PixlBit

The PixlBit staff loves HD and wants to see some of their favorite franchises get the treatment.

 Castlevania: Handheld Collection

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night came out for the Sony PlayStation in 1997, ushering in a new era of greatness for the popular Konami franchise. Blending RPG elements with the ability-based exploration mechanics of the Metroid games, it was the first of what would later be unfortunately described as “Metroidvania” games. It was also the first Castlevania game to be headed up by Koji Igarashi (IGA to his friends), who would go on to set the pace for the series for over a decade. In our nomination process for this dream HD release list, the PixlBit staff voted for the three Game Boy Advance titles to get the fresh coat of paint. Well, I’m going to dream a bit bigger and cheat just a bit, because there’s no reason why we can’t get the DS games onto a disc, as well.

If you really go back and look at the first two Castlevania games for the GBA (Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance), you’ll see that they are games that hold nostalgia for people, but aren’t actually as good as later entries in the series. Circle of the Moon brought back a whip-wielding protagonist, but this was just a bit boring after controlling Alucard with all his pointy weapons in Symphony of the Night. Harmony of Dissonance continued this trend, and while it was a nicer-looking game with deeper mechanics, it was also very long and meandering, with lots of aimless wandering around, wondering where to go next. The third game Aria of Sorrow is one of my favorite Castlevania games thanks to the variety of weapons, unique storyline, and the ability to equip the souls of fallen enemies as special items. It received a direct sequel on the DS called Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, which is part of my reasoning for including the DS releases in this collection.

So let’s start with these GBA games before moving on. Remember that, even though the GBA was technically a 32-bit system, the sprites that it could handle looked more like the stuff you would see on the 16-bit Super Nintendo. A simple increase in the resolution just won’t do; even Symphony of the Night looked a little rough when it was ported to XBLA. No, we’re going to have to redo the graphics, Guardian Heroes-style. I’m thinking all new sprites, but with an art style that is in keeping with the dark, moody visuals of the source material. I’d also have the soundtracks remixed and remastered to take advantage of the surround sound systems that so many people have for their HDTVs. The games should be retranslated as well; in the case of Harmony of Dissonance, better steps should be taken to guide the player through the immensely large castle. For Aria of Sorrow, I’d include the ability to trade souls between players online instead of the link cable trading that was present in the original cart.

The next three games were for the Nintendo DS (Dawn of Sorrow, Portrait of Ruin, and Order of Ecclesia). These entries in the series were a serious graphical step up from their GBA cousins, and as such wouldn’t need quite as much work to bring up to HD standards. Dawn of Sorrow is my favorite Castlevania game, and there’s really not much I would do to it. The anime scenes for this and Portrait of Ruin could probably be redone, and Dawn of Sorrow had an annoying overuse of the stylus, being an early DS game. I’d take that right out, possibly replacing it with a button-activated ability. Portrait of Ruin had a two-character mechanic, and that seems to be ripe for a co-op mode, ala the digitally released Harmony of Despair. With Order of Ecclesia, I’d either add an easier mode or rebalance the game, as it was punishingly difficult to the point that the game felt impossible at points. Since Order of Ecclesia features a Glyph system similar to the Soul system in the “Sorrow” games, I’d include an online trading mode for this one, as well.

While I envision this Castlevania HD Collection as something for PSN and XBLA, I think it would be a perfect fit for the PlayStation Vita, especially since these games were all designed as portable adventures. If it was made for the Vita, you wouldn’t even have to make the small changes to the DS games since the system has a touch screen as well. The 3DS is a possibility as well, though I’m not quite sure that the system would support the HD sprites that I have in mind for the GBA games. It’s been a long time since a brand new 2D Castlevania was released (Harmony of Despair reuses assets), so this collection would be a great package for fans of that classic Symphony of the Night style gameplay.