JiggyJay's Full Review: Castlevania: Circle Of The Moon for Game Boy Advan...
Ever since I completed Metroid Fusion my Gameboy Advance has been out of commission. Dormant. Unused. Gathering dust. I’ve been too lazy to buy Golden Sun: The Lost Age and Final Fantasy Tactics so my GBA use has just been halted. Well, that changed a couple months back when my brother lent me Castlevania: Circle Of The Moon. When I first bought my Gameboy this game was one of the ones I was considering to buy, but I didn’t since I had had no prior interest in the series. You see, I grew up on Super Nintendo games, but I had never played a single Castlevania game. Well, my brother had beaten Circle Of The Moon and he suggested that I give it a try so I did and I was instantly blown away by how fun and addictive it was. Now, two months later and two pairs of batteries juiced out, I have to say that it’s about time that I do a review on this incredible game from Konami.
The game begins with a small group of people infiltrating Dracula’s castle to stop him from being resurrected, but they don’t arrive soon enough and he is set free from his grave to wreak terror onto the world. The master of the group gets taken and his two disciples get thrown from the frying pan into the fire all the way into the middle of Dracula’s evil castle. Nathan Belmont separates from you to try and find his father (the master) and now it’s your job to kill some demon-spawn with the help of your trusty whip and stop Dracula for the final time. Now that I’ve played other Castlevania games like Castlevania III and Harmony Of Dissonance I have to say that this story line is recycled and used over and over again and then having beaten the game, I have to say that the story isn’t the strong point of the game at all. But the point of the game isn’t the story, it’s the action!
The goal is to get through the castle fighting monsters along the way and finally defeating Dracula. You are armed with a whip, which is what the series is known for and this whip grows powerful as you play through the game since you can enchant it through the clever DSS system. When you kill enemies you have the chance of obtaining cards from them. There are two types of cards: Attribute cards and Action cards. Through mixing and matching you can come up with special powers to help you defeat certain bosses in the game. The system was very well made and it’s an adventure all by itself to find all of the cards and use them. Circle Of The Moon isn’t just a senseless action game; there are a ton of RPG elements surprisingly included. As you kill monsters you find cards, but you also find armor to up your stats. You can improve defense and strength (through leveling up), but you can also find armor and accessories to help you along the way. Finding these items also gives an RPG feel, but I only wish that there were more armor and items to find in the game. And in Metroid fashion, you travel through the castle finding health and magic upgrades as well as new abilities that you can learn in order to get further into the castle such as the dashing ability, double jumping, and tackling.
Circle Of The Moon is fantastic, but there’s only one bad thing I have to mention: the graphics. These graphics look like they were created for Gameboy Color, but then again Circle Of The Moon was a launch title so the graphics were in early stages. But the graphics are still pixilated to a degree of disappointment. And the screen is far too dark. You have to bee in perfect light (a la directly under a lamp) to perfectly see the graphics and although maybe the developers thought it would add to the theme of the game, all it does is annoy because I love playing my GBA in the bathroom and I can’t if I have to be in bright light. Other then that there are some good things about the graphics like the fire sprites. In the game you can enchant your whip with fire and the graphics are good. The many particle effects are impressive, but the one thing that I really like about the graphics is the nicely detailed monsters that you fight especially the bosses. They were very nicely designed and created. The developers get kudos for this.
Since we’re on the subject of complaining, I just have to mention how frustrated I got while playing Circle Of The Moon. Why? Two reasons: the difficulty and the castle. The castle is so big that you can easily get lost or confused about where you are. I often found myself wandering around searching for where to go and then coming across the same room two times in a row. My frustration always got the best of me and I always had to put the game down because of this. These were the only times when I put the game down. On top of that, the game is hard. The AI during boss battles is just tough as nails. I found that I had to spend maybe an hour or two of killing enemies and leveling up before each boss battle because they were so tough. And you have to explore the castle and find the health upgrades (which upgrade your health bar) in order to beat the game entirely. The enemies are difficult to beat and I found that some regular run of the mill villains gave me a hard time. Now, I’m all for being challenged since a game gets boring if it’s too easy, but some boss battles were so hard that I had to put the game down for days at a time because of my frustration. And I have to admit that the last boss battle was so hard that I had to level up my character a crap load in order to just slimly get through it.
As for the music, well there were some nice symphonies here and there like the haunting score at the beginning of the game, but other than that there’s really nothing special in Circle Of The Moon. Since the GBA is so small you shouldn’t expect nicely crafted Final Fantasy-like soundtracks since developers (when working on GBA titles) don’t really focus too much on music. Aside from the Golden Sun soundtrack I haven’t heard any truly groundbreaking music. For what Circle Of The Moon lacks in music, it makes up for in sound FX. The crack of the whip is appreciated as are all of the dark themes displayed throughout the game.
It took me thirty hours to beat Circle Of The Moon so there’s no question about how much your twenty dollars will get you, but I probably wouldn’t play Circle Of The Moon over again. It certainly is a battery burner and one of the most addictive titles I’ve played on the Gameboy Advance since Advance Wars. I had a lot of fun playing this game what with all of the things you discover through this side scrolling adventure and the very satisfying ending. The depth of the battle system and the smile you get when you beat bosses is just icing on the cake that is Circle Of The Moon. Not only is this a game that every Castlevania lover should have, but it’s one that every GBA owner should own. I should have played this game sooner. I really missed out. Circle Of The Moon is worth your time and your money so give it a shot.
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