This review was originally published in October 2012. We're updating and republishing it to mark the game's arrival in the Nintendo Switch Online Game Boy library.
The odds were stacked against Castlevania Legends almost from the start. When it was released towards the end of the '90s, it had the near-impossible task of following Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - a game which had revitalised Konami's gothic series and won widespread critical acclaim.
To add to the heady level of expectation, it was one of the first games from Konami's fledgling (and now defunct) Nagoya studio, which would later code the commendable but ultimately inferior Sega Saturn port of Symphony of the Night. Another reason fans had to be excited was the game's status as the sequel to the fantastic Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge, arguably one of the best action titles on the console. And finally, it was one of the last big-name monochrome Game Boy games before the system was usurped by its successor, the Game Boy Color.
Given this combination of circumstances, it's perhaps unsurprising that Castlevania fans expected something big, but they were left feeling bitterly disappointed.
Positioned as an origin story and notable for being the 'first' Castlevania adventure in terms of chronology (until the release of Castlevania: Lament of Innocence in 2003, at least), Castlevania Legends sees a female Belmont assume the lead role for the first time in the history of the franchise. Sonia Belmont makes a positive first impression, she's capable of changing direction mid-jump and can even crawl whilst crouching, something that was only previously possible in Super Castlevania IV. Equipped with the trademark whip — which can be powered up by collecting special items — Sonia feels like a true Belmont, at least.
Another neat touch is the fact that Dracula's troubled offspring, Alucard, makes an appearance as an end-of-level boss, his intention being not to harm the heroine, but to test her mettle to ensure she's up to the task of taking on his villainous father. Something which is rather less welcome is the insinuation during the end credits that Alucard is Trevor Belmont's father, and therefore the entire Belmont bloodline is actually part-vampire - arguably one of the key reasons that Castlevania Legends has since been removed from the official timeline of the franchise.
Visually, Castlevania Legends is a mess. From the barren and repetitive backgrounds to the unimpressive sprites (only a handful of which possess more than two frames of animation), the game looks downright amateurish. Compared to the brilliant presentation of Belmont's Revenge, the drop in quality is shocking - even more so when you consider that a staggering seven years separates the two titles. Given the amazing advancements made in Game Boy development by companies like Rare during the middle of the decade, it's almost unforgivable that Castlevania Legends was released in the Game Boy's twilight years.
Despite some tight and responsive control, the gameplay doesn't do much to win you over, either. Castlevania Legends appears to have been created by somebody who has only the vaguest grasp of game design. Levels are constructed in such a manner that enemies often fall off high, unseen platforms and land directly onto your character, giving you no time to react. Elsewhere, platforms are arranged almost at random, which makes picking out a safe route a case of luck rather than skill. Couple these problems with some crippling slowdown and the game becomes even harder to enjoy.
Also, for some inexplicable reason, Konami Nagoya decided to include special 'trap' rooms, which can only be escaped by defeating a series of re-spawning enemies. Your reward for surviving this frustrating onslaught? Freedom from the room, and nothing else. By the time you've fallen foul of these traps (some of which are unavoidable, while others are triggered by whipping candles which look identical to all the other candles in the game) for the third or fourth time, you'll be close to hurling your Game Boy at the nearest wall in disgust.
The frustration doesn't end there, though. Enemies automatically respawn, so if you backtrack (as you often have to do, as the game features many dead ends) you'll have to battle them all over again. In the interests of keeping you on your toes, this could be seen as a benefit. However, there are moments when you'll have to fight the same enemy repeatedly because it knocks you backwards, and by the time you've killed it and are ready to advance again, it has respawned right on the edge of the screen.
To counter this terrible game design, Konami Nagoya took a drastic approach. Instead of rebalancing the difficulty, the studio simply added an 'easy' setting in the form of the Light Mode. Here, your whip is permanently at its fullest power, making things a little easier. If you ever feel the need to ignore this review and experience the game for yourself, Light Mode is the way to do so as it's slightly less likely to give you high blood pressure.
While the game itself is generally shoddy, Konami Nagoya should at least be commended for attempting to factor in some new elements. In a controversial move, the sub-weapon system has been removed entirely, replaced by a spell mechanic. These 'Soul-weapons' consume hearts — just like the traditional sub-weapons — but you get a new one upon the completion of each level. The iconic sub-weapons haven't been completely forgotten, however - they're hidden as collectable items throughout the game, and are one of the main reasons the stages have so many branching pathways and dead ends.
Another addition in Castlevania Legends is 'Burning Mode', which can be activated once per level and temporarily turns Sonia into an invincible, flame-covered harbinger of death. Best saved for the tricky boss encounters (which are made even more challenging by the fact that you can never see how much health the boss has remaining), Burning Mode is a neat feature, but it feels like it's there to balance out the unfair challenge more than anything else.
The Castlevania series is famed for the high standard of its music, but aside from a stirring variation on the classic Bloody Tears for the opening level, Castlevania Legends' soundtrack is one of the most jarringly discordant we've yet witnessed on the Game Boy. Again, this is in stark contrast to the music featured in Belmont's Revenge, which managed to overcome the limitations of the hardware to deliver classic, toe-tapping tunes. Regrettably, Castlevania Legends is one of the few titles in the lineage that you'll want to play with the volume turned right down.
When Castlevania producer Koji Igarashi expunged Castlevania Legends from the 'canon' timeline in 2002, he admitted that the game was something of an embarrassment. While one could assume his stance was largely due to the fact that he didn't personally oversee the production of the title, it's hard to disagree with his opinion. Castlevania Legends is a shambling mess of a game which very nearly plunges to the depths previously charted by the equally hateful Castlevania: The Adventure. Don't be sucked in by the name; this is best avoided.
Conclusion
After the sublime Belmont's Revenge, Castlevania fans deserved something really special to see off the series on the Game Boy. Sadly, they got Castlevania Legends instead. Poorly-designed, atrociously scored, and generally lacking any of the polish we've come to expect from Konami's famous vampire-slaying series, it's an inauspicious end to a portable trilogy that only has one worthwhile entry: the aforementioned second title. Don't be fooled by the game's steadily-increasing value on sites like eBay — this is collectable solely for its name alone, not for the game itself.
Comments 61
Played it for the first time today, couldn't stick with it for more than a minute.
Such a shame this was the final gameboy Vania title.
Also a shame that KCE Nagoya ported the Saturn version of SOTN. It deserved a far far better version of the PSX game.
The NSO page presents this as the Belmont origin story and it got me confused. Am I living in the timeline where it didn't get retconned by Lament of Innocence? What year are we in?
Yup, this is definitely one of the lesser games in the series.
I'm worried that it being the only Castlevania game available on NSO will turn people away from Castlevania as a whole.
It's nice that this rare and expensive game has become playable to the majority of Switch owners for free overnight. ...But I'm not sure if it will attract much positive attention towards Castlevania.
EDIT: wait a sec, I forgot that Castlevania Bloodlines is also on NSO if you have the Expansion Pass. Well, I guess what I said is still true for people who only have the basic subscription.
Eh, it's been a while I played this, but I don't think the game was that bad...though I wouldn't label it as one of the series' "goods" either.
I still prefer playing that over Konami's other game Operation C, though.
Edit: Sorry, people. I just get a little snappy when Castlevania Legends gets called a "poor game" when I don't think it's all that bad, though I wouldn't label that game as one of my favorites in the series either.
Anyways, I (re)played the first two levels of Operation C and Castlevania Legends, and while I've been more impressed with other games in each of their series, I didn't have too much of a bad time with either of those games I played.
Always disappointing that the one Castlevania game with a female lead is linked to the worst of the franchise. We wouldn't get another Castlevania title with a female lead for a whole 10 years with Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia and 13 years later I'm still waiting for another one. I know there's Charlotte from Portrait of Ruin but she had to share the spotlight.
@EarthboundBenjy
Well, the very first on the Gameboy turned me away from the Series until i gave Super Castlevania a Try 2018.
So the Possibility is there XP
Castlevania Legends is... not great. But it does at least feel like an attempt was made, which is more than I can say about Castlevania Adventure 1 on Game Boy.
Legends at least has responsive movement and decent hit detection, and dares to ask the question: "What if Castlevania Adventure was playable?"
@Bobb The game came out before Lament of Innocence did and yeah, Legends was sorta supposed to be like, the Belmont's origin story. But then people noticed where the story takes place and how we see a major Castlevania character in Legends...which just didn't make sense and created some connectivity issues. So this game become non-canon and then, Konami did Lament of Innocence which is now the canon game that tells us the origins of the Belmont Clan vs Dracula.
It's so weird but that's why I think Konami pretends this game just never happened because they know it didn't make sense with the rest of the series. Heck I think that's why this game wasn't added to the Castlevania Anniversary Collection
@StephenYap3 Whaaaaat? Operation C is awesome and fun : (
Like it isn't amazing, but its a good attempt of putting Contra on the gameboy.
@Eric_Shadow616 The limitations imposed from the Game Boy made Operation C unfun to me, not helped either by the lack of a two-player mode.
@Eric_Shadow616 But why was Kid Dracula added to the Castlevania collection? Inquiring minds want to etc.
@StephenYap3 Blasphemer. Operation C was a perfectly decent Contra game. Very good for the hardware.
@Ralizah ...okay, fine. I'll play through Operation C again and see if my opinion is concreted or changed.
I have just played the first 3 levels on NSO and I actually think it is pretty fun. So far I have not encountered any of the supposedly unfair situations described in the review. Maybe not as good compared to other Castlevania games, but for what it is, it's a solid experience so far.
Still better than the original gameboy game minus the music which is pretty dull. Sure it's no Belmonts revenge. I'd at least Give it a 6.
@LadyCharlie If only Konami also remake this game similarly like The Adventure Rebirth. I guess the rebirth games were just a one time thing and for only one IP. Konami really missed the boat on that one.
As bad as the game is, I cherish my cartridge and enjoy its Super Gameboy functionality occasionally.
Still disappointing that this was omitted from the Castlevania Anniversary Collection.
The other GB games weren't exactly studs either.
to be fair, that version of Bloody Tears is VERY good
Even if CV Legends isn't particularly great, I'm still very happy that it came to NSO to be honest as it's one of very few Castlevania games to never get a rerelease prior to today so having a way to officially play it on a modern console (regardless of the quality of the game itself) is extremely cool.
It also works out very well for me too as I've just started playing through classic Castlevania thanks to the Anniversary Collection on Switch and having Legends be easily accessible through NSO is nice for me wanting to go through the series in as much chronological order as possible so that's nice.
@LadyCharlie Good question! My opinion, I think its because Kid Dracula, while we can call it Castlevania game, its a parody spinoff title. Like it doesn't technically take place in the same timeline or lore with the mainline games. Not only that, but everyone who plays Kid Dracula, will know its not like the other Castlevania games and its really its own thing.
Legends though can be confused with the mainline Castlevania games because it plays, looks and feels like an actual Castlevania game like the other 2 Gameboy games. So I think Konami knew that Legends would cause some confusion and decided not to add the game in the Collection. But that's my theory
@Jeyl Well, at least Order of Ecclesia is one of the best Castlevanias there are.
Yeah, was playing a bit last night, this game is rough. What really kills it for me is how ploddingly slow Sonia is. I know the Belmonts have never been the most fleet of foot game protagonists, but it's more apparent than ever in this game. Sonia moves with all the urgency of a granny with a walker taking a trip to the corner store to buy cat food.
@StephenYap3 Good boy.
It's no Super C or anything, but I've always been impressed with it considering how GB spinoffs often turn out.
I own one of the 4 copies of this game that was sold in the wild, and it's actually a favorite Game Boy title of mine. Sonia's movement is slightly more modern than the original NES movement (yay changing the jump arc in the air), and I actually really like the minimalist visuals. Having hidden relics in the stages is fine, and the secret level actually impacts how you approach the final boss. All in all I'm glad I'll be able to put some more time here.
Honestly though, this was a Super Game Boy game. Why isn't that functionality part of the NS emulation?
I don't hate this game. It's flawed and its weak, but I do feel like there was some merit to it. Sonia is a well-designed character (albeit maybe leaning a little heavy into titillation), and remains one of my unironically favorite characters in the series.
She deserved better than to be retconned out. They couldn't even just reboot the poor girl? Aiya...
@MasterGraveheart To be fair, they were going to give Sonia another game with Castlevania Resurrection, but you know how that went
I disagree with the music being bad in Legends, there are some great tracks on there, but they’re too short before looping.
It has an awesome boss theme: https://youtu.be/tiPLBm8QU8M?si=DVPFeVBGd6fr7J81
@Fizza I still think nothing beats the original:
https://youtu.be/r6xpEV-W60I?si=e0OeDcs6GYs3ZhqZ
@Eric_Shadow616 And the Konami went and redid the origin story yet again with Lord's of Shadow so who knows at this point which origin story is correct, apparently not even Konami.
@Tasuki Lords of Shadow trilogy is self contained. It tells a complete story by itself and only has small references to past Castlevanias (like Rinaldo making the combat cross / Vampire Killer)
@Antraxx777 It's still Castlevania though.
I'd love to see the Anniversary collection updated with this game and a rewind function. The Advance Collection has a rewind function...
Also still no collection of the DS 'vanias and still no Rondo or SotN on Switch. Like come on man, all the 'vanias should be playable on modern systems already, what's the hold-up?
There's been a few candles that, when hit, opens a trap door and I end up in a room with zombies infinitely respawning. Is there a way out of them or are they just beginner's traps that want to add insult to injury rather than just a straight pit?
@TopazLink Yeah, it'd be nice to get Rondo and SotN on Switch. I was playing Rondo the other day on my ps4, and while I can beat the game normally, I was crying for a rewind feature, or at the very least save states. It just lessens the frustration/repetition inherent in the older games.
@RandomDave Nope. You have to fight your way out. The traps are dumbest design decision in the game (especially the mandatory ones). I can only imagine it was to pad the game’s length
@OldManHermit I freaking hate falling down from the alternative chapel route
@Antraxx777 Omg, yes.
Ya the game isn't that great but it's nice to see Konami still recognized it after all these years. Sonia Belmont as a character I wouldn't mind seeing them bring her back in some form of canon. They obviously would need to rewrite her story though.
When they announced this game was coming to NSO, I immediately booted up the Castlevania Collection to see if I had somehow missed it being on there. After all, it's got two Gameboy Castlevanias + Kid Dracula.
I think it's pretty clear that Konami wants everyone to forget about Legends as much as possible, which makes this sudden reappearance completely inscrutable.
There's a lot of Castlevanias that could do with being properly playable on modern systems and beyond:
Legends, Chronicles, Vampire Killer, The Adventure Rebirth, Harmony of Despair, Order of Shadows, Grimoire of Souls.
Then there's Dracula X Chronicles with Rondo and SotN, the DS 'vanias, 64, Legacy of Darkness, Lament of Innocence, Curse of Darkness, Judgement and the Lords of Shadow games too.
I just hope that if we do end up getting them all that they're not split up into too many separate collections...
The worst part, at least for me, is Nintendo probably blamed the female protag for the bad reviews, which is I would guess why they never had another female Belmont.
I didn't hate this game when it came out. Heck, as someone who was metroivania'd out after SoTN, I enjoyed a straight-forward entry for once.
Now that it's seeing the light of day again, I'll resume hoping for a Rebirth style remake to bring Sonja back into canon. She doesn't have to be the origin, just in there.
Played it for a half an hour or so last night. Seemed fine to me. Based on the half hour I played I'd give it 7/10.
It's pretty sad that Konami wanted to forget about this game yet they felt they could simply dump it off to NSO. Talk about wtf. It kind of makes me feel some kind of way about how developers feel about NSO. As much as I like surprises and rarities, I do hope some quality will still be maintained with future releases on NSO.
This Castlevania is not even that bad... It is not one of the best ones at all, but it's not a 'poor' game.
And the candles that trigger the Trap Rooms do, in fact, look different.
It wasn't bad in its day; the producer was just a misogynist
@MaxPlastic I agree. I just played it a little and was refreshing my memory before I spoke. The "trap room" candles do in fact look different so it is easy to tell what they are. Also, the game is fine - the level design isn't super creative or anything, but it's decent enough for a playthrough.
Perhaps they'll remake it someday like they did with Adventure Rebirth?
@EarthboundBenjy There's also 2 castlevania collections for purchase on the eshop. So it's not like newcomers are left with only 1 game to play.
@Whyita But Nintendo didn't make the game. Konami did and I didn't see anyone mention that the game sucked because it has a girl in it. They said the gameplay itself sucked.
@TopazLink That'd be great!
@Tempestryke
That's true, but buying the collections requires the newcomer to already have an active interest in Castlevania. For many people with NSO subscriptions, this awkward, unpopular entry in the series will now be the easiest one to "just try out to see if I like it", which generally happens before the desire to buy the collections comes into the picture.
This happened to me actually, with Valis. I saw the overpriced Valis collections on Switch, and decided to give the SNES Valis IV on NSO a try just to see what kind of game it was. I beat the whole game, and was utterly underwhelemd after all was said and done. It was decent-ish, but definitely felt amateurish, and it did not convince me to buy the collections.
I've heard some people say that the SNES Valis IV ain't the greatest one, but still, I'm in no hurry to try any others right now.
And I don't doubt that there will be people who have the same feeling in regards to Castlevania Legends
@Tempestryke Yes but I said Nintendo would think that's the reason. Also it was a Nintendo exclusive
@chipia Yeah, same for me. Although rewind is a blessing. I even like the music.
What a pointless review.
It’s just an old nostalgic game.
The game wasn't great, sure, but I still feel that it could've fit into the timeline.
If Alucard, a half-vampire, indeed sired Trevor, then that would make Trevor just a quarter vampire. I don't see this as a stain to the Belmont name, unless they were into Nazi-level blood purity or something.
@calbeau agreed. I liked that twist when the game was fresh. And then Igarashi came out and obliterated it from the timeline, alongside Circle of the Moon. Which is another beloved entry of mine with mixed community opinions. It was my first GBA title, and finding it + a GBA the day I got them was an adventure up and down my whole county 😂 so I probably have some nostalgia bias.
Iirc, IGA's reasoning at the time was that he wanted to clean up having too many premature resurrections of Dracula in the timeline. I don't think the games stories as is hurt the larger narrative, but he was the shepherd of the franchise at the time so it was his call.
@Kisame83 I did hear Dracula's early resurrections were considered problematic to the timeline, though unofficial ones like the one from The Castlevania Dungeon weaved all the games together rather well. It's still my headcanon even now.
Speaking of Iga, Konami should just give the entire franchise to him. I'd like another Iga-vania from him. Bloodstained didn't do it as well for me.
@Whyita Which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. You're pulling accusations out of thin air. And of course it was a nintendo exclusive. There weren't a ton of companies making handhelds back then. That also has zip zero zilch to do with anything you deliberately imagined.
Messed with it earlier this week and I actually thought it was alright. Doesn't hold a candle to the other games, but it works. Biggest drawback for me was a couple of the traps that just spawned endless enemies until you died, but I liked the rest.
@Tempestryke It did actually if you listened to what I actually said. Just name another playable female Belmont.
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