I neglected to mention my buying CastleVania Legends for the Game Boy near the end of June 1998. Automatically, that tells you the game's rating. But for everyone else, I'll play resurrector and give the dead some light.

Mid-July, 1998. As Mom tore up the road and Grammy rode shotgun, us three on our way back from a random seafood place in the traditional destination of City Island, I loaded my new CastleVania Legends cart into my Game Boy Pocket. During the trip, upon hearing a heart being collected for the 34th time, I compiled in my mind a review which I would completely punch up that night.

Next to last Saturday of September 2000, I decided this review could be improved upon. There were still some things to mention, clear up, and fix.

Come about '97... In the early days of my little known Internet Sector, "CastleVania III Dracula's Curse The Page!!!", I publicly requested of Konami to produce a new CastleVania game in which the lead would be a GIRL BELMONT. CastleVania III's Sypha Belnades and Dracula X Rondo's 13-year-old girl Maria Renard wouldn't count here. I doubt that this request inspired Konami, or if this was on their list of projects for the year in progress, but on March 1, 1998, the Game Boy game CastleVania Legends was released in the United States, and the lead was a GIRL named Sonia Belmont! Take that, Lara Croft!

Newly written recollections! Kurt reported this game, known originally as Dark Night Prelude, in late 1997 (as well as the ability to play as ALUCARD[?!]), and had even hooked me up with the ROM around the Christmas season! VGB-DOS' poor music emulation didn't help my soundtrack inquiries, but I do remember some familiar sound effects. The gloomy title screen looked quite nice and still visuals looked VERY good, even for the system, such as a vacant cemetery for the GAME OVER screen. In Dark Night Prelude, you're able to save your progress and return to the last stage you quit. I don't remember playing much of it. Boku Dorakyura-kun (Kid Dracula), however, was a different story.

Prior to that, I visited Konami's Japanese site and found, amongst the thousands of scrambly squares and undeciphered JIS code, several lovely anime styled illustrations of the main characters and bosses. This game was going back to the art styles of CastleVania Dracula X. Sonia did indeed look formidable. Take that, Lara Croft! If looks could kill, you wouldn't be too healthy right now. As you'll soon found out, looks is all Sonia Belmont had going for her...

Late June, 1998. After successfully completing Senior year at Cardinal Hayes High School, and after a smashing performance on my portfolio review for New York Institute of Technology, I was rewarded a $200 spending spree! After dropping off the stuffed makeshift cardboard portfolio case, I went out and bought SEGA's REAL MODEL Evangelion Unit 00, Joe & Mac for the secretly purchased Sega Genesis, and that weekend, Sonic the Hedgehog 2, CastleVania Legends and Mega Man II for the Game Boy, The Lost World: Jurassic Park's Dino Damage Lab (the included rip-apart Allosaurus for use in the year's Jurassic Park movie which wouldn't occur until 1999), and Neon Genesis Evangelion tapes 5 and 6.

CastleVania Legends, Konami's second CastleVania prequel, is the third CastleVania for the Game Boy, developed by Konami Computer Entertainment's Nagoya branch. It's also been specially designed for use with the Super Nintendo's Super Game Boy module. This time, the Konami propaganda dictates the game to take place in the "Middle Ages", a generation BEFORE Trevor Belmont, the First True Vampire Killer. That's basically saying, "Let's do this so the new American 10-year-old CastleVania fans of 1998 could have an internet battle with the retired once-10-year-olds of 1991, who thought Trevor was the first Belmont. Plus I'm sure the little gofers will love to control a GIRL Belmont. Sex sells! Sex sells! Sex sells!" Perversion really wasn't my intent, guys. Who wrote this script, anyway? Oh, and P.S. ...it was truly sad how the kid at that one CV site cyber-drooled over his DreamCastleVania screenshot collection in which he claims to have seen Sonia Belmont's rough-and-tumble underwear. Kono 'puerco' desu, naa...

The game concept. CastleVania Legends takes place some time before CastleVania III: Dracula's Curse (yeah, right), when Count Dracula was just starting out on spreading his reign of terror (you won't convince me of that). You play as Sonia Belmont, the true (NOT!) origin of the Belmont warlord (non double-Y) chromosomes. At 17 years of age (!?!?!?), she is the first to set forth and challenge the Dark Leader.

The game itself is linear to a certain extent, until you discover a hidden stage after finding special 'Collected Items'. You're tossed back into the same Stage 5 either way. Legends also brings us back the very cool Japanese animation stylings for which intelligent internet personality named Morrigan categorizes CastleVania as anime-like. By the way, the covers for the instruction booklet are in color!!! What's more, you can learn about the wonderful world of BLUESCALE within its pages, along with the white, blue, and black text! HOLY COW!

Before I overformat the text, I just need to point out that I enjoyed The CastleVania Adventure more when IT came out, than I enjoy CastleVania Legends NOW. A little over ten years have passed since I was blessed with The CastleVania Adventure, and I STILL enjoy that same little cartridge MORE than Legends AND CastleVania 64 COMBINED.

We start the TRULY FIRST EVER CastleVania foray...in the forest, with a decent remix of the Wilderness/Forest/Outside theme from CastleVania II: Simon's Quest.

As well as a string of informative tangents.

The idea of remixing tunes began in Konami's 5th Vampire Killer game, Legend of Demon Castle, or CastleVania III: Dracula's Curse on the Nintendo Entertainment System. In Stage 8, we were delighted with the track, Deja Vu, which was an awesomely percussioned remix of the theme last heard in the first board of CastleVania 1 (and Japan's MSX Vampire Killer). As remixing goes, that little thing they pulled in CV3 was a great and welcome surprise.

The remixes in the Super NES's Super CastleVania IV were beauties, because they knew what they were doing with their tools and tech-knowledge. Konami even composed remixes from Simon's Quest AND Dracula's Curse for CV4.

CastleVania number 6, a.k.a. CastleVania Dracula X on the SNES, killed anything that had to do with remixing tunes for a sweet surprise. It appeared as if remixing had been run into the grave along with the play control, I'm sorry. There were SO MANY remixes in the WORST places. For example, I wouldn't want to hear a shoddy remix while being bumped backwards 16 times in a row by a single Medusa Head in Stage 3.

In the 5th platformer (which I bought months after my original Legends review), CastleVania Bloodlines, there are some well-placed remixes, but nothing I personally would take to heart, since I never really grew up playing this game.

In the summer of 1999, I bought the soundtrack to Japan's PC Engine Dracula X, and indeed, CastleVania 6 just falls through the cracks, barely holding on by its guitar slappin' Stage 1 theme and snobbish stage theme entitled in the Japanese version, 'Slash'.

Aaaaneeeeway, the game gets on your nerves from the getgo. The main objective of this board is to collect as many (70+) currently useless hearts as you can whilst you march through the forest swatting blurry enemies and sliding down ropes. Hearing the hearts "viveep" every 1.2 seconds gets annoying, and their sound is even audible on a fairly crowded New York City subway car during rush hour. Oh, and these are all single hearts you're collecting, no Large Hearts here. This is pre-Trevor after all. Your main weapon is the Mystic Whip, given to Trevor by the Poltergeist King in CastleVania III. Check this out, though. The legendary Mystic Whip, this is pathetic, when powered up to the max...is VERY short. Half-powered chain whips in the other console games have better range than this sucker. Advance apologies for all the lady readers... Here's a special tip for kids too young to see Guy Double Target or La Blue Girl: rapidly tap the A and B buttons for BURNING MODE. I've always called this the "Busty Barbara Mode". Hannibal Simpson would agree. I think it's rather silly when Sonia sticks her 3-pixel bust out to power up before going into this invincible, very quick, berserk mode. Busty Barbara Mode lasts as long as it takes for the meter below your energy line marked B (for Burning or Busty, not Boss) to run out, which is about 15 seconds. On the left hand, there are SOME things good about this new player character. Would it be because she...

1. ...walks fastest of all one player characters in the CastleVania Game Boy games?
2. ...can run?
3. ...can leap higher than Grant DaNasty or Michael Jordan wearing Moon Shoes and effectively change direction in mid-air?
4. ...can move when in a crouched position the way Simon did in Super CastleVania IV?
5. ...can fall through "thin" platforms when you crouch and press jump?
6. ...is a girl?

Here's another...milestone for the historians to jot down into their notes, and also the reason why you've been hoarding those 220 hearts. This is the only Game Boy CastleVania in which Spells are used. To give the game more of a "Middle Ages" edge, these heart count reducers are called "Soul Powers". Don't ask what I call them. You gain each one of these elemental sub-weapons after you beat a boss.

The Wind Soul Power replaces the Pocket Watch, Time Stopper, School Bell, Second Slower, and Flash Stopper, all in one 5 heart consuming package. It ceases all active ENEMY characters in their tracks for five ticks, allowing you to frolic around.

The benevolently harmful Ice Soul Power lets Sonia restore all of her lost energy at 20 hearts a'pop regardless of how much energy she needs, so not only is Sonia healed, but the player is hurt by the severe drop in the count, the rarity of replacement hearts, and the absolute absence of Large Hearts which restore 5 at once in the other games.

The Fire Soul Power is not to be confused with Sailor Mars' 'Fire Soul Bird in Love' song from Sailor Moon; this Soul Power replaces the Rosary and wipes out (or severely damages) bad guys on the screen for a sale price of 5 hearts.

The Saint Soul Power is just the Scroll Weapon from the other NES classic made by Konami, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Saint sends an unstoppable wave of energy forward to wipe out the opposition. At one heart mark per use, this seems to be the only useful weapon in the game, but you only get it after the fourth board.

I have yet to sit down and play the game again to try it, but according to the instruction manual, the Magic Soul Power... "Destroys an enemy other than the area and stage bosses and nullifies the enemy's attack. Consumes 5 heart marks per use." I'm not sure of the booklet's deeper meaning, but since I already killed the bad guy, I doubt he can hit me back.

Correction: I actually played the game today using one of the below passwords and got the Magic Soul Power after beating the bulky "Stage 6" boss. What this does is magical! It shuts off all the lights in the room and makes all enemies disappear! Of course, I've found that consequently shutting the Game Boy off produces the same effect.

It must be a Konami in-joke that Sonia uses these Soul Powers though she happens upon the Dagger, Cross Boomerang, Holy Water, Axe, and Pocket Watch on the way to CastleVania. Sonya-kun! Anta baka?!

Enemies. I'm an enemy advocate. You've gotta love the bad guys. Without bad guys, you have...no bad guys. You can tell I'm a baddie fan since I volunteered to rewrite The CastleVania Dungeon's boss descriptions a while before Legends was released. For Legends, I give the enemy casting a C. Adding more to the non-fun is "Enemy Refresh", which gets extremely aggravating in the vertically scrolling areas.

For those of you who have never heard of my term for it, "Enemy Refresh" simply means vanquished enemy characters will return to the screen you wiped them from when you backtrack to it. This principle works in the opposite way for some NES and GB games. Here's a tip for an unrelated game: to avoid a mauling by the bug-eyed fishies in the 4th stage of Konami's GB hit Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fall of the Foot Clan, jump up so the scrolling wipes the bugger from the bottom of the screen. When you drop down, it's gone (just like the Pizza you could've scored by swatting it). CastleVania Legends and "Enemy Refresh"; challenge improvement or catalyst for TGBS (Thrown Game Boy Syndrome)? You decide.

On another note, I just realized that Konami used a now outdated release of Adobe Illustrator to make the CastleVania Legends logo. For one thing, I know that the copper and blue colors in 'astleVania' are gradation defaults.

Well lookie here. CastleVania on the Game Boy has finally seen the advent of Zombie enemies. They look terrible, but not that bad. I can't say much when I've only seen one CVGB Zombie design. The Mad Men plopping from the sky in The Adventure don't count. To make up for the absence of Zombies in CastleVania for the Game Boy, Legends sticks in "Trap Candles" that toss you into a tight room to battle a slew of Zombies. If forget whether or not the Zombie fight theme is cool...

In the first stage, you'll find, and these I've named on the fly: Side-Profile-Flapping Vampire Bats, their perched sprites as big as the Big Bats in Belmont's Revenge; Floating Spirits, which look like short comets bobbing up and down flying across the screen slower than molasses in Russia; Dancing Spirits that'll chase you down, Tree Worms to jump over, Zombies, and Skeletal Spearmen. In the second stage, I was impressed to see our giant skull pal Puweyxil suspended in the air. I was also impressed to see it come forth and bite Sonia's backside when her back was turned. The Puweyxil here behave as the Boo Buddies do from Super Mario Bros. 3 and 4. I also liked seeing the Dragon Skull Cannon as well. They are in stacks of three, and get this...their fire ball sprites are the same as the Mystic Whip's shots from The Adventure and Belmont's Revenge. The Molemen...Hunchbacks, finally look like Hunchbacks! They will run forward and back and are as tall as Sonia. They'll start to leap if you get close. Following Alucard to the Game Boy are several of the Giant Green Armors, the Sword Lords of CastleVania: Symphony of the Night. A pest in the Clock Tower is this Weird Lizard Guy who climbs the chains and spits out projectiles. The Fish Man, who is quite bouncy, makes an appearance in the hidden stage, inexplicably leaping from spike beds.

The bosses in this game...are, well, not as good as I hoped 9 years of technological advancement would bring forth. Neither do they have an energy meter. The Busty Gauge saw to that. All you can do is pray, avoid getting hit, and keep hitting.

The first boss of Legends is actually the Blue Gargoyle with arm-attached wings from Super CastleVania IV and Symphony. In the instruction manual, he looks like an ugly doofus with transparent wings, and, to make no improvement, Konami of America calls this thing "Creatures Bat". Apparently, Sam Sneed, who was fired after he submitted the name to Konami, asked his 7-year-old son Jake to name it. The kid was way too young to improperly pronounce "Gaibon", let alone play CastleVania Symphony due to the blood and nudity. So we're stuck with Creatures Bat. According to the manual, the Creatures Bat is an artificial life form. I guess making reference to an obviously higher technological knowhow is A-O-K in the "Middle Ages", when the description was apparently written.

The second boss is the Death Dragon at the end of The Library. It gets its name from the DEATH BAT of The Adventure, and in the tradition of Konami continuance, a decaying dragon succeeds the winged decaying Slogra-like beast from The Adventure. Before the Dragon fight, you're bounded backwards to the left end of the screen as you clear ceiling panels falling with each step of the Dragon's advance. When half of him finally shows up, his head and neck will move up and down, spitting flames, and he'll hop to drop ceiling parts atop your head. Yawn.

At the top of the Clock Tower stage, you find, for the first time in any Game Boy CastleVania, the Grim Reaper, whom in the artwork was apparently modeled after the Joker in a pack of Bicycle poker cards. He'll hop from one side of the room to another, launching his sickles to slash you up. His performance in Legends isn't really that bad, and the pattern isn't too tough to learn.

As in the other straight-up-and-down CastleVanias, you clear a board by nabbing a crystal, then you're treated to a victorious fanfare that lasts usually under three seconds. NOT IN CASTLEVANIA LEGENDS!!! Since this IS after all the "Middle Ages", and since each boss you kill seems to detonate after about 30 hits, the crystal they give you causes some sort of magical twinkly sound effect that is probably a good thing.

Riding the coattails of his PlayStation success with CastleVania Symphony, Alucard decided to make an appearance in Legends, the fool. If Legends REALLY takes place before Trevor's game, why does he decide to fix his hair up into an afro, lose his sword and fancy-shmancy wardrobe, and don a Halloween costume for CastleVania III?! ARUKAADO-SAMA! ANTA BAKA?! At least he's the Stage 4 boss. He attacks with his sword, the excessive pixels he takes up, and his Wing Smash attack from Symphony. I killed him easily in Busty Barbara Mode.

I was totally gassed up when I heard that Alucard would be in the new Game Boy game, and even more enthused with a rumor that you could play as him. Of course, this was before Alucard's popularity exploded in late 1997, early 1998.

Dracula is the last boss you face. Since this allegedy takes place before all of the CastleVanias, Drac thought it would be a good idea to go last. Let's go LIVE to this historic moment, transcribed directly from the Game Boy for the first time ANYWHERE (until you prove me wrong)!

Dracula: You have done well my girl. In fact, you are the first human who has come this far. You have my praise.
Sonia: You are the Prince of Darkness. Because of you many people have died, many people have suffered.
Dracula: Oh no, my dear. I have merely done what you humans wished for, fulfilling your insatiable desires.
Sonia: People must fulfill their dreams with their own power. You who have been consumed by the power of evil no longer have the strength to determine your own fate!
Dracula: Silence! On the contrary, I am just the one to use this power, and I will be the king who rules over the entire world. Give yourself to me, young lady. There may be merit in having your power, in having your presence.
Sonia: My strength will only be used to protect the world! Lord of Darkness, prepare to suffer for trifling with so many lives!
Dracula: As you wish, girl. Then it is your fate to kneel before my power!

Since this is of course the "Middle Ages", Drac only had 2 pick-up lines, one of which was incredibly racy for this game, rated "Kids to Adults". I mean, come on Drac, you're forgetting your demographic! Couldn't you have said...

Dracula: Bring your soul into the Eternal Bleak with me, young lady, and our essences will forever flow through the howling shadows of darkness.

Or..

Dracula: Follow me, mortal. You stand outside of the gates of immortality. Join me, and together we shall forge plowshares of blood through those who would oppose us.

Or even...

Dracula: Sonia... I am your father. Come with me to the Dark Side. That would be cool.

But alas, it needed to be "give yourself to me," which could be easily misconstrued into the most lurid visualizations imaginable. But we're forgetting the battle at hand. The Count fades in and out of his little room, opening his bat wing shaped cape to launch blocky rolling things in five directions. Now would be a good time to go Busty. After a few seconds, his maniacal mug shot reappears next to the following words:

Dracula: Well, well. You are a worthy foe. You have lasted much longer than most.

Then Sonia's face, her distaste in CastleVanian Pooridge beautifully detailed in pixels, says,

Sonia: Prepare yourself!

And Drac is like,

Dracula: Oh, I've just been toying with you so far. But now its time to get serious!

Uh oh, that makes me nervous. I'm in trouble now! Wipe to a sudden scene of calamitous enemy character design; standing on two herds of leg-shaped pixel smudges is a winged pile of vaguely head-shaped pixels dominated by a close up shot of a bat's face. The face will fade in and out in a pattern, launching more of those blocky chunks in now 8 directions. I think this one's actual weapon is the ability to make you laugh at its prodigiously cheap looks. As a bonus, you can listen to a decent GB style remix of CVIII's "Beginning" track during the battle with his Ultimately Terrifying Form. You know, my opinions are humble and expert and whatnot, but The Adventure's final phase was much more. Not much more difficult, just much more.

The music. In sending out my love letters to both Babs Bunny and Asuka Langley Soryu in 1998, I forgot to mention the game's music. The Title Screen, Clock Tower, and Dungeon themes have potential, but other than that, there aren't many memorable original tunes. Take the end-of-stage twinkle for example. WorldWide CastleVaniac MIDI experts are still deciding whether or not to compose an elaborate 4 minute long, 16-channel medley of the twinkle tune. (Seanbaby-influenced madness would propagate a petition to actually GET a medley out for this song, but...I don't have time like that.) Unlike CV6, the remixes here shine a bit, but not as much as the funky Stage 3 beats of the Adventure and the emulated electric guitar anthem of Cloud Castle in Belmont's Revenge.

In 2000, when writing my love letters to Babs Bunny, Akari Kamagishi, and Nanako Shichigusa, I still forget to mention the music. In short, the music wasn't much to write your girl about.

The graphics. Legends takes a back seat to the solid details of The Adventure and Revenge. I think it takes more than four pixels to generate the idea of Sonia having a ponytail, guys...

The artwork. Mostly good, run-of-the-mill anime style. Character design and coloring are good, and the action poses of Sonia Belmont look REALLY cool for non-fanboy reasons. She does look like Evangelion's Dr. Ritsuko Akagi, though. The Medusa Queen (seen at the Konami site) looks good; the Creatures Ba---Gaibon looks messed up, even for Gaibon; Alucard and Dracula look even more undead with their light blue skin complexions (and not just because of the manual).

The ending. Frack if I know. I haven't beaten it yet, nor will be inspired to try any time soon.

The number rating. I give CastleVania Legends a 3.59, or a 4 maximum rating out of 10. It pales in comparison to The CastleVania Adventure and CastleVania II Belmont's Revenge.

The final word? I'm no Konami staffer, but CastleVania Legends is yet another situation in which the production artwork outdoes the production. They took a good idea and slipped up while carrying it out. Like Wu Tang said; "if you gonna spread mathematics, spread it right!"

SPECIAL POWER UP BONUS: CastleVania Legends Passwords!
CastleVania fan Austin Erickson sent me these passwords on 4-02-98, according to an e-mail printed on June 29th, two days after I got the game. I've already declared my negative feelings towards the game, so why am I posting these anyway? Because you're not me. Keep in mind that these codes are for Standard Mode.

Key:
C=Candle D=Dagger X=Cross H=Holy Water
A=Axe PW=Pocket Watch M=Meat O=Clock []=Blank
Double letters indicate item pair icons.

Stage 2: A A [] X
Stage 3: A C [] CC
Stage 4: O [] X CC
Stage 5: O H MM CC
Stage 5.5: D CC CC CC
Stage 6: D [] CC MM

Coming one day: "I must have been nuts when I requested a 3D CastleVania", a 'CastleVania 64' review.