I was so excited. I don’t think you know how excited I really was, but I was really excited. Here it was before me. A staple of the Castlevania series and one of the levels that I normally love for the challenge it provides. I speak about none other then the Clock Tower.
Most Castlevania games have a Clock Tower of some sort. They normally involve tricky jumps and annoyingly placed enemies. This one has, well, neither I’m afraid. It’s a very straight forward level and they do try some platforming segments. But the game just isn’t designed for it. I missed so many jumps do to Gabriel’s jumping style. He lacks any real air control which is pretty crucial for platformers, especially in 3D. There are a few timing segments to overcome but nothing complicated. I felt pretty let down in the end. It didn’t really feel like a Clock Tower level. Plus, I’m missing the classic Castlevania music. I think I need to play Super Castlevania IV, such a classic game.
To top it all off, Gabriel has to fight the GMSTIPBAF again. This round is even easier than the last round. The Scorpion has picked up this new trick where it levitates items and then throws them at you. That’s fine, but it doesn’t increase the difficulty. At all. The items are easy to dodge and I found that if I was in the Scorpion’s face he couldn’t hit me with them. And he used that attack 80% of the time. He rarely tried to electrocute or even punch Gabriel. This fight lasted just over a minute and then it was done. And it felt stupid.
Next area is an even bigger boss fight against a decently difficult boss. The unfortunately named Olrox is the brother of Brauner. This means a giant Vampire is here to kill Gabriel and avenge his brother. What makes Olrox difficult is actually his basic attack. He doesn’t telegraph it. He just sprints forward and then he might turn it into a one-two combo. And he can change direction during the combo. Olrox’s biggest mistake is when he throws out his sword. This one you can see coming a mile away making it easy to dodge. While his swords are out Olrox is defenseless, I used this time to lay some Guillotine action on him and net some nice orbs.
Olrox will also heal himself. He has two bodies (werewolves?) pinned up in iron maidens. He’ll drink the blood of the werewolves to restore his health. Now wait just a minute here! I thought that Vampires and Werewolves were natural enemies, like Pirates and Ninjas. I also thought that Werewolf blood was poisonous to Vampires. Tell me how this works out huh? Drinking Werewolf blood to heal himself that is just cheap. If it had been a couple of Knights of the Order that would have been a nice little trick to pull. Gabriel has to destroy the bodies in the Iron Maidens to prevent Olrox from healing, only then can he finally be killed. This can make the fight last a good while if you’re not fast.
I have to admit that Olrox was tricky enough to combat. His quick attacks had me on my toes, but only until I figured out his attack pattern. Once you get it down Olrox becomes easier. What makes him a little more fun is that you still need to remain on your toes. Once he goes down he fills some large plate on the ground with his blood. How convenient.
The large plate is “puzzel” and I use the term lightly. Really have to drag the blood from one hub to the next and there’s a limited amount of time to reach the next hub before you have to start over again from the last hub. I hope that makes sense. The problem I had with the “puzzle” is that there is nothing to figure out. You just have to drag the blood quickly from one spot to the next. Yes there are multiple paths, but the correct path was pretty obvious to me.
Next time is the battle against the Vampire Lord Carmilla. I think she deserves her own blog post.
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