1. I don't know what it was like to play this in 1997 but I can tell you playing it right now is great. Some of these so-called classics are really best left to retro-gamers and other insufferable dweebs but I think Castlevania: Symphony of the Night flies by its own two wings. Gameplay is terrific and you don't have to add "once you get used to the outdated control scheme" or any of ten thousand qualifying conditions that these old games are usually allowed.
2. Also, crucify me if you will, ye old game nerds, but the NES-era Castlevania titles are horrible. Symphony of the Night moves the emphasis from getting knocked off platforms because you hit an erratically moving low-level enemy to exploring its foreboding gameworld and is amazingly better for it.
4. This does take one cue from the original games that's quite welcome though: the music is excellent. Go listen to it. It is clearly awesome and anyone who says differently has ears that are really stupid and ugly. It is a varied mix of rock and more symphonic music and each piece sets the mood of its area perfectly. Both in terms of composition and sound quality, Symphony of the Night's soundtrack can stand its ground against any game soundtrack ever made.
5. The graphics don't hold up quite so well, mostly from a technological standpoint. This isn't to say this is a bad looking game--quite the contrary--but modern hi-bit pixel art games that aren't as limited by resolution simply look better. The art style sets the tone nicely but there's times where things get muddled and confusing due to a dark color palate and a limited level of detail.
6. The story here is window dressing. They give you and excuse to go explore a giant castle and you do so. I guess there's something about your mom and Dracula and also some remarkably stiff voice acting so, I dunno, if you need a story, you can pretend this has one.
7. This all actually works because exploring this castle is awesome. Every area has a different theme, different monsters, different music and a whole different feel to it. It is by no means a reasonable structure as anything other than a video game level but, you know, it is a video game level so that's fine. You are given ample reason to explore beyond what you have to through a myriad of hidden powerups and optional bosses but most people would probably want to go around anyway just to see what's tucked away in the various obscure corners.
8. The save system in this gives me flashbacks to when I'd have to leave my old systems running for hours unattended because my mom needed me to do something and "Hold on, I need to find a save point" was an unintelligible to parents in the 90's.
9. On this same subject, I do understand spread out save points from a gameplay perspective--it creates challenge and tension as you traverse between them--but what I don't get is why Symphony of the Night needs to dump you out to the main menu every time you die, requiring you to sit through roughly six hours of loading screens to get playing again.
10. To be honest, I am unsure if I'd have gotten through this w/o consulting an FAQ and map on a few occasions. You pick up a lot of random crap in this and there's a few instances where knowing that something is important is only going to happen if you spend a lot of time digging through menus... or just cheat and look it up. Similarly, you can spend hours exploring every possible path and passage through the castle... or just look at a map. My recommendation: push through as much of this as you can w/o help but a few hints here and there kept me moving and stopped the game from getting frustrating.
11. Speaking of frustrating, this has those same godawful sine-wave flying Medusa heads that knock you off platforms every Castlevania game has--and they are somehow not even the most annoying enemies in the game, not by a long shot.
12. The boss battle is in danger of becoming a lost art in gaming. One advantage of going old school is you are in no danger of ending a level on a glorified clip scene where you have to hit a button as prompted from time. The boss battles here are epic, skill-based challenges and there's tons of them. Huzzah!
13. As touched on in 1, I don't buy into any era in the past being some lost golden age of gaming. Games now are better than they've ever been and that will be true whenever you read this. Games that hold up for twenty years are very much the exception rather than the rule but Symphony of the Night is one of these games and you should play it. It sounds great, looks fine, play great, annoys you only occasionally and is completely engaging throughout. This makes it better than most games regardless of when they came out.
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