Rondo of Blood Thread

[A Black Falcon]

Yeah, SMW is definitely a better game than SMB3.  SMB3's levels are too small!

[RyuHayabusa]

SMB3>SMW.  Only people born after 1986 will disagree.  SNES has aged terribly, just slow moving, low animation, muffled sound garbage these days.

Have to disagree on both of those statements, and I was born in 78. SMW vs SMB3 is purely subjective to begin with, but I prefer SMW though I love SMB3 as well. As for the SNES not aging well, I'd say it's aged as well as any of it's contemporaries. It has it's share of crap titles like any other console but it has it's share of all time classics. SMW, Link to the Past, Super Metroid, Yoshi's Island, Final Fantasy IV+VI, Chronotrigger, Axelay, Contra III, Actraiser, and on and on. When it comes to sound, yes, there are many examples of terrible synth horns and guitars, but in the right hands the SNES sounds amazing. Donkey Kong Country, Axelay, Castlevania IV, Chronotrigger, etc. I love the Turbo but the SNES was a damn fine system too.

As for Rondo vs CIV, like I've said before Rondo is the deeper game but CIV has a spookier atmosphere due to the darker visuals and the more gothic music. While I love Cross a Fear and Opus 13 they don't really create a dark mood like you'd expect for a Castlevania game. Nostalgia aside Rondo is the better game but I still love CIV.

[geise]

I agree with everything you said.

[yoyo]

Indeed an incredible game. One of the best experiences I had with the PCE.

[munchiaz]

I'll give one thing to SCIV. The soundtrack is def different than most castlevania games, but in a good way. Rondo is still the better game, But SCIV is good as well

[GohanX]

The soundtrack to Castlevania 4 is indeed amazing.

[awack]

In some ways SCIV is a study in how not to design a game, even people who call it their favorite game of all time tell you that you just have to get past the first  three or four levels and then things pick up, for the most part you will only have around 2 or 3 enemies on screen at once, you have far more on screen in Rondo of course, the main way you or at least most people die in SCIV from what Ive seen is from disappearing blocks and such, in Rondo its doing battle with enemies, enemy AI seems to be far superior In Rondo as well, SCIV gives you multi direction whip...in comparison Rondo gives you the ability to jump on and OFF stairs, multiple characters, different paths to choose, item crash, back flip, slide, tumble, double jump, money actually has a purpose, able to pick your secondary weapon back up, a lot of people might not know but if you keep your finger on the jump button your able to control your jump, and the turtle crash, your able to control where goes (up or down) with the direction pad.

Like I was saying before, here are some of the fx/animations that are still being used today, no other snes or genesis game can claim this. This is where Rondo of blood is the best of its generation.










here are all of the similar SCIV fx/animation for comparison..cant capture transparencies

[Tatsujin]

and not to forget about one of the most important factor in games generally "THE PASSION FOR DETAILS".

Drac X was a huge milestone in that department, and can still hold up ultimately well with all the 2D casts that have been released ever since until these days.

[RyuHayabusa]

Keep in mind that CIV is an early SNES title and only 8 megs whereas Rondo is a Super CD game that came out late in the lifespan of the PCE. When it comes to sprites and frames of animation of course it's going to win out over CIV. Having hundreds of megabytes compared to 1 megabyte will give you an advantage when it comes to frames of animation and detail. Same thing goes for Forgotten Worlds PCE vs the Genesis port. Heck, even Ghouls N Ghosts could've been closer to the Supergrafx port had it been 8 megs instead of 5 megs. As I said before, Rondo is the better game due to it's depth it still lacks the atmosphere created in CIV due to the darker visuals and tunes. And, I love the first few levels of CIV, especially level 2 in the forest. The parallax in the clouds looks cool and the music creates a dark atmosphere. Something I loved about Symphony of the Night is that it's music had elements of both games. Some upbeat tunes that sound nice and a few creepy tunes like when you go down into the darker areas of the castle. Lastly, keep in mind that Slogra and Gaibon were carried over to SOTN as well. Not sure what other games used Rondo sprites besides SOTN.

[fragmare]

The thing that bugs me the most about CV4 isn't the length of the game, number of animation frames, linear paths or any of that... it's the fact that Simon's sprite looks as if it's made up of about 5 or 6 separate sprites all kind of trying to coordinate into something resembling a walking animation.  It's just clunky and weird looking.

[RyuHayabusa]

The thing that bugs me the most about CV4 isn't the length of the game, number of animation frames, linear paths or any of that... it's the fact that Simon's sprite looks as if it's made up of about 5 or 6 separate sprites all kind of trying to coordinate into something resembling a walking animation.  It's just clunky and weird looking.

Really? I don't see that other than maybe when you hold down the whip button and use the d-pad to jiggle the whip around. If you want to see a character made up of multiple sprites that looks clunky check out Earnest Evans. They tried something unique but it didn't work out at all.

[Tatsujin]

Keep in mind that CIV is an early SNES title and only 8 megs whereas Rondo is a Super CD game that came out late in the lifespan of the PCE. When it comes to sprites and frames of animation of course it's going to win out over CIV. Having hundreds of megabytes compared to 1 megabyte will give you an advantage when it comes to frames of animation and detail. Same thing goes for Forgotten Worlds PCE vs the Genesis port. Heck, even Ghouls N Ghosts could've been closer to the Supergrafx port had it been 8 megs instead of 5 megs. As I said before, Rondo is the better game due to it's depth it still lacks the atmosphere created in CIV due to the darker visuals and tunes. And, I love the first few levels of CIV, especially level 2 in the forest. The parallax in the clouds looks cool and the music creates a dark atmosphere. Something I loved about Symphony of the Night is that it's music had elements of both games. Some upbeat tunes that sound nice and a few creepy tunes like when you go down into the darker areas of the castle. Lastly, keep in mind that Slogra and Gaibon were carried over to SOTN as well. Not sure what other games used Rondo sprites besides SOTN.

1. I don't think rondo is using hunderds of megs for grafx. not even close.
2. so if castIV was "only" an early SNES game, what was dracXX in 1995 using how many megs?

[awack]

Dracula xx, is around 16 or so megs, which is just about as big as action type games(shooters and hack n slash etc) got on the snes back then a side scrolling action rpg like super Metroid was, if im not mistaken 20 to 24 megs, not sure though,  a few late platformers were around 20 too 24 megs too I think.

Legendary Axe 1 and 2 both have 2 megs each, which is pretty amazing in my opinion, I always wondered what a 8 or 16 meg castlevania  would look and sound like on a hucard going by Axe 2.

Lastly, keep in mind that Slogra and Gaibon were carried over to SOTN as well

They were redrawn for SOTN, Rondo of blood sprites and special fx were not changed other than maybe a lighter or darker color palette, Th GBA was not able to reproduce the animated fx from Rondo, they tried but they look aweful, most of the Nintendo DS use sprites and special fx from Rondo, again unchanged, castlevania harmony of despair for the xbox 360 also rondo sprites, and also at least one cell phone game, Rondos quality is truly amazing.

[lukester]

Legendary Axe 1 and 2 both have 2 megs each, which is pretty amazing in my opinion, I always wondered what a 8 or 16 meg castlevania  would look and sound like on a hucard going by Axe 2.

Even after playing Rondo, I still love LA too. But, I've never played LA 2, as much as I want it.

I could be wrong, but a HuCard Castlevania probably would've been a port of Haunted Castle. you never know though.

awack, I would be interested if you have more PCE sprite rips. I wonder what other games are as technically good as Rondo, but behind the scenes. HuCard rips of beautiful games like New Adventure Island and Twinbee, would be interesting too!

[Bonknuts]

In some ways SCIV is a study in how not to design a game, even people who call it their favorite game of all time tell you that you just have to get past the first  three or four levels and then things pick up, for the most part you will only have around 2 or 3 enemies on screen at once, you have far more on screen in Rondo of course, the main way you or at least most people die in SCIV from what Ive seen is from disappearing blocks and such, in Rondo its doing battle with enemies, enemy AI seems to be far superior In Rondo as well, SCIV gives you multi direction whip...in comparison Rondo gives you the ability to jump on and OFF stairs, multiple characters, different paths to choose, item crash, back flip, slide, tumble, double jump, money actually has a purpose, able to pick your secondary weapon back up, a lot of people might not know but if you keep your finger on the jump button your able to control your jump, and the turtle crash, your able to control where goes (up or down) with the direction pad.

Like I was saying before, here are some of the fx/animations that are still being used today, no other snes or genesis game can claim this. This is where Rondo of blood is the best of its generation.










here are all of the similar SCIV fx/animation for comparison..cant capture transparencies

 Love your sprite rip work, awack!