Today, we're talking Son of Dracula, we're talking
two castles, and we're talking composition for
When the Sun Goes Down. That's right, it's Castlevania
Symphony of the Night. Hello everyone, welcome
to the second episode of Retro Gaming Beyond
Presents Video Game Club. We're your hosts, Joe,
Eric, Ryan, and Jacob Vanderloski. But before
we get started, we're going to do our little
word of the nerds section here and see what's
going on in our little section of our nerdiedom
that we got going on. So, what have you guys
been up to? I've been watching the Invincible
show, or whatever you want to call it. Nice dude.
It seems like it's a pretty big bandwagon right
now, but... I had a buddy tell me to watch it,
and I finished it, and I loved it. Yeah, it's
been pretty good. Yeah, I've been seeing a lot
online about it. That's the same guy who made
The Walking Dead, right? And you like that show.
Kirkman, yep. Funny enough, a lot of the voice
actors are from The Walking Dead. Oh, really?
Cool. A lot of characters in that show, too,
yep. Right, yeah. It's pretty cool. The main
character is Steven Yeun, and he played Glenn
in The Walking Dead. Okay, that's cool. And there's
a bunch of other side characters and stuff like
that that are Walking Dead characters as well.
Is it an AMC show? I don't think so. I think
it's HBO, I think. Oh, okay. I think it's like
an old separate thing, but it's pretty good.
And I know it has its comics too, so. Yeah, I
would like to read the comics. I would too. I
don't know anything about them. apart from the
show, but I've heard the whole series in just
general really good. Right, yeah. All right,
that's cool. Eric? I'm still reading my Berserk.
Oh, yeah. Making my way through those. I think
I've watched Akira since last time we talked.
Oh, okay, yeah. Akira, that's a classic for sure.
That was a dope movie. It's pretty crazy. Some
awesome animation in the movie. Hell yeah. For
its time, it was fucking awesome. Yeah. I think
I was watching Death Note and then I'm only about
halfway through that. I don't like the whole
arc that's going on with that right now where
he forgets the thing. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Is
that when the girl comes in? Yeah. Yeah, it gets
a little silly there. Yeah, so I kind of stopped
watching them. I'm just kind of slowly getting
through those. and then uh i started watching
solo leveling too so which is what's that this
guy like um is he fights like these monsters
and he can like level up his like like in a video
game oh okay oh is it an anime yeah oh okay well
it's actually korean so oh it's pretty cool like
it seems like it gets a lot of hate online but
yeah well what doesn't yeah i know But I'm only
like four or five episodes in, but I've been
enjoying it, so it's pretty cool. All right,
cool. Might have to check that one out. Yeah,
it's pretty dope. Playing any video games other
than, you know, Castlevania? Not too much. I
started that Star of Providence game. Oh, yeah,
that's right. We were watching you play that,
yeah. Yeah. That game looks awesome. That's about
all I've been playing lately. All right, cool.
Jacob, you got anything? What have you been doing?
I started playing the Metroid Prime games. I
finished the first one. You preparing for a four
that's coming out? Yeah, uh -huh. That direct
looked pretty cool, but I started playing the
first one a few weeks before the recent direct.
But yeah, I want to go through all three. I beat
the first two a long time ago, and I just wanted
to repeat them that way. I kind of know the story
about the third game, whatever I do, get to it.
Yeah. I remember the first one being pretty good.
Yeah. The third one, that's on the Wii, right?
Yeah. That's the one we had. Yeah, that one was
pretty... The third one was pretty fun. Yeah,
I remember the third one being pretty good, too.
Was the second one good? That's where they had
Dark Samus, right? It was in the second one?
Yeah. The second one was pretty good, too. Yeah,
it was a pretty sweet series. So you're working
on... You finished the first two, you're working
on the third one now? No, I beat the first one.
I'm still on the second one, but I'm getting
close to the end, so... Maybe someday we'll have
that in the podcast. It should be old enough
at this point. I've been... Assassin's Creed
Shadows just came out, so I've been playing that
quite a bit. I love those games. Played through
all of them. Speaking of a game that gets a lot
of hate online, that takes the cake right now.
Yeah, well, that game is just so massive. So
many people know about it. Of course, it's going
to get a lot of hate. But I don't know. I'm enjoying
it. I think I heard it was one of the best selling
Assassin's Creed. Yeah, it did fine. It did just
fine. I mean, it's definitely like I can see
some complaints because it seems like it's just
more of the same. like it's a huge open world
game the battling the combat hasn't changed too
much and everything but i don't know i just love
these games i can't get enough of them so yeah
it's just kind of odd because it's a setting
that's already been done yeah with ghost of shishima
a couple yeah and that game was you know yeah
pretty well done kind of hard to beat that one
I don't know. I haven't gotten super far into
it, but so far it's been good. I think it stands
up to Ghost of Tsushima pretty well. Is it like
Mirage? It's more like Valhalla. Because Mirage
was a little bit simpler. Okay, gotcha. That
didn't have leveling in Mirage, right? They got
rid of that? Yeah. In my opinion, it's a lot
like 1. yeah it is they went back to the ruins
of it they did yep yep no the shadows is more
like like Valhalla there's there's like levels
and stuff and everything now the only the only
thing I can't stand about that is when they do
the assassination thing where you can't like
outright kill some of the like they have elites
now and you can't like outright kill like assassinate
and if they're like a too high of a level or
something right yeah that's the ones yeah yeah
that's the only thing I don't like but although
I will say I think Valhalla and Odyssey fix that
where you could like There was like a perk or
something you could buy, and then it would always
allow you to assassinate them or something. So
I'm pretty sure this one has that too, where
you eventually get to it where you can do that.
You just can't do it right away. Did Valhalla
have, like Odyssey did, where you had to be a
certain level to play story missions? I think
so, but it was way, way better at leveling correctly.
If you just did a few things here and there,
yeah, it was much better at that. That was Origins
too, right? Yeah, yeah. Origins wasn't... Odyssey
was the worst in that. Yeah, it was for sure.
Odyssey, you had to do everything around you
or you wouldn't be able to continue for sure.
And that was my biggest problem with Odyssey.
I couldn't stand it. I haven't played anything
past Origin. The size of Odyssey was just so
massive. It's too big of a game, honestly. Video
game -wise, that's about it. I've been watching...
Anybody remember Ah! Real Monsters? Remember
that cartoon? It's actually pretty funny. I'm
actually enjoying it. It's a pretty good show.
I definitely remember a lot more about it than
I thought I would. I don't remember watching
it too much when I was a kid. I watched it quite
a bit. I enjoyed that one. Alright, I guess that's
it. So we'll go ahead and get to our game. Castlevania
was developed and published by Konami for the
PlayStation in 1997. It was... Kind of a renaissance,
really, for the Castlevania series. This was
the first one that had, like, an exploration
thing, because the other ones were kind of linear.
One of the cool things I found out when I was
reading was that actually a lot of the design
employees on this game were actually women. Like,
the main artist and the main music composer were
actually women for this game, which is pretty
cool. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah. So, were
you guys able to complete this game? Yeah. It
took a while, but yeah. Yeah, this one was definitely
tougher than our last game for sure. The game
was way longer than I thought it was. Yeah. See,
I knew there was like two castles, but I didn't
realize that's how it was done. Like, which we'll
get to that later. But yeah, I thought it was
like a after like a what do you call it? Like
a extra dungeon or whatever. I thought you just
like beat the main castle and then you can go
back and play the inverted castle. But no, it
was. it was all one game yeah it's part of the
game so yeah yeah i beat it too um this game
was weird because it like it started out so difficult
like at first the first couple hours i played
this game i was kind of mad at it and i was like
i don't know if i want to beat this it's so difficult
and then if you learn how to do the battling
and then you get a little bit more into it and
all of a sudden you start powering up and it
becomes so easy Yeah, the beginning is definitely
very frustrating. Yeah, and then once you get
a few power -ups, a few couple of weapons, and
then you just start tearing through the game.
Yeah, when you find the right items and get your
level up a couple times, it does, yeah, things
get a little definitely easier. And then it gets
extremely hard again. Yeah, true. It's not like
a linear difficulty. No, it's kind of all over
the place. That's because... you can go in any
direction in any way you want so yep for the
most part there's you know areas locked off until
you get certain but there's no like first boss
second boss or third boss it's it's wherever
direction you go that's yeah yeah yeah we'll
get to that so let's explain the game real quick
so Symphony of the Night it's a 2D action platformer
you're playing as Alucard you're the son of Dracula
and So Richter has gone missing and Dracula's
castle has come back and you decide that you,
the son of Dracula, are going to go in and finish
your father off once and for all. It's kind of
like we said, it's an exploration game. This
game is literally where the word Metroidvania
came from. This game is the one that started
all that. So, I mean, obviously Metroid, but
then... This Castlevania is the one where all
that started. Because a lot of the ones before
this were very 2D linear games, but this one
is the one where they started doing the find
and explore type stuff. So, yeah, you start out...
Actually, you start out the game as Richter.
This is actually a sequel to Rondo of Blood,
which was a Japanese -only exclusive for a while.
And at the beginning of this game, you kind of
replay the ending, and then it gives you a nice...
Little FMV of the castle, right? Wasn't there
an FMV at the beginning? Yeah, dude, there's
a couple FMVs. Yeah, that sweet PS1 compression
we all love. You gotta love FMVs, man. Yeah,
yeah, yeah, I do, I do. But then, yeah, then
you start the game's Alucard, you have everything,
and then within the first five minutes, death
just steals everything. He's like, yeah, you
don't need that. But yeah, and then basically
the game just drops you in and says, okay, see
you later. And you have to figure out everything
on your own. And that's it. And this was the
biggest frustration with this game. Yeah. And
it's kind of hard to fault it, too, because it's
such an older game. Like, that's just an older
game design choice. So I can understand it. But,
you know, being in the world that we're in now,
just even all I would have really wanted was
just a little hint of direction. Like, hey, you
need to go to the catacombs. Or, hey, you need
to go to the library. Just something like that
would have been nice. But no, dude, they give
you nothing. Literally nothing. I think the reason
why they did that back then is so you play more.
Because back then, there's no over -the -air
updates. There's nothing like that. Once you
buy a game back then, that's what it was, and
that's how it stayed. Yeah, for sure. It's like
that artificial hardness and all that stuff.
Yeah, exactly. Again, I don't know if this game
builds off of other games, but I don't think
so. But there is no move list. There is no, I
didn't even know there was a map for like the
first hour of the game. Yeah. Just, they just
give you no, no, anything, man. Yeah. Did you
read the manual? Cause it doesn't help much either.
No, I didn't. I didn't, I didn't even know this
until I pretty much had beaten the game. You,
so you have a weapon for your, or you have a
button for your left hand and you have a button
for your right hand. And if you have a shield
and sword in combination, you can press those
buttons together and you'll get like a special
ability. Yeah. That's what I wanted to figure
out too. Yeah. I only knew that because I looked
at achievements. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The achievements
honestly gave me a lot of direction in what to
do, funny enough. Yeah. But I wasn't trying to
look at them too much to not ruin the game, but
try to figure stuff out on my own. But yeah.
make sure I can get them before I lock myself
out of them. Yeah. I know. Yeah. You've had some
problems with that in the past. Yeah. So, but
yeah, this, this, it's just kind of frustrating
in the beginning. Yeah. It's weird. It's getting
into it. It does. Yeah. I'm easier. The first
couple of hours, I was like, I don't even know
if I want to finish this. But then once you once
the ball starts rolling and you start getting
those power ups and you start really getting
into the castle, you're like, you know what?
All right. This is actually pretty fun. I kind
of want to see where this is going now. Yeah.
One of the big things for me was the boss fights.
The bosses are all freaking cool. There's some
really cool bosses and everything in there. But
I didn't feel like there was a lot of strategy
to the boss fights. Like it was just kind of
like do more damage to them faster than they
do more damage to you. I don't know if you guys
feel the same way or not. Some of them, it's
just... It's funny because the only thing that
the bosses really had was just speed. They were
just fast moving. And then some other ones, you're
just in... Like the one boss in the Underworld
or whatever, the Ice Crystal Cave. You're just
on a tiny platform and she's far away from you.
You know? Yeah, that one was a pain. It's not
like the bosses per se are hard. It's just with
the game. disadvantages from you to me it just
felt like there was no strategy like you would
just you hit them faster than they hit you and
that's what it felt like to me yeah i will say
though the grand faloon that giant balloon of
like dead bodies yeah that's one of the coolest
bosses yeah that was so awesome when that boss
is so sick dude yeah that was one of the coolest
ideas for a boss i've ever seen that was that
boss fight was cool yeah a lot i mean almost
every boss is you know Not a disappointment in
graphical -wise or aesthetic -wise. Yeah, we'll
talk about graphics when we get there, but yeah,
for sure. I just feel like I wish there was more
strategy. I don't know. They had more of tell
signs of what was going on. Maybe I'm just stupid
and I didn't realize it all, but to me it just
seemed like hit them faster than they hit you,
which I think a lot of the older games are like
that, like original Castlevania is kind of like
that and stuff. Yeah. For the most part, there
really was not much strategy. I think it just
comes down to finding the right weapons for the
right boss. Yeah. Yeah, well, and then figuring
out, which, again, didn't know about those combos.
I'm sure those help a lot. Yeah. There's that
one, I think, when you find his sword and shield,
Dracula's sword and shield or whatever, you're
basically invincible. Didn't know that. Yeah,
there's one. I forgot which one. I think it's
like when you get Dracula's sword and his shield,
or it's like the shield. I can't remember exactly
what it was. When you use the combo, you get
just surrounded by, like, 13 swords or whatever,
and then you just decimate people. It's, like...
I beat Dracula in, like, five seconds. It's ridiculous.
I mean, I guess that's the cool thing about that
game is there's just so many different combinations,
and most of it's hidden. Like, the game doesn't...
Since there's no direction in that game, you
have to figure that all yourself. Yeah, there
is literally a... plethora of weapons and armor
and just a huge amount of things in this game
i had no idea that there was that many yeah there's
a lot there's a lot i mean i i played i don't
know i don't know probably nine ten hours on
it and i probably have touched nothing in the
game yeah i mean there's i mean a lot of them
are dropped from enemies and they're rare drops
so they're hard to get yeah Dude, the amount
of stuff these guys, the passion in this game
is insane. I can totally see why this is such
a classic. There's so much stuff just pushed
in there that doesn't even need to be in there.
There's an entire armor set that just changes
the entire way that the game plays. I forgot
what it was called, the knuckle guys or whatever.
I don't remember the name. Yeah, but they had
the axe lord armor or whatever it's called. You
become one of the enemies and you play as the
enemy. Yeah, and you play super slow. Yeah, it's
crazy. And I know it's funny, too, because in
our previous episode, we kind of mentioned and
mocked the 140 -ish enemies that were in the
game. Yeah, yeah. But, I mean, there were, like,
no duplicates. Yeah, there was a couple of palace
swaps. They had the Medusa heads. Yeah, but they
did. They were different in a way, yeah, yeah,
yeah. So, yeah, no, that was a pretty big list.
For the most part, there was 140 enemies. Mm
-hmm. Which I found pretty impressive. Yeah,
that's cool. And it was funny. A lot of the enemies,
too, had, like, funny little animations, too,
sometimes. Yeah, they did. Those stupid flea
men were so annoying. Yeah, the little guys.
Yeah, dude, those guys were annoying. They were
hard to hit. Yeah. But I like the one with the
skeleton where you hit him and his head falls
off and, like, bounces on the ground. Oh, yeah,
yeah, yeah, yeah. And the other one where there's,
like, two skeletons carrying something. And if
you kill one of them, the other one starts running
away with his hands flailing around. That was
funny too, yeah. There was some nudity and stuff
in there too. Like the flower ladies or whatever.
Yeah, I know. I didn't expect that either. I
thought it was pretty cool how the... I liked
how when you're exploring and everything, you
can unlock doors and all that stuff. I thought
it was pretty cool that the map permanently was
changing. Anytime you open a door or whatever,
it always stayed. you know you could come back
and come and go and it would always it would
never change back to what it was you know it
always felt like you were actually doing something
in the game yeah jacob any thoughts over there
i don't really have much to add i mean i kind
of agree with everything you guys said about
how like the game just just throws you in no
direction no nothing just go around the map find
out everything on your own that's it Oh, I was
going to say too, using items was such a pain
in the ass game. I hated the way the item use
was done because you have to take your weapon
off, put it on, use it, and then go back and
put your weapon on. I don't know what they were
thinking on that one. And then just like there's
so many items and going through every single
one. Yeah, there was no way to like, yeah, there
should have been a way to like reorder the list
or something. Yeah. Yeah, just it was very clustered.
Yeah, that definitely could have been done better.
Yeah. I didn't really even end up using items
that much, honestly, because of it. I didn't
either. I maybe ate a couple health items. But
other than that, I had everything just stored
in my inventory. Anything else in gameplay? Controls?
I mean, I guess we can talk about controls. Alucard
feels like he's slow, but it's still like a fluid
movement. He's not frustrating to use. Right,
he's not sluggish. He's just a slow -moving character.
Yeah. Yeah. I think it was pretty cool how you
could, you know, eventually you can get the upgrades
and you can turn into a wolf, which was pretty
cool. Yeah. And you can, like, bite enemies.
You can run through them and everything. Then
you get the... The game also doesn't tell you
anything about... Yep, doesn't tell you about
any of that. You can turn into the bat and use
sonar in the dark rooms. That was the one spot
that I got stuck on that I had to look up because
I forgot that the bat had the sonar thing. Mm
-hmm. and there's that room with all the spikes
yeah that was the one thing i looked up for this
game i was like where the hell do i go and then
i i looked it up and i was like oh come on that's
so obvious i don't know how to figure that out
but yes that's why this game's so just weird
because i went to that room before i got the
echo for the bat yeah once i got it i already
knew what i had to do yeah yeah so for it's just
funny how some different people get stuck on
different parts because they didn't explore this
before that and right yeah funny how it works
everybody has kind of like a different situation
or experience with the game yeah it reminds me
of like for like a modern audience it's like
a dark souls or the eldering kind of games or
whatever yeah there's a lot of similarities between
the two yeah i i agree there was a few times
where i had to like look up little stuff yeah
yeah definitely But other than that, it's, you
know, pretty straightforward. Just exploring
until you find the right thing to get to the
right area. Yeah, I will say it did that pretty
good because you'll go in one direction and you'll
basically not be able to go anymore. So you're
like, oh, well, I guess I don't go that way anymore.
And then you just go back to wherever you hadn't
explored yet and then you'll find what you need.
I feel like at first it's very daunting and you
get kind of frustrated, but then once you play
it, you're like, oh, I kind of see the design
choice here and how this works. Yeah, definitely,
because you literally have access to the entire
map besides the areas that you can't access.
You can just go wherever you want and the game
is not going to stop you. It is very much to
take in when you first start. yeah for sure yeah
yeah and it's not a small map either no it's
not because as we mentioned as we mentioned not
only is there in one castle um so once you pretty
much explore the entire castle uh you will go
and fight richter um he's being you find out
that he's being controlled uh and then you'll
and the funny thing is you can actually kill
richter there and you'll get a different ending
um But if you kill the little controlling thing,
then you get the normal ending. But then once
you finish that battle, you get transported to
another castle. They took the entire map and
turned it upside down. And you have to explore
the entire castle again upside down. I mean,
there's some changes. There's new enemies. The
rooms are a little bit different. But for the
most part, it's the exact same map upside down.
Yeah. It's crazy because it's literally just
an upside down map. And to me... That's crazy
because I've done development stuff before. Just
the time that it took to make sure that every
piece of that map worked upside down as well
as normal. That work had to be crazy. Yeah. I
mean, they kind of cheated a little bit with
the bat thing because that helps you go anywhere.
Yeah, but still, the amount of work that went
into that, it's crazy. Yeah, a lot of the inverted
was bat related. Yeah, and I think that's how
they got around a lot of it. But still, they
still had to make sure it worked both ways. Yeah.
The platforming in this game feels good. Every
jump you make, you feel like you're going to
guarantee the land where you want. Yeah, I don't
really remember dying too much from that. The
only time I really remember dying is just annoying
enemies. I never felt like controls were a problem.
I didn't understand how to fight an enemy. Yeah,
the enemies were the ones that were the pain
in the asses. And there were some pain in the
ass enemies. Oh, my God. I hated the clock tower
so much. Yeah, yeah. God, the Medusa heads and
the... Oh, my God. That's got to be the worst
area of the game. It's horrendous, man. There's
just a whole horde of them. Yeah. And if you
get hit by one, it stones you. I hated that area
with every five of my beating room. That's like
the first area you have to go through. on the
second castle the upside down castle yeah it's
not as bad with the inverted if you have the
gas because you can just turn into the gas yeah
and not take any damage but oh the mist it's
called the mist yeah well yeah the mist my bad
but yeah that's that was infuriating yeah for
sure I mean, that's just kind of Castlevania
in general, though, because the original ones
are just like that. There's Medusa heads in those
ones, and they're so annoying. Almost like every
flying enemy in this game was just annoying.
Yeah. And then this one had the knockback, too,
right? That's such a classic Castlevania thing.
Yeah, that's the most annoying thing, because
you make it so high up, and then you get knocked
down all the way to the bottom. Yep. And there's
nothing you can do about it. Expect, dude, the
clock. Not the clock tower, where you're climbing
the castle where the bells are. Oh, yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah. And you're jumping on those like
wooden platforms. Those stupid birds, man. Yeah,
the crows or whatever, yeah. They would always
knock me down. Yep, that is very Castlevania
for sure. It's just, I don't know, it wasn't
hard. It was just so nerve, just annoying. Yeah.
Yeah, again, I never felt like... I never felt
like it was the player's fault, which is a good
thing. It's just that the fault of the enemies
was so annoying. Yeah. It's just not very forgiving.
Yeah. You were talking about the movement earlier,
about how Alucard's kind of sluggish, but he's
slow. One thing that I did, because the match
is so huge, if you want to speed yourself up
a little bit, you can just... turn your back
towards where you want to go and then just use
the dash uh move and you'll just go you can really
speed through sections and stuff like that i
tried that a couple times i didn't really notice
a difference in speed it's probably just a perceptive
thing but yeah i think it's minimalistic at most
but i mean even if it is faster there's so many
ledges and just stuff you have to jump over which
you can't do while you're doing that yeah so
it's In all honesty, it's probably the same time
to get to a room, but if it's flat or like a
longer room, it's probably better. Well, I was
also playing on emulation, so I just hit the
fast forward button. I was going to say, if you
really want to speed the game up. Yeah, I played
a lot of this game in fast forward. Yeah, I did
that too. And I'm glad that doesn't mess up the
achievements. No. yeah because sometimes it just
it gets too much especially if you hit a place
where you can't progress and you have to go back
and you don't know what you're looking for and
you have to search everywhere for it yeah it
takes a long time yeah well for me it was just
like doing like uh waiting for the transportation
rooms to like load or whatever yeah because that
animation is so slow too it is We live in a world
where we don't have to wait for CDs to load anymore.
That's something we didn't mention. They added
transportation. There was teleporter rooms to
help you get around the castle, which I thought
was pretty cool. They didn't need to do that,
but it was nice. Considering the size of the
map. Yeah. It's funny. That map is so huge. Even
if you do use them, you still have to travel
a little bit. Even if you know where you're going,
you can... get kind of close, but it still takes
a little bit. I'm just saying, imagine if those
didn't exist, how much longer would it have taken?
Yeah. And then the only really thing, that annoying
thing was the, if you wanted to go back between
the castles, you had to use that one teleporter
route. Yeah, there was only one route, yeah.
Unless you used the library card or whatever,
but you could only go to the one castle, not
back. Yeah. And if you used the card, you had
to go all the way back to the teleporter to get...
Mm -hmm. Oh, their castle, the second castle.
Yeah. Mm -hmm. Yep. But like I said, once you
have all the power -ups and stuff, especially
the mist one with the poisonous gas. Yeah. You
can kind of just, you don't have to fight every
bit, every time. You just fly over. Yeah, true.
You can kind of go through it a lot faster. And
then just put it in fast forward. Yeah. Mm -hmm.
So. There was something else we didn't mention
was the relics. So you, not only do you have
your weapons and your shields and your items,
you also have relics, which are like the classic,
like, holy water, the knife. There was like a
gemstone or something. Yeah, like a diamond or
something. Which one did you guys end up using
all the time? I had the dagger. I used the dagger
all the time. Yeah, same. I used the axe mostly.
Yeah, that's what I was using because Alucard
doesn't really have a good up or diagonal attack,
so I felt the axe was good for that. There's
a lot of breakable floors in the game too. Yeah,
there was a lot of secrets. And so that's, from
my experience, that was the only relic that actually
worked. Well, you can punch diagonally down.
Yeah. You can also attack straight down, too.
Yeah. And I also didn't know that. Yeah. Again,
with a game with no direction. Yeah. It took
me a while to figure that out. Yeah. You have
to kind of just do it as you go. Yep. Oh yeah,
we also didn't mention the pets or whatever they
were called. Yeah. What were they called? I forgot
what they were called. The familiars? Is that
what it was? Familiars? Yeah. The fairy, the
demon. Did you guys use them much? I couldn't
figure out how to turn them on until later on.
I had the demon on all the time. Yeah, he was
the one with the spear, right? Yeah, he was pretty
cool. I liked him. Yeah, so... The relics are
actually the cards and stuff that you get. Those
are the permanent upgrades. Yeah. Oh, you're
right, you're right, you're right. I don't know
what the other items are. I guess active items,
whatever you want to call them. Yeah, something
else, too, was the relics. There's a bunch of,
like, not just... I mean, I guess it's kind of
just the upgrades, right? Because that's the
wolf stuff, and then... Yeah, those are, like,
the permanent upgrades, yeah. But, yeah, you
just keep those and stuff. Definitely, yeah.
But, yeah, that includes all the transformations.
the familiars, and then a bunch of other stuff
too. Yeah, the special items are the ones that
use the hearts, which that will always be such
a weird design choice to me, that hearts are
like a currency to use weapons for, not for actual
health. Instead of mana. Like they could have
just made it mana or something. Yeah, just hearts
equals health. I don't know. It's just so weird
that it's not health. It's just such a weird
thing. Yeah, because using those items has nothing
to do with your health. It's the hardest that
you collect around the game. That is an odd choice.
I know it's been that way since the first one.
It's just such a weird design choice. It's just
kind of weird. I always love looking at that,
where video games, what they used to do, and
now looking at it, it's kind of like, what? Would
a video game do that nowadays? It's such a weird
thing. It's weird. Because every game you play
that has a currency for moves or skills or something,
it's always mana. Yeah. Or energy or something.
Right, and hearts always equals health. I can't
think of any other game where hearts does not
give you health. Yeah. I mean, that should just
be basic. I mean, they were doing that in, what,
the 80s? I know. That's what I'm saying. It's
just such a weird thing. Yeah, why change it
all of a sudden? Well, I mean, the original Castlevania
was just like that, and that came out in 83 or
4 or whatever. And circling back on, you know,
it's funny to see what games would do, you know,
nowadays or not. This game literally gives you
no direction at all, and new games just won't
leave you alone. Yeah, that's true, yeah. Yeah,
because you have tutorials now, and then you
have help throughout the game or hints. Yep.
Hold your hand through the whole game sometimes.
Well, I think that's why a lot of people, like
I said, like those Elden Ring or Dark Souls,
because they're a lot like this. They just throw
you in, and you just go. I feel like if you like
those games, you'd probably actually like this
game a lot. Yeah. But this game was just... I
don't know. They gave you no move list, no nothing,
man. I didn't know you could do that super jump
for half of the game. Oh, yeah. Yeah, the move
list or... honestly very overpowered because
i didn't know that they were even a thing and
you have to buy them from the librarian you have
to like buy them and then you can go into the
pause menu and look it up but right right i was
watching some videos just watching playthroughs
how other people played it because it's interesting
to see because like i said earlier like not all
the time but It's great to see somebody else
play and they have a different experience. They
go a different way or whatever have you. But
some of these people, they just dump these abilities
and shred bosses like it's nothing. Yeah, I know.
It's so weird. Yeah, that's what I was talking
about before too. I didn't feel like there's
any strategy, but it's probably because I just
didn't know. It's just weird because you won't
know that probably the first playthrough of this
game. No. I mean, I did it until I got maybe
halfway through the second tower or second castle.
And even then, I wasn't even using them because
I didn't know they were that good. Well, that
was the thing. I was watching some other dude
play the game and he was doing that jump. And
I'm like, how did he get that? Meanwhile, I had
it the whole time. I just didn't know how to
do it. Yep, same. That's probably insanely useful
for the second castle. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah.
But once I figured it out, I was using it all
the time. Yeah, we did it the hard way for a
while. Well, funny enough, this was the easy
way. The hard way is when it first came out,
when there's no internet. Imagine not having
internet for that game. Oh, I know. I don't know
if I would have beaten it yet. You'd have to
get the Nintendo Powers, right? Yeah. Well, the
PSM. PSM, that's right, yeah. PlayStation Magazine.
Yeah, yeah. Or EGM. That's funny. You would need
that back then. I'm sure it had a Prima Guide
or whatever they were called. I'm sure there
was something on the internet, right? Not obviously
when it first came out, but even in 97 there
was internet. You couldn't just type in Castlevania
Symphony of the Night, walk through and get everything.
It's not like it is now. Even games now, people
speedrun them in hours and then they're like,
oh, here's a YouTube video of it. Bro, people
freaking go through the code to figure out how
to break it to speedrun those games nowadays.
It's nuts what people do. It's impressive, honestly.
Alright, so let's move on to the graphics. This
game is... I weep for the PS1 2D games. I understand
the market and people with the shiny... 3D was
the shiny new thing. But dude, the PS1 is so...
good at 2d sprite graphics i wish there had been
so many more 2d sprite games this is one of the
most beautiful games on the ps1 yeah i agree
hands down i agree this game is absolutely beautiful
it is gorgeous dude it's like a amped up super
nintendo game like it is just such a beautiful
game you know this being a 2d game it's it's
aged wonderfully as much as i love the ps1 it's
such a special place in my heart the 3d games
just They don't look great nowadays. I think
it's aged better than some of the other ones,
like the N64. I know there's a lot of 64 fans
out there, but man, that system does not look
good. Yeah, I agree. PS1 will always be my favorite,
man. Yeah, I mean, I love the N64 too, but...
I always thought the PS1 looked so much better.
Yeah, it just... I don't know if it's better.
It just definitely has a different look about
it, and I definitely prefer it, but... Yeah.
Well, I just, PS1's probably my favorite console
of all time. Yeah, I mean, we grew up with it,
so obviously. What I really liked, what I thought
was really cool was the mix of, like, the 3D
objects with the background, with the 2D sprites.
Like, the lava effect in that one area was really
cool. It had, like, the clock tower in that one
background. Yeah, that was cool. That was cool.
Did you see that, like, giant eye watching you
in that one? Yeah, that was cool, too. Yeah,
yeah. yeah i was i was gonna say that first time
i walked into that church room with that giant
sword oh yeah that was cool with the stained
glass and everything i'm like oh my god dude
i was like this is beautiful man yeah dude i
know there's like those ones there was like um
they had like the skeleton like uh giant uh painting
whatever in that one room yeah That was cool.
They had a lot of relief stuff in the background.
I mean, I love skeletons, skulls and stuff. The
backgrounds are beautiful. Yeah, I agree, man.
It's a beautiful game. As I mentioned earlier,
I was on emulation, so I had mine upscaled, but
even then, it was still good looking. I think
even without it, it would still look pretty damn
good. Yeah, it would have been totally fine.
The only thing that didn't age very well was
the FMVs, which I think there's only like one
or two, right? There wasn't a lot. No, there
wasn't that much. And they were short. It was
just the castle showing up, right? Yeah, it wasn't
like the human FMVs where people were talking.
Yeah, I think that's all it was, was the castles.
Right, it was just the castle in the beginning
and then the inverted castle, right? Yeah. But
still, that's like the perfect way to include
an FMV. Yeah, just short and sweet. I think if
you killed Richter if you chose that path, I
think the whole castle disappears or blows up
or something. There's like a big light up to
the sky. But yeah, it's only like the beginning
and I guess beating the game. That's pretty much
it. No way of fault on the game at all. That's
just the PS1's inadequacies. But the actual game
though, it's Yeah, it's cool. Even the body part
boss or like the body boss, the background of
that was awesome. Yeah, oh dude, the boss sprite
work was phenomenal. They're some of the coolest
enemies I've ever seen. They did a great job.
Yeah, they really did. But that boss room was
just so ridiculous looking. I mean, the floor
was just... skulls and bodies yeah it's pretty
cool yeah it's just it's crazy but that's cool
oh something else i wanted to say too i really
like the um some of the like some of the environments
would actually change like when you came back
to them like that one the like tower outside
tower whatever like sometimes would be raining
out there sometimes it'd be foggy that was pretty
cool they had like different uh environment um
I don't know if you guys have seen that. Yeah,
when you're on the outside wall. That was cool.
I like that. Yeah, it's a nice inclusion, man.
For sure. And then they had the random telescope
thing. I don't really understand what that was.
Yeah, where you're just watching that boat man
or whatever. Yeah, ferry man. Just a random thing.
There was a thing where you could watch a bird
be born and grow up. Yeah, like its whole lifespan.
weird things in here. There's a lot of little
tiny things that do nothing for the game, but
they're just little things. The fact that you
can sit in chairs in this game for no reason
is... Dude, that's... Yeah, I mean, that alone
is insane. Yeah. And it's funny, there's a little
thing in there. If you sit in that chair long
enough, you fall asleep. Oh, really? I didn't
know that. Yeah, yeah. All the cars will fall
asleep and there's like little Z's come up. Yeah,
see stuff like... Tiny little things like that,
man. That's what makes a game, you know? yeah
100 just shows the passion that these guys had
for making this thing and then like it's kind
of crazy too because like depending on like if
you're standing on a flat surface compared to
like you know like a sloped or slanted surface
all the cards stands differently too yeah yeah
got like a difference it's just the very minute
details yeah i know it's crazy so and then like
when he like You can have his cape over him or
whatever. Oh yeah, you can equip a cape and then
change it to whatever color you want, which is
crazy. Yeah. And then it changes your batwing
colors too. Yeah. That was cool. Yeah, there's
a lot of cool capes in there too. Like that translucent
one was pretty cool. That's something I want
to mention. That after effect of him moving,
that kind of got a little annoying after a while.
I don't know why they decided to keep that forever.
Yeah. His after image or whatever. I mean, it's
not that big a deal. Yeah, I didn't pay any mind
to it, I guess, because I just got used to it.
I'm just not really sure why they needed that
constantly. Yeah. I get if you were running all
the time, maybe. Yeah, if you're at full speed
or doing a move or something, sure. But I just
understand why that was default. It's just a
little much for me. Yeah, I can see how that
would be annoying after a while. It was a weird
color, too, wasn't it? It was like blue. Like
a blue afterimage. Yeah. Yeah, just like a transparent
blue or something. It's just weird. Yeah, odd
color choice. If it was like the color of your
cape or something, that would be pretty cool,
but... I don't know, just a weird little thing.
I was just like, why do they need that? I guess
they were just like, this is so cool, we gotta
have it at all times. Yeah, for the PS1, that
was probably a cool effect. Yeah, I guess so,
yeah. Is that mind -blowing 32 -bit graphic?
There it is. That we made fun of last time. Yeah.
We did make fun of it, but this game is beautiful.
It is. It really is. Honestly, mind -blowing
how good it is. I want to retract the statement
I made earlier. I really did not expect this
game to look that good. I really didn't. You'll
never mock the back of a CDK saver again. I guess
not. No, we'll do it for sure. I heard that this
game is beautiful, but even then, I didn't expect
it to be as good as it was. Yeah, I knew the
love for this game was out there, but yeah, I
was still blown away. Especially when you're
coming off of newer video game 2s with realistic
graphics, you're like, oh, this game can't look
that great. It's PS1. Yeah, it's hard to believe
that a PS1 game, people are like, wow, this is
actually pretty impressive. Yeah. because of
just what we play now and what's out there and
the technology that's there. I mean, it's night
and day, but for a PS1 game to look this good,
it's really impressive. I mean, it's just art,
you know? Yeah. It's just a kind of art style,
and that's all it is. And it's done really well.
This is the type of game where you know they
love making this, and there's a lot of pride
and passion into it. Yep, this is one of those
games you would use as an argument for is video
games or this is definitely one of them. Yeah
100 % I Also liked a little like save icons to
every time you like loaded. They were all different.
I didn't notice that you didn't notice that I
Think there's like a progression thing. I think
they're just random. Oh, okay They might have
been because I got some some, you know, I would
be all over the place And I just got the red
one. Yo, heck, a Deidre that spun around every
time? No, no, no. When you're in the menu and
you go to the memory thing. Select your save.
Oh, oh, those icons. Oh, okay, yeah. I thought
they were, like, based on the boss, but I don't
know. That's what I thought, too. Okay. Yeah,
I know what you're talking about. Yeah, they're
just a bunch of different random stuff. Cool
little detail. Mm -hmm. Because, like, the PS1,
it was, like, the save always looked the same,
you know? I wonder if you went into the PS1 memory
card management if it would show a different
image every time. That I do not know. That was
just a game. I didn't play this on the original
hardware. I doubt it because I'm pretty sure
it just goes off of a game sprite. I don't know.
I think you could change it. It would get it
from the game. I remember one game had different
images for each save that you used. Yeah, I don't
know. Maybe somebody who's listening knows. They
can tell us. Yeah, that's a good question. Oh,
I had something I kind of wanted to bring up.
Yeah, go ahead. So I feel like maybe it's just
me, but I think it's kind of easy to tell. You
know how there's stuff in the background that
you can just attack it and it'll drop something
like a heart? I felt like it was pretty easy
to tell what objects you can hit and it'll give
you something. Yeah, that was nice. You weren't
really guessing on anything, right? Yeah. It's
pretty easy to tell what was going to drop something.
Even some of the secret stuff, you kind of have
to look a little bit harder, but you can kind
of see, like, oh, wait a minute, that wall has
something on it, you know? Like, there's something
there. Like that room with the bookshelf you
can push? Right, yeah. If you looked hard enough,
you'd be like, oh, wait a minute, hold on a second
now. And then, I don't know if you guys noticed,
but there was a couple rooms where statues were
pointing at the walls and stuff. That's how I
figured out you could break walls. It was a statue,
yeah. I should have known better, but... Yeah,
bro, you never heard of wall meat? I think I
was so overwhelmed with the game, bro. Yeah,
it was a lot, yeah. It was like the last thing
I was thinking about. I've seen something about
where... It's that when Konami approached Sony...
Computer Entertainment America about localizing
Castlevania. They refused to allow the game since
it was not done in 3D. So Konami threatened to
cancel all localization plans of Metal Gear Solid.
All right, let's move on to the sound. I mean,
let's just get this out of the way. Dude, Konami,
like in this era of Konami, their soundtracks
were just freaking king, man. They were so good
at it. The music is absolutely, yeah. And that's
something Konami has always been good at. Their
NES soundtracks, their SNES soundtracks, bro.
They're so good. I think we made fun of that
too. Did we? I don't remember. It's like the
orchestrated soundtrack or something that'll
synthesize you. I mean... We might have, yeah.
It's marketing slang for sure, but... Yeah, yeah,
yeah. We were making fun of it, but it is good.
They actually went on their word. Yeah. They
didn't just say that to say it. They actually
did it. Yeah. It holds up. Well, that was the
other big new thing at the time that, you know,
was actual music on a CD. Now it wasn't all fabricated
by the sound chip or whatever. Yeah. this was
actual recorded audio that you could play during
the game and yeah they the the soundtrack in
this game is so good there's so many good songs
in here and there's a lot of different ones too
like you know there's like a orchestral like
castle song and then there's a couple like heavy
metal ones and stuff and everything so and the
music is actually you know it it's not it doesn't
loop like very no yeah they're like songs it
goes out for a while the only thing was that
that credit song i was kind of like What? What
is happening right now? The one with the chick
singing or whatever? Yeah, that one was a little
out of place. I was like, what's going on right
now? Funny enough, I don't know if you know this
or not, but if you actually put the PS1 disc
into a CD player and there's actually a track
on there that you can listen to. Yeah, some of
them had that. Some of the PS1 games had that.
This one, it's like all the card talks to you.
He's like, I can't remember exactly what he says,
but he's like. don't listen to this. And then
it's a, Oh really? Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty funny.
It's just a remake of the, one of the songs,
but it's pretty cool. Yeah, that's cool. Uh,
the other thing on the sound was I, I actually
didn't know this game had voiceover, so I was
not expecting that at all. I was like, what the
hell? This game has a voiceover. Unfortunately,
no, it's not, it's not great. That was not great
at all, man. And I don't think that was a choice.
I think that was just how it was. I mean, just,
I don't know, but it was just so emotionless,
man. Yeah, it was. It was. It was just dry acting.
I mean, there's some good lines in here, you
know, like, what is a man for a miserable pile
of secrets? I mean, the writing itself wasn't
bad. Just, yeah, the... Well, that's taken from
a book, I think, anyway, though. Yeah, I know,
but it's in the game, so... But yeah, I wasn't
expecting it, so even having it at all, I was
like, whoa, all right, okay. Yeah, I don't know
if it was the PS1 either, just how they recorded
voice acting or voice lines on the CDs, but they
just sounded staticky, I guess, like muffled,
the voices in the game. They're probably low
bitrate and very compressed. It's so weird because...
The music actually sounded pretty good, but once
it came to the voice acting, it was a very different
type of sound. I don't know if they do that as
an effect of making it sound like talking or
what, but it was an odd thing to hear. It could
be emulation, too. Who knows? It's true. It could
be, but it just sounded kind of tinny, like a
tin can, I guess. It was weird. Yeah, could be
the recording, could be emulation, who knows.
The freaking guitar shredding is awesome. I'm
probably going to add this to my playlist. Yeah.
They have metal and that stuff. The guitar shredding,
they're just shredding on the guitar. I don't
remember any of the enemies or anything having
like... unique sounds or nothing that I can really
remember. There was a couple. There was one where
you kill him and then he just goes like, and
then all the blood starts pouring out of him.
But yeah, there's nothing crazy. Jacob, you have
anything? There's just one thing that I thought
was kind of funny. I think the map in this game,
it looks practically identical to the map in
Super Metroid. Oh, does it really? Yeah, I think
it does. And the map for Super Metroid kind of
looks like, I think it's Metroid Fusion's map,
and even like Zero Missions' map, because I think
they run on the same engine. I'm not 100 % sure.
But I think the map... Oh, you mean like the
style? You don't mean like the actual layout?
Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's true,
yeah. They have like that blue background. It
looks pretty similar. I thought that was funny,
because I'm pretty sure this game definitely
takes inspiration from there. Probably, yeah.
Was this game like the first Metroidvania game?
Like, was this the style of the game besides
Metroid? This was the first one for Castlevania,
for sure. Because there was only, I think there
was only four or five before this, and all of
them except one of them were all linear games.
Because the first three were on the NES? Yeah,
the first three were NES. and the one and three
are linear three has like branching paths but
it's all linear and then the second one's a little
weird a second one's kind of like a metroidvania
type game but not like not like this like it's
yeah it's a little bit more like rpgs or something
or like zelda 2 if you ever play zelda 2 and
then 4 is a linear that one's on the snes and
then i think the only other one at the time was
the pc engine one the which is the the one before
this one the rondo of blood Yep, which wasn't
released here. No, it kind of was. They remade
it for the SNES and called it Dracula X or something.
That's right, yeah. It's not the exact same game,
but... And then now it's been released nowadays,
but... But yeah, this is the first one that was
like, explore, find locked doors, get upgrades,
go back to the locked doors. This was the first
one for that, sure. For Castlevania. For Castlevania,
yeah. I think Super Metroid had already come
out at this point. Yeah, it definitely had. It
was a SNES game, yeah. Yep. Yeah, I don't know
if there was a lot of other ones that were doing
that. I'm sure there were other games there had
to be, but it definitely probably wasn't a big
genre like it is nowadays. Yeah, and I'm sure
this game made it a big genre. Yes, it did. The
Metroidvania part of that, it came from this
game. This one actually kind of rewrote Castlevania
after this because most of them followed this
formula after all the games that came after followed
the formula of this one. What was after this
one? Was it the advanced games? I think so. That's
a good question. I actually don't know. I think
there was another one on the PS1. Legends was
the next one, which was a Game Boy one. Oh, the
next one was Castlevania 64, which I really do
want to play, but I don't think this is a good
game. Nobody seems to be talking about that one.
Yeah, no, that one is not a good game. So let's
talk achievements now. What did you guys think
of these achievements? They suck. Yeah, this
list is too much, dude. I always feel like any
list over 99 or 100 is just too much. And the
achievements for this game are like for the people
who've played this game like 10 ,000 times. Yeah,
they are not like beginner friendly. No, or just
even like just casual friendly. Like this is
a... The sweats achievement list, for sure. Castlevania
sweats. Yeah. The first couple hours of this
game, I was getting no achievements. I was like,
am I doing something wrong here? I know. I didn't
even play through as Richter. I started and I
was like, no, I'm good. Dude, Richter is tough
to use. Yeah, I didn't make it very far. I was
like, I'm done with it. You have to use his special
abilities constantly. I didn't really know this,
but on the Saturn version, you can actually play
as Maria as well. Yeah. The Saturn added a couple
content. There's like a secret room that you
can go into that you can't go into in this one
or something. Oh, yeah. Yeah, this list was too
big, too much. I'm not going to be mastering
this one. I think I got about halfway. they're
just too specific yeah like beat the boss with
this weapon and and yeah for every single boss
yeah it's too much and not get hit too also and
then i i missed one stupid enemy that that one
enemy spawns or whatever so i can't get that
one out without starting the game over which
i'm not gonna do i went through a lot of these
and i tried so hard and maybe one day i'll i'll
master this but Nah. Yeah, that's a big feat,
dude. Yeah, I have 72%. Big feat. Big feat. But
some of these have like a 1 .3 % unlock rate.
Yeah, that's pretty crazy. And that's a good
amount of them on here. A lot of them aren't
like hard. They're just time consuming and like...
Just tedious. They're just tedious. achievements
like what you said you have to beat the boss
undamaged and have this certain armor and weapon
set and you can't use abilities you can't use
this and that it's too much it feels like this
list was made by somebody who played this game
a lot like absolutely you know is obsessed with
this game so it would make sense if they had
like a subset for some of this stuff I agree
That's one of the things I feel like the site
does a lot is like some of the stuff sometimes
it's like, personally, I feel the achievement
should be approachable, you know, like doable
by everybody. Like not easy, but just like there
can be hard ones, but they don't need to be like
so, I don't know, crazy hard, you know. But if
you do want that stuff, that's what the subsets
are for. Exactly. That's more of like a, I guess
you could say sweat thing. Yeah. Yeah, just a
hardcore player, yeah. Finish the game as Richter
in one session, defeating all the bosses and
without using save points to refill your health.
Yeah, that's ridiculous. That shouldn't be like
a normal set achievement. It should just be the
game as Richter. Yeah, that's way too absurd.
Which is hard enough. Yeah, exactly. Also, that
freaking boss, man. Galamoth? Yeah, yep, yep,
yep. He's the hardest one. He was tough. He's
harder than Dracula. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. He's
an optional boss. Yeah, but... Well, that's...
He's the hardest boss, man. That's where I found
out about the combos, and if you use that one
sword with the shield, you get that... the 13
swords or whatever it's called, and you kill
him in, like, five seconds. He becomes trivial.
Yep. No, I struggled on him hard, man. Yeah,
I mean, don't get me wrong. I tried like an hour
before and doing trying to kill him. And I was
like, dude, what do you do here? That dude was
tough. Yeah, he was. He was very difficult. All
right. I guess we won't be mastering that one.
So there's slight hope for me, but I like my
sanity. Yeah, same. Your words are as empty as
your soul. Mankind ill needs a savior such as
you. What is a man? a miserable little pile of
secrets but enough talk have at you all right
so let's jump to the review uh what we do here
we don't give like a score anything it's just
a two -part thing it's did you enjoy the game
and would you recommend the game so who wants
to go first i'll go so did you enjoy it initially
not really but the more and more i played it
it started to grow on me and then And then I
ended up liking it. And would you recommend it?
It depends on if you like Metroidvanias, definitely.
If you've never played it before. But you have
to be, you know, a pretty decent gamer for this
game to really dig into it. Yeah, you got to
be able to play video games for sure. This is
not just a, I'm going to pick this up and kind
of play it. You have to really put time into
it. And for an average gamer, I don't know. Yeah,
it would be tough. All right, Ryan. Yeah, I would
agree. At first, I definitely didn't because
there's no direction. You don't know what you're
doing. You don't have any clue of what's going
on. But once you do start powering up and you
understand items and this and that, there is
a lot to learn to the game. You have two castles
to play through and you still learn stuff. You
beat the game and probably don't even know everything.
Yeah. It's a lot. I did enjoy it after I played
it. I thought it was a really good game. I can
see it living up to the hype. I really do. But,
man, that first initial couple hours, it's rough.
All right. Would you recommend it? It depends.
If you're just a casual gamer, I wouldn't because
it's a lot to take in. I wouldn't say it's a
niche thing, but as a Metroidvania, I'd say it's
really tough and it's unforgiving in a lot of
aspects. But if you like Metroidvanias, you probably
already played this game because it's probably
the most talked about one. If you like a challenge,
if you just want to play a game want something
hard, you don't want any direction, you like
that type of stuff, then this game is for you.
But it's hard at first. It really is. It's a
commitment to get into it and start getting the
ball rolling. It's a commitment. But once you
actually start getting into it, you beat a boss
here, you learn some of the stuff, you find some
of the hidden stuff, it's a great game. But just
that initial start is a lot. All right, Jacob.
Yeah, I don't think I'm going to say much new
here. I did enjoy this game. But yeah, the beginning,
it's just it's you really had to work on it.
You really had to be like, listen, it gets better.
It definitely gets better. Again, I wouldn't
recommend this to a casual gamer. You definitely
have to be experienced because, again, the game
just gives you no direction, so you're really
going to have to sit there and just know certain
conventions about video games to really understand
it and pick it up. It is a good game, but it's
not for everybody. If you do want to get into
this game, just know you're going to have to
commit to it and be ready to learn and just be
ready to... go all around the castle and just
pick things up here and there and learn. Yeah,
like a Metroidvania, right? I feel like if you
want to get into this game and you've never really
played a lot of Metroidvanias at all, I would
start with another game. Like Metroid Fusion.
Fusion is definitely a great starting point.
Fusion is king. That's my favorite Metroid game.
I agree. We will play that eventually for this.
Yeah, it's, in my opinion, the best one. Yeah,
for sure. I think we all agree on that. Yeah,
same thing. Like I said, at first I was frustrated,
but there was just something, man. The graphics,
the music, just the exploration of the castle.
something just kept drawing me in even though
I was kind of like I don't know if I want to
play this but it's like you know what I do want
to see where this is going there's just there's
obviously something here because of how big the
name is on this game so um yeah I did eventually
enjoy enjoy it um like I said there's just so
much to see and and find and they keep they keep
you going by sprinkling little things here and
there and everything it Like at first, like you
said, there's no direction. But then once you
start playing it, you actually see that there
is kind of a direction. It's just a lot. It's
just not so obvious at first. So, yeah, I did
enjoy it. I don't know if I'd play it again.
Like I said, I didn't even play through as Richter
again. I'll probably probably won't play it again.
But yeah, I had a good time. I think I would.
I think I would recommend this game to anyone
to try. And I say that just because of things
that, like, we have Demon's Souls and Dark Souls
and, like, Elden Ring. Like, those games are
just so massive, and they do the same stuff,
and everybody seems to love those games. So,
you know what? If you like 2D games and you like
those type of games, then I would check it out.
I would say just check it out. Even just to look
at, like, the artwork and hear the music that's
in this game, I think is worth it. But, all right.
Agree with that. Yeah. All right, that's our
review of Castlevania Symphony of the Night.
So let's go ahead and get on to the next game.
We're going to be playing Splatterhouse for the
TurboGrafx -16. So do you guys have any experience
with this game? You know anything about this
game? I've never played the original ones. Yeah,
we had the PS3 one, which was pretty good. The
PS3 one was pretty good. That's the only experience
I have with Splatterhouse. Okay. That's nothing
like this one, but... Yeah. I've seen things
here and there about this one, but no actual
gameplay experience. Yeah. To not hear of this
game before is... You've never heard of it before?
No, I'm just like, if nobody has ever heard,
you know, you're a gamer and you've never heard
of this game before, it's kind of hard to imagine.
Yeah, I wouldn't say this is like a huge, like
it's not like, you know, Castlevania, but if
you're in the hobby a little bit, then you've
definitely heard of this game, yeah, for sure.
I've played a little bit of it before. I'd never
beaten it or gotten very far, but I know it's
a pretty tough game. But, you know, Jacob, any
experience with this game? No, all I know is
about the PS3 game, so that's it. Okay. All right,
well, it'll be a new experience for us. We'll
see how that goes. And then if we want to, let's
take a quick look at the artwork here. So we
got the front artwork here. It's got a Jason.
It looks like a Jason knockoff and a Scarecrow
knockoff from like Batman or something. Yeah,
this artwork is awesome, bro. Yeah, you got chainsaw
hands like Evil Dead. It's pretty cool. Chainsaw
hands are just like built into his body. That's
true, yeah. He's like Evil Dead Ash from Evil
Dead or whatever. Blocks for hands. Chainsaws
coming out of him. With the freaking ooze on
the walls. Yeah, why is there ooze back there?
I was going to say, I think the green ooze with
the red blood dripping is an odd choice for coloring
there. Monster blood. Yeah, kind of, yeah. I
like the text on the bottom. The horrifying theme
of this game may be inappropriate for young children
and cowards. Yeah. I mean, this artwork, I mean,
this makes me want to play this game. Yeah, it's
pretty sick, yeah. It's enticing. And from what
I know of the game, this is a pretty good representation
of what you'd be doing. Like, you actually do
pick up a stick in this game and beat people
with it. That's awesome. I don't know if this
chainsaw man's in the book. I hope so. Yeah.
It's pretty sweet. All right. And then let's
take a look at the back of the box here. So let's
see. Alone on a stormy night. Enter, if you dare,
the unspeakable horror of Splatterhouse. Hideous
ghouls and demented demons leap from every corner
in a relentless nightmare of terror. Who's that
with a saw? Look out for that axe. Just don't
lose your head as shock after gruesome shock
assaults your senses. Your only hope. Unleash
the monster within yourself and fight back in
the grisly mayhem of Splatterhouse. Yeah, this
has definitely got me sold, for sure. Sounds
badass. The artwork's pretty cool. Oh yeah, Chainsaw
Man is there. Oh yeah, there he is, yep. That,
like, second picture in the middle there is creeping
me out. Yeah, what is going on, though? Like
a big flesh baby thing or something? Yeah, I
have no idea. And then what is he doing? He's
like... kneeling in the air i don't know that
was an odd picture yeah it's funny you can see
how fuzzy these are they're like pictures off
a tv screen because they didn't have ways to
make take uh screenshots back then i like how
this says ages 10 years and up it's just gonna
say i love that man that 10 years and up that's
crazy dude i know this is like a pretty bloody
game i wonder just the time children i guess
I guess so. I know this is based off an arcade
game, so I wonder if this one's not as bloody
as the arcade game. Maybe. They didn't have ratings
back then either, huh? No, not yet, no. Because
they don't have anywhere on the box. It says
on the box 1990, so this would be like two years
before the ERSB thing. 88. It says 88. Yeah,
but it says 1992, so I mean. Yeah. I think the
88 was the arcade, the 90 is the TurboGrafx.
Yeah, that's a very odd thing to read. It's inappropriate
for young children. Ten and up. Alright, well,
this is another episode. Thanks everyone for
listening and look forward to the next episode
when we play Splatterhouse. So we'll see you
guys next time. See you guys. Bye.