Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon is A PERFECT Spiritual Successor to Castlevania 3

Cover art for the game

Castlevania fans have been BEGGING for a new game in the legendary franchise since 2014, when Lords of Shadow 2 was released. Most of the fanbase, including myself, have been wanting Konami to return to the classic style of Castlevania 1 and 3 for this new game. But sadly, Konami never granted all of our wishes, and still hasn’t to this day. But in 2018, we, as Castlevania fans, got a pleasant surprise when Koji Igarashi, the director of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, teamed with Inti Creates to fulfill one of the stretch goals for a Kickstarter he had started for a SOTN spiritual successor game, titled Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.

That stretch goal was for a 2D game that was in the style of classic Castlevania, which would be titled Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. This game would serve as a companion game to ROTN, which I’ll be reviewing in the future. This title was originally planned as a prequel to ROTN, but was changed during development to become an alternate spin-off title that happens to share similar characters and themes with ROTN. This change was made thanks to gameplay reasons (playable characters mostly that aren’t playable in ROTN), as well as continuity issues with ROTN.

The story for Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon sees you play as Zangetsu, a demon hunter who harbors a deep grudge against all demons. This is because Zangetsu was given the moon’s curse by said demons, so his purpose in life is to hunt down any demons standing in his way. Zangetsu senses the existence of a very powerful demon with a horrifying aura and decides to go hunt this demon down and destroy any demon that gets in his way. Along the way, Zangetsu runs into people that he can potentially recruit as companions to help him on this journey.

The first is Miriam, a woman who is endowed with crystals that hold demonic powers. The second is an old man by the name of Alfred, who is a skilled alchemist with the knowledge to control powerful spells. The third and final potential companion is Gebel, who has the same crystals that Miriam has implanted in him, but he not only has greater powers than Miriam does, he can also shapeshift into a bat. Naturally, Zangetsu is very wary about traveling alongside people who have such great demonic powers, but if the player decides to recruit these companions (more on that later), he values their prowess in battle. I would go into more detail about the story, but I want you all to play the game for yourself, so I’ll leave it with this. There are multiple endings in this game that are tied to various modes, which I cover in the gameplay section.

The gameplay for Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon works a lot like the classic NES style of Castlevania, in particular, Castlevania 3: Dracula’s Curse. You have 8 stages to play through that are all linear in design. You scroll from left to right and/or right-to-left, you jump on platforms, and you hit enemies in the face with whatever weapon your character is using. Since there are 4 characters in this game, you can switch between the 4 of them if you choose to, like you could in Castlevania 3. The difference between that game and this game is that you get more than one character to swap from in this game. You can actually swap between all 4 characters whenever you obtain them all, and you can swap on the fly, too, like you can in CV3.

The platforming in this game feels fantastic. It’s fluid, and the feel of jumping changes depending on which characters you’re using. For example, Miriam’s jump is higher than the rest, meaning she’s in the air for longer, so her jumps are a lot riskier. Zangetsu, Alfred, and Gebel’s jumps aren’t as high as Miriam’s, so they’re not in the air as long, meaning that they’re more suited for rapid platforming sections where you have to jump between platforms fast, which you’ll see a lot of in this game.

These characters also feel different in combat, and this is mostly due to their weaponry. Zangetsu has a Katana that does great damage, especially if you get a power-up to increase damage, and it attacks quicker than any of the other weapons in the game, but it has short range. Miriam has a whip, which makes fans of the Belmonts like me feel at home, and sacrifices the attack speed for longer range. Alfred has a staff that is just as short in the range department as Zangetsu’s Katana is, but Alfred is more suited as a magic user since he’s an alchemist and has those powerful spells at his disposal. Then you have Gebel, who has an attack that sees him draw back his cape and unleash three fireballs as Dracula did in Castlevania 1, but not nearly as effective as Dracula’s, because that would be busted.

But the best thing about this game by far is the replayability. Not only can you replay it by only recruiting certain people and then playing as those people, but you have different modes as well. You have the difficulty modes in Casual, which have more checkpoints, unlimited lives, and no knockback, as well as Veteran, which has fewer checkpoints, limited lives, and knockback. Then you have multiple endings to get as well. Then, on top of that, you have Nightmare Mode, which you obtain by unlocking the ending with all characters recruited, and you start Nightmare Mode without Zangetsu and are in control of the other characters. Then there’s Ultimate Mode, which leaves you in control of a powered-up Zangetsu with all allies.

So not only does this game have the classic Castlevania vibe with the gameplay style and the art style, but it has ALL of the spirit of classic Castlevania. The replayability, the tight and responsive controls, the vibe, the enemy design, the stage design, and the gameplay style are what make COTM a perfect spiritual successor to Castlevania 3: Dracula’s Curse. Even the soundtrack screams Castlevania in every single way, and that’s just as big a factor as any of the other stuff I mentioned because it always was a focal point of the Castlevania games.

If you are a fan of classic action platformers or especially a fan of classic Castlevania, then you should totally play Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. This game was made for people who enjoy those games, and it was made with 100% love and care by Inti Creates. And I sincerely hope that they get to do more Curse of the Moon games in the future because I will gladly eat them up every single time they drop.

Thank you so much for reading, and I’ll see you in my next post!

-TheMadBelmont