Castlevania has had a, let's just say, difficult time going from 2D to 3D. And although the two Nintendo 64 titles were a little on the weird side, they were still pretty fun. But the first PS2 effort has got to be the worst Castlevania game I've ever played.
Gameplay
For some reason, Konami thought somewhere along the line, that changing this Castlevania game from an adventure game to a hack n' slash game(Think Dynasty Warriors here. No joke.). The gameplay has been dumbed down terribly. Instead of letting you figure out where to go on your own, they have arrows going in or out of the door to tell you if you're supposed to go that way or not. The combat in the game is no better, either. You have a weak attack and a strong attack. You're supposed to make combos out of 2 attacks (and a downward air-kick). This leads you to doing the same 3-5 hit combos over and over again. The relics you find give the combat a minor saving grace, but not by much. Also, no level-up system or interchangable weapons forces you to run around looking for Life Max Ups and Heart Max Ups...you get the idea.
Storyline
The storyline is the only reason to play this game. It tells the story of the Leon Belmont trying to save this girl he's engaged to. Eventually, he ends up in the castle. Since it's based in the 11th century, the game tells how the Belmonts got their whip, Vampirekiller. As well as how Dracula was born in the first place, and his true link with the Belmont Clan.
Graphics/Sound
The graphics are admittedly impressive consideriing it was on PS2. It looks good. The details are there, and the movements are pretty fluid, too. The cryptic soundtrack is nice, too. And it fits the mood of the castle well. Good graphics and good sound don't make up for crappy gameplay, though.
No disrespect to Konami, and especially no disrespect to that "Iga" guy or whatever his name is (The guy that worked on Symphony of the Night as his first project. I forgot his name), but they should be embarassed at what they've done here. Bottom line, if you really have to know how the whole Belmont-Dracula business began (I unfortunately did), then you'll have to play this. Otherwise, soak it in Holy Water, because it needs major purification here.
The PlayStation 2 was a treasure trove for all kind of experiments. Today, we're taking at the best PS2 Metroidvania games.
If you decide to play a Castlevania game, make sure it's in 2D. Unfortunately, the series has never been able to make the jump from 2D to 3D successfully. Publisher Konami has tried. Six times in fact, but whether trying to build it in-house or with a third party developer, they never captured the essence of the series or make a good game for that matter. So just to be sure you know what to look out for, here are the six 3D Castlevania games that have been made.
I loved the hell out of lords of shadow, lords if shadow 2 had its moments but just didnt leave as much of an impact on me as the first did, still loved it though. They are both great games IMO, maybe not the best "Castlevania" games but great games in their own right.
Yeah that first game was legit good. Really wish they hadn't taken a step back for the second, this series really looked great in 3D.
According to one of the former devs of Mercury Steam the higher ups kept interfering with the sequel to the point where the game was nothing like what the dev team had envisioned for the sequel so we got the mess that was Lords of Shadows 2.
I enjoyed Lament of Innocence and Lords of Shadow. They were entertaining titles and I wouldn’t mind trying Lords of Shadow 2 on PS Now.
Just because a game isn’t GOTY worthy does not mean it’s not worth playing. You could do a lot worse than those exceptional titles.
I really liked lament of innocence and Lords of shadow! Havent tried the other 3d games. But ive played most of the 2d games!
I don't know why Castlevania: Lament of Innocence gets a bad rap. It was one of the best in the series at that time and really was a compliment to the Devil May Cry 3rd person style of action that was getting popular at that time.
I rented it on a fluke and was seriously surprised on how good it was. So much so I went out and bought a used copy of Curse of Darkness and instantly returned that trash.
The problem with Nintendo 64 games is they all tried to mimic the Mario/Zelda 64 style of gameplay and how could they not with that whacky ass N64 controller. Almost every game outside of Nintendo's own felt horrible and incomplete.
With the Castlevania Anniversary Collection coming up, now seems like the perfect time to grab Castlevania Lament of Innocence on your PS2 or PS3.
I seriously loved this Castlevania entry. It had the God of War action style and some really cool enemy designs. Plus hidden areas like SOTN.
Very underrated and extremely good, imo.
It was actually a Devil May Cry style they were aiming for since Gow hadn’t been released at the time
Good game, but you gotta get used to the grid style controls with linear pathways.
