The Castlevania N64 Games are Better Than You Thought | A Contextual Castlevania N64 Retrospective
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- Опубліковано 21 кві 2021
- Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness N64 review. Castlevania needed to 3D games to stay relevant. If you’ve heard the N64 Castlevania games suck, I’m here to tell you they don’t. The N64 CV games are better than you thought.
The way the Castlevania N64 games turned out is a perfect example of how every franchise struggled to transition to 3D. Does this mean Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness aren’t worth playing? Absolutely not. Both Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness are well worth your time.
Sources
vgmuseum.org
www.castlevania.de
castlevania.fandom.com
castlevaniadungeon.net
www.ign.com/articles/1999/11/...
some-generic-customer.tumblr....
www.unseen64.net/2008/04/04/d...
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Thank you so much. That's so kind of you! I'm glad you like the videos
@@MattyStoked I kind of agree it's not an unplayable mess no it's not but original release is rough around edges for sure compared to up dated Legacy of Darkness
Why on Earth is this pinned?
Totally agree! :) Instan sub!
I want a remake of castlevania 64...I live that game
Yeah it's great. I think a remake of this whole game, with only a few updates to the fundamentals, would result in an extremely satisfying game.
I would like that as well
A remake would be very interesting, specially of Legacy of Darkness. I third this.
Dude what the absolute fuck me too!
@@ABCDEFGH-ub7wg lol
Castlevania 64 was the first Castlevania game I ever played. I fell in love with the atmosphere, music and story. It made me a Castlevania fan then and makes me one now. Because of this game, I play and own just about all of the games. You got yourself a subscriber.
Thank you so much, Liz. Castlevania still works so well in 3D. I'd love for us to get a new entry in the series.
I would actually agree with this too. I also played Castlevania 64 first, and I was still blown away at the atmosphere and the characters. I also loved the little story between Reinhardt and Rosa, so I was never going to forget what this game really meant for me.
I had the same experience and it has been an absolute joy seeing its reputation slowly being restored!
The N64 games have so much atmosphere, its like a resident evil game. Especially the first half of the game, you can check everything. Look it up, you can check so many thinks. It adds so much more to the game. The music also, its very atmospheric.
I play LoD every halloween 🎃
LoD has the better camera and is overall the better game with expanded levels, but unfortunately it misses the voice acting for the Reinhardt and Carrie levels.
I really like the music! It's less actiony than other Castlevania games, but it's synthy and atmospheric so it's definitely still in the Castlevania wheelhouse.
I was legitimately gonna say the same thing. Especially the 1st half is amazing. It drips of atmosphere. It hits all the right tones. IMO you can’t complain about the controls and platforming. It’s a product of its time and personally, very manageable.
@@dolemite8282 yeah there was a lot of criticism about the camera/controls back in the day, which was totally overblown in hindsight. Almost all of those old 3D games had the exact same problems. I think people were picking up on smaller nuances at the time, which we’d see as almost trivial now. It would be like if carrots were the only food you had ever eaten; you’d spot even the slightest differences in carrots, and they could be a big deal. Then someone feeds you steaks and ice cream and pancakes and this shit for 20 years. Those differences wouldn’t seem as massive as they used to.
I really dislike Angry Video Game Nerd and JonTron for basically burying this game and it's Sequel/Prequel into the ground and their legion of fans adopting said hate too. I actually started Castlevania on 3D on Legacy of Darkness no less and was shocked that Castlevania was mostly 2D and that folks hated this game. I'm glad that it's getting appreciated and respected now.
It's entirely unfair. I understand the characters have their schtick. But the impact their negativity has had on a lot of games is really unfair. This is absolutely one of them! Check out my most recent upload for the longer, more in-depth review of CV64 :)
@@MattyStoked Will do! Cheers for this video as well mate!
The worst part about AVGN playing Castlevania 64 is that he didn't even check Legacy of Darkness and played Castlevania 64 on Easy Mode, meaning that the game didn't let him get past the Nitro/Mandragora bombs part because Easy Mode is for babies and he just gave up at it. I stopped watching the AVGN a long time ago and realized how much of a hack and a fraud James Rolfe really is.
@@marianokaz1503 I think he has a very specific type of a opinion and is very certain on his thoughts which is why so many people like him but speaking your mind isn't the same as having a relevant or interesting opinion on something and on this, it was terrible. Never been too much a fan myself when I first found him 10 years ago and still not now.
@@marianokaz1503 Yeah unfortunately James has shown his "true colors" a while ago. It should be noted also that he flat out lied in this Castlevania retrospective as he never actually buyed an N64 when he was younger. Before meeting Mike Matei and starting the AVGN his last console had been the SNES.
Konami nailed the ambience, the sense of isolation and sinister creeping threat with Castlevania 64, and it was one of my favourites. It's great to see more creators covering how much better Castlevania 64 was than the net gave it credit for.
Good work!
Thanks. It really is partway to being the best Castlevania game. When I do my Ideas Guy video for the dream CV game, it will be 75% CV64.
Sounds good, I'd started with 1 and 4 before finding C64 and even after having played Crash, Super Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time first I was still really impressed with it.
I feel this game in a very scary ambient!!! The games from 2000 to nowdays are like more adventure not scary at all!!!
Castlevania 64 deserves more love than actually received have a great ambientation , innovative mechanics and awesome soundtrack in my opinion this games have some elements of the classic Resident Evil especially in the castle segments because you always feel unsafe because everytime are enemies spawning and it used the time and day/night mechanics before Majoras Mask , we'll hope that the time give it the place it deserves.
Castlevania 64 en especial castlevania legacy pf darkness, sirvieron de inspiración para dark souls
Reinhardt is the best Belmont and I won't let anyone deny his canon-ness, especially given folks denying his Belmont status is already part of his history. That man is a goddamn sweetheart and his gift to Rosa honestly made me tear up when I saw it.
"God forgives us all Rosa... But you I can never forgive!"
Reinhardt for life
I really loved that storyline between Reinhardt and Rosa. It was so touching. It's too bad that people never took the time to appreciate it, and only judged it based on modern standards.
The Aesthetic of these 64 and early 2000’s games are unrivalled imo. Your imagination had a part in adding to the experience
I absolutely loved the N64 Castlevania games. I never EVER understood why they got shit on so much.
This game was an instrumental part of my childhood, I remember playing it as a toddler and on. The atmosphere was very spooky to a young kid, and even now it's still a little unsettling.
Disappointed about the last half of the game being so linear and about the... subpar controls in some areas, but I think overall this game isn't necessarily bad, just could've used more time to complete properly.
As a child I could not even play through the first level, the atmosphere, in my child's mind, the theme dark, no different than Shadows of Empire, Resident Evil and so on...
Passing each stage and overcoming the fear was an experience in itself....
I remember playing castlevania 64 around 12….first time I experienced true horror and dread in games in the garden maze section
God, I hated that chase bit with Frank and the dogs! True terror haha.
That maze section really gets the blood pumping lol!!
While at my place almost everyone hated the N64 Castlevania games, I ended up loving them a lot, flaw aside, I agree the games got great ideas, and recently I got my chance to get my "revengeance" on Reinhardt and Carrie's quest as I wasn't able to get their good endings (but despite that back in the day, the games got me the biggest joy of saying to my bros. "In your face!!!" as they got soft-locked in Castle Center because they went to the wrong way with the Magical Nitro to the Behemoth arena).
okay but that nitro part is bullshit lmfao
@@littlecr0w Can't deny that Nitro BS (that Legacy of Darkness also has... unless you play as Cornell or Henry without using Gameshark to enter unintended areas like Castle Center for them).
Feels like yesterday that I would be falling off platforms, getting frightened by Cerberus and listening to the unique music within the game. Sure do miss those days without a smartphone 😢
Well worth firing up again! I've been going back through Legacy of Darkness for Halloween. The atmosphere and music is really awesome and it's a fun space to poke around in.
I think if Nightdive Studio would have a chance to remaster this game. I would be leaps and bounds. They would be not only able to to add missing content/deleted content, but also improve on everything else.
i love me some positive takes on media people usually dismiss, and goddamn if i don't really wanna play these games now
Thank you :-) It's nice to have a slightly controversial opinion in the positive, I think. These games get a hard rap. Some high profile negative reviews have cast a long shadow over these games and I think unfairly so. Go get 'em! I'd love to hear what you think :)
I’m really happy to see this video. I’ve been interested in these games for a long time and always thought they looked 110% up my alley, but the negativity surrounding them had me a little reluctant to jump right into them. I can tell now that was foolish. Fantastic video, man! You’re very rapidly becoming one of my favorite channels!
Thank you so much for that lovely comment. That's amazing to read. I think AVGN made a great piece of entertainment when he covered this game all them many years ago, but I think that video did a lot of damage to this game's reputation. There are frustrating parts, don't get me wrong. But nothing any more egregious than any other game on the system. They really are good games. Lots of atmosphere and it shows Konami were really trying to use the medium as a serious way of telling a story. Let me know if you play either one :-)
it gets a lot of unfair hate
Thank yoooou. I love this game and every one always laughs at me. The controls are a little weird on the N64 controller but on a emulator it’s perfect.
Agreed. Ironically, one of the biggest pitfalls of this game is the hardware its on. I suspect if this had been on PS1 it wouldn't have half the negative opinion it's been getting. Still, it's a great game and I love that we can share our opinion on that.
Everyone hated on it because they didn’t have enough sense to keep the camera on action. That and the fact that reviewers played it on easy mode and got locked out of the end half of the game. It’s very sad, because this game is an absolute hidden gem as far as the N64 goes and one of the best horror games on the platform. It has such an amazing atmosphere that is pretty unrivaled, the music absolutely kills it, easily As good as Mario 64 and Zelda. I feel like it more people went into the game with no expectations and an open mind, they’d really love it.
I'm making graphics for a low poly 3d game, and I thought this would be good inspiration to draw from. Got to the castle center so far, and I gotta say, this game is beautiful. The character models are full of style, the environments are at that abstract level of detail where your imagination starts to fill in the blanks. The slow paced gameplay goes well with the graphics too. Great game and review. Thanks for giving this game exposure.
Thank you so much. The low poly work in this is peak 90s. Really clever use of the hardware's limited capabilities. Using an alpha map on the skeleton ribcages is INSPIRED.
Whats the name of your game? I would like to play it when it comes out
@@Paz-EXP That's very kind of you to say that. Unfortunately my job is killing my time atm and it's just me working on this side project. You know how life is haha. Most of the coding is a completed, I'm just completely switching the graphics to low poly style. Because modern just wasn't appealing.
I'm determined to finish though, I'll promise to respond back when something substantial is completed.
@@Paz-EXP Hey dude. I'm not sure if you're still curious but I just recorded a small gameplay video on my channel. Still got lots more to do but it's a start... I hope @The Game Show doesn't mind me shilling my projects here :P
I love castlevania 64 the ambience is superb I have and always had 0 problem with controls maybe because I played it to death and. Mastered it, it felt muuuch more like a castlevania game than lords of shadow. Seriously I dont remember having issue with the controls even if you died there was always a save crystal nearby. Anyway Love castlevania 64. Is a friking gem. And the soundtrack is amazing.
As a kid, like 9 years old, this game was super scary
Castlevania 64 was my second game for N64. Totally loved the game my favorite stage was Villa.
It's really something that SCIV and Bloodlines came out around the same time, were so different and yet so good, and the same thing happened again with SotN and C64.
Don't forget the Game Boy games, too! Konami had entirely different teams running in parallel, which is why they're all so unique. Sometimes they would share ideas, but I like to think there was an element of playful competition between them.
@@MattyStoked The GB games get shit on a lot too. I’ll concede that Castlevania Adventure is easily the weakest of the 80s/90s games (though I still enjoy it quite a bit), but Belmont’s Revenge and Legends are fantastic.
@@tds2117 Belmont's Revenge is a certified banger! I've covered them too, check out the uploads list :-D
@@MattyStoked great! I’ll check them out soon.
Side note: Legends ending up as the rare, hyper-priced Castlevania game is strange as fuck. I can’t figure out how that happened. I’d sell mine if not for the fact that my pre-IGA CV collection is pretty bangin and I don’t want to take away from it.
LOD has been on my top 10 N64 games of all times. They can be wonky but the art design, characters, story and especially the music, I mean the Science and Art Tower themes are just amazing!
I first played Legacy of Darkness and not C64, so I had the "complete" experience first hand. I hold good memories of it, and of course I don't hate it.
For me was a good game, just rough around the edges.
I think that's an entirely fair review. Rough around the edges, but full of heart. Like all my favourite people
It's really a shame that a game as excellent as Legacy of Darkness has been forgotten in the shadow of its predecessor that it had serious problems because of its very rushed development that didn't generate a good fame. The game shows that Castlevania 64 would really be an evolution of the game series if Konami's studio in Kobe team had more development time and it was a great video talking about it.
Castlevania 64 absolutely _was_ an evolution of the series. It's a really great game! It's interesting that so many other horror games started coming out to compete with it. I think that's really what worked against it so much.
These games were wonderful. In my opinion far more enjoyable than all later 3D installments. Love the moody, Castlevania IV-esque atmosphere. It's a tragedy these didn't perform better and I hope one day they get the respect they deserve. Thanks for helping to spread the word.
I remember playing these when I was young. I started with Bloodlines and became a hardcore fan of the series. These two were a nice breath of fresh air for the game. Great music, hard to beat on the harder difficulty, good story and great bosses. I’ll always love them and wish we’d get a remake combining both games.
Actually, the motorcycles with sidecars and MG42s were in the original CV64 as well. They only show up once you play Hard mode.
Personally I prefer the final boss from CV64 vs the one of LOD.
If you play on hard mode it's basically launching one hit kill nuclear homing plasma balls everywhere, using one hit kill earthquake attacks, summoning dragons made of fire to hunt you down...
The most chaotic fight in the game for sure.
This video deserves way more than 20k views. Production quality is really good, review is clean and well thought out and you come across as very professional whilst also being genuine and down to earth. Really enjoyed this! Also I love Castlevania LOD so I’m biased 😊
Thank you so much. Feel free to share the video, it's the only way it will get more views! Facebook, Twitter, text it to your mates. It all helps!
I LOVE Legacy of Darkness. Fantastic Castlevania game. The atmosphere and gameplay are exactly what I wanted in a 3D Castlevania. Cornell was super cool and you could play as Henry then unlock the previous game's characters and stories but with the new updates. Beautiful.
As someone that has loved these games since 1999 I am so glad to see videos like this. This was also such a well put together video you got a subscribe from me.
Thank you so much! Thanks for the sub, it means a lot. You will be rewarded as the next video is a much longer one just about Castlevania 64 ☺️
One of the best N64 Castlevania reviews i have ever seen, that was heartwarming, enjoyable, calming and awesome. You deserve all the praise, love, happiness and then some. 💐🎂🥳🍾🤝🇪🇪
Thank you so much. I'm glad you enjoyed your stay. Same back at you xxx
I’m so stoked to see this series continue! These Castlevania games are kind of a blind spot for me cause I never owned an N64, but man do they look cool. I know emulators show graphics at their sharpest but even then, this games graphics hold up so well. I love the synergy between our videos with skeletons on motorcycles LOL!
Sometimes emulation can show the flaws, the CRT covers a multitude of sins! But these games look great to me. Thanks man, I'm glad you liked this and yeah, I love that we're both covering boney biker bois 🤣
Really glad to see this video. The whole narrative that 3D castlevania doesn’t work is just ridiculous and has only ever been one of those pretentious ‘doesnt this sound clever’ things that every fandom has. It’s a lot like how the IGA era fans sort pretend that his canon was always canon as opposed to the truth in that he retconned the hell out of the series (Scv4 was not intended as a remake, rondo and Sotn were designed to be non canon spin offs as was bloodlines and the n64 games were actually the relaunch of the main series that had died with scv4). It even got the point that people were calling the blonde x68k Simon (who looks just like Christopher belmont but nothing like Simon) ‘classic Simon’ despite the Cv1/2 Simon having the shorter red hair in all of the official artwork it sourced out to separate artists. Or how LoS is a blatant remake of Cv1/2/4 featuring elements and plot lines from each of them and Gabriel and Marie being obvious Simon and Selena stand ins due to them making the games ‘stand-alone’. All this stuff should be obvious to a fan but the narrative is so muddled because a core group of the fandom who loved the gba/ds games have essentially written the franchise into a corner whilst buying into inaccuracies spread by IGA at the time. The idea that the n64 games were non canon spin offs that weren’t good is a totally inaccurate idea yet the most popular one as a result of all this.
Fantastic insight here. Castlevania works just as well in 3D. I can clearly see a genetic line between this game and modern horror-themed action games like Darksiders, Dark Souls or God of War. You could take everything in this game, give it a tidy up and it could hold its own against anything on the platform (or since)!
I put the whole blame on IGA and his toxic fanbase. He totally shat on these and Castlevania legends. But brought Cornell back for Judgement🤷🏽♂️. Konami is also to blame as they should have done more advertisement for LoD not just the one magazine ad that only poped up in EGM and Gamepro, I don’t even remember Nintendo power putting an add up. Konami definitely learned a lot from these titles as the Mystical Ninja staring Goemon was fantastic. Love this video and love the insight man good to see a Castlevania fan who actually know what they are talking about.
Your opinion mirrors mine and probably most fans from the pre-IGA era. Fuck that guy. He ruined the series.
Wait what?
Super Castlevania IV since its conception was conceived as a retelling or new perspective of the events told in the first Castlevania of the NES on a new console with increased qualities, and neither is considered canon within the official timeline that considers only the original NES game as the pure version of the Simon Belmont's story and Castlevania Chronicles (a re-release of Akumajō Dracula X68000) as a legitimate remake of the first NES Castlevania as described in the interview coming as a bonus on the CD. Castlevania: Rondo of Blood from the beginning was a main title that was continuing the story told in Simon's Quest with Richter Belmont being responsible for facing Dracula 100 after Simon, and his Japanese title of Akumajō Dracula X: Chi no Rondo was made due to being the 10th release of the game series (10 in Roman numerals is X) and the Japanese titles did not respect sequential as in western titles (only Simon's Quest numbered Dracula II: Noroi no Fūin); while Symphony of the Night was actually made a spin-off following the Rondo of Blood while preparing a main title that was not the Nintendo 64 games but rather a project that was cancelled dubbed "Castlevania: The Bloodletting" that would come out to PlayStation for being the best media option of the time.
The Nintendo 64 games as well as the Circle of the Moon released for the GameBoy Advance were designed as spin-offs in Konami's studio in Kobe that would not conflict with the major projects developed in the Konami's studio in Tokyo, and this was said by director Yuji Shibata himself. The idea of Nintendo 64 games not being canons because they're not good doesn't really make sense, because The Adventure released for GameBoy is also poorly received and remained in the canon causing a confusion of which game would pass 100 years before Simon Belmont, The Adventure or Dracula's Curse because they both count that it's 100 years before Simon, and only after organizing the timeline was granted the idea that Dracula's Curse takes place in 1476, The Adventure in 1576, Belmont's Revenge in 1591 and the first NES Castlevania in 1691.
This retrospective is really good. After seeing this I want to try those 2 games. I hope we get a remake of these 2 and keep its atmosphere and aesthetic, but better.
Thank you! I'm glad you're interested in these two old games now ☺️ I'd love to see a remake with modern controls!
Its 2022 and nowadays remakes are a bad choice nowadays because they change too much that it loses everything that was good in the original games.
I prefer a collection of all 3d castlevanias with legacy of darkness included .
Esa Castlevania 64 me gustó muchísimo es un juego muy entretenido y re-jugable y su banda sonora es genial👍
Este juego necesita un remake
as a 6-7 year old playing this game. The Maze in the Villa traumatized me. to this day whenever i think back on things that terrify me its one of the first examples i go to its so surreal. this game in general has left such a big imprint on me in terms of its aesthetics art design and sound design wise and ive never really found a game quite like it.
This is EXACTLY what I love about making UA-cam videos. These little stories that touch us and bring us together. Thanks for the story, mate. Pleased to hear it ☺️
ive been singing legacy of darkness' praises for years! no one believed me, bastards probably never even tried.
I'm here for you. There's no reason that these games should be so widely derided. They're great!
@@MattyStoked I'm just glad people are finally coming round to them!
These two games were so amazing. It just became popular to hate on them because they weren’t the best thing to ever exist when Castlevania went 3D. Great review. 👍
Excellent and well informing video :) also greatly appreciate the unbiased review and your experience of the game. Good to see not everyone is a sheep, afraid to say what they feel. great job!
Glad you enjoyed it! I would say I am biased towards being positive, but I'm glad to be seen TBH :-D
Brilliant video mate. It's easy to get hung up on the weaknesses of these N64 games, but there are some really fun ideas in them and I agree that they play better than their reputation would lead you to believe. A spiritual sequel with some of the same concepts but a more refined 3D engine could be a really good time!
I completely agree with this. The PS2 Castlevania games and arguably games like God of War, Prince of Persia etc have a small debt to pay to these games. Kicking open those doors for the first time.
Those motorcycle skeletons jump scared the first time i saw them
played castlevania 64 as a kid.
played it again as an adult.
never understood why anyone didn't enjoy it.
Exactly! It's a good game!
Castlevania 64 was soooo fun and it was pretty difficult too
It's definitely difficult!
These games actually aged quite well. I can go back and play these all the way through and have a great time doing it, unlike a lot of other n64 games. The camera isn't even that bad either like people make it out to be. It seems to always be where it needs to be for each platforming area. I remember speedrunning through the sewers with Carrie, and the camera followed you almost perfectly around corners and thin/tightrope bridges you ran over. Play this, then pop in Super Mario 64 afterwards and tell me which camera follows you better for platforming.
The camera is really good! You don't have as much control over it. That's all. It does a lot more thinking on your behalf but exactly like you said, it's surprisingly intuitive and I never really found myself getting stuck because of the camera.
Once you master the wonky camera quirks it is quite good. The atmosphere is grand.
Indeed! Thanks for joining in, my friend :)
I just finished Cornell story and I'll say it has the best 3d platforming controls i ever played. This 90's game reminded me something that Ubisoft did only in 2005 with Prince of Persia (Two Thrones) and guess what, it feels better in C64.
The only horribly bad thing in this game is final boss. Attacks just goes through Dracula and you have to deal with his fd up frames plus ultimate Dracula (just try it on "normal" without save states for the first time)
Great video, atmosphere looks on point and I was thinking about trying them since a long time...
But still not sure about if I could handle the gameplay lol
I love this game. I have played most Castlevania games, except for the PS2 ones which I haven't been able to get and the Lords of Shadow ones and Castlevanai 64 and Legacy of Darkness are likely the ones I've played the most, I'll beat the game twice in one sitting.
Reinhardt is my favorite Belmont ever (and yes, he is a Belmont, listen, when Death itself calls you Belmont that's because you are). Unlike most Belmont's before him he actually had a story, experienced emotions and loss and goes through character development.
The whole idea that they were bad came from one idiot UA-camr who purposely played wrong and overblew the Nitro bit. I consider pretty much every other Castlevania to be harder than this one tbh.
I think Death calls Reinhard "Belmont" is because during development he was originally called Schneider Belmont. Most likely they forgot to fix it 😂 I love this game too, but the PS2 games (specifically Lament of Innocence) live in my head. I paid a lot of money for physical copies of Lament and Curse of Darkness, but I really have no qualms with emulating them. I would highly recommend them.
And yeah, there are a couple of big heavyweight UA-camrs who certainly dented this game's rep a long time ago and it doesn't seem to be able to recover. The nitro bit is hard, but it's really unique and it definitely stays with you! But all told, it takes less than an hour to do that whole section so I don't see the issue.
So. Used to live in this huge warehouse. 8 to 10 people. Huge artist/loft/warehouse space with common areas. This was right after 96 the Atlanta Olympics . And before 9/11 The downtown support from the city in the more "darker" areas disappeared for like 10 years stopping gentrification in certain areas. We got this space for a steal.
Anyways, we had a common living room with a 64. Had Castlevania 64 and pod racers.
Saw literal fist fights over pod racer games lol.
But I.loved that Castlevania game. Someone erased my save when... It's hard to remember but it was like a king's garden area. I feel like there was a maze too.
Anyways. Lovely game. With I could play it again on any of my systems PS5 or Xbox one. I got the.... It's like a Castlevania package from the PlayStation plus . But it had games I hadn't even heard of lol. Didn't even have the original NES versions lol.
Also. I love the part when you say " there's elements from previous games here. And weapons . And..... ". Then while saying this you see a flying/floating fish coming out of some portal lol(unless that's from a previous game, then I was unaware).
And we used to make a joke all the time....
"Man this place sucks. It would really suck if there were skeletons riding around on motorcycles.
Or man this place is cooler. It would be even cooler if they had skeletons riding around on motorcycles.
Wow. Haven't thought about that little one liner we used to all say for a long time now. Thanks for the memories, sir!
That's a great story, thanks for sharing!
Hey! Happy to have found your channel and this video! How do get that image quality?
Happy to have you here, thanks for the lovely comment! Do you mean the quality of the game footage? I'm running it in an emulator, which allows me to up the internal rendered resolution. It doesn't improve the texture quality, but it renders the geometry at a higher res, so it looks really crisp and clean.
I recently finished beating castlevania 64 as I’ve never beaten it due to not having a save pack but honestly the game was really fun to beat as both characters and the controls were never a problem and playing on an og n64 controller felt super good and the only problem I had with the controls was letting go of ledges resulting in death but eventually realized it was my fault cause I’d let go of the button so I think for most people it was them not understanding the controls cause after learning my mistake it made the game a lot smoother, and camera angle wise was never a problem atleast for other than the 1st stage of the Dracula fight but I also recently went to play castlevania 1,2,3 and Although I have a lot of respect for these games I honestly think I prefer castlevania 64 a lot more, the atmosphere, level design, story, sound track was amazing and even love how they included a lot of designs from the original games, like whip upgrade, sub weapons, platforming etc castlevania at its core was to go through a castle and defeat Dracula and this does just that but still pays respect to the original games while still trying to be its own game, if you’ve never played the game in it’s entirety I highly recommend but I also know it’s not for everyone
Thanks for that high effort comment! I'm glad to meet another fan. In fact you're a bigger fan than I am, so well done you!
What i found really cool about this game was how Carries bad ending was actually her canon ending so she ended up becoming Draculas wife later on which would of been really cool to see in later games.
Hell yeah, give me a game where I play as badass goth gf Carrie
Citation?
@@harlannguyen4048 i keep trying to post but the comment keeps getting deleted.
@@rc59191 Keep trying
@@harlannguyen4048 i been UA-cam doesn't let me post links anymore
I have not seen the video yet, but just know that I have already subscribed due to the title alone. Finally, a UA-camr with a good take.
Now THAT is the kind of comment I like. Thanks bud! :-D
Crazy imagining any Metroid prototypes. Even if they were ultra basic from devs just fooling around.
In the 90's we didn't know better: we took other people's opinion for granted, and many injustices occurred. I agreed that both N64 Castlevania games are definitely good games. Not the best, not the worst. Today, I signed Gamepass, and no one tell me which games are good or not, I play by myself and do my own judgement. The days of professional reviewers are ending.
Games cost a lot of money. Back in the 90s they cost a lot more in terms of comparison to average income. I can see why reviews existed, but this game in particular is a victim of the "rage reviewer" trends of the late 2000s unfortunately :( In the 90s, these games got pretty decent reviews!
This was my first Castlevania game. I was 5 years old (am 26 now) and my dad and I grinded through this game together. A memory burnt into my head is when you have your first vampire encounter in the like dressing room. It grapples our character and my dad said, “Get off me, you prick” to which 5 year old me said, “Yeah, get off him, you prick.” And well..was told not to say that lmao. Someone deleted our save file though or it got corrupted. Was a bummer. Was so close to beating the game, too.
I never knew these games were this hated until a few years ago, and I'm guessing a lot of the hate was spread online by people who were just repeating the opinions of a few others and never played the games themselves. I never owned CV64 (N64 games were stupid expensive), but I spent a weekend playing it with my cousin and thoroughly enjoyed it. Sure, it has its fair share of jank by today's standards, but so did a lot of early 3D third person games.
Exactly this! It *is* a bit janky. But is it significantly jankier than *any* 3D game from the late 90s? No!
I never disliked the Castlevania 64 games. In fact CV64 is actually my personal favorite of the series. It has a lot of atmosphere and the music is brilliantly gothic. Of course the camera can be tricky and frustrating(which was mostly fixed in LoD).
Yeah, completely agreed! Thanks for the comment :)
I played legacy of darkness in 2006 I think, and even when I already played stellar games, I really liked it even ignoring it was sequel of the 1st born 3D game of this dev team. I know the game has issues but I rate it quite good and not only for nostalgia. I played C64 afterwards and it was a totally different experience. LoD had lot of qol improvements over the original which made going back hard.
This guy is right about these games. The castlevania on the n64 are great games that should be played.
Thank you, I'm glad you agree!
@@MattyStoked Your welcome!
What i didn't like about Castlevania 64 was all of the jump puzzles with terrible camera angles. But it might have the best title intro of any game i've played with the violin music and the "Transylvania, in the mid-19th century..." I will watch the video now.
It's got a great opener. I agree, the traversal mechanics are unrefined, but that's a hallmark of the era. Like I said in the video, I just used save states to compensate for the fact that you'll often die from miscalculating a jump. I don't see that as cheating, just using the emulator to sidestep something less enjoyable.
I never finished Castlevania 64. That dumb magical nitro section was a huge roadblock for me.
By the way, 2 of my favorite Castlevania songs are in these 2 games. Invisible Sorrow (which plays in the underground tunnels) and the version of The Sinking Old Sanctuary (which plays in the art tower.
That nitro thing wasn't anywhere near as bad for me as it was for others, apparently. Could I suggest trying it again with save states? It may well improve your enjoyment of the game :)
I grew up on these games. I would love to see them remade with modern graphics and voice acting. Or at least re-released on digital like they've done for other old Castivania games. Sadly neither will probably never happen though.
Konami have shown that they're able and willing to re-release the old Castlevania games. I'd really like to see a digital re-release. Perhaps they'll be included if we ever get an N64 mini?
@@MattyStoked It was just announced the other that the analog 3D will play N64 cartridges and upscale them to 4k. It's rumored to be released in 2024 some time.
This game is the reason that I got my scholarships. The opening scene. The beauty to its sound had me fascinated with the string family even as a small child. I wanted to reproduce the music of this game so I opted to learn to play it. This was back when your internet connection was still tied to your phone line so music piracy wasn't easy do let alone even have anything to play it on unless you recorded it off your speakers with your walkman.
This comment absolutely wins because of the era-specific piracy. Well done you!
If Legacy of Darkness had released first (as was obviously intended) it might have been considered one of the N64 greats. The manner in which these games released is what killed them in the end. Shame; they’re fantastic! And that theme you played from the Art Tower level is one of the best in the series.
The music is a really interesting point. Going from those hi-energy synth tunes to this atmospheric ambience was a turning point for the series. And I'm all for it.
Really loved c64 and c64 part 2 electric Boogaloo. In fact I still do. Nothing beats getting mad at the magical nitro part. I prefer the first game over legacy of darkness when i play Carrie or Reinhart. All the voice acting for their scenarios feel more limited in legacy. Gone are the opening narrations for both of those characters. The meeting on top of the tower after the boss fight is silent while the musical cues remain. The music has always been great and the addition of old sinking sanctuary for parts of Cornell's segments is one of the best renditions of the tune.
I played so much of this game since I was a teenager that I absolutly have no problem with the controls. And I love this game so much. I think konami got the atmosphere and feeling just right Im a fan of Dracula and vampires so I love C64 atmosphere so much even to date... still symphony of the night Draculas curse Super C4 and aria of sorrow are my top favorites. C64 have a special place on my heart thou.
I had 7 Zelda on my wii and I was a happy: Legend of Zelda I, Adventure of Link II, Link to the Past III, Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword. Sadly what it didn't have was Link's Awakening, Wind Maker, and Link between Worlds. If it did I'd a been more happy. All 10 titles are the best and only good Legend of Zelda. In looking for a portable that's good quality, immersive screen, good power, long battery, and with all these titles. An elusive search indeed.
I also had Castlevania I, Simons's Quest II, Dracula's Curse III, Akumajo Dracula (SC4), Legacy of Darkness, and Rondo of Blood. Would a love it if they had Symphony of the Night but it did not. 🤔
This was some years ago on the wii before they shot down the virtual console. Sadly my wii was stolen from my apt I lived in at the time.. never got a system since.
They're really fine games of their times. I still much prefer the PS2 era (and would actually rank Curse a banger alongside Lament) but they're really fun nonetheless. Speaking of the ranking I'll definitely watch the DS games videos as I want more insight on that Order of Ecclesia ranking. It was one of my favorite 2D Castlevania and my favorite DS one by far so I expected it just below Banger truthfully! The versatility of the gameplay letting you make your way through skill or leveling was amazing. And the combat actually made me feel the same way you described LoI's orb system. It created an interesting and innovative combat experience!
Thanks for the high effort comments across these videos, mate. They will all be covered in time! GBA is up next, then I'll drop back to the PS1. DS will be before I cover the two PS2 games together. The DS games are all straight bangers if I'm honest, it will be hard to choose between them.
Thank you for this video!
Long story short, this game was a mainstay in my friend group growing up. We were speedrunning it before we even knew what speedrunning was!
A memorable experience was when my friend's younger brother played this for the first time; he had a spooky blast!
Such good memories!
That's so great to hear. I'm so glad you enjoyed the video! I've really enjoyed hearing people's personal stories with this game. I'm so glad to have made this video :-)
Nice to see someone who appreciates the 3D Castlevania games.
I thank you so much for defending this game. I had so much fun while playing this as a kid. The garden part with Frankenstein and the stone dogs chases you was just heart pounding the first time i did it.
I didn't understand why I couldn't move. Once it clicked that dogs paralyse you, that segment had such a great horror synergy. It's pretty damn terrifying!
This game was my childhood and OMG i was obsessed! Carrie Fernandez was my fav character and Actrise the witch was my fav boss of all time and she inspired my love for witches and her aesthetic 💙 i wish they would remake this game. Elden ring being the blueprint for what a game should be like map and story wise, castlevania would be a huge success.
Castlevania has always been relevant! It wears its influences on its sleeve, in a way far more obvious than Elden Ring. But a big 3D castle and the surrounding forest, with big spooky vibes and a strong focus on melee combat is honestly just the perfect idea for a computer game.
When I watched the Angry Videogame Nerd barely play this for his Castlevania retrospective I always thought that Castlevania 64 was a bad game until I found out he was playing it on Easy Mode and in that mode you can't progress in the Nitro and Mandragora part, he didn't even play Legacy of Darkness either, what a schlock!
I have always had a huge love and respect for him. But his coverage has done a lot of damage to the public perception of this game. Just doing my bit to try and re-address the balance.
Crazy atmosphere scary moments as a kid creepy vibes everywhere very hard in a good way and overly hated on
This game came out hot on the heels of Ocarina and after Symphony of the Night. So, it got a double dose of fanboy hate from the Sony camp and oddly enough, from its own console's fanbase due to them dogging it because of Ocarina.
I'm not saying it's better than either one of those 2 games, btw, but it got destroyed by people due to their devotion to those other 2 games (and console in the case of Sony fans).
I love finding videos like this this game was awesome back in the day and like you said it got pretty good reviews. it wasn't until the AVGN video that the game stated getting universally bashed mainly by the Iga/SotN cultist. Thanks for this video subscribed right away.
Absolutely agreed. The 2010s ranty-reviewers did a lot of damage that I'm trying to fix. More Castlevania in a few weeks!
I think the problem was people didn't realize AVGN's reviews were just meant to be satire and not a genuine review but of course the IGA purist took this as gospel and ran with it.
Reinhardt is an actual unit, one of my most admired characters from childhood that I wanted to be. I was very new to gaming when I first played Castlevania 64, in fact N64 was the first system that was truly mine and I played this right after Ocarina of Time. There's nothing quite like what this game delivers, if you can forgive it for its first impressions. I started a new save file on my steam deck recently and I'm looking forward to experiencing Rienhardt and Carries' story again. And I very much appreciated the new main character, QoL improvements and other additions. LoD is one of those games that has a cult status but not the recognition it deserves. That's a shame but I'm so thankful there was LoD, whatever that might mean to each person. I personally view it as an expansion of sorts, and I don't remember being as excited for anything else than I was to experience LoD which built on the base game that I already loved and played for countless hours.
I am absolutely loving meeting people who share the same view as me on this game. LoD in particular is a great deal - you technically get the Reinhard and Carrie quests included after you beat the game, with remixed content, new costumes and the QoL improvements included with LoD. Genius
I remember Castlevania and Legacy of Darkness for the N64. I play LoD and my brother played Castlevania…. Great memories watching each other play.
The ps1 and ps2 castlevania games are legendary greats! Saved the franchise
Check my most recent upload!
First wanna start by saying I heard this game was very unliked which surprised me. My childhood memories of being scared but excited to play this game was awesome. I liked playing the second character because I could shoot balls of light at enemys.
The castle def feels "empty" but thats to be expected with the N64 limitations. I never thought of this game as a "bad" game.
It's a really great game and I'm glad we're all on board with enjoying it. Carrie is a really cool character. And she's available from the start which was unusual up to this point.
Thank you for making this video! CastleVania 64 and Legacy of Darkness were my childhood, my soul in physical form! I have loved EVERYTHING about these games still to this day. The gameplay, the story, the levels, the music, the enemies, the sound effects, and of course the characters. This game means the world to me and it always made me sad with how little love and respect the game got, so to see someone show some love and appreciation to it brings me so much joy. thank you
You're very welcome! That's a lovely comment. I'm actually blown away by the positive response this video has got. I've got a couple of standalone Castlevania videos coming out this year. One of which is a deep dive into Legacy of Darkness on the N64. If that sounds good, hang a sub and I'll see you there :)
My first Castlevania game was on the N64 this game is nothing but nostalgia and great platforming in my opinion. Legacy of Darkness is the Definitive version
Also, one thing that is bugging me for years and I was hoping you could help me out 😜.
Why....how....when you jump as Cornell in the coffin in the villa, howcome you end up at the outer wall? 🤔. I can understand the caves (Reinhardt) or the sewers (Carrie), but the outerwall?
Please help 🙋🏽♂️
Maybe it's a really fancy toilet? I know fancy old castles would sometimes have the latrines piped out to slop all the poo and wee down the castle walls and into the moat. Maybe Cornell goes down the poop chute? Stinky boy.
Simons Quest at the very top (11:25) over symphony of the night lol interesting…
I think SotN is pretty mid...
I think Simon's Quest is pretty good...
So, y'know
Shocked to hear the N64 controller isn't great for platforming in this. SHOCKED. well, not really that shocked. Great video as always
Evan stop bullying the N64 controller. It was a good controller that pushed the boundaries. And you could duel wield them.
Thanks mate! Yeah the thing about the N64 controller was that it was already kind of problematic when it was new, but they rarely age well. So playing on original hardware now is a lot harder than it needs to be.
Man, I can’t imagine playing them on anything other than that dumb controller.
Nice job on the video. I'm currently playing Castlevania LoS series (x360) and they are really good. Definitely inspired by DMC and God of War.
Thank you! I absolutely LOVE the LoS games. The second one in particular is in my too 5 X360 games.
Wonderful video man. Your videos are top notch quality.
Thank you so much, that means a lot!
I wonder how these two games would be regarded if they were played with new ergometric controllers instead of rhe origonal clunky n64 control pads. I own a lot of Dreamcast games and the arena fighters like Power Stone and Heavy Metal are a pain to play originally but using a streamline 3rd party controller like the StrikerDC makes them a joy. I bet the same thing would happen with a newly designed n64 controller.
I hope I made a good enough point about the controller being one of the weaker aspects, which is entirely alleviated by using a better controller! Funnily enough - you mention the StrikerDC. RetroFighters did actually make a redesigned N64 controller, which I reviewed on the channel when it came out! Take a look at that :D
I played them both fairly new abs enjoyed them completely. I remember being confused by Castle64 at first and thought "this isn't what I wanted" but it quickly became a fun experience.
I tried playing it a few months ago and thought it sucked, but gave it a second chance here recently and I am now enjoying it. I think it just took me some time to get used to the controls.
I find that going back to old games often takes some time to readjust. You have to take off your preconceptions and go in with a completely open mind. You can really find some great old gems that way!
Castlevania 64 is a magnificent game with some understandably frustrating technical problems.
the only thing that i hate about this game is that the main character get damage after falling down and he can not go back to the stage where he used to be once he has cleared that stage
I really enjoy the non-linear section of the game and it would be fun if Konami had managed to realise that all the way through the game. Linear games were common at the time so I don't see this as a great sin, but it would definitely have been better if the whole game was one free roamable space.
My favorite Castlevania game.
Carrie Fernandez was my favorite and it would be cool to have co op at as well. Expand the first Forest of Silence and give character combos and Carrie Fernandez can have multiple powers maybe even levitation and variety of magic or psychic attacks. Diff type or whips etc.
A co-op Castlevania game would be awesome. It's common to have multiple playable characters, so why not have them all at once?!
I had the first N64 Castlevania and absolutely loved it. I did not even know that Legacy of Darkness was released during the N64's run and it was out of print when I was trying to get it. My then girlfriend (and now wife) looked around and found a used copy at a GameStop or Funcoland. I played the hell out of it then and still play it every now and then through emulation.
I'm glad you wifed that girl. She's a keeper!
Perhaps the best aspect of Castlevania 64 is that out of the 3D Castlevania games, it translates the trap and obtacle mechanics of the side scrolling Castlevania games pretty well. The guillotine blades in the hallways, the rotating cogs, the potential falls into the abyss? All there.
Good to hear from you, Alucard!
@@MattyStoked Thank you
I've played all of the Castlevania games countless times and Legacy of Darkness is probably my fave, its so much fun, always beat it at least twice whenever i put the cart on the N64 lol
Yeah, it's absolutely a top five pic. Really fun game. If it was rebuilt now in a slightly more sophisticated engine it would easily be a hit. Great game.
It’s surely in my top 3. Definitely the most enjoyable.
THANK YOUUUUUU
Castlevania 64 is one of my favorite games!!
its so good man. Thank you for this
Thank you for your lovely comment 💗