Better than COTM, and Harmony without a doubt. Portrait is way too easy. Haven't replayed Aria, and could never beat Dawn because my L button broke lol, so I wont weigh in on those two.
Agree: I thought OoE was outstanding (and I still go back to it occasionally). I think the weakest ones are CotM and HoD (though they're still pretty good).
It's my favorite by far, has even surpassed Symphony of the Night for me and I'm not sure if I like it better than Bloodstained or not, but they're close. The review makes it look like Joe didn't get very far in the game. He doesn't seem to have a clue that you still get to tackle Drac's castle, for instance, which has very interesting and innovate level design for the series.
I was kinda disappointed that the Castlevania Anniversary Collection didn't include any of these games. But considering the $20 price, it's understandable. I hope Konami does a second Castlevania Collection, but with all the Metroidvania installments and Rondo Of Blood.
Konami would have to put in work to get the DS games working in single screen or not be willing to sell Symphony of Night for more than 10 bucks, both things that aren't up their alley.
@@anthonya.jumelles7103 If Capcom can get the Mega Man ZX games to work on modern consoles with their upcoming Zero/ZX Collection, then Konami should do the same with their Castlevania titles.
@@anthonya.jumelles7103 more like they never heard of their consumer, I mean look at new Contra, I don't know if that can be consider as Contra game when it's just generic top down shooter there even no run and avoid mechanic just shoot at endless enemy unlike other 3D contra game and the character is boring to look.
My uncle got me a Gameboy advance in 2011,when I wanted a psp. While the world was playing psp games,I was playing The aria of sorrow. It was the best thing that happened. The music of that game still makes me nostalgic. And it is through this Gameboy advance I realised the joy of playing these old games that came before me
Assalamualaikum sister, similar to me but my first was Castlevania Circle of the Moon and it was in 2001 and I fell in love with the series ever since. Aria of Sorrow was my second Castlevania shortly after.
Aria of Sorrow is the best of the Vania’s. I had a GBA SP and picked up Aria of Sorrow when I saw the gameplay on G4(I believe that’s what the channel was called at the time instead of its other names), and it was showcased gameplay only on their gametrailers show. Still have two of the games complete in box. My brother, cousin, and I printed out the entire map on 4 or 6 pages of paper and taped them all together on my closet door. We had our own game saves and actually took turns playing it surprisingly 😂
@@JazGalaxy Honestly, a long time ago, I would've considered OoE to be my third favorite Castlevania game in this style, but revisiting it in the past year really changed my opinion on it. I found most of the enemy drops to be really uninteresting, with most of them being crafting items instead of interesting items. As much as I hate farming for items in games like this, I have to say that it's at least a nice surprise on occasion in these games. Over the past year, I've been playing a lot of SotN with the SotN Randomizer, and the enemy drops with the Randomizer have gotten me to play SotN so much differently. I don't think OoE encourages the same level of variety in how you play it.
Wolfdragon92584 really? It’s been a very long time since I played it but I don’t recall having that reaction at all. O remember having to fight the end boss a few times and that collapsing tower a few times just because I didn’t understand what I was supposed to do. But other than that I didn’t have any problem with it and really enjoyed it. I only think I died at those spots.
@@JazGalaxy Well, for a Castlevania game it was very tough. Granted, most Castlevania games since the 90s were rather on the easy side- with some exceptions. It was definitely the toughest Castlevania since Circle of the Moon.
I remember when Circle of the Moon came out. Everyone complained the game was "too dark," and some went as far as to say it was "unplayable." This may be why Harmony of Dissonance is so bright.
kylethestyle it totally is. Also CotM being “too dark” was a blessing in disguise since it’s graphical style when blown up on a backlit screen (be it a GBA SP, a DS, or an HDTV) looks so much better than the super bright HoD and AoS games that came after.
That is EXACTLY what it was. The major complaint about Circle of the Moon is that it was too dark. It actually wasn't too dark, it was the un-lit GBA screen that made it that way. A lot of early GBA games made their games extra bright to compensate for the lack of lit up screen. A lot of the SNES ports did that (Donkey Kong Country and some of the Mario ports are good examples). I imagine the group making Circle of the Moon hadn't thought about the darker screen yet (I mean, it was a super early game. Googling tells me it was released the same month as the GBA itself. March 2001.) By the time Harmony was released, it was already pretty common practice to make games brighter on the GBA to try and make it visible on the dark screen. Honestly, I hate that they had to make games brighter to make them playable. To the point where I'd rather use my GBA flash cart to play rom hacks of a lot of the games that darken the colors. I didn't find any such hacks for Harmony, but someone DID make a hack to remove the weird glowing border around stuff, so that's something.
@@Madman-bi5bf Capcom was never so low to release games like MGS Survive and Contra Rogue Corps and nothing else besides bare minimum ports and collections of games from their glory days. Even when they were at their lowest they at least tried. RE5 and 6 for all their faults are still competently made games with high production values and care put into them and i despise RE6 but that's not the point. And we still got stuff like Revelations 1 and 2 along with glorious remasters of RE0 or Okami way before the Ultra "RE7-MM11-MHW-REmake2-DMCV Comeback Combo". I give Konami 3 more years (and that's generous) to release a game with some form of budget and vision or a collection where they'd have to actually put in some effort like a CV DS Trilogy Collection where they'd be forced to change things like touch controls for modern consoles which requires competence and care. If all they're gonna do is to rely on their old and easy to port (but not optimize appearently) games from the past and low budget, almost cynical, products straight out of their asses they can rot in their MGS3 and SH2 "erotic action" pachinko hole for all i care.
Konami were my favorite 3rd party publisher back in the day. Here's hoping they get their game together. If not, independent developers will pick up the slack. EA gave up on Dead Space. Now Negative Atmosphere will pick up the slack. Independent game developers are listening more than the large ones are.
@@specknacken6507 You make it sound as though Konami cares. You do realize that they're actually one of the richest gaming companies from Japan right? It's similar to how everyone assumes Sega is going bankrupt when they're still the 2nd richest game company in Japan, after Nintendo.
@@specknacken6507 I ain't defending Konami, just saying that Capcom had to win back gamers, coz Capcom was on the verge of bankruptcy. Konami doesn't care, coz they don't need us. It's a shame & I wish someone would buy off their Ips, but it's the same case for Sega. I wish someone would buy off Sega's ips too. In both cases, Konami & Sega re too expensive to buy out. Nintendo or Sony are the only game devs in Japan who have the cash flow to buy them out.
33:32 I thought the glyph menu worked that way because you had a “last 3 used” memory function for each hand… so, y’know, if there was a trio of glyphs you liked using for each hand, you could quickly swap between them rather than hunting for them in the entire list. I kinda thought it was a nice function, but I guess I can see where it might be confusing.
9:39 First time I notice how extremely well Joe's last name "Redifer" fits into the Castlevania universe. It could totally be the name for a new character, like "Redifer Belmont" and it would sound great.
Man the GBA and DS were such a golden time for Metroidvania games. The 6 Castlevanias, Metroid Fusion and Zero Mission, Mega Man ZX and Advent, there was just always something new to play.
Also, just to add: If you get all the boss orbs in Julius mode and finish that map Julius will "unlock" the full power of the Vampire Killer making it stronger.
One of my favorite castlevanias is portrait of ruin. I loved the dual characthers and the different stages a.k.a "portraits" were a breath of fresh air. And also it was great to know more about the story of castlevania: bloodlines. ... When it comes to classic 2D castlevanias, my favorite is Super Castlevania which I was able to finish back in the day thought a lot of effort.
In Order of Ecclesia, the reason some things are shown twice with different colors is because you have one equipped. You can equip the same glyph multiple times, so it needs to be shown twice. I found Order of Ecclesia's difficulty refreshing after so many super easy Castlevania games. I feel that you're intended to rely on your skill a lot more, instead of being super powerful.
Honestly, I feel like a good metroidvania style Castlevania game would let you rely on either skill OR power. Like, you can make your way through the game by being good at it. Or you could simply grind to get stronger, making the game easier for you. I always prefer when I have the option to make a game easier for myself by actually putting in the work to MAKE it easier for myself.
One of my favorite eras of handheld gaming during the 2000's. The excellent GBA an DS Castlevania games that were constantly pumped out by Classic Konami will always have a place in my heart. It's one of the many reasons the 3DS era feels so lacking to me.
Next then the 3D Castlevanias? -Castlevania 64 -Castlevania 64 Legacy of Darkness (is not bad as everyone thinks, just the camera sucks) -Lament of innocence (very good one) -Curse of Darkness (another very nice) -Lord of Shadows (is not a bad game, but i don't consider this a Castlevania, still have to put in this list) -Lord of Shadows 2 -Reincarnation (that reject form Dreamcast)
Lament of Innocence? One might just wonder if the title was pointed at the unknowing gamer starting up the game. Barely any music, mapdesign is bland at best and nothing else interesting ever happens. Curse of Darkness is almost as bad, only real difference being it has some good music. The N64 ones got a fair review at AVGN and those last gen CVs leans more to being some DMC siblings.
The moment when Alucard enters in the darker lobby and the music begins to play just when lights get brighter. I never felt so damn heroic as that moment.
Joe, you missed one! The one for 3DS "Lords of Shadow - Mirror of Fate" It's a Metroidvania-style castlevania game. Easily the worst of them, but still.
@@DOSfanatic The video is about Castlevania Metroidvanias. Not Castlevania MetroidVanias made by Iga's team at Konami. And one of the ones featured did not have Iga as creator so... Yeah, he missed it.
Funny enough about Harmony of dissonance is that I think the bad music is intentional given the title of the game. Also once you beat it and reach the credits, the music becomes amazing for only one song lol
@@jbfarley emulators give mixed results depending on the game, the ROM, the emulator used, and the hardware readily available. Most of these games can be emulated without a hitch, but the DS games, nah, its a bit of an issue with a second touch screen and not as convenient.
I'd rank them like this: 1-I really ended up loving Portrait of Ruin. I thought the soundtrack was just as good as SotN, the two characters specializing in different things was extremely fun to experiment with, finding all the spells for Charlotte or the subweapons for Jonathan and completing all the quests was very worthwhile as they rewarded you with some really OP gear, like the time stop spell. The different portraits were incredibly varied and fun to explore, with a ton of new enemies, new music for each one, secret rooms and memorable bosses, and even the endgame gauntlet dungeon was something I really enjoyed. The only flaw I can think of is that leveling up Jonathan's subweapons took way too long, but it's also entirely optional so you can just ignore them if you want. Charlotte's spells are better anyways. 1-(tied) Symphony of the Night is still up there, however, and I can't really decide between the two. While the inverted castle was a bit of a pain to navigate because of those jumps that you couldn't quite clear without turning into bat, everything else I absolutely adore. Banger soundtrack, insane amounts of gear, even with fun gimmicky attributes, tons of cool powerups, great enemy variety, and just the slick and classy presentation that pretty much defined the rest of the series from then on. This game is what got me hooked to Iga's works, and because of that I discovered about Bloodstained and how the spirit of the Igavanias was still living on. 3-Aria of Sorrow introduced the massively fun soul collecting and that's really a stroke of genius. Turning the main character into Kirby really made everything a lot more interesting. This was the second Igavania I played and it consolidated my appreciation for the genre. The story was a slight step up from every other game in the series, and the movement and controls on handheld Castlevanias were finally perfected with this entry after the rougher style of CotM and HoD. 4-Order of Ecclesia. True, I was a bit disappointed by how linear it was at first, but the game opens up massively once the first half is over and you unlock Dracula's castle. The boss fights and combat overall felt very polished and tactical, making me consider enemy weaknesses and patterns for the first time and forcing me to learn how to avoid taking damage and gitting gud for once. It's a slow burn to the second half, but once I made it through the Classicvania portion, I found it a lot more enjoyable. Not that the first half was THAT bad to begin with. 5-Dawn of Sorrow could've been amazing if it wasn't for those pesky seals ruining the pace of boss fights. The best thing about it is undoubtedly Julius mode, as it's definitely the best alternative campaign in the series. Although I'm with you on the sliding puzzle, and overall I feel the castle's design was a bit weaker in this entry than the others. 6-Harmony of Dissonance is a game that on all accounts I should be harsher on, but there is something about the ground movement and dashing around the entire map that was just inherently fun to me. Having both a forward and a back dash was an interesting choice that really saved the experience, because that soundtrack would've made my ears bleed out otherwise. I just wish the castle had more fast travel points, as it's a massive slog going from one end to the other. 7-I don't hate Circle of the Moon, but I think you can tell it wasn't made by Igarashi. The controls feel weird, like how you can turn around in midair while whipping, completely changing the direction of your attack, instead of the more sensible retreating jump attacks you could do in Symphony and most other games. Nathan felt incredibly heavy and the castle was very lazily designed, with huge rooms filled with enemies and no real interesting landmarks or memorable layouts. The difficulty was also a bit erratic, as the final boss was one heck of an unexpected spike while the rest of the game was fairly easy. At least this one still managed to have a great soundtrack.
Something I never see in these videos about Symphony of the Night is the secondary attack for many weapons being mentioned. This wasn't even mentioned in the official strategy guide. For instance, if you perform the haduken input (down, down-forward, forward, then press the attack button) with the Wereblade it doesn't swing once - Alucard swings the blade about 6 -7 times very, very quickly. This is strong enough to kill many bosses with only a few hits. The Falchion can be thrown like a boomerang, also using the haduken input. Some of the weapons used a back-forward input instead of the haduken input. If you ever play this game again, try this with the weapons.
Portrait Of Ruin was my first and favorite, followed by Order Of Ecclesia due to having the most challenging gameplay. I'm so glad Koji Igarashi made Bloodstained which is a superb climax to the whole metroidvania system in modern times.
Castlevania Symphony of the Night is one of my favorites too and still own on my PSX. I like it quite a bit that I even rushed Castlevania Dracula X Chronicles just to unlock it on my PSP,
It is by far my favorite, but there are certain parts that suck especially the weapons you fine. Superbunnyhop points them out. Check out his review for sotn
top 10 metroidvanias #1 - Symphony of the Night #2 - Orchestra of Unhappiness #3 - Encore of Depression #4 - Interlude of Annoyance #5 - Ditty of Creepiness #6 - Rock Opera of Genocide #7 - Mix Tape of Disorder #8 - Drum Solo of Ennui #9 - A Cappella of Bad #10 - Bonus Track of Boredom
You totally missed Performance of Peril, Concert of Callousness, Music of Mid, Aria of Sorrow, Jam session of Juvenility, Melody of Melancholy, and Harmony of Dissonance!
Love this entire series, mainly because the titles of the games all sound like gothic metal bands or albums. Aria of Sorrow. Symphony of the Night. Harmony of Dissonance. Circle of the Moon, etc.
Justin Corber Sorry pal, can't see why people like OoE so much. Uniteresting story, very little innovation when you compare it to PoR, and some very boring stages. This game is overhyped for sure and I am happy that some are starting to renew their persective on it.
Next SOtN isn't overhyped at all, it's the evolution of the genre that made all of the following games possible. Absolutely deserves the praise it gets.
What the, Order of Ecclesia is one of the best Castlevania game it's have unique mechanic and feature woman as Main Character which only few in Castlevania universe, heck Order of Ecclesia is the best for me which follow by Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow coz you can play as Dracula.
Honorable mention should be "Harmony of Despair". Sadly overlooked and under appreciated. It is a slight departure from the series due to it's multiplayer component, but the co-op made it an amazing experience. Also, easily one of my favorite Castlevania soundtracks ever, newly performed and recorded classics from all over the series with some super shreddy guitar work. Way up the list for me.
Ryan Christensen yeeeaaah it’s fantastic!!! Music is out of this world good. Bored of this song on this chapter? Switch it out! Game play is perfect except we want more chapters!
Ecclesia is my personal favourite for many of the reasons Joe didn't like it haha. I havn't played SoTN, so for me ranking goes: 1. Ecclesia 2. Aria 3. Portrait 4 Dawn 5. Dissonance (the music is a bit of an acquired taste, I personally like it a lot, fits the -dissonant- theme of the game ) 6. Circle
It is wild to me that with how good symphony of the night was, they never did another game in that style for the major consoles I remember playing circle of the Moon for the first time on GBA though and being absolutely hooked on it. That was actually the first of these that I played. In fact it was the first Castlevania I ever played even I would later get the chance to play symphony when it was on the Xbox live arcade for 360. Absolutely loved it, and I played the rest of the GBA titles throughout college. Which I loved all of those too, despite the flaws with the soundtrack and the weird character outlines, I'm really partial to Harmony of dissonance. Not that it's incredibly important, but I was excited that that game brought some more Gore into it compared to circle of the Moon. Just seeing blood on Game boy advance in general always felt kind of special due to the nature of most games for it I'm digging this video up because I never got the chance to play the DS games because I just didn't have one. But today they just dropped a collection with all three of them and I am excited to dive back into this. I think it says something for there to be seven of these games in this fashion and it appears basically all of them or at least nearly all of them are complete bangers I really hope to see another one again. I know they did bloodstained curse of the Moon, but I just don't dig the art style the same way I do Castlevania.
As good as Symphony is... it had same issue most of games in the series did - lackluster sales. Same as Earthbound, it became major hit and genre mother postfactum. And even all the GBA games, as evident by "extra generic anime" style of Dawn and Portrait, weren't too succesful.
I found Ecclesia to be the best game of the metroidvanias. Exploring, and then coming back later to open secret paths and even the challenge modes was amazing. What it lacked in a huge end castle (although it was pretty large still), it made up for a gigantic world. And you found yourself coming back, even farming the extra runes. I actually found ecclesia to be the easiest to grind too, although i do agree on the difficulty in the beginning.
Portrait of Ruin is my favorite ^_^ I loved the tag-team mecanics and the characters were actually likeable. The story itself has its share of plot twists that surprised me too. Gameplay-wise, the game controls pretty well, you get 5 unlockable characters and even the secret area is great. The Nest of Evil has you fight bosses from Aria and Dawn of Sorrow, and the Greatest Five dual crush is pure fanservice :D The only thing I kinda hated was that they reused themes for the last 4 portraits. Now, I undertand that it might have been a nod to the inverted castle, but it would have been nice to get 4 brand-new environments. They were not bad though... except Burnt Paradise, they went overboard with the medusa heads there X_x Order of Ecclesia is too difficult of its own good... Consuming mana for attacks was one more thing to manage and special moves could be activated by accident and consumed a lot of hearts. In addition, the sidequests were more complicated due to the lower item drop rate and such. Also, the story was kinda dumb, as Shanoa loses her memories at the beginning of the game, including how to use her own abilities. It was also kinda stupid that as the story progressed up to Dracula's Castle, she never regained part of her mind, up to the point of completely recovering before the castle. Finally, the secret stuff wasn't as good as Portrait of Ruin, as due to the difficulty, getting the best item wasn't easy...
Michiru Yamane was certainly busy in 2002-2003. She composed music for the 2 GBA castlevania games along with the PS2 Castlevania entry, Lament of Innocence.
@rockman fan i have played it in the mean time 1 its does not suck its not a good game either but it is far from a bad one 2 it has everything a metroid vania has if this is not a metroid vania then super metroid and castlevania sotn isnt either
One thing to mention about Dawn of Sorrow is that the English version, despite using voices in Japanese, is missing about half of the voice clips from the Japanese version. I would definitely recommend picking up the Japanese version over the English one.
I actually think that Order of Ecclesia is the best metroidvania but hey that's just me. It's closely followed by the sorrow games. SOTN always seemed a bit too easy and lost some of its challenge as you progressed. The gba non sorrow games were meh and portrait of ruin was too gimmicky for my taste.
I agree that Order of Ecclesia is the best. It is much more difficult than the other games, but they tried something new and it worked. I was obsessed with this game. You get special trophy items when you defeat the bosses without taking damage, and you can permanently miss those items. I remember doing the "no damage" challenge to get 100% of the items. If you haven't played it, Salt and Sanctuary brought back a lot of Order of Ecclesia memories for me.
For me it's : 1. Order Of Ecclesia 2. CIrcle of the moon 3. SOTN ( amazing game but way too easy ) 4. Aria Of Sorrow 5. Harmony of dissonance 6. Portrait of Ruin 7. Dawn Of Sorrow I always thought the metroidvania games were too easy for my taste exept for order of ecclesia and circle of the moon. I Have never played Harmony of dissonance in hard mode tough.
I always felt like Order of Ecclessia is really underappreciated. It combines a whole ton of new mechanics with more linear yet challenging game design, paying homage to the classic games. I think after 8 (including 3D PS2 ones) consequent Metroidvania games, this unique new approach felt like a breath of fresh air, and also it had a much darker art design, unlike the generic anime of the previous two games. For me it's the best of the NDS Castlevania titles.
Seeing the game Phantasy Star in the intro put me back 30+ years. I remember wanting a nintendo and my parents got me a Sega instead and my dad got me Phantasy Star and was like this game is huge, the guy at the store said it was 4 megs!! Neither of us knew what that meant but we both played it together from start to finish over that summer. Once getting lost 7 levels deep in a dungeon with no heals and having to save with almost every step while trying to figure out how to get out. We stayed up all night playing u til it was daylight again. Good memories
Love how in Order of Ecclesia you can just casually summon giant sword that take up the whole screen. Don't know how you can say it is the worst game in this episode when you featured Circle of the Moon.
It was the worst as the story was bad the music wasnt that good and the level design was bland there was no real exploration. it so refreshing that he actually pointed out the flaws of this game as people claim it was the best but was actually the reason Konami looked to other studios for the next installment of the series.
After Symphony of the night, Dawn of Sorrow(DS) has to be my favorite metroidvania. By the way, you forgot to mention Julius Mode in Dawn of Sorrow, where you can play as Julius, Yoko and Alucard, which is a gameplay nod to Castlevania 3. My favorite channel on YT.
if you ever do a castelvania clone series or a clone series in general i would like to massively, massively, massively, MASSIVELY recommend RUSTY for the nec pc 98. there is an english translation patch.
@Timothy Owens ive never tried it but i know niko emulator also works on android though i have no experience getting it to work so i cant say if its great or not. most f the setting configurations from the video should still apply though,
Joe talks about Ecclesia music at 34:09... Nothing stands out? O_o Order of Ecclesia has one of the best soundtrack imo. "An Empty Tome" anyone? "Rhapsody of the Forsaken", "Unholy Vespers", the list goes on. Amazing stuff.
In the old style, the outline of the map uses only one color (usually white) and all the passages are just parts of this outline missing. The new style has the outlines in multiple colors. In Aria, for example, the outline is white, but he passages are light blue. Some people have trouble seeing the passages on the DS screen. Trying to find passages that we didn't went through yet is a bit harder, specially for people with poor eyesight.
8:01 It's not weaker than the regular whip, just check your attack stat when the card is activated--it's higher. Of course the damage done will depend on each enemy's weakness and tolerances.
Joe apparently doesn't understand the concept of elemental attributes. You'd think after all those RPGs he would have gotten it down. I guess he just grinded his way through all those games without understanding anything.
Isn't it weird that no one ever mentions Konami's first attempt to make a Metroid-clone? TMNT 3: Radical Rescue was the first time I remember a game of Konami trying to act like Metroid. A decent sized map that you need specific skills and power ups to be able to explore to completion, a map showing where you are and where you need to go, boss fights that give you access to the other turtles (you start as one with specific skills and then you unlock others). It was a decent game but very hard and unforgiving. Still, I've never seen anyone mention it when making a video about Metroidvania type games.
Order of Ecclessia is very highly under apreciated imo. After revisiting the DS trilogy myself I believe it is the best among the three. Graphically it's by far the best, and I disagree on your comment regarding the music, I actually think it's pretty great. It has lots of stages, albeit some of them a bit repetitive, they're all explorable and have very varied enemies, not to mention the last one is a fully fledged Castle (which is roughly 1/3rd to half of the game). You can do pretty awesome things with the glyph system if you dig a bit into it, you can even absord super powerfull glyphs from bosses. The amped up challenge is great to balance out the over the top glyphs and powers you get later in the game, by actually forcing you to think which ones are better for each situation. Seems like lots of people do not give OoE a proper chance due to its slow start and its steep difficulty compared to the rest of the DS titles, but it's an incredible game overall.
For me: #1 - *Aria of Sorrow* - Great stage design, good controls, cool magic system and tons of secrets while not being overly grindy. #2 - *Symphony of the Night* - Pretty much the same as above, I just think the Soul system is better. Really tough to choose between the two. #3 - *Circle of the Moon* - Very different from the others, but I like the controls the best, the boss fights are really well done, and although it's basic compared to the others in terms of features, it's really focused and well-executed. I really like the DSS system, too. The Mage playthrough is always an interesting one. #4 - *Portrait of Ruin* - Like AoS and SotN, really tough to place 3 and 4. Loved the two-character system, great variety, and really well-balanced. #5 - *Dawn of Sorrow* - The changes to the Soul system made the game a lot grindier, which really bothered me. Having to collect 9 souls for maximum power was ridiculous when it could have just been a stat check or story item to unlock further power levels just made the game a time sink if you wanted to explore and have fun with the system. Bloodstained really suffers from this as well. The touch stuff never really bothered me. The seals were a lot easier on the OG DS if you had the thumb slider thing, though. #6 - *Harmony of Dissonance* - The floaty controls and poor music really drag this down, and the castle has good setpieces, but very little good platforming and a lot of dead space. CotM was a lot more fun to navigate for me. The biggest problem is that it's WAY too easy. The bosses are pushovers. Visually impressive, but pushovers all the same. The whole thing sort of feels half-baked. #7 - *Order of Ecclesia* - I agree with you on every point, and that's exactly why this one is on the bottom. Dead last, no question.
@@BinaryDood Once you get used to double tapping to dash, CotM's speed, responsiveness, and gravity feel great. It's very snappy. HoD by comparison feels like you're underwater, has a far less interesting magic system, and is easy to the point of being boring at times (especially during boss battles). Still a great game, but I, personally, enjoy CotM more.
@@gargonovich The jumps in CoTM don't even make sense, they lack any unity of flow and momentum. HoD is the only game in the series to give you a dash forward, and not only that makes traversal the best but also eliminates the problem you mentioned. I barely walked in HoD, I dashed as long as I could. I disagree with the magic system being better in CoTM, it is reliant on a terrible RNG drop and is not swapable in-game, and also the effects are far less creative. As for the bosses, true there are far too many in Dissonance, but those that are good still outshine CoTMs imo. This mostly because CoTM's bosses are lacking in audiovusal cues for their attacks and either move around the screen to much or have gimmicky hitboxes. Idk, when playing Circle of the Moon I felt like playing something incomplete, like the alpha of a game.
@@BinaryDood I do like the forward dash in HoD, but mashing L and R to move at a decent clip gets irritating. I feel just the opposite about the bosses, everything is telegraphed well once you know what to look for and has obvious patterning and thought put into it, whereas most HoD bosses you can just wreck with Ice+Bible before they do anything. DSS can be unintuitive with the random drop on some modes, but the Mage mode playthrough is super fun because there are a ton of options that the system opens up. As far as the controls go, I think CotM is more like the classic series than any other game in the RPG series, and that could also be why I like it so much since I spent a lot of time with those games before getting into the RPGs. This seems to be a case of different strokes for different folks, I guess! That's what's tough about ranking such a great series, it's totally down to personal preference.
Order of Ecclesia’s story is much more subtle than the other games. it seems like you either love it or don’t care at all. I love it because I’m big brained
Portrait is my favorite after SoTN. Easily the best OST also after SoTN. I liked how you used "Dracula's Tears' to highlight Dawn's music, it is absolutely the best track in that.
Circle of the moon was my first GBA game, my first Castlevania and my introduction to many of the original castlevania songs, and i wouldn't have it any other way because the renditions are really, really good. I would really like to somehow hear the non-bitcrushed versions of these tracks but that is not likely to happen.
Actually i like more cotm than sotn, the reason is that sotn progress system doesnt work, is like enemies become more weak while you become stronger with the time, you dont even have to move when facing a boss, just press attack button a few times and the boss die in less that 5 seconds.
I think the coloring in cotm was the best of the gba games. My big problem with harmony of dissonance is that some of the backgrounds are really lame. They created one tile, layered all over. And slapped it behind areas. Areas will have a background that has 2000 doors for no reason
I agree with your ranking partially. 1. Symphony - definitely the best, 2. Aria - I remember getting sucked into this game, 3. Order if Ecclesia - all around the best on the DS in my opinion. It felt more gothic, more horror, I loved the challenge, and the glyph system. 4. Portrait - I was a little disappointed in this one originally, after aria I just didn’t find it as deep, the story was kinda weird, and it was easy tbh. 5. Harmony - same complaints as you. 6. Circle - way too clunky tbh. I never played Dawn sadly
to be fair it isn't castlevania but if it was it would easily be the best by a long shot, btw there's no way konami could pull a might number 9 vs mega man 11
Aria of Sorrow is my favorite of the bunch, with Ecclesia next. I'd say Symphony is way more overrated than people lead on. The inverted castle is just giant filler that's awkward to move around in, with the exception to the new bosses. I'd much prefer they made it so the areas swapped themes or something instead of what they did. Dawn of Sorrow is also a piece of something, because the soul system wasn't really fixed, since grinding is all luck based in the game, but now the best weapons in the game require souls to unlock, so that's grinding randomly to get a really good weapon, when you could just find it on the map in Aria of Sorrow. Order of Ecclesia's difficulty made it really endearing to me, because figuring out the best glyphs to use and timing things just right to do massive damage was very fun. Dracula's castle at the end was a giant marathon that was so fun to do. I'm quite disappointed you said nothing stood out in the soundtrack, and the story was really cool too. I think you'd be more warm to the game if you played it again when you aren't burnt out on Castlevania.
I can understand why HoD's soundtrack is so offputting, but IMO it's one of the greatest soundtracks in the entire series. It's an acquired taste, but I absolutely love how crunchy and psychotic it gets. Clock Tower Casualty in particular never fails to give me anxiety with it's aggressive build-ups and sudden loop. Luminous Cavern is also one of my favorites, and I can't stop thinking about when I saw someone describe it as "what it feels like to attend your own funeral."
The funny thing with how great SOTN looked on PlayStation, was magazines at the time took points off for it's "16 bit graphics". Giving it scores like 7/10 because of that. Man how times have changed.
God the view of "everything has to be 3-D or it's old hat" think of the mid 90's was just terrible. We could have got so many great 2-D games instead of butt ugly 3-D games that didn't play as well. I'm glad we all wisened up and realized that it's just a different style. The same kind of "it has to be this advanced or else it sucks" think happens today with people crying when something isn't raytraced or 60fps, etc ... like, the gameplay is really all that matters. Is it fun and playable? Then who cares if it doesn't look perfect.
Here's how I rank them: 1) SOTN 2) Harmony of Dissonance 3) Aria of Sorrow 4) Portrait of Ruin 5) Order of Ecclesia 6) Circle of the Moon 7) Dawngrade of Sorrow.
So why exactly do you dislike Dawn Of Sorrow so much? I just binge played thru the Castlevania series again and the only negatives I can possibly think of for Dawn are the touch screen nonsense, Low quality anime character art and somewhat forgettable story (Tho that's pretty much every Castlevania game for me personally lol) It pretty much nails everything else that made Aria so special and in many aspects surpasses it. Calling it a "Downgrade" Feels very odd as it's obviously an upgrade in many areas, Graphically, Audibly and overall attention to detail in the gameplay is on another level. I really don't see how anyone could say this is the worst one unless they just have something against Dawn for some weird reason lol
Order of Ecclesia is in my top 5 Castlevania games. It's hard as f*ck and not really that much fun to play due to that, to be honest, but the graphics, effects and story are so good ♥️ I love the fact that the story is about this secret organization no one knows about and no one will ever know about it (finish the game and you'll see why). The protagonist suffers a lot throughout the game and has to stop this evil force without getting any kind of recognition, unlike the Belmont clan.
I guess there is no dictionary definition, but Castlevania 2 is totally the first Metroidvania. It's more like the first Metroid than it is the first Castlevania, though it is clearly an amalgamation of both. But no big deal. It was only the true original.
![ลองสุ่มไอโฟน 990 โกงมั้ย? [ โกงมั้ยครับ ep.101 ] | DOM](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/bfsWe0j492k/mqdefault.jpg)
Order of Ecclesia is actually my favorite post Symphony Metroidvania.
I also thought OoE should rank higher; HoD is my least fave
Better than COTM, and Harmony without a doubt. Portrait is way too easy. Haven't replayed Aria, and could never beat Dawn because my L button broke lol, so I wont weigh in on those two.
Indeed, Ecclesia is the one I keep coming back to. It might have bland level design, but it has the most interesting weapons and enemies.
Agree: I thought OoE was outstanding (and I still go back to it occasionally). I think the weakest ones are CotM and HoD (though they're still pretty good).
It's my favorite by far, has even surpassed Symphony of the Night for me and I'm not sure if I like it better than Bloodstained or not, but they're close. The review makes it look like Joe didn't get very far in the game. He doesn't seem to have a clue that you still get to tackle Drac's castle, for instance, which has very interesting and innovate level design for the series.
I was kinda disappointed that the Castlevania Anniversary Collection didn't include any of these games. But considering the $20 price, it's understandable.
I hope Konami does a second Castlevania Collection, but with all the Metroidvania installments and Rondo Of Blood.
Konami would have to put in work to get the DS games working in single screen or not be willing to sell Symphony of Night for more than 10 bucks, both things that aren't up their alley.
@@anthonya.jumelles7103 If Capcom can get the Mega Man ZX games to work on modern consoles with their upcoming Zero/ZX Collection, then Konami should do the same with their Castlevania titles.
@@anthonya.jumelles7103 more like they never heard of their consumer, I mean look at new Contra, I don't know if that can be consider as Contra game when it's just generic top down shooter there even no run and avoid mechanic just shoot at endless enemy unlike other 3D contra game and the character is boring to look.
It's called Castlevania Requiem. It has Rondo and SoTN.
That'll never happen
I always love the sound effects added to the game carts and consoles I don't know why it's satisfying
Me too 😀
My uncle got me a Gameboy advance in 2011,when I wanted a psp. While the world was playing psp games,I was playing The aria of sorrow. It was the best thing that happened. The music of that game still makes me nostalgic. And it is through this Gameboy advance I realised the joy of playing these old games that came before me
Assalamualaikum sister, similar to me but my first was Castlevania Circle of the Moon and it was in 2001 and I fell in love with the series ever since.
Aria of Sorrow was my second Castlevania shortly after.
Aria of Sorrow is the best of the Vania’s. I had a GBA SP and picked up Aria of Sorrow when I saw the gameplay on G4(I believe that’s what the channel was called at the time instead of its other names), and it was showcased gameplay only on their gametrailers show. Still have two of the games complete in box. My brother, cousin, and I printed out the entire map on 4 or 6 pages of paper and taped them all together on my closet door. We had our own game saves and actually took turns playing it surprisingly 😂
I found Ecclesia the best of the Igavanias. To each their own.
Same here!
Me and my brother think the same.
Same..
I love it as well The Glyphs the remixed soundtrack and that Art.
And you, my dude, are correct.
Order of Ecclesia is AMAZING!
Yeah, that was a plot twist. I’m shocked Joe didn’t like it. Maybe he would like it more if he knew it was pronounced Ekk-Lah-see-uh.
@@JazGalaxy Honestly, a long time ago, I would've considered OoE to be my third favorite Castlevania game in this style, but revisiting it in the past year really changed my opinion on it. I found most of the enemy drops to be really uninteresting, with most of them being crafting items instead of interesting items. As much as I hate farming for items in games like this, I have to say that it's at least a nice surprise on occasion in these games. Over the past year, I've been playing a lot of SotN with the SotN Randomizer, and the enemy drops with the Randomizer have gotten me to play SotN so much differently. I don't think OoE encourages the same level of variety in how you play it.
It's Dark Souls hard, but rewarding in its own way.
Wolfdragon92584 really? It’s been a very long time since I played it but I don’t recall having that reaction at all. O remember having to fight the end boss a few times and that collapsing tower a few times just because I didn’t understand what I was supposed to do. But other than that I didn’t have any problem with it and really enjoyed it. I only think I died at those spots.
@@JazGalaxy Well, for a Castlevania game it was very tough. Granted, most Castlevania games since the 90s were rather on the easy side- with some exceptions. It was definitely the toughest Castlevania since Circle of the Moon.
I remember when Circle of the Moon came out. Everyone complained the game was "too dark," and some went as far as to say it was "unplayable." This may be why Harmony of Dissonance is so bright.
kylethestyle it totally is. Also CotM being “too dark” was a blessing in disguise since it’s graphical style when blown up on a backlit screen (be it a GBA SP, a DS, or an HDTV) looks so much better than the super bright HoD and AoS games that came after.
That is EXACTLY what it was. The major complaint about Circle of the Moon is that it was too dark. It actually wasn't too dark, it was the un-lit GBA screen that made it that way. A lot of early GBA games made their games extra bright to compensate for the lack of lit up screen. A lot of the SNES ports did that (Donkey Kong Country and some of the Mario ports are good examples). I imagine the group making Circle of the Moon hadn't thought about the darker screen yet (I mean, it was a super early game. Googling tells me it was released the same month as the GBA itself. March 2001.) By the time Harmony was released, it was already pretty common practice to make games brighter on the GBA to try and make it visible on the dark screen.
Honestly, I hate that they had to make games brighter to make them playable. To the point where I'd rather use my GBA flash cart to play rom hacks of a lot of the games that darken the colors. I didn't find any such hacks for Harmony, but someone DID make a hack to remove the weird glowing border around stuff, so that's something.
I try to play through symphony of the night every halloween, it is still to this day my absolute favorite game!
Play the Others Too you Know....
@Eissari4 Ecclesia, HOD, Circle of the Moon and Aria Doesn't have that
I actually do this every year myself. I finished my playthrough about halfway through Oct this year, but I absolutely love SOTN.
"Thank you Konami"
This sounds so weird and wrong nowadays...
I mean some time ago Capcom was a pretty shitty company before but they got better hopefully the same can be said and done for Konami in the future
@@Madman-bi5bf
Capcom was never so low to release games like MGS Survive and Contra Rogue Corps and nothing else besides bare minimum ports and collections of games from their glory days.
Even when they were at their lowest they at least tried. RE5 and 6 for all their faults are still competently made games with high production values and care put into them and i despise RE6 but that's not the point.
And we still got stuff like Revelations 1 and 2 along with glorious remasters of RE0 or Okami way before the Ultra "RE7-MM11-MHW-REmake2-DMCV Comeback Combo".
I give Konami 3 more years (and that's generous) to release a game with some form of budget and vision or a collection where they'd have to actually put in some effort like a CV DS Trilogy Collection where they'd be forced to change things like touch controls for modern consoles which requires competence and care. If all they're gonna do is to rely on their old and easy to port (but not optimize appearently) games from the past and low budget, almost cynical, products straight out of their asses they can rot in their MGS3 and SH2 "erotic action" pachinko hole for all i care.
Konami were my favorite 3rd party publisher back in the day. Here's hoping they get their game together. If not, independent developers will pick up the slack. EA gave up on Dead Space. Now Negative Atmosphere will pick up the slack. Independent game developers are listening more than the large ones are.
@@specknacken6507 You make it sound as though Konami cares. You do realize that they're actually one of the richest gaming companies from Japan right? It's similar to how everyone assumes Sega is going bankrupt when they're still the 2nd richest game company in Japan, after Nintendo.
@@specknacken6507 I ain't defending Konami, just saying that Capcom had to win back gamers, coz Capcom was on the verge of bankruptcy. Konami doesn't care, coz they don't need us. It's a shame & I wish someone would buy off their Ips, but it's the same case for Sega. I wish someone would buy off Sega's ips too. In both cases, Konami & Sega re too expensive to buy out. Nintendo or Sony are the only game devs in Japan who have the cash flow to buy them out.
33:32 I thought the glyph menu worked that way because you had a “last 3 used” memory function for each hand… so, y’know, if there was a trio of glyphs you liked using for each hand, you could quickly swap between them rather than hunting for them in the entire list. I kinda thought it was a nice function, but I guess I can see where it might be confusing.
9:39 First time I notice how extremely well Joe's last name "Redifer" fits into the Castlevania universe. It could totally be the name for a new character, like "Redifer Belmont" and it would sound great.
Harmony of Dissonance was my jam in high school. Replaying it tonight after all these years!
Beautiful game but that music and color scheme was a fever dream nightmare lol.
@@ohlord3650People say that, but it honestly looks great in the intended hardware. If you are on an emulator, you may need to colour-correct it.
Man the GBA and DS were such a golden time for Metroidvania games. The 6 Castlevanias, Metroid Fusion and Zero Mission, Mega Man ZX and Advent, there was just always something new to play.
Also, just to add: If you get all the boss orbs in Julius mode and finish that map Julius will "unlock" the full power of the Vampire Killer making it stronger.
One of my favorite castlevanias is portrait of ruin. I loved the dual characthers and the different stages a.k.a "portraits" were a breath of fresh air. And also it was great to know more about the story of castlevania: bloodlines.
...
When it comes to classic 2D castlevanias, my favorite is Super Castlevania which I was able to finish back in the day thought a lot of effort.
I felt like I would have enjoyed it more without the constant "Jonathan! Charlotte!"
I'd choose Bloodlines for favorite Classic-vania, it's gameplay feels like retro done perfectly. IV wins in presentation though
That’s literally my opinion on both metroidvania and 2d side, good thing I’m not alone
Yeah I agree I think the tag team mechanic was pretty near
In Order of Ecclesia, the reason some things are shown twice with different colors is because you have one equipped. You can equip the same glyph multiple times, so it needs to be shown twice.
I found Order of Ecclesia's difficulty refreshing after so many super easy Castlevania games. I feel that you're intended to rely on your skill a lot more, instead of being super powerful.
Honestly, I feel like a good metroidvania style Castlevania game would let you rely on either skill OR power. Like, you can make your way through the game by being good at it. Or you could simply grind to get stronger, making the game easier for you. I always prefer when I have the option to make a game easier for myself by actually putting in the work to MAKE it easier for myself.
It's just something about Rondo of Blood + Symphony of the Night that made me keep coming back to it.
I had SOTN, it was so good the guy i lent it too never gave it back.
Ha-ha! Same thing happened to me!
I have had to buy the game on four separate occasions for that same reason
@@dromano1977 it took one time and I've never "loaned" another game to anyone.
i never loaned my games movies or cds out... games were to expensive to loan cd and dvds were to risky because of scratches
@@GeorgiaRidgerunner that's just stinginess.
Thanks for keeping going with the show, Joe. Been a fan for almost 6 years now and still love the content.
Wait Joe actually loves someone that isn't, Yuzo Koshiro?
:O
Do you blame him? Michiru is a total babe
By the way: there is also a patch on romhacking to remove the glowing outline in the GBA version.
Symphony of the Night will always be my favorite. So, so damn good.
One of my favorite eras of handheld gaming during the 2000's. The excellent GBA an DS Castlevania games that were constantly pumped out by Classic Konami will always have a place in my heart. It's one of the many reasons the 3DS era feels so lacking to me.
Next then the 3D Castlevanias?
-Castlevania 64
-Castlevania 64 Legacy of Darkness (is not bad as everyone thinks, just the camera sucks)
-Lament of innocence (very good one)
-Curse of Darkness (another very nice)
-Lord of Shadows (is not a bad game, but i don't consider this a Castlevania, still have to put in this list)
-Lord of Shadows 2
-Reincarnation (that reject form Dreamcast)
Lament of Innocence? One might just wonder if the title was pointed at the unknowing gamer starting up the game.
Barely any music, mapdesign is bland at best and nothing else interesting ever happens. Curse of Darkness is almost as bad, only real difference being it has some good music. The N64 ones got a fair review at AVGN and those last gen CVs leans more to being some DMC siblings.
@@MrX-rk9or Reincarnation never came out...
was lord of shadows 2 any good?
The moment when Alucard enters in the darker lobby and the music begins to play just when lights get brighter. I never felt so damn heroic as that moment.
Joe, you missed one! The one for 3DS "Lords of Shadow - Mirror of Fate" It's a Metroidvania-style castlevania game. Easily the worst of them, but still.
Different creator, he didn't miss it
@@DOSfanatic The video is about Castlevania Metroidvanias. Not Castlevania MetroidVanias made by Iga's team at Konami. And one of the ones featured did not have Iga as creator so... Yeah, he missed it.
@@Real1Gaming yep you are right!
@@DOSfanatic Yep he missed it!
@@Real1Gaming It's about 2D Castlevania Metroidvanias. Curse of Darkness is 3D and Mirror of Fate is 2.5D.
Funny enough about Harmony of dissonance is that I think the bad music is intentional given the title of the game.
Also once you beat it and reach the credits, the music becomes amazing for only one song lol
In case anyone is wondering, you can buy all these games on the Wii U Virtual Console for around $9.99 each.
Yes, _that_ Wii U.
Quick before Nintendo shut down or remove them like Duck Tales remastered from their eShop !!!!
@أفضل ألعاب مع جستر yes, but Wii U actually has two screens like the DS games do, so its more authentic
@@hepwo91222 so do emulators
@@jbfarley emulators give mixed results depending on the game, the ROM, the emulator used, and the hardware readily available. Most of these games can be emulated without a hitch, but the DS games, nah, its a bit of an issue with a second touch screen and not as convenient.
@@bhirawamaylana466 That wasn't Nintendo's decision, that was Capcom's.
I'd rank them like this:
1-I really ended up loving Portrait of Ruin. I thought the soundtrack was just as good as SotN, the two characters specializing in different things was extremely fun to experiment with, finding all the spells for Charlotte or the subweapons for Jonathan and completing all the quests was very worthwhile as they rewarded you with some really OP gear, like the time stop spell. The different portraits were incredibly varied and fun to explore, with a ton of new enemies, new music for each one, secret rooms and memorable bosses, and even the endgame gauntlet dungeon was something I really enjoyed. The only flaw I can think of is that leveling up Jonathan's subweapons took way too long, but it's also entirely optional so you can just ignore them if you want. Charlotte's spells are better anyways.
1-(tied) Symphony of the Night is still up there, however, and I can't really decide between the two. While the inverted castle was a bit of a pain to navigate because of those jumps that you couldn't quite clear without turning into bat, everything else I absolutely adore. Banger soundtrack, insane amounts of gear, even with fun gimmicky attributes, tons of cool powerups, great enemy variety, and just the slick and classy presentation that pretty much defined the rest of the series from then on. This game is what got me hooked to Iga's works, and because of that I discovered about Bloodstained and how the spirit of the Igavanias was still living on.
3-Aria of Sorrow introduced the massively fun soul collecting and that's really a stroke of genius. Turning the main character into Kirby really made everything a lot more interesting. This was the second Igavania I played and it consolidated my appreciation for the genre. The story was a slight step up from every other game in the series, and the movement and controls on handheld Castlevanias were finally perfected with this entry after the rougher style of CotM and HoD.
4-Order of Ecclesia. True, I was a bit disappointed by how linear it was at first, but the game opens up massively once the first half is over and you unlock Dracula's castle. The boss fights and combat overall felt very polished and tactical, making me consider enemy weaknesses and patterns for the first time and forcing me to learn how to avoid taking damage and gitting gud for once. It's a slow burn to the second half, but once I made it through the Classicvania portion, I found it a lot more enjoyable. Not that the first half was THAT bad to begin with.
5-Dawn of Sorrow could've been amazing if it wasn't for those pesky seals ruining the pace of boss fights. The best thing about it is undoubtedly Julius mode, as it's definitely the best alternative campaign in the series. Although I'm with you on the sliding puzzle, and overall I feel the castle's design was a bit weaker in this entry than the others.
6-Harmony of Dissonance is a game that on all accounts I should be harsher on, but there is something about the ground movement and dashing around the entire map that was just inherently fun to me. Having both a forward and a back dash was an interesting choice that really saved the experience, because that soundtrack would've made my ears bleed out otherwise. I just wish the castle had more fast travel points, as it's a massive slog going from one end to the other.
7-I don't hate Circle of the Moon, but I think you can tell it wasn't made by Igarashi. The controls feel weird, like how you can turn around in midair while whipping, completely changing the direction of your attack, instead of the more sensible retreating jump attacks you could do in Symphony and most other games. Nathan felt incredibly heavy and the castle was very lazily designed, with huge rooms filled with enemies and no real interesting landmarks or memorable layouts. The difficulty was also a bit erratic, as the final boss was one heck of an unexpected spike while the rest of the game was fairly easy. At least this one still managed to have a great soundtrack.
Why PoR? Most weak level guidance and levels balance, also - good ending , OMG< how stupid the way is...
@@TheDrQuake Because Portrait Is Great
@@Next-xm2dh Nope, only for eyes, gameplay is just have no balance and not polished at all to match progress with difficulty.
Something I never see in these videos about Symphony of the Night is the secondary attack for many weapons being mentioned. This wasn't even mentioned in the official strategy guide. For instance, if you perform the haduken input (down, down-forward, forward, then press the attack button) with the Wereblade it doesn't swing once - Alucard swings the blade about 6 -7 times very, very quickly. This is strong enough to kill many bosses with only a few hits. The Falchion can be thrown like a boomerang, also using the haduken input. Some of the weapons used a back-forward input instead of the haduken input. If you ever play this game again, try this with the weapons.
Never knew!
Portrait Of Ruin was my first and favorite, followed by Order Of Ecclesia due to having the most challenging gameplay. I'm so glad Koji Igarashi made Bloodstained which is a superb climax to the whole metroidvania system in modern times.
Order of Ecclesia is incredible. I say good day to you sir!
Agreed. They were actually moving fwd and improving the play system, even if there were some uninventive stages, and other signs of creative burnout.
Loved order of Eclesia. Didn't like it at first but towards the end really grew on my.
Castlevania Symphony of the Night is one of my favorites too and still own on my PSX. I like it quite a bit that I even rushed Castlevania Dracula X Chronicles just to unlock it on my PSP,
Castlevania: SOTN is my favorite castlevania game, the best.
It's good for sure but I have to agree with James Rolf,my favorite is Castlevania 4. Treasure before they left Konami.
It is by far my favorite, but there are certain parts that suck especially the weapons you fine. Superbunnyhop points them out. Check out his review for sotn
Wrong. Castlevania 3 is the best
@Neutral 69
Alternative title:
Demon Castle Dracula X: Nocturne In The Moonlight
As traditional Castlevania my favorite is Rondo of Blood, then after it is Symphony of the Night.
top 10 metroidvanias
#1 - Symphony of the Night
#2 - Orchestra of Unhappiness
#3 - Encore of Depression
#4 - Interlude of Annoyance
#5 - Ditty of Creepiness
#6 - Rock Opera of Genocide
#7 - Mix Tape of Disorder
#8 - Drum Solo of Ennui
#9 - A Cappella of Bad
#10 - Bonus Track of Boredom
I laughed at Mixtape of Disorder😁
You totally missed Performance of Peril, Concert of Callousness, Music of Mid, Aria of Sorrow, Jam session of Juvenility, Melody of Melancholy, and Harmony of Dissonance!
Yes!
Time to pause Dragon Quest for my other favorite series ever!
Love this entire series, mainly because the titles of the games all sound like gothic metal bands or albums.
Aria of Sorrow. Symphony of the Night. Harmony of Dissonance. Circle of the Moon, etc.
They sound like Blind Guardian album titles
When Konami cared about quality video games...😩😳😞😒
Now it's cash in after cash in. Oh, you need that extra save slot? Yeah that will be $10.
@@B33FY2011 Yeah that's totally not how it actually worked in MG: Survive but whatevs.
Ooooooo yes, my fav genre... looking forward to this
@Most Deadest Pool of em All. hahaha I get this almost daily
Slopey slopey slopey slopey boy-ee
There's a slope on this bridge
Just my opinion:
1. SOTN; hands down.
2. Aria/Dawn of Sorrow
3. Order of Eclessia
4. Portrait of Ruin
5. Harmony of Dissonance
6. Circle of the Moon
Justin Corber Sorry pal, can't see why people like OoE so much. Uniteresting story, very little innovation when you compare it to PoR, and some very boring stages. This game is overhyped for sure and I am happy that some are starting to renew their persective on it.
@@songokusolo Not as Overhyped as SOTN that Is
Next SOtN isn't overhyped at all, it's the evolution of the genre that made all of the following games possible. Absolutely deserves the praise it gets.
As a huge fan of Castlevania games I thank you from the bottom of my heart for this masterful work.
This video is a national treasure.
Joe, you should try the Dawn of Sorrow randomizer they did away with the seal drawings.
What the, Order of Ecclesia is one of the best Castlevania game it's have unique mechanic and feature woman as Main Character which only few in Castlevania universe, heck Order of Ecclesia is the best for me which follow by Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow coz you can play as Dracula.
Honorable mention should be "Harmony of Despair". Sadly overlooked and under appreciated. It is a slight departure from the series due to it's multiplayer component, but the co-op made it an amazing experience. Also, easily one of my favorite Castlevania soundtracks ever, newly performed and recorded classics from all over the series with some super shreddy guitar work. Way up the list for me.
Ryan Christensen yeeeaaah it’s fantastic!!! Music is out of this world good. Bored of this song on this chapter? Switch it out! Game play is perfect except we want more chapters!
This episode has been one of my favorites by far. You're doing a great job Joe. I've been addicted to Game Sack for years.
Ecclesia is my personal favourite for many of the reasons Joe didn't like it haha.
I havn't played SoTN, so for me ranking goes:
1. Ecclesia
2. Aria
3. Portrait
4 Dawn
5. Dissonance (the music is a bit of an acquired taste, I personally like it a lot, fits the -dissonant- theme of the game )
6. Circle
K C You haven’t played SoTN? What are you waiting for?
Call me crazy but i actually like the music in Harmony of dissonance
-DarkCloud- 5407 I didn't hate it either. I also kinda dig the glowy outlines on your character.
i like the three ones were the games that i played a lot of back in 2002-2005
Same. My only real gripe about it is that there really should’ve been more save rooms, but even then it was still ok.
@一本のうんち Yeah it was some great music and a great game as well...Aria was better but Harmony should NOT be missed.
It is wild to me that with how good symphony of the night was, they never did another game in that style for the major consoles
I remember playing circle of the Moon for the first time on GBA though and being absolutely hooked on it. That was actually the first of these that I played. In fact it was the first Castlevania I ever played even
I would later get the chance to play symphony when it was on the Xbox live arcade for 360. Absolutely loved it, and I played the rest of the GBA titles throughout college. Which I loved all of those too, despite the flaws with the soundtrack and the weird character outlines, I'm really partial to Harmony of dissonance. Not that it's incredibly important, but I was excited that that game brought some more Gore into it compared to circle of the Moon. Just seeing blood on Game boy advance in general always felt kind of special due to the nature of most games for it
I'm digging this video up because I never got the chance to play the DS games because I just didn't have one. But today they just dropped a collection with all three of them and I am excited to dive back into this.
I think it says something for there to be seven of these games in this fashion and it appears basically all of them or at least nearly all of them are complete bangers
I really hope to see another one again. I know they did bloodstained curse of the Moon, but I just don't dig the art style the same way I do Castlevania.
As good as Symphony is... it had same issue most of games in the series did - lackluster sales. Same as Earthbound, it became major hit and genre mother postfactum. And even all the GBA games, as evident by "extra generic anime" style of Dawn and Portrait, weren't too succesful.
I actually really liked Order of Ecclesia. It felt like a breath of fresh air in my opinion
My second favorite game on the DS (behind Dawn of Sorrow).
I still prefer Portrait of Ruin but otherwise I agree
I found Ecclesia to be the best game of the metroidvanias. Exploring, and then coming back later to open secret paths and even the challenge modes was amazing. What it lacked in a huge end castle (although it was pretty large still), it made up for a gigantic world. And you found yourself coming back, even farming the extra runes.
I actually found ecclesia to be the easiest to grind too, although i do agree on the difficulty in the beginning.
Actually, Order of Ecclesia is my favourite portable Metroidvania game. You should mention the artwork btw. Great video.
I only finished CV SOTN this year. I know I'm late but still amazing.
better late than never, man!!
Did you get the good ending?
@@PurpleSanz I killed shaft if thsts what you mean.
Portrait of Ruin is my favorite ^_^ I loved the tag-team mecanics and the characters were actually likeable. The story itself has its share of plot twists that surprised me too. Gameplay-wise, the game controls pretty well, you get 5 unlockable characters and even the secret area is great. The Nest of Evil has you fight bosses from Aria and Dawn of Sorrow, and the Greatest Five dual crush is pure fanservice :D The only thing I kinda hated was that they reused themes for the last 4 portraits. Now, I undertand that it might have been a nod to the inverted castle, but it would have been nice to get 4 brand-new environments. They were not bad though... except Burnt Paradise, they went overboard with the medusa heads there X_x
Order of Ecclesia is too difficult of its own good... Consuming mana for attacks was one more thing to manage and special moves could be activated by accident and consumed a lot of hearts. In addition, the sidequests were more complicated due to the lower item drop rate and such. Also, the story was kinda dumb, as Shanoa loses her memories at the beginning of the game, including how to use her own abilities. It was also kinda stupid that as the story progressed up to Dracula's Castle, she never regained part of her mind, up to the point of completely recovering before the castle. Finally, the secret stuff wasn't as good as Portrait of Ruin, as due to the difficulty, getting the best item wasn't easy...
Michiru Yamane was certainly busy in 2002-2003. She composed music for the 2 GBA castlevania games along with the PS2 Castlevania entry, Lament of Innocence.
Oh no, Casltevania Lords of Shadow: Mirror of Fate is missing!
Why do youtuber allways do that to new games?
@rockman fan still we would want a review
@rockman fan i have played it in the mean time
1 its does not suck its not a good game either but it is far from a bad one
2 it has everything a metroid vania has if this is not a metroid vania then super metroid and castlevania sotn isnt either
@rockman fan
It is. Play it and see.
One thing to mention about Dawn of Sorrow is that the English version, despite using voices in Japanese, is missing about half of the voice clips from the Japanese version. I would definitely recommend picking up the Japanese version over the English one.
Really?? I Have to Try that
I actually think that Order of Ecclesia is the best metroidvania but hey that's just me.
It's closely followed by the sorrow games.
SOTN always seemed a bit too easy and lost some of its challenge as you progressed.
The gba non sorrow games were meh and portrait of ruin was too gimmicky for my taste.
I totally agree with that.
Ecclesia was pretty good. Only got great when you get to the castle IMO
I agree that Order of Ecclesia is the best. It is much more difficult than the other games, but they tried something new and it worked. I was obsessed with this game. You get special trophy items when you defeat the bosses without taking damage, and you can permanently miss those items. I remember doing the "no damage" challenge to get 100% of the items. If you haven't played it, Salt and Sanctuary brought back a lot of Order of Ecclesia memories for me.
For me it's :
1. Order Of Ecclesia
2. CIrcle of the moon
3. SOTN ( amazing game but way too easy )
4. Aria Of Sorrow
5. Harmony of dissonance
6. Portrait of Ruin
7. Dawn Of Sorrow
I always thought the metroidvania games were too easy for my taste exept for order of ecclesia and circle of the moon.
I Have never played Harmony of dissonance in hard mode tough.
God, these castlevania games are beautiful 😢
I always felt like Order of Ecclessia is really underappreciated. It combines a whole ton of new mechanics with more linear yet challenging game design, paying homage to the classic games. I think after 8 (including 3D PS2 ones) consequent Metroidvania games, this unique new approach felt like a breath of fresh air, and also it had a much darker art design, unlike the generic anime of the previous two games. For me it's the best of the NDS Castlevania titles.
Seeing the game Phantasy Star in the intro put me back 30+ years. I remember wanting a nintendo and my parents got me a Sega instead and my dad got me Phantasy Star and was like this game is huge, the guy at the store said it was 4 megs!! Neither of us knew what that meant but we both played it together from start to finish over that summer. Once getting lost 7 levels deep in a dungeon with no heals and having to save with almost every step while trying to figure out how to get out. We stayed up all night playing u til it was daylight again. Good memories
Love how in Order of Ecclesia you can just casually summon giant sword that take up the whole screen. Don't know how you can say it is the worst game in this episode when you featured Circle of the Moon.
Clearly Circle of Moon is the worst of all by a mile
It was the worst as the story was bad the music wasnt that good and the level design was bland there was no real exploration. it so refreshing that he actually pointed out the flaws of this game as people claim it was the best but was actually the reason Konami looked to other studios for the next installment of the series.
Joe, the side shots of the monitor when changing scenes is some A+ work. I love your videos. Give Dave my love
After Symphony of the night, Dawn of Sorrow(DS) has to be my favorite metroidvania. By the way, you forgot to mention Julius Mode in Dawn of Sorrow, where you can play as Julius, Yoko and Alucard, which is a gameplay nod to Castlevania 3. My favorite channel on YT.
Julius can now also level up
Symphony > Aria > Harmony > Portrait > Sorrow > Eccelesia > Moon
if you ever do a castelvania clone series or a clone series in general i would like to massively, massively, massively, MASSIVELY recommend RUSTY for the nec pc 98. there is an english translation patch.
@Timothy Owens ive never tried it but i know niko emulator also works on android though i have no experience getting it to work so i cant say if its great or not. most f the setting configurations from the video should still apply though,
@Timothy Owens ill warn you it can be obnoxious to configure things so that you see any text at all. be sure to follow the video carefully
@Timothy Owens pc 98 emutlation is ... its not the most user freindly thing
Whoa that game looks great, thx so much. I rly hope i can find the dos version.
@@ShulasShulman unfortunately there is no dos version.
Joe talks about Ecclesia music at 34:09... Nothing stands out? O_o Order of Ecclesia has one of the best soundtrack imo. "An Empty Tome" anyone? "Rhapsody of the Forsaken", "Unholy Vespers", the list goes on. Amazing stuff.
I dont understand your complaints about the maps. They are all the same, except the colors
In the old style, the outline of the map uses only one color (usually white) and all the passages are just parts of this outline missing.
The new style has the outlines in multiple colors. In Aria, for example, the outline is white, but he passages are light blue.
Some people have trouble seeing the passages on the DS screen. Trying to find passages that we didn't went through yet is a bit harder, specially for people with poor eyesight.
8:01 It's not weaker than the regular whip, just check your attack stat when the card is activated--it's higher. Of course the damage done will depend on each enemy's weakness and tolerances.
Joe apparently doesn't understand the concept of elemental attributes. You'd think after all those RPGs he would have gotten it down. I guess he just grinded his way through all those games without understanding anything.
This video is a Masterpiece and I always come back to watch it as I'm a huge Castlevania fan and for your marvelous work ❤️
Isn't it weird that no one ever mentions Konami's first attempt to make a Metroid-clone? TMNT 3: Radical Rescue was the first time I remember a game of Konami trying to act like Metroid. A decent sized map that you need specific skills and power ups to be able to explore to completion, a map showing where you are and where you need to go, boss fights that give you access to the other turtles (you start as one with specific skills and then you unlock others). It was a decent game but very hard and unforgiving.
Still, I've never seen anyone mention it when making a video about Metroidvania type games.
Hardly any one has played it. I haven't. I'll add it to my folder and play that on 3DS.
SotN started my collection of all these Metroid style gems. Still awesome!
Order of Ecclessia is very highly under apreciated imo. After revisiting the DS trilogy myself I believe it is the best among the three. Graphically it's by far the best, and I disagree on your comment regarding the music, I actually think it's pretty great. It has lots of stages, albeit some of them a bit repetitive, they're all explorable and have very varied enemies, not to mention the last one is a fully fledged Castle (which is roughly 1/3rd to half of the game). You can do pretty awesome things with the glyph system if you dig a bit into it, you can even absord super powerfull glyphs from bosses. The amped up challenge is great to balance out the over the top glyphs and powers you get later in the game, by actually forcing you to think which ones are better for each situation.
Seems like lots of people do not give OoE a proper chance due to its slow start and its steep difficulty compared to the rest of the DS titles, but it's an incredible game overall.
For me:
#1 - *Aria of Sorrow* - Great stage design, good controls, cool magic system and tons of secrets while not being overly grindy.
#2 - *Symphony of the Night* - Pretty much the same as above, I just think the Soul system is better. Really tough to choose between the two.
#3 - *Circle of the Moon* - Very different from the others, but I like the controls the best, the boss fights are really well done, and although it's basic compared to the others in terms of features, it's really focused and well-executed. I really like the DSS system, too. The Mage playthrough is always an interesting one.
#4 - *Portrait of Ruin* - Like AoS and SotN, really tough to place 3 and 4. Loved the two-character system, great variety, and really well-balanced.
#5 - *Dawn of Sorrow* - The changes to the Soul system made the game a lot grindier, which really bothered me. Having to collect 9 souls for maximum power was ridiculous when it could have just been a stat check or story item to unlock further power levels just made the game a time sink if you wanted to explore and have fun with the system. Bloodstained really suffers from this as well. The touch stuff never really bothered me. The seals were a lot easier on the OG DS if you had the thumb slider thing, though.
#6 - *Harmony of Dissonance* - The floaty controls and poor music really drag this down, and the castle has good setpieces, but very little good platforming and a lot of dead space. CotM was a lot more fun to navigate for me. The biggest problem is that it's WAY too easy. The bosses are pushovers. Visually impressive, but pushovers all the same. The whole thing sort of feels half-baked.
#7 - *Order of Ecclesia* - I agree with you on every point, and that's exactly why this one is on the bottom. Dead last, no question.
Are you insane. harmony of Dissonance has infinitely better controls than Circle of the Moon. That game is mediocre at best.
@@BinaryDood Once you get used to double tapping to dash, CotM's speed, responsiveness, and gravity feel great. It's very snappy. HoD by comparison feels like you're underwater, has a far less interesting magic system, and is easy to the point of being boring at times (especially during boss battles). Still a great game, but I, personally, enjoy CotM more.
@@gargonovich The jumps in CoTM don't even make sense, they lack any unity of flow and momentum. HoD is the only game in the series to give you a dash forward, and not only that makes traversal the best but also eliminates the problem you mentioned. I barely walked in HoD, I dashed as long as I could. I disagree with the magic system being better in CoTM, it is reliant on a terrible RNG drop and is not swapable in-game, and also the effects are far less creative. As for the bosses, true there are far too many in Dissonance, but those that are good still outshine CoTMs imo. This mostly because CoTM's bosses are lacking in audiovusal cues for their attacks and either move around the screen to much or have gimmicky hitboxes. Idk, when playing Circle of the Moon I felt like playing something incomplete, like the alpha of a game.
@@BinaryDood I do like the forward dash in HoD, but mashing L and R to move at a decent clip gets irritating. I feel just the opposite about the bosses, everything is telegraphed well once you know what to look for and has obvious patterning and thought put into it, whereas most HoD bosses you can just wreck with Ice+Bible before they do anything. DSS can be unintuitive with the random drop on some modes, but the Mage mode playthrough is super fun because there are a ton of options that the system opens up. As far as the controls go, I think CotM is more like the classic series than any other game in the RPG series, and that could also be why I like it so much since I spent a lot of time with those games before getting into the RPGs. This seems to be a case of different strokes for different folks, I guess! That's what's tough about ranking such a great series, it's totally down to personal preference.
@@gargonovich Wait, what is the Mage mode?
Order of Ecclesia’s story is much more subtle than the other games. it seems like you either love it or don’t care at all. I love it because I’m big brained
Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin is by far the best handheld Castlevania game. 😁
and its soundtrack is so good
Portrait is my favorite after SoTN. Easily the best OST also after SoTN. I liked how you used "Dracula's Tears' to highlight Dawn's music, it is absolutely the best track in that.
Circle of the moon was my first GBA game, my first Castlevania and my introduction to many of the original castlevania songs, and i wouldn't have it any other way because the renditions are really, really good. I would really like to somehow hear the non-bitcrushed versions of these tracks but that is not likely to happen.
The original songs are some of the best in the GBA too. Awake and Proof of Blood are the best first and last stage song duo in the whole series IMO.
Cotm is my favorite Castlevania on the gba
Actually i like more cotm than sotn, the reason is that sotn progress system doesnt work, is like enemies become more weak while you become stronger with the time, you dont even have to move when facing a boss, just press attack button a few times and the boss die in less that 5 seconds.
I think the coloring in cotm was the best of the gba games. My big problem with harmony of dissonance is that some of the backgrounds are really lame. They created one tile, layered all over. And slapped it behind areas. Areas will have a background that has 2000 doors for no reason
I would pay dearly for these games if they come to the Nintendo SWITCH.
Saad サアド سـعد The GBA games are on the Wii U.
@@wes788411 Sadly I don't have a Wii U.
I agree with your ranking partially. 1. Symphony - definitely the best,
2. Aria - I remember getting sucked into this game,
3. Order if Ecclesia - all around the best on the DS in my opinion. It felt more gothic, more horror, I loved the challenge, and the glyph system.
4. Portrait - I was a little disappointed in this one originally, after aria I just didn’t find it as deep, the story was kinda weird, and it was easy tbh.
5. Harmony - same complaints as you.
6. Circle - way too clunky tbh.
I never played Dawn sadly
You forgot Castlevania: Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night. 😏
to be fair it isn't castlevania but if it was it would easily be the best by a long shot, btw there's no way konami could pull a might number 9 vs mega man 11
@@bignekidbatzero Because Iga left Konami. Otherwise title would definitely had been Castlevania: Ritual of the Night.
@@MrX-rk9or true
Aria of Sorrow is my favorite of the bunch, with Ecclesia next.
I'd say Symphony is way more overrated than people lead on. The inverted castle is just giant filler that's awkward to move around in, with the exception to the new bosses. I'd much prefer they made it so the areas swapped themes or something instead of what they did. Dawn of Sorrow is also a piece of something, because the soul system wasn't really fixed, since grinding is all luck based in the game, but now the best weapons in the game require souls to unlock, so that's grinding randomly to get a really good weapon, when you could just find it on the map in Aria of Sorrow. Order of Ecclesia's difficulty made it really endearing to me, because figuring out the best glyphs to use and timing things just right to do massive damage was very fun. Dracula's castle at the end was a giant marathon that was so fun to do. I'm quite disappointed you said nothing stood out in the soundtrack, and the story was really cool too. I think you'd be more warm to the game if you played it again when you aren't burnt out on Castlevania.
Always Good To see Someone That Doesn't Overrate SOTN
It's my boy Game Sack Joe *back at it again with the Metroidvanias!* ✌🔥
I can understand why HoD's soundtrack is so offputting, but IMO it's one of the greatest soundtracks in the entire series. It's an acquired taste, but I absolutely love how crunchy and psychotic it gets. Clock Tower Casualty in particular never fails to give me anxiety with it's aggressive build-ups and sudden loop. Luminous Cavern is also one of my favorites, and I can't stop thinking about when I saw someone describe it as "what it feels like to attend your own funeral."
I like anytime you talk about Castlevania on Game Sack
The funny thing with how great SOTN looked on PlayStation, was magazines at the time took points off for it's "16 bit graphics". Giving it scores like 7/10 because of that. Man how times have changed.
God the view of "everything has to be 3-D or it's old hat" think of the mid 90's was just terrible. We could have got so many great 2-D games instead of butt ugly 3-D games that didn't play as well. I'm glad we all wisened up and realized that it's just a different style. The same kind of "it has to be this advanced or else it sucks" think happens today with people crying when something isn't raytraced or 60fps, etc ... like, the gameplay is really all that matters. Is it fun and playable? Then who cares if it doesn't look perfect.
Check out Dawn of Sorrow - Definitive Edition
It's aptly named. ;)
Here's how I rank them:
1) SOTN
2) Harmony of Dissonance
3) Aria of Sorrow
4) Portrait of Ruin
5) Order of Ecclesia
6) Circle of the Moon
7) Dawngrade of Sorrow.
So why exactly do you dislike Dawn Of Sorrow so much? I just binge played thru the Castlevania series again and the only negatives I can possibly think of for Dawn are the touch screen nonsense, Low quality anime character art and somewhat forgettable story (Tho that's pretty much every Castlevania game for me personally lol) It pretty much nails everything else that made Aria so special and in many aspects surpasses it. Calling it a "Downgrade" Feels very odd as it's obviously an upgrade in many areas, Graphically, Audibly and overall attention to detail in the gameplay is on another level. I really don't see how anyone could say this is the worst one unless they just have something against Dawn for some weird reason lol
It's late at night, this was a symphony to my ears.
1. Sotn
2. Dawn of sorrow
3. Portrait of ruin
The only bad one is harmony of dissonance
there's also patches to get rid of the outlines for HoD
Order of Ecclesia is in my top 5 Castlevania games. It's hard as f*ck and not really that much fun to play due to that, to be honest, but the graphics, effects and story are so good ♥️ I love the fact that the story is about this secret organization no one knows about and no one will ever know about it (finish the game and you'll see why). The protagonist suffers a lot throughout the game and has to stop this evil force without getting any kind of recognition, unlike the Belmont clan.
I know nothing about Castlevania, but I saw your video and I guess I'm interested in this!
What!? I personally found the bakground story of Ecclessia really interesting like a "What if the Belmonts dissappeared from the timeline?".
Also yeah, you can't grind for leveling in this game not until you unlock Dracula's castle. From there is whre the game gets really though.
Honestly Castlevania was one of those series that screamed "I would be awesome as an RPG!"
Yup
They tried that. It's called Simon's Quest.
Awesome overview of the Igavania, Metroidvania series. We're finally got Game Sack to cover DS games. And I love it.
What a time to be alive :)
Now we need "Metroid: The Castlevaroids"
There aren't any.
Actually, that's every single Metroid game.
I guess there is no dictionary definition, but Castlevania 2 is totally the first Metroidvania. It's more like the first Metroid than it is the first Castlevania, though it is clearly an amalgamation of both. But no big deal. It was only the true original.
My favorite Metroidvania game is Castlevania: The Search for Dave. That one was awesome!