I played Rondo of Blood because Professional Video Game Expert Tim Rogers will review it for his Action Button Reviews Series. I'm treating his reviews like a little book club: if he announces he will do a review and I'm interested in the game, I want to play it to for my own opinion and be better informed for his analysis.
Wow! Rondo of Blood is cool! This is the kind of game that feels like it's from 1993—hard as nails and rewards players for learning the levels. It's designed for multiple playthroughs where levels become laughably easy runs to the bosses. Getting to that point is rough. My little brother watched my play the first few levels dozens of times while I died again and again because I am bad at games. However, I could confidently turn it on and rush through quite a few levels since I played them so many times (because, again, I'm bad at games). That's a cool feeling! I can really see the DNA of this game in Bloodborne, because I had to do the run to Father Gascoigne so many times that the level design is burned into my memory.
The sprite work and graphics in this game still hold up really well, and I love the music. It's like cool guy butt rock in the best way possible.
At the end of the day, this game was never quite fun to play, although I can appreciate just about all of it. Movement is stiff and deliberate (once again, this is like Bloodborne!), and takes a pretty steep learning curve to even feel competent.
Wow! Rondo of Blood is cool! This is the kind of game that feels like it's from 1993—hard as nails and rewards players for learning the levels. It's designed for multiple playthroughs where levels become laughably easy runs to the bosses. Getting to that point is rough. My little brother watched my play the first few levels dozens of times while I died again and again because I am bad at games. However, I could confidently turn it on and rush through quite a few levels since I played them so many times (because, again, I'm bad at games). That's a cool feeling! I can really see the DNA of this game in Bloodborne, because I had to do the run to Father Gascoigne so many times that the level design is burned into my memory.
The sprite work and graphics in this game still hold up really well, and I love the music. It's like cool guy butt rock in the best way possible.
At the end of the day, this game was never quite fun to play, although I can appreciate just about all of it. Movement is stiff and deliberate (once again, this is like Bloodborne!), and takes a pretty steep learning curve to even feel competent.