Good Dracula kicking poser Dracula's @$$? Awesome
User Rating: 8.5 | Castlevania: Akatsuki no Minuet GBA
Castlevania:Aria of Sorrow is the final made GBA Castlevania, right after Harmony of Dissonance and Circle of the Moon. Luckily, it is one of the best. Basically, you are Soma Cruz, and you need to solve the mystery in Dracula's Castle. You meet a wide range of characters ranging from a mysterious missionary named Graham Jones and a witch named Yoko Belnades. As you start killing things, you realize two things: 1) Instead of the Belmont whip, you have a wide range of weapons, from a lame hammer to the powerful Claihm Solais. 2) Instead of the usual Belmont spells and abilities, you have an awesome "soul" system. Basically, every monster you fight can give you its soul, and there are three types of souls. The main attack one is obtained by holding up + B and does basic things. For example, a flame demon's sould would shoot fire, and a waiter skeleton's sould would throw food. Next is the "guardian" soul where you hold R down and have something happen, though it drains your magic power. Finally, there is one that acts as a buff and stays until you take it off. For example, one can let you walk on water, while another can increase your strength. There are hundreds of monsters, and in turn hundreds of souls. Unfortunately, some are easier to get than others, but you can still just run into a room, kill it, leave, repeat until the monster dies. The whole gameplay works very well. It abides by the whole explore, kill, kill boss, get item, backtrack, etc. system. Also, the monsters are designed very well and look great, as with the bosses. The lame timeline in Castlevania, as with the other games, means nothing here so you wont be playing Castlevania in space. Overall, this is an excellent game that will lead Castlevania with much confidence onto the DS.
