Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia

After spending 10 hours to complete every area in the game including all boss medals, full enemy list, and all glyphs i though I'd write something about a game i spent time on.

Anyways having recently completed the game, with a joke of a last boss, I was wondering what the hell Konami was thinking. The game overall is great and very challenging which SOME PEOPLE have an issue understanding as to why the game is so difficult but it has some serious flaws in the gameplay depth. There are lack of uniquely new weapons and abilities and the first weapon is just about the same as the second one. Honestly I kept wondering why my Macir glyph was not doing enough damage on Eligor until I noticed it was Vol Macir not Melio Macir I had equipped. Go figure. Sometimes I wonder what Konami was smoking while making the game but whatever it’s up to them.

Graphics: 9/10

This is one of the best looking Castlevania on the NDS so far. It has an amazing blend of 2D and 3D graphics which makes it much more unique as compared to the previous castlevania’s which felt like the same games only with different sprites. The enemies have also been redone and look much better in looking and killing them. The background, especially in the water levels, are absolutely amazing where you can see the tide rise and fall in the back which is affecting the actual game as well. It is actually very visually appealing to play the game although some of the areas seem a little too similar which seems to imply laziness on Konami’s part.

Sound: 7/10

To be perfectly honest the soundtrack in this game is as amazing as some of the previous games but it does nothing to really make itself stand out. It sometimes feels like “wait didn’t I just hear that track?” But maybe that’s just me. I did expect something like SoTN but honestly that isn’t going to happen. But still the soundtrack is great there is no denying that but I truly wish it was something amazing.

Story 4/10

Well you have to give Konami some props for not making such a crappy story such as PoR. This story itself is quite simple yet interesting. You play the part of Shanoa, who is part of the organization called Ecclesia. The game begins with Shanoa ready to perform a ritual to become the weapon to stop Dracula. (Yay?) The ritual is interrupted by Shanoa’s friend Albus who wants the power for himself. Then the game goes blank and you wake up to find out all your memories are gone and your retraining to go after Albus and reclaim the power to stop Dracula. Yea well that’s not too exciting and the story is predictable for someone with half a brain.

Gameplay 7/10

Ah the real reason for actually playing a Castlevania game has arrived with a brand new glyph system. The game works as such: you can equip 3 glyphs total; two on your arms and one on your back. The ones on your arms are used for attacking and the one on the back is for support glyphs. You equip the glyphs on the X and Y buttons and press the respective buttons to use them. The L button is for your back glyph which can do anything from increase your Intelligence to summon a familiar. The X and Y button can be used to combo (more like spam) the weapons over and over which consume MP per use. Your MP also recovers over time (very quickly too) allowing you to spam attacks over and over as long as you’re pressing X and Y in synch. That leaves out the hearts which are used for the new glyph union function (press and hold up and press y). Glyph union allows you to combine both the glyphs equipped on your arms for a combination attack that most of the times cover more than half the screen. For example you have Macir and Macir equipped on your arms and you use glyph union, you’ll do a gigantic hammer attack that hits about half the screen. Simple yet effective.

Glyphs can be obtained from enemies but are not as abundant as the souls in Dawn of Sorrow. You’ll find yourself using a few goods one and leaving the majority of others in your inventory never to see the light of day. Although the familiars are fun to use you’ll find leveling them takes either hundreds of enemy kills or having to spend time absorbing the same glyph over and over to level them. All the while during boss fights you’re going to be using an Intelligence boosting glyph instead of a familiar.

Glyph Unions are also very limited. There’s about a total of 29 unions you can perform as Konami felt like not spending time giving the game a little more depth. Most of the unions are just for show but some of them are extremely over-powered given the right conditions. Honestly I killed death in 4 hits so that should give you some idea about it.

The biggest issue most people seem to have with OOE is the difficulty. A lot of people have been complaining about how tough the game is or how stupid a certain part it and all I have to say to them is go complain to someone who cares. I’ve been waiting so long for a difficult game to play it’s not even funny. It seems like good old days are gone and games suck so much that they need games to be made easier for them. For me I believe that the difficulty of this game was perfect and I have all the boss medals to prove it. Not to mention hard more 1 and hard more 225 are even better. Unlike previous castlevania’s where bosses were a joke in this one they are actually a challenge. You need to fight them a few times to understand their patterns and them go in for the kill. Enemies possess certain weaknesses as well but that isn’t that big of an issue as most people seem to complain about. Whenever you enter into a new area there are almost always new glyphs to get that actually make the area much easier. You just have to be smart about what you use most of the glyphs suck and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out which ones. Then the good ones are just that good. Stick with the good ones and ditch the rest it’s that simple.

Exploration 6/10

Unlike previous castlevania’s this one is quite linear which, is quite a bit of a turnoff for some gamers. I enjoyed the fact that areas were separated but there I sometimes felt like I didn’t get to do any exploration until the last stage. The fact that each areas map was separated made it much easier to find hidden areas and the overall change of pace from previous Castlevania games was much more fun. The new area by area system is a somewhat new concept to the Castlevania games somewhat like Lament of Innocence for the PS2, although it was done much better in Lament of Innocence. It seemed like Konami just put together certain areas in their sleep and approved them.

Conclusion

A very new concept by Konami which had some very unique features but the game itself felt rushed and could have been much better with a few adjustments. All in all it’s worth a buy if you’re a Castlevania fan nothing revolutionary but fun to spend some time on. My one question for Konami would be “What the hell were you guys smoking?”

Overall Score 6.5/10