These include quality of life changes like being able to change the dimensions of your mini-map or gaining permanent stat boosts by eating new types of food (the Igavanias always had lots of food items, but they were usually ignored for the standard potions). Most of the changes, though, are welcome mechanical improvements. This was certainly the case with the first boss of the game: a kraken-like monster called Vepar, who would swing its tentacles menacingly in the background before swiping them across the deck to damage you. Some of it works, though a lot of it is pretty rough going: some odd lighting choices here and there, some dubious canned animations, and when the game decides to play with parts in the background that suddenly become "active" once they enter the plane Miriam is working in, the transition between when something is there and when it isn't is really hard to judge. Part of that process is the new look, of course, which has a much heavier emphasis on 3D character models and environments. Igarashi is careful to make sure the game is highly evocative but not entirely a carbon copy of his previous works. Even though Heretical Grinder sounds like some heathen equivalent of ChristianMingle, it can really do some damage early on.īut these familiar beats are part of Bloodstained's charm. The game's antagonist is another of these shardbinders, Gebel, but you get the hint early on that it's another "Richter's being possessed" situation: I've no doubt I'll need to figure out what's controlling him and remove it if I want to see the rest of the game and its true ending. If you've played Order of Ecclesia (or either of the Aria of Sorrow/ Dawn of Sorrow duo) you already know the score. Like Shanoa, Miriam is covered with demonic tattoos that confer a number of demonic powers, and each enemy in the game can potentially drop their "shard" for Miriam to collect and use some shards are active spells while other provide passive effects like familiars that float around and support you, or provide boosts to stats and resistances. That's a loose approximation of what sense I can make out of the story, because it's really just an excuse for Iga to cast Shanoa in the leading role again without violating any Konami copyrights. Bloodstained follows the adventures of Miriam: a "shardbinder" who was cursed by human alchemists with a crystal embedded into her body that is capable of channelling darker forces so she could be a pawn in a conspiracy to summon a demonic horde to overwhelm the complacent populace of the 18th century, who had long since stopped giving alchemists money for their research because fancy steam trains and automated factories were more the rage. Talking of heavens forfending things, we've got a castle chock full of demons to slay. Nah, I'm just kidding can you imagine waiting years for some Japanese auteur designer to finally release his dream project free of any shackles only to find out it's a horrific disappointment? Heavens forfend. It's fair to say that for all those who backed the game at least, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is one of the most hotly anticipated releases of this year. The big surprise return of Koji Igarashi to the genre he helped define through Castlevania: Symphony of the Night started with a Kickstarter project that was wildly successful, to the extent that it even made a stretch goal to develop a completely separate prequel game. However, I would argue that Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is the most important explormer of this year, and it's therefore paramount that I cover it here instead of some minimal budget thing from 2016 (not that I mean to denigrate minimal budget things from 2016 plenty more of those coming in 2020). Indie Game of the Week 146: Bloodstained: Ritual of the NightĪll right, all right, so it's another explormer.
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