It’s a shame that we can’t (yet) enjoy Castelevania: Symphony of the Night on our Android devices, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get close with a little bit of Castle of Shadows, by developer PlayPhone. The game comes packed with a righteous amount of swordplay, devilish opponents, and weapons upgrades, offering a fantasy blend of action gameplay to entertain even the most hardcore of fans. Best of all: The game is completely free in the Android Market. For our full thoughts on this RPG from beyond, check below beyond the break!
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Concept and Gameplay
Castle of Shadows
As stated, Castle of Shadows bears a heck of a lot of resemblance to the (now ancient) console series Castlevania. The app features lots of side-scrolling hack-and-slash, encouraging players to march from scene to scene, swinging their massive sword at every baddie that waltzes haphazardly past. As the user blasts through wave after wave, they’re also expected to uncover the various power-ups, improvements, and money items that lay about, or are produced by a successful conquest. These items, combined with the experience points accrued by killing monsters, eventually lead to level increases, which mean bigger, better, and badder attacks.
Speaking of that sort of thing, there’s a whole lot of upgrades available for the user to work through. We were generally impressed by the breadth of the weapons system involved here, though we might have appreciated an easier to understand it. What we mean is, the menus are often confusing, leading to further complications where the surprise upgrade is concerned. We were never quite certain what improvement our character had just suffered, and without a convenient way to check, it was essentially a grin-and-bear-it style scenario.
Design and Graphics
Thankfully, the graphics are absolutely top-notch. We couldn’t be happier with the retro feel of the environments, nor the excellently designed character sprites. Enemies were ghoulish, while the protagonist and his allies shined like fresh chrome. However, we weren’t such fans of the need to connect our Facebook account to the game before being granted access. Nor did we particularly favor the terrible translations which plague the menus and inter-level text. If it were an occasional grammatical error, that would be one thing: Sadly, whole narratives are left completely incomprehensible because—well—they just don’t make sense!
Overall Value
All of that being said, free is a price that’s certainly hard to argue with, especially when a truly Castlevania-esque experience is on the line. We couldn’t be happier with the actual gameplay of Castle of Shadows, and though we aren’t cheerleaders for some of the app’s other aspects, we can’t deny that it’s at least fun. If you’re looking for a creepy, ghoulish, and retro action title to take with you on the morning tram, this sans-pricing option is easily your quick fix.
Android Apps Review Details: Castle of Shadows app is free. This app requires Android 1.5 and up. You may download Castle of Shadows from the Android Market. A small expedite fee was paid by the developer to speed up the publication of this review.
