The 1st castlevania on PS2 and the best Castlevania game in 3D.
Everyone that has interesting in the videogames history knows very well the name "Castlevania" and certainly knows what castlevania is about, even if you don't care videogames history you probably know that Castlevania its a great long running franchise. For quite some time when a new Castlevania was released we knew what to expect from it (except for castlevania 2 - belmonts quest), a good dose of 2D action adventure game and later with the addition of some RPG elements.
With the Nintendo 64, two castlevania games were release, and this time in 3D, while in the PS1 and gameboy advance the castlevania franchise continued its 2D great legacy, the PS1 title "Castlevania - Symphony of the night" was also recognized to be the greatest castlevania game ever.
The 3D games for the N64 were not a success and they were not great games like their 2D brothers.
Now the franchise comes to the PS2, and this time in 3D again.
Graphics:
The game starts with a good presentation, you walk just a few steps and you'll meet a wise alchemist that will be usefull to you during the whole game, when you meet him the is a long cutsceen explaining some basics of the game history (wich is not a complex one).
The overall graphics look pretty good so far. When you enter in dracula's castle (what else could it be?), the graphics look pretty good and better than the previous environments (probably because you spend 95% of the game inside the castle), unfortunetly after a couple of hours playing you'll notice that the levels are kind of repetitive with only slight diferences between the 5 main areas of the game(it can't be called levels, better say rooms or something like that).
Despite of this the overall graphics in the game look pretty good, enemies are well design with nice art direction and you'll face a lot of monsters, some new and some you already know from previous castlevania games.
8.
Gameplay:
Your weapon its a whip!!! (this is something really new to the castlevania franchise...). All the old movements are there and new moves were added, more flashy moves gives the game a more stylish sense, the gameplay its fastpaced (not like a devil may cry) with good exploration sense.
Thank god the camera its not a problem in lament of innocence, many games of this kind suffer from bad camera that trully afects gameplay, castlevania its not one of this thanks to someone.
Because of the lack of RPG elements Lament of innocence falls a bit short in innovation, some RPG elements would have helped the gameplay a lot, Lament of innocence lacks in innovation but has good graphics, the gameboy advance titles and symphony of the night are more innovative but lack the 3D graphics (I think 2D castlevanias are great even with the 2D graphics).
7
Sound:
Lament of innocence looks good, but sounds even better, the great soundtracks are gorgeous, they fit the game like a glove and the effects from the weapons, monsters etc sound really good.
The great soundtracks in the game helps the game a lot so it can maintain and even raise the greatness of the gothic atmosphere that the game offers.
9.
Value:
Lament of innocence its a very simple game. You go into some areas, slay some skeletons, ghouls, ghosts etc... to get to your final objective, there are 5 main areas you need to go before you enter the final area. The game its also as short as simple, you finish the game in just around 6 - 7 hours of play. The game still have some replay value due to its secrets in the castle that people will want to check out.
The is also another character to play and a crazy dificult mode to entertain people a bit longer.
Its a short game with not much replay value, some extras would have definetly helped this castlevania out.
6.
Overall:
This new 3D castlevania its a good game, unfortunetly it could have been better (this happens to a lot of games), anyway this shows the would that a 3D castlevania can be a good game and a good castlevania, since the 3D castlevanias for the N64 people didn't believe in this.
All the fans of the series that didn't know if they should buy this game, just buy, its also a good game for people that like the genre and are sick of devil may cry, god of war or prince of persia franchises.
8.