80%Emulated

really quirky how the doppelganger boss is damn near impossible without the stopwatch but absolutely trivial with it. why is it like that. tbf maybe it's doable with a shield but i missed that shit !!!!!!!! (though that's my fault for not exploring in the metroidvania)

this game is very good and very fun, but i'd be having a lot less fun without save states- i don't mind the placement of checkpoints too much, but having to watch the death screen and then work through a menu just to go back to them is mad annoying !! zipping back to the checkpoints after a death is a lot nicer, and something modern games simply do better, but thankfully emulation helps smooth out the experience

besides some small gripes, this game really surprised me with how well it held up to the expectations i had (ive heard that this game is better than hollow knight! (it's not)). the spritework, the music, the full voice acting, the use of the ps1's 3d capabilities,, small things like being able to change the color of your inventory menu? why did they do that? why don't modern games do that? it's clear why this game spawned a genre. why wouldn't you want your game to be like symphony of the night?

90%Emulated

First time playing, can see why it's held in very high regard. Still one of the top Metroidvania games to date.

70%Sega Saturn

Esta versão só presta pelo conteúdo adicional da Maria.

100%PlayStation

MASTERPIECE! ★

85%Emulated

Let me preface this by saying that this is my first playthrough of this game in general. I can see why it was so game changing for its time. It stuck with solid pixel art and had good CGI cutscenes. ALL of the dialogue is voiced which is kind of crazy for its time.

The visuals are rock solid and the music is top notch. The gameplay is extremely difficult to get a hang of and it just throws you in there without any explanation of what to do or where to go. I didnt even know how to use the save points, that might be user error though.

Would I play it again? Not anytime soon but I would like to revisit it in the future and play as Richter Belmont. All the hype for this game aged well and I can see why its a favorite among Castlevania fans. I was a little displeased with the traversal in the inverted castle but the now bosses were great.

Im still new to this genre and I wouldnt put this game on top of my list of favorites it is very well made and thought out.

*Played on Anbernic RG35XXH*

100%PlayStation

Best metroidvania of all time. that soundtrack is legendary.

90%Emulated

This game was amazing, and I had no idea coming into it that I would have this much fun. I'm not a fan of platformers and have very limited experience with Metroidvanias. I just loved the exploration in this game. I played it similar to how I would play a Soulsborne game, finding all of the rooms and all of the treasures. I enjoyed the RPG-lite elements. I actually enjoyed the easier difficulty level, which kept it so that mechanical skill was more important for exploration and efficiency than combat. The music was surprisingly good, especially in the library.

100%PlayStation

obra prima

80%PlayStation

Hard to review. The inverted castle is copy and pasted and rushed/padded/unfinished as hell - and makes up literally half the game.

It’s a 10/10 game with a 5/10 game stapled onto it, so where does that leave it? I don’t know

90%PlayStation

Castlevania Symphony of the Night is an incredibly impressive game. It so confidently drops you straight into the action, wastes no time explaining its own concept, while somehow not leaving the player completely helpless. Exploring Dracula's castle is so fun, with a variety of interesting locations with unique set pieces, its surprisingly difficult to get genuinely lost in such a sprawling maze. The weapons are an absolute joy to use, and minmaxing to create a crazy build is very fun. This game manages to hit that perfect balance of being approachable, yet engaging. Even if you break the game and make everything way too easy for yourself, theres a lot of fun to be had in that process alone. Its absolutely insane to me that they were able to hit it out of the park as well as they did here

80%PlayStation

Played in 2024.

It obviously paved the way for a lot of modern games.
The presentation is top notch: graphics, music.
Plenty of secrets, some impossible to find without a detailed guide.

But the game also has some glaring issues.
Navigating the menu is awful. Finding a piece of equipment once your inventory grows is a pain, so is using an item.
The RPG elements are quite light, and you cannot really come up with a lot of different builds for your character.
Last thing: the 2nd castle castle does not have that "come back here once you've got the ability" aspect, and I found exploring it less fun that going through the 1st half.

Still an amazing game though.

100%PlayStation

11/10

70%Xbox Series X/S

I think I might prefer Aria over Symphony weirdly enough.

Back when it first released Symphony was a triumph and pretty much kicked off the Metroidvania genre but now a days it's fine.

First the good stuff, the graphics and general presentation of the game is great for a PS1 title, not to mention it's great soundtrack that really suit the eerie vibes of a big vampire castle. There's a lot of enemy variety and boss variety so tackling enemies always feels fun. Also it's fun to find weapons, powerups and items as you explore the castle.

The thing that bothers me though is that those weapons, powerups and items just don't feel good enough or variety enough. There's many different weapons but the only types are swords and shields. Powerups are great for getting to new areas but I wish they were a bit more tighter or smoother to control, there are a tons of consumable items but the only ones that feel worth using are health items and the teleport to shop item. There's also Alucard's magic attacks but you need to perform fighting game inputs to use them.

Also while the inverted castle is a good bonus it also makes the game drag a bit too long towards the end.

All in all, SOTN is a pretty good Metroidvania that has aged a bit when it comes to mechanics but not with presentation, music and gameplay.

90%PlayStation 4

+ Innovative open-endedness in level design makes for excellent pacing

- Vague endgame access

100%PlayStation

It's Symphony of the Night. What else needs to be said? The best pixel art direction of any game, some of the greatest music ever composed for a game, highly satisfying movement and combat with tons of build variety, fantastic level design with lots of secrets to uncover and the most well-paced sense of progression I've seen in a game rivaled only by Metroid. Since its initial release nearly 30 years ago, it has spawned countless imitators but has yet to be outdone or even matched.

100%Xbox 360

Um jogo pra vida... um dos melhores que já joguei. Os gráficos, trilha sonora, personagens, tudo nota 100!

70%PlayStation 3

Although many praise this game as one of the best of all time, I didn't enjoy it to that extent. It was a nice game but it ends there.

90%PlayStation

An absolutely fantastic game that possibly has the perfect formula for a metroidvania game.

Fantastic music, fun and unique boss fights and great gameplay. I absolutely love the input based spells you learn.
The RPG elements are very varied with many options that alter gameplay.

I really like the map exploration and how you re-explore later on with new abilities. I love the goofy voice acting and cutscenes, and the characters are great.

I like the story, and the humorously named villain Shaft as well. The art style and graphics are amazing and have aged really well. The sound design is superb aswell. The Reverse Castle is a really fun way to reuse the map in an interesting and unique way.

90%PlayStation 5

Struggled at the start, but got going once I found a few upgrades. Can definitely see this games influence on Metroidvanias that came after it. It's hard to say that any since have done it much better. A big map with lots of secrets to find, good enemy variety, some RPG elements, and multiple possible endings. There's not much this game doesn't have, and it still holds up 27 years after its release.

70%Emulated

It's quite large, but is a fun adventure

85%PlayStation

This is the first time I played this game. Overall, a fantastic metroidvania, with great art/music/controls and very addictive. It is one of the PS1 games that has aged the best.
That being said, people saying the game "it's perfect and and hasn't aged at all" are absolutely blinded with nostalgia. I don't know how anyone would look at the pause menu and don't think that it's outdated, even in the PS1 era that was considered ugly. The inventory management it's very basic, and some actions like using a healing item are absurdly clunky (open pause, change the item you have in one hand with the healing item, close pause, use the item, open pause again, equip the previous item...), it also have that absurd old games trend of kicking you to the main menu when you die and forcing you to reload the save (instead of just teleporting you to the last save room). There's also some obscure secrets that pretty much require to use guides.
Difficulty it's also a total mess, it start challenging, then you become too OP with the RPG elements and by the end of the first caste you can kill most enemies with one hit and only receive 1 point of damage per enemy hit. Then you reach the inverted castle and the process repeats, it start difficult and become ridiculously easy over time.
The design of he inverted castle it's also very annoying, having to use the bat constantly for actions as simple as a jump between 2 platforms.
So yeah, I think that game would benefit from a remaster that fixes those things, then it could actually become the masterpiece some people claim it is.
But all that being said, it's sill a memorable experience, most the level design it's superb and I couldn't put the game down until full completition. Totally worth to play for metroidvania fans.

75%Emulated

A great game held back by some weird decisions, like taking extreme knockback from any attack no matter how small.

80%PlayStation 5

Castlevania SotN is a brillant game in its first half, absolutely shining despite it's age due to a mastery of it's own genre with satisfaying exploration, actually relevant RPG layer and lots of little details that shows how polished the soft is, my main complaint may be the lack of explanation related to key elements (Looking at you "Mist form") but that's nothing to scoff at especially in a time where Google exist.

The second part or reversed castle if still likable, feels way less magical, essentially turning into a freeroam "fetch quest" in an altered environnement with stronger foes for whom wants to get the good ending(s) and throw hands with Dracula.

If it wasn't perfect all the way in I still find Castlevania SotN exceptionnally enjoyable and well worth a recommendation, it's one of those games that stand the test of time way more than they have any right to.

80%Xbox 360

It's a good game but it's obviously aged.

90%PlayStation

9/10, Not only great, but impactful.

Never played this one until 2024. That's wild. But it is insane how much of this game's thumbprint I see on newer games now. I couldn't put this down. It ages well, still controls REALLY clean, and it's just a general jam. This will be on my replay list for sure.

90%PlayStation 5

It's great!

100%PlayStation

Initially, I simply planned to re-play an hour or two as part of a work I was writing about the "metroidvania" formula... ten minutes later, I was completely hooked up, again. If we forget the lack of ergonomics of its menu (which was already its only real flaw in 1997), SOTN hasn't lost any of its brilliance after all these years and remains one of the absolute references of a genre that has been overexploited in recent times.

100%PlayStation

El juego que más me ha marcado en mi vida, el mejor Castlevania, el castillo invertido, ese toque RPG, Alucard personaje increíble, Maria Renard.. no hay palabras para definir a esta obra de arte.

85%PlayStation 4

It might say I finished this in 10hrs but it took more like 30

100%PlayStation

10/10

100%PlayStation Portable

One of the best PS1 games, masterpiece

80%PlayStation

continua sendo uma obra de arte em todos esses anos, recomendo muito jogar.

90%PlayStation 3

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
• Third time playing
• The best Castlevania game, hands down

100%Sega Saturn

Hadn't played it properly probably since the XBL port some time ago, but when I saw that some team had "fixed" the Sega Saturn port and even slapped an English translation on it I absolutely had to download it. Pretty much from the jump I was hooked and before I knew it I blew through both castles to the credits all in one sitting.

That said, the Saturn levels were disappointing. Some trippy enemy design aside, the backgrounds looked slap-dashed, the areas themselves fairly short and completely skippable. Now I finally know why they've been omitted from every port ever since.

Still the main game was perfection and the Saturn port felt smooth as hell, so I can forgive what otherwise amounts to middling DLC.

80%Emulated

Reverse Castle was confusing as hecc

100%PlayStation 4

One of my favorite games of all time. Every aspect of the game is crafted perfectly. Honestly one of the first games that blew my mind when I was a dumb kid. I first played the game when I was ten, I legitimately thought my copy was broken because the game started and I almost immediately fought Dracula. Now as a dumb adult I probably beaten the game probably about eight times or so and I recommend to anyone who wants to get into video games or has been playing games for years. The only problem I have with this port is the PS4 version doesn't have the weird dialogue in the beginning. I unironically like the originally back and forth Dracula and Richter have.

100%Xbox Series X/S

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a masterpiece. It brought in a new era for the Castlevania series, making it more exploration-focused rather than having linear level progression. In the game, you play as Alucard and explore Dracula's Castle. Similarly to Metroid games, Alucard is weak at the beginning and gets stronger as you explore the castle and find new weapons and armor. There are RPG elements as well, with Alucard having stats and leveling up as you defeat enemies and progress through the game. The game can be completed in various times, depending on which ending you go for. The full game has two halves; if you fully explore Dracula's Castle and find the Gold and Silver rings, you can unlock the second half of the game, in which you must go through an upside-down version of the castle with new enemies and bosses. This is the ideal way to complete the game, as it results in the good ending where Count Dracula is defeated. Symphony of the Night has very good graphics, using pixel art and enhancing it with 3D models in some areas to make a "2.5D" style that I think works really well. The soundtrack is phenomenal, with a mixture of classical sounding tracks, metal, and jazz. There is variety in the tracks but nothing sounds out of place. There are some issues with difficulty balancing, but overall Symphony of the Night is an incredible game that holds up well and is worth playing to this day.

100%PlayStation Portable

PORTUGUÊS

É o Dark Souls do PS1, muita coisa aqui foi copiado e colado no Dark Souls, tenho certeza.
Mas fora isso, é um jogo incrivel, ele pegou várias coisas do Rondo of Blood e evoluiu ainda mais. Adicionou um efeito de exploração extramente prazeroso e recompensador, você está sempre ficando mais forte e com bons itens quanto mais você se dedica a explorar o jogo, a gameplay dele é viciante.
A história é ok, mas esse não é o forte de Castlevania, mas na gameplay esse jogo brilha, os controles são sólidos e muito bem responsivos, mesmo sendo de 1997
É uma obra de arte que não precisa de remake, porque ele é muito bom feito, a movimentação e controles tudo está perfeitamente calibrado, não mudaria nada nesse jogo

ENGLISH
It's Dark Souls on PS1, a lot of things here were copied and pasted from Dark Souls, I'm sure.
But other than that, it's an incredible game, it took several things from Rondo of Blood and evolved even further. It added an extremely pleasurable and rewarding exploration effect, you are always getting stronger and with good items the more you dedicate yourself to exploring the game, its gameplay is addictive.
The story is ok, but that's not Castlevania's strong point, but in gameplay, this game shines, the controls are solid and very responsive, even though it's from 1997
It's a work of art that doesn't need a remake, because it's very well made, the movement and controls are all perfectly calibrated, I wouldn't change anything about this game

100%PlayStation

One of the great Metroidvanias, you can't talk about Metroidvanias without SotN being mentioned. An absolute timeless classic that has tight platforming and exploration, and the light RPG elements really engross you.

90%Xbox 360

The gold standard of metroidvanias

90%PlayStation

Alternative
05/11/2004
16h00min
94%

80%PlayStation 5

PlayStation 1 classic considered by some to be the greatest Metroidvania of them all. I started playing this as a game to play on Halloween and it soon got its teeth into me, I've kept playing it after to fully finish it, yes I even bought the duplicator! The atmosphere is amazing with beautiful backgrounds and visual elements really enhancing the game not to the mention the soundtrack which is worthy of its reputation. Navigating Drac's castle is a great experience with hidden rooms, bosses and upgrades making any detour a worth while trip. The best part is the RPG element which is simple but effective, seeing your numbers go up is a great motivator in this game and there's plenty of ways to do it with the magnitude of items and equipment at your disposal. I'd like to give it a higher score I really would but there's some parts which have not aged well, there's not enough teleporters, I don't mind a bit of busy work but some parts of the castle are infuriating to get back to and the main problem I have is that the game is far too easy 99% of the enemy's are just fodder and most of the bosses are too for that matter, I don't feel like I was over levelled or anything they just die in a few swings making any fights unsatisfying. Its the first Castlevania I put serious time into and it did not disappoint with the game defiantly still holding up to modern standards and even surpassing in some aspects.

90%PlayStation

I really should've played this sooner than later (same with Super Metroid). I've played older Castlevania games before and have endured painful experiences with those. So finally giving myself the urge to sit through this definitely blew my expectations. It was definitely more of a relaxing journey than I thought. Also loved that I only had to use one save file just to experience multiple endings (would recommend checking this when playing). Would give this another spin in the future or maybe even try the Richter playthrough right now. (⌒‿⌒)

70%Emulated

My first ever Castlevania & Metroidvania game, and got to say, despite some problems I had with this, I enjoyed this a lot with it as a newcomer to the genre, though some problems still in mind.

One of the things I love about this game is the non-linearity exploration here. The amount of locations you can discover from area to area is insane, and can be a bit overwhelming when deciding where you want to go, but nonetheless the discovery of them is has me going "wow" at some areas. Some of the location designs are visually stunning, along with amazing soundtrack to make the discovery much more impactful. Dracula's Castle is an absolute banger when you enter in the first time. I think my favorite might be Finding secret areas along with items is a very rewarding experience, though there are times when it can be very obtuse when trying to find an item or where to go next. For example, wearing the two rings in the clock tower, when it actually meant go to the clock room where you find Maria, and not the one with the flying medusa heads. Another example is using the clock sub-weapon to open up a secret room for the Alucart set. How in God's name was I even going to know that? Not even a hint at all? I pity anyone who did this back then without the internet.

The use of RPG elements is compliments it good enough, and by going through levels, leveling up, finding new weapons and spells, it adds a lot of progression here. There is a huge vast amount of weapons to find and some with their own quirks though I find myself using the Holy Sword or Alucard's sword as there are too many for me to care to pick, or that some other weapons are WAY too OP. I feel like that was another issue I had, was the overwhelming amount of items they give, and that the lack of inventory management was tiring to scroll through, looking for the weapon or item you found or need. Not only that but healing with food is an absolute chore to do. Pause, go to menu and scroll looking for the food you need that's cluttered in your inventory, clear whatever item your holding to equip, exit, press the button to drop and walk by as it gives you little health. Absolutely annoying...

The boss battles are hit and miss for me. Early in-game it's a bit of a challenge because I didn't have OP weapons and was fairly leveled. The only one I found tough to fight was the doppelganger, who moves very fast and dealt a lot of damage with throwing knives and jump attacks, which made me play at a fast pace. I will say some of the visual designs on them look amazing. The corpse with Beelzebub's, for example, was hauntingly stunning to look at, as is the final Dracula boss fight with his demonic chair-thing. However gameplay wise, I felt like there was very little strategy here, just duck or jump and then keep hitting them with your sword. Not too bad here, but oh man here's the next half that leads to my next biggest problem...

The inverted castle. I absolutely hate this. Having to reexplore everything, now that the platforming here is an absolute pain in the ass for how high they are to reach and how many times you have to use bat form which is so slow and boring to use during exploration and it's attacks are god awful. I can't decide which level I hate the most. The inverted clock tower with all those medusas turning you into stone while you get gang-banged and hit-stunned to oblivion by cloak knights, or the bell tower as you also get gang-banged and hit-stunned by Imps and fall all the way down because of a Sniper of Goth. Boss battles here are already done in a few seconds because all that time you've spent leveling up in the 1st half, you've now become OP and over leveled in the other. Even Death felt like an absolute joke here. The Grim fucking Reaper killed in 5 hits because I have high damage and defense. The only one that's truly hard is Galamoth, but even he is ridiculously OP, with very little room to avoid attacks that do WAY too much damage to you. Playing this made me realize how balancing in this game is such a mess here.

Overall, I really did like the 1st half of the game. I loved it's area exploration and platforming here. Finding items and some secret areas is a rewarding and satisfying experience. The gothic-horror art style is within the enemies and levels are what I personally dig the most as a horror lover, and the soundtrack definitely enhances the atmosphere much more. However, once it reaches the 2nd half, that's where everything just soured down with more tedious exploration and platforming that just feels downgraded. If it wasn't for the former I mentioned, this game would've gotten a lower score or I may have just gave up.

Flaws aside, I will say I'm glad that this was my first experience into the genre and hope to dive into more. I don't think it's a masterpiece as everyone makes it out to be, but it's solid enough in my book. I'm looking forward to diving more into Metroidvania games like Metroid or Hollow Knight.

90%PlayStation

Changed my mind. This is my favorite Castlevania, with Aria being a close second. The inverted castle can be a pain to navigate, seems like platforms are just out of reach for your double jump and you need to awkwardly angle the high jump, or turn into a bat just to make a basic jump. Other than that, this game is amazing. The only way you might get a challenge of this is on a first, blind playthrough, or to restrict the use of certain items.

90%Xbox 360

First off, I realize just how important Symphony of the night is, and yes, it is a great game. But after finishing it, it's not my favorite Castlevania game or even my favorite of the Iga-vania style ones. Though it was the first, and therefore the most influential for the direction the series took from there, I believe some of the games that came after it surpassed it.

Up until SotN, Castlevania was a linear action platformer series defined by rigid but tight controls, great music and atmosphere, and a high degree of challenge. The early games sometimes had multiple characters to play as, or branching paths, but the games were short, and their replayability came from trying each path, or each character, and the time investment needed to overcome each challenge.

As games became higher budget, and as the capabilities of the consoles we played them on became higher, games started increasing their mileage by easing off the difficulty and making the game itself much bigger. Symphony of the Night is the first Castlevania game to completely change its level structure to be an open-ended explorable 2d map akin to Super Metroid, where you could revisit any area, and progression forward was made by acquiring new items or abilities that allowed you access to more places on the map. This was groundbreaking for the series. Until SotN's release, Super Metroid was one of the only games in existence to play this way, but Castlevania broke into this new style with such success, that the genre itself has been referred to as "metroid-vania" since.

As you progress through the game, you gain experience from killing enemies and level up like in an RPG, making you stronger over time. This genius innovation smooths out the difficulty curve and creates a great sense of progression. The game as a result does feel a bit on the easy side, but that really isn't a mark against it. This game wouldn't work if it was as hard as past entries.

You plays as Alucard, Dracula's immortal son who has teamed up with humans to stop his father from bringing chaos upon mankind. While exploring the castle, you run into Maria Renard, who is looking for Richter Belmont, the last person to face Dracula 5 years prior. You can follow their subplot to reach the true ending or ignore it to end the game at about the halfway mark. You need to pay attention to find the true ending, but I was able to find it without a guide on my first playthrough. The story isn't anything to write home about. It's the gameplay that shines.

Alucard has at his disposal a number of weapons, a few magic spells, and even a couple summonable familiars to aid him in his quest through the castle. He also has three different forms he can take aside from his human state, and a couple extra movement abilities. The game is extremely well designed and thought out. Controlling Alucard feels great, he doesn't play like the stiff castlevania protagonists of old. you must explore, and often revisit area with new abilities to find the path forward. Revisiting an old area now stronger than when you first came through is always gratifying because you can see how much more powerful you are on the second visit. It is easy to miss a few things, but most of the things you need to find are a clear enough path forward. The one thing the game doesn't explain well though, are your extra movement abilities. When you find a new relic, the description text in the menu tells you what it allows you to do, but not the button combination for it. I had to look up one of these things online. I imagine the original manual probably told you but I have a digital version. I didn't need to look up anything else to get nearly full completion.

The only other negative I have is Alucard's arsenal. It's all too similar to each other. 90% weapons have the same attack, but with different reach and recovery time between slashes. In later games, there are far more weapon classes, and you choose what to use based on personal taste for speed reach, hotbox shape, and many other things. Only 10% of the arsenal is varied like that in this game. Another cryptic aspect is elemental affinity. There are different types of damage but the game does a poor job of communicating what is effective against what and how to best use each type against what enemy. The game could just do with a bit more explaining its mechanics and it'd be better. These are issues the DS titles got right, and as such, I have to settle for a score that leaves room for improvement.
91/100

100%PlayStation

O pai dos metroidvanias, se você curte qualquer metroidvania saiba que ele provavelmente surgiu deste aqui, esse jogo é maravilhoso até hoje, não tem desculpa pra não jogar.

60%PlayStation

I think it's overhyped. I think I mostly discovered I like my castlevania games to be linear. Not a fan of the metroidvania versions. The RPG aspects felt tacked on and the upside down castle felt like a Ghouls 'n Ghosts like cheap trick to me. It wasn't a bad game, but I didn't really enjoy it. I think it's historically important and all... but yeah... not my thing.

80%PlayStation

The "old game jank" is strong with this one, but I'm rating based on how I think I would have felt in 1997.

It's easy to see why this game is so revered and legendary. Unfortunately I did not grow up with it so I'm looking at it with 2023 eyes. The good: the castle is awesome, the movement and physics are awesome and very tight feeling. The soundtrack is incredible. And man this game is a looker, I love the sprites. Cool lore too. The voice acting on the PSX version is so bad it's good again lmao (I know they retranslated and redubbed on PSP). Exploration is really fun until you actually are trying to advance.

I tried hard not to look stuff up at first but I don't have the endless time I had as a kid. You often need an item or ability to advance, in proper Metroidvania fashion, but have little to no idea where to look. This wouldn't be as bad if there weren't so few fast travel spots for how often you are backtracking to certain places in the castle. What you need is often so far away.

The inverted castle is so damn cool, and it would have blown my mind if I didn't already know about it going in! Though the advancement here was even more of the issue I mentioned above. What you have to do is so cryptic and obtuse, I once again found myself on Google.

Overall a fun time and a trip down the roots of a genre I enjoy tons, just with some very poor aging. I recommend playing with save states and maybe a guide.

95%Emulated

Definitely a masterpiece, time has not passed for this game. Sadly the difficulty is too low for my taste, I would have preferred more challenging bosses.