Symphony of the Might match 5: Of Lecardes and Alucard

In the last battle, Rondo of Blood and Chronicles went head to head, and in a near landslide, Rondo smashed Chronicles. Now, the time has come for another interesting battle: Bloodlines Versus Symphony of the Night.

The rules are the same. I'll list off a brief summary and my personal takes on the game, and you lot can all vote for your favorite. Feel free to post opinions as you wish, or to rebuttle opinions, or whatever. Just keep it clean. After this is over, I think I'll also host a Symphony of the Trite (title credit to the Bonus Level video)

First game to get 7 votes wins, or which ever one has the most votes after 3 days wins

I'll be doing this in (almost) chronological order, skipping Haunted Castle, Vampire Killer, Order of Shadows and NitM. Some games have been moved around slightly to have fan favorites duking it out.

Match 1: CV1 Vs CV2: SQ WINNER: CV1

Match 2: CV:A Vs CV2:BR Surprise entrant: Legends WINNER: CV:L

Match 3: CV4 Vs CV3:DC Winner: CV3: DC

Match 4: CV: RoB Vs CV X68000 (for the purpose of this, Chronicles)WINNER: RoB

Match 5: CV: Bloodlines Vs CV: SotN

Match 6: CV: L Vs CV: 64

Match 7: CV: LoD Vs CV: CotM

Match 8: CV: HoD Vs CV: AoS

Match 9: CV: LoI Vs CV: DoS

Match 10: CV: CoD Vs CV: PoR

Match 11: CV: DXC (For the purpose of this, only the remake of RoB counts. Ignore SotN and original RoB) Vs CV: OoE

The rest of the match will go fairly obviously, Winner Vs Winner

Now, on with the show.

In the Blue Corner, we have...Castlevania: Bloodlines

The Facts: Bloodlines was a unique game. Featuring two characters, it was the first (canon) game to not feature a Belmont, instead featuring the offshoots of the family, the whip weilding Morris' and the spear weilding Lecardes. John and Eric Lecarde could be played, not together but either one or the other, each with unique skills, John being more ****c while Eric is more versatile. They must travel through rather unique locals, from the ruins of Castle Dracula, to Atlantis, to the Leaning Tower of Piza, to the mighty (and trippy) Castle Prospertina. Generally well accepted, it is known for being censored heavily in europe, ranging from recoloration of zombies to removing Erics spear in the death animation. It features some interesting new tricks and interesting level design, but known for suffering from visuals and in some areas, gameplay.

IMO:To me, this is one of my favorites. Eric Lecarde (my character of choice) is a unique, fun and interesting character and well deserves the fame he has received. The game has always been rather underplayed, due to bad timing (near the end of the genesis days) and the mighty SNES overshadowing the console it was on. Unique, clever and fun, this game, to me, is one of the best games in the series.

Gravity!

And in the Red Corner, we have...Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

The Facts: This is the game that completely changed the series. SotN was a complete rework of the entire series, featuring the first ever non-whip wielder, adding many RPG elements and removing the linearity of the series entirely for a more explorative castle. With smooth animations, nice visuals and famous music, this game well deserves its fame. However, since we all know about the great stuff, let me concentrate on the bad. Difficulty in this game in non-existant. Completely and totally. Its one of the easiest games in the series, next to no challenge in a regular game. The Inverted Castle contains the largest amount of recycling in the entire series, literally taking the whole map, making color changes and flipping it upsidedown. The game is often cited for being incomplete, with a grate in the entrance that can be entered via glitch, the IC only having 5 tracks, and the huge number of glitches that can be found.

IMO: Ah..SotN. I'll be honest, I'm not nearly as fond of this game as I once was. I'll admit, its an amazing game, and completely revolutionary for the series. However, the more I play it, the more obvious the flaws become. The game, as I mentioned above, really feels incomplete. The Anti-Chapel, for example, requires you either morph or super jump to get to steps that are literally one or two pixels higher than you can possibly double jump, making you very succeptable to the annoying imps. The entire IC is incredibly lazy in many ways, obviously copied and pasted with slight color changes.

But the bad is oft outwayed by the good. The gameplay, the visuals, the music, the atmosphere itself, and the legendary voice acting, especially for the time, made this a complete revolution in the series. Be it good or bad, its up to you.

That mysterious area under the grate. What was it intended to be?

Well said, brave hunter

Their fate is now in your hands.

I loved Bloodlines, but any game that goes up against SotN is gonna lose.

I never expected the inverted castle either. I finished the game, found the gold and silver ring afterwards whilst trying to get 100%, and read the descriptions, it just lead on from there.

Bloodlines, or as it was called in Europe 'The New Generation' was the first Castlevania i properly played. Up until then I'd been a straight up Sega fan, this is the game that got me into Nintendo.

Symphony is awesome, but I have to vote for Bloodlines on the fact its not only an awesome game, but also the one that started it all for me.

Quite interesting that the only 2 CV games to see releases on Sega Consoles were pitted against each other.

I voted for SotN. One of the best video game soundtracks ever, awesome boss fights, the best castle of all CVs and the coolest main character... yeah.

I seriously love Bloodlines... really... it's such an awesome game... unfortunately, the music in Symphony is too good to pass up.... sigh.... as much as I like voting for the underdog... I had to vote Symphony :?

How do you get to the area below the drawbridge? Do you really need a gameshark to get down there?

Have you played Nocturne yet? Despite the fact that the additional areas are half-assed, I really liked the song from the cursed prison.... sooooo cooooool :D
OmegaAce1313

Theres a glitch with Alucard involving double heart refreshing and falling into the floor. Google...world beyond walls, I think, they've glitched SotN into the 400% area.

And yeah, I've played Nocturne. Its an interesting game, Maria is fun but just absurd, and the new areas...suck, frankly. However, I'd happily consider it superior if it weren't for the lag and big band version of beginning.

I voted SotN.. I LOVED that agme :P That said...

I have never play Bloodlines is the only CV game I have not play :cry: why they do not release it on VC?? :cry: :cry: or on anything... :cry:

I voted SotN.. I LOVED that agme :P That said...

I have never play Bloodlines is the only CV game I have not play :cry: why they do not release it on VC?? :cry: :cry: or on anything... :cry:

chang_1910

Symphony of the Night, end of story.

I bought it AT LAUNCH and have beat it atleast once a year since. One of my top 5 favorite games of all-time.

i vote for sotn. i played bloodlines as a kid, and this was back in the day when i saw this as a game that was almost as scary as splatterhouse 3 was. lmao. but as great as that game was for its time, sotn was just too much better.

the music was great and i actually started listenin to Symphony X after i played the game (they did alot of the soundtrack). the story was good and it had a ton of stuff i didnt really expect. the extra castle was a good idea and i loved that bosses from the first one were regular enemies in the second one. it was also one of the first action rpgs i ever played so it always has a place in my vg memories for that. plus it was the only other game you could play as alucard at the time. lol. so bad then that was a huge deal for alot of people.

bloodlines, on the other hand, had its own interesting story. i at first didnt like it and ignored it for a long time, but it was ok lookin back at it. the levels were fun and were tough to beat back then. i havent actually played the game since back in the genesis days so i cant really remeber much other than being outside of the castle and stuff like that. overall though, its one of the games that i forget about alot since it doesnt have as much that stands out about it that alot of the other games in the series do.

I think that this is an unfair vote. Nothing is gonna beat SotN, and Bloodlines was good. It shouldn't have to face the king. Just my opinion though. I still voted SotN.ShaunyP

For a fairly primitive game, Bloodlines did very well against the alleged king. I'm interested to see how some of the later games fare against SotN. Regardless, thread done, SotN won. I'll get Match 6 up soon.

[QUOTE="ShaunyP"]I think that this is an unfair vote. Nothing is gonna beat SotN, and Bloodlines was good. It shouldn't have to face the king. Just my opinion though. I still voted SotN.semianonymous

For a fairly primitive game, Bloodlines did very well against the alleged king. I'm interested to see how some of the later games fare against SotN. Regardless, thread done, SotN won. I'll get Match 6 up soon.

it was the best way to set the match imo as well... After all you had to put Bloodlines with a 2D...

*closed*