Castlevania:Lament of Innocence

Castlevania: Lament of Innocence

I must say I have never been a diehard Castlevania fan.  I really liked Symphony of the Night, but I always found the SNES and NES games too slow and plodding.  I recognize their quality, but in a world of Mario’s and Mega Man’s they could never really hold my interest.  

Besides, it seemed like the series died out on home consoles after SOTN.  Sure, there were tons of them on handheld consoles, but I never really owned handhelds.  I think it had a lot to do with how poorly the N64 ‘vania games were (and make no mistake about it, they were bad).  That leads us to Lament of Innocence.  I don’t remember it getting much hype when it came out and I don’t remember it being reviewed too well or too poorly.  I also didn’t remember having it in my collection, but here we are.  

I guess we will start with storyline and presentation.  For those that care, this is the first game in the franchise chronologically.  It tells the story of Leon Belmont and his quest to rescue his betrothed (fancy medieval term for his girlfriend) from a vampire named...Walter?  All of this leads to a big reveal and an explanation of why the Belmont clan hates vampires so much.  

The story is told through very, very poorly written/translated cutscenes that range from okay to unintentionally hilarious.  The voice acting is passable though and if you are into they mythology of the series, its worth a play.

The presentation, on the other hand, is excellent.  The atmosphere is creepy and the castle is suitably intimidating.  Each of the five worlds look great, with unique environments ranging from a haunted theater to a garden populated by ominous stone statues.  The music is also outstanding, to the point that it really helped pull me through when the game started to drag.  The graphics in general were also great for their time.

As for the gameplay, its a mixed bag.  Its literally a mixed bag of Symphony of the Night’s RPG esque equipment system and map and the side scrolling games’ focus on combat and platforming.  The combat is fun, but its repetitive.  It really all boils down to “block until the enemy stops attacking, then whip them until they die.”  

The expanding map and interesting environments give you the illusion that you are playing a non-linear game, but it really is pretty straightforward.  Sometimes the illusion is all you need though and at least the combat doesn’t try to be something it isn’t.  There is no obnoxious dodging or impossible combos.  The sub-weapons are also fun, with a range of orbs that drastically change how they behave.  Experimenting with all of the combos was a blast.

Unfortunately, there is one fatal flaw that keeps this from being a great game...the camera.  I know I spent a lot of time talking about how much I hate the camera in Horizon: Zero Dawn, but LOI has the opposite problem.  You can’t move the camera.  Like, at all.  There are sooooo many buttons on the PS2 controller, you couldn’t dedicate ONE to the camera?  It makes combat nearly impossible at times and leads to a lot of cheap, frustrating deaths and missed items.  

But worst of all, it cripples the platforming.  My god are the platforming sections abysmal.  Prepare to repeat every platforming puzzle at least four times.  They usually aren’t high stakes, but they sure are high frustration.

In conclusion, Lament of Innocence is a good game, but I wouldn’t call it great.  There are some good things here and it was an overall fun experience that is certainly better than the N64 games, but it really dragged a lot at the end and it lacked variety.  I really enjoyed the music and the environments, but as a whole package it just barely missed the mark of being a hidden gem.

7/10

You should play this if:

You already played the Devil May Cry games to death

You want to start your journey into the Castlevania games

You were into vampires before they were cool

Avoid this if:

You can’t handle cheesy cutscenes

You really hate the fixed camera

You need games with more variety