Castlevania: Rondo of Blood
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Castlevania: Rondo of Blood also known as in Japan Akumajō Dracula X: Chi no Rondo is a video game developed by Konami for the PC Engine's Super CD-ROM² System and directed by Toru Hagihara. The game was later remade for the SNES as Castlevania: Dracula X and for the PSP as Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles. The title is also playable on the TurboGrafx-16 Mini. In 2021, Limited Run Games announced an English release for the TurboDuo
Plot
This game takes place in 1792 and it centers around the eternal conflict between the vampire hunters of the Belmont Clan and the immortal vampire Dracula who has once again been resurrected. 19-year-old Richter Belmont comes to the castle after his beloved Annette is kidnapped by Dracula's servant, Shaft, as bait for a trap. The plot in Dracula X is similar to the original game yet it takes place in a different continuity rather than the official timeline. Maria and Annette are portrayed as sisters despite not being blood relatives. The shaft is absent in this storyline as well.
Why It Has Some Divine Bloodlines
- For Rondo of Blood, this is the first Castlevania game to be released on the CD. This caused more features to be included for any Castlevania game at the time like the soundtrack being more in the quality of an actual CD and the cutscenes being present.
- The graphics in the game are really cool. Rondo of Blood happens to be the best of the bunch due to the details being more polished for their time. Dracula X Chronicles also has some improvements on the graphics due to the PSP's hardware and they still stay true to the original game. The SNES version also does look pretty for SNES standards.
- Speaking of the cutscenes, they are well animated in their retro glory. Not to mention the color pallet. A lot of the cutscenes have a fitting mood to convey the story in its retro graphics. For instance, the cutscene where Richter meets Maria is just wholesome while the Dracula and Annette cutscene is depicted to be cruel as Dracula in this scene interacts with Annette.
- Enemy AI is much more solid. To prove this to you, the boss characters in the game can perform a unique final attack when their health meter is depleted. If the player didn't sustain any damage during the fight and manages to avoid this attack, a "Perfect Bonus" (1UP) is obtained.
- Despite being a staple to the series, you don't need to pick up the upgrades for your whip. So if you die and lose a life, you won't have to worry about your whip being less powerful and it will stay in its original form in this game.
- Item Crash is introduced in the game. This is a special sub weapon attack where you get to be invincible for a short amount of time and a powerful attack is performed at the cost of large amounts of hearts. After this special attack becomes introduced, it became a staple. There are a lot of items crashes found in the game and gosh they all look so cool.
- The branching path system from Dracula's Curse returns only with some differences. Unlike the game, it's not possible to choose between two paths in-between stages. Stages have two ways of the procedure with one of the paths being hidden and requiring some tricks.
- Since Richter has to rescue four characters that were kidnapped by Dracula, you then start to realize that Richter isn't the only playable character. One character you get to play is Maria who attacks with magical skills. If you were to play as her, the cutscenes, the ending, the defeat sequence, and the conversation with Dracula are depicted in a more lighthearted tone which fits her character so well. Maria also has some different food items that she can heal with that are not found in Richter's levels like soft-serve ice cream, sushi, hamburgers, boiled starfish, and cake.
- Once you clear the stage, it can be selected from the stage selected in the file screen at the start of the game. If you were to do player selection, you can switch to Maria.
- As expected from a Castlevania game, the soundtrack is on the point. The music this time around goes for a bit of pop style mixed with the classic progressive rock feel of the older games. You would need to listen to the music in order to believe it!
- There is a thing called Technique where it shows off videos that have the correct strategy to use against bosses. To get the videos, you need to collect certain amounts of money.
- Good amount of replay value. The reason behind this is the alternative pathways being shown in the game.
- The level designs are fantastic. You can have some great memories with some incredible levels. For instance, the first level takes place in a stagecoach while you fight Death. The next level takes place in a firey village with a resemblance to Aljiba from Castlevania 2. The Entrance to Castlevania level is a recreation of the first stage from the original Castlevania. Everything else is just phenomenal like a cemetery, the mountain range, the iconic clocktower, and a ghost ship.
- Believe it or not, there is a hidden minigame included in Rondo of Blood and it's called Akumajyo Dracula Peke. You take control of a cartoonish Richter Belmont moving from left to right while defeating purple creatures with his whip. The stage is short and ends in a large board telling players to reset the game and use the correct system card while a cartoonish Maria Renard walks about, occasionally jumping and saying "Sorry". The Dracula X Chronicles version tells players to press start to return to the main menu.
- This minigame has a variety of unlocking methods in each version. The original version allows you to use the CD with the incorrect system card inserted or get the Peke item in the boss rush mode.
- Good voice acting. This is for both English and Japanese versions of the respective games that had voice acting.
- The endings of the game vary depending on your actions. In other words, the game has multiple endings.
- The Dracula X Chronicles version has a lot of changes that are different from the original.
- The story and cutscenes are redone with new voice acting including David Vincent as Richter, Tony Oliver as Shaft, and Patrick Seitz as Dracula.
- The conversation between Dracula and Richter now matches the one from the prologue of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.
- Maria's dialogue has been rewritten to match the serious tone.
- The stage design shuffled a bit, certain candles drop different items and backgrounds have been completely altered in some instances; for example, in the room before the Minotaurs boss in Stage 3'
- The soundtrack has been remixed.
- Boss rush mode and sound test have been added to the menu.
- Stage 5' has a unique boss called Hydra.
- Overall, this game marks the first time that Rondo of Blood has been released officially outside of Japan.
- Much like in Dracula X, there is a plot element where you fight against the vampire version of Annette. This is proof that the remake includes plot elements not found in the original.
- The difficulty is decreased compared to the original game. This is for those who have trouble. However, the game does have moments of increasing difficulty like with Dracula's boss fight.
- Some levels have been expanded with new areas to explore including those with new puzzles.
- You get to play the original CD-ROM² version of Rondo of Blood as well as a port of Symphony of the Night. To play them, you need to meet certain requirements in order to play.
Bad Qualities
- Dracula X did lose some things that the original had like removing Maria as a playable character or the game being more difficult to use sub-weaponry when climbing or near stairs. Heck, the game itself is one of the hardest games in the series due to a lot of factors like enemy positioning and mobility restrictions. Dracula X also faced some factors as well.
- Certain characters like Tera, Iris, Shaft, Medusa, The Creature, etc. are not found in Dracula X.
- Even though this could be intentional due to SNES hardware, the voice acting is non-existant in Dracula X.
- Even though Nintendo had restrictions back then, the blood for Richter and Death had to be recolored. Ironically enough, the blood was kept on the title screen.
- Another thing is that Dracula X is quite inferior to Rondo of Blood.
- Richter is much more frustrating to control as if he had psychics that fit better on an NES game. It gets worse when certain stages show up.
- The levels are redone and they happen to be much more of a threat.
- Rondo of Blood had a final boss fight where you fight Dracula and it turns out that Dracula's boss fight is deemed too easy in the original version which may throw some people off. Thankfully Dracula X fixed it. Heck, Rondo itself is a bit too easy which may throw off fans of the Castlevania series.
- The stages are far too short despite the level design being awesome.
- Due to the lack of international release, Rondo of Blood is quite rare. It costs over $100.
Reception
The PC Engine version of Rondo of Blood was positive. Nintendo Life gave the game a 9/10 while Electronic Gaming Monthly stated that it "can easily be the best CD title yet", and argued that the only negative aspect is that it would not be released in the USA. Unlike Rondo of Blood, Dracula X met with mixed reviews. Many critics call it inferior to the PC version. Next Generation gave the game one star while GameFan gave the game a 259/300. Electronic Gaming Monthly scored it a 6.75 out of 10, saying it is a good game in its own terms but does not hold up to previous Castlevania games When The Dracula X Chronicles was released, it got generally positvie reviews with a Metacritic score of 80/100. Pocket Gamer gave the game a 3.5/5.
Trivia
- Koji Igarashi said that Rondo of Blood is one of his favorite episodes of the series alonside Dracula's Curse.
- On March 2015, there is an unused boss sprite from Stage 1 that was discovered. It's a boss that resembles a green, four legged creature.
- Akiropito (The composer for the original game) said that the sory was originally set during the middle ages much like the original Castlevania.
- To get the best ending for Richter, you must save all four maidens.
- This is the only game of the series to mention the character's blood type.
- This is the first installment where the Red Oni and the Blue Oni trope was used with Maria/Richter being good examples of this.
- The Dracula X Chronicles had a type in one of the promotional material. The Belmont family is misnamed as Beaumont.
Reviews
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