Customer Reviews

Castlevania Harmony of Dissonance

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I haven't been this hooked on a side-scroller since Castlevania-Symphony of the Night for playstation; and that is quite an accomplishment for any game to achieve.

(Note: I've been playing my Japanese imported copy of the game for about a week now, so this review is based on me actually playing the game instead of assuming how great it's "going to be when it comes out.")

The game is very similar to SOTN; much more so than Circle of the Moon. The castles (two of them) you explore are huge, and like the original, there are a vast assortment of items to seek out and equip. The spell system has been slightly changed so that you combine your subweapons with various spellbooks you find. This is much easier than the complicated magic system used in Circle of the Moon.

The graphics have been improved. The animations are more fluid, and the colors are brighter this time so that no additional lighting will be necessary. However, in putting so much of the Gameboy Advance's resources in the graphics, the sound has taken a considerable hit. The music sounds like the 8 bit Gameboy color. A bit disappointing, but it doesn't detract too much from the overall experience. Perhaps the worst aspect of Harmony of Dissonance is all the backtracking that is required for you to complete the game. Save points and warps are much more sparse, so you'll end up spending most of your time hauling yourself all the way across the castle many times.

That said, this game is pure joy to play. You acquire new items, which allow you to explore previously out of reach areas- this feverishly addictive quality keeps you coming back for more and more until you beat Dracula.

Overall, this is the best game that you can currently buy for the gameboy advance (until Zelda is released!). The gameplay is fantastic and unparalleled by anything else offered by any other game company. You need this game!

Konami has been bringing us Castlevania games for over a decade now. From the first adventure on the NES, which introduced us to the Belmont legacy to the classic Symphony of the Night on the PSX and amazing Circle of the Moon on the GBA, Castlevania has always been one of the best series around and every game showcased something new and grand - upped the ante if you will. Harmony of Dissonance isn't bad in any way. It simply isn't as good as the classics before it.

Don't get me wrong, Harmony of Dissonance is not a bad game, but it's not without it's flaws. Major flaws. After hours of playing this game, these flaws will become obvious to you as well.

Harmony of Dissonance plays much like Circle of the Moon. You run around a huge maze-like castle, beating enemies with your whip and special items like the holy or the axe. When you beat a boss, typically, you can go onto the next level, you gain some new ability that allows you to progress into the castle, be it a double jump, wall jump, etc.

Harmony of Dissonance takes a good deal from SoTN or CoTM and puts a twist on it. There are different weapons you can get, there is now a code book instead of DSS cards, there is an alternate dungeon. All of this is well and good, but there simply isn't enough new about this game to warrant a purchase Unless you're a die-hard Castlevania fan.

The music flat out [stinks]. Anyone telling you anything else is either lying or tone-deaf. And it's not just that the music is low, NES quality, it's that the compositions are dull, some of them are downright annoying. Gives double meaning to the subtitle Harmony of Dissonance.

The graphics are upgraded from CoTM, and all in all it's an improvement. The characters and enemies are now easy to see and there are some neat graphical and rotation effects with the bosses. Some nice stuff.

But graphics and sound aren't what makes a game. Even though I hate the sound and love the graphics, I won't let that alter my score. I'm grading this game on gameplay. The gameplay is where it's all at. And this is where Harmony of Dissonance is lacking. The castle design in Circle of the Moon is far superior. In Harmony of Dissonance you'll find yourself wandering aroung for hours, partly due to poor maps, sometimes having to walk across half the castle to get to where you want to go. And when walking across the castle takes five minutes each time or more, it gets to be annoying.

Okay, so that part's not that bad. The thing that really degrades the game for me is that it's way too easy. In past Castlevania games, you got to a boss, and he was a challenge blocking your way. You had to memorize complex patterns to show him who's boss. In Harmony of Dissonance, most bosses are insanely easy, follow the simplest of patterns, and take off only a smidgen of health when they hit you. [lame]. I don't like frustrating, but I don't like feeling cheated, either. And well, it's a Castlevania game- IT SHOULDN'T BE EASY!!

All in all, this isn't a bad game. If it was the first Castlevania game, it would be brilliant, but most of the game simply seems to be what the game designers loved about previous Castlevania games. One of the problems with the game is that it's a rehash, and it plays way too similar to old Castlevania games. And it's too easy. Way too easy for a Castlevania game. Next thing you know, we're gonna see an easy Contra game...

This is my first review, but since reviews always help me out I wanted to return the favor. First off if this is your first castlevania game for gameboy, dont by it, get the other castlevania title, circle of the moon, than go from there. If you liked COTM and are thinking of buying this, I suggest it.

The graphics are better to start off with, and the normal walking monsters throughout the map are also more of a challange. On the downside, the bosses are much easier and the sound is much worse. You also only have 3 save files, but there is a new quicksave which comes in really handle if you have to stop playing in a hurry.

The magic system has been changed from cards to spellbooks, your spellbooks go off of which subweapon you use. I'm not sure if I like the change, but its livable.

The RPG system is the same and the game is still fun to play. Considering I'm deployed in Afgainstain right now, I have all the time in the world to play games, so I'm happy to have this one. It's worth the money.

Being a long time castlevania fan, I was really excited about this game. I however was somewhat disapointed with it. What the game gets right is great play controll, cool areas, some neat items and a neat gothic-vampire-esque story. But this game has almost no difficulty (except for collecting ALL of the relics... that is a chalenge)... To be honest, the only time I died was while playing the final boss, and even then, that death could have been easily avoided if I had used one of my 13 potions. The magic system in the game is ok, using spell books with weapons to create powerful magic, but these spell books are too easilly obtained (except for the last book, the summoning tome, which reqires a little bit of searching)and just a little too powerful. The bosses are also VERY uninspired and boaring compared to previous castlevania bosses. The game is a great time killer and is fun, but if you are looking for some gothic, vampire slaying action, You should probably look at Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, or Castlevania lament of Innocence. If you're a fan, then pick it up ..... but if not, you might want to consider another castlevania game.

I just finished playing Castlevania:Harmoney of Dissonance. I have bought two other great GBA games along with Castlevania, and without any hesitation I picked Castlevania to play it right away. I can honestly tell you that I'm satisfied with overall production value, however...

I read it in the magazine/reviews, saying that music was way out of line, outdated like good old NES time.. I wouldn't say it's THAT outdated, and also it was good enough, more than enough to create and convey the classic atmosphere of Castlevania series. What I really liked about this series was the graphic. Personally, I'm not really into graphic when it comes to gaming, however, graphic plays a significant role in Castlevania series and I'm more than satisfied with the graphic, which they managed to produce. The movement of Juste, the protagonist of the game, is simply unbelievable, par with the one from the Symphony of the Night for PlayStation.

Ok, I'll get to the point. I really welcome the idea of expanding the whole map so players can spend more time, which i find myself being thrilled like in PS version, like they did for Symphony of the Night for PS. However, the way they expanded, or more accurately doubled the size of the map, wasn't that inspiring like in PS version. In PS version, they included this 'inverted' castle, where every single area looks and is brand new, with all new enemies...whereas in this version, it was just simply doubled instead of being 'new'... So though you were going back and forth to get from Castle A to Castle B, it felt like you were just running around the same castle with little bit of change here and there, which you could tell it was done poorly with no solid effort. I was more frustrated then found pleasure out of this poor, poor effort of simplying doubling the original castle, compare to awesome PS version (I might be complaining about this simply because i have played PS version, for those who haven't played PS version, i'm not sure about how you will take it as..)

I didn't think the bosses were that easy, or may be it's just me who were having hard time with them. My point is that if you are there to fight with the bosses with no potion or any kind, I don't think there are lot of people out there who can say that they can manage to beat every single boss easily with confidence. It looks like the boss fights turned out to be easy one because of there's unlimited, literal unlimited supply of potions from merchants- Okay, may be you can control yourself from using no potion at all, but the VERY ESSENCE OF CASTLEVANIA SERIES HAS BEEN THIS 'THRILL' YOU GET FROM FIGHTING EVERY SINGLE BOSS WITH LIMITED HEALTH, PERIOD. The very serious flaw of PlayStation version, the flaw that the game became way to easy toward the end, has been fixed in the Circle of the Moon, the previoius GBA version by having consistent difficulty, yet that 'similiar' problem, I wouldn't say it's similiar but overall-wise, the game was on easy side when you compare it with previous Castlevania games. Of course, this game has this RPG element to it and character has to become stronger to face stronger enemies, but the game was still on the easy side.
I believe they could've done something by drastically raising the difficulty as the game progresses.
Now, why would I give this game 5 Stars with all the critical flaws I just mentioned above? Well, I don't know, but it seems like it's hard to find a 'worthy' game, worthy enough to finish it all the way, devoting my time out of busy schedule these days. So I figure that it offered enough elements and fun factor to finish it all the way in couple days. It's a great game. Well, it's a Castlevania game and i might have this favoritism for the series, however, I'm satisfied with this very series for GameBoyAdvance from objective perspective as well.

Enjoy it!

PS: Don't forget to get the 'real' ending

Harmony of Dissonance (HoD, for the contraction) begs to be compared with any and every Castlevania game that has appeared since the series began in 1986, but despite the large number of cameos and overall classic feel it is best to ultimately judge this title on its own merits, providing comparisons merely for reference. It accomplishes what it sets out to in providing a gameplay experience that has some incredibly strong points and a variety of goals, but tastes as though it has had some artifical extenders added into the mix.

The GBA's shoulder buttons allow you to dash left or right at nearly any time, setting an emphasis early in the game on making an attack quickly and dashing away. Tellingly, there aren't any poisoned waters you will be collecting a necklace to treat; while many upgrades will be familiar from Circle of the Moon (CotM, Konami's 2001 GBA Castlevania), Harmony of Dissonance adds some of these essential items as whip upgrades and effectively integrates them into the game. In place of CotM's DSS card system is a new Spell Fusion system which allows the player to use only the classic subweapons (a dash of holy water or a thrown axe in your enemy's face) or to pair a subweapon with a particular type of elemental magic to great effect. Inscrutable enemy tolerance/weakness come into play once again, but an Encyclopedia of fallen enemies will help you figure out what's helpful - though the trouble of changing your whip upgrade or Spell Fusion combo is usually greater than simply whipping away at the enemy would be. As a bit of a spoiler, at least one combination allows you to rotate your d-pad to get something extra out of the attack, and it's also possible to use one type of music by itself (though you must lose the subweapon first - can you figure that one out?)

The magic and item systems are responsible for the wealth of "bosses are easy" comments. Played in a traditional fashion without magic or using healing items during battle, Harmony of Dissonance is indeed challenging. Even with some use of the Spell Fusion system against bosses, they absorb many hits before you can finally vanquish them and their attacks often deplete a fourth of your life meter or more.

HoD also differs from Circle of the Moon in that characters are is much larger than in CotM, while areas are smaller in scale and don't feature the same panoramic vistas of that other title. HoD provides, pixel for pixel, more variety and actual content in all areas despite this.

At release, HoD was considered to be a significant step up from CotM in terms of graphics with many highly detailed backgrounds taking the place of CotM's usually repetitive ones (in addition both games have paralax scrolling in many areas). Visibility is now less of an issue with the introduction of the GBA SP and the GB Player, but at the time the "neon castle" approach was very appropriate (it reminds one of the original Rastan arcade game in a way), and fans were relieved for the reprieve against visits to the eye doctor and purchasing Afterburner kits. Harmony goes overboard with tons of large artwork pieces to be found that fill a good section of the screen and many large details filling in parts of the environment - it actually manages to compete with the third GBA Castlevania, Aria of Sorrow. Unfortunately, this game also contains some amazingly ugly and repetitive areas; a few of the game's tallest shafts are nothing but a series of floors to jump onto over and over, with a slow elevator in the middle. Harmony would have been served better to have some of these less interesting areas spruced up a bit; a few superfluous elements to the game should've been axed to make it happen. The save rooms in particular simply look pathetic, with a silly bouncing ball in the middle. The sprites for the three main characters also aren't anything to look at; your hero's running animation is comical. Overall, though, many of the trippy graphical ideas come off excellently.

HoD has taken a severe pounding for its music. Notably lower in quality than Circle of the Moon's neat music which at times sounded on par with the SNES; the reasoning here is that to provide the (usually) incredible graphics they had to fall back to PGM sound - basically back to programming sound for the Game Boy Color. Given this, the music sounds very good, with some incredibly strong tracks such as Successor of Fate (the Entrance theme), Offense and Defense (the next area BGM), and Chapel of Dissonance (the Sky Walkway area BGM) is rather nice as well. That said, some of it might be favorably described as a strange attempt to set the mood (the Luminous Caverns track)...or simply unpleasant to listen to and even depressing. This is a mixed bag, but Juste's Theme (the Entrance Theme again) has become a personal favorite from not only the game but the series.

There are some other minor quirks, and the game employs a trick to allow more of the same castle to be visited (along the lines of SotN). I felt that this idea was executed brilliantly overall; sometimes the changes are quite stunning and unexpected. On the down side, some interesting references to previous Castlevania games in the item list were botched for the English translation - Sypha (the female magician from Castlevania III) became Cipher, and a curious item that allows you to fling fireballs from your whip when at full health is no longer called Christoper's Soul. There's also a bit of (humorous!) unedited translation in the script that should keep you chuckling. The "true endgame" is very hard to find and figure out, but the pieces are all within your reach early on.

This is a great game - not great enough to make one a fan of bangles and room decoration, but it's a solid game overall with some incredible moments that few other games have.

The Castlevania series are my favorites, for sure, and this one's another gem for the collection.This one's about Juste Belmont, blood descendant of Simon Belmont,a master vampire hunter who has slayed the Count on multiple occassions. The plot is different than just slaying Drac though. Juste's friend Lydie has disappeared within the walls of Castlevania, and Juste and
his childhood friend Maxim Kischne set out to find her, yet everything ends up going awry somehow...Just to boot, Maxim's body is invaded by Dracula's spirit...BUT...The real aim of this game is to find all of Dracula's Remains (Fang, Tooth, Nail, Ring, Eye, Heart) though most players will not realize this without help from a strategy guide of sorts...

As for the actual review, there are a variety of things right and wrong with this game. To boot, we have superb graphics, boasting some of the most vivid, easy-on-the-eyes background scenery on the Game Boy Advance, but the blue aura surrounding Juste makes him seem somewhat out of place. Not to mention when he walks and jumps, he seems like he's magnetically attracted to the ground-but that's a completely seperate problem!

The castle is huge. There's so much to explore, and I'm glad they brought back the teleporter system, which predecessor Circle of the Moon sloppily butchered. There are two castles, one being a harder version of the other (a Symphony of the Night element.) with greater puzzles and challenges. Everything's easy to adjust to, and it never seems like you have to guess where you're going, which is another thing Circle of the Moon did wrong. Also brought back is the currency system with the Merchant's Shop though the items are a little cheap...which can add or take away challenge depending on what the player wants...even though the game is challenging without being strenuous as it is.

The music is well orchestrated, but the sound quality is a throwback to the days of NES. A select few compositions are simply superb, while the rest are mediocre. Listen closely for the one in the Sky Walkway, which is haunting. Moving on...

The bosses are redundant and often pointless (Getting a jewel that inreases MP restoration rate for getting rid of one of the game's harder bosses for example...and MP is not important) but some are unique and well-thought of (the Devil, for example.) Death (Grim Reaper) also makes a lovely appearance (or four) One thing they stole from Symphony, however, that they shouldn't have is the cheesy dialouge. Yes, it's back. Misplaced curse words and utterly stupid scriptwriting at some points add a flavor of kiddy gameplay to the game- not that the game is, however, a kiddy game. My biggest qualm, however, is that the game is simply a pain (...) few points, if that tells you anything. Some enemies have no pattern to them, hence, they're so unpredictable that it makes the game frustrating. But you'll adjust over time, and the good far outweighs the bad. The best of the three Castlevania GBA games, by far, if simply for the replay value (very, very high...) and the overall quality. It would have made a successful Playstation game. The 2nd best in the series, in my opinion, even with the negative points.

BOTTOM LINE: Harmony of Fun
GRADE: A

This game is so much better than the previous Castlevanias. Except for symphony of the night. Great adventure, storyline, and suspense. The main thing is you go around and build up your character and collect items that allow you perform certain movements or boost your players attributes. The spell books and items are way better. Mix spell books with items to really enhance the effects. My favs are wind and dagger,wind and cross,and fire with book. The castle(s)are divided into sections that are set at different levels of gameplay. Excellent graphics, the controls may take some getting used to. One of the things i like most about this game is you grow with your character. You get better as the game goes on and so does gamplay. This is a must have for the Game Boy Advance system!

I have to say I loved it, its a great time, from the moment I got it. The graphics are awesome and it feels like you are playing Symphony of the Night. I bought Circle of the Moon and it was good, but this one is a lot better. The game plays faster thanks to the dash buttons. There are enough extras to keep you entertained with the game for a while. Many people do feel dissapointed cause the game really is on the easy side. But if you are looking for a good time not some hard action game so hard too beat it will get you frustrated. This game has a beautiful look, an fast paced feel and it gets you intrguied enough in it that you wont stop until you beat it. Love it

first of all, This game is not as easy as some might think. I just found the porthole to castle B, and spent 2 hours wondering around the castle and not getting anywhere! you almost definately need a guide to play this game. Still, this game has a classic Castlevania feel to it, almost like I'm playing castlevania 4 again, with the return of a belmont in the staring role, the dangling whip tactic, and the simple music, and the castlevania MUST: a clock tower. The music isn't so bad. you can even hear a familiar Bach motif in the "entrance" area. I also like the clock tower theme. Kind of has a frantic feel to it.
Also, if you make it to the end credits, the "entrance" theme is played remixed to Circle of the Moon Quality. It almost sounds like an actual orchestra playing it. a very nice reward for beating the game