Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (PS4, XB1, PC) Review

After a fully funded Kickstarter and years of development and developmental updates, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is finally out as of last week. Nintendo Switch owners had to wait until this week to get their hands on the game. That said, this review only focuses on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC builds of the game. Here's the SuperPhillip Central review of Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.

Offer tribute to this marvelous Metroidvania

Kickstarters with famous video game names and personalities attached to them have decidedly not had the greatest level of successes. The most obvious example of this would be Keiji Inafune of Mega Man fame and Mighty No. 9, which turned out to be one nightmare of a game. Then, there was Yooka-Laylee, which fared better critically, but also did not come near the glory of the game it was modeled after: Banjo-Kazooie.

Now, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night comes from Koji Igarashi, the mind behind Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and other games cut from that cloth. These Castlevania games are so beloved that a moniker was named after Igarashi, the "Igavania" games. Obviously modeled after Igarashi's previous works and meant to serve as an ode to the genre, does Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night prove that the third time is indeed the charm with Kickstarter games?

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night makes no attempt to hide its Castlevania: Symphony of the Night gameplay influences, as that's what fans really wanted out of the project to begin with, but at the same time, there's enough freshness here to make for a game that has plenty of surprises in store for players.

If you've played any type of Metroidvania, then you know what to expect. You have an expansive interconnected world to explore that is separated by individual areas, and the keys to progression are new abilities earned from defeated bosses and through other means. Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a bit unique in that it's more open than past Igavanias, allowing players a bit more freedom in which areas they choose to explore and when. Yes, many paths are gated off and deemed inaccessible until you acquire the right ability to pass them, but when my brother and I played our own save files, we saw ourselves venturing to alternate areas and completing some of them in a different order. That said, this less rigid structure also leads to some situations where you can be completely in the dark about where to go next and how to proceed. It's a common thing in Metroidvania games, but it's especially noticeable in this particular game.

These foes may think they have an advantage on Miriam, but the odds are actually stacked against THEM.

Like Symphony of the Night, our heroine Miriam can slay enemies and, with enough luck, earn their abilities through shards. Each shard comes in one of five types and can be equipped in a menu. Some allow Miriam offensive skills like the ability to launch a flurry of arrows at enemies, while others are passive, granting Miriam more luck, giving a higher probability of rarer item drops. Furthermore, shard abilities can be enhanced within the game, as well as have them magnified by collecting more of the same shard--up to nine.

There is a great variety of shards to earn, and some shards have rare drop rates, meaning you'll have to enter and exit rooms to respawn a foe with the desired shard you want until they finally give you it. This is also how item drops work with the game's sizable collection of items, materials, weapons, armor, headgear, accessories, and more. Some foes can be quite stingy in dropping the rarer items, some of which have a very low percentage chance of parting with them, but with enough persistence (and some luck-enhancing abilities), they'll eventually drop the shard or item you're looking for.

While you won't have to grind too much for this Morte Bone's shard,
 other foes will prove to be far less willing to let Miriam have their abilities.

A friendly character in the game will allow you to synthesize said items to form new crafted goods of all varieties--enhance and upgrade equipment and all that good stuff. Once you create a given item, it is able to be purchased freely in a nearby shop. Though tracking down the necessary materials for an item you're wanting can be a trite overwhelming, as there are a ton of enemies that drop different materials at varying drop rates. It can be challenging to remember which enemy drops what, but there is some help with the in-game catalog of items and bestiary of foes.

That said, what isn't so helpful is the actual map of Bloodstained, which should be an adventurer's most helpful tool for navigating around the game world. It currently lacks any sort of map legend, so without the assistance and knowledge of the Internet I had no clue what the various symbols on the map meant. Each individual area on the map is hard to distinguish at a glance, making it so areas on the map blend in together. A simple recoloring, making it so each unique area is a specific color, would make a world of difference in reading the map in an optimal way.

While deciphering the in-game map isn't the best, the sheer wealth of ways Miriam can dish out damage to demons, devils, the undead, and any other horrors that stand in her way certainly is. She's more than happy to oblige in her enemies' collective death wish. To do this, she has an arsenal of weapons she can utilize--boots, swords, daggers, spears, whips, staffs, greatswords, axes, firearms, and much more--as well as her aforementioned shard abilities, the latter use magic points (or MP) that slowly replenish when not in use. Bookcases found around the massive platforming playground of Ritual of the Night bestow new weapon techniques that can unleash powerful attacks on foes with specific controller inputs, many similar to a fighting game. All of these options bring a multitude of methods and manners for Miriam to mercilessly massacre foes. Although some of these can be gamed to make Ritual of the Night a less-than-challenging adventure overall.

Miriam has a slew of weapons she can acquire. One might call this one a killer of vampires. Maybe.

With all of the shards and equipment you have to switch through in Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, it means you're constantly entering and exiting menus to switch up your current loadout. While there are shortcuts to save your favorite shard and equipment builds to, any time you earn better equipment, you have to also replace each build mapped to each shortcut for the changes to stick. This isn't the most time-consuming process at first, but it slowly and steadily adds up over the course of the game, especially as you earn better and better equipment.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a tremendous Metroidvania game, and it's a promise fulfilled as a quality game in the same vein as the director's Castlevania works. However, I can't call it a particularly outstanding game without mentioning the problematic technical issues that the game is riddled with--some being more obnoxious than others. For one, there is some noticeable severe instances of the frame-rate hitching when attacking enemies on occasions. It doesn't happen especially often, but it's there more than I like. Worse than the hitching is the immense slowdown in specific areas of the game, most evident in a late-game boss fight. Finally, and this is the most frustrating of all--the game has crashed on me on the PlayStation 4 version twice, losing valuable progress in the process.

'Tis but a flesh wound?

Furthermore, the presentation of Ritual of the Night doesn't hit all of the high notes with this particular symphony. While the art design is delightful with wonderfully done and designed architecture, areas can come across as utterly garish. One specific area near the bottom of the map has bloom overload, and it's simply an eyesore. Fortunately, the sound side of Bloodstained fares much better with the splendid and masterful musical works of longtime Castlevania composer Michiru Yamane as well some rather good voice acting to spice up the presentation and special story beats.

My, what big teeth... and tongue... and everything else you twin dragons have!

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is possibly my favorite of Koji Igarashi's Metroidvania games, and it would be my absolute favorite for sure if it wasn't marred by its current technical issues and lack of polish. The gameplay and level design are top tier, the boss fights are exciting and entertaining, and the level of challenge in the game is certainly there. I've never been so engrossed with a game in this style in a long time, and even with its many technical faults, I'm still in love with Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night. It's a Kickstarter-funded game with a notable personality behind it done right, and it's about damn time.

[SPC Says: B+]

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (NSW, PS4, XB1, PC, 3DS, Vita) Review

Wednesday night at SuperPhillip Central sees us coming down with a curse! But thankfully for us, this is the good kind of curse, an excellent game from Koji Igarashi of Castlevania's Metroidvania entries, and Inti Creates of Mega Man Zero and Azure Striker Gunvolt fame. When these two creators collide, what we get is an excellent homage to Konami's classic franchise with Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. Here's my review.

What a wonderful night to have a curse

Koji Igarashi's Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, a spiritual successor to his directed Castlevania games, successfully saw itself reach its funding goal on Kickstarter. One of the sub-goals for the game was an 8-bit prelude to Ritual of the Night that would play like the classic NES Castlevania games--whereas Ritual will be in the Metroidvania style. This game, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, has since launched on all major platforms, and while it comes off a greatly more than just an homage, fans of retro gaming and old school difficulty alike will find something to love about it.

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon finds the main character, Zangetsu, cursed by a demon. In a tried and true formula, he sets out to strike down the demon which bestowed the curse to him. Along the way, he quickly gathers three other comrades, each with different abilities to assist in getting through the game's eight levels.

It might not be the Vampire Killer, but Zangetsu still whips it, whips it good.

Zangetsu is the standard, all-around character with great attack strength and sizable enough health. Meanwhile, the other trio of characters each possess something unique to serve their uses. For instance, Miriam has a long whip that can easily cut through foes several spaces ahead of her. Her ability to perform a high jump means she can access areas that Zangetsu cannot. She also has a slide move to get through tight spaces. Then, there's the magician Alfred who is limited in his abilities due to low health and a lack of melee moves allowed to him, but his spells deal plenty of damage. Finally, there is Gebel, who might as well be Alucard. He slings bats at enemies to attack them, and can even turn into a furry, flying rodent himself to cross over gaps. Of the four characters, he's the only one who cannot gain access to or change special attacks.

Alucard--I mean--Gebel unleashes bats from inside his cape to take down enemies.

The levels of Curse of the Moon take place in all kinds of interesting places--from a rain-drenched ghost ship to a sand-showered pyramid. These are linear affairs, but the replay value is beefed up through the notion of alternate paths, which there are plenty of in each level. Most can only be accessed by one of the character's unique abilities, and some paths are harder or easier than others. Occasionally, having a certain character for a path is mandatory if you wish to reach areas otherwise inaccessible to the other characters, usually housing goodies in them like health, magic, or defense upgrade.

Without Miriam and her ability to slide, this magic upgrade would remain untouched.

Character management is important, too, as once a character loses all of their health, falls down a pit, or otherwise perishes, they're unavailable to you until the next level or when you lose every other character--whichever comes first. Thankfully, you can switch between characters on the fly with the shoulder buttons, so if one character is low on health, you can swap them out for another whose meter is better filled.

Each level concludes with an engaging and enjoyable boss battle that pits your team of demon-slayers against a powerful foe, where pattern-memorization, careful planning, adept dodging, and precise timing are all key to survive and escape with your life towards the next level. Most bosses employ some sort of desperation move after their health has emptied, using their last breath to try to take you out with them. While most of these attacks are thankfully not one-hit death deals, it can be a little unfair to not know what kind of health-deteriorating attack a boss is going to hit you with, sometimes resulting in you dying at the very conclusion of battle only because you couldn't have possibly foreseen what was coming. A small gripe, but a gripe all the same.

The first boss is one feisty furnace that Zangetsu is about to send to the repairman.

Curse of the Moon doesn't quite reach "NES Hard" levels like the classic Castlevania games, but it is challenging nevertheless. You can make the game as hard or as easy as you'd like by virtue of two main difficulties. There is Veteran, the standard difficulty that limits the amount of lives you start with (though you can find 1-Ups hidden in levels) and causes your character to get knocked back upon taking damage. Then, there is Casual, which is a much easier difficulty that gives you unlimited lives (though characters can still die and not be able to come back until you start the level over and complete it) and no knock-back from enemies and hazards whatsoever. I strayed towards Casual mode to give myself a more relaxing, less strenuous time, since my Castlevania-styled skills don't hold up like they did for me as a kid (nor as someone with much less time and patience), but even then, Curse of the Moon holds a pretty stiff challenge, nonetheless.

Even still, simply beating the game once won't give you the full story. There are multiple modes that unlock upon reaching the initial credits, such as one that follows directly after the events of first completing the story. Then, there's a mode where you can play through the game solely as Zangetsu, killing each character you'd normally team up with in the story to take their special power and attempt to beat the game that way. Other than that, there is also a Boss Rush mode which is one boss after another until the final showdown.

Whereas this particular boss is one gold rush away from a serious and total beat-down.

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon is a satisfying appetizer to the upcoming main course that is Ritual of the Night, that succeeds in delivering a classic Castlevania game in all but name. Perhaps the game strays a little too closely to Konami's NES trilogy, but it's a wonderful, awesome homage all the same. Some might find the controls a little too unforgiving, with how the game forces you to dedicate yourself to your characters' jumps (i.e. no midair course correction), but for everyone else yearning for a retro-inspired Castlevania in new franchise clothing, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon is the game for you. It's by no means cursed to mediocrity. In reality, it's far from it.

[SPC Says: A-]