Topic: Harmony of Despair (The next Castlevania game?)

[thernz]

Well, that just makes the game sound pathetic. But whatever. I'm still interested in skeleton mode, no matter how menial it seems.

[Kingshango]

Another review
http://www.msxbox-world.com/xbox360/reviews/review/570/Castlevania-Harmony-of-Despair.html

In the end, Harmony of Despair is a paradox. Konami wants Castlevania fans, the gamers who are most likely to enjoy the game to its fullest, to pay for content they've already played. First-time players, on the other hand, will probably enjoy the game less, even though all of the content will be new to them. However, with a price tag of 1200 Microsoft points and the likelihood that future DLC won't be free, first-time Castlevania players would be better suited picking up Symphony of the Night for 800 points instead. Long time Castlevania fans, on the other hand…well, you probably already bought the game on principle (and I wouldn't blame you).

7/10

Annnnd another
http://resolution-magazine.co.uk/content/review-castlevania-harmony-of-despair/

Harmony of Despair may include a single player mode, but it’s quite clearly meant to be a multiplayer-only experience. After playing with other people, going back to the single player is really rather lonely. It feels as though the single player was simply thrown in to give those who don’t play online something to do. Hence, a word of advice – if you don’t play games online, I definitely do not recommend buying this game. You will be frustrated to your very limits and enjoyment will most likely not be on the cards.

If however you’re looking for an interesting title to play with friends, this may well be what you’re looking for. If you can put up with the cheap deaths and somewhat fiddly gameplay, there are six levels to conquer, challenging achievements to unlock and plenty to see and do.

6/10

[affinity]

Well all of those reviews are flawed and they misinterpret many things about the game.   

http://www.strengthgamer.com/Castlevania__HoD.html
Even these positive reviews have some dumb nitpicks about it.   The media as a whole are greatly misunderstanding and underrating this game's greatness. 

Intelligent players will see that the single player being a more difficult challenge breathes new life and purpose to one who wants to conquer bigger and better challenges than they faced in other games that just hold players by the hand and make things too easy. 

for 1200 pts.  Harmony of Despair gives more than quadruple the fun, variety and replay value than SOTN.
Of course playing online with friends greatly boosts its fun and value, but even single player is very valuable for a true Castlevania fan that wants to prove themselves as one of the best who faced one of the most challenging and rewarding Castlevanias in history!

and recommending SOTN just because it costs 400 pts less than Harmony of Despair is ridiculous. After players beat SOTN with Alucard and Richter, most would find almost no reason to play it any further since:
1. they can't play it with friends.
2. there is no harder difficulty setting.
3. just 2 playable characters and 2 castles full of easy, weak and predictable bosses isn't enough these days.
4. all of the secrets and everything about it has been archived for over a decade. 

Harmony of Despair at least has so much new things to learn with the new castles, new challenges,
new secrets, teaming up with groups of friends in the world online for the first time in Castlevania,
great selection of characters all in one game instead of separate games (therefore more characters to use and master with the new rules and enviornments), Dracula and the others bosses have some new surprises,   basically Harmony of Despair would outlast SOTN and any other Castlevania game's fun factor and replay value, especially online.   

People who still are negative about it really are shutting themselves out from a very great experience!

But oh well at least those that understand and appreciate this game will have endless fun with it.   

[RegalX7]

It sounds exactly like what everyone thought it would be. It would be embarrassing if IGA intended this to be his newest and greatest.

Well all of those reviews are flawed and they misinterpret many things about the game.
http://www.strengthgamer.com/Castlevania__HoD.html
Even these positive reviews have some dumb nitpicks about it.   The media as a whole are greatly misunderstanding and underrating this game's greatness.

That is the same exact thing you said about KoF XII. I believed your hype then, like the idiot I was.

[crisis]

In Reply To #827,

Honestly, I trust the reviewers a lot more than your lackluster attempts to excuse this of it's glaring flaws, most of which run prevalent throughout the course of the game. It's like everybody sees it except you.

You'll probably disappear in a few months, though, so you might as well get all the hype out of you now.

[Ahasverus]

It sucked, and it sucked hard. That's it.
Strangely enough, IGn says it's only ofr CV fans, that's a shame, if you are a CV fan, you SHOULD NOT play this game, purchasing it is just encouraging Konami and IGA to tke garbage out to the market.

[affinity]

It sucked, and it sucked hard. That's it.

Saying a new game sucks without playing through the game yourself, is not a true sign of a Castlevania fan, or a positive open minded Castlevania fan for that matter.  That's like calling Simon's Quest trash just because many frustrated reviewers think so.  

It sounds exactly like what everyone thought it would be. It would be embarrassing if IGA intended this to be his newest and greatest.

That is the same exact thing you said about KoF XII. I believed your hype then, like the idiot I was.

No don't bring that up.  Everyone who did their homework knew exactly what KOFXII was going to turn out to be.  Everyone knew it wasn't going to have a boss or story, and the online was tailored for quality connections within Japan (it's GSS, what did people expect?)    Gameplay wise, KOFXII is still very good, but of course it wasn't enough for a lot of people by fighting game standards.  

but relating KOFXII and Harmony of Despair is like comparing soda cans with a full dinner.  

You can't compare the two cases.  Harmony of Despair gives more than what people see, and review copy players already confirm there is no noticable lag online.  

Harmony of Despair will at least have a cult following and really set its mark as the most fun you can share with friends, and most challenging and innovative Castlevania this generation without being less of a Castlevania (like Lords of Shadow is turning out to be. Many fans agree 3-D just doesn't work for true and pure Castlevania gaming, even if you try to make it similiar to God of War, it just ends up being more God of War and Golden Axe than Castlevania.)


There was classic Castlevanias, Metroidvanias, and now we have the first Onlinevania, which will really bring veteran and new fans and really be praised as their favorite Castlevania as more players play it and more is learned and enjoyed from it.  ^_^

Harmony of Despair sets the new standard for Castlevania fun, community, variety, challenges and rewarding replay value.    It really deserves all the love from Castlevania fans especially!   ^_^

[thernz]

So like, affinity, can you at least tell us one thing about the game that's flawed. You might build more credibility that way. I mean, no game's perfect.

[GummiCandyful]

I kind of knew this was going to happen. I mean-why not? And the one thing that I find ironic the most is that, majority of the fans were disappointed when this game was first rumored, and non-CV fans were looking forward to it, yet the reviews state that only a CV fan would enjoy this, and not a non-fan. Wow, the media doesn't know us fans. They think that we'll all get hyped for anything with the Castlevania name on it.

[affinity]

So like, affinity, can you at least tell us one thing about the game that's flawed. You might build more credibility that way.

*Well for one thing, I would of liked a single room-sized camera zoom (not 2 rooms far or 1 1/2 rooms far).  The closest one they have is a little too far for my preference, but I heard there is a 4th zoom option you can set (I heard you can set up to 3 zoom settings and there are 4 settings to choose from: Map, Regular, x2, and there is a x3 zoom I think we have yet to see in action.  Like someone said in another board, it seems x3 is not configured into the camera control system by default, but the 4th option is there, and you can also set the order it zooms.  

*There shouldn't be time penalties, but again with skeleton mode offering infinite respawns, it helps to punish players for getting killed too much.   Sloppy gaming shouldn't be rewarded.  So my rant on that is neutralized.

*It would also be nice to have a no timer option and setting the rule so that skeleton players can't respawn after the first time.  But 30 minutes really is more than enough time, and if that shrinks to 5 minutes because players got killed too often, well then just survive, play better and help each other next time!   But yes even if it's reserved for easy mode, no timer would be nice to have for those that just want to play at their own pace, though I accept that the 30 min. timer does keep things moving forward at a decent pace just like the first Castlevanias that had timers.

*And yes, I agree with some complaints there should have been also a local multiplayer option, that auto-zooms in or out depending how far the other players are.   I think the limit for Xbox360 local play is 4, but it they added local co-op maybe there is some way to have 6 wireless controllers play together locally.   Hmmm maybe in a sequel/expansion.

[RegalX7]

No don't bring that up.  Everyone who did their homework knew exactly what KOFXII was going to turn out to be.  Everyone knew it wasn't going to have a boss or story, and the online was tailored for quality connections within Japan (it's GSS, what did people expect?)

That's not how you felt, and were acting. You kept hyping it as the best fighting game ever, called it a "masterpiece," gave a million excuses as to why any negative thing that was said about it should be written off, and threw out personal insults to anyone who said otherwise... The same stuff you are doing with Harmony of Despair. Once people bought it, and the online complaints started coming, you vanished. It wasn't until this was announced that you resurfaced. Will you once again disappear, once the post-release complaints start coming?

[uzo]

endless bs

Oh can it. You got owned. Deal with it.

[ChibiMaddiChan]

Mulitplayer is online only? No co-op offline? I already wasn't sure about buying it, but this is the deal breaker.

[DingusBelmondo]

Listen, everyone is allowed to have their opinion... just be prepared to defend it... reasonably. Also, maybe don't accuse reviews of being flawed, when you would obviously have been using them to gloat if they had been positive. The last stage of grief after denial is acceptance after all.  

[Ahasverus]

Wahahaha, this is going to be interesting...
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Castlevania-Harmony-of-Despair/133256500038453