This was a good Castlevania game. I don't find it particularly worse than Rondo,why did people trash it so much?
Figure it out.
>>12894230I gaslit myself into thinking rondo controlled badly because the last game in my memory was dracula x and I assumed it played 1:1, rondo actually feels much snappier, doesn't have an awkwardly vertical jump.
>>12894230This game is finally redeemed.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m31c-QZVU8g
>>12894235
The narrative that it was a botched port of a much better game that Westerners couldn't play without importing gave it a sour reputation in the West
>>12894230Too hard for gamers coddled by Super Castlevania 4.
>>12894230Come on OP knock it off. Rondo is clearly the better game. In fact that is the best Castlevania game along with SOTN. They really cooked with both of those games. >>12894241What is great about Rondo is they found a way to improve the maneuvering and combat without having to resort to a multi-direction hitting whip. This made it so that you had more control over Richter then you would in prior CV games but you also had to rely on this movement in order to do good in the fights. I really like how you can hold the action button and do the backwards walk its really useful.Also the fact you don't have to upgrade the whip was imo a good thing for the most part although I still think maybe having 1 level of an upgrade could have worked. Maybe as a rare drop per level or doing it the way it worked in Bloodlines where if you have max health the whip is at its strongest. I do also think the item crash is too strong or should have had a better balance to it like maybe only one use per level or something to nerf it. Great game overall very deserving of being seen as the best of the classic style CV gameplay. I feel like playing it right fucking now.
>>12894289X68K > RoB
>>12894291I still need to play that one but I will respect your opinion anon. You won't convince me however.
Tendies coping hard to defend this game
>>12894261He had so much guilt for not buying a Dreamcast during it's lifespan, and even more guilt for not being one of the first to buy and play Shenmue, that he ends up buying more Dreamcast and Shenmue related items than anyone I know.Thankfully I bought a Dreamcast at launch, bought Shenmue when it first release and I helped fund Shenmue 3. I have no guilt when it comes to the Dreamcast and Shenmue, I've been a fan since day one. Adam and I took different paths in life. Thankfully my love of Dreamcast and Shenmue didn't turn into an obsession.
>>12894230It's a loose port of Rondo of Blood, while being worse than it
There's like 5 games called Dracula X.
>>12894272It's not a port. It's a completely different game.
>>12894329It's a "different version of the same draft" game. Those were common back in the day. The dev was probably given a general gist of what to make and that's how you end up with two versions that are sort of the same game but not.
>>12894334It's not even the same draft. The levels are completely different. Only the very broad character designs and aesthetic remain.
>>12894289>In fact that is the best Castlevania game along with SOTNThe best Castlevania is not retrorder of ecclesia
Dracula X isn't as bad as people say it is, but Rondo is still the better game overall.At the same time, Rondo is still overrated because the game's quality is very inconsistent. People call it a masterpiece, yet ignore how many shit levels it has. It is inconstent in terms of environmental design and also in terms of level design. Some of the alternate levels literally look unfinished.Even as early as map 2B, you can see the inconsistent quality.Map 2A's setting goes from a forest at night with beautiful rain into a blue-purple castle with underground water dungeon areas. Amazing visual variety. See: https://www.castlevaniacrypt.com/wp-content/img/rob/maps/2a-entrancetocastlevania.pngMap 2B's setting is just....90 percent spent with a dry repetitive tileset set against a super bland daytime backdrop, with the same recycled bosses for 2A.See: https://www.castlevaniacrypt.com/wp-content/img/rob/maps/2b-lakebridge.png5B is the worst of these. Not only is the level design complete dogshit, the environments look like they were slapped together in like one afternoon. It literally doesn't even have a boss. See: https://www.castlevaniacrypt.com/wp-content/img/rob/maps/5b-hiddendocks.pngPay particular attention to the last room. It looks like an NES room.Oh, there's also a literal GREENSCREEN pre-boss room for map 4B (pic related). They didn't even finish this. They left it this way as is in the game.The PSP remake (Dracula X Chronicles) largely fixes ROB's inconsistency problems in its levels (and even adds a 5B boss) at the cost of uglier 2.5D visuals overall and at the cost of a 30fps cap.
I’ll use this as the continuation of the last Castlevania thread. Just cleared CV1 for the first time, with a hitless Dracula phase 1. Anons’ tips about walking left on phase 1, and walking through stunned Dracula on phase 2 helped a ton. Thank you guys!Really nice game. Feels very replayable too.
>>12894625That green background is on purpose and is a Hammer Horror reference.
>>12894628Congrats. You should consider posting your 1CCs on YouTube. Even if you're not planning on becoming an e-celebrity, it's good to keep a record of these accomplishments just to look back on them. Now try out the Castlevania Chronicles on PS1, which is a remake of Castlevania 1 that adds a beautiful arrange mode and also makes the original mode even harder with 6 difficulty loops.
Since nobody answered me in the previous thread due to it falling off of page 10, I'll ask again: Is there any value in playing CV2: Simon's Quest? Is it as bad as people say it is or are these criticisms wrong?
>>12894646Just play it knowing it’s not quite like the rest.
>>12894243>>12894625Hey, i tought of something...............member the Maria Bellydancer hack?............just saying!?https://warosu.org/vr/thread/12613476
>>12894630Bullshit
>>12894321This game's real name is Dracula XX. "Dracula X" is Rondo of Blood, in fact when "Rondo of Blood" was finally released in the west it was called titled "Dracula X". So people who insist on calling Dracula XX "Dracula X", would be like insisting on calling Final Fantasy VI "Final Fantasy III" even after the actual Final Fantasy III released under that name in the US. Except nobody does that, but they do it for Dracula XX, and don't even know what they are saying because they're dumb like that.The irony is that entire reason why in the US they renamed Dracula XX to Dracula X was a marketing ploy to pretend the game is something other than it is. To understand that you need to go back to the US in 1993 and 95. Dracula X (Chi no Rondo) came out in Japan and every try-hard US magazine was like "this is the bestest Castlevania ever but you'll never play it because it's Japan-only and on a CD add-on for a console nobody owns, now look at how cool WE reviewers are for playing this hidden gem you'll never play!", as a result Dracula X got a lot of hype in the US but they never got to play it.Then in 95 Dracula XX came out. In Japan it had that name and all new key-art, making it clear it's not supposed to be Dracula X - Chi no Rondo, but it's something new merely based on it, the X means "spin-off", XX means "spin-off of the spin-off". In Europe they didn't get Dracula X either but they kept XX's new key art and came up with a new title altogether for the game.But in the US they renamed XX to X; and you could think "okay, that makes sense, it's like renaming GameTitle2 to GameTitle because the first game never came out", but they didn't just do that, they replaced all the key-art (cover, manual, magazine stuff etc) of XX to that X. The marketing ploy was clearly to pretend "This is the Dracula X that have been hyped up by magazines for 2 years now! Yep, you're finally getting it!". Except that it wasn't, and the marketing tactic rightfully backfired.
>>12894916[cont]In other words, the marketing ploy worked so well that 30 years later Americans are STILL calling Dracula XX "Dracula X", while calling the actual Dracula X by its subtitle, and at the same time it backfired so much that 30 years later they're still caling Dracula X "a port of Rondo". Crazy how things go in the land of marketing.
>>12894645Thanks! Oh it’s not a 1CC, just a casual win. If I do a 1CC eventually, I’ll definitely post it on YT like I did with my DoDonPachi DFK 1-ALL recently.>6 difficulty loopsThat’s insane lol, I’d be impressed if anyone actually 6-ALL’d that because of the length alone.
>>12894916The American names are considered the default for this series. No one outside of Japan refers to them as the Demon Castle Dracula games now do they?
>>12894957>The American names are considered the default for this series. You lack reading comprehension don't you. As I said what you're saying is like insisting on calling Final Fantasy 6 "Final Fantasy III" even after the actual FF3 remakes and remasters came out in the US.
>>12894230Some awful enemy placement, worst in the franchise. While it's not a "botched port", it just reuses Rondo's assets in a mostly nonsensical fashion.It's also missing a ton of content compared to Rondo. It has the worst Dracula fight of all Classicvanias. Once I got a 1cc with the best ending, I never felt the desire to play this piece of shit again, meanwhile I replay all the other pre SOTN games constantly.
>>12894607>The game is a reimagining of Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, which was originally released exclusively in Japan for the PC Engine Super CD-ROM. Despite being commonly labeled as a port, the contents of the game are drastically altered from the original and is instead considered to take place in a different continuity than the official timeline.
It was a peculiar operation that actually said something about the moment in time in which it was releasedIV is where it's atthat was actual new blood to the series as it was back then
>>12895078also i wanted to addseason 1993/1994 was a mistake
>>12894301You're both faggots
>>12894230dracula x is better than super but is a romhack. mismatched assets and enemies with incomplete animations. also has the worst dracula fight in the series ''pits and fireballs'' lol
>pay for console nobody in the West cares about>overpay for Rondo of Blood>proceed to trash all the Americans who bought the only available version in their country on the SNES
>>12894747That is NOT goin to happen, right??
Now that I've revisited and refinished Aria of Sorrow, its onto revisiting and refinishing Portrait of Ruin.After a really good start with the first little bits of the castle and the first portrait done, I arrived at this boss. What in the fuck?How is this a boss?I completely forgot this was even a boss.
>>12895110>also has the worst dracula fight in the seriesSomeone hasn't played Belmont's Revenge
>>12894230The issue with Castlevania games is the life system, it worked in the past but nowdays its just frustrating. Checkpoints should be permanent.
>>12895861Modern gamers don't seem to mind long boss runbacks in souls titles, so I don't believe it's outdated
>>12895904Soulsborne games have level ups, Castlevania games have nothing. It gets boring after a while evn if you "get good". Reminds me of the last stage of Castlevania 4, i got bored running the bridge after losing because it was so easy it was essentially just a time waster, that i just used a save state right afterthat area. Saved a good 2 minutes every run. Anyway, permanent checkpoints.
>>12895686So...we all see a cock here, right? It's not just me?
>>12895928You're always saying that
>>12895904>Modern gamers don't seem to mind long boss runbacks in souls titlesthese have been pretty much eliminated with elden ring. there hasn't been long walkbacks since dark souls 2. however this is generally a good thing design-wise. i want to play the game, not spend time getting to the part where i can play the game.
>>12896087Games need tedium, or some sort of punishment. Otherwise there's no tension. I'm afraid of dying to a boss because that means I'm gonna face real consequences. I have to lock in. If there's no consequence to failure, the big scary dragon monster is no longer scary, just meh. Victory becomes meaningless.
>>12894230It's very difficult, particularly in the level design. That can be frustrating, and people just get mad at it.
>>12895686I just played PoR this past year for the first time and I do not remember this thing at all.
>>12894230Dracula X is to Rondo of Blood what the NES version of Metal Gear is to the MSX version of Metal Gear. Good on its own terms but it's a frustrating regression when you compare it to what came beford.
>>12895928I see a big Jugg with a nice pair of knockers
>>12894628Congrats on your game clear and your no-hit phase 1!
>Akumajo Dracula XX>can only play as XYIt should've been Maria's solo game!
>>12894916Too much autism. And you're not even correct.The entire series is called Demon Castle Dracula (Akumajou Dorakyura) in Japan, so "Dracula X" is a part of the original title, it's NOT a subtitle. Basically, it was supposed to be Castlevania X: Rondo of Blood, and Castlevania XX for the budget SNES demake.And SOTN is a direct sequel to Rondo so it's also part of the X label.
>>12896431>so "Dracula X" is a part of the original title, it's NOT a subtitleI never said Dracula X was a subtitle, I said people call Dracula X by its subtitle, which they do (Rondo of Blood), and still do even after it got an official release AS "Dracula X" (the PSP shit).You're all so retarded with this thing, next time I'll have to make a drawing.
>>12896435In that official release the original game was called Castlevania Rondo of Blood though.Please make a drawing.
>>12896312You fight it not too long after finishing the first portrait. It's literally the most random boss fight ever. I didn't even realize that I was entering into a boss room, because there's no build up to it. They just randomly decided to place a boss in a room in a random part of the map. My guess is that one of their designers didn't finish the boss, but they felt sorry for the guy, so they kept it in anyways.And when I say "unfinished", I really mean it. It has a grand total of two (2) moves. An energy ball it shoots forward that can never hit you because his head is so high up and a bukakke rain in front of it. They both have the same exact telegraphs btw so the bukkake is pretty much undodgeable if you happen to be at a bad spot.You kill it by smacking the pot like 6-7 times (which brings out the penis head), then smack the penis head like 2-3 times before it retreats back into the pot. Rinse and repeat. Funnily enough, I looked up the wiki and this thing literally has 666 health. It has to be some kind of a joke.
>>12895861These classicvania games are typically no longer than like 35-40 minutes to beat. Plus they're super generous with 1UPs/extends and health items, so this complaint about the life system is meaningless. You can play super sloppy and still get a clear. >>12895909>uses save states while bragging about certain sections being "easy" and "time wasters"Classic scrub cope.
>>12896263The punishment is that you restart the boss fight from scratch and all your hard work in beating him is erased. Which, for games that often have multi-phase boss fights, is more than enough punishment. You can't tell me that someone who dies at the last phase of FagLord Radahn doesn't feel punished even though he immediately respawns outside the boss's fog door. From Software did good in removing these runbacks. I wish they were removed 100 percent instead of still insisting on having at least a handful of runbacks per game (like how you still have long runbacks against Malekith and Placidusax and like a few more in Elden Ring, as well as a few in Sekiro that still require you to waste time runnig through chunks of the levels). At least Armored Core 6 removed them 100 percent completely.Stop being a retarded runback defender. This isn't 2012. You don't have to posture as being hardcore by defending runbacks and other retarded shit in FS games that people back then mindlessly defended like religious zealots.
>>12896263This. Won't play if there's not enough stakes and risk throughout the playthrough. Goes for any game.
>>12896512Why yes I come on /vr/ to talk about off-topic modern games and claim that modern game design should be applied to old games, makes perfect sense!You know that's precisely the problem with famous game series that are still ongoing, it attracts idiots who don't know, understand or like anything about old games to those games for "gamer creds" and then instead of actually trying to understand what the games are about, and since the games are outside of the modern comfort zone, it leads to those generalities that are nothing but copes about how "we have it so much better now!". Unless you want to understand why what you're saying makes sense in the context of modern games but not in the context of a 8/16-bit Castlevania (and you're not), nobody here cares.
Because it's a downgrade in every regard
I'm with you OP.At worst, it's still an above-average action-platformer and a good classicvania.The complaints about it having "less content" than Rondo look skewed when you play the game and realize the entire levels are different, so instead of missing content it's judt another game. I doubt someone who genuinely enjoys playing Rondo would dislike Dracula X unless they ONLY like playing as Maria.The performance is better than Rondo, with less/almost no slowdowns and new bosses, some returning bosses, like Death, are harder here than on Rondo.It's still understandable to prefer Rondo, but claiming X is bad is just strange, it's nowhere near a bad or questionable game, it's straight good.Oh also, the SNES rendition of the first stage theme has great arrangements and sounds very fresh, I prefer it to the Rondo original despite it being CD audio and all.
>>12899450All the musics are excellentBackground graphics in XX are also underrated. It was the first CV game which tried to not make it obvious that it was made out of a succession of square tiles, as opposed to things like pic related which look unfinished. A lot of things in Rondo seem unfinished for that matter but nobody ever seems to notice that. They even stitched together a bunch of unrelated unfinished rooms to create a bonus ng+ level, because that side of the world map was missing a level, and it's like nobody's noticed. It's the sort of things that make me realize most people only judge games on a very surface level basis.
>>12894289>SOTNYou mean Bloodlines
>>12900226The ROB dickriding really just boils down to adulation of the game's spritework and environments, which admittedly are the best of all the classicvania games. What they created in ROB ended up laying the groundwork for the game that created the next phase of Castlevania, which is SOTN.Yet, as you have pointed out, a lot of ROB is unfinished. And, might I add, inconsistent. A fanboy of ROB might point to the opening village ruins stage as being evidence of ROB's beauty. Indeed, that opening level looks beautiful. But there isn't a single other level in the game that looks even remotely as detailed and beautiful as that opening level. Anyway, as I've written earlier in this thread, the PSP remake of this game has largely fixed ROB's problems. Unfortunately, you have to put up with the somewhat uglier 2.5D visuals, alongside the game being capped at 60fps (though apparently mods on PPSSPP have largely bypassed this issue).
>>12897395I prefer Dracula X simply because it feels like maybe the closest Castlevania sequel to the original game. It's just a nice straightforward game. CV4 is good but the swinging section feels like a cheap gimmick and I'd argue having all the extra control on the whip alter the fundamental gameplay a bit too much
>>12895928Goes to grocery store. What are these cocks? While fondling bananas. Goes to the park. What is this a cock? While rubbing all over a fire extinguisher. Looks up in the sky. There are cocks everywhere?!?! Clouds slowly drift and pass by.
>>12894243It needs to use the Maria design that the SNES release already had. Not too hard, I'd imagine, as the lone Maria sprite was already her same one from Rondo with her hair edited down into a bob.
>>12900761No it wasn't, they made her look like Sherlwy Temple
>>12897395I wonder why they never made a Castlevania character control as good as Simon did in IV ever again... it was genuinely perfect, made playing feel a lot better too.
>>12901264He's too mobile for the game he's in and if you build a game around this mobility you get gay shit like the current dead cells abomination
>>12901264I have a theory.I don't think it's because "it makes the game too easy" or similar arguments about it rendering subweapons useless, which I think it's all debatable (especially when the other CV games all have their own broken subweapons or moves, too).Castlevania IV actually did influence later games, with Bloodlines having upward-diagonal whipping (though only when jumping, and there was no difference in whip framedata during the process - no instance where the whip did more damage depending on the trajectory/button press timing, a subtle, more intricate mechanic from IV that people often overlook), same with X68000's downward whipping.But, these games only adopted a partial element of IV's full multi directional whip.Was this intentionally done to restrain the playable character's abilities? I'm not sure and my theory is that the developers of Bloodlines and X68000 couldn't come up with a satisfactory recreation of the multiwhip from IV, and the reason being that I suspect Mitsuru Yaida, the main programmer for Simon in IV, seems to be a guy obsessed with 8-directional imputs, and likes to polish them a lot to the point it feels natural and seamless. Again, compare the awkward upward diagonal whip from Bloodlines to the flow of the same action in IV.I'm not saying the coders from BL or X68K were bad but I don't think they cared enough to polish a good multidirectional control scheme, so they only used a lite recreation of it.Yaida later went on to work on Gunstar Heroes and Bangai O, both games with huge emphasis on 8 directional sidescrolling action.
>>12894230It got labeled as a shitty Rondo port, and no one had played Rondo so they just assumed that was accurate.>>12894625I'm glad to see someone else appreciates the Rondo remake. An awful lot of people seem to dismiss it entirely because of the visuals.
>>12901352The reality is that majority of people don't have their own opinions, it's mostly parroting opinions they read. At most, they emulate the games for 5 minutes, confirm bias what they read, and proceed to parrot said opinions on the internet for years/decades. Also have into account that these original opinions get distorted and exaggerated over time, so for example "not as good as..." becomes "is a bad game"
>>12901314>couldnt comeyou can grapple any vertical surface on Bloodline. Super only allows you to grapple that grapple thing
>>12901352I adore DXC. It still looks beautiful on PPSSPP with upscaling. The PSP in general housed so many good 2.5D games, whether it's DXC, Mega Man Powered Up or Ultimate Ghosts N' Goblins. Also, on a side note, I prefer Richter's DXC look (pic related) compared to his original look. I feel like pic related is more timeless than the 1980s anime hero look he had in the original ROB.If Konami had any brains, they'd release a PS5/Steam remastered version of DXC with 60fps and improved textures. Sell it for 30 bucks and people will be happy, especially since it also includes the original ROB as well as SOTN.
>>12901264They love to re-use enemies in the series and none of them are designed for that control scheme. Even in Super IV you can just sit under the stairs or whip through a wall and kill everyone before they even see you.
>>12896435I get what you're saying but the tradition is to change "Akumajou Dracula" to Castlevania.悪魔城ドラキュラX 血の輪廻 = Castlevania X: Rondo of Blood悪魔城ドラキュラXX = Castlevania XXUsing "Dracula X" is just more confusing localization-inspired bullshit, even if that's what the official release was titled later.
>>12894646You really prefer to ask this not once but twicr instead of JUST PLAYING THE FUCKING GAME?
Supposedly, SNES Dracula X ended up being what it is due to the 95 Earthquake since they originally were porting Rondo of Blood but had to scrap it and make a different game with ported sprites but different backgrounds and that is why they look do unfitting, like they were meant for a different game.
>>12905163Blessed earthquake, giving us a better game
>>12905168>It's good people died and suffer Oh fuck you smith, seriously.
>>12905163I'm pretty sure Dracula X is what's left of Bloodletting, which was basically the original draft for what became SotN. The earthquake might've had something to do with it, who knows
>>12905168Tranny fuck you, people died.
>>12905163You know, can't we use Opus to modify the engine behavior to polish it and make it behave more like the RoB one? Dracula X only had 10 stages total and then being short, in total it was 2MB, could Konami successfully port RoB in a 4MB cart?
>>12905257I hate that people don't make more romhacks using these sprites or a simple 3 fan remake using the SOTN sprites
>>12900761>Shirley Temple, American loli starEven better.
>>12905163The 1995 Kobe earthquake destroyed many chipsets, which also delayed the N64 (Ultra 64) release.>>12905168Anon, I...Dracula X should rework but don't disrespect the victims.
>>12905168
I genuinely don't understand why skill mastery in Portrait of Ruin is so goddamn grindy. Yes, even with the Master Ring (especially with how many sub-weapons there are to grind mastery points for). It's so stupid that you only get SP from each monster once. So for the optimal double Minotaur strat, you're constantly going in the room, hitting them with your sub-weapon, leaving the room and then repeating it over and over.
>>12905406You only need the pie for the Richter fight and the axe for everything else. Completionism is a mental illness.
>>12905326>Calling a real woman who was a child Loli.Bruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh
>>12905337I double checked the date differences between the disaster and the japanese release of Dracula X, and yes it was 6 months to basically pick up what they could and made the best of what they could, even if it resulted on a game that didn't felt completely right.
RoB is 33 years old today.
https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/10241/SOTN Ultimate has been released!
>>12905430first week on 4chan?
>>12905640Nobody cares LOL
>>12905215>>12905285>>12905337>>12905385I got some more Auschwitz and 9/11 jokes were that came from
>>12905640>everything from the Saturn and PSP versions in one modSounds too good to be true, is it AI sloppa?
>>12905878most ROM hacks are gonna involve AI assistance or vibe coding whatever we like it or not sadly
>>12905886Yeah I already read the reviews, the mod has random bugs and glitches all over the game, even in the old content that shouldn't have been affected, it's AI slop.
>>12905257>>12902569>>12901264>>12899450>>12896430Soon, vampire hunters...https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZbrsOnN2bk
>>12906004>RAPED protagno, thanks
>>12905886>most ROM hackslollmaoROM hacks have existed for decades prior to AIsloppa.
>>12906781nta but that doesn't matter. From now on you're gonna see so much AI usage that it's gonna drown the non-AI hacks
>>12906004Oh but nobody pay attention to this? >>12905640
Stop liking Super Nintendo games
