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What's the best castlevania?

SantaC

SantaC

Member
Castlevania
Simon's Quest
Castlevania III
Super Castlevania
Vampires kiss (dracula X)
Castlevania Bloodlines
Castlevania 64
Castlevania: legacy of darkness
Castlevania Symphony of the night
Castlevania Circle of the moon
Castlevania Harmony of dissonance
Castlevania Aria of Sorrow
Castlevania Lament of Innocence

+ the castlevanias to gameboy classic
+ Rondo of blood

This is very difficult to choose. But I take Castlevania II: Simons Quest as the best ever.
 
R

radios shipping overview

Member
49105main_popcorn.jpg
 
D

drohne

hyperbolically metafictive
castlevania III, at least in terms of gameplay. lots of branched levels, stiff challenge, classic mechanics. rondo of blood is of course a more accomplished package, but the difficulty isn't there. the 16-bit castlevanias don't do it for me, honestly. sloppy mechanics. their boss fights are attritional. everyone who doesn't say "sotn" is going to say "castlevania IV." they'll be dead wrong. fucking snes fetishists.

i dig the metroidvanias too, but it's hard to compare them to the action games. sotn is still the best of those, though aria of sorrow comes remarkably close. psp metroidvania, pls.! that's probably the only way we'll see a proper sotn sequel.

castlevania II is surely the worst in the series. invisible pits, illogical puzzles, and townspeople who lie do not make for a good game. the 3d versions all suck too.

edit: wait! i forgot the unfairly-maligned snes dracula x! yeah, it's a hacked-up "remake" of pce dracula x, but the level designs are strong, it has the 8 bit mechanics, and it's brutally hard in places. i also like the x68000 castlevania, actually, at least in its rebalanced psx form. so there are 16-bit 'vanias i dig.
 
S

Spiritreaver

Member
My favorite is definitely Aria of Sorrow and then a tie with COTM and SOTN, but then again I haven't beaten either of the latter two, close to it, but they were really fun games. I'm hoping the DS continues this trend and to a greater leap. Especially in sound and music. That's probably what captivated me the most about those titles, there are some really great tracks.
 
K

kitchenmotors

Banned
Super Castlevania 4 sticks with me more so than any other Castlevania. It's just the perfect combination of Castlevania gameplay, atmosphere and music.
 
O

Oh! My Car!

Member
kitchenmotors said:
Super Castlevania 4 sticks with me more so than any other Castlevania. It's just the perfect combination of Castlevania gameplay, atmosphere and music.
Click to expand...
Agreed, Jun Furano's SC4 stands out more than any other game in the series. In my useless f'ing opinion, of course!
 
X

Xellos

Member
1. Symphony of the Night
2. Rhondo of Blood
3. Aria of Sorrow

Never played CVIII; it's the only "main" CV I skipped out on. :(
 
V

Vieo

Member
Simon's Quest is the best Castlevania.

And also, out of ALL of the Belmonts, Simon was the greatest Belmont to ever slay vampires.
 
L

Lyte Edge

All I got for the Vernal Equinox was this stupid tag
Best Castlevania is without a doubt Notcurne In The Moonlight/Symphony of The Night

But there's two types of Castlevania games...the platformer style and the exploration style. So with that in mind:

Platformer: TIE: Castlevania III/Dracula X Rondo of Blood
Exploration: Castlevania NITM/SOTN, followed closely by Aria Of Sorrow.
 
K

Kiriku

SWEDISH PERFECTION
Best action/platformer Castlevania: Castlevania Bloodlines

Best action/RPG Castlevania: Castlevania - Symphony of the Night
 
Alcibiades

Alcibiades

Member
Super Castlevania IV


though I'm gonna finally give C64 a try in a few weeks time, heard it was better than LOI, so we'll see...
 
D

drohne

hyperbolically metafictive
anyone who says anything nice about simon's quest should be forced to go back and play it. without a walkthrough. i loved it at the time too. but i didn't know any better.
 
Pimpbaa

Pimpbaa

Member
Hitler Stole My Potato said:
Symphony of the Night but, just like it is with every Castlevania title, the music in the game is completely overrated.
Click to expand...

Sorry you're wrong, the Castlevania series has some of the best videogame music ever.
 
D

Dilbert

Member
Since I've never played a Castlevania game before, is there a benefit to playing the original on GBA before playing any of the others?
 
D

drohne

hyperbolically metafictive
-jinx- said:
Since I've never played a Castlevania game before, is there a benefit to playing the original on GBA before playing any of the others?
Click to expand...

it's still really enjoyable. and it'll help you appreciate the franchise's conventions and recurring bosses and such. but there's not much in the way of story background, if that's what you're getting at.
 
Alcibiades

Alcibiades

Member
I already got the regular C64 cause it was cheap and it's the one that they had (didn't have Legacy of Darkness, though if I like C64, I'll probably seek it out)...

also, just today I got Castlevania NES-edition for GBA at Circuit City...

great music and gameplay...
 
A

ara

Member
For slightly different reasons, I think the best ones are:

Super Castlevania IV
Akumajo Dracula X (PC Engine!!!!)
SOTN
PS1 release of the X68000 Akumajo Dracula


Now that we are also arguing about music, here are my favorites for MUSIC ONLY: (I know, lots of overlap :) )
Lament of Innocence
Super Castlevania IV
Akumajo Dracula X (PC Engine)
PS1 release of the X68000 Akumajo Dracula
 
B

belgurdo

Banned
Level design: Harmony of Dissonance (hey, I keep a special place in my heart for that 'outrace-the-ball' thing)

Gameplay: SOTN
 
Craig Majaski

Craig Majaski

Member
My personal Top 10 Castlevania games are as follows:

1. Dracula X (Turbo Duo)
2. Castlevania III (NES)
3. Super Castlevania IV (SNES)
4. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PSX)
5. Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)
6. Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance (GBA)
7. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest (NES)
8. Castlevania (NES)
9. Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (GBA)
10. Castelvania 64 (N64)
 
R

radios shipping overview

Member
I love this series too much not to chime in seriously, so:

Castlevania (NES) is probably my favorite to go back and replay. It holds up much better than CV2 ever did (the only good thing about that game is the music), and I have yet to beat the blasted thing. PCE Dracula X is the king of the series' traditional flow, with so much polish and style and great design. SOTN owes so so so much to it as far as enemies, gameplay, and visual style, though they made a very wise choice in bringing Ayami Kojima on to create individuality for SOTN. CVIII is nearly as good as Dracula X (as much as the hardware allows, anyway), and is something I need to spend more time on.

I have much love for CV4's soundtrack, but not so much for its sound or level design. It's so sluggish and obviously first-gen SNES that it hurts. And boo on it for introducing the useless free whip that non-series-fans go ga-ga over.

Bloodlines has really grown on me over the years. Its faster pace took some getting used to, but it's more intense and action-based than most games in the series, and the soundtrack's excellent.

I've been playing Castlevania Chronicles tonight (and have made it further than I have before, thanks to me trying arranged mode over the merciless original), and: wow, what a treat. It has the good stuff from CV1-4 thrown into something more akin to those than the redesign that Dracula X brought. I haven't played SNES Dracula X enough to get a sense for it beyond the first couple of levels (regrettably), but I'd like to find what fun it has to offer.

As for the Metroid clones, obviously nothing yet has compared with SOTN's polish. The demo of LoI bored me, and I really enjoyed Legacy of Darkness and Belmont's Revenge.
 
J

JackFrost2012

Banned
impirius said:
Castlevania III!

I have the clock tower music as my cell phone's ringtone. REPRESENT
Click to expand...

Holy fucking shit, SO DO I. I made it myself using an NSF -> MIDI and MIDI->ringtone converter. It's a great ringtone.

In any case, I vote III for Actionvanias, and Aria of Sorrow for Metroidvanias.
 
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