Topic: Do we owe an apology to this game?

[whipsmemory]

So, I've been recently replaying Harmony of Dissonance and Circle of the Moon, as in I've literally been swapping between the twos playing via the GameCube's GameBoyPlayer on a CRT** , and i've been asking myself the subject question the whole time.
I played both games upon their launch (multiple times), on a first model GameBoy, and I think I've replayed Harmony of Dissonance through an emulator on my PC a while back, but its the first time i've been playing both pretty much at the same time and, good god, even tho they launched only one year apart, they feel like theres a 10 years gap between the two titles.

Ill start in saying that i love both titles and i recognize both are somehow flawed under different and specific aspects, but theres no way, beside personal taste, that is assured, Circle can be considered superior as a whole to Harmony, which is the thing I've been reading\hearing over and over again in these years and i keep reading\hearing, thus my opening question.

I'll try to proceed and explain my point of view:

I won't consider graphics and music which could be considered as subjective matters in defining which of the two games one could prefer (ie. i really love Cotm clean, detailed and proportioned sprite work, but i think animation, background design and enemy design is overall superior in Harmony, but thats completely subjective), rather Id like to delve into core game design choices as a mean to try and point out why I think Harmony is a better game.

1) Movement
This is the first thing i noticed going from HoD to Cotm and back. The controls in Harmony feel fantastic, fluid and natural in the hands, on the contrary Cotm has really stiff controls, physics and speed of movement similar, and fitted, more to a Classic stage-based Castlevania than for an exploration game. Im not sure wheter this was intentional for the developers to try and mix the feel of old Classicvania and NITM like, but even if thats the case i think they made a terrible game design choice as in it doesnt fit at all the exploration oriented mechanic, much more if you think it was supposed to be played on a tiny screen on a machine with limited battery life.

2) Battle mechanics
Im not talking about the Spell Books or DSS system, rather the proper whipping mechanics. As for the generic movement, Cotm whipping feels very stiff and straight forward, exactly like old style CV, with minions moveset being extremely limited, asking you to repeat the attack, take cover/jump, attack, take cover/jump, and so on which soon becomes tedious and boring as, again, we're not in for a multiple stage with different enemies ride, but for a backtracking and exploration focused experience.  On the contrary Harmony's Offense\Defense system feels way more suited to the exploration system, being extremely fast, also even adrenalinic sometime, asking you to take the risk to take the chance at a second or third strike instead of backdashing, or dashforwarding into an enemy before it can strike and so on. Not to mention the system feels great in the hands and you can actually tell it was conceived holding a classic GBA in hands, as it works perfectly with hands reflex on your standard GBA grip. It may feel obvious and taken for granted, but thats exactly what good design in any field makes you feel like, you really dont notice it and feels perfectly natural until you step back for a moment and think about it. Also it is worth mentioning and, for me, of uttermost importance, the feedback given by the enemies being hit and upon destruction doesnt feel satisfactory at all in Cotm as it does in Harmony

3) Level Design
Ok so this is a point which goes usually in favor to Cotm, especially when it comes to the "zigzag halls" in HoD, but beside the nice platforming i found a bit too often tedious sections in Circle of extremely long halls, or tall towers, with the same enemies placed over and over again, which sometime take very long to destroy (due to my two previous points), which at some point makes you want to just keep on running and jump overhead the enemies if you can take the risk of being underlevelled going on in the game, again, not much fun exploring at all.

Summing up, I feel like Cotm is a great game with a wrong (intentional?) premise, which is adding a classicvania gameplay feeling to an exploration based game. This may be to some its most interesting feature, but i cant help thinking its a wrong and bad game design choice, thus resulting in HoD being a like it or not, better designed game.

Im interested in hearing your thoughts asking you to keep aside what has been discussed over and over again in the years and i mean the graphics, chiptune music and composition and juste's ugly sprite.

__
(**note: this i think is important for a fair and square comparision of the two titles, because theres no such problem as screen lightning, audio output and screen size, and i could focus on the very core mechanics of the two games)

[X]

You did bring up some very interesting points, it was an informative read. And though HoD had all that going for it I still seem to enjoy CotM more. Can't really describe it as it's just one of those things 

[whipsmemory]

You did bring up some very interesting points, it was an informative read. And though HoD had all that going for it I still seem to enjoy CotM more. Can't really describe it as it's just one of those things 

Yeah the purpose wasn’t to change anyone’s mind, and I do love Cotm myself, just wanted to have a comparative analysis on different standing points rather than the usual music/ graphics for once (:
Glad you enjoyed it

[VladCT]

If there's any sore point I felt in CotM, it's the jump physics that always comes to mind first. Like holy crap, why does jumping feel so heavy in this game? Not even Classicvanias felt this heavy when it comes to jumping, I think.

[PFG9000]

When Harmony of Dissonance first launched, the fanbase seemed to agree that it was easily superior to Circle of the Moon in just about every way except sound quality.  Sometime around Aria of Sorrow or Dawn of Sorrow, things somehow reversed and Harmony became the whipping boy (sorry) of the IGAvanias.  It's still a great game in my mind, even despite its mediocre soundtrack, bright graphics, and complete lack of difficulty.  But to be fair, Circle of the Moon has plenty of great qualities as well.

If there was a way to combine the graphical detail of Harmony with the dark shades of Circle, the musical creativity of Harmony with the high sound quality of Circle, and the fast, smooth movement of Harmony with the platforming of Circle, now that would make a fantastic game.

[Succubus]

None of the GBA games are bad, but I still like CotM the most among them and, no, it's not because of graphics and audio. My main reasons for preferring CotM are 1) it actually puts up some degree of difficulty, unlike the total cakewalks that are the later two, and 2) it feels like it has at least a little bit of its own unique identity, as opposed to the later two which are extremely derivative of SotN. I mean, if I want to play SotN, I'll play SotN, not less-good clones of it. Level design is a factor too. Sure, CotM may not be amazing in that regard, but it still feels like it has more variety to the shapes and obstacles of its rooms, as opposed to the later two which are jam-packed with straight corridors that are empty save for equally spaced apart enemies and vertical shafts where you just jump/drop back and forth over and over. I find those more tedious than the occasional excessively large room in CotM. I don't mind that the controls are on the stiffer/heavier side in CotM. It takes a brief adjusting period, but they soon feel natural enough, especially once you gain more abilities. I don't feel they're a hindrance in the speed of the game, as you can still move around swiftly. I've beaten every mode in CotM, and I think most of my files are like 5-6 hours for clearing the entire map.

[whipsmemory]

None of the GBA games are bad, but I still like CotM the most among them and, no, it's not because of graphics and audio. My main reasons for preferring CotM are 1) it actually puts up some degree of difficulty, unlike the total cakewalks that are the later two, and 2) it feels like it has at least a little bit of its own unique identity, as opposed to the later two which are extremely derivative of SotN. I mean, if I want to play SotN, I'll play SotN, not less-good clones of it. Level design is a factor too. Sure, CotM may not be amazing in that regard, but it still feels like it has more variety to the shapes and obstacles of its rooms, as opposed to the later two which are jam-packed with straight corridors that are empty save for equally spaced apart enemies and vertical shafts where you just jump/drop back and forth over and over. I find those more tedious than the occasional excessively large room in CotM. I don't mind that the controls are on the stiffer/heavier side in CotM. It takes a brief adjusting period, but they soon feel natural enough, especially once you gain more abilities. I don't feel they're a hindrance in the speed of the game, as you can still move around swiftly. I've beaten every mode in CotM, and I think most of my files are like 5-6 hours for clearing the entire map.

I don’t know, not even when the high jump, running and slide are all available I ever get the feeling of actually enjoying a good degree of movement in Circle of the moon to be honest. About the level design, I think the only difference is that in Harmony the combat system, at least for me, makes it funnier and more bearable than Circle does, but as far as proper level design goes, none of the twos really shine at all. As for the difficulty level, don’t you find it comes mostly due to lack of movement rather  than due to a proper challenge in the game itself (as in enemies variety of attack patterns, environmental hazards, and such..)?  It is undoubtfully true tho that Harmony’s challenge is very low, but the fun of playing makes up for it I think

When Harmony of Dissonance first launched, the fanbase seemed to agree that it was easily superior to Circle of the Moon in just about every way except sound quality.  Sometime around Aria of Sorrow or Dawn of Sorrow, things somehow reversed and Harmony became the whipping boy (sorry) of the IGAvanias.  It's still a great game in my mind, even despite its mediocre soundtrack, bright graphics, and complete lack of difficulty.  But to be fair, Circle of the Moon has plenty of great qualities as well.

If there was a way to combine the graphical detail of Harmony with the dark shades of Circle, the musical creativity of Harmony with the high sound quality of Circle, and the fast, smooth movement of Harmony with the platforming of Circle, now that would make a fantastic game.

I find Cotm to be more detailed under many aspects graphically speaking, but harmony is definitely richer and diverse, but yeah a combination of those points you mention would be amazing, and I think the closest we got to your idea would be Order of Ecclesia

[X]

I can agree that part of CotM's challenge comes from the character's control movements. But that's about 1/3. The other 2/3s have to do with the enemy placements (and there can be some real annoyances that I had to go through), and as the game progresses some of the enemies change and get tougher. The catacombs is a good example: at the start of the game there are only skeletons, bonepillars and ceiling worms. When you reach a certain point in the game they are replaced by bears and arachnid women.

[Succubus]

A game has to be truly exceptional for me to set aside a lack of difficulty, but none of the GBA games are, not on the level of, say, CV4 and SotN. (And even then I'll still point out that a lack of difficulty is a flaw in those games, but I love them in spite of that.) The looser controls of HoD don't amount to much when most everything dies in an instant anyway. I agree that the rigidness of CotM's controls affect the difficulty early on, but once you have access to greater options of movement, virtually anything can be dodged with ease by an experienced player. The difficulty comes less from the controls and more from the effort it takes to gain that experience, learning patterns and what have you, and in the balance of how much damage you take, how much damage enemies take to be defeated, the distance between save points, and the frequency at which you gain healing items. And, yeah, enemy placements as well.

[whipsmemory]

A game has to be truly exceptional for me to set aside a lack of difficulty, but none of the GBA games are, not on the level of, say, CV4 and SotN.

This may be OT but I'd say i prefer and recognize Aria as being above Sotn, even tho Sotn is basically my favorite game of all times, lol.

I agree that the rigidness of CotM's controls affect the difficulty early on, but once you have access to greater options of movement, virtually anything can be dodged with ease by an experienced player. The difficulty comes less from the controls and more from the effort it takes to gain that experience, learning patterns and what have you, and in the balance of how much damage you take, how much damage enemies take to be defeated, the distance between save points, and the frequency at which you gain healing items. And, yeah, enemy placements as well.

Of course it can, I didnt mean it is an unfair game to any extent, its just that as i stated in the opening post, the whipping and dodging in Cotm, especially when against stronger enemies which take plenty of hits, takes sometimes too long, and that gives the game a much slower pace. That wouldnt necessarily be a defect of course, but i think that appears to be at odds with the exploration and backtracking focus of the game, which again is my basic point. Besides, i think the distance between save rooms appears to be pretty much the same between the two games, its just that in Cotm they're often more difficult to reach due to, sorry if i keep repeating myself, a way less smooth control over the character. Enemy placements is indeed a thing, instead.

have to do with the enemy placements (and there can be some real annoyances that I had to go through)

Again, this i find to be particularly true.
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Its nice to discuss these two games under a different perspective for once, thank you all who are contributing to this thread (:

[Succubus]

I meant the distance between save points in relation to the other things I listed, rather than the distance in one game versus another game. Everything between the save points in CotM is hard enough to provide some degree of tension in trying to get from one to the next. What's between the save points in HoD doesn't offer much tension. I guess my point here is that CotM feels as if more care was taken into balancing all these different elements that can either increase or decrease difficulty, such that they all work together to create a game that's neither ridiculously hard nor pathetically easy. In the later games, Konami didn't seem to care that the difficulty was lacking. After all, if SotN was a big success and it was super easy, why not just repeat that?

Personally, I associate exploration-focused games with a slower pace than pure action games. I have no problem with the pacing of CotM. It still feels brisk to me, and I think the game would be over too quick if enemies took fewer hits, on top of then being too easy.

[whipsmemory]

After all, if SotN was a big success and it was super easy, why not just repeat that?

More than this, i think the reason was simply in making a game accessibile to a wider audience than pure hardcore gamers or diehard adrac fans. Anyhow, I still think the difficulty in Cotm to be purely artificial so to say, but i can see your point

[Belmontoya]

Too bad we can't re-boot the music and sound for hod.

[piscesdreams]

HoD has always felt like a bit of an acid trip to me.  I have to be in a particular mood to enjoy HoD, whereas with CotM it is much easier to sink into.  I don't think it's just from an audio/visual standpoint either, but in terms of tone as well.

[Belmontoya]

HoD has always felt like a bit of an acid trip to me.  I have to be in a particular mood to enjoy HoD, whereas with CotM it is much easier to sink into.  I don't think it's just from an audio/visual standpoint either, but in terms of tone as well.

Further proof that I need to try LSD.