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« on: August 09, 2023, 03:48:13 PM »
Castlevania Bloodlines
Looks like this is the only game left on the Anniversary Collection that I hadn't yet played, and apparently this is the same one that's included in the Genesis NSO dealie, so I s'pose there will just be one Castlevania game this year for me. To round out the collection, I still played it there, even though the NSO version has better emulation features. I don't know if I ever really heard about this game, so I didn't have expectations for it. And I've gotta say...
...It's a'ight. There's always a bit of a disconnect when I play a game like this: the controls and physics are still the same as the NES titles, but now with Genesis graphics and sound. Thanks to advances in hardware, games during this era tended to improve on things like smoother controls and more dynamic physics, so it's always jarring for me to play a game that looks 16-bit but plays like something much older. Although, at least this guy learned how to whip upwards, even if only while jumping; still surprised me to see that! There's a fun variety of visual tricks across the stages, including reflective water, and a real mindfunk of splitting up the screen in a late stage. Relatively speaking, the tone of this one feels a little goofier than is typical, including a boss that is some sort of grouping of metal gears that dances across the room.
Moving past that however, the stage design here generally feels easier and more fair than the NES titles. There are usually less enemies in each screen, and it relies less on infinite enemy spawns, though there are still a few such sections. There are also a fair amount of bosses and sub-bosses, relatively speaking, and their patterns are typically slower and more predictable than the erratic ones in previous games. This one felt shorter than the previous ones, though I dunno if it actually has less stages, or just feels shorter due to the much easier difficulty. I'm actually kind of surprised at how breezy this game is, since it was released during the height of the rental era where many games were made more difficult to combat rentals.
It's increasingly clear to me that Classicvania just isn't for me. I don't know if there's necessarily anything wrong with them, and I can see why they're popular as they often had great presentation for the era. They look good, they sound good, but I just don't care for the stiff and rigid gameplay, even when the game is overall easier like this. I played a couple stages to try out the second character, but seeing that they seem to have the exact same levels, I think I'll call it here.
And thus, the Castlevania Anniversary Collection is also complete! Now I know that won't count as its own completion for this, ha ha, but I can still mark it as such in my own backlog.
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