New Games on The Great Games Experiment http://www.greatgamesexperiment.com/css/logo.jpg en-us In 1830, Morris Baldwin and his two apprentice vampire hunters enter Castlevania to stop the resurrection of Count Dracula. They arrive too late, and Dracula kidnaps the master Baldwin to use as a sacrifice to regain full power, and casts the two young pupils - Hugh Baldwin and Nathan Graves - into a bottomless abyss. Hugh, upset that he was not choosen as his father's successor, runs off on his own. It is now up to Nathan Graves to find Hugh and recover his master.

Nathan's control and abilities differ from protaganists in the later GBA games. He naturually walks at the speed of an eight bit Belmont, and double tapping the d-pad allows him to run. Holding the whip button causes him to rapidly spin his whip, which can be used as a shield against weak enemies and projectiles.

Also unique to this game is the DSS system, which allows you to collect special cards which magically affect the whip. There are two different types of cards - attribute cards - which must be paired together to produce some result. For example, the Mercury Action card causes attribute cards to effect your whip, so pairing the Mercury action card with the Salamander (fire) attribute card causes Nathan to use a flame whip. There are twelve cards of each type in the game.

]]> 22 Feb 2007 04:53:22 This is a Castlevania fan game based off of Castlevania 2 : Simon's Quest. While the gameplay and structure is very similar to that game, the levels, world layout and objectives are almost entirely different. The game improves on the original formula by allowing you to control three different characters, mix potions, perform item crashes and more. In addition to Bloody Tears and the other songs from Castlevania 2, there is wealth of new music created for the game. Much of it is remixed songs from previous Castlevania games, although there are also entirely new tracks that would not be out of place in an official Castlevania adventure.

Please note that the Castlevania series, which this game is based, belongs to Konami. The author has such a disclaimer available on his webpage as well.

]]> 19 Feb 2007 01:19:38 the underside is an exploration based action platformer in the vein (it's a pun~) of games like castlevania, metroid, and cave story. however, unlike most other games in this genre, the gameplay is driven more by plot than by free-roaming exploration (though the world is fully explorable).

the game's graphics and engine are (believe it or not) completely original. the game's engine is written in clickteam's multimedia fusion 2, while the graphics are done in humanbalance's graphicsgale.

the music is written by both me (arthur lee), and my close friend, j. michael brown. done in fruityloops using the 3xosc plugin as well as tweakbench's toad and peach vsts, the game's soundtrack has a real retro feel to it.
the game's plot revolves around a character named 'ip' who must escape from the underside, and maybe prevent the world from being destroyed while he's at it. the game's world, characters, plot strands, and dialogue are heavily inspired by earthbound, and are quirky, whimsical, and sometimes a little strange.

the gameplay is very fast based -- a lot more akin to games like megaman or metal slug rather than metroid or cave story in terms of pacing.

]]> 11 Feb 2007 04:25:52