Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow

"As of 2007, it's still my favorite DS game."

Gameplay

Single Player: In Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, you basically explore a castle, fight enemies, gain abilities, fight really cool bosses, and gain equipments and souls. The most defining feature of this game is the soul system. If you kill an enemy, you might get its soul, which allows you use its ability. There are 4 types of souls: Bullet, Guardian, Enchant, and Ability. Bullets souls are simple, one burst attacks like subweapons from the more traditional CVs. Guardian souls are indefinitely long, which are turned off and on by either holding or pressing the R button. Enchant souls usually give stat boosts and little perks (like not flinching from all but the most powerful attacks). Ability souls give practical, necessary abilities like double jumping, swimming, breaking crystals with the touch screen.

These replace the Relics and all of them can be on at once.
The game is incredibly deep. Having souls for all enemies (119) save for 3 bosses would be deep enough, but having 11 types of weapons, lots of armor and accessories, more items than I'd bother to count, being able to level up those souls by getting extra copies, being able to merge a soul and a weapon to get an extra weapon, and some light RPG elements make it ridiculously deep. This is the deepest game I can think of.

Then there's the exploration element. It's not anything new, really, but it works very well. You explore the castle, find a boss, kill him, get his soul, and you can go back to that area and get past the obstacle you couldn't before by using his soul. There's a few linear areas, but for the most part it's very open-ended.

And the action. The core of a CV game is the action, so all that depth and exploration wouldn't mean if the action sucked, would it? Fortunately the action is just as good as all the other CVs. There's really not much to say here; it's just good. The bosses are very good, being plenty challenging and inspired. When a boss permanently destroys part of the castle, you know you've got an impressive roster. A time stopping ninja, zombified T rex, a pagan god of fire, Jimininy Cricket's evil twin brother, and of course, Death. Some really intense boss battles there.

Multiplayer: 2 modes, Soul Trade or a race to the finish mode (Enemy Set Mode). The multi for this is weak with only 2 players, no ghosts, no editable terrain, and no high scores. But who really cares about the multiplayer in a CV game? I'll answer: no one.

Replay: The normal quest is about 10 hours or so. Sounds a little under whelming? Julius mode adds about 2/3 of that, and hard mode added quite a bit more time for me, so you'll be spending a lot of time with the main mode and having a AAA time. The game can be bit tedious at times, leveling up and getting souls for an aggravating boss (especially for hard mode, I'm looking at you, Paranoia). Enemy Set, whether in multiplayer or single isn't that captivating. Boss Rush will add some more days. There's also quite a few secrets worth hunting down. Plus, you'll want to come back because of how fun the game is. Tons of replay value.

Gameplay Score: 9.5/10 Incredible

Presentation

Menus & Packaging: Attractive, clean menus, a library for story elements, a list of enemies you've defeated, good amount of modes and extras, and you can even suspend the game. Too bad the main menu is a little awkward in some areas, Julius mode should have been a part of ‘Game Start' and

Story & Characters: The story is somewhat simple, but it doesn't need to be complex for a 2D action game. A cult is trying to hunt down Soma to reawaken Dracula's soul inside him, so he and some of his allies from AoS go to the cult's head quarters and try to stop them. The cult has two ‘replacements', of sorts to inherit Dracula's soul should Soma die or something like that. The plot works just fine, and there's a cool plot twist in the beginning of the end.

Cut-Scenes: The game employs ‘talking head' cuts-scenes. The heads are anime style, which would be ok, but they seem so basic compared to how lush the rest of the game is. Lack of verbal voice acting in most of them hurts. The scenes themselves are just fine, they tell the story well and get the job done, of course, there isn't exactly high standards for 2D cut scenes. There's also an unremarkable FMV intro, but fortunately it can be skipped.

Presentation Score: 8.5/10- Great

Graphics

Graphics- The game is incredibly detailed, every single pixel of the DS is used to its fullest potential. Extremely detailed characters and environments, and there are lots of them so there's no need to worry about repetition. Some cool effects like transparencies are added also. The best-looking DS game I have ever seen.

Animation- Everything smoothly animates right down to Soma's trench coat flowing as you run to a creature's tail moving with each step it takes. A lot of animation effects are used, including scaling, rotation, and parallax. Enemy death animations are sweet, such as the Skeleton one which their bones fly in the direction you hit them. However some normal enemy animations are surprisingly stiff (Dead warrior), but fortunately they are by far the minority.

Frame rate- You can mess with the frame rate. There are about 2 cases I can remember. 1) Having fun with the Death and Abaddon souls in the large room in the dark chapel while swinging your weapon. 2) Letting a Stolas dominate a room with monsters. Apart from that, not a hitch.

Graphics Score: 9.5/10- Incredible

Audio

Music- One of, if not the moodiest soundtrack I have ever heard, each track seems perfectly tailored to the area or event. Some of the tracks, like Illusionary Song, Bloody Tears, and Momentary Moonlight are some of the best tracks I've ever heard. There is a total of 28 tracks. The developers even included a sound test so I can listen to Illusionary Song more. One of the best soundtracks I've ever heard.

Sound- Amazing. From a subtle thump as Soma lands down on the ground to a Final Guard marching down the room to attack you, DoS boasts a great sounding, huge library of sounds. Everything just feels right. It takes full advantage of stereo, so you can hear where an enemy is. The only oversight is that a few sounds are repeated, but that's insignificant.

Voice Acting- The weakest aspect of the audio. The characters' grunts as they attack, jump, get hurt, ect., sound just fine, but in the ‘talking head' cut-scenes I would appreciated at least some simple verbal bits. There are a few cases of these, but not enough. I've seen other DS games pull it of fine, so I'm sure DoS could've handled it.

Audio Score: 9.5/10- Incredible

Closing comments: CV: DoS is without a doubt, an instant classic, ,and a game that every DS owner should have. This is my favorite DS game so far. Even with its successor, Portrait of Ruin, it's still my favorite DS and CV game.

Overall Score: 9.5/10 AAAmazing. Rounded to 10.

Plus
+Action, Adventure, and RPG Elements all successfully married
+Highly Satisfying Action
+Great variety and depth with a solid challenge
+Almost perfect graphics and audio
+Great Replay value thanks to lots of extras

Minus
-Getting some souls is annoying
-Frustrating Seal System
-Bare-bones Enemy Set Mode
-Lack of verbal voice acting
-Some Graphical nit-picks

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 02/13/07