Castlevania: Lords of Shadow Review

For the first time in 25 years of Castlevania, the franchise is wiping the slate clean and heading down a path which is unfamiliar for the series. Touted as a reboot, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow is a 3D action adventure title, opting for more of a hack and slash style of gameplay rather than the 2D platformer we've all become accustomed to over the years.

As this is a brand new direction, the storyline for this title has no correlation or association to the existing storyline of the eternal struggle of the Belmont family against the dark lord himself, Dracula. Not even Alucard, the star of what is arguably the best Castlevania title to date Symphony of the Night, makes an appearance in the fresh look of this game. So all that you may have learned or know of Castlevania is best left at the title screen and enter this world with a completely empty mind as Gabriel Belmont is about to take you upon an epic, epic journey.

Gabriel Belmont is our protagonist for this game, however he is not a true Belmont, just having taken the name on due to being an orphan left upon the steps of the Brotherhood of Light, a holy order tasked with keeping the order between good and evil, protecting the world against lycanthropes, trolls, vampires and annoying little devil bat things which hurl fiery bombs of irritation at you. Gabriel took the surname of Belmont, after his love of mountains and the high places of the World, now a member of the Brotherhood, he's on a personal quest against the Lords of Shadow to resurrect his slain sweetheart, Marie.

Castle-Bayonetta-May Cry-Of War, sets you on a very linear path of typical go here, fight this, find that relic to complete the level with very little deviation in order to explore, this means item hunting will be very minimal indeed, resorting to drops for secondary weapons while upgrades for your combat cross are either part of the mission path or only available after revisiting a level when you have gained the appropriate skill to pass an obstacle.

While the levels do branch off from time to time, they all lead to the same end point to progress further in the game. This may deter hardened Castlevania players as they would be used to the open ended nature of older titles since Symphony of the Night took the franchise into the realms of RPG, however the linear mission structure actually serves an admiral purpose in driving the story behind the reboot.

In an effort to break up the ‘Hack n Slash' moments in the game, Castlevania will have you scaling walls, swinging over crevasses and solve basic puzzles. The pace of which these have been set out seem to have hit a sweet spot as you're not constantly battling enemies or forever wandering aimlessly, you get a sense of true progression though levels and rarely have moments of being hopelessly lost.

As you progress through the game, you will earn experience points which can then be used to purchase new combo abilities for Gabriel. These will give our protagonist bigger combo's. harder hitting attacks and generally make him a force to be reckoned with, additionally Gabriel has access to both Light and Shadow magic which further augment his abilities.

While Light magic is active, you may regain lost health as each hit you perform on a monster will steal some HP from him, also you may unleash huge holy attacks which stun groups of enemies allowing you some breathing space. Shadow magic will increase your overall damage with your combat cross, as well as adding an explosive element to your throwing daggers. You may also purchase extra abilities for your Light and Shadow magic move set which really do become necessary later in the game.

To replenish these meters you have to absorb neutral energy orbs which your slain enemies will drop, there are also fountains of these orbs in some levels allowing you to fully restock on this magical element.

Finally if you are able to chain together a number of combo hits without receiving any damage you fill up a concentration meter, when full, this enables all hits made against enemy characters to drop the natural orbs onto the battlefield. Successfully being able to sustain this meter will allow Gabriel to either constantly use Light or Shadow magic as there will be an abundance of raw materials to absorb.

For a 3D game of this style it's unusual to have a fixed camera which cannot be altered by the player, while this works reasonably well on the most part, there will be times when you just wish you could pan around to spot that grappling point or that hidden passage to some loot. Also this fixed camera also confuses the controls when it changes scene, numerous times I've been holding one direction between camera positions when the natural reaction would to be to adjust your stick to the new camera angle for it to retain the positional movement from the previous camera angle.

For example, I would be running up the screen through a cave, on the other end of the cave the camera would be facing Belmont's right hand side, now the natural thing would to then push right to move your character, but no, the controls are still set to as if the camera was behind Belmont, only till you stop then move again are the controls set to that new camera angle.

However this is a fairly small annoyance in what is such a beautiful game. Belmont's path will take you through absolutely stunning vista's, beautiful architecture and gorgeous design overall. Each level has its own distinct feel and look to it, making sure that visually you will never be bored. It seems like the further you travel along Gabriel's storyline the more your jaw drops at the scenery, there is no denying that Mercury Steam have done an outstanding job here, there were many moments where I just stopped to admire the visual beauty on my screen.

Unfortunately this level of visual nerdgasm takes it's toll on the Xbox 360 as you will notice frame-rate issues during cut scenes or moments of intense fighting against a high number of opponents, that being said it does not drop to unplayable levels of stutter, also it's mainly during cut scenes when this is noticeable so it is not really a game killer. No doubt this will be another tool in the Xbox/PS3 fan-boy troll wars as this title does run noticeably better on Sony's hardware.

Now an epic game such as this would not be complete without some epic voice talent taking the roles of the various characters in game. Our protagonist, Gabriel Belmont, is voiced by Robert Carlyle (Begbie - Trainspotting) while fellow Brotherhood member Zobek has the talents of Sir Patrick Stewart (Captain Jean Luc Picard - Star Trek), who also does the narration for the game. Voicing the Dark Lord himself, Dracula, is Jason Isaacs (Lucius Malfoy - Harry Potter). Fans of the Castlevania series may be disappointed to know that their beloved soundtrack is not present in this title, opting for a completely new musical set to accompany this new reboot, the soundtrack does really add to the atmosphere of Castlevania, yet a little part of me wished to hear Dracula's Castle theme from Symphony of the Night in this new title.

Overall Castlevania: Lords of Shadow is a well rounded package which will offer hour upon hour of enjoyment to those who pick this up. From the epic vista's to the superb voice acting and the 20 hours or so of game time through its 12 chapters, each of which vary between two and ten levels, there is plenty to absorb from an awesome reboot of the franchise. Die hard fans of previous titles may find it a bitter pill to swallow that their beloved 2D platformer has now gone 3D and in a new direction but I urge them to leave their reservations behind and at least give the new game some time, I'm sure you will not be disappointed.