As a fan of Castlevania, I have to say that Lament of Innoncence is a huge dissapointment.
User Rating: 4.8 | Castlevania PS2
Note: For my reviews, 5 is average. After Aria of Sorrow, the most ground-breaking entry in the series since Symphony of the Night, my faith in the Castlevania series had gone from 80% to 100%. It is interesting then, that just around the time I think that there will be no more dissapointments in Castlevania, that this appears. Prepare for a journey through a bland, undecorated castle so that you can fight bland enemies, with a bland combat system. There definetely is redeeming quality to this game, but for people who are fans of the series, you won't find much except for disapointment. I'll just say it so I can get it over with and not burst into tears: Top-down camera. Fricken top down camera. Lazy, even more bland, top down camera! I borrowed my friend's PS2 for this top down camera! I feel so MAD! In the game's combat, there is a slow and powerful attack, a quick attack, and a magic attack. You can get different magic attacks by fusing orbs and weapons to form different kinds of magic. This is a nice kind of experiment, and is probably the best thing about the combat. Considering that the game's "combos" are very few. I've only found three real combos you can make with the slow and fast attacks, and the only difference between these was that they involved more moves. Not very much can be said other than that. There are five levels in the Castle, each of which you can go to in any order. There is absolutely no adventure to these bland enviroments. The only reason you'll actually look at the map is because there are so many different unnecessary paths in these levels that you will get extremely frustrated. This is probably the only thing in the game that will get you extremely frustrated, considering how easy your blood-gushing enemies are. The only time you will find a challenge in the game is on some of the bosses, but that is only for a select few, the rest have very clear strategys or ways to avoid their attacks. After you defeat these five, bland, repetetive levels, you will reach the end of the Castle, in which you must fight to the end to beat the crap out of the vampire. Overall, this quest leads to an abrupt end that has no real conclusion and leads you to only an introduction into the Belmont clan (despite that this game's story is good) after only 10 hours maximum. There are side quests that lead to stronger magical orbs or items, which are easily reached by taking the extra paths through the bland levels. But in a game this small, there is no real incentive to get them. Overall, If you're a Castlevania fan, and you don't own a PS2, don't worry, you aren't missing out on anything except a small piece of the Castlevania timeline that can be read up on. If you do own a PS2 (which you probably do, unlike me). Than You may want to give this game a rent if you're a fan of Castlevania, but if you aren't you probably won't find any real point in playing this small game in every way. 
