Topic: Lords of Shadow Opinions (has Spoilers)

[The Silverlord]

Sat last night and went through the artwork section of the game.  I honestly do not think I've played a game with more dark and beautiful concept artwork.  There’s more than a whiff of fantasy, but it’s often bleak and haunting, fantastic, or raw and exposed, cold and vivid.  It truly feels like autumn into winter.  I’d say this is the best artwork ever seen in a Castlevania game.  It may not always seem to be Castlevania in essence, and you could argue the likes of Symphony or Castlevania IV did more with much less to inspire better atmosphere, but you cannot take anything away from the quality.

Mercurysteam need to keep those guys and gals, at all costs.

[Kale]

CoD's Dracula's Castle was the test to see if you were really stupid enough to play through it despite how horrible you knew it was.

The castle might've sucked but the Dracula fight was good imo.

[corneliab]

The first form was cool, but the second form felt... like a big uninspired copout.

Music also got way worse during that second phase.

[Thunderbrand]

The castle might've sucked but the Dracula fight was good imo.

The Drac fight was pretty good but the castle itself just didn't seem right to me. From the way it appeared, to the physical structure itself (it was more cathedral than castle-like), to the goofy winding stairs to the keep, etc. It was just "off." The Abandoned Castle level at the beginning of CoD had a better design, layout, and atmosphere IMHO.

[Kale]

The Drac fight was pretty good but the castle itself just didn't seem right to me. From the way it appeared, to the physical structure itself (it was more cathedral than castle-like), to the goofy winding stairs to the keep, etc. It was just "off." The Abandoned Castle level at the beginning of CoD had a better design, layout, and atmosphere IMHO.

I agree completely. That was the one place I absolutely hated because of it's design.

[PFG9000]

I don't really know where else to post this, so I'm throwing it here.  I finished Lords of Shadow about two weeks ago, but I haven't had much time to digest the experience or post about it here.

Overall, I think it's a really awesome game.  It's one of the best games I've played this console generation, and it's nearly pretty enough to rival Uncharted 2 and God of War 3.  When you consider the budget for each game, that's an impressive feat.  There's a ton of depth to the gameplay.  It's obvious at every point of the game that tons of thought was poured into the tiniest details (except maybe for the repeating, random soundtrack, which was pretty good but could have used about three times as many tracks, and more tracks tailored to fit specific areas).  When you make a 3D fantasy action/adventure these days, it's hard to make it not feel like a God of War clone, and I think Mercury Steam did their own thing quite well.  I like the format, with the quest broken down into chapters and levels, and small hidden areas within each level, and the ability to go back into individual areas from earlier in the game.  There's some real promise shown here.

But it's not a very good Castlevania.  I understand it's a reboot, and I acknowledge the cutscene at the end.  But this game has so little to do with Castlevania, I had that "It has to get more CV pretty soon here" feeling throughout most of the game, and as the end got closer and it still felt like something completely foreign, I just felt more and more disappointed.  I get that Gabriel becomes Dracula, but when you play through the whole game and Dracula has absolutely nothing to do with it until the last seconds of a 20-hr experience, how can you call that Castlevania?  Why were the only musical references a liberally remixed CV4 Waterfall theme and a Vampire Killer remix?  Why were so many of the environments completely un-CVish?  And worst of all, why does a game called CASTLEvania have so little to do with a Castle?  (Yup, CV2 and CoD and others were mostly outside the castle, but they had so many more things to tie them into the series.)

As I was playing through LoS, I kept reminding myself that SotN was a drastic change for the series, but it was still a good change, so I should keep thinking positively.  And while SotN introduced a lot of new things and threw a lot of CV staples out the window, it still existed within the same universe as the previous installments, it featured familiar characters and locations, and it was even a direct sequel to a classic CV!  (Yes, one that was unknown to Western fans at the time of release, but still...)  Lords of Shadow doesn't have any of that.  The only thing it has in common with Castlevania as we knew it is the whip, and it even changed that.  I don't have a problem with rebooting the series, but if you change it so much that it's not the same series anymore, what's the point?

I really hope the next game is more of a typical Castlevania, and if it is, I will probably understand the drastic differences this game has, as they will all have been meant to set up a fresh start for the series.  But this game is so far removed from everything that CV has ever been, that if it isn't meant to set up more games that are classic CV, Belmont-enters-castle-to-take-down-Dracula kind of stuff, then I think it's very likely that I'll lose interest in any new games in the series.

[crisis]

I agree PFG9000, you make some very logical points. Unfortunately I believe MercurySteam won't do too much to make the next game cater to our tastes & make it "more Castlevania;" they got their formula down & they're gonna stick to it. But alas, there's still the possibility that Konami will continue to make handheld titles, with the 3DS & PSP2 around the corner. With those atleast we can expect a more traditional Castlevania experience.

[Wallachia]

Haha, awesome, PFG. I was actually thinking about you after I beat it, wondering if you played it, and your thoughts. I liked your feedback. I agree with most of it, except that I got a bit more CV feel out of it, then some of you guys. Not sure why. The great thing you bring up, is how they bring up Dracula out of the blue, at the end of this very long story. Kind of shoed in. BUT, maybe it is to just tease us, and they have a smart, logical story planned out for the next game. But still, yes, strange..

Crisis - I wonder about that, too, how much they will cater on the next game, to CV. I think they might even leverage it MORE. Since they know they will make money on the new franchise, and that David Cox is a passionate fan, he will keep CV prevalent, hopefully more. And we saw Slogra in the preview at the ending of LoS. You know there are tons more CV enemies, characters, bosses left to put in the next game. They better do it. And I want a PROPER Death/Grim Reaper! CV IV style!!

[Alutwon]

@PFG9000

It has the two most important things it needs imo; dark and beautiful atmosphere and the name lol. It could have been more along the lines of the same stuff we've had for the past 10 years sure, but do we really want another CoD? It is missing however, that certain energy the earlier games had but it works for it I think because the game is so calm and moody. Castlevania's traditions are what I both love and despise about it unfortunately. But yes they could have kept hearts and candles and some music for crying out loud. Biggest unforgivable beef is hearing waterfalls of Agharta in the castle entrance....*grumble *cranks Vampire Killer remix

[thernz]

What traditions do you love and despise specifically?

[Alutwon]

What traditions do you love and despise specifically?

I think you misunderstood what I meant because I didn't specify I was referring to Iga's games. I love that the series is consistent with the little things such as hearts, sub weapons and the music but other traditions like (referring to Iga's games of course) the attack system (the soul system was great initially but has lost its charm after 4 games) and the emphasis on exploration over difficulty (I love the exploration which is why I love metroid too. CV tho, unlike metroid, needs to be more difficult) are over due for change. The old games never suffered from this because they played like a tightly wound clock relying on the players precision and memory and because of this each one only needed to change levels, bosses and aesthetics, not the attack system or strategy involved to maintain a sense of freshness. Iga's games are easy and all of his protagonists are OP which contributes to the problem. If your going to give us the same easy gameplay with each new release at least have different attack systems to keep it interesting. Basically metroidvanias are in a constant state of "almost there", they are all great and I like them for what they are but there is just that feeling I have that with a little more effort and vision and the next one could be perfect.

[Ahasverus]

Don't you dare to call me that say a little bad thing about IGA or you will be flagged as a "Castlevania hater" around here by the "Castlevania Lovers" who really hate how LOS strayed away from Castlevania lol

[thernz]

You are such a Castlevania agnostic. I just thought it was an oddly structured sentence to say he love-hated traditions, so I asked him to clear it up because I misunderstood lol.

I can see why someone would prefer action over exploration in this instance. The IGA games have become increasingly shallow in their exploration elements. I mean with Order of Ecclesia it was better because of the heightened emphasis on action made you know that exploration wasn't a priority. In the other games, it was like, so, what's happening lol

[darkwzrd4]

I've never played the game, but I did watch a series of youtube videos that was a guy playing through the entire game on warrior mode.  That being said, I loved the environments, the puzzles, and the combat system.  But, I thought that there was way too much platforming.  In my opinion, you spend most of the game hanging from ledges and jumping over gaps that would lead to you instant death if you don't make it.  I say they should have removed the "castlevania" from the title and simply called it Lords of Shadow.  Also, they shouldn't have included so much platforming.

The story was great.  If there wasn't so much platforming (something I've always sucked at) I buy the game and play through it.

[Ahasverus]

But, I thought that there was way too much platforming

lol seriously? LoS is bad because:
- it has no platfforming
- it has too much platfforming
- Too GOWish
- Too SOTCish
- Too old-castlevania-ish
- Great voice acting
- bad voice acting
- No Dracula
- Dracula
- Ending was too good and ecipsed the whole game
- Ending was trash and ruined the whole game
- Necromancer's abyss is awesome
- Necromancer's abyss is bad designed
- Marie is not sexy
- Carmilla is too sexy

,,,
And a long list.
People is weird, it's not taht opinions are weird, but does this game have to be too divisive?