Should I play this? I played Hollow Knight and it sparkled my interest in the Metroidvania genre, is this a good start?

Should I play this? I played Hollow Knight and it sparkled my interest in the Metroidvania genre, is this a good start?

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Yes.

Yes but don't expect any challenge

Yeah

aged very well, great gameplay and ost.
one of the best metroidvania games ever.

It's a wonderful start and basically the game that codified the genre alongside Super Metroid. Play it as soon as you possibly can.

What's the definitive best Metroidvania?

for me, SotN and Dawn of Sorrow (not a popular opinion), but many people prefer Super Metroid.
Shovel Knight is also a nice modern metroidvania with less customization.

Shovelknight isn't a metroidvania in any shape way or form.

Shovel Knight isn't a metroidvania though, it's missing the exploration aspect and the massive interconnected world with secrets scattered across the various areas that require abilities you unlock throughout the game to properly reach. Shovel Knight is Mega Man crossed with Super Mario 3.

Super Metroid.

It's the definitive fucking video game.

because it has stages? ok, but it has many metroidvania elements.

It really doesn't.

i think we are lacking new metroidvania games

>metroidvania
only douche bags use this term

Goddamn I love the pal box art. No, the US just gets a shitty castle.

I can't think of any

Which version of this should I play? PS1 emulation sucks, should I do PSP instead?

It has lots of platforming elements.

Metroidvania is specifically non-linear.

how do you call them?
2D plataform game with interconnected stages, secrets and equipment customization?

xbox 360 or ps3

aside from those?

PSP should do fine.

Symphony of the Night was a pioneer. Not nearly as much as Metroid mind you, but the blending of RPG elements has become quite the staple in Metroidvanias in many cases.
The game is honestly incredibly easy. If you want challenge I would say you simply need to handicap yourself and only use weapon drops instead of buying weapons and armor. You can get the third best armor in the game about 2 hours in otherwise, so everything will just do 1 damage unless it's a boss, in which case you'll take around 10 damage unless it's an elemental attack.

Which can be blocked through other items. True End is a massive spike in difficulty, enemies actually do quite a lot of damage, and mobs are outright harder than the final boss even. But by that point you have so many mobility options you can just kinda avoid them.

It's a great game, I would say it suffers largely from being far too easy. The only times I died were when I accidentally stumbled into bosses on low health and they had elemental attacks. And I probably wouldn't have died in most of them if I just wasn't a stingy fucker that refused to use healing items. It's fun, unique, definitely worth playing. I like Aria of Sorrows better

>You can get the third best armor in the game about 2 hours in

I haven't played in years, what is this armor? The walk armor?

I dunno why but the psp port looks very ugly to me.

Nah, the Diamond Armor that sells for 12000 in the shop. At least I think that's what it's called. It's that expensive item in the shop, it outclasses Walk Armor for almost the entirety of the game. By the time Walk Armor is better you more than likely have Alucard Mail which is significantly stronger since it blocks elemental attacks.

If you're not willing to emulate the you really have no other choice. It'll be fine.

>Dawn of Sorrow
aria was leaps and bounds better in terms of story, design, and overall feel, but dawn upped some of the mechanics and tightened the gameplay while expanding the soul system a little bit in ways that I really liked

fucking shame about the cheap animushit style it took instead of that beautiful j-goth aesthetic aria had

i had forgotten about that awful cover art

>expanding the soul system

Making it so the only way to level up souls was by getting another one was a retarded move. Why not make it so the souls become better with use and the make the repeated ones some kind of currency? (like needing a certain number of souls to craft weapons instead of specific ones). This made the game a grindfest and made even more easy than how it should be.

Yes, SotN is one of the best despite being rather easy. Play SotN, then try Dawn of Sorrow and the other DS games if you're enjoying the series, and if you still want more you can play the GBA games.
I've been thinking of making a flowchart for "so you're new to Castlevania" to show a recommended order to play in, kinda like that Kirby flowchart. Maybe I should get around to making that some time...

Do you think that the PSP version is better than the PS1 one?

They're exactly the same aren't they?

The PSP version's dub is god-awful. Play the PS1 version.

The PSP version does have Japanese voice and text though, I think

The PSP version sucks because they changed the incredible voice acting from the PS1 version.

Well, usually these "ports" have either better or worse framerate, visuals, interfaces, etc.

If they're exactly the same, then it doesn't matter.

I guess I'll pick the PSP since I prefer Japanese dub

Not him and not a SotN guru, but IIRC
- new voice acting
- playable Maria (formerly a Saturn exclusive)
are the only differences. I say "new" and not "better" because while it's technically better, the original voice acting is more entertaining.

Saturn and PSP Maria are completely different.

Why was Richter so fucking useless in this game

PS1 version is generally better, though I played the 360 XBLA version, which I think is just the PS1 version.

1.0 XBLA is the better version, IIRC the ps3 one has some input lag issues.

>Kills Dracula
>Gets put under a possession spell
>Gets his ass kicked by some pretty boy
>Doesn't show up until the end of the game to apologize for being a useless bitch
At least his hair was stylin'.

90% of everything you pick up will be useless and there isn't a single point in the game where you won't be OP, other than that solid game, btw don't cheese the galamoth fight.

so desperate for attention they had to ask Sup Forums for permission to play SOTN

>btw don't cheese the galamoth fight.
>Fighting Galamoth legit
Fuck Galamoth, he's got too much god damn HP. I've used the shield rod strat on him so many times.

Galamoth is like the only good boss in the game

Fucking fight him legit right now you scrub