Topic: Your very first Castlevania experience

[VGuyver]

mine was not so memorable. It was a freakin Tiger handheld version of Castlevania II: Simons Quest. It was a typical tiger handheld... wait were any of them any different at all in gameplay? Meh, not really. So it was boring and repetitive. Eventualy I got to play the original at a friends house, and later CVII as a xmas present. Overall it was worthwhile to come across the series...I just wish Tiger handhelds never come cross my path again.

[narkolepsi]

Also to note, your posts are wonderfully well written.

*bows* Thank you.

Your experience was pretty interesting as well. DIY Castlevania sounds like a lot of fun...if not a little dangerous!

Yup, I am still looking for Bloodlines...I have a few rare games (Herzog Zwei loose, Streets of Rage 2 boxed) thanks to crawling flea markets. But strangely, no Bloodlines...I am hoping the day will come soon.

[crims0nf0rtune]

My first experience was in 2nd grade.  My brothers bought me a copy of SCVIV for christmas and I instantly fell in love with it.  Interestingly, it was about '01 and they were still selling CVIV and Jurassic Park for snes at Toys 'R Us... and I remember seeing it sold still as late as '02 or '03.

[richterbelmontXX]

The first time I was "bitten" by Castlevania was the original NES cartridge given to me in 1988 with the system by my parents at the Age of 3. I played the hell out of that game everyday and the highest level I achieved was to Stage 5 or Death...however, my most memorable experience was by far Castlevania II: Simon's Quest! Now, at the time Blockbuster Video had just opened up in 1988 and I rented that game like crazy! Maybe in my area at that time when I lived there in 1988 I held a record for most checkouts (through my father of course) and love that game and still do. Now, I know Simon's Quest was too many not the best CV and I respect that, but to this day that game is one of my all time favs of the series! The soundtrack was epic to me, leveling up (as tedious as it may seem) puzzles..everything clicked for me. I ended up eventually playing Drac's Curse at my friends house in elementary school and he then garage sold that copy..ugh looking back for how cheap he did and perfect it was I should have bought the damn thing lol!
I ended up oddly enough skipping SCIV and Dracula X on SNES (On Drac X thank god I did until I played the PC-Engine version and then went back and played my cart for SNES lol) moved onto Bloodlines for Genesis, and the Game Boy CV Adventures. Then, Castlevania and I connected in 1997...Symphony of the Night! I played that game until honestly and recently it could not run anymore, which it cannot! Played the N64 ones, however the Legacy of Darkness slightly saved those versions and I use those terms lightly. GBA ones minus Circle of the Moon were stellar as well as DS and PS2 ones. Hell, even played Judgment on the Wii. 22 years later I am looking forward to Lords of Shadow..pre-ordered mine the first day it was able to be and as a lifelong Castlevania fan I think a reboot was much needed for the series as the "timeline" was becoming too tangled! As much as I hate to admit it, if the movie sucks I will still see it even though the animated one sounds ten times better! That is an experience of almost a life time lol

[Amos]

Hmm, i was 10 or was it 11? Can't recall but it was when i was in middle school. I saw this game for GBA and it featured a guy holding a whip with gray hair and a evil background. At the time my mom didn't care about T rating as long as it wasn't GTA lol. Anyways i bought it for like 20 bucks at some CD store called strawberry's since my mom was buying a CD. I opened the game in the car and started to play in on my see through purple GBA. The opening freaked me out as well as my mom. I entered my name blah blah blah. Saw 3 dudes One old, 2 young. At the time i knew that one of the young dudes would be rivals or something. Then came some pink-red woman and a coffin appeared with bats. I've seen Bram Stoker's Dracula so it gave me the idea it was him. Hugh and Nathan fell down the hole and so began the beef with Hugh and Nathan. My first impression of the game was the music was awsm the DDS system was awsm ( kept killing the earth demon mercury card? and the bone pillar for salamander.) At the time i didn't know about the cards and where they drop from i actually got lucky after killing a few bone pillars. At the time that game was my very first favorite Castlevania game for GBA until i payed AOS which was my second.

My ONLY problem with Castlevania was COTM concerning it's retarded battery life. I was near done with the game (I was at the part where the devil was in this long corridor and he'd use his long range attacks and i had to run fo rmy life lol), and when i saved my data was lost. I panicked and almost cried. It was one of the  first games to have erase on me including pokemon yellow. Sadly as i got older i got another game the same thing happend to me and so i got a action replay to finish it off.

[Munchy]

My first experience was in 2nd grade.  My brothers bought me a copy of SCVIV for christmas and I instantly fell in love with it.  Interestingly, it was about '01 and they were still selling CVIV and Jurassic Park for snes at Toys 'R Us... and I remember seeing it sold still as late as '02 or '03.

Yeah, this was how my dad found Castlevania Bloodlines. Good times.

[Tavis Belmont]

Simon's Quest. Thank the lord for Nintendo Power. I would have never beat that game without it. Hell, I still don't remember what to do in that game. But I have to admit, it is still one of my favorites, mainly because it was so different at the time. That, and whatever you found was yours to keep permanently. After that, Castlevania III and Castlevania IV kept me hooked. Then Symphony of the Night solidified my fandom.

I have to give kudos to people who admit loving the game after its original conception. Fearnavigatr's post in particular really made me smile. I read all too often about people swearing they have always loved a series. It takes a pure sense of honesty to admit you like a game or series after it has a strong following. I was that way with the original Mega Man games and with Viewtiful Joe. Here's to great games!

[Blue Cheese]

mine was not so memorable. It was a freakin Tiger handheld version of Castlevania II: Simons Quest. It was a typical tiger handheld... wait were any of them any different at all in gameplay? Meh, not really. So it was boring and repetitive. Eventualy I got to play the original at a friends house, and later CVII as a xmas present. Overall it was worthwhile to come across the series...I just wish Tiger handhelds never come cross my path again.

HA! Same as mine. I continued to get Tiger games no matter how badly they sucked.

[Luke_Belmont]

I was about five years old when I first played Castlevania. It was Simon's Quest though, I didn't make it very far till I got older.

[Abnormal Freak]

Simon's Quest is the only other Castlevania game besides IV that I played when I was really little. It wasn't until Castlevania for the N64 that I got really crazy into the series. Dunno why, since I'd played Symphony of the Night like a million times since it came out, and I certainly love(d) that game a lot more than CV64. Yet, CV64 is the game that made me decide to play beyond SOTN and CV4.

About Simon's Quest... I barely played it, and I was maybe around five or six at the time. Maybe I was even younger and had actually played it before CV4, I'm not sure. A friend of my brother's had brought it over and I got to watch. Tried playing a bit, but they had gotten rather far in the game, so it was a lot tougher than the beginning and I kept dying at those parts. It was loads of fun, though, just experiencing it, despite all the dying.

Eventually they made it to Dracula, and I thought it was epic beyond all get-out watching Simon walk through those huge gray hallways with that great music playing, and then how freaky and massive Dracula looked (and, again, the great music). Totally blew my mind. BLEW MY MIND!

[Belmont Stakes]

I was but a young lad of 14 back in the day when the first game appeared on my NES. So that makes me pretty old . Anywho I can remember my brother introducing the game to me but I was concerned with finishing Super Mario Bros. (which I did) and low and behold I was the one who first beat Castlevania in cool fashion might I add. However I defeated Simon's Quest first and sadly I admit with too much help .

[DingusBelmondo]

It's funny to think that since cirlce of the moon came out, i've had an obsession of finding out about new castlevania games before they are released. I took a long and lonesome cross country plane flight when i was around 12 and the pictures of aria of sorrow in a game magazine i had bought at the airport kiosk was the only thing to keep me company through the sleepless night.

[Reinhart77]

i went over to my friend down the apartment hallway's place and played the first Castlevania game (don't think the second one was out yet).  don't think i ever got past the second stage back then.  but i remember being intrigued enough about it to draw pictures of the different enemies when i couldn't play.

[Shiroi Koumori]

I'm reviving an old topic since i'm gonna post the same thing and i don't want to create another post with the same topic.

My first experience with the franchise was when i was 1 or 2 years old and my dad was playing the first castlevania on the famicom at night. I was so scared and i didn't play castlevania until symphony, then i was hooked. Oh man, my parents were laughing cause they didn't expect me to love the franchise when i was so scared way back then.

[Flame]

VERY first experience of any kind? I saw Aria of Sorrow at Best Buy back in the day. Art left an impression on me.

Years later, (bout maybe 1 or 2 years ago, maybe 3 now) I played Aria on an Emulator. So Aria was my first CV game. Followeeeeeed I THINK, by maybe Lament. Can't quite remember.