[diplo]

mature meter off the scale cap'n we're good to go



what the hell is wrong with trevor's body

also emo zombie



well heck i got hit once



for some reason if you come within like 5 feet of the spikes you die in the game

and die for real



i like the backgrounds in the forest a lot



i was disappointed with the lack of machinated enemies in portrait of ruin
personally i was hoping for some robot owls



the landscape capitalizes on trevor's loneliness

tip-top spot for a suicide if i do say so myself



oh hi



man fuck you guys



when i beat a level in cv1 i like to hold down the jump and attack button so simon whips and jumps like a muhfugga before the victory music stops playing

trevor is incapable of such activities



9 YEARS LATER



the catacombs are boring as shit

time for sum atlantis



god damn it these things take more hits than dracula



oh for the love of



would you just



oh my god



holy hell



good thing grabbing the orb magically saves me from the approaching water somehow



not another underground level



oops got hit by a bat



500 YEARS LATER



this part with falling blocks is just horrendous



losing...will...to...play...

yup i quit.

besides the exaggerations, yeah, i don't dig castlevania 3. for me, it's too big, too frustrating, too many vertical towers with annoyingly placed, sluggish monsters that make you wait until the game decides to have them move away from the top of the staircases.

i do like the first two stages, but anything beyond that feels stretched out, large for the sake of "oh shit huge game on the nes whoaaa this is big oh hi 1990" instead of dishing out fun situations.

maybe this isn't the most positive topic ever for konami week, but i felt like expressing a viewpoint that isn't often seen! i know a lot of fans enjoy the game, and i don't think i've ever heard anyone outright being bored by it.

to end on a happier note, the music is insanely good, and many of the stages' graphics are fantastic. as said, i'm especially fond of the forest with its rich colors and pine trees in the distance.

i'd prefer if this was a castlevania 3-exclusive discussion.

oh, heck - this whole thing is probably redundant! enjoy the screenshots and sink into some nostalgia!!

[Toups]

Are you playing on an emulator?

It's... notoriously difficult to emulate properly! So that might be part of your problem!!
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[Broco]

[Deets]

I think the fact that you're still playing as Trevor past the second stage is your biggest problem. Whenever I play that game I make a beeline for the tower, grab Grant and never switch back.

[haircute]

That was a funny post, diplo!
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Get Wild and Tough!

[Laurel Soup]

For the first time since the '88 Powerfest, I played the Japanese version a couple days back. Am I crazy or are the flea men only in the American version? Check out the 7-03 screenshot above to see the original bigger creepier thing. Anyone know the story behind the great flea man switch?
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[Broco]

They changed a bunch of things between the Japanese and American versions. Aside from the new less scary fleamen, some of the things that come to mind:

- Music crapified.
- No more spikes on the cross at the beginning.
- Everything does like 50% more damage and takes more hits to kill too.
- Boss AI is much more intelligent.
- Respawn point right before Dracula removed, ARGH
- Bats in the pendulum room right before Dracula added, ARRRRGHGARRRGHAHADFHADFH5eyeeafg

To sum up, the American version is much more brutally difficult, its music is worse (though even in its American form it's still some of the best on the NES), and it has some inexplicable minor graphical changes.

I have my masochistic side and I actually like the American version's insane difficulty, it makes it that much more satisfying. I play the Japanese version more often, because of the music, though. Hmm, that makes me wonder, how hard might it be to ROM hack the Japanese version's music on top of the American version...?

[Mr. Mechanical]

I always take the ghost ship path, then on up to the clock tower. That's how it goes, right? I can barely remember, it's been damn near a year since I seriously played the game. I might hook up the NES tomorrow, I've got tons of classic Konami action up in that bitch.
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[diplo]

[Levi]

I prefer Castlevania IV.

[diplo]

[haze]

this is the only CV game I owned so it is the only one I have nostalgia for.

and I've been playing it lately! yeah, the Ghost ship route is so much more fun. the Alucard route, you go through many annoying underground levels, just to reach the castle where you play EVEN MORE UNDERGROUND LEVELS before reaching the main hall.

one slight advantage of the American version, I found out recently on gamefaqs, is the secret names you can use. everyone already knows "HELP ME" for ten lives, but there's stuff like "FUJIMOTO" and some others I forget that give you an ally character from the start.

I remember someone musing on what a game would be like where you get weaker as you go instead of stronger. WELL AMERICAN CASTLEVANIA SEEMS TO BE JUST THAT. god I hate how they increase your damage depending on the level you're on. the Japanese version of CV3 made all enemies have their own fixed damage. I beat Castlevania 1 for the first time this week, and nearly gave up because of how you can only last for four hits at the end, I don't know if the Japan version did the same. the rest of the game's challenge I love, but just not that. it's sick.

[showka]

Yeah, that route can definetly be boring, and the levels where you have to wait for the acid to break the blocks suck, though it makes the game feel fucking epic and more satisfying somehow. I remember playing the Japanese version on my Dreamcast a few years ago, and starring in awe when one of the cavern levels opened up (ie the rock wall in the background had these cracks and openings) and showed a lake. I suddenly realized that what I was looking at was that same lake you can see in the outer wall in Symphony of the Night, and what the characters were doing was scaling the mountain side by traveling through the caverns. In a way, Castlevania III has the same kind of powerful artistic direction as SOTN, it was just made for inferior hardware so it was harder to tell (I beat Castlevania III every which way years before and never noticed the detail described above).

[Lestrade]

Man, I hope this comes out for the VC soon. I still love this game; it just looks and sounds terrific. I actually beat it too, despite its insane difficulty. God, this game made me so angry back in the day. This and Ninja Gaiden turned me into a serial killer.
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Illustration Portfolio | The Gamer's Quarter

[showka]

I think Castlevania III, Ninja Gaiden, and possibly Battle of Olympus made me a master at controlling my anger and cursing violently under my breathe.

[John Mc.]

my good man! as others have posited, try the japanese version! i gave it a once over today, and was dutifully impressed!

i mean, i had fun! with castlevania III! wow!

[Levi]

I just played the japanese cv III and... wow. I had no idea that Grant Denasty was a fucking rapist. I mean, am I mad or did he not have a projectile weapon in the american version? It seems like it's as powerful as the whip, even!

And the music! There's some seriously ominous bass the american version missed out on.

I may have to reform my Castlevania opinions in light of these developments.

[SplashBeats]

I spent John Mc.'s entire playthrough telling him that Grant is awesome in the JP version.

He just ignored me.

[Levi]

Are Sypha and Alucard similarly awesome?

[Action Jack!]

Grant is awesome in the Japanese version, he can throw those knives the whole time and it never uses hearts. The wall grip still sucks though (but I'll call that a control issue, or at least user error).
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{I'll Fill This In Later}

[John Mc.]

[luckystrike]