Topic: DS Castleroids overall better then GBA Castleroids?

[Flame]

I really just dont understand how anyone can find Dawn better than Aria.

I dont just mean plotwise, but even visually, musically, atmospherically, and gameplaywise. Aria just felt more fun to me. The castle in DoS just felt boring and generic. The souls in DoS didnt feel much more fun than in AoS either. And merging the weapon system with the soul system was the worst decision ever, because rather than just hiding the weapon for you to find, or leaving it for hard mode, it forces you to sacrifice souls. Therefore turning the game into a grindfest of epic proportions.  And not only that, but for it's final level up, you must sacrifice a boss soul, of which there are only 1 of. It was stupid.

at least Julius mode was ok. (though Julius felt really watered down, and there was no excuse for that solid black outline)

[kingu]

aria is crunchier and craftier. area structure and enemy placement matters and is appropriate. dawn has some alright bosses, but the game is overall more loose and still falls victim to the copy & paste.

[shelverton.]

Hm. I like DoS because it felt like - dare I say it - Aria 2.0. Or Aria the way it should've been. I TOTALLY realize that I'm probably the only one in these forums with this opinion, but to me it felt more, dunno, polished I guess? Also, I love grinding so that might have something to do with it. And the boss battles in DoS are among my favourites in the entire series.

Now, before you all hate me, understand this: Aria arguably has a much better soundtrack, and story obviously. And it's darker, which I like. And yeah, there are some questionable/lazy level design in DoS, but Aria had that darned Floating Garden thing which didn't sit well with me. Neither did the ballroom or the inner quarters. Many people seem to hate the castle design in DoS but I actually preferred it over Aria.

Make no mistake though - both games are very good IMO. Aria is a 8.5/10 in my book. Dawn however, is a 9/10.

[knightmere]

I like the GBA games better because I enjoy all three of them.  They are unique enough to each have a distinct look and feel.  Cotm has a nice hybrid of metoidmania and classic castlevania.  AoS introduced the tactical soul system and had good mystery vibe going for it.  HoD brought a Belmont back into the lead role and had fast paced gameplay and a cool art style.  PoR and DoS look too similar in style and design and its a very generic design. PoR was the worst offender with the mirrored portraits.  They are not bad games overall but the copy pasted style is very drab.  OoE actually had a much darker style and is my favorite of all six titles.  There is still some repeating rooms and themes but it wasn't as bad as what had been done prior.  Outside of OoE I find myself replaying all 3 GBA games more frequently.

[Flame]

Hm. I like DoS because it felt like - dare I say it - Aria 2.0. Or Aria the way it should've been. I TOTALLY realize that I'm probably the only one in these forums with this opinion, but to me it felt more, dunno, polished I guess? Also, I love grinding so that might have something to do with it. And the boss battles in DoS are among my favourites in the entire series.

Now, before you all hate me, understand this: Aria arguably has a much better soundtrack, and story obviously. And it's darker, which I like. And yeah, there are some questionable/lazy level design in DoS, but Aria had that darned Floating Garden thing which didn't sit well with me. Neither did the ballroom or the inner quarters. Many people seem to hate the castle design in DoS but I actually preferred it over Aria.

Make no mistake though - both games are very good IMO. Aria is a 8.5/10 in my book. Dawn however, is a 9/10.

Dawn had it's moments.
IMO the best stage was the Condemned Tower. the music there was also my favorite track, aside from into the dark night, or whatever that one boss track was called. Gergoth himself was also a real neat boss. and DoS DID bring us one of the best Bloody Tears renditions. But again, while I like certain parts of it, I just dont like all of it as much as I do Aria.

I dont mind grinding, but in DoS I found myself force grinding because I wanted a certain weapon. So it got tedious. Then it asks me to sacrifice a boss soul, and I grumble, because I really like my abaddon soul, or my Gergoth soul.

The clocktower was nice, didnt quite dig the clocktower music though.

Hated the laboratory.

hated the story with a PASSION. Hated the art style, hated Soma's redesign. (which unfortunately, partially carried onto HD.)

I guess I would rate Aria a 10 and Dawn a 8. it's enjoyable, but when I compare it to Aria, it just falls flat for me.

but hey, OPINIONS!

[shelverton.]

Gergoth himself was also a real neat boss.

Yeah, Gergoth is probably my favorite boss in the entire game. I actually died a few times before I got it right, which shocked me considering how the rest of the game is not very challenging at all. The Puppet Master was a pretty cool concept too, though I never had any trouble killing it.

On a similar note, I really liked the Brauner fight in PoR. It had a pretty clever and unique design. Looking back at all the Metroidvanias, there were some great potential in the boss fights, but many of them ultimately fell flat because there were no strategy involved whatsoever. Or maybe I was just ridiculously overleveled (which I always am because of my tendencies to grind like crazy in these kind of games).

[knightmere]

In OoE most of the bosses required real strategy, you couldn't just grind yourself to victory like in many RPGs.

[shelverton.]

In OoE most of the bosses required real strategy, you couldn't just grind yourself to victory like in many RPGs.

Yeah, Ecclesia is the obvious exception here. (Oh, and Circle of the Moon. The Twin Dragon says "hi")
But to be honest I think that the boss battles in Ecclesia weren't as interesting, design-wise, as the ones in Dawn and Portrait. It made up for it by being more challenging though.

[Neobelmont]

Yeah, Ecclesia is the obvious exception here. (Oh, and Circle of the Moon. The Twin Dragon says "hi")
But to be honest I think that the boss battles in Ecclesia weren't as interesting, design-wise, as the ones in Dawn and Portrait. It made up for it by being more challenging though.

These two are perhaps my favorites or at least in the top for mv's. With OOE you had that feeling that no matter how muched you leveled up it did not matter, and Circle was what in my opinion what harmony should of been but better. Circle had a much better system with the dss but it was so hard to obtain some of those cards 

[Little Dracula]

I will go with the GBA games, for me Aria of Sorrow is the best Castlevania game from all those released on GBA and DS and I also have a sweet spot for Circle of the Moon.

[Kamirine]

While I love them all, I'll be honest and say that I prefer the DS games over the GBA titles, even if the GBA titles arguably felt like there was differing variety. DoS for me was an upgraded version of my favorite GBA title, just with more customization and replay value...and I liked the soundtrack better. (The artwork and story...not so much.) I loved the duel system in PoR and had a lot of fun with it: I just wished it would have been a co-op experience. And OoE is my favorite out of all the DS titles (and arguably the GBA titles as well): loved the glyth (SP?) system, the music, what they attempted with the map/exploration, such as the fact that we went to other places than just the castle: the only thing I'd wish they'd done was actually link the places like they do in the castle to make it feel more natural? I suppose. Loved the music, liked the story, LOVED the boss fights...and both PoR and OoE had two of my favorite Dracula fights. (I loved the Death/Dracula collab and someone must have really loved King of Fighters when they made OoE, which is awesome since it's one of my all time favorite fighting games.  )

So yeah: the DS titles for me.

[Darth Cariss]

I'm gonna go have to go with the DS games here. I loved CotM, the music was great, the castle was great, but it did have some drawbacks. The DSS system was annoying for me, having to memorize which cards went well together was a pain. The game also had a couple strange spikes in difficulty at certain points in the game. Still, I look back on the title fondly. HoD was not good for me. This is by far the worst "metroidvania" in my eyes. Minus a couple songs, the music wasn't anything special, the castle had a couple nice areas but it was mostly bland and repetitive to me. Juste seemed too close to Alucard and it kinda bothered me also, and that blue outline... I enjoyed AoS. The music had some nice tracks, it looked nice, and the game was fun to play. I wasn't a huge fan of the story, the japense stuff never really sat right with me, but I liked having guns.

When it comes to the DS games, they just seem superior to me. The music in all of them is awesome, they look good, they play good. DoS is the weakest of the three to me, seeming too much like a rehash of AoS, but I really thought that Julius mode was great. I don't hate PoR like many others seem to, the soundtrack is probably my favorite of the three DS games, and all the different types of level themes made it interesting for me. Also, that has to be my favorite final boss battle in a Castlevania game. Dracula and Death at the same time was a great idea. OoE was great of course, as most people here seem to agree on. The game had everything going for it and it was just a lot of fun to play. Also as a side note, I don't grind to level up or attempt to collect every soul or anything in these games, so that could have an impact on my outlook of them.

[Charlotte-nyo:3]

I'd say there's strengths and weaknesses found throughout them all--many things the GBA games do well, the DS games don't and vice versa. But gameplay-wise (in general), I tend to prefer the GBA ones, which I suppose is what should matter most. There's also some exceptions because it's not totally possible to perfectly generalize all the DS games together or all the GBA ones together: for example, DoS tends to have some aspects of gameplay that still harken back to AoS since it still has an exploration-rich castle, and CotM tends to have some problematic gameplay aspects like the difficulty of getting good card drops and the double-tap run. Meanwhile, the DS games seem to have music I prefer and the graphics are obviously improved. While AoS has one of the strongest stories, OoE has a strong one as well, so that cuts through a generalization. The thing is, I tend to like the gameplay of all of them at such a high level that saying I like one more than the other isn't really a diss at the game I like less.

[Sul_Yong]

With Dawn of Sorrow, grinding was never a problem for me... Soul Eater Ring + Three 7s + Maxed out Ghost Dancer soul (didn't even bother with Dead Warrior) = souls dropping like crazy... I got all the souls, and all the weapons, and if I had to sacrifice boss souls to prevent me getting the Chaos Ring, the story (when you're equipped with Claimh Solais and Valmanway) is able to be beaten in 3 hours, to where you can nab all the boss souls because they're automatic drops... My only problems with Dawn of Sorrow is that the story is mediocre, the souls aren't as good as they were in Aria, and the game is too easy, even on Hard Mode... Tho I am enjoying Julius Mode, as it's a really nice challenge... I don't have a problem with the castle layout... heck, my favorite area of the castle is the Demon Guest House, because there was obviously a lot of thought put into it's rooms... yeah, it's suffers from copy and paste, but with certain enemy placement, every room is different, and looking at the map design, it looks and feels like a little apartment complex within the castle, and it works because that's what it is... as for what I like better, the GBA or the DS games, I feel both are a mixed bag... I haven't gotten around to Portrait or Order yet, but I can't wait to play them because they seem to offer a variety in the gameplay... I didn't really Harmony, as the music and castle design threw me off, I really enjoyed Aria, and right now I'm playing Circle... and my favorite is Circle, just because it offers a fun challenge, and is more challenging than the other metroidvania handhelds...

[Johnny Alucard]

I personally see it like this:

Order of Ecclesia > Aria of Sorrow > Circle of the Moon > Portrait of Ruin > Dawn of Sorrow > Harmony of Dissonance

All worth playing, but some you should dive into first, especially from the GBAvania library.

With Dawn of Sorrow, grinding was never a problem for me... Soul Eater Ring + Three 7s + Maxed out Ghost Dancer soul (didn't even bother with Dead Warrior) = souls dropping like crazy...

Except you had to grind for those things. Three 7s on a lesser level.