Retro Arena: The Castlevania series

[vanpeebles]

*grabs Leon's computer desk and flips it ower with Leon's still sat at it*

[Leon Retro]

*grabs Leon's computer desk and flips it ower with Leon's still sat at it*

Stop messing with me.

[samanosuke]

I would have added it.... but it's a bloody 2015 game.

Are you implying that a game released for a 1982 system, albeit in 2015, does not constitute being retro? An interesting argument, I’ll give it that.

[Leon Retro]

Are you implying that a game released for a 1982 system, albeit in 2015, does not constitute being retro? An interesting argument, I’ll give it that.

Well, it's easy to see that I create a 'timeline', so if I included 2015 Spectrum Castlevania, I'd have to include the GBA games etc...

I definitely consider it to be a "retro" game, but I decided to only include games that were released up to the PlayStation era. If it had come out in the 80s or even 90s, obviously I would have included it.



Anyway, it's a really nice Spectrum game that was crafted with lots of care and attention. Would be a classic game if it had come out back in the day.

[Cepp]

The only Castlevania I ever truly enjoyed was Super Castlevania which is just brilliant. Castlevania Chronicles seemed alright as well but I never got far in it.

Metroidvanias do nothing for me so anything released after the 16bit era is just ignored (excluding Chronicles but that doesn't count).

[samanosuke]

I definitely consider it to be a "retro" game, but I decided to only include games that were released up to the PlayStation era. If it had come out in the 80s or even 90s, obviously I would have included it.

Fair point. And then if GBA then why not DS? Etc etc.

The only Castlevania I ever truly enjoyed was Super Castlevania which is just brilliant. Castlevania Chronicles seemed alright as well but I never got far in it.

Metroidvanias do nothing for me so anything released after the 16bit era is just ignored (excluding Chronicles but that doesn't count).

You have played Rondo, right?

[Leon Retro]

The only Castlevania I ever truly enjoyed was Super Castlevania which is just brilliant.

Yeah, an epic game in all areas. Such a brilliant creation.

Castlevania Chronicles seemed alright as well but I never got far in it.

It's a great way to play the X68000 Castlevania. It has enhancements over the 1993 original. You can choose 'Arrange' or 'Original' versions of the game.

Metroidvanias do nothing for me so anything released after the 16bit era is just ignored (excluding Chronicles but that doesn't count).

I had friends who loved Symphony, so I tried to get into it, but I never got far. The style of gameplay doesn't gel with me -- I prefer the more straightforward formula of earlier games in the series. I can certainly appreciate why Symphony is so popular though.

[Cepp]

You have played Rondo, right?

Yeah, it's alright. I vastly prefer Super Castlevania IV which I still go back to.

[samanosuke]

So Leon disrespects the x68000 and the speccy!!

Innit bruv. Two of the best, if not THE best, home computers ever made*

*personally I would include the Amiga as well but that’s kind of controversial around these parts thanks to its abysmal arcade conversions and identikit middling platformers

[Leon Retro]

And then if GBA then why not DS? Etc etc.

Yeah, I didn't want to enter that territory. Would become ridiculous. I still like to focus on everything pre-2000. That stance will probably change over the next few years.

Innit bruv. Two of the best, if not THE best, home computers ever made*

I'm really fond of the Spectrum because there's something very distinct about how detailed its games can be. A completely different look to the C64 and Amstrad. I also like how developers managed to do quite amazing things with relatively simple hardware. Some Spectrum games still really impress me.

The X68000 though, isn't a computer I have any love for. The most interesting thing about it is the really cool design, which makes it the best looking computer ever made. The big problem is it cost around $3000, so wasn't aimed at the mainstream market. It wasn't a mass market product like the Amiga and consoles. So as much as people say it's amazing tech, that was to be expected when it cost six times the price of an A500.

If it had cost £500, then it really would have been incredible. Instead it was a hugely expensive machine that happened to have the same sort of tech as arcade machines of the time. A cool machine but not one that was within most people's grasp.

*personally I would include the Amiga as well but that’s kind of controversial around these parts thanks to its abysmal arcade conversions and identikit middling platformers

It's easy to look at all the crap games that spoil the Amiga's library, but the best games really show off the tech. Of course, the A500 wasn't ideal in some ways, but talented people managed to do great things with the tech. I see the A500 as a very important part of computer gaming history. It's also a machine that gave gamers lots of truly great games that they have fond memories of. It's just a shame that so many Amiga games were developed by people who didn't have a clue.

Also, as much as there were some truly horrible arcade ports on the Amiga, there are also quite a few decent ports. The best examples manage to show how capable the A500 tech was in the right hands. It's such a shame that some devs delivered sloppy ST ports, or simply didn't have the skills to make the most of the machine.



A truly terrible NES port. It really highlights how amateurish some Amiga devs were.

[samanosuke]

It's easy to look at all the crap games that spoil the Amiga's library, but the best games really show off the tech. Of course, the A500 wasn't ideal in some ways, but talented people managed to do great things with the tech. I see the A500 as a very important part of computer gaming history. It's also a machine that gave gamers lots of truly great games that they have fond memories of. It's just a shame that so many Amiga games were developed by people who didn't have a clue.

At the risk of diverting this thread off-track, I totally agree.

The strength of the Amiga needs to be looked at contextually rather than straight up comparisons against the MD/SNES/PC. It’s easy to retrospectively say X game was better on console or Y was released on the PC so therefore today the Amiga brings little to the table. But looking at it historically, in the mid to late eighties it offered vastly superior graphics and audio to any other platform; consoles were still 8-bit and the IBM PC, which was 100% a business machine costing thousands of pounds, was typically a CGA or EGA machine with PC speaker audio and sorely lacked the custom architecture featured in the Amiga. Much as ST owners would argue otherwise, it neither could compete on a technical level.

So in its infancy it offered the most advanced technology. Its hardware was beefy enough for it to still compete with the 16-bit consoles during their heyday in spite of the five year gap between the release of the original A1000 and the Japanese release of the Super Famicom. That’s practically a generation apart, yet some of the more accomplished Amiga titles were comparable to their console counterparts (Mortal Kombat, T2: Arcade, Alien3, Desert Strike, Robocod to name but a few).

On top of this, during the early nineties there were also a lot of cross-platform ST/Amiga/PC style games that offered something above and beyond what consoles could offer, from point and click games to Western style RPGs, from flight sims to strategy games. It’s easy in hindsight to say that, as great as they are, games like Hired Guns, Frontier: Elite 2, Monkey Island 2, Geoff Crammond’s F1 and Eye of the Beholder are available on the PC and, thanks to the introduction of VGA, look better in many cases, but back then PCs were still consigned to the business market and cost a fortune. It wasn’t until the advent of the 386 that I started seeing them appear around mates’ houses, often belonging to their parents as work machines more than gaming setups. That is apart from one mate whose dad was a banker, and he had a huge IBM 286 with EGA graphics, 5 1/4” floppies and a Winchester hard drive. But I digress; my point is these machines were very expensive and the Amiga provided a route to this type of game for the mass market. I remember even after getting a Mega Drive, I spent as much time of not more still playing my Amiga, and although I played fewer and fewer arcade/action titles on it thanks to the MD’s overall superiority in this regard, games like Dune, Legend (an isometric RPG), Darkseed, Flashback, Wing Commander and other computer style games kept me coming back to it time and time again.

One last point which again is probably lost when looking at it today was the sheer number of PD titles released for it back then, with games costing little more than the price of the disks they came on. It was the original indie machine, and whilst much like today, your mileage would vary in terms of quality, there were some truly astounding and addictive titles to come out from people’s bedrooms. For me I spent literally dozens of hours playing the likes of Crazy Sue and its sequel, Mr and Mrs (a Head Over Heels type game but in a 2D world, free on the front of Amiga Power), and Deluxe Pac-Man. This was something that simply could not exist on consoles back then.

I can totally understand why perhaps those who never owned an Amiga back in the day fail to see its appeal, but for those of us who were lucky enough to own Commodore’s powerhouse, we can appreciate what a truly amazing and versatile machine it was.

Oh, and that Castlevania port for it looks absolutely sh*te.

[Leon Retro]

But looking at it historically, in the mid to late eighties it offered vastly superior graphics and audio to any other platform; consoles were still 8-bit and the IBM PC, which was 100% a business machine costing thousands of pounds, was typically a CGA or EGA machine with PC speaker audio and sorely lacked the custom architecture featured in the Amiga. Much as ST owners would argue otherwise, it neither could compete on a technical level.

Yeah, the A1000 had custom tech that had capabilities way beyond anything else at the time of its inception[1985]. The hardware easily beat far more expensive machines such as IBM PCs and Apple Mac computers during the mid to late '80s. It was also far more capable in all departments than the Atari ST.

The A500 then made the tech more affordable from 1987 onwards. When the price fell to £399, it became the 'must-have' computer of the late '80s and early '90s. That's when clever people started to really show off the Amiga and convince people that it was truly something special.

That’s practically a generation apart, yet some of the more accomplished Amiga titles were comparable to their console counterparts (Mortal Kombat, T2: Arcade, Alien3, Desert Strike, Robocod to name but a few).

The very best Amiga games easily show that the machine could compete well with the 16-bit consoles of the time. Top developers managed to push the A500 further and further right up to 1995. The machine really needs to be judged by its best games.

I can totally understand why perhaps those who never owned an Amiga back in the day fail to see its appeal, but for those of us who were lucky enough to own Commodore’s powerhouse, we can appreciate what a truly amazing and versatile machine it was.

It's easy to look at all the truly terrible Amiga games, many of which are dreadful arcade ports, and then think the machine was severely lacking. But there are also plenty of AAA quality titles that really show off how special the tech is. Even the limited 4 channel audio was overcome by clever programmers. Once dedicated people decided to really take advantage of the A500 and stop doing lazy ST ports, the machine played host to loads of great games.

Oh, and that Castlevania port for it looks absolutely sh*te.

A prime example of how bad an Amiga developer could be. Just one of many woeful games that totally failed to do the Amiga justice.

[fuse]

Symphony is up there as one of my favourite games of all time, and an easy top choice for me. If you've not played it already, I cannot encourage you enough to address that. Rondo's a clear second, as my favourite non-Iga game by some length. Great branching stages, brilliant action (I love the way both Richter and Maria control), and oh my goodness that soundtrack.

Third is definitely the tricky choice. Despite having never sat down to finish it myself, I'd likely go with Super / IV - the weight in the controls feels very right to me, and having watched speed runners take it apart, I find some of the stages and the way you can deal with them is brilliant. Hoping the time-clipping works for this, but if not - from 36:20 there's the clock tower stage, being dismantled in total style and with it's lovely version of Bloody Tears playing in the background.



If GBA/DS games were in here, it'd be a different matter!

I used to love the first GB game but going back to it now is very, very difficult - design aside, it's a bit of a technical mess. Whereas, given I only played it on the Hamster PS2 release, I've always found that AC Haunted Castle is one that I just cannot get on with, though.

This is a whole other topic that I've been meaning to update in here, but on a recent poke about Paris' amazing game shopping scene, I picked up a really nice condition FDS version of the first game, despite not owning any hardware to play it on

[Leon Retro]

I've always found that AC Haunted Castle is one that I just cannot get on with, though.

It's such a clunky game, so I've never enjoyed playing it. A Castlevania taking advantage of coin-op hardware could have been amazing, so it's such a shame it's pretty poor.

I picked up a really nice condition FDS version of the first game, despite not owning any hardware to play it on

I've bought gaming items that I don't really need, but some things have a 'cool factor' that I can't resist.

[JazzFunk]

Happy to say I've played thirteen of those games you've listed, including Haunted Castle when it came out in the arcade. I'm in love with the world of Castlevania, the style. It is a brilliant little zone to be in, get lost in.

So hard to choose a fave. Toss-up betwixt IV, Symphony and Bloodlines I guess. I need to give Rondo more attention.

The first N64 game was absolute rubbish, I'm afraid to say. I didn't like it at all. Not sure what the second one is like?

The PS2 versions are OK. But not Castlevaniaey enough. A bit like low budget Devil May Cry sorta thangs.

Wii ReBirth is the one that blew me away most recently, it's wowsers. But that's not on the list so it doesn't count. Got the Wii one-on-fighter, too, forgotten it's name tho. Anyway, not as good as ReBirth.

Ah, sod it, as I've been playing it on 360 recently, Symphony is my *current* fave. So much content, new enemies and stuff to find and I love the grinding. Never gets old and it has some proper stonking choonage which I'm appreciating more these days.