Vas iz das? Yes, another post to the front of BreakmanX.com! When it rains, it pours, and we, like so many zombies returning from theirgraves, rise up to swarm you like bees and so many mixed metaphors!
It hasn’t all been sunshine and rainbows lately, no sir. Break is still away, busy with film school, conquering the Western seaboardwith his mighty standard. Q and his Mrs are settling nicely into domesticlivelyhood. Richie and his lady are off battling Columbian drug cartels. And I… I am a lowly factory worker, having just completed my first full lengthscript and submitted it to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & SciencesNicholls screenwriting competition. (Zeotrope, I got my eye on you next!)
Yes, dear reader, we have been busy as hell. But Break has much in store for you on the horizon! And ,in the midst of that, there was… a game.
Now, I realize that this game came out like a year and ahalf ago, but dammit, I’ve hardly had time to play any games lately, so havignfinished Castlevania, Order of Shadows, I thought I’d put up a little review. Idoubt most were even aware of the existance of this entry in the highly vauntedgame series anyway, so what the hell.
I was on my lunchbreak when I discovered that a Castlevaniafor cellphones existed. Chewing remorsefully on my ham sammich, I figurednothing could lift my spirits better than a fresh trek through Dracula’scastle. I’m not sure if the result was quite so rejuvinating as all that, butbeing the
Set in 1600s
Desmond bears more than a striking resemblance to anotherKonami character, Yu-Gi-Oh. Like Yugi, Desmond has red, spikey hair and yellowforelocks. If he were blown up in 3D on the PS3
, I’m sure he’d have Trap Cardsstuck to his arms as well. Anyway, Yugi Belmont’s adventure is in the Symphonyof the Night tradition, a freeroaming castle experience with bosses at oddintervals, experience points, and a multitude of subweapons to pick up alongthe way. Also available after a few level-ups is the ability to use ‘alchemy’,spells which don’t take up your MP, which is refilled by hearts.
The gameplay works pretty well. Surprisingly so, in fact.There is only one major button, and you use it to whip baddies to death. The upkey, previously useless in Castlevania unless used in conjunction with ahorizontal direction key to climb stairs, is now your jump button. The subweapons are used by hitting the 9 key, and are really pretty sparinglyutilized, anyway. It was a pleasant surprise just how easily I could navigatethe castle with one thumb, while still eating my ham sammich.
The big problem with the game is that its very short, andalso a little bland. The game’s graphics look as good as anything on the SNES,or maybe the GBA (though with cartoony sprites to accomodate the smallscreens), but they’re just lazy. There are only five areas to the castle, sothe free-roaming aspect isn’t really particularly useful or cool. F
ive distinctlevels would have been a better way to go. As it is, the five areas are barelydistinguishable. We get a dark hallway, dark underground, dark tower, themoment ypu finally get some cool curtains and gothic crosses in the background,you find yourself facing down Dracula himself. The gameplay is fine inprinciple, but there aren’t even 20 enemy types, bosses include. There justisn’t much to see or do here. Hell, the second subweapon I got was theCrissagrim, and I never needed another one after it. Its just kind of ahalf-assed build for the castle. You can get through the entire game in an houror so. Not bad for $10 on a cellphone, I suppose, but Caveat Emptor, friends.Thumbs up for the option to use the new soundtrack, or the original NES midis.
One cool bit, though, is that they use a traditionalweakness of the vampire as a means of defeating Dracula. Sunlight? Crosses?Nope, its the time honored tradition of double jumping over them and thenwhipping them in the back till they drop…. oh, that’s not one of them?Dammit, Konami, fooled me again.
