Forums > Submission Feedback > overdrive's Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance review

Good review Rob.

I found a few things:

"That exploration will be supplemented by a whole lot of monster-whipping, as most of the game's corridors and rooms are populated by various unfriendly critters, including a couple of dozen bosses."

The "couple OF dozen bosses" doesn't sound right.

"By dropping the name of Symphony of the Night in this sentence, it marks the seventh time I've mentioned that review in six paragraphs."

I think you meant "game" and not "review."

Otherwise, nice job, and pretty much exactly how I saw the game. Competent, but ultimately more of the same with less magic.

I don't have to prove I'm refined - that's what makes me refined!

Thanks for the kind words and finding a couple errors.

Yeah, I didn't even bother talking about the magic in this game. The main thing I noticed about it was that it made an easy game easier. Early in the game when I'm causing 20 or so damage with my whip, but can combo the ice book and axe to create a big ice crystal that causes 80 or so damage.......gee, what am I going to do against that boss to make the fight end in 30 seconds?

I'm not afraid to die because I am invincible
Viva la muerte, that's my goddamn principle

Ha, hey I meant the 'magic' of the game, not the actual magic in the game. But yeah, that too.

I don't have to prove I'm refined - that's what makes me refined!

Heh.....misinterpreted that one. But you're right about that. I think part of it comes down to the repetitive nature of the enemies, which SotN didn't have. You're in the final couple of areas and still fighting the same skeletons you fought early in the game, but they hit a lot harder and have a little "gimmick" like breaking out of a glass container or being transparent so you can only hit them when they're attacking you. You go to the caverns in one castle and you're fighting a lot of witches and female mages. In the other castle, you're fighting.....palette swaps of those two enemies. And by the end of the game, I was getting really tired of the "big soldier that stumbles backwards after being hit a few times" enemies. They start out as an early game boss.....then become a gimmick where you get them to stumble into something to remove an obstacle (or in one case, give you all the guardian armor, which is good stuff for that time of the game) and then, essentially become mini-bosses guarding some item.

And of course, no Crissaegrim hurts. There's just something really fun about getting it in SotN, power-leveling on the two really tough knights in that one room until you're at an ungodly high level and then just utterly slaughtering everything before it can even react to your presence.

I'm not afraid to die because I am invincible
Viva la muerte, that's my goddamn principle

The main thing making HoD so much easier than the rest is that potions are cheap and there's no inventory cap on them. The difficulty of the SotN-style Castlevanias seems directly tied to potion availability anyway. Circle of the Moon, for instance, does not let you buy any, and the enemies drop them very sparingly. This more than anything is what makes encounters like the Dragon Zombies so difficult. There's no margin for error.

Well, and the fact that without stiff preparation, Dracula can one shot you.

"Deep in the earth I faced a fight that I could never win. The blameless and the base destroyed, and all that might have been. -- GK"