Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia

As the third game on the DS, Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia has a lot to live up to! Konami had done wonders with this franchise on the GBA and then the DS and this game manages to offer more of the same, but also some fun new ideas to help make it stand out on its own. I had a great time with this one and while it may not be my favorite game on the DS, it is still a thrilling adventure that gets better the more you play it. I recently played through this for the first time in a while and had a great time and actually played all the way through it.

A Lack Of Personality

I will say that the weakest aspect of Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia has to be the story. The game takes place during a time when the Belmonts have vanished, but there is still evil that needs to be put back in its place. Our heroine is a powerful warrior called Shonoa and she is from a group known as the Ecclesia that wants to banish evil using a dangerous weapon called, Dominus. This goes very badly and it not only unleashes more evil, it causes Shonoa to lose her powers, abilities as well as memories, and personality. The story is not bad by any means, but it never gripped me either.

A Map Fit For A King

Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia goes for a rather unique approach to its level design. The GBA and the DS games certainly followed what Castlevania: Symphony of the Night set before it. However, here we have a world map that contains many different levels, maps, stages, or whatever you want to call them. These are smaller in scale and I think that works to the games advantage as the earlier parts of the game are a bit more linear than Castlevania’s of the past and have a more “mission” approach to them where you are given a task, you do it and then move onto the next one. The game opens up more in the later half and then becomes more of what you would expect from a Nintendo DS Castlevania game.

Son Of A Glyph

While there is your typical Castlevania gameplay in many regards here, Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia as well as having your RPG style gameplay introduces a new combat system that is called the glyph system. You pick up glyphs as you attack enemies and you use these to attack. You still have your typical sword, ax, and magic attacks, but you can combine glyphs to make more powerful attacks and you also have an MP system that prevents you from just spamming attacks. It is honestly an interesting way to go about combat in a Castlevania game and it all works really well. Although, there are tons of different combinations that you can supposedly do, but once I found a couple of attacks that worked for me, I pretty much just stuck with them for the whole game.

Beauty In Darkness

The Castlevania games have always been easy on the eyes and when it comes to the Nintendo DS Castlevania games, Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia is my favorite as far as the visuals go. The different areas look fantastic ranging from a monastery, a creepy woodland area, a prison, and a stage that is literally on the ocean. The game looks fantastic and I just love all the little details, even when you go into a building in the town area, the inner buildings are full of fine details that give each stage a ton of personality. I will say that some stages do reuse assets, but this is to be expected. Oh, it also has a kickass soundtrack too that I think fits the visuals pretty much perfectly.

Pros:

• The game looks amazing
• It has some of the best stages of any portable Castlevania game
• I liked the glyph system
• I found that this game got better the longer it went on

Cons:

• Shonoa is not the best protagonist the series has seen
• While the stages look amazing, a few are very similar