Castlevania Judgment -- Story Mode, Dracula

Описание: I forgot that Dracula is pretty much the Lucifer expy in a godless universe... except instead of rebelling in a sense that humans can't really perceive and can only write about, Vlad just went nuts on his fellow man and somehow as a nifty bonus gets to come back to life repeatedly to do it all over again.

I'm almost thinking Dracula had the right idea here, horrific a means and ends as it might be, because I have no idea what on earth keeps "the Church" so faithful to their cause of knocking the old man back down a peg every hundred years or so, even if there's not a handy Belmont around to do the job for them. The only "god" I can see at work in the world of Castlevania has a sickle fetish and suddenly why he would swear loyalty to The Impaler is all the clearer. Have pity upon this "bad world filled with evil."

Unless you're the big man himself, that is! I believe I agree, I'm going to enjoy this.

---

Stage 1: Aeon

I find it interesting how nonspecific Aeon is and how little Dracula seems to care to pursue anything he's talking about... although I imagine Dracula treats all people with the same level of contempt and disinterest and the same would have to go for this alleged enemy with designs upon toppling the Lord of Darkness.

At this news, Dracula is the one out of all the characters we've seen converse with Aeon who finally poses an insightful question: how is this game of his supposed to stop that from happening? (Is it?) I find it equally interesting that Aeon chooses this moment to clam up, being the talker that we know he is.

So Dracula kills him for his insolence, and there was much rejoicing.

---

Stage 4: Maria Renard

Dracula is... simply put, not the kind of character you want to fight directly. The wisest course of action in the presence of someone who knows what they're doing is to just get in some hits and keep away until time runs out, since there's really no way for him to chase you down. The AI is really bad at fighting Dracula.

---

Stage 6: Mermen and Iron Gladiator

Dracula's close-range combo won't detect hits on non-player targets, so you'll only end up leaving yourself open if you try to take monster enemies on with them. On the upside, all of the rest of his crazy moves are perfect for fighting targets that don't flinch or receive mercy invulnerability.

---

Stage 7: Simon Belmont

So both Dracula and Simon already know how this goes down, but Dracula, even with knowledge of the hunters to follow doesn't recall that his curse failed in its intended function. Never fear, however! With my guidance and Simon's ridiculous lack of reserve when attacking even someone like Dracula, it's really a wonder the old man never actually takes over the world... wait, that would probably be (a) bad (world full of evil)...

---

Stage 10: Trevor Belmont

Dracula somehow seems aware that the tenth stage is the last one just as we have observed this pattern across all the other stories... Weird.

---

Clearing Story Mode as both Dracula unlocks Aeo-- wait, what? It doesn't! All it does is tell you to play through the tales of your favorite characters... which I already did. All of them.

Okay... this is where, if you didn't already think playing as each character in turn was a chore, you almost certainly will now... because what we ACTUALLY unlocked just now is known as "True Story Mode"... well, informally, I think, because the game still calls it Story Mode.

The deal is that the Story Mode has been altered ever so slightly. It will unfold exactly the same as you have already seen for every character, but with two additional battles at the end to cap things off with a story-based segment wrapping things up and an epilogue unique to the character you were using.

Once you've cleared this only marginally-expanded Story Mode as any character, THEN you will unlock Aeon's story.

Unfortunately, Aeon's story isn't really so much a story but a catch-all for if none of the other stories actually happens, I suppose is how I would put it. So I'm not going to skip straight to it to complete the full set, because it's so extremely light on content that it can really only be played after any full Story run if it's to have any meaning, since it explains nothing whatsoever in and of itself.

I mean, I see what they were going for here... but... it's just that any enjoyment derived from individual character stories is tarnished by being made to do them twice over and furthermore the final story is incredibly underwhelming and unfulfilling. Uh... not to rain on any parades or anything.

But here's where the good news comes in: I will be cutting out the slog and basically just uploading the new content, because that's the only really interesting part anyway. That said, I'm pretty aimless when it comes to this, and will open the floor to any and all suggestions when it comes to who should come next until finally I reach the end and grudgingly let Aeon have his time last.