Things you dislike about CV: Symphony of the Night

[SlidellMan]

I thought I'd discuss things about CastleVania: Symphony of the Night that you didn't like.

[StopDrop&Retro]

It ends.

[nanochess]

The title made me to think in Colecovision and entered to visit.

[Skippy B. Coyote]

Nothing.

[+save2600]

Symphony of the Night was made for the Colecovision?

 

Been a while since I last played it, but didn't care for the vertical stages where you're jumping from platform to platform. Has a little too much Pitfall! Myan Adventure going on there for my tastes.

 

Don't care for the overall styling and the rpg element really bugs me too come to think of it. I like a much more straight forward Castlevania game... like the originals, IV for SNES and PCE Rondo of Blood/Dracula X. Screw around with the formula too much and it no longer feels like Castlevania to me.

[Great Hierophant]

Here are common complaints about SotN :

 

1. It is too easy (especially the bosses)

 

2. The voice acting and script are too cheesy (What is a man...)

 

3. Spells are too difficult to cast (Street fighter 2 this isn't)

 

4. Too many items that do the same thing (I hope you like Shiitake)

 

5. Alucard can't run (except on Saturn)

 

6. Inverted castle is a weak way to lengthen the game (and almost no character interaction)

 

Despite these flaws, I still love the game.

[Silverfleet]

I have nothing bad to say about SOTN. It's one of my favorite games ever, and I own it for the PS1, PSP (part of the Dracula X Collection) and the XB360/XB1. It's one of those games that i can never get sick of playing, even after multiple playthroughs. In fact, I just started playing it again on the XB1.

[VectorGamer]

The title made me to think in Colecovision and entered to visit.

 

 

Symphony of the Night was made for the Colecovision?

 

 

Came in for ColecoVision discussion. Leaving disappointed.

[+GoldenWheels]

I think even it's few flaws, like the corny voice acting, are pros at this point. I freakin' love that game and always have.

[+Gemintronic]

Enemies have diminishing returns on experience points earned. It almost seems like it's a per monster thing too. So, if you grind on a particular monster that whole monster type becomes useless over time.

 

Probably not the actual case. it sure felt like it when I played.

[HoshiChiri]

I've never played it. Does that count?

[+Gemintronic]

I've never played it. Does that count?

 

Not really since almost every platform game after borrowed something from it.

[Pixelboy]

I love SOTN! The only thing that bothered me about it was how long it took to level-up your familiars, and most of them were somewhat useless even when they were fully leveled-up. You basically had to pick one familiar for the entire game and keep it tagging along to build up its strength and intellect.

 

Also, not really a complaint, but once you get the Crissaegrim, there's practically no point in exploring the rest of the inverted castle. But I do it anyway.

[Asaki]

I didn't get to play it until much later, and by then, I didn't like it quite as much as some of the GBA titles, or Rondo of Blood, or the Metroids that it bases itself on.

 

But on the other hand, there are much worse Metroidvania games out there, and I liked it better than some of the GBA/DS titles.

[NE146]

I always liked SOTN, To me the frustrating thing about some games is how you can play it pretty meticulously, but they have things here or there that you still miss. SOTN was like that (e.g. the shield powers). It took me reading magazines to find out the stuff I missed.. but what if I didn't have that info? Lots of cool aspects of the game would most likely never have been experienced.

 

I remember I was excited enough about the game to buy it at launch.. but it wasn't too long before it on clearance and no one was buying it. Anyone else remember that? It's kinda funny how SOTN has so many fans today when I clearly remember it languishing on the shelves for 20 bucks or whatever.

 

 

[empsolo]

How does SOTN play on the Konami collection for the 360?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Tanooki]

Here are common complaints about SotN :

 

1. It is too easy (especially the bosses)

 

2. The voice acting and script are too cheesy (What is a man...)

 

3. Spells are too difficult to cast (Street fighter 2 this isn't)

 

4. Too many items that do the same thing (I hope you like Shiitake)

 

5. Alucard can't run (except on Saturn)

 

6. Inverted castle is a weak way to lengthen the game (and almost no character interaction)

 

Despite these flaws, I still love the game.

 

I just got the game back after a long time a couple weeks ago. #1,2,and 6 are kind of up for debate on feelings I agree that #3 is out of place and #5 is just stupid (I played it on Saturn first 15 years ago), and #4 is dumb but not a deal breaker.

 

Thing is it could be far worse, it could be the 2nd one on the DS or that crap on PSN/XBL years later. I think the Sorrow story from GBA-DS are superior, but otherwise it against the others aged well enough still.

 

[SlidellMan]

@Great Hierophant

1. Agreed, though Circle of the Moon, the two Sorrow games, and Order of Ecclesia provided better challenges.

2. Aside from Alucard, the Imp Familiar, and Death, I have to agree. By the way, Robert Belgrade also did voice work on the Super NES Star Ocean.

3. Agreed, it is one of the rare instances where the GBA/DS titles have the advantage.

4. I can live with that.

5. I can live with that.

6. Agreed, it just felt like padding. Even the Saturn version's extras felt more interesting than the Inverted Castle.

 

Speaking of the Saturn version, it could have been much better if it were in development at the same time as the PS1 version.

[toptenmaterial]

I adore this game. For me, I always had a little difficulty nailing the spells. Just couldn't pull it off right. Everything else is kind of nitpicky. That being said I think that it has aged remarkably well.

[Great Hierophant]

The worst padding must be the Castle A & B of Harmony of Dissonance. Almost nothing changes between the castles and it is extremely confusing which castle you are in. Plus the bosses are super easy (except for one), the music is awful, the graphics are offensively garish, the story is thin even by Castlevania standards and only using a whip is boring.

[Jess Ragan]

Okay, I'm up for a challenge!

 

Galamoth is almost impossible to beat without the Beryl Circlet.

Some magic spells are annoyingly hard to perform, particularly the heal which brings to mind Geese Howard's Deadly Rave.

Later games in the series (on the GBA and DS) never quite lived up to Symphony of the Night, although the two Dawn of Sorrows came close.

The Saturn version seems kind of phoned in by comparison.

People complain too much about the voice acting, which has a goofy earnestness lacking in the Dracula X Chronicles for the PSP.

You have to unlock Symphony of the Night in Dracula X Chronicles for the PSP.

Other things from the 1990s don't hold up as well as Symphony of the Night (ie Zima).

 

Beyond that, smooth sailing on calm seas.

[Tanooki]

The only fault I ever gave Harmony was being confused to hell about the A/B castle bit the first time around so much I quit on it for months. Came back, erased the save and started it over and finished it and learned to like it quite a lot. I don't agree that both the audio or the visuals are a problem. While it was a big change from Circle, I loved the 8bit chiptune sounding music as it has some personality to it, and the visuals are very well detailed and colorful which helped on that non-lit original GBA panel immensely.

[Austin]

The worst padding must be the Castle A & B of Harmony of Dissonance. Almost nothing changes between the castles and it is extremely confusing which castle you are in. Plus the bosses are super easy (except for one), the music is awful, the graphics are offensively garish, the story is thin even by Castlevania standards and only using a whip is boring.

 

..and there's cryptic puzzles and items to discover, and way too much running left, jumping, then running right, jumping, then running left, jumping.. and, you get the picture.

 

Crap game, IMO.

 

While it was a big change from Circle, I loved the 8bit chiptune sounding music as it has some personality to it

The "music" has about as much personality as dragging a cheese grater along concrete.

Edited June 27, 2017 by Austin

[StopDrop&Retro]

I remember I was excited enough about the game to buy it at launch.. but it wasn't too long before it on clearance and no one was buying it. Anyone else remember that? It's kinda funny how SOTN has so many fans today when I clearly remember it languishing on the shelves for 20 bucks or whatever.

 

I didn't know of the game at launch, I only had an N64 at the time. I ended up playing it after I got a PS2 and wanted to explore its backwards compatibility. I remember buying it at Sam's Club for $10 and it was the greatest hits edition. A game had to sell X number of copies to make it to greatest hits so I'm sure it wasn't ever hurting there.

 

What you noticed about the game going on clearance doesn't sound like lack of demand to me. I recall seeing the same thing happen with Final Fantasy X and Metal Gear Solid 2. There's a point where so many people already bought a game and there are so many used copies of it flooding the market that it becomes harder to sell the new copies and discounts are needed for it to compete with the used market. I remember back when I used to see shelves worth of MGS2 I thought it couldn't be a good game because these stores couldn't get rid of their copies. Now I know it was extremely popular and what I was seeing was a byproduct of a highly successful game.

[BydoEmpire]

I'll be the outlier here. While there's a lot to like about the game, I didn't like that you had to play it all over again through the reverse castle to get the ending. It felt cheap and frustrating. I thought the reverse castle was clever when I first saw it, but quit playing about a third of the way through and never picked it up again. It felt like "Well, the game's not long enough, let's make them play through twice! Then we can say 10 hours of gameplay" or something.