the pixel art is incredible. it’s not just the level design though, the weapons all feel terrible to use compared to aria. it’s just kind of overall sluggish and bad gamefeel. I played all the gba/DS igavanias last year back to back and DoS stood out the most in terms of just not being fun.
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What was your ranking toups?
dwan of sorrow is also cursed by being an early ds game, and having the obligatory stupid touchscreen gimmick
(in its defence, though, it was dawn of sorrow and sonic rush that got me to trade in my gp32 for a ds)(which in retrospect was probably at least somewhat unwise in the long term)
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something about the level junctions and how difficult they were to match up to the illustrated map in cv3 really gripped my imagination and actually made me not want to touch the game for a while, just let it sit in my mind as this unresolved amorphous structure
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hmm
I guess it’d be like
harmony of dissonance
aria of sorrow
order of ecclesia
portrait of ruin
circle of the moon
dawn of sorrow
harmony of dissonance is just fucking excellent, extremely fun, banging soundtrack, top notch aesthetic, incredible sense of style. just sublime.
aria of sorrow is a more “complete” game, has more interesting mechanics, but is kind of dull conceptually and the soundtrack is well-made but is so thin-sounding.
order of ecclesia is flawed but deeply interesting and has maybe the most satisfying difficulty curve of the entire series. the aesthetic is all over the place but when it works it sings
portrait of ruin is just kind of mindless popcorn fun. the yuzo koshiro soundtrack really carries it. would be a lot less enjoyable without that. also surprisingly challenging in some spots. the late game is kind of a slog though.
circle of the moon has a ton of interesting ideas but just abysmal level design. good ost though and I actually really dig the card/magic system. just wish everything else wasn’t so undercooked.
dawn of sorrow would be a lot better if all the melee weapon animations were like 30% faster and the touch screen stuff was removed. even then though it’s just not very coherently put together and the story is just kind of insipid. soundtrack is hit or miss or too… and even when it’s good it feels like it’s on auto-pilot.
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bloodstained is crazy to me because it feels like it shouldn’t be good at all but it’s actually quite good. I think it actually pushes the genre further than a lot of people give it credit for. like, you have so much more complex build flexibility than in any of the canon igavanias and most metroidvanias in general. really builds on aria’s concepts in interesting ways.
I did not like the general aesthetic/vibe of the game when I first played but it ends up gelling much better than first impressions let on. and yeah the music is way better than I expected. the final product ends up being an interesting mess in a very similar way to sotn, though it’s a distinctly different kind of interesting. I think that’s worth something.
apparently they’re making a sequel and I’m genuinely looking forward to it.
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Yesssss!! Glad you’re on the Bloodstained train! Agree on all your points. I really wish it started off stronger because its first few hours are easily its weakest.
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yeah the opening area is like remarkably dull and uninteresting compared to the rest of the game. feels like they hadn’t found their footing yet but never had time go back and revise it.
as it is though I think what makes it the most sotn-like igavania since sotn is really that it just takes an absolutely maximalist approach. every igavania since sotn has felt reined in and restrained. and while they’re neat, what really makes sotn special is the sense that they were getting away with throwing whatever kind of crazy shit they felt like with a relatively sizable budget for the era. and bloodstained really recaptures that spirit, for all of its other faults. I just think it’s a singularly unique experience so it’s very easy for me to forgive the ways in which it’s awkward and off-color.
that said I’m glad I’m playing it on PC so I can mod out the kickstarter backer portraits with ayami kojima art. on the other hand, I feel like that aspect of it in particular is an extremely appropriate flavor of kitsch that will be looked upon with campy nostalgia before any of us are remotely ready to accept that.
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seriously though how can you listen to this and not get hyped up for whipping some fuckin’ skeletons n bats?
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I didn’t gel with PoR but you can’t deny the soundtrack. The tag team of Yamane and Koshiro is unfuckwithable.
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I loved all of them but Portrait of Ruin’s better bosses didn’t really make up for the less interesting hub based layout for me.
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When I played Bloodstained: RotN I found it so… Frictionless and without texture. I just ran to the earliest ending I could and called it a day. Truly got nothing out of it !
Played of lot of the Curse of the Moon, tho. I think my days as a fan of “Daddy CastVan” are over. I should probaly see what the NES trilogy is going for these days.
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I recently beat Simon’s Quest over the course of two nights and that shit was for fuckin’ babies, yes this may be because I knew what the blue crystal did and some of that other shit but as an NES action game it is very very easy, the night/day cycle is kind of a drag, felt like nights lasted 3x as long as days, also I think I’d rather start over in the first town on a game over than lose all my dang XP but it was an easy game to win, maybe I’ll try beating the first one next, I’m unstoppable
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I solved this by playing in hard mode. I’ve never even tried the normal mode. Probably one of the reasons I have a high opinion of RotN.
All of the Igavanias have the problem of being mostly frictionless of normal difficulty. They give you a lot of player tools but nothing worth using them against. They further aggravate the problem by locking the hard mode behind game completion instead of just giving you a menu up front. Fortunately, Bloodstained at least partly learned from their past mistakes by providing a secret code to turn it on on a new save (name the file “NIGHTMARE”).
Solves the early game boredom problem too. Like in Ecclesia, the beginning is by far the most deadly area on hard, because you can’t buy healing potions yet.
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Thanks for this. I might venture to try again!
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Be warned - that first boss is a real problem and isn’t balanced at all like the rest of it. If you can get past it (took me thirty minutes) you should be good.
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is SotN’s “thief mode” a worthwhile time?
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yeah the main deal with simon’s quest is that it gets by almost entirely on vibes. it’s remarkable how loose and sloppy the design is compared to how airtight cv1 and 3 are. simon’s quest is one of the earlier hangoutitude games I can remember. the atmosphere is just so cool. the music rips. exploring is consistently confusing and mysterious enough to stay compelling for probably a lot longer than it should.
it’s not exactly a “good” game so I can’t fault you for not digging it, but I can’t help but love it.
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Oh I did enjoy it, it’s sick as hell, its use of black is top tier, I was just shocked by how easy it was mainly! Laure Soup is right, even a parent can beat that game! Yet folks been griping about it for decades now!!
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