Playtime... is over!

Well, I finally wrapped up Hard Mode in Castlevania: Harmony of Despair a few nights ago. Kyle and I, after dying a few times on Dracula, were able to utterly destroy him on our third try.

It was quite awesome, actually.

I've been thinking about this game on a sort of macro level, though. I mean, I may discuss it more specifically at a later time, but I had a thought I'd like to share.

This game is what the single player of Super Smash Bros. Brawl should have been like.

Think about it. You have all these great Castlevania enemies, with level designs (okay, well, graphics, anyway) pulled right out of earlier Castlevania games. You have remixed boss encounters, with some crazy abilities (could you imagine if Gergoth could hit you from anywhere in the castle in Dawn of Sorrow?!) that, due to the nature of the game, fit perfectly. You have all the abilities of these characters from past games (Soma can steal souls, Shanoa can use/inherit glyphs, etc.), so they all remain unique and play differently. You can play it with other people, or go solo.

Now read this old post of mine and tell me it doesn't seem as if they took all my complaints about Smash Bros. and made a multiplayer Castlevania out of them.

I mean, shit is almost uncanny. This quote in particular proves noteworthy: "...for Christsakes, use graphics from the old games (whether ripped right from them or redone)!" So what does this all prove?

Well, it may not have been for Smash Bros., but dammit, I was right. These basic elements form the basis for a really great, fun game. Now, admittedly, it's not as though I described Harmony of Despair 1:1, and I would never claim I did, but some pretty important points are in there. Konami, being actual game designers (and not some blogger writing to about 2 people) certainly made something much better and more interesting than the barebones structure I laid out.

I'm not going to turn this into a Smash Bros. post, so I won't go into any more detail than that. I know it's a bit of an odd juxtaposition, but it made a lot of sense to me when I thought of it.

Now back to grinding spells with Charlotte - which is very, very tedious, so we'll see how long it lasts.