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Offline Morning star

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Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« on: February 27, 2014, 02:45:26 PM »
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As a huge fan of the old school Castlevania games i have come to collect the reproduced hacks. I have played many and own a physical copy of five reproduced original Castlevania hacks myself. Having played these a great many times now, i figured it was time for a review of the best that are available. And what better site to do this on than at a dedicated Castlevania forum!

So here we go.. There are two truly great hacks out there and three total that are worth mentioning. I will start with the best two. I will not credit the makers of these hacks.

Castlevania Remix


Atmosphere:

This game just feels great! It's in black and white. This makes it feel a lot like Castlevania adventure and gives it a classic horror movie feel. The start screen simply says.. Castlevania. This is set inside the standard banner. I love that! Many of the sprites have been changed giving it even more of a "new game" feel. The music was remixed for many of the stages and sometimes does not sound as good as it should. But it's not so bad that it takes anything away from the game. This game is simply amazing in my opinion.

Difficulty:

It's a very hard game. It starts easy, just like the original game. But as you move along it gets very difficult. The final stage is a nightmare! If your not an ace at playing Castlevania games it will take you a VERY long time to complete this one. It was designed to make serious use of the knock back death feature. Way too often the timing between enemy sprites will be perfect with your approach to a ledge or "hole" in the screen. This is not an accident and it's overuse makes it clear that your in for a long and frustrating experience. Put on your big boy pants and get ready to die.

Castlevania overflow darkness

Atmosphere:

This is a beautiful game. The sprites are all remade and the levels as well. Graphics was a key focus and it's easy to note as your playing. It feels like a new game as any good hack should. You forget your playing a hack and that's a great thing! The music is the same tracks as the original game, but they are in a different order. Vampire killer is one of the final tracks to play in this one guys ;) It was very well done. The guy that did this hack took his time and did it right. In my opinion, this is the best Castlevania hack you can get.

Difficulty:

The name says it all. From start to finish this game will test your skill. The only thing easy about this one is the final boss fight. After playing this insanely difficult game, you may not take a single hit killing Dracula. I didn't..

The third and final game worth mentioning is Castlevania blood moon. You can tell your playing a hack while you play this one. It has enemy sprites from Zelda 2 in it, lol. It's a little weak in all areas. Still fairly difficult. Has a few glitches in it that really hold it back. Simon can slide forward while whipping. This can help you or hinder you. But all things said and considered, it's worth giving it a go. Especially when you consider that it's one of only three hacks that i consider worthy of being listed here. Is it worth paying money for a physical copy? That's not my call. But i have a copy.






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Offline X

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #1 on: February 27, 2014, 05:56:03 PM »
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I've play bloodmoon myself and was frustrated with the difficulty. Fortunately it is a hack of the original Castlevania and therefore susceptible to the awesome powers of...'The Game Genie!' Take that difficulty!  8)

There have been other hacks I've tried out as well, but the majority of them is; same graphics, just rearranged. Some hacks were easy while others were a pain in the @$$!
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Offline K.K. Drunkinski

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #2 on: March 25, 2014, 07:48:58 PM »
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Out of all the hacks of the NES CV games I've played, the one that amazed me the most was Castlevania: Chorus of Mysteries. All new sprites, backgrounds, and even all new music written for the game. The level design is pretty good as well. The main character is a descendant of Grant DeNasty, and he's on a quest to destroy Count Olrox. My only gripe is that the game is a tad TOO hard.

Offline X

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #3 on: March 26, 2014, 06:29:49 PM »
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Castlevania: Chorus of Mysteries. Played this one too and not only was I using game genie but also save states, lol.
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Offline Morning star

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #4 on: March 26, 2014, 08:44:22 PM »
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Yeah, i have a copy of chorus of mysteries. It's not that bad.

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Offline EisaKrieger

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #5 on: May 17, 2014, 07:47:15 PM »
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I should acquire at least one of the hacks on actual cart soon.

As far as applying the patches to roms in the first place there's a few I'm having trouble with.

Emulating in FCE Ultra
Castlevania Remix - Great except candles and their items seem to be invisible.
Prelude of Darkness - Screenshots online look fine, but when I start it graphics are messed up in the opening view of Simon walking into the castle.
Boss Rush v1.1 (status bar gfx messed for first level, but ok when you start the 2nd stage)
Castlevania Extreme - Can't apply patch.  It's an exe instead of just an ips and it couldn't find file to patch, when it's right freaking there!

Castlevania 3 Remix - Can't apply patch.  Same exe business again.

Got Overflow Darkness working fine.  I mistakenly had it applied to PRG1 when it's for PRG0.

Also when trying to run the Famicom Disk System games, FCE Ultra says FDS Bios rom image missing when I have [BIOS] Nintendo Famicom Disk System (Japan).bin right there.  Can't find any configuration setting to select the file.  I've also tried putting it in different folders and renaming it.



And are there any issues with NTSC vs Pal?  It seems just the hacks Orchestra of Despair and Horror of Dracula are for the Euro NES Castlevania.  Having just NTSC hardware I guess I should avoid getting a cart of those two.  Not knowing that, I first applied the OoD patch to the US rom and it seemed fine in FCE Ultra, but maybe it changed it to pal?
« Last Edit: May 17, 2014, 09:35:31 PM by EisaKrieger »

Offline EisaKrieger

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #6 on: July 07, 2014, 06:53:51 PM »
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I just got an actual cart of Chorus of Mysteries.  Sent a very good condition but mediocre donor cart to here and for reasonable fee got back CoM.

I had only checked out this hack emulated a little before.  Very impressive playing on the actual system. Lots of good graphics where they did a great job fitting in stuff from 16 and 32  bit games just with reduced colors and shrunk a little.   I was totally blown away to hear a very well done 8-bit composition of classical music from SotN.    So far I got to Olrox's second form.  There's an awesome sound effect from CvII&III.  I don't think the original Cv had laurels, did it?  They've been hacked into it, I think replacing the stopwatch, and function like CvII granting temporary invulnerability.  I think in CvIII and Chronicles(X68000 remake) they give you a chunk of health back instead.  I was not aware of all that could be done with the original CV engine.  Massively impressive and feels like a new game.
« Last Edit: July 07, 2014, 06:55:22 PM by EisaKrieger »

Offline X

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #7 on: July 07, 2014, 11:18:53 PM »
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You know it amazes me whenever I look at the inside of a NES cart; All that wasted space. Games would have much more to them and be much, much longer if they utilized the entire inside of the cartridge rather then the small space at the bottom.
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Offline Ratty

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #8 on: July 12, 2014, 10:14:29 AM »
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You know it amazes me whenever I look at the inside of a NES cart; All that wasted space. Games would have much more to them and be much, much longer if they utilized the entire inside of the cartridge rather then the small space at the bottom.

Yeah that's because the carts on the original Famicom really were small like that. I can only suppose that the carts were made so much longer and larger for the NES to make it more visually distinctive from predecessors and competitors like the Atari's and Sega Master System.

Offline EisaKrieger

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #9 on: July 13, 2014, 03:24:31 PM »
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I realized that the first stage music in Chorus of Mysteries is from Super Cv IV.  That's pretty cool too.

Offline Kaneda

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Re: Original Castlevania reproductions/hacks
« Reply #10 on: October 03, 2014, 12:00:32 AM »
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Chorus of Mysteries is pretty neat hack.

Has there ever been a remix/hack of Vampire Killer? I'd love to have an NES rendition of that game. It's times like these that I wish I had the technical know-how to do such things. *sigh*
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