Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles is a 2.5D remake of Rondo of Blood (ROB), with the original PC Engine game, as well as the direct sequel Symphony of the Night (SOTN), also present in the package as unlockables, so it’s essentially a compilation of three Castlevania games. Neat! My original intent was to play the remake (ROBR) until SOTN was unlocked, since SOTN was the game that I actually wanted to play. To my surprise, I enjoyed ROBR so much that I just kept playing, all the way to the very end.

Rondo of Blood Remake

You play as Richter Belmont, and the way he moves around feels a bit stiff, to be honest, but you eventually get used to it. You can also play as Maria, if you were able to rescue her in one of the stages. Her abilities pretty much makes her playthrough easy mode, but it’s still fun to go through the game with her. Doves and double jump for the win!

Maria aside, this is not an easy game - I died A LOT, but there’s this immense sense of satisfaction every time you clear a stage, as well as excitement and dread when you begin a new one. There are also optional alternate stages that take a bit more effort to find, and they are definitely worth your troubles, as these levels are completely different stages to their standard counterparts.

The final boss was challenging, he comes equipped with a new form exclusive to the remake, and it took me a while to get familiar with its different attack patterns and hand him the L.

Every stage looks great aesthetically, and there are plenty of secrets to be found. The soundtrack is really damn amazing, so it’s a good thing that you can find items for unlocking songs from all three games.

Rondo of Blood

I tackled the OG Rondo of Blood afterwards, and had a blast here as well. Some sections felt harder here vs. the remake, while other parts were easier, but overall I feel the difficulty wasn’t too different. Richter controls a bit better in ROBR though.

The remake soundtrack was great, but I feel like the original music is even better and catchier:

Bloodlines

Beginning

Ghost Ship Painting

Symphony of the Night

The game that gave birth to the “Metroidvania” genre, it’s very interesting that SOTN is the direct sequel to ROB, yet the gameplay is completely different. There is now an enormous castle to explore, with RPG elements sprinkled in. There are many weapons, armor, accessories and other items to obtain and equip, though I rarely used consumables due to how cumbersome the inventory system was.

It’s very gratifying to expand the map, especially when you are finally able to access areas that were previously closed off, though there were a few times where I was banging my head trying to figure out where to go next, which caused a bit of frustration. I think the game could have also used a few more warp rooms.

The game went from good to great for me when I unlocked Alucard’s bat form. This feeling reminded me of Xenoblade X, when I got to fly around in a Skell for the first time - absolute freedom to go anywhere!

SOTN definitely focuses more on exploration than combat, and as a result it is a lot more forgiving compared to ROB. You generally will survive until the next save point, even after taking a bit of damage.

There are many memorable boss battles, with Granfaloon being the stand out for me in its grotesquenesss:

It’s pretty mindblowing when the second half of the game opens up. The difficulty ramps up as well, which culminated with what I thought was the best boss fight in the game with Galamoth:

The soundtrack is quite different to ROB, yet it’s no less outstanding. The different areas all had tracks that fit perfectly with the atmosphere, with an assortment of musical genres and styles.

Overall, this compilation is truly a bang for your buck, and the bottom line is that I came here for SOTN, but ended up staying for ROB.