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Akumajou Dracula Special: Boku Dracula-kun (1991)
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Platform: Nintendo Famicom
Stages: 6
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Japanese Version
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Kid Dracula is not technically a Castlevania game, put you can defintely see the relation. Kid Dracula is to Castlevania as Parodius is to Gradius. It pokes fun at the series, while still making a fairly good game.
The story goes something like this: Kid Dracula, the self-proclaimed Demon King has awoken from some long sleep, only discover that the dinosaur Galamoth has challenged him (note that Galamoth makes an appearance in Symphony of the Night.) Swiping his father's cape, it's up to Kid Drac to venture throughout the world to destroy this monster.
The game play a lot more like Mega Man than any Castlevania game, although the first level is filled with references to Castlevania 3, like the spiked ceilings and pendulums. The music is an upbeat remix of "Beginning", the first level theme, and there's even a small staircase up to Dracula's room where you fight the ghost family. The rest of the game sends our protagonist through the clouds, underwater, through the city subway system, out to ancient Egypt and finally to outer space.
Although you start off with only a normal fireball attack, each level will grant you some new ability, like a bat-boomerang or the ability to fly. Destroying enemies with powerful attacks will yield coins, which you can then use in a variety of wacky game-show style bonus games, including one where you must guess the panty color of some cabaret dancers. Even more bizarre later one is when you attend a quiz hosted by the Statue of Liberty - lose and you DIE. Silly indeed.
The game, with its brightly colored graphics, is aimed a little bit more towards children, but the difficulty ramps up to near maddening proportions by the end of the game, as is typical for any NES-era Konami game. However, there's a password system, which does make the game fairly short - providing that you're vaguely proficient in Japanese, anyway.
For some reason, the Gameboy version was translated and released in America, although this one stayed exclusively in Japan. It's unfortunate, as it's a fun little game.
Boku Dracula-kun Artwork
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Castlevania Games - Akumajou Dracula Special: Boku Dracula-kun
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