I have just beaten pic related. It's my first Castlevania and now it's one of my favourite games...

I have just beaten pic related. It's my first Castlevania and now it's one of my favourite games, so now I'm going to start Circle of the Moon and Castlevania IV. What other instalments from the franchise should I play?

Other urls found in this thread:

youtube.com/watch?v=YhIf_zV6yK0
romhacking.net/hacks/3356/
youtu.be/gm-t3UOemow
romhacking.net/hacks/3305/
twitter.com/NSFWRedditImage

all the gba and ds games , symphony of the night and rondo dont play los and the westernvanias

Honestly I would say do Dawn of Sorrow next, it IS the sequel to Aria of Sorrow.

SotN is still the best of the nonlinear Castlevanias.

>dat fucking Abandoned Pit music
youtube.com/watch?v=YhIf_zV6yK0

Dawn of Sorrow is the one to play next if you enjoyed Aria. It's more of the same, but with a worse artstyle and a bit of a worse castle design. Early on feels a bit sluggish to get through. Up until the Dark Chapel at least. Also, really dislike how the Wizardry Lab is laid out.
Otherwise, Symphony of the Night is the obvious go-to Metroidvania. It started it all and it really is remarkable just how much it got right for the formula. Every other Metroidvania draws from this game, yet there are some unique aspects that are only found in SotN.
I'd say Circle of the Moon is a bit low on the priority list. It's a good game for sure, but it's a little weak in comparisons to SotN, Aria, Dawn and Portrait. The magic system is novel and fun to play around with and it's a very replayable game. I just think the movement and combat is a bit stiff.
As for Classicvania, IV is a really good starting point. It's basically a remake of the first game with drastically lowered difficulty and more platform-friendly controls. It's my favourite of the pre-SotN games for sure, because despite being a tad easy in comparison to other Classicvanias, it's a lot of fun to play and it hits the right balance for me.
The first game is also a must play. It is really impressive how tight that game feels and how satisfying it is to beat. 3 is similar, but much harder. I'd recommend the JP version if you want to try it. It's easier and has a fucking baller soundtrack thanks to the VRC6 chip.

ill second this post, skip COTM for now, it was the prototype for the other color gameboy CVs, so it's simpler

I have positive memories of CV4, one of the best soundtracks in the series, but it's a true platformer, there's no extraneous shit, other than getting to the end and killing the boss, it may feel simple compared to aria

That track used to spook me out as a kid. Goddamn. Now I want to replay SotN again.

Best of the Classicvanias is Rondo of Blood, PC Engine CD version. That one is absolutely must-play.

If you just beat this and loved it why would you not go directly to symphony of the night

>but with a worse artstyle
romhacking.net/hacks/3356/
Here ya' go.

The X68000 version of Castlevania is pretty good, but fucking hell the soundtrack has some real stinkers.
youtu.be/gm-t3UOemow
I'm all for jazzy renditions, but this swingy beat just takes away the dramatic feel of the song and makes it goofy.

Brainlet detected.

>Wicked Child of Bel Air

I always hated how non-imposing and almost silly look of this character in the original, but with the AoS style, she actually looks decent. I like this.
Is there also a way to get rid of the touchscreen shit? It was so unnecessary and hurt the flow of the game.

Learn how to navigate romhacking.

>SotN is still the best of the nonlinear Castlevanias.
God I hate this meme, the Inverted Castle alone is enough to make the game an 8/10 but the terrible balance and the pacing of upgrades is terrible too.

People are easily blinded by pretty graphics and nice music. SotN is just more of Simon's Quest stupid nonsense, jit just has more collectibles.

get an emu for psx and play the best castlevania of all time: symphony of the night.

i play it for myself once in a year

>symphony of the night
>best castlevania of all time

>SotN is just more of Simon's Quest stupid nonsense

I played SotN last year and didn't have to use a walkthrough at all. It sounds like you're just bad at videogames. :)

>Responding to bait
Come one now.

Except Simon's Quest plays completely differently and is a chore to go through due to absolutely awful design and translation errors up the ass. SotN plays well.

For Metroidvania (Symphony of the Night and games like it, such as Aria of Sorrow), I'd recommend Dawn of Sorrow, the direct sequel to Aria. Afterward you can try Portrait of Ruin, and from there Circle of the Moon and Order of Ecclesia.

For Classicvania, or the more arcade-style games, Castlevania I is a must-play entry in the series and an extremely solid, well-designed game. Castlevania III is even better, though at times frustrating in the US version and a little rough around the edges in some stages. Bloodlines and Rondo of Blood are both great, and Sharp X68000/Chronicles is another wonderful game, though quite difficult. Finally, there's The Adventure Rebirth on Wiiware.

What's the easiest Classicvania to ease myself into?

Castlevania 4 is rather easy.

Valdis Story - The Abyssal City
Excellent Metroidvania on Steam, shame nobody's ever heard of it. Great gameplay, deep, and multiple characters that play differently

I find it really weird that I don't like Valdis Story considering it's basically everything I want from a metroidvania

I or IV. I'd recommend starting with I though, as it'll give you an idea of how the mechanics have developed throughout the series and might better teach you the importance of subweapons. Some people find that the advanced whip options in SCV IV make the game too easy on their own and thus rarely use the subweapons, which tend to be very important in the other Classicvanias.

>someone mentions SotN is his favorite
>autistic screeching
Can we not? If only for one thread.

As for your question, OP. I, III (play the Japanese version, it has better music and balancing), IV, Bloodlines, Rondo of Blood, SotN and all GBA/DS games are worth playing.

me too, i thought i would like it but i wound up hating it

something about combat put me off, spongey enemies

>someone mentions SotN is the best anything
>gets rightfully mocked

FTFY

This.

In all honesty? 2. Simon's Quest is really easy and forgiving, but it's a pain in the ass to get through because it's just so cryptic. Half the NPCs straight up lie to you, or speak in such broken English that you're going to need a scholarship in bullshit to understand what they're telling you.
But, the game itself is really easy. The grinding is exaggerated and if you somehow manage to get your ass killed, you'll just restart where you left off. Even if you game over, you'll start right where you died, though you'll lose your hearts. Still, it takes almost no time to get them back just by playing the game.
The bosses are all jokes and there are only two mandatory ones. One is Medusa, the other is Dracula. That's it. Both of them are fucking pussies too and can be cheesed without even trying.
That said, I kind of like the game. There is something hilarious over the absolute horseshit that this game presents and playing it with a map was honestly pretty enjoyable. I don't think it's a great game, but I had fun and I'd honestly recommend it for at least one playthrough.
Or, you can just play Super Castlevania IV.

There's nothing fun about Simon's Quest.

would you say the chronicles soundtrack is an improvement?

Does listening to the OST count as fun?

You don't need to play the game to listen to the OST

The entire game is fun. It is the game that is responsible for SotN. It just had a REALLY shitty translation because Konami hated Americans and work even back in the 80's.

It's more about the ones you shouldn't play, which are Castlevania 2, the old Gameboy Castlevania games, the shit tier SNES port of Rondo of Blood, the N64 games, and Castlevania Judgement.

If you're looking for the absolute best, I'd say Rondo of Blood is it, followed by probably Dawn of Sorrow.

Add Harmony of Dissonance and Lords of Shadow 2 to the avoid games.

Lords of Shadow 2 was better than the first game in almost every aspect. Better visuals, better gameplay, some mild nonlinear exploration elements, better characters and story. The only things that I feel are worse are the level design and the lack of puzzles.

Seriously I enjoyed that game quite a bit compared to what I thought going in due to all the reviews.

And Harmony of Dissonance, despite the absolutely appalling graphics, has fantastic gameplay. Juste has like a billion moves and using L and R to dash everywhere is the best use of those buttons on the GBA period, it just feels great to move around in that game. Shame the graphics and castle design are shit but the core of killing things is fun.

And using some of the moves to sequence break is pretty enjoyable too.

I thought all GBA games were good

>The entire game is fun

Go to bed Bizarro.

>It is the game that is responsible for SotN

Which is exactly why SotN fails so hard to get the point.

>It just had a REALLY shitty translation

Just fucking learn japanese or use a romhack instead of bitching about your shitty localized version. This is 2017, this doesn't hold as an argument about why Simon's Quest sucks, the game sucks beyond that because the core experience is shit and those idiots at Konami built SotN upon that.

Which Castlevania game had the best bosses?

I don't think I'd say Aria had the best boss fights but this is definitely my favorite boss fight.

I'm going to say Rondo. The bosses have this perfect level of being challenging but still having predictable, avoidable moves and patterns, and multiple strategies for beating them.

Also contains the most fair and fun and badass version of Death.

>all this hipster anti-sotnposting

Lol, I love how you all conveniently never mention that the reason that sotn is beloved is its countless small touches and countless things it does right..not perfect challenge or gameplay

Sotn is a love letter to video games, it represents the culmination of Sprite based games in the 8, 16, and 32 bit eras. Perhaps it's harder to appreciate that if you are younger

...

Ecclesia. Portrait and Dawn had some really nice ones though.

Can't go wrong with Rondo either.

>Lol
When do you think anyone would or can take your opinion seriously?

>you all conveniently never mention that the reason that sotn is beloved is its countless small touches and countless things it does right
Exactly, SotN problem is that it just ignores the core experience to focus on a gazillion of trite details. Which would be great if the core experience was here, though it sadly isn't the case.

>Sotn is a love letter to video games
SotN is nothing but developers masturbating while missing the point entirely.

>it represents the culmination of Sprite based games in the 8, 16, and 32 bit eras
People play games, people don't play sprites.

>Perhaps it's harder to appreciate that if you are younger
It's harder to appreciate when the core experience is fucking schlock designed for people who are bad at games.

Shaft's gauntlet fucked me up.

thank fuck Medusa is easy as shit, but yeah the rest are fucked.

>contrarian faggots tsundere over bestvania
wew lads

what's your favorite castlevania game then champ?
this gunna b gud

If you want to play Dawn of Sorrow, for the love of god play it in an emulator with the patch that removes the touch screen gimmick shit.

Also use the romhack that restores Aria's portraits so you don't have to put with the anime trash.

Even on a DS, I would recommend getting that patch since my God, are those Magic Seals a pain in the ass in later fights if your Touch Screen isn't in a pristine state anymore.

I really like cotm and aria, but why did they make it so that you'll never end up getting to use so many abilities? I don't want to grind for card/soul drops forever. It's also so great to get a +16 str soul, then later on in the game when backtracking, I get a +4 str soul. Thanks, that's so useful now.

III, Rondo, or X68000.

Honestly, Simon's Quest could probably work if it was remade as a modernish Metroidvania. Simon having a moveset that ends up closely emulating Julius's moveset a la Sorrows duology could help retaining the whip-centric gameplay. Having the deliberate classicvania controls in a game that encourages heavy exploration definitely didn't help things out.

The thing is, the different magic seals don't need to be performed the same, some need to be very precise while other need to be filthy loose.

Why not just make the 1999 game at that point?

it has always been anime, but you're right in thinking that the bottom of your pic was fairly generic as fuck when compared to the top, especially when they're suppose to represent the same damn character.

You know damn well why the 1999 game isn't being made outside of Konami going full pachinko. Game is almost certain to not live up to the hype especially when 1999 is the year Dracula is killed for good. Better to leave it as an important background detail that people can fill in with their own imagination while playing as the Japanese reincarnation of Vlad.

>What other instalments from the franchise should I play?

Bloodstained Ritual of the Night.

Isn't Soma implied to be American though?
And his birthday being 21 August 2017,
during the Solar Eclipse above America?

romhacking.net/hacks/3305/
What the fuck

Play them all, man.

Rondo, Chronicles, 1-3, sotn, the DS games, the GBA games.

If you get Dracula X Chronicles, you can unlock sotn and Rondo in there. THATS the version of Rondo you want to play, but either version of sotn is fine.

Actually, you might be right on his heritage, but he is studying in Japan as a high school student while having the Childhood "Love" Interest being the miko of a Japanese Shrine. At that point, in my mind, he might as well have been Japanese, even if his name was Iberian/Castillian in origin.

He's only American in the English version; in the Japanese version he's just a Japanese person. Also, his birthday and age aren't confirmed at all.

All these mad AoS kiddies every thread makes my day.

Because Igarashi left and Konami hates making games now.

What is AoS?

Dawn of Sorrow and Order of Ecclesia

Definitely Order of Ecclesia

so is that stuff about dawn of sorrow just a meme, or should I really use a romhack? Should I play it vanilla the first time?

> (You)
>>symphony of the night
>>best castlevania of all time

name a better one and tell me why its better

>if you just met this amazing girl, why would you not immediately impregnate her, thus skipping all the fun shit in between, and going straight to the point where life becomes completely dull

Honestly OP, you can't go wrong with 2D Castlevania. I assume you're doing both classic and Metroid, so you've done some research already. Classic games are really different, but hard and fun. Circle of the Moon was my first Metroidvania, and IV was my first one period. IV is a good starting point because it's not that hard and the soundtrack is rad as shit. Great games all around.

Yes, it's a meme. It doesn't matter.
Some autismos are just sperging over the change in style in the portraits of characters, and while they do look worse, you see them for a total of 10 to 20 seconds throughout the entire game.
The story is retarded anyway, so you can just skip through all conversations.

Not that guy, but I can't think of a metroidvania Castlevania I've played which was worse.
SoTN is the shortest, with the worst movement, the least abilities and the fewest good songs.

But I sort of like the stupid retarded excuse plot they throw into the games.

I mostly agree, but not when it comes to Aria and Dawn. They are the best games in the series, but damn, the story is stupid.

Symphony of the night

>you are the reincarnation of Dracula
>are you a bad enough dude to dominate all the souls?

Dawn of Sorrow *almost as good as aria*
SotN
Castlevania IV
Casltevania Rondo of Blood
Harmony of Dissonance (I liked it.. underrated)

The other ds games are worth playing too, especially Order of Ecclesia.

I easy? why are you such a douchebag?

SotN is by far the weakest nonlinear Castlevania after Simon's Quest and HoD.

>you are an egdy japanese highschool kid
>you live in Tokyo with your osanajimi loveinterest
>now you are going to fight dracula
>no, John, you are the draculas
Though, more than the plot, I really dislike the exposition and the writing.

Aria is objectively worse than Dawn in every respect. What is wrong with you?
Dawn has better graphics, more content, bigger castle, more abilities, more moves, better music, etc.
The only bad thing about DoS is the dumb touchscreen gimmick, but that's very minor.

did you played circle of the moon? far worse
dont wanna even mention HoD

the music in sotn still give me chills, the details are amazing and alucard as a playble character is one of the best.
+reversed castle and you can play the whole game as richter.

what about the touchscreen complaints? is that a meme too? I figured as much about the crappy portraits.

fair point. it personally didn't bother me, but i can recognize that, as far as story goes, it really was just a paper thin excuse for you to go exploring, platforming, and beating all the challenges.

With Halloween approaching I feel the need to ask. Which Castlemania in your opinion has the absolute best version of Dracula and the best battle?

Symphony of the Night is the Japanese version of Uncharted: all style over substance with brain dead gameplay.

Prove me wrong.

No, I haven't played that, so I guess it could be worse.
I have played HoD, but I don't really think it counts. HoD has the same floaty movement as SoTN, though.

Reversed castle was complete shit and it took me a minute to complete.
There are really great songs in SoTN, but only like two or three. Almost all other Castlevania games have many more great tracks.
Playable Richter is cool, but nothing special. You can play as other characters in the other metroidvania games as well.

No, those are a bit stupid. Does the romhack fix those too?
If it does I'd say go for the romhack - though it's no big problem.

Fucking this. The writing is horrendous but after all the patches it got, it became a great Metroidvania with 4 playable characters, each with a multitude of viable builds.

From the Castlevania series itself, no matter what you do, don't skip Portrait of Ruin or Order of Ecclesia. Dawn of Sorrow is debatable since it's a worse AoS with shit art and touchscreen gimmick.

How is soma edgy at all? Appearance aside, he acts the most like a normal guy in the entire series

>Soma
>Not edgy
Look at him and tell me isn't edge incarnate, he's literally Dracula incarnate.

the appearance probably feeds into the edge perception. outside of that, though, you're right. he's level headed even when supernatural shit is going down and his love interest is in danger.

nice reading comprehension dumbass

Reminder Soma's canon love interest is Yoko.