Board 8 > Jeremy Parish's Top 36 Castlevania games

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.polygon.com/features/2018/10/26/18011828/best-castlevania

That's a good top 5

he was totally sitting on this one to release on today, Castlevania Day
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I remember the one time i played the Arcade game. Not sure if the machine itself was just old and the sensors were off or what, but motion based whip light gun game didn't work well.
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Solid list. Would rank Portrait of Ruin higher, and Rondo of Blood and Aria of Sorrow a bit lower, but otherwise mostly agree with it.
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I still have Puzzle of the Night on my phone and it's still playable.

I also haven't updated iOS in like a million years
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Circle of the Moon below Castlevania 64?

http://replygif.net/i/160.gif
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I refuse to believe there are 36 Castlevania games
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Erotic Violence
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Nah don't like the list.

AoS overvalued, Haunted Castle trashed like in recent trends, CotM too low, SCIV as 14 is a joke, Kid Dracula is actually 2 games...

There are even more games if you count ports.
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GuessMyUserName posted...

I refuse to believe there are 36 Castlevania games

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order of ecclesia is deeply overrated. it tries to have the best of both oldschool level-based and metroidvania worlds, and ends up being worse than the best games in those genres at both.

and while symphony of the night is not perfect by any means, i can't really see any good argument at putting it behind the other metroidvanias. to me that's like placing super metroid behind zero mission, or something else similarly bad
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He bottom-tiered the most infamous pachislot but didn't even consider the first three?
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Circle of the Moon so low :(
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Naye745 posted...

and while symphony of the night is not perfect by any means, i can't really see any good argument at putting it behind the other metroidvanias. to me that's like placing super metroid behind zero mission, or something else similarly bad

SotN is just not a balanced game.
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I agree that Aria of Sorrow is a better game than Symphony of the Night
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CotM actually. I even enjoyed HoD more =P
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sotn doesn't really need to be "balanced" imo

like in metroid games you're running around destroying everything in your path by the end and nobody cares, but somehow that's a disaster in sotn? i dunno, the game has a lot more character than any of its successors and i think trying to make every item/enemy/power-up completely balanced would ruin the game

ymmv thooo
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lordjers posted...

Haunted Castle trashed like in recent trends,

wat

I played that game, it deserves everything
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circle of the moon at 25

L M F A O
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Naye745 posted...

sotn doesn't really need to be "balanced" imo

like in metroid games you're running around destroying everything in your path by the end and nobody cares, but somehow that's a disaster in sotn? i dunno, the game has a lot more character than any of its successors and i think trying to make every item/enemy/power-up completely balanced would ruin the game

ymmv thooo

Metroid games are way more dangerous. It's fine if you destroy everything when you get used to it but in SotN you have to make a very conscious effort to die, even against staples like Death. It's not only that Alucard is a ninja tank, but boss patterns are a joke too.

pjbasis posted...

lordjers posted...

Haunted Castle trashed like in recent trends,

wat

I played that game, it deserves everything

ehhhh it ain't that hard. Rainy cemeteries, chained giant monsters, all in the 80s? Game's good.
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COTM's graphics almost earn that ranking alone - it was insanely difficult to see the action on the original GBA.
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especially playin without that SP backlight. cotm was super-dark
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fair criticism on launch, but the SP, DS fat/lite, and re-release on Wii U VC completely solves the darkness issue and that seriously is not enough to bring it down below the N64 games, the PS2 games, and certainly not harmony of shittonance, belmont's revenge, or the kid dracula game

it's easily top 10, if not top 5 of the series (still need to play more of the games before i can say that with confidence)
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The top 3 is perfect and SC4 is below Bloodlines and outside the top 10

All is well
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oh yeah i mean i love circle of the moon and its placement on this list is garbage so no arguments here
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i haven't played the universally agreed upon bad games, so can't comment
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Aria of Sorrow above Dawn of Sorrow is a weird one, though I'm glad to see Order of Ecclesia high (even if it's still lower than I'd put it, given it's my favourite Castlevania game and all). Also glad to see Circle of the Moon low, it's not very good. Whole game is just a tedious slog of repetitive enemy layouts with very little diversity and damage sponge bosses, several of whom don't even acknowledge your presence in any way, and the magic card system is buried behind low drop rates that mean you probably won't ever see much of it. Some good music and the various new game+ modes were cool at least.
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Circle of the Moon is the best Castlevania so fuck that list.

Also Order of Ecclesia in the top 5 is awful. That game so blatantly copy/pasted rooms over and over and over to pad out length. Naturally this is a common thing with must Castlevanias, specifically Portrait of Ruin and SotN but never had it felt as lazy as OoE.
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Wow, that was actually an insanely good list. The top 5 in particular matches my own opinions exactly, which especially in regards to Aria's placement doesn't seem to be too common.
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I beat circle of the moon on an OG GBA without a backlight, get on my level

Paratroopa1 posted...

I beat circle of the moon on an OG GBA without a backlight, get on my level

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Actually... Castlevania 64 is too low too. SCIV/CotM/CV64 is the trio of brilliant atmosphere.

Screw the haters.
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ninkendo posted...

That's a good top 5

Right games, wrong order.
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Paratroopa1 posted...

I beat circle of the moon on an OG GBA without a backlight, get on my level

i mean so did i, and that probably contributed negatively to my memory of it
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He must think very highly of games 28-2 since apparently removing a few nonessential things from his all-time favorite Castlevania is enough to drop it past all of them to 29.
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When you have access to all of them, there's more incentive to play "game that's different but not as good" than "game that's the same in all ways except worse".
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