Between this horrible thing and Jerrmy Parish’s love letter to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night I felt inspired to tackle the game again. I chose the unlockable version in Dracula X Chronicles so I could play on the toilet. I have to say, the game looks great on the PSP. I don’t know why, but I prefer my 2D gaming small. I’d rather play these types of games on a handheld than on TV. Maybe it’s just my imagination but the details seem crisper and clear when they’re tiny.

These details are at the focus of Parish’s article (which can be read in the latest issue of Gamespite Quarterly). He praises the game for the little things like the secret boots that increase Alucard’s hight by one pixel or that you can enjoy a quiet meal with Count Olrox before fighting him. My favorite detail is the practice of literary allusions in the game, which includes a reference to one of my favorite novels.

Nearly every weapon, armor, or item in the game is a reference to some literary work. There are generic weapons, of course. Short Sword, Morning Star, Flachion, etc. But beyond this very little of the game’s items are entirely original creations. For example, Tyrfing is the first dark elemental sword that is found in the game. It’s description claims that it is cursed and equipping it will drop Alucard’s strength by 30 points. At the time you find it this drop in power is enough to make the sword completely harmless; it will simply pass through any enemy you attack. Why does it have this particular quality? Well, the Tyrfing comes from the Poetic Edda, a collection of poems from medieval Iceland. Forged by dwarves to be the perfect weapon, one that would never rust and could cut through steel like cloth. But the dwarves rebelled and cursed it so that it would cause three great evils and kill a man whenever it was used (most likely its wielder). It’s fitting that it’s in game proxy would be given dark status.

Unfortunately, a large marjority of these references call back to that ever pressent mainstay of fantasy: The Lord of the Rings. But there are more obscure references as well. The vorpal blade from Alice’s Adventures Through the looking-glass shows up. As does the twin of Elric of Melnibone’s Stormbringer (here called Mourneblade).

One of my favorite authors is Gene Wolfe. His books are relatively unknown but critically acclaimed. The fact that there’s a reference to his work in Symphony is a joy and a wonder. Terminus Est is a sword dropped by Nova Skeletons in the inverted castle. It was originally called Hrunting (which was Beowulf’s sword don’t you know) but there must have been a Wolfe fan on the translation team.

In Wolfe’s novel The Book of the New Sun Terminus Est is a broadsword with a square point. This means it ccan only be used for cutting, which serves it well, as it is an executioner’s sword. It’s purpose: to sever the heads of criminals. It has a hollow center filled with liguid mercury to give more strength to a swing (this last fact may explain why in Symphony the sword has a posion quality). The name Terminus Est is translated by several characters in the book as “the line of division,” “the place of parting,” or simply “the end.” It one of those weapons, like Anduril or Excalibur, that is a classic of its genre. The fact that it is in Symphony endears the game greatly to me. Someone at Konami has great taste.

There’s a shit-ton of buzz going on right now about Shadow Complex, the “Metroidvania”-inspired game that apparently makes no apologies for aping its source material. 1up.com’s Jeremy Parish has a particularly nice review, in my opinion, in that he actually knocks the game down a peg for being virtually identical in style and substance to Super Metroid. Here’s a link:

http://www.1up.com/do/reviewPage?cId=3175605

I absolutely adore the “-vania” part of SC’s equation — Castlevania’s Symphony of the Night, it is well known to readers of this blog, is one of my absolute favorites. I cannot say the same of Super Metroid, however, because I’ve never played it. Ok, to be honest, I messed around a bit with a ROM download way, way back in college for about an hour. But exams, reading assignments, beer and other campus-related distractions ensured I quickly lost interest.

I have thought many times about downloading Super Metroid for the Virtual Console countless times, but I have not yet quite done so. It is because there is always some other, fresher game out there that catches my interest. Super Metroid will still be a classic tomorrow, so why put down a hot new game like Red Faction: Guerrilla that I am enjoying immensely today?

Now, though, things have changed. I am nearly done with my Red Faction playthrough. I am drawn to SC’s promise of 2D gameplay, and I want to support games like these. I vociferously advocate 2D games with high-end graphics for the console’s download services. But I wonder if I would be well-served to finally play through Super Metroid before I do? I wonder if I play through SC first, SM will seem underwhelming. If SC really has all of SM’s elements, I’ll get Deja Vu, right? But on the other hand, I wonder if I owe it to the gaming world to play SC first. You see, I could provide invaluable perspective. I am unique. I have not had my gaming memory directly influenced by Super Metroid. I see things in a different light than you. I am like a baby boomer who never bothered to listen to Electric Ladyland. Maybe my embarassingly uninformed background is an asset, then? Maybe you want to read the opinions of someone who doesn’t know what he’s talking about?

I’ll be thinking this one over all day. I will make a decision tonight.

DCG

Here there be spoilers; you’ve been warned.

I’ve kind of wanted to do a formal review of the more recent installments of the Castlevania series, and by “recent”, I mean the 2D titles that began with Symphony of the Night. You know, IGA’s stuff. But in brief, while I may have a more involved retrospective later, I do want to touch on something that happened with Symphony of the Night: the Belmont clan lost the reins.

Is this bad? No, not at all. But it is interesting how the first really landmark Castlevania game did not star a Belmont as the protagonist, and even as an antagonist, he wasn’t the lead. There are a lot of arguments for why Symphony of the Night is the best Castlevania game in the series, but I think the easiest and most obvious is simple: it finally gave us characters with a past and potential for development.

I think Igarashi recognized that, hence the Belmont clan becoming marginalized so drastically the more he ran the show. It’s a flaw that’s kind of built into the narrative; only one generation of Belmont at a time will face Dracula, and aside from his title in the series (as Sophia has been written into oblivion), with rare exception that’s it. Thus, obviously, we have to introduce a character(s), make him compelling, and give his arc a satisfying resolution, above and beyond “I killed Dracula because my ancestors screwed me over”. But even then, there’s not a lot of room; aside from Trevor, the real standout storylines are characters not in the direct Belmont bloodline that can be summarized with “I hope I live up to the Belmont legacy”. (Juste… I never liked Juste. His art direction really turned me off; it was like Igarashi realized how significant a letdown Circle of the Moon was after Symphony of the Night, and so he had Ayami Kojima give us a Belmont that was strikingly similar to her previous interpretation of Alucard.) So it should come as little surprise that Soma Cruz ultimately had the most fulfilling character arc: Castlevania has been Dracula’s story all along.

And no, I don’t mean to say that like it’s some “big reveal”, it’s just the way it worked out. Dracula really was just a big bad until Symphony, when all of a sudden he became (shockingly enough) a sympathetic character. (People can complain about the original dub all they want, but Scott McCulloch will always be Dracula to me; I have yet to be able to play through the Symphony port on PSP because of how grating the “lulz serious” dub is.) So much so, that you see through Soma’s secret within five minutes of beginning Aria of Sorrow, though that doesn’t hurt the narrative in the slightest. What it does do is complete the damage to the original series motivation that Symphony began; Portrait of Ruin and Order of Ecclesia aren’t bad games, and they’re even decent games in the post-Symphony tradition, but they just feel… awkward. Ecclesia has its place because we had to bridge the gap from Dracula to Soma, while Portrait of Ruin resolves the old Genesis Bloodlines plot branch, but I guess the problem is the fact they are so out of order and really stick out as tying loose ends after the fact.

Still, I am glad those loose ends are tied, since rumors abound that Hideo Kojima’s Castlevania installment will be a reboot. I have to admit, I was never really a fan of the Metal Gear series, because Kojima seemed to have the stealth element as a straightjacket instead of simply the best approach to infiltration (I’ve only played the original and Solid, but being an elite agent outclassed by a handful of grunts in a fight doesn’t motivate me to stay involved; I’m enough of an obsessive perfectionist as is without a game going out of its way to heavy-handedly punish deviation from its rails), but anyone who has seen any of his GDC presentations can tell he has some ingenious approaches to design constraints, so I have hopes. I definitely fear more “Warlord gene” pseudo-science antics, but even if he doesn’t direct a cohesive story, maybe he can at least bring some good mechanics to the table.

Gibt’s seit über einem Jahr im Xbox-Marktplatz für 10 €. Im Original war Castlevania:SOTN für die Playstation. Heute kann ich sagen: Das ist der beste Teil der Reihe, den ich kenne.

Wer die Spiele nicht kennt, dem muss gesagt werden: Shame on you. Die Spielreihe ist inspiriert von Super Metroid für den SNES und zeichnet sich dadurch aus, dass man, während man durch Graf Draculas Schloss zieht um ihn zu finden und zu besiegen,  an allen möglichen Ecken und Enden neue Fähigkeiten erlangt, mit denen man neue Bereiche des Schlosses erreichen kann.

Ob man Metroid oder Castlevania bevorzugt ist eigentlich nur eine Frage des Geschmackes: Vampirjäger oder Space-Bountyhunter. Eigentlich alle Teile der Serien sind ziemlich gut (wenn man den 3D-Abstecher von Castlevania mal ignoriert).

Es ist eines meiner Lieblings-Prinzipien. Wenn man im Laufe eines Spieles Fähigkeiten erhält, die einem wirklich neue optionen eröffnen – und nicht nur neue Arten, Gegner zu töten – habe ich daran wirklich spaß.

Die Castlevania-Teile ähneln sich alle ziemlich, das muss mal gesagt werden. Man spielt eben jeweils Vampirjäger, die mit der klassischen Vampirjägerpeitsche ausgerüstet sind und heilige Relikte als Sonderwaffen besitzen. Während des Spieles bekommt man die Fähigkeiten zu Rennen, Doppelsprung, Wandsprung, Powerslide, Schieben, Massive Wände durchbrechen, und – mein Liebling – den Supersprung, mit dem man Senkrechtstartend ca. 30 Meter in die Höhe schießt.

Symphony of the Night ist da anders. Man ist immernoch gegen Dracula, aber in diesem Fall ist man selber ein Vampir, sein Sohn nämlich. Und zwar Alucard. Nein, nicht der hier. Der hier. Hab ich schonmal erwähnt, dass ich Hellsing scheisse und uncool finde? Ich find Hellsing scheisse und uncool.

Als Vampir lernt man weder zu rennen, noch den Powerslide, noch den Wandsprung, noch hat man die Vampirjägerpeitsche. Das ist aber alles kein Nachteil. Man ist agiler als die Menschen, man kämpft mit den verschiedensten Waffen, aber vor allem Schwertern – und man kann sich in einen Wolf, eine Fledermaus oder in Nebel verwandeln.

Durch Gitter oder über Abgründe zu kommen ist so natürlich kein Problem. Und wenn mal der ganze Bildschirm mit Gegnern voll ist, wird man halt ein wenig zu einer unbesiegbaren Gasform.

Ausserdem beherrscht Alucard typische Vampir-Magie: Er kann sich für eine Weile durch zugefügten Schaden heilen, Geisterkugeln herbei rufen, mit verschiedenen Waffen sonder-Angriffe ausführen und die klassische Dracula-Fähigkeit anwenden: Wegteleportieren, dreifachen Feuerball schießen.

Während des Spieles findet man ausserdem fünf verschiedene Familiars, von denen einem jeweils einer folgen kann. Das gab es schon z.B. bei Circle of the Moon, aber dort konnte man dann gleichzeitig nichts anderes mehr machen.

Das Ergebnis all dieser Fähigkeiten ist, dass man in jeder Situation deutlich mehr möglichkeiten hat, als wenn man einen der Helden der anderen Spiele damit konfrontieren würde. Und damit sind wir wieder beim Spielprinzip: Man kann das Spiel auf den unterschiedlichsten Wegen durchqueren, und auch Kämpfe auf die verschiedensten Weisen gewinnen, weil man halt so viel kann.

Es ist sehr schwer, SOTN zu kritisieren. Die Musik passt, die Grafik ist in der Xbox-Fassung verbessert (die original-Grafik ist aber auch verfügbar), und 2D-Grafik altert ohnehin deutlich besser als 3D-Grafik, die Handlung ist vorhanden und stört niemanden.

Und selbst ich als erfahrener Castlevanier habe 8 Stunden gebraucht um das Spiel durchzuspielen und habe zwei Stunden später alle Räume des Schlosses entdeckt. Und danach hat man die Möglichkeit, mit einem völlig anderen Charakter nochmal zu spielen. Als Anfänger wird man vielleicht 2 bis 4 Stunden länger brauchen. Das ist wirklich akzeptabler Umfang für 10 Euro – und während der Zeit wird einem wirklich nicht langweilig.

Mir fällt auch nach genauerem Nachdenken nichts ein, was man an dem Spiel kritisieren könnte. Der einzige Grund es nicht zu spielen, wenn man die Möglichkeit dazu hat, ist eine komplette Abneigung gegen Spiele, in denen man springen kann und Waffen benutzt. Aber wer ist denn schon so drauf.

Ich bin ausserdem gerade ziemlich froh, dass ich jetzt zum ersten mal 100% aller Achievements in einem Spiel geschafft habe. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Jetzt kaufen, oder zumindest die Vorgänger als ROM spielen.

(Wer sich damit nicht auskennt: Bei Google “GBA Emulator Download” Dann “GBA ROM Download”. Ist ‘n Aufwand von 10 Minuten.)

Mais um post sobre músicas de jogos fodas, ou música fodas de jogos, ou músicas fodas de jogos fodas =)

Esse jogo é o o Castlevania – Symphony of The Night, também conhecido como Drácula X.

É considerado por muitos como um dos melhores jogos de PlayStation, quiçá de todos os tempos, EVER.

É massa também o Character Design, de uma tal de Ayami Kojima, o traço dela está presente em várias versões. Algumas vezes mudaram o estilo fuderoso-europeu-medieval dela e fizeram uns cocôzinhos estilo anime.

Aqui você baixa a trilha sonora pelo 4shared(não verificado). E se voce tiver o veículo mágico de assistir filmes e séries diretamente dos EUASES, procure por um arquivo que tenha o seguinte hash: 1B1AF5470E967BC9258C431514E62002511CCE53

Assumo a negligencia premeditada; não acompanhei a série Castlevania ao longo dos anos, como gostaria. Contudo, tenho passado alguns Invernos aconchegado, ao lado da chama apaixonante da Konami. Jogar e entender a arte de qualquer Castlevania é um processo moroso, mas único e compensador. Ao leitor menos atento à competência da série, recomendo o folhear cuidado das páginas com a história do clã Belmont, na luta contra o clássico Dracula. Felizmente, para o admirador gótico de ocasião, com especial apreço por metros de cabedal e o Universo dos vampiros, cada título desta série pode ser experimentado sem grande apego ao capítulo anterior. Embora o enredo, que se expande por séculos, possa ser estrutural exigente, o ambiente claustrofóbico e a magia original transparecem pelas paredes da mansão misteriosa.

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night será o exemplo maior dos feitos técnicos e artísticos da Konami. A equipa nipónica oferece um banquete de criatividade, temperado com doses certas de acção, plataformas e RPG, bem ao gosto do escriba de serviço. É-me difícil qualificar a qualidade e exuberância artística da obra, sem a bengala da objectividade e crítica pormenorizada. Mas Symphony of the Night é um título que se dispensa de detalhes e meras formalidades de análise. Quando um jogo se assume como a soma dos talentos envolvidos na sua concepção, a certeza de oferecer um produto diferente, original, mas vanguardista e acessível, sublinha a postura orgulhosa da Konami e respectiva equipa de desenvolvimento.
Symphony of the Night é o resultado duma relação proibida, mas fortuita, entre as raízes da série que representa e a absorção de ideias do alheio. Considerando o passado glorioso, mas convencional e fixo, da série, a introdução pioneira de uma mecânica mais próxima aos RPG ramifica a experiência original. O sabor ímpar do level-up chegou a Castlevania, acompanhado por uma dose modesta de gestão do inventário e equipamento bélico a rigor. Aliás, Symphony of the Night apresenta uma selecção de armamento interessante, construída por lâminas de inspiração gótica e os chicotes mais clássicos. Mas a génese desta obra alastra qualidade, além dos processos mecânicos e inspiração técnica. Há uma alma gigante, um leque de valores único, e sensibilidade artística maior no disco de jogo. Explorar a mansão de Dracula é tão gratificante como experimentar as plataformas e a dinâmica de acção do título, sempre admirando a pintura fresca, original e marcante de cada monstro ou objecto no cenário.

Pela primeira vez em toda a série, o jogador assume o controlo de um… vampiro. Alucard é o protagonista nesta odisseia gótica e sangrenta, assumindo-se como aliado do clã Belmont na demanda secular para derrotar o seu próprio pai – o Dracula, claro. Repare que este paralelismo (conduzir a Diáspora do vilão do enredo) havia sido pouco explorado até ao lançamento do título, em 1997. Felizmente, Koji Igarashi (designer e co-autor do guião) decidiu dotar o jogador com poder sobre-humano, apoiado por feitiços e uma invulgar capacidade de resistência do protagonista. Consagre-se o mérito da ideia; senti-me verdadeiramente poderoso ao comando de Alucard.
Michiru Yamane volta a enfeitiçar o castelo de Castlevania, envolvendo o jogador com uma banda sonora notável, com mostras de sensibilidade e interpretação da obra. Aliás, a dedicação de cada membro da equipa de desenvolvimento da Konami é palpável em cada segundo da aventura.

Symphony of the Night é, portanto, uma ode intemporal à arte nos videojogos. Toda a pintura conceptual foi imaginada e concebida por um talento maior da indústria, uma autodidacta genial que enriquece e aflora a vista do jogador. A japonesa Ayami Kojima assumiu a rédea da vertente artística da série, precisamente desde Symphony of Night. Para o registo, louvo a escolha sensível e certeira da Konami para o lugar. Desde que passei os olhos pelo trabalho de arte original (baseado em pintura a pastel) da artista, adicionei mais um retrato à minha galeria de notáveis dos videojogos. Para além de partilhar o sobrenome com outro mago maior destas lides, ’santo’ Hideo, Kojima ajudou a pintar o painel de competências que hoje reconhecemos à série Castlevania. Juntamente com o criativo, e exuberante, Koji “IGA” Igarashi, Ayami espantou o mundo do entretenimento digital, no final dos anos 90. Ao leitor mais desatento, provavelmente alheio aos méritos da obra, apresento um convite – descubra porquê.

Najlepsza Castlevania. Taka jest opinia większości ludzi którzy zagrali w tą grę. Sterujemy w niej Alucardem który w przeciwności do klanu Belmontów wykorzystuję każdy rodzaj oręża a nie tylko bat. Dostępni są również mali pomocnicy w formie duszków, różne zaklęcia i ruchy specjalne. Zamek po którym się poruszamy jest GIGANTYCZNY a bestiariusz OGROMNY.

Gra posiada cudną grafikę, przecudną muzykę i MÓWIONE DIALOGI!.

Good Friday was solemn. No prayers between readings. Only the necessary hymns were sung. No sign of the cross. No genuflection. The setting sun was fierce at first, gorging through the stained glass. Then, it slowly died, leaving behind a violet, pink, and blue sky until the night smothered it out. A large crucifix was carried into the church and laid on the altar. Then at each of the steps of the altar, a deacon and the priest stood with crucifixes and the people got in line to kiss the feet of the crucifix. Communion was given without wine. The wafer was dry and it stuck to the roof of my mouth. It always gives me the creeps to chew the wafer, but I had to in order to pass it down my throat this time.

Easter Vigil was more moving that I had expected. I’m a sucker for symbols. So in the beginning of the vigil the lights were shut off. The whole St. Monica church, a cavernous, circular structure with a high ceiling, is flooded with darkness. Then lighting starts whipping through the glass, and the thunder reverberates a few seconds after each lash of light. Then the hiss of rain. The priest starts a prayer and a fat tongue of fire starts burning at one of the doors. The father blesses the fire and the altar boys and girls light their candles and start lighting the candles of the people at the pews. Each person then lights their neighbor’s candle, and a wave of candlelight starts moving from the front of the pew to the back end. It was beautiful, seeing the light spread like a gentle fire on a dark grassland. Then the whole church was illuminated by, I would guess to venture, a thousand candles. They ran out of the cups to stop the wax, so my fingers were sealed onto the candle stick itself as the the hot was fell on my fingers.

The complete darkness represents the darkness of the sepulcher in which Jesus’ body laid in death. A primal fear surged in me for a while, as I stood in darkness in a vault. The fire and the the illumination by candlelight represents the moment of the resurrection, when life, symbolized by light, overpowers death, the darkness. It reminded again the beauty of liturgy and the ritual of mass. Whatever inconsistencies I have found in the Catholic Church simply staid suspended and, with me, were overwhelmed by awe. They are obvious symbols, but strong non the less.

I read the epistle before the gospel.

Then, there were baptisms and confirmations. Of course, the baptism candidates where kids older than five and adults. It was beautiful seeing the anticipation on their faces, as they stood in line to receive the holy water on their foreheads. To top it off, a set of identical triplet girls where confirmed into the Catholic…how more symbolic (and provocative: triplet girls/trinity/male personified God) can you get?

The english choir sung beautifully, of course. They included brass along with the organ. The spanish choir sang beautifully as well. The english choir was regal and ethereal, while the spanish choir was humble, smaller, more earthly, with melancholic guitars and a modest violin. The liturgy went back and forth from english and spanish. We even sang Handel’s “Halleluja,” which made me laugh a little.

Tomorrow Easter mass.

Why are all the men very androgynous looking?

http://www.creativeuncut.com/artcv-sotn.html

Why does this remix of Utsuho’s theme remind me of Castlevania? Why do I suddenly want a Touhou remake of Symphony of the Night? Find out next week, same shrine time, same shrine channel.

At the same time, where’s my Koishi bobblehead?

As can be inferred by the title, this countdown is for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. In case you don’t get it, Nintendo created an interesting play to add “Super” to the title of many of their games from this era of games. Anyways, as the undisputed king of all consoles, the SNES absolutely murdered its competitors, namely the Sega Genesis (not even a murder, just TripV’s over-zealous thoughts). This countdown was definitely the hardest to compile and really great games like Mega Man X, Kirby’s Superstars, and Turtles in Time all didn’t make the cut. So without further ado the SNES top 9.

#9 Super Punch-Out

I really can’t emphasize how much I love the Punch-Out games, they are just downright fun. Despite its super simple controls it is still one of the most satisfying boxing experiences to date. Like its predecessor Punchout delivers many humorous characters that often capitalize on stereotypes, the Bob Marley look alike Bob Charlie is just too funny. Perhaps the greatest compliment I can give the game is that I still pick it up and play it to this day.

#8 Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest

The Donkey Kong Country series was a totally wowing experience. The graphics were simply amazing and the controls were refined to perfection. Not to mention it reintroduced Donkey Kong to the Nintendo universe. Now the entire DK series deserves a spot on the list but we had to go with DK2 as the best of the three and the number 8 best game on the SNES.   Not to mention that the play on words in the title of the game is just too much to handle.

#7 Super Mario World

Including levels with the title of “Gnarly”, “Tubular” and “Way Cool” among others, Super Mario World set the pace for the SNES as a system, and because of this game the SNES was flooded with many classics. For all 2 of you who haven’t heard of or played this game, it is essentially a further refined Super Mario Bros. 3 with Yoshi and other new powerups, what else could you possibly ask for? Super Mario World 2? Well that did come about 4 years after but was a totally different style game. Although it didn’t reach our top 9, it can easily be considered one of the best games for the system.

#6 Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars

Mario in an RPG, are you guys crazy? Wait it’s made by Square and its fuckin’ awesome, OK that’ll work. Super Mario RPG was simply outstanding. Mario was put in a more realistic situation where he is pit against a new enemy, Smithy. The new villain on the block pisses off everyone including Bowser, who eventually joins your party; I mean how cool is that? Either way your adventure takes you across a variety of locales with plenty of cameos from familiar Mario characters.

#5 Super Street Fighter II

The greatest fighting game ever (behind the later released SF3:TS), Street Fighter has permeated every aspect of popular culture. We chose this version over the previous two iterations because this was the most updated and included great new characters with all the upgrades that came along the way. Until Street Fighter 2 HD Remix is released, this version still stands at the top. Speaking about the future, we are highly anticipating the release of Street Fighter IV.

#4 Final Fantasy III

Originally titled Final Fantasy VI in Japan (and Stateside in later ports), this is one of those games that doesn’t come around very often. Its extremely large roster is highly irregular for an RPG, yet each character is extremely well developed and highly likeable, except Gau, he’s lame. Even when creating three separate parties in the final dungeon, it’s hard to decide who to include. Musically, it’s Nobuo Uematsu’s greatest work, and that’s saying a lot considering his record. It’s just an ideal fusion of elements.

#3 Super Metroid

Seeing the opening to this game straight up gave me chills. As the third installment in yet another one of Nintendo’s venerable franchises, Super Metroid truly upped the ante when it comes to level design and graphics. Plus all the different powerups and abilities just give the game so much depth and variety. On top of all that the musical score is one of the best in video games, I salute you Kenji Yamamoto and Minako Hamano. For a game that redifined the adventure genre and inspired the Playstation classic Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Super Metroid receives 3rd place.

#2 The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

Even though dkn29 doesn’t want to admit it, this is the best Zelda of all time. This game and Chrono Trigger could have easily swapped spaces in my mind so it’s obvious what kind of class we’re dealing with. This game basically invented the Zelda formula of finding a special item in each dungeon, all of which are awesome, and using it to kill the boss. On top of that the game is just fun and that’s what really matters. Koji Kondo’s soundtrack is truely epic in this game. If you haven’t played it, well, you’re missing out bub.

#1 Chrono Trigger

OMGASM, CT stands tall in rarified air as possibly the best game ever, so it was an easy choice as our top game on the SNES. I mean I don’t know what to say except that this game was perfect, and I mean perfect. There is not a single thing wrong with this game, not one. The soundtrack is highly regarded, and is our favorite Video Game Soundtrack period!  It has charm, phenomenal graphics and game play, and with 13 or so endings, a high replay value. I think I speak for everyone when I say I cannot wait for the DS port, so that I can enjoy the perfection for the 500^th time.

Now that we’ve listed our top 9, if anyone else is reading this, feel free to leave any comments or post your personal top 9.

Han pasado once años desde que Konami lanzara al mercado la primera incursión de la saga Castlevania en Playstation, la soberbia Castlevania: Symphony of the night. Al margen de sus excelencias gráficas, críticos y aficionados se pusieron de acuerdo en ensalzar la calidad de su banda sonora, una producción de unos 68 minutos obra de la compositora nipona Michiru Yamane.

Recurriendo a la fórmula que hizo de Super Castlevania IV otro juego inolvidable, Yamane ambienta los inhóspitos parajes del juego con unas melodías que van del jazz al rock progresivo. En su peculiar visión de la fantasía gótica hay espacio para todos los géneros sin que por ello se resienta la atmósfera que caracteriza a la franquicia. Así, podemos encontrar momentos de gran fastuosidad en el tema “Dance of Gold”, sobrios compases en “Abandoned Pit” o incursiones en el drum’n bass en “Crystal Teardrops”, donde un estilo en apariencia incompatible se confabula con los ecos de una caverna infestada de monstruos.
Estos solo son unos ejemplos del eclecticismo que rezuma toda la banda sonora, que incluso se permite el lujo de revisar algunos clásicos de la saga, como el “Dance of Illusions” que ya sonara en Dracula X Rondo of Blood.

Symphony of the night marcó una época dentro de la composiciones destinadas a los videojuegos y se convirtió en el modelo que la propia Yamane empleó en posteriores secuelas, como Lament of Innocence o Curse of Darkness, ambos juegos para Playstation 2.