Game:

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (1997)

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Vlog

Duration: 4:31

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HAPPY HALLOWEEN! ❤️ I was prepping this for the Nocturne premiere earlier this month, until I dropped everything for Divine Bloodlines instead ahaha, but since I was already pretty far ahead I decided to try to make it my annual Castlevania Halloween upload!

I've wanted to do an intro medley for SOTN for ages, because it's one of my favorite games ever and because how it all kicks off was just mindblowing to me at the time. The acappella women's choir during the save screen, the introductory story screen, the throwback to Rondo of Blood, the Dracula fight, and of course the voice acting which has become the stuff of legends lol. Honestly one of the worst things Konami's ever done (which is saying a lot) was rewriting the script and re-recording the voice work for the Dracula X Chronicles Vita and PS5 ports. BLASPHEMY LOL and the only reason I recommend for folks to play the PS1 classic port on the PSN store. I know that includes "I Am The Wind" as the ending theme but beggars can't be choosers. Besides, weirdly enough, it's kinda growing on me....somehow. lol

Regardless of which version you play though, all the important stuff that makes SOTN such a phenomenal game are intact--gameplay, map design, Kojima's art, and Yamane's music, so if you miss out on the original version of those horrifically amazing voiced cutscenes lol, thank goodness for YouTube. Here's my own loving tribute to that epic intro sequence--the save screen, the camera close-up of the map that zooms to the outskirts of Dracula's castle, the immediate cut to the last stage of Rondo and your playing as Richter, a spiritual extended pause for the "Die, monster!" segment lol, then the fight with Dracula. I originally had the game over ditty (Land of Benediction) to end it all but it felt wrong, since you literally cannot lose the Dracula fight. Maria will run in to save your ass if you're really whiffing it, so we would never hear that theme at that point. Instead i pulled a few bits from extended version of Dance of Illusions from the Rondo remake to round it all out. The biggest challenge was trusting the process with Prologue lmao--adapting metal to solo piano is always a crapshoot, and a lot depends on the delivery. You gotta forget you're a pianist and just give yourself over to that wild energy ahahaha. Hopefully it worked, oh well.

It was also very cool to arrange Metamorphosis, as it showcases the first statement of a major 7th against a tritone played fortissimo--two of the most strikingly dissonant intervals in music and a combination that is idiomatic of the SOTN sound, as it crops up many times in the OST as if to remind us that despite all the Romantic era waltzes and Latin rock and Vivaldi and thrash metal, this IS still a Castlevania game. lol.

Once again, thank you all so much for listening and for all your kind comments! Happy Halloween and stay safe out there, it's been a blast dedicating this month to one of my favorite franchises ever!

All my Castlevania covers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUuQZJjJIic&list=PLp-SYUSsVXsaK8VycuQumOyXjpEKfHrDZ&ab_channel=purpleschala

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