I'm just going to come out and say it: I treat Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow as if I was playing a Shin Megami Tensei game. Whenever I reach a new area of the Dark Lord's Castle, I start hunting all of the monsters in the vicinity for their souls. Maybe there's some light exploration involved, but I don't commit to a direction until I've exhausted the screen of anything worth collecting. Some of these souls are taken to Yoko, so that she'll
There is a feeling of over-familiarity that pervades this entry in the Nintendo DS trilogy. After so much time and so many playthroughs, I have lost sight of what compels me to repeat the adventure. Its form has changed so dramatically over the years that I no longer see the Metroidvania. What I'm seeing instead is an amorphous creature. I shape it to fit my whims, and in return it nestles within the nethermost region of my skull, feeding upon the time I continuously fail to do anything productive with. After the credits roll, the creature is expelled, and almost immediately I question what it was that I actually saw in our creation.
Disgust is too harsh a word, but I must be frank that I strongly dislike this game's flavor. Other descriptions that I'd consider too harsh are banal, or the product of a committee, yet the fact that they cross my mind is not something I can ignore. It starts with the music, particularly the first few notes that play in the opening area. They feel like heavily saturated grime dribbled into my ears. The rest of the soundtrack fares only slightly better. Compositionally, it's fine; serviceable synths strung together into adequate arrangements. Underneath however, there is nothing. I've listened countless times over numerous playthroughs for a melody that sang to me. Did I ever hear it? Of course not. Instead, I get these earworms (derogatory) that are frustratingly dull, but never to the point where I want to mute the game and find some actual music to accompany the soul-farming.
Visually, it's all whatever to me. Everything looks fine, nothing stands out. The most interesting portions of the game are in the very beginning and very end. Snow-capped vans situated next to extremely rustic houses hint at what could've been. I also appreciate the surrealistic nightmare realm with the freakin' sweet knives embedded in the walls. All of the castle in-between occupies a dread space where there's neither enough gothic nor modern aesthetics to capture my imagination. It's the interactions with monsters and toying around with their souls that breathe life into each screen.
Yes, here's the part where I start paying Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow some actual compliments. Its attention to creature details is so deep that I'm still making random discoveries. Skeleton Apes, whose sole contribution is tossing their barrel at Soma, will elbow him in the solar plexus when he attempts to sneak up behind them. Every soul that the protagonist makes use of has personality. The mini-Soma that rides Quetzalcoatl is cute as heck. Calling upon Persephone and her vacuum to suck projectiles and HP totally rules. Summoning homunculi, cats, or even Gaibon to crush adversity? Fantastic stuff. I can't forget about Dmitrii Blinov and his ability to copy any soul that's thrown at him. In my most recent playthrough, I tossed a Yorick's skull at him, then proceeded to stab the smug jerk repeatedly as he spammed a fruitless counterattack. It's all these little touches that help make the farming process manageable.
Although the back of the box typically describes Disgaea as an SRPG, I've always thought of it as a cross between a puzzle game and a logistics simulator. To put it another way, I'm always looking for a more efficient grinding method. Arranging the troops to perform a specific set of commands, eliminating several monsters in an instant, and keeping turns to a minimum. This... this is exactly what I see in Dawn of Sorrow. Whenever there's a specific soul or rare drop that I want to farm, I don't just hunt down the enemy that carries it, I hunt them down with efficiency. Everything from the location to the soul-set to the number of moves Soma makes is pared down to the barest of minimums, ensuring that I attain the maximum number of kills in the time I allot myself. It's honestly surprising just how addictive finding these perfect farming routes can get. Cutting away the excess maneuvers until there's nothing left but a lean & clean grind.
When it comes to discussing Dawn of Sorrow's controls, I admit that objectively there's nothing wrong with them. Soma runs, turns, ducks, and jumps with as much grace as a Swan with a dex build. His basic abilities are perfectly natural, demanding a nonexistent level of effort from the player. I say all this, but you already know exactly how I feel. Anything perfectly natural might as well be boredom incarnate. I need an aggressive series of seemingly arcane inputs to keep Soma moving. This game absolutely delivers with multiple flavors of back-dash cancels. By utilizing a constant series of back-dashes and the tiniest of hops, the hero can move noticeably faster. Executing this with any amount of consistency will take a lot of practice. Since I'm being honest though, I'll admit that I'm not a big fan of this movement-tech either. Getting those microscopic hops requires a feather's worth of pressure on the jump button. I prefer the simplicity of getting around in Harmony of Dissonance or even Order of Ecclesia.
All that said, making any effort to learn the absurd movement tech definitely pays off in combat. Let's take the katana for example, which is the most entertaining weapon in this entry. Normally, the katana has a ton of recovery, since Soma sheathes it after every strike. This animation can be canceled by pressing back-dash + crouch. Part of what makes this technique so enjoyable to learn is the penalty for messing up. There's no canceling out of a crouching attack, so alternating between attack and back-dash + crouch has to be done with precision. Altogether, there's an entire layer of depth that I've never even considered pawing at in spite of the seemingly infinite playthroughs I've sunk into this damnable game.
Over the years, much has been said about the boss sealing mechanic. I'm of several minds about it myself and have jumped between all of them depending on the time of day. First off, I won't deny that there is - or at least was - a very real thrill in trying to draw a seal with shaking hands after a tough fight. I also appreciate the system M2 came up with for the Dominus Collection, which linked the seal drawing to a series of button-presses. Nowadays however, I just skip the entire thing with Definitive Edition +. This romhack also fixes the luck-stat so that it influences drop-rates and makes several other QOL changes. In my eyes, it's essential.
With that out of the way, allow me a moment to praise the great boss-fights in this entry. Their unique talents and variety of attacks ensure that they're much more than just a moving target with a lot of HP. I also love how I can use everything available to me to stomp them out quickly or limit my options to create an engaging battle. Maybe next playthrough I'll try to kill the bosses with nothing more than bats and zombies. That'd also give me an opportunity to refine my bat & zombie soul farming strategies. Wow! Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow is just the game that keeps on giving. Well, maybe it could've given a less-crappy final boss, but I can't get too hung up on that filth.
Ultimately, I'd say that my relationship with this game is a complicated one. I hate how cloyingly safe it gets. The acid threatens to erupt from my lips every second I spend listening to its music. So much of what I expect to see in a Castlevania is lost in this whirlwind of suffocating blandness. You saw it yourself, didn't you? The part of me that wants to escape this game so badly that I start to imagine I'm playing something else entirely. Yet in spite of everything, I can never start a new file without seeing it through to the end. There is so much mechanical density that I want to engage with it on a molecular level. I love the ridiculous amounts of movement & combat tech, even if the former threatens to worsen my carpal tunnel. I adore the vast array of abilities. Depending on how my day is going, I can choose to try them all or go straight for the SSS overpowered Guillotiner. I am both fascinated and repulsed by everything this product has to offer.
You should try it sometime if you haven't already.
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