Topic: The Lords of Shadow series has come and gone, time to reflect on it.

[machetespeghetti]

Simon watched from afar.

[Dremn]

Alright, time to finally post my final thoughts on this series;

I have a big love/hate relationship with the LoS series. I still don't see LoS1 as a Castlevania game, but it's a damn good action game. If it weren't for Mirror of Fate I probably wouldn't have been so excited for LoS2 because of the inclusion of the old storyline everyone wanted in the first place; Belmonts vs Dracula.

Before LoS even came out I remember all of the incredibly misleading trailers that released making everyone think LoS1 would be Super Castlevania IV in 3D because that game was apparently their "bible" while developing LoS1, and have the traditional Belmont vs Dracula storyline. What made it so exciting though was seeing the series receive a larger budget treatment for once. I still remember the scene with Jason Isaac's talking while the camera panned around Dracula's Castle, which never showed up in the final game. It was a clip from their prototype with Simon Belmont to help pitch the LoS series. Horribly misleading, I remember being so disappointed when it was Carmilla I ended up fighting instead of Dracula. They even included that familiar staircase leading up to the throne room.

In the end the only things LoS1 did that reminded me of SCIV was the moody atmosphere, the whip swinging, and the occasional heavy rearrangements of songs from IV. I was never a fan of how many QTE's it had and how gory some of the deaths were. Not to mention, of course, the glaring similarities it had to God of War. I don't care how much MS will defend the GoW complaints, there were too many things ripped from it down to Gabriel's basic combat animations, balancing on planks of wood, and the health fonts. GoW was their primary influence instead of Super Castlevania IV.

I liked Mirror of Fate for what it was because I expected it to be LoS in 2D, and that's exactly what we got. It has my favorite incarnations of Simon, Trevor, Alucard, and Dracula to date. The character and monster designs are really fantastic, and a welcome shift from how Tolkien inspired LoS1's bestiary was. Not to mention it finally made the series seem like it was about the Belmonts vs Dracula, and not Belmont-Dracula vs Satan.

LoS2 looks like a huge improvement from LoS1 and hopefully one day I'd like to play it. In the end, Mercury Steam did what they hoped to accomplish, so I applaud them for that. As a Castlevania fan, I just want to see Konami leave LoS behind and move onto something new. I'm pretty sure MS wanted the same thing if they had plans to make the original ending to LoS2 incredibly tragic and bittersweet. I can only hope now Konami returns to 2D Castlevania, or creates a reboot that encompasses our original desires for the LoS series before we knew much about it.

...just keep Satan the fuck out of it.

If this comes off as negative, I was going for something more in-between. I enjoyed the ride over the years, but I don't want to see the LoS series become the new face of the franchise. I fell in love with Castlevania because of the gameplay of the 2D games, mainly the ClassicVanias.

LoS's heavy focus on hack and slash and borrowing ideas from other franchises has very little to do with that.

[ChibiMaddiChan]

OSM summed me up perfectly. Bravo to you good sir.

[Kale]

i feel the same way mistressalucard, which is why i called out everyone in the los2 thread that beat the game in record time just by putting the game on easy, and no one had the balls to even admit it & just ignored my posts lol

People play games on Easy? 

Does this game even have difficulty settings? I truly don't know. But if it helps me avoid QTE, I'd say go for it. Though on the PC, at least, there seems to be a tick just for that. MS, thanks, for not lying about it..... and then doing it, again.

[crisis]

hay Kale long time no see 

believe me, i was shocked too, when i noticed people that acquired the game a day or 2 before its official release date, then making posts on how amazing it is, then later that night posting on how theyre at the last boss fight already. lol wtf?

i says to them i says, "how u guys beated this 20+ hour game with almost no effort?" so i deduced that they must have set the difficulty to easy so they would have bragging rights by saying "i just beated the game, ask me anything"

of course no one confirmed or denied doing that. i consider myself a pretty decent (in fact more than decent) gamer as i love action games of this calibur, but not even i would be able to defeat lords of shadow 2 as quickly as these elite gamers, unless i put it on easy

there are indeed difficulty settings in los2, the easiest being called "Twilight Knight" LOL
it goes Twilight Knight>Creature of the Night>Lord of Shadow>Prince of Darkness (prince of darkness being unlocked only after you clear lord of shadow difficulty)

i am playing on Creature of the Night, cuz i know full well that if i started on los then i'll just get my ass kicked repeatedly. i always start games on the "normal" difficulty setting (unless am feeling confident enough to go immediately to hard, but not here)

[thernz]

...just keep Satan the fuck out of it.

no

[crisis]

for me, having Satan in video game form is like showing God in video game form; i'd rather them leave it out & let the players imagination decide how they really look like

but for castlevania purposes, in the future, i kinda like the idea of Dracula usurping Satan for Hell's throne, but at the same time not actually showing him in any way shape or form, just imply it happened in the backstory. thus explaining why Dracula is considered the "ultimate evil" in the castlevania universe

[VEP]

unfortunately it's never gonna get back to the way it was, people need to accept this fact.. those of us that are still clinging to the 90's/early-mid 2000's era of castlevania need to realize that konami arent gonna take steps backward to the way things were. its just the nature of the business....

I guess I am just a KCEK fan for whatever reason and ya those days are done...

I've only played MoF, but I liked it.  Despite the teasers and previews for these games, I never clearly understood that they were essentially an alternate timeline, so I was initially a little miffed.  However, once I realized it wasn't really connected to the other Castlevania games (aside from the title and references to characters and such) I was okay with it.  It may not have been what I wanted it to be, but it was still a well made game that I enjoyed playing.

But I'm beginning to wonder if my feelings may change if/when I play LoS 1 or 2.  It seems like many people here, while ultimately displeased with the trilogy straying from the original timeline, were most forgiving of MoF...which is the only one I've played so far.  Perhaps I'll come post again whenever I play through either of the other titles.

I guess in regards to playing a castlevania not in a particular timeline is part of what I liked about the old castlevanias is that there was a mystery between the titles as at the time technically we weren't completely sure how they were connected. We could only wonder and theorize but perhaps ensuring a timeline made it easier to determine where new games could fit or not...The lack of a conscious effort to ensure complete fitment to a specific linear timeline made different producers of castlevania  less restricted...

So maybe the idea of a new timeline was in the air of trying to return to a less convoluted mess.. as we could make more castlevanias and fit them in

[crisis]

i agree, which is why i say OoE sorta did it right & overall pushed "metroidvania" in the right direction [gameplay wise]; it was ambiguous with the exact year it took place. all of the cv games before it had a specific year, right in the intro they told us what year the game takes place in. ooe however just said "sometime during the 19th century" and thats how cv should do it from now on. let us speculate on when it could take place, so we wont have to worry about the timeline being cluttered with exact dates

[Dremn]

no

p-please

but for castlevania purposes, in the future, i kinda like the idea of Dracula usurping Satan for Hell's throne, but at the same time not actually showing him in any way shape or form, just imply it happened in the backstory. thus explaining why Dracula is considered the "ultimate evil" in the castlevania universe

Now this I would be totally fine with.

[Kale]

hay Kale long time no see 

Sup, didn't think anyone really remember me. Stopped coming by because the place I work/worked at started blocking game sites, this included.

I saw Total Biscuit's video on it, and I'm so glad for the QTE option. I wonder how much that guts the game though. Looking at it though, I'm really liking it too much. But I can't say I really liked the first. I believe my opinions on it was surrounded by complaints about QTEs though.

As for God/Satan, I honestly don't care how they do it, have em in, have em out, not have em, whatever. I prefer the story, presentation... the game/media is unhindered by rules unless the rule is to prevent them being lazy.

[Mike Belmont]

Sup, didn't think anyone really remember me. Stopped coming by because the place I work/worked at started blocking game sites, this included.

He, I think I remember you, too . By the way, have you tried to install a virtual machine in your work PC, if is permited? Is the way I follow. Windows 7 have one, and works really good. My PC filter block games sites, too, but in the virtual machine, I can see it . You could try this, if you wish .

[Morning star]

When they get back to making real Castlevania games somebody please wake me up and let me know alright? That's my opinion...

[zangetsu468]

My honest opinion:

LOS1 was a good action/platformer/combat game and I was particularly impressed with the combat system. It wasn't traditional Classicvania in 3d but it was close, and a very good game in its own rite. The main character? Brilliant, the closest we've had to Simon Belmont sporting his red tunic in CV II. The context was interesting but not original, and the story... that's really where the game fell short for me, but I didn't care because the good points outweighed that. I believe LOS still respected the original CV series mostly, but I don't buy the 'dark fairytale' aspect, should've been Transylvanian-medieval-gothic.

MOF... Average game... Gameplay was good but I expected more out of the game because it was LOS in Classic style.
Gabriel and Trevor = Great. However, I think the most disappointing aspect was that it disrespected Alucard and Simon, who were characters I really liked. There was no reason for Alucard to be called 'Alucard', it was still Trevor, MS just ripped that from the old series.. (Why couldn't he just be 'Trevor'?) The story cutscenes were irrelevant and the memento style gameplay did nothing for the game because there was no twist or story (aside from how Trevor became Alucard) for that matter - it was just using the most famous Belmonts to try and sell to oldschool fans. (The same wasy LOS did with the title, but at least the main Character was a new Belmont) .. The puzzles were terrible and the camera/ framerate was jittery. It felt like the same track was playing over and over. Added to the checkpoints in boss battles and the game was far too easy even on hard mode. and what was with the barriers appearing in battles? It meant you had to fight, but it also meant you could only fight a few enemies at a time, why not be able to be rushed by 10-20 enemies at once? Remember SOTN where you could blitz the inverted library or clock tower and get pack raped by hoardes of enemies?? Could the 3ds just not handle this? Environments were drab and uninspired.. No extremely hard mode (akin to Lvl 1 max hard cap) The Bad points definitely outweighed the good here.

LOS2 looks amazing to me, almost like a sort of 3d open world (SOTNish) CV, which many fans have been waiting on for a long time. Battle system looks innovated upon from the first game, the concept of the Castle rejecting its master seems interesting. It has me intrigued, but I won't have time to play it for the next month or so.

[Viskod]

I thought the series was a much needed breath of fresh air for the franchise and I love Lords of Shadow 1 dearly. It is a fun game, with beautiful settings, and good combat. I didn't pick up Mirror of Fate until the HD rerelease, but I enjoyed it as well. But not nearly to the extent that I've enjoyed any of the other 2D Castlevanias, I was basically playing Mirror of Fate for the story and didn't take the time to go back and 100% it after I was done, and then just youtubed the extra ending scene.

Also, Trevor calls himself Alucard for the exact same reason that Adrian calls himself Alucard and because the son of Dracula being called Alucard goes back to the 1943 film, Son of Dracula.

I am enjoying Lords of Shadow 2 very much so far. Everything seems improved over the first game except for the wide variety of settings, but this game takes place in one area and not all across the countryside on a long journey. The combat is much, much improved and I love the robust move list for the Void Sword and the Chaos Claws. The counter attack from jumping over enemies seems to work much better in this, and is a great way to get some hits in on blocking enemies when you don't have magic to burn on a shield breaker that works for the things that the sustained direct combo does not.

I really like this story as well, and how it brings up the fact that Draculas castle exists from his will, and makes me wonder if Dracula really wanted to and was at full strength if he could raise his castle from underneath this modern city and wipe it out in the process. I think that would have been a fun thing to explore for the final act of the game.

While I haven't beaten the second game yet, I believe I'm just past the midway point and I haven't had any problems with it so far story wise. So unless it goes pants on head stupid at the last minute I'm probably going to like this game just as much as the first.