Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

Full disclosure: I haven't finished it yet, nor will I for probably a week or two. There is a dearth of metroidvanias. There are even fewer good ones. This game takes what was good about Castlevania and Metroid games, avoiding many of the pitfalls of other products. Or, for that matter, of SotN. Unlike Axiom Verge, the colors contrast enough for the character to be clearly visible. Unlike Ori, this game doesn't demand perfect platforming and involves a lot of kicking. Unlike Hollow Knight, you can actually keep track of what is going on. After the first boss, you realize that boss doors are marked, so you won't wander into one on accident without saving, something that SOTN needed. If you like memes and castlevania references, it has them. If you don't, you can ignore most of the memes. Except the memes that were in earlier Castlevania games, which we used to call easter eggs back in the day. There are some enemies that break up the mood, like the dog and cat enemies (you'll know them when you see them), but most of the backer goals fit the setting. I love the paitings with all the different faces that attack you near the beginning. It's a great nod to backers without being obnoxious. So yeah. If you're old and love metroidvanias, get this one. If you're young or haven't really tried them, give it a quick look on youtube. You just might love it.

A few hours in and you can tell alot of painstaking detail and work went into this. It's got those good Castlevania SOTN vibes but it feels new too.

Love Symphony of the Night, but this game not so much. It starts off decent, but quickly becomes repetitive and really doesnt have it's own personality. There's nothing wrong with more of the same, but this lacks charm and I honestly didnt find it fun.

Do you like Igavanias? Then get this game, you will like it too because it's more of the same, including the same mistakes. The game itself is fine, it's pretty fun, the weapon variety and techniques are nice, the castle is okay, but nothing new. It's a new IP that didn't NEED to take place in a Castle and could have explored new areas, but whatever. The customization is pretty nice but limited, it would have been nice to be able to recolor items and have a vanity slot to be able to use accesories you like but still get bonuses of better items. Crafting exists. You only use it if you really want to get the 100% completion (like i did) but it's pretty useless and a waste of time otherwise. The biggest mistake this game makes is the same one it made in previous games, but somehow even worse. Sometimes you had to get some enemy drops to obtain certain endings and unlock like half the game and true endings, wich is a really dumb choice, but at least they gave you a lot of hints. It's still a terrible choice though. In this game they did this with the drop of a random enemy just to PROGRESS in the middle of the game, and no good hints. An NPC gives a hint ONCE, and never again, so if you ignored the dialogue, or skipped, or just forgot, you're screwed. If you don't visit the store, you'll never even get the hint. There's an OPTIONAL quest that makes you kill that enemy, but because the drop is random you may complete the quest without getting the shard. I spent hours like and idiot exploring the whole castle like 3 times, searching for a room or boss that allowed me to walk underwater to progress like in every igavania ever. Anyways, it was entretaining but stale, it adds nothing new to the formula, wich is fine and i'm sure most people like that, but i'm burned out (The completion requirements don't help, crafting is awful). I recommend playing it, completing the map and fighting every boss but nothing else. It does have great support after launch, wich is nice.

This was kickstarted a few years ago by the man who broke the Castlevania games into a series of highly popular action exploration games - metroidvania. This game was not without fault upon it's release. It had some initial backlash during it's production with a concern of graphics and the game movement felt off for some people. The feedback regarding the graphics was taken into consideration and a visible clean up was made. The game movement was accepted as higher levels of gameplay opened up the faster pace movement people were expecting. I'd highly recommend this game if you enjoyed Symphony of the Night and similar Castlevania games. I'd also recommend buying the soundtrack as well - it's arranged by the same composer who did the music for Symphony of the night and other Castlevania games.