The finest of the classic Castlevania games, and a true masterpiece.
There's really no story. Something about Dracula rising again...blah blah blah. But who cares? It's not about the story. It's just you, your trusty whip, and the things that need to be whipped. That's all you need to know.
The game is totally linear. You basically just go from one end of the stage to the other end, fight a boss, and advance to the next level. Some people view this as a problem, but the upside is that there is no backtracking required. Plus, the more you play it, the better you will become, because you will be able to memorize the level layouts and enemy positions. Each level is quite different from the previous one, so you get to adventure through a lot of diverse environments. Some of the levels are really cool. There's one where all the rooms are filled with gold and jewels. Another level places you in a room that spins around you.
The gameplay is not very complex, but it doesn't need to be. You can walk and jump and whip. And you can use secondary items like the boomerang, stop watch and knife. But what's really cool about the whip in this one is that you can whip in every direction. This might not sound like much, but try going back to only being able to whip in front of you after playing this and you'll see how big of a deal it is. Additionally, you can latch onto metal rings with your whip and swing across chasms Indiana Jones style. The real fun of the gameplay comes largely from dealing with the wide variety of enemies who all have their own unique attack patterns that you have to learn to deal with and avoiding the various obstacles--everything from standard pits to falling spikes to dripping acid--in the environment. The game isn't too tough in the earlier stages, but some of the later levels are fairly challenging with some tricky enemies and environmental hazards and tough bosses. It takes a while to make your way through the game too, as there are quite a few stages and plenty of challenging moments.
Overall, the game looks quite good, with good animation and lots of parallax scrolling. Again, there is a lot of variety in the look of the levels and the enemy designs which greatly helps to prevent boredom from setting in. There is also a particularly good use of Mode 7 in one later level. One truly stand out aspect of the game that must be mentioned is the music. This game features one of the best soundtracks in all of gaming and really shows off the SNES' sound chip.
So yeah, that's pretty much it. If you're an old school gamer like me I'm sure you've already played and loved this game. If you're newer to gaming, I'm not sure if you'd like this because it's really not too similar to the newer Castlevania games. But whatever...the point is that I love this game and will forever consider it an absolute classic.