Konami changed things in the Metroidvania formula for Order of Ecclesia in a number of ways. Firstly, you play solo as An Actual Woman, a rare thing in Castlevania games. Shanoa is part of an organisation tasked with protecting the world from the possible resurgence of Dracula in a time in history when the Belmonts seem to have disappeared. Spoiler: the organisation actually wants to resurrect Dracula.

Secondly, there’s a world map with many discrete, and mostly small levels. Like with Portrait of Ruin this means many more non-castle themed areas, but also like Portrait of Ruin, some are just recoloured versions of others. There’s still a lot of variety though.

Additionally, Shanoa’s powers are sort of similar to Soma’s, where she absorbs glyphs (rather than souls) from enemies and can then make use of their powers herself. However, each power drains magic points, so even basic attacks can leave you magicless and you have to wait for it to recharge. A bit annoying when all you want to do is slash a boss in the face over and over.

The graphical style is somewhat different to previous GBA and DS Castlevania games too, which, coupled with the new areas and related foes, does mean that the much-maligned asset reuse of the series isn’t apparent here.

When I played this originally, I gave up for some reason. I don’t know why, as I was enjoying it. Presumably something else came along at the time and I just never went back. It means that this time through, I remembered almost nothing bar the first half an hour or so where the story is set up. Imagine my surprise, then, when after completing a load of levels it turns out there is a castle after all – and an huge one, if not quite a full size one, at that. You get to what you think is pretty much the end of the game and suddenly you’ve a whole extra game, sort of, to do!

I think I ended up preferring this to Portrait of Ruin, but all three of these DS Castlevania games have been excellent in their own way.

After so many, let’s be honest, near identical Castlevania games where you go into Dracula’s castle and explore and there’s a ballroom and a clock tower and some sewers, Portrait of Ruin comes up with a way of changing that. Sure, you’re still in the castle, but you’re not up against Dracula – just some other guy who has taken over his house and put paintings up everywhere.

Each painting leads to a different world, so there’s a creepy house, an Egyptian pyramid, a village, and a weird circus where the rooms are sometimes upside down or rotated 90 degrees.

It still plays like a “normal” Castlevania, just these worlds are a bit more linear and it feels like a hub world with levels within it. Like a 2D Super Mario 64? Sort of. Maybe. In this game you play as both Jonathan Morris and Charlotte Aulin, whom you swap between at will. Jonathan is your “standard Belmont type”, albeit unable to make full use of the Vampire Killer whip, and son of John Morris from Castlevania: Bloodlines/The New Generation. Charlotte is a Sypha/Maria magic type and supposedly a descendant of Sypha Belnades. I’d totally forgotten this was effectively a sequel to the Mega Drive game, and it was only when (minor early spoiler) Eric Lecarde from that game turned up that I twigged.

It isn’t as good as Dawn of Sorrow, and the “worlds” in paintings are all duplicated as darker, harder versions later which is a bit of a cheat, but it’s still a great game.

Fun fact: Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow on the DS was my first Metroidvania type Castlevania game. Yes, I played the Holy GBA Trilogy a couple of years after this, and it’s 19 years since I first played Dawn of Sorrow. I’d not even had this diary going for that long at the time.

Somehow, I still remembered a lot of the game. Most of the bosses, how to reach certain areas, and certainly the plot were all there in my head ready to go again, which is odd because the same wasn’t true for the GBA games which I replayed recently on the Switch. This is on the Switch too, by the way, as Konami surprise announced Castlevania Dominus Collection which brings together Dawn of Sorrow and the other two DS games (plus Haunted Castle for $reason) and I preordered it so fast I got whiplash.

To the game, then. It follows on from the Game Boy Advance Aria of Sorrow, following Soma Cruz again as he ends up in Dracula’s castle again, this time up against a cult who are trying to resurrect the Dark Lord in the body of one a couple of prospective vessels.

As with all these games, there’s exploring, map filling, huge bosses and the usual things you’d expect from a Metroidvania. It’s also still really good!

Being a DS game (and following the weird DS trend where game subtitles had to have “DS” as initials) there are some hardware specific things which don’t translate directly to the single-screen Switch. The main one is that the game screen and the status screen (with the maps and stats) now fit on a single screen, although you have control of the size and arrangement.

The other thing is the touch screen controls. They’re still there if you play handheld, but otherwise you use the right stick to move a cursor. It’s hardly needed, just a few areas where you tap blocks. In the original game you had to draw sigils to “seal” beaten bosses, but you can now do these as QTEs instead.

The RPG and soul mechanics of the game are still excellent now and it’s just as playable and fun as it was all those years ago.