Castlevania: Lament of Innocence Review

By Rob Fahey Published 5 March, 2004

The man from Belmont, he say...

Version tested: PlayStation 2

Updating a classic 2D franchise into 3D is something of a minefield for even the most experienced and talented development studio. Unless they cheat like hell and create some kind of 2.5D game, designers find themselves faced with the tricky task of working out what exactly defined the success and lasting appeal of the 2D original, and distilling those elements into a new 3D framework. Sometimes they get it spectacularly right, like in Mario 64 or Metroid Prime. Sometimes, well, it doesn't work so well - the disappointing 3D update of Defender being an example that springs readily to mind.

Ahh, fresh victims...

'Castlevania: Lament of Innocence' Screenshot 1

The Castlevania series ranks, in many people's minds, as one of the true pinnacles of 2D platform gaming, combining as it did basic role-playing elements with hardcore platform action and an exploration mechanic similar to that found in Metroid. The series arguably peaked with Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on the PlayStation, which despite being a 2D game regularly shows up in all-time best game lists for the console thanks to the lush artwork, great music, RPG dynamics and superb gameplay.

A foray into 3D for the series on the Nintendo 64 was something of a noble failure, however, and ever since then Castlevania has remained firmly in two dimensions, with a series of excellent Game Boy Advance titles continuing the legacy of the Belmont clan of vampire-hunters. Until now, that is, and with the return of the franchise to home consoles for the first time since the N64, the first outing on a Sony console since Symphony of the Night sees 3D gameplay being given another crack of the whip - literally.

As you might expect from a Castlevania game, Lament of Innocence features the most basic plot imaginable; you play Leon Belmont, a holy knight who leaves his squadron to rescue his beloved, who has been captured by an evil vampire lord. Upon arrival at the forest surrounding the castle, you are met by an old man who lives outside the walls and runs a shop for adventurers seeking to slay the vampire, who - after much hilarious over-acting as both characters ham it up for all their worth - gives you an enchanted whip to use as a weapon and a few words of advice on how to defeat the vampire.

Lashing gorgeous

'Castlevania: Lament of Innocence' Screenshot 2

The first think you'll be struck by, even as you run up towards the castle, as that the game looks absolutely fantastic. Every environment is imaginative and incredibly detailed, with every separate section of the castle (there are six major sections in all, each of which you must explore) having a unique theme. Although the rooms and halls within the different sections do repeat themselves a lot, this rarely becomes annoying, and the rich gothic style of the game is quite unlike anything else we've seen on the PS2. Besides, it occasionally throws out some quite stunning things, with some of the bosses in particular being incredibly imaginative and impressive, and best of all, it throws around these spectacular environments and tons of enemies and weapon effects at a constant 60Hz, with no sign of a frame dropped anywhere along the way. It's also completely full-screen - no nasty PAL borders in sight.

In gameplay terms, this is pure Castlevania - you have a range of combo attacks with your whip as well as a selection of sub-weapons, which can be picked up by breaking special stone torches scattered throughout the castle. Combat is generally a matter of pure timing, as you attempt to measure your combo attacks, avoid getting swarmed by the enemy, block enemy special attacks to replenish your MP, and select the right combination of sub-weapon and magical orbs for a given tricky situation. There are five main magical orbs which you get after you defeat the five key bosses in the game (one at the end of each major section of castle, and then the vampire Walter Bernhard himself after a further castle segment), and each sub-weapon does different things when different magical orbs are equipped.

In many respects, this is old school videogaming without many frills. You enter a room full of enemies, kill them all with some pretty basic (but extremely slick) combat, and proceed to the next room full of enemies. Walk back through the door, and the enemies in the original room will have respawned - although this time, you'll be able to run straight past them if you like, as once you've cleared out a room the doors are unlocked the next time you run through and you don't have to kill all the bad guys again. The last game we saw which used this kind of mechanic so shamelessly was Sega's hugely disappointing Shinobi remake, in fact - although Lament of Innocence is certainly a better and more enjoyable game than Shinobi was, by quite a huge margin. It helps that the combat system does evolve as you go forward, with new combos being learned all the time, and even occasionally new attacks - such as the diving kick attack which turned up late in the game and added quite a new dimension to the combat just at the point where it was starting to feel a little stale.

Whip Crack Along

'Castlevania: Lament of Innocence' Screenshot 3

As you'd rather expect from a game with platformer roots, there are certain platforming elements here as well - Leon can jump, double jump, and grab onto things with his whip and swing from them. However, although there's a comprehensive tutorial at the beginning of the game showing you how to accomplish these various feats of acrobatics, Konami seem to have decided at some point in development that platforming isn't really what this game is about, and have confined it to a number of rooms in each sector which contain (often optional) platform puzzles. This is both a good and a bad thing at once - it's good that Konami recognised the weakness of the platform element of the game and didn't force frustrating and badly conceived platform puzzles on the player, but it's also a real shame that the developers didn't shore up this element of the game and put more platformer sections in to break up the combat-focused gameplay.

In fact, that aspect of the game is symptomatic of the single largest problem with Lament of Innocence as a whole. While the game achieves the things which it sets out to do with polished aplomb - excellent combat, beautiful and atmospheric environments, a slick control system (including an innovative menu system which is navigated using the right thumbstick and can actually be used intuitively to select items even in the heat of battle) and incredibly well designed levels - it simply doesn't set out to do very much, and you can't help but feel that the original design for the game was more ambitious but was cut back in order to facilitate a more polished and focused game, but one which is fundamentally not as interesting as it could have been.

Gone, for example, is the majority of the castle exploration that played such a vital role in other Castlevania titles. Gone are the majority of the special abilities that enabled that exploration - the Metroid style power-ups that allowed you to get into previously inaccessible areas. This element is still there, but it's vastly toned down and mostly focused on secrets and extra bonuses, rather than being a core part of the gameplay. Gone, in fact, is the overall castle map - each of the six stages is completely distinct from the other, and they're only linked by a single hub area at the front of the castle. Veterans of the Castlevania series will occasionally look at their surroundings and realise that they're in a classic part of the castle, such as the clock tower or the towers of science and industry, but the game makes no reference to this and the overall feeling of being in one huge coherent structure, which was so vital to previous games in the series, has been lost completely.

Not That Innocent

In the absence of these things, what we're left with is an extremely competent and well-made combat game, with beautiful graphics and polished gameplay, but ultimately without many of the things which made Castlevania games so interesting in the past. Pure arcade-style combat games featuring rooms full of identikit respawning enemies seem to be undergoing something of a renaissance at the moment, and there's no denying that Lament of Innocence is the best game of this type that we've seen in a very long time - but it's also quite short (you can be spanking Walter Bernhard around the room with your whip within around five to six hours of play, although admittedly you'd have to have raced through the game for that - allow about ten hours to unlock everything, we estimate) and slightly disappointing given its heritage.

Castlevania: Lament of Innocence is definitely worth playing if you enjoy this style of game - it's worth it simply for the graphics and atmosphere, and it's also no bad thing to appreciate just how impressive PS2 games can still be when sufficient attention is paid to their production values. However, it's probably more of a rental than a purchase - and although we're very impressed with the superb quality of the things which the game does well, the multitude of things it doesn't even attempt do smack of a missed opportunity.

7 / 10

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Picture of Rob.

About Rob Fahey

Rob Fahey is a former editor of GamesIndustry.biz who spent several years living in Japan and probably still has a mint condition Dreamcast Samba de Amigo set.

Read more articles from Rob by visiting the Rob Fahey archive page.

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Comments (21) Latest comment 7 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Blerk #1 8 years ago

    Liked the demo. Might pick it up when it's cheaper.

  • renzo #2 8 years ago

    I've already picked this up in a swappage and tradage deal, so I'm hoping it's good. 7/10 is what I expected.

  • Sko #3 8 years ago

    I just found it repetative (but I know, that's like moaning football has too much kicking in it) and the half-a-room camera system just wound me up.

  • Dizzy #4 8 years ago

    It's ok.. but Maximo is the better game and if you have an XBox Ninja Gaiden is the prime choice.

    7/10 is about right.. I would rate it just a little bit lower because of the quality and legendary status of the 2D games.

    They should consider a Cube version of this, since I am sure it could do very well on a Nintendo console.
    Edited by 1 at 05/03/04 @ 09:44

  • Seth. #5 8 years ago

    "In gameplay terms, this is pure Castlevania - you have a range of combo attacks with your whip as well as a selection of sub-weapons"

    no, the Castlevania games didn't have combo attacks and block buttons and shit. This sort of gameplay is more Final Fight than Castlevania.
    I thought Castlevania was a platform/exploration game, but LOI is nothing like that, it's another 3d hack-and-slash DMC clone, with short levels (short corridors actually), sluggish controls, "combo based combat" (button mashing) and slow movement.

    Also I think Shinobi is a better game than LOI. Shinobi doesn't have the easy to do "flashy" combos, spells, attacks etc. that made DMC popular. But it's faster than all the stupid DMC-clones combined.

    It's strange that people seem to like the DMC clones more than Shinobi/Nightshade. Shinobi is better you fuckers. Maybe it's because button mashing games are easier, and you get to transform into a half demon and shoot lightning bolts and breathe fire, and the retards get excited with this sort of thing.

  • Shinji #6 8 years ago

    Maybe it's because button mashing games are easier, and you get to transform into a half demon and shoot lightning bolts and breathe fire, and the retards get excited with this sort of thing.

    Personally I'd attribute it to the fact that the Shinobi remake was one of the most abysmally fucking shit games I played last year. But hey, that's opinions for ya!

  • valli #7 8 years ago

    Good review and fair rating. Two major things were left out though: the music, which imo is bloody excellent and the option to have the voices in Japanese.

    Hold on, Jap. voices is available in the US version of the game, did they remove it from the EU version Shinji? Hope not!

  • Shinji #8 8 years ago

    Er, I certainly didn't notice it. Hang on - I'll boot the game up right now and see if I can find it.

  • Shinji #9 8 years ago

    Nope, there's no Japanese language option there. Are you sure this was present in the US version? Bit shit if they'vd ditched it since then...

  • bluebird #10 8 years ago

    I bought and played this game and am at the last level now. It's a good game but I was constantly thinking how DMC did all of this, but better.

    The point in your review about this Castlevania missing a consistant environment is very true, I missed this a lot, it felt more like going from similar corridor to similar room. Most rooms are made of a basic type with some small variations, where in DMC all rooms were unique, well designed and fitting for a castle. It may seem like a small thing but the effect is that the game lacks cohesiveness, and the quest becomes a repetitive monsterbash.

    What saves it is the excellent fighting system, with little extras to boost your power as you go. A pretty good game but sadly, unremarkable (sadly because I loved the other castlevanias)

  • Seth. #11 8 years ago

    "the Shinobi remake was one of the most abysmally fucking shit games I played last year"

    hehe, well ok, but at least don't put it in the same category with DMC and LOI, cause they're not in the same fucking category, DMC is a beat em up, Shinobi is a platform game with aerial ninja combat.

    I am not sure how to describe it. In Shinobi you're supposed to kill them as fast as possible and then perform crazy ninja jumping air dash manouveres on top of "bottomless pits". Fuck you're fucking going against all odds!

    Meanwhile, in DMC and the DMC clones, you just stand there and mash the buttons, you press square again and again while slowly moving across some kind of corridor. I mean how fucking monotonous and fucking retarded can this get, press square, fill the special attack bar, use the special attack or transform to satan or whatever, and then the special attack kills everything automatically and you have to open the door to the next corridor.

    Like that stupid new game Ninja Gaiden, exactly how is this supposed to be a ninja game? First of all Hayabusa doesn't even look like a ninja, he looks like a fatass DOA wrestler, then there's the combat engine: example:
    XXY= Dragon Slayer Slash
    XXXY= Super Dragon Slayer Slash
    XXYXX= Dragon Slayer Wave
    YXYX (while jumping) = Dragon Slayer Wave 2
    XXYXX + direction (while wanking) = True Dragon Slayer Wave
    XXYYXXYXYYXY+direction+XXYXYXYXY = Button Masher Wind Wave Throw 2

    Now wait, my question is, WHAT IS THIS IS XXYX CRAP? Ninjas don't use button mashing like that! And I hear some people say "Ninja Gaiden is better than Shinobi" don't make me laugh, Ninja Gaiden Sucks, by the time it takes for Hayabusa to swing his fucking sword, Morritsune can kill him 50000 times, not that Ninja Gaiden or C:LOI are bad, but at least stop comparing them to Shinobi.
    Edited by 1 at 05/03/04 @ 14:04

  • valli #12 8 years ago

    Nope, there's no Japanese language option there.

    It's definitely in the US version.

    Bit shit if they'vd ditched it since then...

    Yes, it sucks! Is the EU version localized for Spain, Italy, etc.? That could be why they left out the Jap. soundtrack.

  • Cubfan #13 8 years ago

    Seth... not too bright are you?

  • kingmob #14 8 years ago

    Quite enjoed LOI. It is short and repetitive but it did the job well enough.

    Shinobi and Nightshade suck major balls though.

  • funk #15 8 years ago

    the only castlevania game i played was super castlevania 4, which was excellent
    you guys say castlevania veterans will love the rpg elements (or something like that) i don't remember rpg elements in castlevania 4

    it was a good 2d platform game with a whip and a few special weapons, axe, holy water some cross shaped boomerang thing and a dagger, simple

    so maybe these rpg things and whatever else aren't as old school as you think, try castlevania 4, great game, though the graphics are pretty awful by todays standards- the guy with the whip has no face

    the clock tower level was good, as was the music, and the music in a section between level 4 and 5, i think it was, was very eery- nice

  • Daryoon #16 8 years ago

    The RPG/Metroid elements are all fairly recent additions to the series, only appear from Symphony of the Night I believe. Before that there were a ton of Castlevania games that were level-based affairs, and iirc this was supposed to be a 3D version of them, not the more modern entries in the series.

  • Sko #17 8 years ago

    Lol. Aye, you wouldn't want any of those pesky improvements messing up a perfectly dull game. :)

  • Shinji #18 8 years ago

    I guess it IS fair to look at LOI as being a fairly faithful 3D conversion of older games in the series - but it's six years at least since Symphony of the Night, and all the recent 2D Castlevania games have adopted the improvements such as the Metroid style exploration mechanic. I don't think it's legitimate to defend the failings of the game because it's a return to the much poorer early instalments in the series, rather than a continuation of the more recent successes...

  • funk #19 8 years ago

    shocking, an old game i really liked and its considered poor and dull
    i was just confused about why everyone was speaking of rpg elements in castlevania games

  • renzo #20 8 years ago

    "Twin Snakes is looking good, but Konami are only partially involved in this re-make."

    I think you've got that the wrong way round. It's Silicon Knights that are only 'partially involved'.

    "All in all, I think Konami need to get their act together because I've lost a lot of trust in them lately, which is disappointing."

    Heathen!

  • facilitypro #21 7 years ago

    "Walk back through the door, and the enemies in the original room will have respawned - although this time, you'll be able to run straight past them if you like, as once you've cleared out a room the doors are unlocked the next time you run through and you don't have to kill all the bad guys again. The last game we saw which used this kind of mechanic so shamelessly was Sega's hugely disappointing Shinobi remake, in fact - although Lament of Innocence is certainly a better and more enjoyable game than Shinobi was, by quite a huge margin."

    Uh...Shinobi never had respawning enemies (unless you count the ones that appear during boss fights). Besides, once you leave an area, you can't return to it. It becomes blocked off. Did you even play Shinobi before you reviewed it? It's comments like this that make me not take Eurogamer seriously.
    Edited by 1 at 04/04/05 @ 16:33