My favorite part about Castlevania is that it came out in 1986.
I’m often told NES games didn’t have enough space for detailed backgrounds.
Well, Castlevania does and it came out in 1986.
I’m often told games in the 1980’s didn’t have infinite continues.
Well, Castlevania does and it came out in 1986.
“It isn’t fair to criticize an NES game’s questionable hit detection.”
Castlevania…
1986.
“NES games had to repeat stages.”
They didn’t.
Castlevania, 1986.
That is not to say Castlevania is a perfect game, but it is clear the developers were
not going to use the excuse of limited hardware to make a sloppy product.
Castlevania is remarkably polished, audibly, visually, and mechanically, and many of the
structural philosophies can still be found in modern gaming.
Perhaps this is why the game remains so popular among certain gaming circles.
Or maybe it is the unique set-pieces.
While the North American manual fails to give the game much context, the player assumes
the role of Simon Belmont, a vampire hunter wielding the Vampire Killer, a holy whip passed
down through the ages.
The goal is to defeat Dracula, who has been resurrected along with his castle in Transylvania.
In addition to Dracula, Castlevania uses many other classic monsters that have fallen into
the public domain, like Frankenstein’s Monster.
More mythical creatures like the Grim Reaper, Medusa, and Mummies are also featured.
Despite the primitive hardware and sprite limits, Castlevania does an commendable job
portraying these classic monsters on the 8-bit hardware.
Another interesting touch is the cohesiveness of the game world.
The opening cinematic shows Simon at the property gates, with Dracula’s tower way off in the
distance.
The 6 levels of the game do an admirable job creating a realistic path from the gates to
the tower, and it doesn’t take much imagination to understand where Simon is.
While the graphics are not realistic, there is a level of detail found here which other
titles of the era failed to match.
The ambitious style certainly aids in the game’s uniqueness and continued popularity.
Of course, a unique visual style and monster-movie set-pieces are not enough to make a game good.
So let us take a closer look at the gameplay.
Castlevania is a linear action game, with the player having to battle an increasingly
hostile set of enemies through 6 increasingly difficult stages.
While the whip is the primary weapon, Simon is able to utilize 5 sub-weapons to aid in
the journey.
Unlike the whip, these are limited use items, with the player needing to collect hearts
to power them.
The first thing I really dig about Castlevania is how most of these are shown to the player
on the very first stage.
The watch temporally stops time, freezing all enemies in place.
The dagger is a projectile weapon, firing straight across the screen.
The ax is another projectile weapon but at an arc allowing one to hit enemies above Simon.
The Holy Water ignites a small fire on the ground, while also freezing enemies.
And lastly, the boomerang fires across the screen, and returns, allowing for multiple
hits when used strategically, but isn’t showcased until the second stage.
Castlevania does a reasonable job with item placement on the opening stage as well, offering
the Holy Water in a convenient location, showing its utility in damaging enemies at a lower
plane.
More famously is the ax, the last item offered before the first boss.
Assuming a first-time player breaks every single candle in the stage, the ax is the
weapon one should end up with when encountering the first boss, which is incredibly efficient
against the airborne foe.
As a whole, Castlevania’s first stage does a great job easing the player into the action
without being overly tutorialized.
Candles are placed in the air, encourage players to jump and attack, a crucial skill needed
for future enemies.
Plenty of stairs are presented, letting players familiarize themselves with how to climb up
and down them, without there being an onslaught of enemies to try and avoid while coming to
grips with them.
And finally, players are encouraged to explore, with both wall meat and a double shot being
rewarded inside of breakable blocks.
Sadly, like many games of the time, there is no real clue to which blocks can be broken.
One initially just has to swing the whip at everything and then memorize the locations
to save time later.
Thankfully, as Castlevania is a sidescrolling game, rather than overhead, there are limited
possibilities as to which blocks might contain goodies.
But still, later games handled it better.
Moving along, Stage 2 ups the difficulty significantly.
Castlevania’s notorious bottomless pits are introduced here.
While the first stage has a certain flow to it, where one could mostly press forward with
little regard to the terrain, players now need to stop and assess the situation.
One might want to attack an enemy before leaping across a platform for example.
Moving platforms are also introduced.
The initial one thankfully has a platform underneath it, reducing the possibility of
a mistimed jump, but the margin for error decreases as the stage wears on.
This brings us to the jumping itself.
It is primitive.
Pressing the button longer will not yield a longer jump versus a quick tap.
Simon either jumps straight up into the air or makes the same arced forward jump, no matter
what.
While a dated concept for sure, there isn’t anything particularly wrong with the approach.
The lack of any control basically eliminates any sort of debate on if the jump is too floaty
or too weighty.
Simon has a predefined arc, and that is that.
Thankfully, the level design in Castlevania is designed around the specific arc and never
requires more from the jump than what is available.
Platform spacing is uniform, moving platforms always have a decent width allowing for some
slop, and enemy behavior never requires additional precision.
While I found the arc somewhat rigid when I first attempted to play the game, it is
something I’ve grown accustomed to and it honestly feels like second nature.
I never found myself longing for more control, as the game is expertly designed around the
jumping limitations.
So, if the first stage is an item tutorial, and the second a jumping tutorial, then it
only makes sense the third stage is a combat tutorial.
While the zombies in the opening stage were mostly harmless, things really pick up in
stage 3.
The hunchbacks jump around erratically, bone pillars are placed after pits, and the birds
like to dive at Simon from an incredibly awkward angle.
Timing then becomes key to success.
The player can whip the bone pillar projectiles, however, one must learn their timing, as button-mashing
won’t cut it.
Same goes for the birds.
One can jump and attack, dodge the bird and then attack, or use a well-timed sub-weapon.
If one doesn’t take the time to learn the patterns, a grim fate awaits.
I suspect even the most novice of players will be able to clear the first three stages
of Castlevania.
There isn’t anything too taxing here, the bosses are easy, and while there is likely
some frustration to be found for the uninitiated, I don’t believe anything here is impossible.
However, the final three stages ramp up the difficulty significantly, and not always fairly.
I’m sure I’m not the first person to jump on the moving platform, have a bat spawn,
and then promptly get knocked off the platform because the whip is too high to hit the bat.
The player can actually control where the bats spawn.
It appears on the side of the screen the player is facing, and at the same level as Simon.
However, if ducking, the player might miss as the bat changes its altitude.
Honestly, it feels cheap.
Another annoyance is the sometimes random nature of Castlevania.
Usually, the items found in the candles do not change.
Therefore a player can reasonably expect certain items to always be found in the same spot
on every playthrough.
This is critical as certain sub-weapons are vastly superior in some scenarios compared
to others, especially bosses.
Therefore, when a hunchback randomly drops an ax during a hectic segment of stage 4,
it can be incredibly annoying.
Hunchpbacks won’t drop other weapons either, just hearts and axes.
Of course, one hopefully won’t make the same mistake on subsequent playthroughs, but
Castlevania is an intense game requiring fast movement and quick decisions, and the weapon
drop behavior seems counterintuitive to the game’s philosophy.
The random drops aren’t always a bad thing though.
On this run, I managed to retain the Holy Water, and the bone pillars on the next screen
dropped a double shot, and then a triple shot, on my way to the final boss.
Stage 5 was especially perplexing, with both a skeleton and a hunchback dropping a watch,
ruining my current credit.
So why does the randomness bother me so much?
Well, the boss of stage 4 and 5 are incredibly difficult.
While I can beat Frankenstein without the Holy Water, it sure makes things a heck of
a lot easier.
Death, on the other hand, I cannot beat straight up.
So when the randomness takes away my choice of weapon, I find it rather annoying.
Speaking of stage 5, this is when the utility of the Holy Water becomes most apparent.
The 5 sub-weapons in Castlevania are not created equal.
The more one plays Castlevania, the more obvious it becomes the Holy Water offers the best
value to the player.
Generally speaking, the ax and the dagger will hit an enemy once.
The cross has the potential to hit an enemy twice.
But the holy water… can do far more.
However, each sub-weapon costs just a single heart to use.
There is a real lack of balance here.
It seems the more powerful weapons should cost more hearts to use, but that is not how
it works.
The watch actually uses 5 hearts, as if the developers thought the watch was the most
game-breaking sub-weapon, but I can not for the life of me understand how the developers
reached this conclusion.
However, it isn’t just the Holy Water in and of itself that can be game-breaking.
Rather, it is the double and triple shot upgrades.
These allow players two use their sub-weapon two or three times at once.
Without them, the player cannot use the sub-weapon a second time until the first one leaves the
screen.
With them, the sub-weapons become dramatically more versatile.
And in the case of the Holy Water, completely game-breaking.
Bosses which were previously painful, are completely neutralized.
Now, one could argue if a player manages to retain the Holy Water all the way through
a stage, managed to avoid grabbing a different sub-weapon, which removes the shot upgrades,
without dying once, they deserve the privilege of cheesing the boss.
But part of me feels the extreme difficulty of the Grim Reaper, in particular, is the
problem.
The projectile attacks are extremely difficult to avoid and do not fall in line with Simon’s
rigid jump arc and default melee attack.
While it isn’t impossible, it is well beyond the skill threshold of the average player.
It is here where Castlevania does feel dated.
It is a console game, following quarter munching arcade principals.
There is a score, despite infinitely spawning enemies.
And there is a timer, meant to keep players moving along feeding the machine quarters,
even though Castlevania is game on a home console.
Oddly enough, the boss encounter of Stage 6, is the complete opposite.
There is both a Cross and Holy Water available to the player at the very end, meaning one
doesn’t need to survive through the gauntlet of the stage to face the boss with their preferred
weapon.
Is an odd moment of mercy, and the inconsistency is puzzling to me.
As we near the finish line I should probably talk about the knock-back.
When Simon is hit by an enemy or projectile, he will fall backward.
At times, right into the abyss, making for quick one-hit deaths.
However, in practice, I rarely found it to be a problem.
When the alternative is running through enemies…
I’m beginning to think knock-back is a necessary evil.
Proper punishment for poor play.
And if a player isn’t aware of their surroundings and playing sloppily, that is on the player.
Except for here.
Of course, Castlevania has one saving grace.
A feature so forward-thinking, it is the standard in today’s day and age.
A mechanic so important I’m not sure Castlevania would be as beloved today if it wasn’t included.
Of course, I’m talking about the unlimited continues.
When one runs out of lives, they are not taken back to the title screen, instead, they are
returned to the beginning of the stage.
When one runs out lives.
Feels cheated.
Or is simply learning the game, they don’t have to repeat previously mastered stages
if they don’t want to.
Nothing would suck worse than making it all the way to the final boss, attempt to learn
the pattern and then get booted all the way back to the title screen to replay the whole
thing again to get another chance.
All of my little nitpicks with Castlevania are greatly mitigated thanks to unlimited
continues.
This is a stark contrast to something like...
The Lion King, which has limited continues.
The game is unfairly difficult, and one cannot practice and learn the later stages at their
leisure, because the designers did not offer unlimited continues.
This isn’t me being some youngin’ who doesn’t know how games used to be back in
the day when games were good and didn’t hold one’s hand.
This is Castlevania, the notoriously difficult, 8-bit hard, pedal to the metal, hardcoriest
of the hardcore, Castlevania.
And it has unlimited continues.
The final thing Castlevania is notable for is its soundtrack.
The opening track, Vampire Killer, has got to be one of the most iconic pieces of 8-bit
music, rivaling the likes of Mario and Zelda.
The intro is fantastic, with an upbeat riff that is both memorable, and filled with energy,
perfectly capturing the beginning of a long treacherous adventure.
The verse is darker and moodier, offering a contrast to the intro, and gives a sense
of the danger the player is embarking on as they make their way to the Count.
And finally, there is the chorus, the supremely hummable part and the distinct set of notes
one might think of when remembering classic Castlevania.
It is truly an epic piece of game music, and Vampire Killer will forever be ingrained in
my brain.
While less iconic, Wicked Child also deserves a mention, and it largely follows a similar
formula.
When I listen to the Castlevania soundtrack, I don’t feel like I am listening to video
game music.
It feels like I am listening to something composed by an artist, an expert in their
field, someone who isn’t trying to create something catchy, but rather, someone composing
music for a scene in a movie.
Wicked Child is mysterious, energetic yet there is something darker lurking underneath.
Simon is nearing the halfway point and sounds like it.
Heart of Fire is another one that stood out to me.
The player is in the prison of the castle.
There are remains everywhere.
Some clearly died a slow and painful death.
The pain can be heard in the music.
It is somber, Simon has reached the darkest moments of his journey but is nearing the
finish line.
And of course, the music perfectly captures these moments.
As I said, it doesn’t sound like video game music, it sounds more mature, like something
composed for a film score.
As I’ve stated in the past, I’m not a musician, I have no particular expertise in
the field of music, and I lack the vocabulary to talk about music with any intelligence
or authority.
So with those caveats, these are my thoughts about the soundtrack as I experience Castlevania.
So with all of that out of the way, I must reach a conclusion on the first Castlevania.
While the game is iconic and influential for sure, those facts alone don’t make it good.
Lots of games are iconic and influential, that doesn’t mean they were well designed.
Some games just happened to be released at the right time and place, and with a bit of
luck, captured the attention of a generation.
I think Castlevania offers a bit more than the average NES game though.
There were two moments in particular that stuck out to me.
First, when Simon goes through a door or gate, all of the enemies disappear from the screen.
It may seem like a minor point, but it assures the player cannot take damage when Simon is
not in the player’s control.
It is an example of the attention to detail the designers had when crafting Castlevania.
Nothing feels haphazard, the designers had the player in mind when crafting the world.
The second moment I rather enjoyed was the ax-men encounters.
These actually felt like a tactical battle.
They back away from Simon when he gets near.
And will move closer when Simon backs away.
It isn’t much but is more effective than the combat found in Zelda II.
Once a player learns they can manipulate the AI, it can be enjoyable to drop some Holy
Water, and then lure the enemy into it.
Again, it is a little moment, but one of those ah-has a player experiences when they figure
out how to quickly defeat what can be an otherwise brutal enemy.
Sadly, not every enemy encounter is engaging.
Some enemy placement is extremely annoying.
The boss battles are visually impressive, but the first three are way too easy and the
middle two far too hard.
The final boss, thankfully, is just right.
Dracula’s first form requires a split-second jump then whip to clear projectiles and hit
Dracula’s head during his brief vulnerability.
The second phase initially frustrated me.
I had it in my mind stunning the boss with the Holy Water was the key to victory, only
to waste hours trying to perfect a strategy.
When I stepped back and reassessed the boss, I quickly surmised the cross would not only
have the potential to hit the boss’s head twice, but it would allow me to stay a safe
distance and jump over projectile attacks.
This proved to be exceptionally effective and I could beat the game far more consistently
using an alternate strategy.
And ultimately, this is what Castlevania is all about.
The game isn’t about exploring the game world, but rather, exploring different strategies.
Or put more bluntly, it is a game of trial and error.
Every obstacle found in Castlevania can be overcome.
The solution to every problem is usually obvious, however, executing the strategy to overcome
the problem is often very challenging.
One might have to try numerous approaches to a problem, different platform locations,
different sub-weapons, or just tank damage if it seems like the best solution.
Often times patterns can be complex, but the designers were good enough to give the player
some space to figure it out, like the platforms on stage 4, or the dense enemy patterns on
the clock tower found in stage 6.
And even if a player gets it wrong, they are never punished too severely.
Checkpoints are frequent and continues still reset the player to the beginning of a stage.
So if a player wants to brute force their way to a solution, the option is available,
without ever restarting from the beginning.
It doesn’t matter the timing of the projectiles of the bone pillars doesn’t quite match
the speed of Simon’s whip, because the player has unlimited chances to learn and master
the pattern.
So yeah, Castlevania is still a good game.
Though I would be hard-pressed to call it a great game.
The bosses are mostly weak, enemy placement can be suspect, the randomness can often make
or break a run, and the item placement could have been more forgiving, but the unlimited
continues really save the game.
It is likely the reason many kept playing it until they beat it, rather than giving
up and moving onto something else.
While I dig the presentation, the artistry found in Castlevania is significantly greater
than other games of the same vintage, and the soundtrack is amazing, I don’t think
these completely mask some of the cheapness found in the game.
Still, the controls are responsive, with a predictable jump and reliable whip, and the
level layouts never require more than Simon’s arc is capable of producing.
There simply aren’t any pixel-perfect jumps required, which is why I wouldn’t consider
this a platforming game.
Rather, it is an action game with a jump button.
And of course, the attention to detail is excellent.
From the Bat on the title screen flying towards the screen to the enemies disappearing when
going through a door.
That attention to detail carries through to the design.
From the holy water first being offered to the player at the perfect location to use
it, to the first moving platform having a platform underneath it, to some of the scripted
enemy behaviors allowing the player to race through untouched.
The player even continues at the steps leading up to Dracula’s lair after getting a game
over, letting one go right back to the final boss as many times as they need, and not waste
time on the area leading up to him.
In fact, Castlevania contains very little, if any, padding, which is awesome.
While not the greatest action game ever, it is surprisingly good.
And it has unlimited continues.
In 1986.