Castlevania Dungeon Forums
The Castlevania Dungeon Forums => General Castlevania Discussion => Topic started by: Mach 7 on May 19, 2008, 10:21:11 PM
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Well I've been seeing a lot of negative reception towards
PoR and I've always wondered. What makes PoR undesirable?
Aside from, the anime drawing style, and the childish dialogue.
I've actually enjoyed the game, and I just wanted to know why other players don't like it, additionaly it has been rated decently at gamespot and the like, further making myself ponder on the question even more.
so Castlevania peeps please
enlighten me and give me reasons why PoR is hated, bashed and what not, opinions will be appreciated!
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In Reply To #1
I am about to write a piece about this very topic for a review site. So I'll link it when it's done.
In a nutsehell,
There's MANY reasons:
- Generic anime style.
- Some truly awful and silly looking new enemies
- The sprites in general aren't even as good as DOS
- Main castle is boring in layout, execution and art. Some rooms have nothing more than a black backdrop, pretty much. Too small, too.
- Portrait stages feature fresh ideas, but fail in level design because they simply repeat layouts too much. If there's a game that feels like what COD did wrong, but in 2D, it's POR's painting stages. They feel too long, linear and uninspired, considering the potential they could have harnessed.
- Jonathan and Charolotte are now the "Scrappy Doo and Cousin Oliver" of the series. Little annoying wonder twins that act like tweenies in their twenties. Their banter is neither charming nor productive, and their portraits are rather lacking in emotion.
- The soundtrack was solid, but most of the treats came in form of Bloodlines', Curse of Darkness and Haunted Castle remixes. THe new stuff was a little underwhelming and quiet (perhaps to match the blandness of the stages)
- The "quests" are confusing and vague.
I could go on...
Portrait of Ruin sounded like such a good idea when the info was first leaked. But it turned out to be a rushed and thrown together attempt at both lowering the age of the target audience and trying to make the castle bigger just because.
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In Reply To #1
I am about to write a piece about this very topic for a review site. So I'll link it when it's done.
In a nutsehell,
There's MANY reasons:
- Generic anime style.
- Some truly awful and silly looking new enemies
- The sprites in general aren't even as good as DOS
- Main castle is boring in layout, execution and art. Some rooms have nothing more than a black backdrop, pretty much. Too small, too.
- Portrait stages feature fresh ideas, but fail in level design because they simply repeat layouts too much. If there's a game that feels like what COD did wrong, but in 2D, it's POR's painting stages. They feel too long, linear and uninspired, considering the potential they could have harnessed.
- Jonathan and Charolotte are now the "Scrappy Doo and Cousin Oliver" of the series. Little annoying wonder twins that act like tweenies in their twenties. Their banter is neither charming nor productive, and their portraits are rather lacking in emotion.
- The soundtrack was solid, but most of the treats came in form of Bloodlines', Curse of Darkness and Haunted Castle remixes. THe new stuff was a little underwhelming and quiet (perhaps to match the blandness of the stages)
- The "quests" are confusing and vague.
I could go on...
Portrait of Ruin sounded like such a good idea when the info was first leaked. But it turned out to be a rushed and thrown together attempt at both lowering the age of the target audience and trying to make the castle bigger just because.
I agree with a majority of your post, though I'll admit, I did like the soundtrack. (The only part I disliked were the so called 'CD' versions of each song. In some instances, I thought I was listening to a bad fan-made remix.) The bolded reason you gave was the reason I disliked the game the most, though I'll admit, I don't outright hate it or anything.
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I'm in agreement with Chibi. I think it would've been a much more solid game if the thick layer of childishness to it all wouldn't have detracted so much from the atmosphere. I can handle cheesiness, like Haunted Castle and portions of the initial Castlevania, but not "combine our powers of heart and friendship to fight the evil!!!"
Now I liked the quests and the environments. The level design wasn't the best, but I didn't find it atrocious.
I also liked some of the bosses. Keremet and the Cleopatra-knockoff were both interesting, and at least they had the decency to upgrade The Creature with some new moves. Sadly, the same cannot be said of Legion or Dracula.
And damn. Dracula and Death. Now I appreciated the Lugosi-look; as big a fan I am of Ayami Kojima, it was a nice throwback to see the classic Dracula back. His anime portrait was laughable, but I like I said, I can stand some cheesiness. Death was just sad. WITH EVEN MORE SAMURAI ASPECTS, and just to compliment it all they gave him Mickey Mouse hands. After his performance in CoD, this was just shameful.
The soundtrack was solid. I didn't think any of it was bad, and yes, at worst it was boring. I liked the new tracks, however; I found the remixes to be charming at first but ultimately kind of forced. The instrumentation to Cross Your Heart and Iron Blue Intention were both iffy, and Simon's Theme came off a bit too laid back- using the MIDI Soundtrack's variation of said theme was also pretty perplexing. Damnit, I want my gloomy SCIV version. >_>
It was a decent title, and surely not loathsome, but it did not live up to the potential it could've had.
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It was all about the delivery for me. I don't have a problem with anime, mind you, but as already stated, the anime used for this particular game was generic at best. The specific art style used was just...awful in my opinion. A lot of the outfits and designs were just outright tacky or horrible to look at. (All the vampires looked bad.) And I'll agree, that was a nice throw back for Dracula but must his pants look so damn high-water?
As for the story, again, it was the delivery that bothered me the most. It actually wasn't that bad and could have actually been, dare I say, a moving one had it been done in a more serious, dark manner. As for the main characters, I've finally decided I hate Charlotte the most, because at the very least, I could *tolerate* Johnthan's lame, generic attitude over hers. When she complimented Dracula and Death on their teamwork, all I could envision was her getting sliced in half by Death. (I too, support Serio's cause.)
I agree with Chibi, I actually liked the original soundtrack but I don't know what the hell happened with the CD edit for it. Considering who composed the soundtrack, I was very disappointed with it's sound.
As for the overall layout for the game stage wise, I honestly wasn't disappointed until we got to the second set of portraits. I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel let down that they were just rehashes of the first four, though I think I felt it more when I went to the second Egyptian stage. At least with the lab, it wasn't too bad.
I rather liked the bosses, there were a lot of interesting new ones (though I still like Dawn's originals better) and while weaker sometimes, I like the new versions of classic bosses, such as the Werewolf and Medusa.
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wow many fans of this series :P are more nitpicky than the Naruto fans of the manga. I felt PoR is a game worthy of
the Castlevania name, and enjoyed it more than DoS and AoS combined.
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Now I'll list what I DID appreciate:
- Character switching could be a lot of fun. Some enemies were easier to down with Charolotte's magic, and sometimes you wanted quicker kills with Jonathan's subweapons. At first I was regularly switching but as the game went on and got easier, ... not as much. Still there were definitely times where I ALMOST died. Also it's awesome you can control their attacks at the same time. Having Charolotte in front with her Stone Circle Lv2, and Jon backing her up with the VK and knives was one of my favorite attack/def combos. There's so many ways to experiment.
- Mastering Jonathan's subs became an obsession for me at one point. I'm always for that Elder Scrolls-esque level-as-use system. Even creampie was useful on some enemies. The mastery rings helps a lot. However I was disappointed my favorite weapon, the knife, takes too many hearts/MP.
- There actually was an honest attempt to get some platforming back into the mix. I loved seeing a return of the flip platforms, swinging axes, and falling/rising spiked mechanisms. Too bad these oldschool moments were rare, though.
- With all this content and all these different items, the replay value is actually very big. For instance I started two more saves, where I would just use Charolotte or Jonathan the whole game. It plays pretty different that way since the character's weaknesses are more noticeable and you have to think a little harder.
I will always appreciate IGA's games for replay value at the very least. That's of course if the game is at least decent enough to warrant a replay, and POR is actually no slouch at the end of the day. Could have been a lot better, though.
There's just a lot of unfortunate annoyances along for the ride :(
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Well thanks for all the info peeps, i finally got a grasp
what was wrong with it,. Just a thing though: isn't Charlotte
16yrs old, and Jonathan 18 yrs, and not in their twenties?
so making them, or at least Charlotte making thier banter not surprising?
And lastly if not for gameplay, wat do you peeps think of character development for PoR, if they weren't that talkative towards useless things? cause im my opinion they were great, so much character flaws.
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I also agree with Chibi, the soundtrack was great. And the reason it is so childish is because Iga was having a bad day and decided to direct it towards kids. Just like the kind of day Yamane was having when she composed "Portal to Dark Bravery"! ;D
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I think I can only add that there was little to no immersion.
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My main complaint is that I've basically played the same game before. But other than that, the level design wasn't exactly inspiring. There are definitely some highlights, but since the game is much larger than the previous games in the series, there should've been more dynamic stuff, like being chased by creatures, stopping trains and so on.
(Actually, the train part was very stupid, but it's better than just an empty corridor)
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(Actually, the train part was very stupid, but it's better than just an empty corridor)
LOL. I actually liked the train part. Because it disappears afterwards, so you know it was just a ghost somehow (you know in as much as FF6 had its ghost train). But it took me awhile to figure out the timing to get past it.
I think it set up the mood of the place.
It's really hard for me to find bad things about that level when the song there just kicked so much ass.
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Only thing I can say on the character development/banter: wasn't PoR set losely in Europe/Germany during the first world war in 1944?
1944. That would make it World War 2. But yeah, that's an interesting thing to bring up, because instead of all this useless bantering and lighthearted storytelling, IGA could have really focused on the time period and implied such horrors as the holocaust. I'd say the circus levels were a metaphor on the subject of war, but he wasted so much potential for relating the dead of Dracula's castle to the horrible casualities of that war.
We could have got a deeper meaning, and even a greater connection through the characters.
The manual states the deaths of World War 2 is what summons the castle, but after the opening prologue, this subject is hardly mentioned again in the game.
What a waste.
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I expected some more from that as well, but then again, Bloodlines only referenced WW1 in the prologue and the German munitions factory.
Still, fighting undead grenadiers was better than nothing.
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In Reply To #14
Yeah even Bloodlines had its munitions factory. And I mean that level was really themed around modern war, and, what Hemmingway once called, "mechanized doom."
POR takes place near the end of one of the outright bloodiest wars in history and it all but ignores that.
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But it took me awhile to figure out the timing to get past it.
Same here! I think it took me maybe 5 tries to stop the damn thing. Which is why the wow factor kinda disappeared. Especially when I wasn't really sure if I was supposed to stop the train with my bare hands, or if there was some secret item I needed. But yeah, it's still one of the highlights in the game, and there should've been more stuff like that.
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the best way to stop it was to use an axe special move to avoid it though :o
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Now I'll list what I DID appreciate:
- Character switching could be a lot of fun. Some enemies were easier to down with Charolotte's magic, and sometimes you wanted quicker kills with Jonathan's subweapons. At first I was regularly switching but as the game went on and got easier, ... not as much. Still there were definitely times where I ALMOST died.
You beat it w/out dying? I don't know normally castlevania games are no prob. for me and I hardly ever die, but there were a few spots that gave me probs and I died a few times and the drunk castle layout didn't really help all the save points are all bunched up, I mean c'mon what was the designer smoking?
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The layout of Dracula's Castle actually didn't bother me much in PoR. Sometimes when I play other CVs I don't have the feeling that I'm actually traveling through a Castle. PoR's Castle felt like I was steadily making progress through it.
For some of the portraits, though...bleh. They were good the first time around, and some like Sandy Grave and the Forest of Doom still aren't too bad. Second playthrough, though, it really highlighted much of the faults. Especially those circus levels. Amusing at first, but then it just gets tedious.
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I can agree with much of what has been said. There were many lines of dialogue that kept me thinking of how much I just wanted to smack some sense into those kids. Also, I agree that the 2nd set of paintings could have been MUCH better. They were basically mirrored versions of the others. Definitely could have used more stuff like the train to keep itmore exciting.
I'm wondering if it couldn't hurt to either re-translate or re-write the script? I might give it a try after I finish my current projects.
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I honestly think most of you are being very nit picky but I mean you all have very legitimate points. When I played through PoR which I only have once, I found it to be a breath of fresh air. I mean I love the classic Metroidvania games like Dawn, Aria and Symphony and even Harmony is growing on me a little. I mean the game was silly and very light hearted but for some reason I actually liked the corny dialogue. I mean it could've been a lot better but it was amusing. The artwork didn't look much different than Dawn of Sorrow and I happen to really like Dawn of Sorrow.
The Anime style is controversial but it doesn't bother me cause other than the videos at the beginning, it doesn't really stand out that much to me. I felt PoR was a solid Castlevania game and it was quite fun to play through. The only thing that bothered me was the level design. I mean I just felt like I was seeing the same thing repeatedly throughout the whole game. Another thing was as "big" as the castle is I blew through it in 5 hours at 1000% easily w/o too much trouble. Some of the bosses were harder than usual but once you figured out their pattern you could waste them.
Its not the greatest Castlevania game in the world but I mean people keep saying its "Portrait of Shit" I think its a decent Metroidvania even if its a little Curse of Darkness with the repetitive level designs. Definitely not the most memorable Castlevania game. The soundtrack I thought was awesome, graphics could've been better but weren't awful. Some of the levels were great and the re-playability with all the different modes definitely was an added bonus. If anything it tried to take you outside of the castle in a sense its just too bad that it couldn't have been more Castlevania 2 meets a bit of Castlevania IV.
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I only remember dying a few times while fighting the sisters... or, rather: While trying NOT to fight them but using that spell instead. It was awfully slow and charlotte was interrupted time and time again by some ice magikz :(
Oh yeah, I died one time while fighting the whip's memory right after that. But that was because I wasn't prepared for it really.
Other than that, the game was a breeze. Easier than DoS(Gergoth literally made me fucking cry. Unlike in PoR where I killed him in in 10 seconds.)
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the sisters are piss easy if you want to use the spell.
wait for them to cast the ice wind, run behind them, put charlotte, then run in circles and cause them to turn around in an infinite loop, running behind them as they turn around. they won't recover and the spell will be casted in no time
tl;dr lol pork ai
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its just too bad that it couldn't have been more Castlevania 2 meets a bit of Castlevania IV.
that would be the greatest game ever made, all the castlevania IV action and difficulty with simon's quest's puzzles, god it's giving me an orgasm thinking about it. I love PoR don't get me wrong but the main castle design sucks, and I died alot for some reason. ???
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I liked PoR and thought it was definitely one of the more fun Castlevania games in the Metroidvania genre. The dual character system is a lot of fun too because Johnathan and Charlotte compliment each other well. They're both very useful (Charlotte probably moreso IMO) and I found myself using them both pretty equally once I got the hang of the game.
I think the biggest problem with PoR is the wasted potential. The level design isn't great, the dual character system could have really been made much deeper than it was, and had the art been a little more dark, the story could have been a little more believable.
That said, it was meant to be an action game, so I can forgive the story being slightly lame. After all, LoD and LoI are about the only CV games with a good story that I can see.
There's plenty of replay value as well and there's so much gear you can get than you could conceivably never play the game the same way twice.
As for the remixed portraits, everyone lauds SoTN for the Inverted Castle, and the remixed portraits are a good bit different from the first ones as opposed to the Inverted Castle which is exactly the same thing but upside down, so I don't get why that's a sticking point.
In the end, it doesn't MATTER why people don't like it. It's not like we're all paid reviewers (and even if we were, it STILL wouldn't matter.) If you like it, just enjoy it for what it is rather than picking it apart. It's a solid action game that has some flaws, but it's nowhere near as bad as everyone makes it out to be.
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that would be the greatest game ever made, all the castlevania IV action and difficulty with simon's quest's puzzles, god it's giving me an orgasm thinking about it. I love PoR don't get me wrong but the main castle design sucks, and I died alot for some reason. ???
I know ;D, it would be the greatest thing ever. I have often thought about what it would be like if they combined the best of both worlds into a big large Metroidvania style game. I mean it doesn't necessarily have to be a Metroidvania but it could be a very big Simon's Quest with all the greatness of CVIV (like the Indiana Jones whip swinging to the 8 directional whip). Maybe even put the character switching from CVIII in it just for kicks? A thing that was cool about CVIV was it wasn't all in the castle. A good half of the game was outside of it and it could work just like that. Start in some town, go to an evil church, creepy cemetary, maybe even a haunted mansion and just keep adding levels with bosses and have different paths you can take but its all interconnected. It would be perfect as long as the level design was top notch which would be expected.