This is the best Castlevania outing following Symphony of the Night and also one of the best games in the GBA library.
The game offers a lot of fan service by introducing the main character Juste Belmont, the grandson of gaming icon Simon Belmont. Like his grandfather, Juste is equipped with the Vampire Killer, a whip passed down through the family with the purpose of slaying Dracula. Juste is on a mission with his friend Maxim to find their lost friend Lydie in what could be Dracula's Castle. Like other Castlevania titles, the story of the game isn't on the side of being deep and engaging, but it does have some nods to past Castlevania games that will make you crack a smile wile experiencing them. Another ode to Simon Belmont is finding parts of Dracula Throughout the Castle like in Simons Quest for the NES. This Castlevania game also flows like all the other ones in terms of story. Some might say this is a bad thing and might make the sires stale and repetitive, but the story of the game is barely a diversion to what the design and gameplay offer.
The gameplay in Harmony of Dissonance is a great and vast improvement over was played in "Circle of the Moon". Gone is the need to double tap the D-pad to make your character to run at a reasonable speed and to do lengthy jumps. The controls for Juste feel super tight and never come to a point were it feels like a boring grind to control him. The magic system is also streamlined really well. Juste collects spell books that contain the powers of fire, lightening, and so forth to combine with the sub weapon that Juste has equipped. Not only is it easier to use the magic, but also the spells that Juste has are the fun spells that Richter Belmont had in "Rondo of Blood" and "Symphony of the Night" like the Holy Storm. Another great and welcome addition to the gameplay over "Circle of the Moon" is the dashing command being added to both shoulder buttons. The direction you press on the shoulder buttons (either right or left) is the direction that Juste will dash in. This is a great addition to any who find the best ways to speed run through their games. There are many skills to gain throughout the adventure to enhance your mobility to make you jump higher or slide under narrow places and all of these commands control very well.
The level designs for the most part are what you would expect from this genre of Castlevania games and also with some cool touches here and there. One design aspect that seems to take it's influence from Zelda: A Link to the Past is the idea of going between a dimensions of a light castle and dark castle, or in this case a caste A and castle B. Juste switches between the two dimensions of the castle which have closely identical geography, but different enemies and barriers strewed throughout the map. Another slight change that was made to the level design is that almost all the areas have the thin confined with few large chasms to experiment with the high jump. This might seem off-putting to the fans of "Symphony of the Night", but the secrets in this game are still cleverly designed and are a lot less shallow than in "Circle of the Moon".
The art direction in this game is fantastic and pleasing to any fan of 2-Demensional side scrollers. Ayami Kojima takes the helm of character design again after the beautiful work she did on Symphony of the Night and the presence of her art on the package really gives this game the big console game feel. The sprite design is great and has more frames of animation in Juste than Nathan did in "Circle of the Moon". The brighter colors that are used in the color palate of the castle also make the environments more vibrant and easier to navigate through, especially if this game is played on the original, non-backlit GBA. One criticism that could be leveled against the graphics of this title is that the sprites of some of the enemies look like they were down-rezed into the game strait out of "Symphony of the Night". Yet this is another touch to give it the same legitimacy as it's console big brother. The graphics of the game just have that polished quality that make the game look like 16bit plus game. I wish I could say the same for the sound and music of the game. When traveling through the halls of Dracula's castle you can hear some good compositions of songs but outputted in a terrible 8-bit sounding quality. Hearing this only makes one think of the great potential that the game's soundtrack could have had. The sounds are fine with some recorded human voices and a great sound for Juste's death that sounds much less wimpy than Nathan's in the previous game. Yet this doesn't make up for the music quality.
Even with the terribly executed music in this title, all the elements of design aside from this are top notch. This game proves through and through that the design of a big console game like Symphony can be brought into the handheld realm much better than its predecessor did. This title should not be one forgotten in the grand GBA library.
Gamplay: 10
Graphics: 10
Sound: 6
Tilt: 9
Value: 10
Score: 9.0