CorBin's Castlevania Shrine

"Long ago, people lived in peace and harmony.

No one noticed the looming shadow among them..."

"Clouded in darkness evil ate away at their souls."

"Evil has once again made flesh...

Lord of Darkness... DRACULA."

--Castlevania: Rondo of Blood


Castlevania 3


Summoned by the Church to fight on their behalf, Trevor must trek through Wallachia defeating monsters under the control of Dracula.

Trevor is equipped with the Vampire Killer, a holy whip intended to well... Kill vampires!

This is the only NES Castlevania to feature character swapping, it makes it very fun to replay and see all the routes and character abilities. The map shows where you're going and some routes are faster.

Grant as a character opens this game up early with the ability to high jump and cling to walls.

Sypha has a selection of spells, flamethrower, a lightning ball, ice is funny because you can make platforms.

Alucard is just Dracula. Turn into a bat, FIREBALL!!!

Everybody can timestop...

Cool Stuff


Castlevania


That Dracula guy is doing evil stuff again, or like the first time too I guess.

I attempt to do this game deathless to keep it interesting, remembering where all the items I want are located, all the food and all the treasure I can.

When I die I usually just take a break. The only reason you can screw up is because you didn't do it right once you know how it all works so I don't typically get mad when I lose anymore. I will attempt to recover until my health bar is empty though.

It's not over till it's over, I'm not trying to speedrun just deathless and minimizing damage.

It still doesn't take long, probably the quickest for me to play start to finish.

Most of the enemies spawn in either the same spot or based on what you're doing for Medusa Heads. Just set yourself up and nothing is hard!

The most fun enemies to fight are the Axe Knights!

My strategy is to get Holy Water to level 3 on the first stage and keep it until Frankenstein, where I swap to the axe in the middle of the level. Keeping it for the Death fight.

They really gave Simon the most annoying to deal with weapons in platformers but let the player use them. Really makes the Belmonts feel overpowered.

Weapons

Every Belmont mainly uses the Vampire Killer, it has a fixed range and angles it gets thrown out at so it skips the problems with most whips and just turns into a horizontal line of damage with charge up. It gets a chain upgrade, and gets a longer chain as the final upgrade.

The dagger, throw a projectile that travels in a straight line. Grant can throw them opposite of the walls he is clinging to.

The axe is thrown in a arc that favors height, it's annoying to dodge for most people so it's a pretty nice tool.

The cross is a boomerang that travels a fixed length in front of you and then heads the direction you threw it from until you pick it back up, if you dodge it and keep it on screen it will go forever in a straight line. If you set it up correctly you can clear rooms.

Holy Water is thrown in an almost diagonal path downwards to the ground and burns for a set period, stunning monsters and dealing damage. The bottle itself can kill weak monsters, after an upgrade you can stun lock some bosses.

The Stop Watch, stops time for two seconds. Doesn't work on bosses.

Candles can drop upgrades, small treasure and different weapons. Monsters drop them as well so walk under them carefully if you want to keep your upgraded gear!

Richter Belmont

Despite not talking about his game, my favorite character is Richter Belmont.

His inclusion in Smash Ultimate was awesome!

He looks really cool and is really dramatic. He's over-prepared, but who wouldn't want to be, right?

Some of his previously exclusive moves were retroactively given to Simon but they shine here. Like the uppercut, dash attack, dive kick and slide kick. Although he was given Simon's free-whip ability and ledge tether from Castlevania IV.

His unique move difference is his Holy Water is Aura based and burns things that are fire resistant which leads to the funny headcanon of implying Lucario is using a Holy Power!?

I prefer Richter's voice and outfit 90% of the time. "IT'S TIME!" "YOU DON'T BELONG IN THIS WORLD!" "TAKE THIS!" "GO!" "PREPARE YOURSELF" and "FAREWELL!"

His voice actor returned for Smash Ultimate. The only sub-weapons missing are the stop watch and the dagger; Item crash is here but only an altered form of Grand Cross.

Castlevania (animated series)

I really like this series, it's animated nicely and features the characters with the most diverse combat applications, I assume the lack of Grant here is because he would be fighting in a way similar to Trevor.

Trevor from this show is essentially a different character to most people. Having only played the NES games, I don't know what to expect personally, I do like his character myself.

I wasn't really a fan of Castlevania Nocturne. I made it about three episodes in before I decided it wasn't for me.

The Soundtrack

About every song here is amazing, here's some of my favorite songs!

Beyond Castlevania

Dead Cells: An indie rougelike that is inspired by Castlevania and now features characters and Castle Dracula from Castlevania.

Bloodstained: By the former director of Symphony of the Night, it features a similar look and feel to the more RPG-centric Castlevania games.

Bloodstained - Curse of the Moon: Once again the same director however focused on giving the traditional castlevania experience. The second game offers cooperative play; It's pretty fun, love Zangetsu in this.

Metroidvania: A genre where a large map, that occasionally loops is explored and unlocked with items and moves found in other parts of the world, requiring backtracking and usually favoring puzzle solving with what tools the player has. Occasionally experience points and leveling are featured as well.

Examples: Super Metroid, Hollow Knight

Cool Castlevania Links

https://castlevaniaspeedruns.com/ - A place for tips and tricks and information on speedrunning castlevania games.

https://castlevaniadungeon.net/ - A Castlevania fan-site, from 1997. Although an update seems unlikely as of right now it's cool to look back at and check on.

https://castlevaniadungeon.net/forums - Aforementioned fan-sites forum section, just to draw extra attention to it. More frequently updated as it's a forum.

https://www.spriters-resource.com/nes/cv/ - Spriters Resource link for the first Castlevania

https://www.spriters-resource.com/nes/castlevania3draculascurse/ - Spriters Resource, Castlevania 3

Special Thanks

Sprites Ripped By (spriters resource)

Badbatman3
Mister Mike
sleepyren
SmithyGCN
Superjustinbros