the first time, I never know if I should try to judge it based on how it would be to play it the year it was released, or how it is to play it now. I'm sure this game was a mind-blowing masterpiece in 1997, and honestly it's truly remarkable what it does given when it came out, but at the end of the day, I am playing this game in 2023... and in 2023, this game has some flaws that hold it back from perfection.

After years of playing Metroidvania games, it's incredibly cool to go back to the roots of one of my favorite genres and see the origins of so many of my favorite mechanics and gameplay loops. I think one of the things that impresses me the most with Symphony of the Night is how good it feels to play. Going back and playing old games 20-30 years after their release can be a gamble but SOTN feels about as good as any modern game in this genre feels.

Where Symphony shows its weakness is mainly in the refinement that modern games have taken years perfecting. The inventory in SOTN is horrible; Aria of Sorrow improves upon it. The distance between fast-travel points is far too large which leads to a lot of backtracking; said backtracking wouldn't feel as bad if Symphony had the fantastic dash mechanic introduced in Harmony. Save points are often too far away from boss encounters meaning a lot of replaying sections when you die. There are no frames of invincibility after you get hit which often leads to you getting stun-locked by enemies as you helplessly bounce around from hit-to-hit. The combat difficulty isn't particularly well-balanced - I died several times in the beginning of the game but by the end of the game I was literally just walking through enemies. These little things resulted in more than a few moments of either frustration or boredom.

Symphony of the Night is a brilliant game and I loved playing it to finally see the origins of one of my favorite genres in gaming. But even though some of my favorite games might not exist without this, I was often left wishing I was playing a modern game while struggling through some dated game design.

+ Fantastic game that helps invent a genre and still holds up
+ Cool weapons to find and equip
+ Great overall world design

- Save points and fast -travel point placement not ideal
- Easy to get stun-locked by enemies
- Difficult balance not consistent
- Poor inventory organization

Curioso juego. Aqui van las cosas que me han gustado:

1- La interfaz es chef kiss.
2- Las visuals estan bastante bien, juega mucho con el rojo y blanco.
3- Variedad de armas con distintos potenciadores que te permiten jugar de diferentes formas.
4- Los poderes estan muy chulos.
5- Ningun nivel se me ha hecho especialmente dificil o aburrido.
6- El sistema de coleccionables esta bien.

Cosas que no me han gustado:
1- La historia esta contada de tal forma que te tienes que buscar un video en youtube para entenderla.
2- En relacion al punto anterior, como la historia no me enganchaba lo he atrasado muchisimo y no he tenido ganas de jugarlo.
3- Los combates se vuelven muy automaticos porque tienes literalmente 3 mecanicas, volar, lanzar y disparar.
4- El sistema de habilidades es muy pobre y casi no te dan puntos a no ser que hagas misiones secundarias.
5- En relacion al punto anterior, no te dan ganas de hacer misiones secundarias, deberia haber algun tipo de feedback en el sentido de, vale si haces esto te damos esto, pero solo te dicen lo que tienes que hacer sin saber lo que te van a dar, asumo que puntos de habilidad.

En conclusion, esta bien para pasar el rato, tienes mecanicas chulas pero podrian haberlas desarrollado mas y la historia te la podrian contar de una forma mas masticable a mi parecer.

Don't really care about the J.K Rowling controversy. Whatever pennies ended up in her already millionaire net worth was worth it for paying the devs for their work.

So, the game is much worse than Witcher 3/Elden Ring, but much better than most RPG's Ubisoft throws out these days.

A very shining positive, for example, is that the talent (skill) system is composed of almost 95% mechanical changes to the spells rather than like, 2% damage increases, which is the absolute bane of modern RPG design. Could not praise this decision more.

The story, outside of Sebastian's tale, is not all that awe-inspiring. People talk about Goblins being allegory for Jews, but, from an outsider perspective, that just seems like projection. Like, if you see the evil Goblins in this game, and think they remind you of semitic tribes... that's on you.

Other's have mentioned that the dev team sought to distance themselves so hard from controversy, that they added plenty of LGBT/POC characters. To the point that I found it a bit weird there being no tension at all given that it's 1800s London, and the original trilogy from the 90s had a much less diverse school despite being the 90s... but whatever, it's a magical children-oriented universe.

It's a bit bland, but overall a good experience. If you're a Harry Potter fan, I can see it being a 4/5 because they really put an effort into making it authentic to the feel of HP.

(Since my last review got removed)

I fully expected this game to suck since the creators have not done anything worthwhile but by god, they actually pulled it off. This is a legit a great open-world RPG. The graphics are fantastic and the combat is actually really fun and complex. I've been wanting a good triple A Harry Potter for a long time so I'm happy to say that it's finally here and it's terrific. I will say this though it does have its issues. It suffers from problems that most open-world games have and the story is fairly standard. But even with those problems the world and gameplay kept me satisfied. I hope the next game is even better. I feel like it has the potential to be a 10/10 game.

Le pongo 3 estrellas pero no es un mal juego. Aqui van las cosas que me han gustado:
1- La historia es interesante y se cuenta de una manera entretenida de forma que te mantiene enganchado para saber que es lo que esta pasando.
2- La atmosfera del juego me ha encantado, todo lo que sean estaciones energeticas, espaciales o de ese ambito pero con el toque abandonado a mi me tiene enamorado.

Las cosas que no me gustan:
1- He tenido que usar la guia un monton al final del juego porque se me estaba haciendo muy pesado y en un punto del juego la historia no avanza tan rapido como yo querria.
2- El final un poco esperable, y a parte la historia en general se ve venir.
3- No me he enterado de nada lo relacionado con el WAU, creo que es un elemento que sobra muchisimo pero entiendo que tenian que hacer algo para que el juego fuese de miedo.
4- Un poco mas largo de lo que yo querria, la historia podria tener menos zonas pero dan 500 vueltas para estirarlo como sea.
5- Es un juego de miedo asi que las mecanicas son limitadas.

En conclusion, me ha gustado la historia y ha sido entretenido aunque en algunos puntos no me apetecia mucho jugar por lo dicho, se estira demasiado.