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Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (Switch): COMPLETED!

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More than 14 years after last completing this, it was re-released on modern consoles as part of the Castlevania Advance Collection along with some of the other GBA Castlevania games (it’s missing the NES Classic original on there) and Castlevania X for some reason. Since it really needs to be played on a handheld, I bought the Switch version and then played it almost entirely on the TV. Tch.

The general consensus is that of the three GBA IGA-vania games, Circle of the Moon is the weakest. I’ve seen a lot of people say so over the years and it’s my recollection from playing through them all that time ago, but I found this playthrough fantastic so even if it is weakest, it’s still a top tier Castlevania.

Reading back over my previous diary posts on the game, I’m surprised how many of the boss fights I struggled with. This time through, I was marvelling at how easy they were, and it can’t be because I remember how to defeat them because I didn’t remember any of the game at all. Maybe I’m just awesome now? I still struggled with a few “normal” baddies in various areas, especially when you have a few gang up on you, but nothing insanely tricky like my memory suggested. I also used hardly any of the magic card powers, tending to stick to just the “flames that swirl round you” one.

Really good, and great to play through again. Harmony of Dissonance awaits!

Metroid Dread (Switch): COMPLETED!

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It’s been a long time coming, but I have filled this last year or two with many, many Metroidvania games in preparation. Even though I didn’t know it was coming. Of course I ordered it instantly.

And, it was really good. I didn’t expect otherwise, but people were very down on Metroid: Other M and I never really got into that myself either. It was lacking the Metroid lonely atmosphere, I think. Too many other people. Lots of chat. Not quite 2D. It was just a bit off in so many ways. But not here.

There’s a story which attempts to tie into the lore of previous games and references events in them, but ultimately it doesn’t matter as the outcome is the same as it ever was – Samus lands on a planet, some reason for her losing all her powers is concocted, and you then spend the rest of the game reacquiring them, which each opening up new areas of the map. It’s a good job they were all hidden in the exact order and locations they were otherwise you’d have no chance!

Samus is very quick, and has many different moves. These combine to form a slight issue in that the controls are a bit complicated, with often having to use the triggers as kind of shift modifiers, and this results in some moves and combos requiring use of the stick and three or even four buttons at the same time. My old brain can’t cope with that so often I’d be pressing the wrong things, thankfully rarely causing major problems or death. Still frustrating, though!

While I’m mentioning problems with the game, I should mention how easy it was. Previous Metroid games have been (for me) really difficult, especially the bosses, but Dread was was very, very easy. Only the end boss caused me headaches and even then, after a few attempts, I’d managed to see the attacks coming and knew how to best deal with them, so beat him virtually unscathed – eventually.

The EMMI sections, where you had to run and hide from evil robots, were also a problem. They were not fun, and often it would be random if you managed to make it through their designated area as they seemed to spawn in different places. They were like an unwanted gear-change, and didn’t really fit into the game.

Thankfully, none of these negatives really stopped me really enjoying Metroid Dread. Samus slowly becoming an unstoppable beast is, like most games in the genre, the big draw, and the exploration and puzzles are both great. It’s not a perfect game, but it is a fantastic one.

Sunless Sea: Zubmariner Edition (Switch): COMPLETED!

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I used to play Echo Bazaar, an online web-based story RPG thing from Failbetter games, ages ago. Before it was renamed as Fallen London, which is also the setting of the game. It was good, although you really needed to pay for extra moves and features to get the most out of it. I’m against IAPs as a rule so kind of fell off it. I did love the Lovecraft/Pratchett crossover vibe of the world though, and so Sunless Sea – a fleshed out, naval focussed spinoff with no IAPs – piqued my interested. And then, when it was about £4 bundled in with Slain and Snakeybus on the Switch, of course I was going to buy it.

Sunless Sea takes the same story-RPG base of Echo Bazaar, but adds to it an action boating game, where you sail the seas of the Neath – the world below the world – exploring strange islands and trying not to 1) run out of fuel, 2) run out of food, 3) get smashed to pieces, or 4) go utterly insane with terror. It’s also a roguelike in that you, as captain of a barely sea-worthy vessel, are prone to becoming A Bit Dead (due to the reasons above, and more) and when you die, it’s game over. Well, except your heir takes over but can’t carry much of your skills, belongings, money, or even sea charts over.

Much of the game is sailing as far away from London as you dare, interacting with the strange characters and creatures found on outposts and far-away cities, and carting items and dodgy passengers around the map for varying amounts of reward and bonuses. Generally, the further you go, the riskier your trip, as enemy ships and giant sea creatures attempt to kill you but also because your supplies and fuel may not last the trip – and you can’t always restock en-route.

One of the problems of the game therefore is glaringly apparent. Sailing, which is 90% of the game, is slow. Sure, you can upgrade your engines and later, if you have enough money, buy better ships, but even then it takes ages to get from A to B and back. Even the non-boaty bits are also slow, in that there’s a lot to read and digest, and even (I found, anyway) planning to do. Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter, but it does make the game a bizarre dichotomy of laidback ocean trundling and heavy stress panic as your fuel counts down your impending death.

After my first “run” ended abruptly after less than an hour, and the next two or three were little longer, I managed to get around 5 hours into a game only to make a stupid mistake (I bought something which left me without enough money for food, so had to eat my crew, and then I died). Five hours is a long time for a roguelike game, so I was a little deterred. However, I gave it another go and this time managed more than 60 hours before I realised I was close to my goal (“become the greatest explorer” or something was my chosen win condition) and from then on the stress was almost unbearable. Sixty hours of “work”, when I was so close to a win, which could all just vanish at any moment through idiocy or randomness. The trip back to London was torture. But finally, I did it. A win! The end! Phew, eh?

The Magnificent Trufflepigs (Switch): COMPLETED!

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At first glance, and indeed, at several subsequent glances, The Magnificent Trufflepigs looks and feels very much like Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture if it was a series of The Detectorists. It has the same slow, pondering walk through realistic British countryside aesthetic, no combat, and a story which just gets more interesting as you progress. Plus, you have a metal detector and have to dig stuff up.

But the detectoring is just a delivery mechanism for the story, which has you called up by an old friend to help search a local farm for an earring to match one found years earlier. You set off, separately to cover more ground, to discover buried nails, scraps of machinery and bottle caps while discussing how your friend’s life is starting to unravel a bit.

That’s all there is to it – about two hours of digging and chatting in a relaxed, stressless way – until the story reaches the end and there’s a revelation which I have to say I did see coming so wasn’t really surprised. It didn’t matter because it was the journey, the chat and the low-impact gameplay which was excellent and a nice diversion from most other games. And it’s oh so pretty and atmospheric.

Axiom Verge 2 (Switch): COMPLETED!

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I do love a good metroidvania, and I’ve played a fair few in the last year or so, and the original Axiom Verge was a great metroidvania. It’ll come a no surprise, then, that I pounced on Axiom Verge 2 the second I was able to get it from the eShop, and here I am telling you I’ve completed it.

And not just completed, but 100%ed – all items, all the map, everything. Which is a sign of a fantastic game in this genre, as far as I’m concerned.

Axiom Verge 2 isn’t really a sequel to the first game, as it’s more of a tangental story that is linked but separate for the most part. It does away with the “glitch” mechanics of the original, but replaces them with a sort of subspace, low res, corruption of the main world that you can slip in and out of in a similar way to how the two worlds work in Link to the Past. This lets you reach areas which would otherwise be blocked, by sort of skipping round them via a fourth dimension.

The plot is complicated, and references worlds that are linked, different civilisations on at least three of these worlds (one of which is Earth), but it’s interesting if difficult to get your head round. I recall the first game had a similar plot complexity and I’m sure recalling that better would shine more light here, but actually, you can mostly ignore it without detriment.

It’s the gameplay that really shines here, and Axiom Verge 2 eschews the normal combat-filled exploration of the game type with the scales tilted far more in favour of exploring than smacking stuff. In fact, you don’t really have much in the way of ranged weapons like before, and every boss in the game (bar one, I think) can be ignored entirely unless you’re after 100% completion. There are even more pacifistic ways of taking down foes too, as you’re able to hack most of them and turn them off, slow them down, or even turn them against each other.

You have to be this spiderbot thing when you’re in the Breach low-res areas.

Exploration is rewarding, both in terms of eureka moments when a puzzle is solved or an obtuse route is discovered, as well as a new power-up or upgrade is collected. I’m one for colouring in all of the map in these games and there’s a great map to fill in here. In fact, unlike other metroidvania games, the map itself is like a very small set of thumbnails of each location, rather than just a blank box.

And the music! Thomas Happ created some bizarre but incredible tracks for the first game and he’s managed the same here. It’s incredibly atmospheric, and the scratchy chiptunes for the “breach” areas are superb too, matching the low resolution aesthetic perfectly.

Someone broke some stuff then.

One of my favourite games this year, for sure.