Retro Review – Castlevania: The Adventure

<p>Some people have been ranting about how difficult <em>The <&sol;em><em>Legend of Zelda&colon; Breath of the Wild<&sol;em> is&comma; and I guess they might have forgotten that Nintendo&&num;8217&semi;s been publishing games with soul crushing difficulties for decades&period;  Take the <em>Castlevania<&sol;em> series for example&semi; it&&num;8217&semi;s a series that&&num;8217&semi;s been difficult since its earliest releases&period; <em>Castlevania&colon; The Adventure<&sol;em> was released in December of 1989 on the Game Boy and it can be incredibly difficult just getting to the next level&period; My Retro Review cohort&comma; Josh&comma; reviewed one of the best games in the franchise&comma; <em><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;retro-review-castlevania-symphony-of-the-night-wonderful-pile-of-secrets&sol;">Symphony of the Night<&sol;a> <&sol;em>and despite being more accessible than some of the earlier games it still had quite a difficulty curve&period; Games only recently began holding our hand all the way from the beginning through the end credits&period; When I was younger&comma; difficulty was not only a major part of the game&&num;8217&semi;s design but also one of the ways developers were able to make games long&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This story takes place one hundred years before anyone even knew who Simon Belmont was&period; You play as one of his ancestors&comma; Christopher Belmont&comma; and are on a quest to defeat Dracula&period; Pretty simple right&quest; Grab your whip and start running to the right to save the day&period; That&&num;8217&semi;s pretty much the story&period; There weren&&num;8217&semi;t as many possibilities in terms of story or presentation on the Game Boy&period; It didn&&num;8217&semi;t matter too much though as it forced there to be a tight focus on gameplay and that&&num;8217&semi;s where <em>Castlevania<&sol;em> has always shined&period; The Belmont boys have had a hard-on for killing Dracula that&&num;8217&semi;s spanned hundreds and hundreds of years&semi; can&&num;8217&semi;t they just leave the poor guy alone&quest; This game consists of a whopping four levels to get through&comma; but let me tell you while the game is short&comma; you&&num;8217&semi;ll put in plenty of time by replaying levels over and over because of how often you&&num;8217&semi;ll die&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;121141" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-121141" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-121141" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;03&sol;14011316&sol;castlevania-the-adventure-1&period;jpg" alt&equals;"&lpar;The Castlevania Adventure - Nintendo&rpar;" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"576" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-121141" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Castlevania The Adventure<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; Nintendo&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>That&&num;8217&semi;s right&period; To complete this game you only have to get through four levels and four bosses&comma; but man they do not make it easy for you&period; The controls are somewhat sluggish&comma; especially when you have to platform over areas while fighting enemies that will repeatedly respawn&period; A is jump&comma; B is attack and the D-pad controls your movement&semi; yes back in the primitive days we only had two buttons with which to pass our games&period; You are timed and only get a certain allotment of time to pass the level&comma; which makes things interesting I guess&period; Personally I hate timed missions and timed levels&period; I feel that you miss out on what may be in the level and a certain amount of enjoyment&period; Just because the developers were being so nice as well they took away sub weapons for this version&comma; so all you do have is your whip&comma; so don&&num;8217&semi;t drop it or you are S&period;O&period;L&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The developers did attempt to give you a fighting chance in defeating Dracula though&period; While you don&&num;8217&semi;t have sub-weapons&comma; your whip is upgradable when you find orbs&period; Only problem is when you get hit by an enemy your whip slowly degrades&comma; so not only do you lose health with each hit but you also lose weapon power&period; To get these orbs&comma; hearts and coins you have to whip candles&period; The hearts give you health and the coins increase your point score which can actually help you&period; If you hit 10&comma;000 points you get an extra life and for every subsequent 20&comma;000 points you earn another&period; This is a nice bonus seeing as you only start with three lives&period; Once those lives are done then you begin again&period; The game is pure <em>Castlevania<&sol;em> though&semi; this is no idle spin off this is the real deal&period; What really makes the game feel like<em> Castlevania<&sol;em> is the music&period; While the music may sound like it&&num;8217&semi;s in a tin can and consists of MIDI files&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s still intense and everything a <em>Castlevania<&sol;em> score should sound like&period; I just sit with my GameBoy Advance open and listen to music feeling like a total badass before I get schooled by a measly bat later in the level&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;121147" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-121147" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-121147" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;03&sol;14014017&sol;gfs&lowbar;38555&lowbar;2&lowbar;8&period;jpg" alt&equals;"&lpar;Castlevania&colon; The Adventure - Nintendo&rpar;" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"576" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-121147" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Castlevania&colon; The Adventure<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; Nintendo&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>For the <em>Castlevania<&sol;em> enthusiast this is a title that you should take a gander at&period; You will like it&comma; heck you may even love it because it is the original <em>Castlevania<&sol;em> formula just dumbed down a bit in a weaker system&period; Difficult games seem to be stuck in a niche now&comma; but in 1989 that&&num;8217&semi;s all we had&period; If you want to play a portable <em>Dark Souls<&sol;em>&comma; then this is the title for you&period; There&&num;8217&semi;s slow walking to the right&comma; jumping that seems more like levitating&comma; whips and chains and of course the Alpha Male Christopher Belmont that gets to destroy Dracula this time around&period; Grab a copy or a download of this title&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s only &dollar;2&period;99 on the 3DS eShop so you can play it the way it was meant to be played for a very low price&period; You won&&num;8217&semi;t be disappointed&semi; you&&num;8217&semi;ll be enraged&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;