Castlevania: Curse of Darkness (Xbox, 2005)

The game is the typical side scrolling fighting game where the goal is to defeat a boss and gain their special ability to help you in the following stages. As you fight the evil devils, you gain experience points which you will use to upgrade. The interesting twist is this time you are now a Forgemaster in which you are able to conjure up what they consider Innocent Devils to fight for you. Each Innocent Devil type has different characteristics which you you will find usefull in one way or another (healing vs fighting vs flying, etc).

As with previous Castlevania titles, the graphics are ok. The fight engine is arcadic with limited controls needed to accomplish anything.

The Good:
1) Beat them up... a lot
2) Puzzles
3) New twist on conjuring
4) Wow... cool bosses
5) Much better graphics than before
6) Definitely replayable game to see all the different Innocent Angle forms
7) Ability to switch weapon each with their own attributes
8) Combos and more combos

The Bad:
1) Graphics are still not that good in certain areas
2) Fight engine is still just a basic hack and slash
3) Feels very repetitive.

Overall, it's a keeper with lots of replayability.

This Castlevania game is one of THE best I have played. The Graphics are very gothic and beautiful all through out the game. It gives the player a chance to get used to the system through the first level before sending an entourage of enemies at them. The Music is very well done. Any fan of rock, jazz, or classical will enjoy the music.

The new Innocent Devil system is better than Symphony of the Night's Familiar system in many aspects. The fighting system was quick, unique, and very responsive. Battles gradually become harder as the player progressed. Sound effects where fairly standard for a Castlevania game. The voice acting was done exceptionally well. Storyline is easy to follow and not confusing.

The gameplay was pretty linear. Replay value is high because of the unlockable playable character. All in all a very well made game. Any fan of RPG's, Slash 'n' Gashems, Adventure, or Action games would enjoy this game.

This game is insanely boring. Most of the time, you're walking through corridors, forest paths and other linear environments. Now, some paths have several options and pathways for getting through them, and some are dead ends, but the walking around is pretty dull.

The game does get better as you play through it. It starts insanely dull, seemingly terrible, and it eventually becomes more bearable by giving you slightly more movement options and more items to toy around with. When it comes time to use familiars, the game shows some promise, but you probably won't even care long enough to get this far, and if you do, you'll notice the familiars are extremely dumb and not so helpful. I tend to stick with my healer faerie, because she can't be attacked and is a very nice way to quickly heal in battle.

This game is boring because of the repetition. You fight the same enemies over and over and over and over and over and over... and over again! Then, finally, you get a boss battle or maybe a group battle that's slightly interesting, but then, you fight more generic enemies as you walk through more pathways.

There are few secrets and few challenges. Most of the secrets are extremely easy to find, so I wonder if maybe the designer was a kid. I don't enjoy this game at all, and the most rewarding part of the game is the sense of progress as you continually gain better items and skills. However, most of the skills are abilities you should have from the beginning, and the items are never very interesting.

All the weapons are created using materials collected from the enemies, and each weapon has stats, much like in a MMORPG like Runescape. There's nothing wrong with this design, but every weapon is just as easy-to-use as the others to me. What's the point of having an axe and a sword if you only need one or the other? Most of the weapons you make will end up being sold to the shop lady for extra money to pay for potions and other actual aids.

On the positive side, the cutscenes are good-looking, and the story is decent, but a lot of the story is told through text, and the characters talk just a bit too much in some cases. Especially that damned shop lady.

I highly recommend staying away from games like this, but if you simply must try it, make sure it's cheap, because it's one of those games you wonder why isn't free.

This game is one of my favorites. It has some really interesting features, including the weapon building system and the Innocent Devil system, while retaining the classic ability-driven exploration feel of the Castlevania series. The bosses are sweet too. I would recommend this game to pretty much anyone willing to try it. It's top-tier quality.

I will agree with a lot of other people that this game is very similar to the previous title Lament Of Sorrow, and not quite as good, but I still had a good time playing it. While I've mostly played the more modern games in the series due to not having consoles as a kid, I've enjoyed almost all of them and this one is no exception. Probably my only complaint was that sometimes it was hard to tell where to go as some of the 'corridor' designs were not easily navigated. I liked the upgraded graphics (courtesy of more powerful hardware) and better load times thanks to the hard drive. Overall I think it's a solid entry in the series and if you can get a good price, give it a try.