Alex_The_Hedgehog

User Score
8.0

Presentation - 10
Gameplay - 8.0
Value - 8.0

Back in my Super Nintendo days, a friend of mine had a japanese game cartridge about a "guy with a chained whip". Well, that's how we called Richter at that time. I absolutely loved that game. A few years later, I discovered what was the actual title. Castlevania: Dracula X.

This game is actually a "demake" from Rondo of Blood, for PC-Engine. You control Richter Belmont, and with the help of his whip, and a few different weapons, you must once again destroy Count Dracula and his troops.

But there's more: Annette and Maria were captured by the evil forces, and are locked somewhere in the castle. Can you find and rescue them? Something bad will happen if you can't...

The gameplay here is actually a step down from Super Castlevania IV: Richter can only use his whip forwards. If you press the jump button twice, he will perform a backflp. Not exactly the most useful move, but it can help you to avoid some enemies.

There's something new, though: The Item Crash. The sub-weapons (Cross, Holy Water, Axe, Knife) can be used when you collect hearts. If your heart counter is blinking, that means you can perform a special attack by pressing X. If you have no itens, Richter will use a fire whip strike.

There's a total of nine stages, but you will only pass through seven of them, since there is a secret route, very hard to get it on your first playthrough. You'll know when you reach this point. There's a password system, so don't worry too much about that for now. By the way, the true ending (best ending) is really hard to get at the first playthrough, so I sugest you to do a Bad Ending run first. Like I said, you will probably notice what you must do to reach the best ending, but I doubt it will be possible on a first playthrough, since it requires plenty of skills.

The difficulty... Well, since I play this game since my childhood, it's not that hard for me, but I see where people are coming. It has a lot of mortal traps in Dracula's Castle, and the bosses don't go easy on you. But since there's a password for each stage, I think it's not that bad.

The graphics and the soundtrack are probably the best thing about this game. Dracula X is still a beautiful experience. I feel like the music is almost CD quality, and the visuals are very impressive for a 16 bit platformer.

Overall, many people say that Dracula X is a step down from Super Castlevania IV. I prefer to think of them as individual experiences. We all know a Rondo of Blood port for SNES was probably impossible, but Dracula X turned out to be a solid entry on the series.