PS3 Review – Castlevania: Lords of Shadow
Since becoming a fan-favorite in 1986, Konami’s Castlevania series has had quite the journey through the decades. It’s had the good (Super Castlevania IV), the bad (Castlevania: Judgement) and the masterpiece (Symphony of the Night). While the series has mastered the realm of 2D artwork and sprites, the series’ battles in the world of 3D have almost always been failures and major disappointments in the eyes of fans. Konami looks to change this with Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, with developer MercurySteam handling the development duties and some team production company named ‘Kojima Productions’ supervising along the way. PlayStation LifeStyle’s review for this ‘rebirth’ is finished. Did Konami finally make an AAA quality 3D Castlevania game or is this yet another stumble along the way to greatness?
While the group of core fans will never come accustomed to a rebirth of the series, it proved that the series can do one thing and do it well: amazing production values.
The production values for Lords of Shadow are some of the best around from a third-party developer on the PlayStation 3. In the past, when two characters ran across one another while exploring Dracula’s labyrinth of demons and death, it was simply two 2D sprites conversing to one another while text rolled across the screen or after the PSOne days, horrible voice acting. This is no longer the case seeing as how Konami went as far as hiring Robert Carlyle to voice Garbiel Belmont, Sir Patrick Stewart himself to voice Zobrak (and narrate the game), and Spanish composer Óscar Araujo to work on the game’s epic score. The team at MercurySteam went all the way with the game’s production values and it shows; from the music, the cinematics, to the voice acting, and to the little things: like the way the game shows you a combo before purchase, which is represented with a 2D sketch of Gabriel. It’s all so good, I would actually just sit there and listen to Patrick Stewart narrate the game, long after I had already read what he was going to say. It was just that epic.
With everything from the graphics to the games movie-quality cinematics screaming AAA value, it instantly calls for comparison to the PS3′s iconic hack and slasher. However, the game’s gameplay doesn’t quite match that of God of War’s in terms of fun or depth. God of War III is commonly regarded as one of the best looking PS3 exclusives to date and Lords of Shadow is easily one of the best looking third-party titles available now. Every environment you adventure through and explore are brimming with life and detailed down to the smallest leave on a passing tree. Character models are detailed and come to life with a variety of facial expressions and emotions, perfectly rendered by the game’s graphical engine. Plus, the game runs smoothly at almost all times. Even the times when the screen is full of goblins attempting to end your journey, the game moved along without a hiccup in sight. Really impressive, considering the fact that the only other next-gen game developer MercurySteam has made is Clive Barker’s Jericho. Yeah. Talk about a sophomore surprise! The team added little graphical details like rain running down the screen, which was made famous by Metal Gear Solid 2 back in the PS2 days. Or hell, the small, yet cool, way snow sticks to the screen, then melts away. Nice touch.
The game’s storyline and narrative will capture your interest and no let it go until the credits roll. Gabriel’s journey to bring his wife back from the dead is full of twist and turns, is very well written, and full of great dialogue. It might not have a big-name hollywood writer like some games have had recently, but you could have fooled me. Also, make sure you stick around after the credits for a surprise ending. If you thought the twist at the end of inFamous was a jaw-dropper, wait until you see what could be happening in the next Castlevania game. I won’t spoil it for you, but it could be a very, very interesting setting for the series and could breathe a ton of new gameplay elements into it.
The old school Castlevania games easily made up for the lack big-budget productions values with awesome gameplay. Go play Super Castlevania IV or Symphony Of the Night and tell me you’re weren’t addicted to slashing flying medusa heads and poorly animated skeleton warriors. Well, those days are over. Sure, you still kill skeleton warriors, but seeing as how the gameplay has moved into the realm of 3D, gameplay has more in common with the God of War series and Darksiders than it does the original Castlevania games. Yes, you’ll still find sub-weapons like the daggers and fairies along the way, however gameplay consist of plenty of hack and slash gameplay that will have many of you feeling like your controlling Kratos instead of a Belmont. You even mount various creatures along the way that just happen to be by bright, shiny doors that need to be crushed be said creature. The gameplay isn’t super original, but it still tremendously enjoyable and to help spice things up is the magic system. You have access to light and dark magic; seeing as how restoration fountains are few and far between, you have to use the light magic to regain health. Activate it with L1, beat the hell out of some baddies and shazam, your health is back. Dark magic is for inflicting more damage on your enemies and opening a door or two along the way. The game make things a bit more interesting as you have two separate bars to fill, rather than one drains both energy types. So when absorbing energy from enemies, be wise and decide which you need more. Just a quick tip, 90% of the time get light magic so you can increase your health bar.
On the case of enemies. This was sadly a very sore spot for Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. There was essentially 3 enemy classes. The small enemies: Lesser Lycanthropes, Goblins, etc. the large mountable enemies: Spiders, Giant Goblins, Greater Lycans, etc. And finally, the boss battles. The smaller enemies are far too simple, just button-mashing should suffice. The larger enemies are far more difficult, and the strategy you’ll use to take them down is too similar against every enemy. Just slash, dodge, rinse, repeat. The boss battles take a crack at the formula that made Shadow of the Colossus so great: Bosses are in a sense, a stage in their own light. You must climb these towering titans, gripping and grappling until you get to a weak spot, which is of course glowing (doesn’t your weak spot glow?). Stab repeatedly and you win. Oh and a pet peeve of mine, nearly every enemy in the game has a move where they smash the ground causing an impact that Gabriel must jump over. Seriously, just about every enemy. The variety, or complete lack thereof, is truly embarrassing considering the amazing potential these beasts of Castlevania lore offer.
Even if the gameplay isn’t all the original, Lords of Shadow will take you over 20 hours to complete everything that is available. The stages in the game are linear so there isn’t much left open to explore (certainly not like previous Castlevania titles). You are however encouraged to return to finished levels once you’ve gained certain types of power-ups so you can access areas you couldn’t the first time through. Let’s face it: Games aren’t cheap, and you want to get your money’s worth. So it’s good to know that Castlevania: Lords of Shadow is packed with plenty of content, and enough reason to give it another go after your first playthrough.
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow is barely a Castlevania game. It doesn’t feature much from previous games in the franchise aside from the main character being a Belmont and some of the game’s enemies being creatures of the night. Don’t expect a hefty dose of nostalgia. However, if Lords of Shadow wasn’t at all attached to the Castlevania name, it still would be a great game that is worth playing. The production value, storyline, and other aspects are worthy to stand aside any of the top games of this generation. A few glaring flaws, repetitive gameplay, and strict linearity keep the game from being the masterpiece we all had hoped for.
PlayStation LifeStyle’s Final Score
+ With over 20+ hours of gameplay, plenty of gaming value for your dollar. - Gameplay, while good, lacks originality and borrows to heavily from the competition. |  |
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17 Responses to “PS3 Review – Castlevania: Lords of Shadow”
looks like it might be worth a go then!
“Gameplay, while Good, lacks originality and borrows to heavily from the competition. ”
too not to
Thanks for pointing that out, bud. Fixed.
It borrows too much from God Of War and Darksiders? I can’t count the amount of times a reviewer has easily compared a game to another game and then not used it as a negative. I’m not insulting you it just seems if Darksiders copies from God Of War and Zelda then it can’t be used as an example.
Like with the PS Move, just because someone already did a certain idea dosen’t mean Kojima should have to give up the right to make it right, so many games copy God Of War becuase it’s a fun game and those elements can work in a mixture of differant games.
Too me saying they “Copied” God of war is like saying anyone who uses the UDK engine to make a game is copying Epic Games.
For the record, GoW copied the first 3d Castlevania which debuted nearly 2 years prior
Thomas,
Great review, but i have to disagree with your analysis of “Gameplay, while Good, lacks originality and borrows to heavily from the competition.”
The fact is that the first 3d Castlevania debuted on the PS2 on October 21, 2003, nearly 2 years before the first GoW.
GoW and GoW2 borrowed heavily from the 3d Castlevania’s in terms of gameplay. Especially Kratos’ ability to use the blades as a grappling hook or sorts.
To be noted is that GoW set the industry standard in these terms of gameplay, hence all similar games are called GoW clones.
I truly prefer this game to GoW3.
Most notable for me is the ability to revisit a single level. I truly hated having to replay Kratos’ entire story to go back and find a Godly possession i missed
Also worthy for me are the number of enemy types, and monster compendium. I find a good variety between each monster in attacks movement and ai.
I also felt that the moves had greater variety and skill needed than that of GoW3 which you could beat with just the Plume combo.
@ Anthony Severino
And yet your main complain (and only one you and most reviews mention) is that is not “enough Castlevania”… and the beginning of this review Castlevania Symphony of the Night is remarked as a “masterpiece”. May I ask any of you reading this, how much Castlevania is SOTN? I mean, that game is NOT Castlevania. PERIOD. Castlevania (until that moment) is a 2D action-platforming side-scroller, completely lineal adventure about a guy named BELMONT wielding a WHIP kicking Transylvania’s ass all over the place. SOTN ? Castlevania it is not. However that game got absolutely NO BACKLASH for being a great departure from the classic formula. It actually BORROWED HEAVILY from other games like Metroid. Yes, the games is a masterpiece, no doubt about. So why bitch so much about Lords of Shadow? what’s so bad about not being what people (wrongfully) believe is “Castlevania”? You may not like the game, or you could be expecting something similar to a classic, but Castlevania Lords of Shadow, I dare say, is MUCH more Castlevania than SOTN ever was! A better game? maybe not, I haven’t finish it, I can’t tell. But please, stop this nonsense. Maybe some of the reviewers grew up with SOTN and later Castlevania games?? I really don’t know where they are coming with this bitching.
Thanks for the review, Thomas. Nice one.
I really want to try this game…
But that save file bug is breaking hopes and my heart
This is a really great game and you shouldn’t shy away from it because of the “save bug”. It has happened to me, yes, but just save your game whenever you think about it to a USB and enjoy.
PS. The bug isn’t as prevalent as you might think.
eager to give this a try but don’t want to pay full price. Solid review
Picked this up today and have enjoyed it so far. Not too far into the game so still a very limited skillset etc. but I have liked it so far.
Will be playing this through the rest of the week.
Oh and cheers for the review guys!
Good review. I read a garbage review on DieHardGameFan or what ever its called. That site is crap and those reviewers are hacks. He didn’t have the game a score but he did label it “Dreadful”. I called him out on it and he said i didnt have a right to comment because i have only played the demo…..right….
anyways, good, review. Can’t wait till i get this game. Amazon screwed up my shipping so i maybe another week or so but it arrives.
in deed this game is a 7 but an 8 is just as acceptable. l enjoyed this game a lot. The problem with this game is that it didn’t borrow enough gameplay from GoW
Couldn’t agree more. While the combat is fun its not as smooth as God of War.
Didn’t borrow enough? You’re being sarcastic, right? I just want to be sure before I say anything further. I would hope that we don’t want more games to be more like each other.
As far as combat though, it may not be as “smooth” as God of War, but that’s what I love about it. I can pull off 100 hit combos in God of War half asleep. God of War is WAY more forgiving than Lords of Shadows because the AI doesn’t exactly push the issue when you’re in mid rage mode, and Kratos’ attacks also have a much higher penetration priority than Gabriel’s, making it easy to hit multiple enemies at once, at any given time. It’s not really about being smooth, but because of the design, Castlevania is just more of a challenge. The air setups and juggles actually feel much more akin to Devil May Cry than God of War, but I don’t see anyone bringing that up anywhere. I don’t normally pay much attention to reviews these days, because I too often read a critique about what the game isn’t instead of what it actually is, but I think Lords of Shadow is a great game.
I also see a lot of people like to bring up the 3D Castlevania predating God of War, but the comparisons or things borrowed aren’t just about being a 3D hack n slash title. Rotating cranks, context sensitive button mashing, kill sequences.. Let’s just be real here. These things were clearly inspired. Also, smashing the runes and traversing on the titans is straight out of Shadow of the Colossus. While the game is definitely not traditional Castlevania, that doesn’t scratch off any points. I have no problem with releasing a downloadable, smaller classic Castlevania, but to take on a project like this, it would just be doing a huge disservice to star in the past. I’ve played this franchise since the beginning, and while it is a hall of fame title, it was very limited in that form. I just don’t see what they could do to keep it’s roots without limiting creative control for the type of game that it is. Hell, the original Castlevania tune in the music box level and the faint Metal Gear Solid theme was enough of a homage for me. For once, it actually has a real story too. In the end, I think it is a great production, and I’m looking forward to the next one. Maybe they’ll find a way to incorporate the classic feel to it, though I’m unsure how.
I’m having a lot of fun with this right now. I would say its definitely a total departure from Castlevania as any one has ever known it – however, that’s not a bad thing, just unexpected. As of now I just beat chapter 5. It borrows heavily from other games, but that’s not really bad either – it doesn’t do much that’s particularly innovative, but at the same time, the game elements its using are great, and it comes together to be a lot of fun. The things I’m loving: battles feel God of War-esque, but the combo system is completely different. Juggling is really important, varying moves to build your focus is really important for earning magic (who didn’t spam Plume of Prometheus in GOW?), and the magic system works really well with it. The extra layer of strategy in fights for garnering magic, and then deciding when to use what type really helps mix it up a little bit, and the alternate weapons like daggers and fairies help add to that. The really sweet thing is you’re always upgrading – almost every single level garners enough exp to get another combo or ability, and there’s tons of of them, so that keeps it constantly fresh trying to work that in to the battles. The SotC style scenes mean I’m definitely not bothering with SotC HD, its simply not going to look this good, and while its definitely a straight rip, its still pretty cool.
Things I find annoying: The camera! I’m amazed you didn’t mention this, for some reason the camera doesn’t reposition itself well to show the enemies that get too close to the screen, and as a result I find my focus getting broken by a werewolf diving in who I didn’t even know was there. Its merely a nuisance, but more so than it should be. Checkpoints in boss battles! This is getting nit-picky, but in the boss battles when you’ve gained a critical hit it checkpoints… but this isn’t always a good place. You die, and instead of starting at the beginning full health full magic, you start part way in half health no magic, and immediately getting pummeled with no chance to dodge or block. Its only on certain ones, but there have been a couple where I went out to the world map and restarted the whole thing. Lastly, I agree about the ground pounds big enemies have. Okay if a few do, but in this most do, and in some instances its incredibly annoying, since your fighting close range when they pull it and even jumping their swing hits you, rolling away the pound hits you, and its unblockable. This forces you to keep a distance constantly and thats pretty hard to do if you want to pull off a decent combo. All these complaints are pretty minor, I really tried to think of more but thats pretty much it.
Overall, this game is pretty freakin’ awesome for a multiplatform game. Yea, it feels like a lot of other games mixed together with the Castlevania name slapped on it, but I’m okay with that, because they were all really great games in their own right, and so this makes for a helluvalotta fun.
WOAH. sorry about the wall of text.