Super Mario World (Wii): COMPLETED!

Amazing scenes. I found a warp to Star World (yeah, I’ve played SMW a few times before…) and worked my way around that, finding all the secret exits and ending up at Bowser’s front door. Chose route 4 and route 5 through his castle, and reached him without getting hit. Then it was time to kill Bowser himself, who was the easiest thing ever, ever, and I didn’t get hit there either. Game over, win!

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA): COMPLETED!

So I went rummaging around for three books that Mina suggested I might need. I actually had one already, and the other two were found pretty easily once I’d taken a good look at the map. I found another boss (Legion) who was alarmingly easy to kill, and then got another soul or three. After all that, I had the books required, and the three souls it was suggested I equip (Flame Armour, Succabus, and Giant Bat – all traits …

Super Mario World (Wii)

New Virtual Console Game Day! Yaay! Mind you, I haven’t really played Mario Kart 64 much after buying that last week, but that’s mainly because The Castlevania has stolen my brains. So I downloaded Super Mario World, and tried very hard to get used to the “proper” way of holding the pad (I have this freaky way of doing it with the SNES pad and the classic controller for the Wii isn’t quite right). I think I may have it …

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)

Bossaroo! Did the third boss-room-that-isn’t-a-boss first of all today, and then moved on to the actual next boss. At first, it seemed like it was going to be a giant bat, but then a huge hand came out of nowhere and squashed the bat, killing it. Instead, I had to kill the two hands and two eyes of a, uh, thing. Balgone? Something like that anyway. It was actually pretty easy once I’d sussed the fact you could jump on …

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)

Death = DEAD! Well, sort of. He got sucked into some sort of whirlpool thing. I’d got the lightning doll soul, which really helps, and gone up a couple of levels. In the room just past Death was a soul giving me the power to swim (I guess Soma never got his bronze swimming certificate), so off I went into the waterways in the bottom of the map. Found lots of new baddies, souls, weapons (I now have an ice …

My blog, from 10 years ago

Ten years ago, blogging didn’t exist. Well, it did, but not in any way the same form as it does today, and certainly the term hadn’t been invented then. And who would want to read a load of rubbish about what you did today and stuff? Well, in 1997 I found a program for my Amiga called, I think, Captain’s Log. It was a simple journal program where you just type stuff and it timestamps them. You may recall that …

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)

I’m lost. I think. I killed another boss, and got a power-up to do the Jesus thing and walk on water, which let me access a couple of new areas. However, I then stumbled into some kind of garden filled with giant chickens, and then into some strange castles in the sky that are linked together in a strange way with really difficult wear-jaguars (or something) and devils in. Then I appeared to be in a clock tower, and it …

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)

I’m 35% through this already! Lawks. Killed the Manticore easily this time, as I found that if you stand in the doorway, you can’t be hit. Grenade-tastic! After that, it was STOP! Hammertime! As in, I met Hammer. And he told me he was going to set up a shop by the castle entrance. As you do. I then collected a soul that gave me a double-jump (finally!) and had a bit of an explore some more, heading vaguely to …

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)

Squeezed a bit more of this game into my day, exploring an area I’d have found far more easily if I’d actually looked at the map I’d found. Worked my way up into some sort of bell tower, but couldn’t find anything to do up there, so came back down again. I then found another save point, followed by a Manticore boss, that killed me. So it’s harder than Harmony if nothing else…

My love for Castlevania

How did this happen? I’ve always liked Castlevania games, and was quite excited about 18 months ago when Dawn of Sorrow came out, even though I hadn’t really played a Castlevania game since the SNES one about 12 years previous. But good as it was, it didn’t propel me into buying any other, older, Castlevania games. Last year, however, when the first details of Portrait of Ruin for the DS were filtering onto the internet, I thought I’d best pick …

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA)

So, no sooner had I finished Harmony, I was on to Aria. They’re even on the same cartridge (hence the same box art on the left there), so I didn’t have to swap games or anything. Ace. Only played for about half an hour so far, and Soma’s sword (rather than Juste/Nathan’s whip) is taking a bit of getting used to. I’ve already found a few things about Harmony that I prefer to this (yes, I know – and I …