Castlevania: Dracula X - Title Screen & Prologue
9And now for my 5th Castlevania game to be feature on my channel... Sort of...
If you've followed me for my Castlevania material for years, you may remember when I did an extensive playthrough of Rondo of Blood. The biggest curse of that game (at least... for years) is that it was stuck on the PC-Engine, a.k.a. the Japanese TurboGrafx-16.
As a bit of a consolation effort, Konami brought this game over for the SNES as Dracula X. HOWEVER! This game, despite sharing some common ground, is actually quite different from Rondo of Blood. And by that, I mean it doesn't have a lot of things that made Rondo of Blood so special for its time.
One of the bigger things missing is that the cute blonde vampire huntress, Maria, while she's still in the game, is now only a damsel-in-distress and isn't playable at all (she also has a completely different look). Nun Tera and Nurse Iris have been completely removed from the game. For Annette herself, the game changes much more significantly depending on whether or not you rescue her.
Other things includes a much smaller emphasis on alternate level routes, and no voiced cutscenes.
Dracula X is ultimate not just a gimped version of Rondo of Blood, but despite its clean graphics, it also feels less controllable compared to the previous SNES game, Super Castlevania IV. If you're used to that game's 8-directional attack, you're gonna be in for a bad time with this game.
But if you're willing to forgive all of that, and not compare Dracula X to its direct SNES predecessor nor its PC-E inspiration, you should still have a decent Castlevania game in your hands, here.
It is because of that, that I'm willing to give this game a whirl, anyway.
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As the prologue shows, Dracula was reawakened from his slumber by humans who seemed to have worshiped him as a god. This prince of darkness then proceeds to once again spread his evil throughout the nearby town, killing innocent people, and kidnapping maidens, such as Annette and her younger sister, Maria!
The one to answer the call of this terror was the current successor of the legendary Belmont clan: Richter Belmont! Armed with the holy whip, Vampire Killer, Richter planned to hunt the night, storm through Dracula's forces, save the maidens, and then clash to the death against the Count, himself.