Castlevania

I just polished off Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, while at the same time the Angry Video Game Nerd completed his four part series on the Castlevania franchise (told in parts I, II, III, and IV, and of course supplemented by his classic coverage of Castlevania II). Given the type of game the Nerd generally covers I usually only go to him for entertainment value, not critical analysis. But watching these videos on the Castlevania franchise I found he and I seem to be in exact agreement.

There’s an inflection point on the Castlevania franchise, which is Symphony of the Night. Truth be told, I haven’t actually played it - the hilariously bad voice acting turned me away immediately. But I have a good idea what Symphony is like because every Castlevania game after it carries its influence. This is when games stopped being called Metroid-clones and started being placed in the “metroidvania” genre.

I’ve played most of the handheld games (Aria of Sorrow, Dawn of Sorrow, Portrait of Ruin, and most recent Order of Ecclesia), and they all follow the same formula. You’re fighting Dracula (although generally with some other secondary villain). You explore his castle, progressing through tough boss fights and unlocking abilities that open up new areas of the castle. Gone is the classic whip, replaced with a set of swords, axes, pole arms, and sometimes magic. There’s some attempt at a story, and it’s always terrible. There is series gothic atmosphere, but the annoying characters completely destroy the mood (Portrait of Ruin’s childlike heroes were particularly guilty of this, but to be fair Order of Ecclesia wasn’t so bad). Then there’s a layer of RPG elements where you have stats, level up, and manage all sorts of equipment. And throughout this is a ton of recycled art assets (going from Dawn of Sorrow to Portrait of Ruin I felt like I was playing the same game). Overall the formula takes in classic Castlevania and adds in elements from Metroid and Final Fantasy.

These sources are good games, so the combination should be awesome, right? Well, not really. The end result is… diluted. Instead of overcoming enemies with skill you can now just out-level them. But the developers have taken that into account so unless you know all the tricks you should expect to do some level grinding. And by tricks I don’t just mean patterns, I also mean particular equipment combinations that exploit their vulnerabilities. A lot of that equipment comes from random drops, so you won’t just be grinding for XP. Some of this grinding comes naturally, because the branching exploration means that you’re going to retreat the same areas more than you’d like instead of experiencing a clear climactic progression. Despite all the flaws I obviously find something of value in these games because I keep playing them. But I’m always left a little disappointed because they fall short of that classic action game I remember so fondly.

What is that classic game? Super Castlevania IV for the SNES. On this the Nerd and I agree; Super Castlevania is the pinnacle of the series. The music… the tight control… this game is awesome. It’s definitely on my short list for best 2D action games. Each level has it’s own feel, with perfectly paired music and some challenging boss. The game is hard, but not cruel. You can infinitely continue from the beginning of the stage, and the password system let’s you save your progress easily enough (for the standard of the day). So although there will be parts that test your patience and precision, it’s manageable.

Your primary weapon in Super Castlevania is the whip, and here it is at its most deadly. You can attack in all eight directions, as well as control the whip’s motion after the initial strike. This creates a weapon with a lot of subtlety, with plenty of tricks to master. The “evolution” from this to the wide array of single-button single-direction weapons in later games is a complete disappointment. Instead of being compelled to get better with the whip you’re only strategy is to find weapons with better stats or larger hit boxes. Maybe this broadens the audience for the game by requiring less skill, but it’s not like the whip is impenetrable.

I’ve always had this ambient dissatisfaction with the post-Symphony Castlevania games. I’m excited to start them, but by the end I’m left feeling that something was missing. Like they could have been better if they were less RPG and more like the classic Castlevania games. I figured it’s possible that nostalgia had clouded my judgment, so I decided to dust off the Wii and download Super Castlevania IV for the Virtual Console. It did not disappoint. I played the game to its completion and enjoyed every minute of it. It’s really amazing how little the series has evolved over the past 15 years, and how so many of the changes don’t really add anything to the experience. The new titles have more gameplay breadth, but not really depth. In my opinion the franchise has lost its way and become something far lesser than what it once was.

The more I ponder this topic the more I realize I’m missing a piece of the puzzle. I’m going to go grab Symphony of the Night off XBLA and report back with my findings.

Let the Right One In

When Halloween rolled around this year I decided that I was very much in the mood for a vampire movie. So I flipped through this article on Rotten Tomatoes of the top rated vampire movies of all time. I cross reference that against the list available for instant watch on Netflix and landed on Let the Right One In.

This movie tells the story of a boy in some Scandinavian city who falls in love with a vampire. No, this is nothing like Twilight (although I will say the people that seem to loathe that movie need to get over themselves - it was neither spectacularly good nor spectacularly bad - it was adequately entertaining). The life of the vampire in this world is not sparkly and moral, but rather messy and vulnerable. She is both predator to humans and also completely reliant on them. Her motivations are not completely selfless, but there is something sweet about her connection with this boy. Which is not an emotion you’d typically associate with a horror movie.

I’m a fan of a careful blend of mundane and supernatural. If everything is fantastical then a story becomes hard to relate to. But if there isn’t enough magic and mystery then it can be a little bit boring. There are real life stories that definitely entertain me, but I have a preference for something a little bit more than real. Given my video game habit it shouldn’t come as a surprise that I’m a bit of an escapist, but the trick is blending in just the right amount of fiction that it’s still believable. Unbreakable is an excellent example of this. Let the Right One In also hits this sweet spot really well. Yes, this is a world that hosts vampires, but the story around this is such a sleepy human tale that the vampire element doesn’t feel so outlandish. The movie doesn’t gloss over vampire mythology, nor is it the focus of the narrative.

The movie totally scratched my itch. I was looking for an innovative new tale of those delightfully enigmatic bloodsuckers and that’s exactly what I got here. If you’re also looking for a more relaxed, less in-your-face (but still dark) vampire movie then you should check this one out.

Ghostbusters

Played on Xbox360

Like many, the first time I went roller skating I was timid and hugged the wall the whole time. But there was a turning point where I finally gained enough confidence to let go, power skate as fast as I could, and really enjoy myself. That point was when the Ghostbusters theme song came on. I remember later in my life, going to some skating birthday party where my mom told this little factoid to a girl I was crushing on. I was mortified, of course. But apparently it doesn’t embarrass me now, as I sit freely blogging it to The Internet.

The first time I saw the Ghostbusters movie I obviously enjoyed it enough to inspire death defying confidence. I mean, bustin’ makes you feel good, right? But of course I didn’t really have a clue about most of what was going on (keymaster… why are the adults laughing?). As time passed and I returned to the movie it just became more and more awesome. But I’m not here today to talk about the movie. I’m here to talk about the video game. No, not that one. The new one. Yes, there’s a new Ghostbusters game that features all the original voice talents.

And really, that’s what makes the game: the voice acting. You go around to familiar locales, fighting familiar ghosts, all the time listening to the chatter of Venkman, Stantz, Egon, and Winston. Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis do an awesome job; Ernie Hudson does good but has a more limited role; Bill Murray pretty much phones it in. Murray’s obviously the more successful actor, but he just doesn’t feel like the same Venkman from his Ghostbusting days. But in general the whole cast transports you right back to the 80’s, living out your childhood dream of busting ghosts with the Ghostbusters.

The core gameplay can be generally described as a first person shooter, but it doesn’t really feel in any way like Halo or anything. Because instead of packing a rifle you’ve got a freaking proton pack. The developers did a great job of making the proton pack feel just right. It’s got the sound, the look, and leaves just the right amount of carnage. You use the stream to wear down a ghost until it’s weak enough for you to wrangle it, then you toss out a trap and suck that apparition in. It feels exactly how it should, and each capture is very satisfying.

To mix things up you also have alternate modes for you weapon. The slime feels very appropriate for a Ghostbusters game, but the shotgun and machine gun modes are a little more of a stretch. It’s not so far out of place to yank you out of the groove, they’re there for the less traditional ghosts that you don’t actually have to trap. It doesn’t feel as satisfying as the classic ghost wrangling, but the game is probably better for having the variety.

Basically the rest of the game rides on those two main strengths: the voice acting and the feeling of your proton pack. The rest is pretty standard for the genre. The environments aren’t bad, but rarely are they particularly inspiring. The story is an appropriate vehicle for giving you an opportunity to return to classics like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, but it isn’t particularly memorable beyond that.

I’d say the biggest problem of the game is the uneven difficulty curve, which is exacerbated by the extremely long loading times. Every time you die you’re dumped to the loading screen and treated to that ever so classic Ghostbusters theme. Every time. No, no, I mean every time. And it always starts at the beginning of the song, with the game finishing loading right about when you’re going to find about “something strange, in the neighborhood.” It’s really amazing that no one realized how extremely annoying this would be. You get to some freakishly hard part in the game where some gargoyles are cheezing you, and you’re going to listen to the first part of that theme a couple dozen times.

The game does make it a little harder to die as that as long as one of your fellow Ghostbusters is still standing they can revive you. Well, they can… but they might die before they get to you. Of course you have the return the favor, reviving them when they get knocked down. Which you will be doing constantly. There are many fights where you will spend as much time fussing over your comrades as actually unloading with your proton pack. It’s hardly heroic. I don’t mean to say that the game is too hard, because it’s not. It’s just that it’s uneven. You will coast by most of the time, but occasionally you’ll hit an annoying snag, and then you’ll have the Ghostbusters theme song stuck in your head for a couple days.

Aggravating load times aside, I did truly enjoy this one. It’s all about the source material. If you find the Ghostbusters movies hilarious, and you’re okay with a light FPS, then this game is a nice short distraction.