A third Castlevania title for the GBA, looking great already
Fans of the first two Castlevania releases on the Game Boy Advance; Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance, will be pleased to hear that a third game titled Aria of Sorrow is on it’s way to our favourite handheld in a few months time. The announcement of this title seemingly came out of nowhere, but it’s not really that much of a surprise that we’re getting another Castlevania based on the success of the previous two titles. Konami have stated that we can expect some pretty drastic changes to the Castlevania formula. Not only will the game feature a new soul absorbing system that replaces the sub weapons and spell books, but they also promise a new story that takes the series into the future for the first time. Sounds exciting already, doesn’t it?
The story starts off in 1999 when once again Dracula and his castle have been spreading evil across the land. The vampire hunters banished Dracula and the castle during the solar eclipse that took place in that year. Fast-forward to year 2035, and high school student Soma Cruz is about to witness the first solar eclipse in 36 years. During the eclipse he loses consciousness only to awake and find himself inside Dracula’s castle. He discovers that his friend Mina has been poisoned, and the only way for her to survive is for him to search the castle and find a cure. Unlike previous Castlevania titles, Soma is not related to the legendary Belmont family in any way, this alone provides potential for the game to take a new direction.
Structurally, Aria of Sorrow will play very similarly to the past three Castlevania titles (Symphony of the Night and onwards), as it will take place in one large labyrinth-like castle. As you progress you’ll travel through the many rooms of Dracula’s castle defeating enemies and acquiring new abilities that will allow you to explore areas that you could not access previously. As you would expect there will also be plenty of huge and hideous boss characters for you to destroy, these will hopefully be a lot more challenging than those featured in Harmony of Dissonance.
The biggest change to the game is the way that you actually acquire new abilities, sub-weapons and spells. Gone are the spell books, relics, sub-weapons pick-ups, and even the trademark whip of the previous games. Instead, you can now absorb the souls of fallen foe, allowing you to inherit the abilities of that enemy. There are said to be at least one hundred different attacks and skills that you can absorb. These range from powerful spells and weapon abilities such as swords, axes and crucifixes to relic-like souls that give Soma a new ability such as the double jump. From the looks of it, the souls you collect will be stored and accessible through the Pause screen under the ‘Soul Set’ option. If you have a friend with a copy of the game, you’ll also be able to use the link cable to connect up and trade the souls you have absorbed.
Graphically, judging from the first screenshots you can expect Aria of Sorrow to be on par with Harmony of Dissonance. The visual appearance of both titles is very similar, and Konami have once again addressed the issue of the GBA’s screen by designing the game with bold and bright colours. Additionally, Ayami Kojima is handling the character design, so we can expect some really nice packaging and character art. As if we would expect anything less? Finally, this game should be a lot more pleasing to listen to than Harmony of Dissonance. Whilst I personally didn’t have a problem with the quality of most of the music featured in that game, many complained about it because it obviously didn’t live up to the standard set by the stunning Circle of the Moon soundtrack. In Konami’s words, Aria of Sorrow will feature a “haunting musical score”, so get those headphones ready!
Konami currently have Aria of Sorrow slated for release in America on May 6th, and you can expect a European release to follow a couple of weeks later. Interestingly, Konami of Japan haven’t even mentioned the game yet, but it would be safe to assume that it would hit Japan a month or two before the US release date. Hopefully we’ll have more information regarding this matter shortly, so be sure to check back soon for any updates on this great looking game. Assuming it does get a significantly earlier release in Japan you can be sure that I’ll get hold of an import copy for review a few days after the Japanese release. However, we’ve got a fair wait whatever the situation is, so I think I’m going to go back to Harmony of Dissonance and play it once more to satisfy my cravings for the latest game in the series. Unless something goes horribly wrong, the latest Castlevania adventure is going to be yet another great one, so be sure to keep your eye out for it when it hits stores later in the year.
