What the fuck is this: Castlevania SOTN is now going for like $70?!!

This game seems to have been in development forever, but it's obviously meant to scratch that Castlevania itch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyskUorhheg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTRohTxCRlk

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, the 8-bit style prequel game to Bloodstained, is coming out tomorrow. it has very strong Castlevania III vibes, and it has many og Castlevania creators working on it. in a lot of ways it is the first new Castlevania game in a long time.

not sure exactly when it comes out, but there has been an email sent out to Kickstarter backers. only confirmed dates so far for consoles are May 31st for 3DS and June 6 for Xbox. they are giving out temporary Steam codes for anyone who backed the game on consoles, as it seems they are still waiting on console keys, but have the Steam ones ready to go. i backed it for Switch and was able to get a Steam code that said it is valid until June 8.

it is 20MB lol

wait a minute i am playing it rn! looks like this game is out!

this is really cool. very CV3. the art isn't the prettiest (not nearly as good as classical Castlevania art but what is?) but it is still a fun and cheap Castlevania knock off. the music is awesome as heck, and the 8-bit presentation feels very true to authentic limitations of that era. the art not being pretty comes from over-use of tiles in some places, which is really just more economy. levels are visually varied with layers of parallax and lots of colorful well-defined sprites.

the level design, enemy combat, etc. are all classic CV. items are valuable again; they help you get past the gauntlet of enemies. it controls like CV3 except with ROB/SOTN stair-jumping. difficulty wise it is not a pushover, i died twice before beating the first level, i would say harder than SOTN at least. the boss fight was kind of like Order of Ecclesia, with a large, almost puzzle-light battle.

the game is so Castlevania. jumping around slicing floating lamps and candles while fighting goblins and monsters. i started as a dude with a sword or something and then met Miriam and gained her as an ally and she has a whip and basically controls like a Belmont, only she can slide like in Mega Man 3.

https://i.imgur.com/BkxEXU2l.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/V3DQxKKl.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/ENikJkYl.jpg

Doh! Only the Steam version is available to backers, console codes aren't out yet.

Confused, is this out for Switch now or not? If I backed the Kickstarter shouldn't I get a code or something?

would like a new metroidvania castlevania for the switch though

unfortunately i don't think it's out for Switch yet. but if you backed the kickstarter for it on consoles, you should be able to use the Steam code in the meantime. look through your emails to find the Survey Resender and use that.

i hear the EShop gets updated around noon EST so maybe it will come then. kinda sucks but still it's nice to be able to play in the meantime.

I don't even know what Steam is.

it's an online PC hub/store where you can buy games. if you are writing on a computer it probably supports Steam.

So this is to play games on my computer? I've never really done that (have a laptop).

yeah. you can buy games through it and play them w it. not sure if you have to give them your CC or not for you to make an account.

install Steam, go to Games, and Activate a Product on Steam. then you post in the code and it installs the game. to get the code you have to go to the back survey, and you can resend a link to that, if you search your kickstarter emails.

i wonder if that is David Hayter doing the cheesy voiceover on the trailer.

The whole reason I have a console is to not play games on my computer.

hah. yeah w the amount of controller driver issues an stuff i deal with, i entirely understand.

i probably wont play this too much on Steam cos i want to play it on Switch.

it's no big deal to only play games on a console, but you miss out on a lot. like games that are just much better with a mouse

that's pretty much just shooters though and gyro aim makes up most of the difference.

i guess stuff like RTSes too but i don't really play those these days

4x strategy probably not a good fit for console either, or text adventures.

4x strategy probably not a good fit for console either, or text adventures.

― valorous wokelord (silby)

i thought you were saying 4x was not a good fit for text adventures and got to thinking about "suspended" (which isn't quite the same thing but has pretty strong strategy elements)

there was a console civ but it was pretty much what you'd expect from a console civ

man this is pretty awesome. feels nice to play this with a PS2 controller but i need my dang Switch code so i can play it there.

i can't get past stage 4 lol. Curse of the Moon is actually legit NES tough.

i am liking the graphics more and more. some of the art looks like random "level asset" tiles but for a game this big it makes sense, plus there is plenty of beautiful art throughout the game. important to remember they had to deal with creating everything from scratch. the 2D Castlevania series were always reusing art and repurposing character designs etc. and by Castlevania they 3 had this library of classic designs that had already withstood multiple teams and generations of games.

not only that but they had less screen space to deal with. the new game is still pixelated 8-bit art but on an HD widescreen scale. thank god they did not have camera zoom. i played some of Harmony of Despair and did not enjoy myself. having the screen too zoomed out makes it look more like a maze, the art looses definition, the sense of place is lost.

they really went classic with this and it feels like an NES game, just designed for a larger screen. level design is classic: some platforms, some stairs, some enemies placed among them. bottomless pits are back, reinforcing the ideal of enemy as level design. the threat of knockback deaths forces you to reconsider your approach. the ghouls and demons placed throughout are not mere combat challenges: they require adjustment of pacing, they require strategy. the bosses are the same, only on a bigger scale. large gorgeous pixel art, wider areas of attack, multi-stage fights. very much an evolution of OoE.

https://i.imgur.com/v9bcWpTl.jpg

this keeps getting better and better. i love the green bricks on red/purple bg they got going in some of these levels. its sort of punk. i love the alchemist, even though he is super slow and useless against most enemies, it is such a cool idea, and sometimes you can actually do some damage w that cane of his.

the enemies are duocolor cartoony horror fantasy throughout and they keep switching it up for every level. rn i am fighting evil giant scissormen and jumping blue bunnies. i just fought a painting (which was more or a puzzle than a fight, which was cool) and earlier i ended up fighting a cool boss on the top of the ship that reminded me of Rondo of Blood crossed w Mega Man.

So lame that backers get their codes not just last but late.

all the backer codes should be out now. i got my NA Switch code last night. also there is a E3 Beta Backer demo of the full game coming June 21st.

still really love "Curse of the Moon". a friend came over to check it out and we used casual mode to run through most of the game. it's a really nice addition cos otherwise it is for real NES hard. casual mode gives you more health but it also nixes fallback, which is a huge help around all those bottomless pits.

finally beat the game on Veteran. now playing on Nightmare and getting wrecked by the turtle boss in level 2. the fight is definitely more difficult. like the move where they are at the top of the screen and rocks fall down 3 times before he lands, now there is a rock right in the middle where you used to be able to hide. yeah it's crazy shit.

also started a new game using Zangetsu and killing the allies, gaining new abilities along the way. the jumping slash and the double jump are very nice, but now im wondering how i will make it through the later stages with a single character...

going back and replaying the earlier levels, it is fun to switch around characters and try out different techniques.

sometimes one of them will have a skill that makes them particularly suitable to nerf the room. sometimes the vampire can just fly over enemy's heads, hitting restorative potions along the way, sometimes he is shit in a room. so there's a bit of strategy to it. it's only a matter of trying them out to see who is best where.

i have Curse of the Moon on Steam and Switch and play it on PS2 controller vs. Joycons and imo i prefer the latter for controller and presentation. for some reason the UI in Windows is a bit crap.

I said this in another thread but worth repeating - Curse of the Moon is really good. Praying that the full, "real" game is as good, because the preview build I checked out last year was pretty weak.

That said - there are SO many indie Metroidvanias and otherwise that have come out over the past decade, I have no idea what's actually worth the time. Looking for advice on this one, since I several in my libraries already - Gaucamelee, La Mulana, Steamworld Dig and more I'm forgetting. I started Shovel Knight, which is pretty awesome. Others I'm curious about like Axiom Verge, Shadow Complex, Ori & The Blind Forest, Dust An Elysian Tail, Salt & Sanctuary, and so on. Someone also mentioned Hollow Knight as a good Metroidvania that just got ported to the Switch. I want hot takes, people - what's actually worth the time?

Shovel Knight is tons of fun, with tons of content. Which Steamworld do you have?

Played Shadow Complex a hundred years ago and it was slick but ultimately kinda bland?

I totally loved Salt & Sanctuary as a 2-D game where all the classic Dark Souls elements are used really well (different classes/approaches, losing your currency upon death and having a chance to regain it, blocking/dodging/parrying, etc). Although oddly I don't have any desire to replay it...they really released it at exactly the right time (just before DS3 came out).

second the S&S love, that's a great game.

I got about halfway through Axiom Verge, got stuck, and completely forgot about it. i played through Shadow Complex and i guess i had a good time but i remember almost nothing of the experience.

I think I have Steamworld Dig 1 on like three different platforms

Oh man, get the sequel! It's the same idea but even cooler and better.

axiom verge is my favorite of the recent batch; hollow knight is also very good (and quite long, I didn't finish it)

I thought Dust an Elysian Tale was really boring

but I did enjoy the Strider reboot, worth a go if you see it cheap

I have that from PS+

new Bloodstained Steam demo is supposed to drop on June 21st.

Hollow Knight definitely rules. it gives me more Metroid feels than Vania but that is mostly the level design. controls are nice and the hand drawn art is very charming in an Edward Gorey way.

Metroidvania games always seem more metroid than vania to me, tbh. The metroid part is the exploration of the map, gradually accumulating new skills/items that let you backtrack and reach previously inaccessible areas. What is the vania part? Just being awesome?

Maybe a sort of Gothy vibe?

I don't think it's a matter of 'parts' - it's that Metroid and middle/late Castlevania are the most influential examples of this formula.

the melee combat. Metroid was shooter based. the focus on fantasy over sci fi.

Oh, we're talking the parts of Hollow Night specifically? nvm

Vampire Killer came out 2 months after Metroid and had backtracking/unblocking previously inaccessible areas. ditto Simon's Quest. "Metroidvania" the term is used because both series have used these elements since their inception.

Hollow Knight makes me think Metroid cos the rooms themselves are cavelike floating platforms and such. you could plop Samus down and it would work. you even attack the barriers on the sides of screens just like you attack the doors in Metroid.

but the combat is more close-quarter, more like SOTN.

middle/late Castlevania

I guess that’s the key. Symphony of the Night, especially. Early castlevanias didn’t have the backtracking and all of that, though, while they were all present in Metroid from the very beginning.

Yeah I was very disappointed to find Castlevania IV on the SNES mini was fully linear, no exploration/backtracking in there at all.