Game:

Castlevania: Dracula X (1995)

Duration: 7:34

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3

Richter made many sacrifices. The long fight is over. Dracula is [re-not-un-]dead [...double-killed... or whatever... again...] and all other spirits are asleep. After this fight, the Belmont name will be honored by all people.

I'm sure that's everything. We're not forgetting anything crazy, like the whole reason why this zany whip-flinging quest even got started... and now, between this game and Rondo, I'm pretty sure I have to stop passing the buck to Rick for forgetting about Anette (or "Annet," this time) and then totally not-suspiciously-at-all trying to gloss over her very existence, even after the cat's already out of the bag and had been that way ever since the opening sequence...

Right then, let's get back into the castle and start looting! ...er, looting for the ladies, obviously. Gotta save 'em... pickin' up chicks... and whatever. Yeah, that's right. I didn't mean anything else. I'm sure I don't even mean anything now! There's just so much content left unchecked! Content... in Richter's heart. To be spilled in the name of... loo... love. Yes, love. Sure. That's what I meant.

Our first unturned stone is rather obvious from the way the playthrough initially unfurled, so let's take a quick look at the password screen and take a trip to Stage 3. (Neither of the first two stages have anything left to offer us, just for the record.)

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Stage 3

Well, unlike in Rondo of Blood, it's very obvious that something was amiss on our first run through the ravenous revenants running rampant on the ramparts of Castle Dracula. It's clear that a lot of thought and care went into designing its stage layouts to funnel players directly towards a main path and grant admittance to (or continuation along) alternate stage routes for only properly intrepid explorers. At the same time, it's not like most of these alternate paths are particularly deviously hidden so as to fall completely unnoticed by the player, and certainly not through the entirety of the game's duration. Then the game's layers unravel and you become aware of just how complex a proposition it really is.

And then there's Dracula X and its method of adapting this mechanic, right down to labeling the alternate paths as "prime" versions of the stages... except it doesn't play cool about it, and the path we ended up on took us to Stage 4' as the "catch-all" lowest-common-denominator playthrough means of exiting Stage 3. So we have no idea why the stage we were in ended so abruptly and why the one we ended up in has a little symbolic modifier separating it from the lack of a logical Stage 4 with no such distinction.

This time around, I decided that I'd make use of the Stopwatch subweapon at least ONCE all game long... it's even more underwhelming than usual, but at least the Item Crash is interesting, and... as it happens, immensely useful for where the stage path diverges. It's hardly necessary, but I can't even begin to tell you how easily you can be caught by a stray Medusa Head you thought was a second or so from appearing.

Probably the most useful tip to keep in mind is that Richter won't be knocked back by most attacks (like contact with Medusa Heads or fireballs) if he's crouching. This even carries through to the final battle with Dracula, so if you HAVE to take a hit, make sure it's not absolutely catastrophic.

Our final stretch is a hallway filled with hearts and subweapons, so we know what THAT means... but wait, here's a key! But there's no more stage left to use it in! Let's just say I have... vague reasons, not least of which being that passwords save subweapons (recall that I started this stage with an Axe), and I might deliberately be avoiding whatever the key unlocks. No clue why!

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Dullahan

Hey, we know this guy! ...and his updated version was definitely giving us the business several times over for the latter half of Harmony of Despair. Yep... good times, 'Han, ol' buddy... good... definitely-not-hanging-out-by-choice times...

This fight is pretty much the same as it was in Rondo, although the arena is a fair bit different in some key ways. For starters, it's much longer, which has two major impacts on the way the action unfolds. On the plus side for the player, it means you have much more room to run around, especially in the "away" direction... because Rondo's fight was pretty tricky just because of how claustrophobic it was. So, instead of sticking close by the platforms so you can make a quick retreat to avoid the ice crystal attack, you can simply outrun it in a slow-moving chase. On the other hand, it means you can be caught that much further from safety if he decides to start shaking the room (and especially the unseen ceiling) with his awkward bellowing laughter.

So... it's pretty overwhelmingly easier in this version than it was before. I'm not really complaining. You might notice that it's SO much easier that I didn't even need the tactical advantage granted by the Holy Water I insisted on grabbing... sheesh.

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