Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night Reviews
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a love letter for all the fans that waited for a real new Castlevania game. Igarashi delivered what he promised 5 years ago.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night could be one of the biggest surprises this year. For Castlevania fans, this represents the best chance you'll ever have to experience that franchise's golden days. For everyone else, this game is a tightly paced and engaging explore-'em-up that will devour your attention span and reward you appropriately.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a worthy follow up to the Castlevania games that many grew up with in terms of its exploration, but lacks some much-needed polish in the combat and animation department to truly shine as a modern gem
Aside from a few script malfunctions and some odd enemy behavior at points, this is a perfect Metroidvania game. If you are a fan of the genre, a fan of Castlevania, a fan of Metroid, or just a fan of 2D platformers in general, you owe it to yourself to pick this one up.
If you're into post-Symphony of the Night Castlevania, you will find with Bloodstained : Ritual of the Night what you wanted. It doesn' have the name or the same setting, but the feeling and the atmosphere are the same, with some very generous content and a lot of nods to the Konami series. It could have been a lot more polished wisually speaking, felt more of like a game of this era, but how can we be frustrated to get what Koji Igarashi and his team were expected to do ?
Review in French | Read full review
Bloodstained has some mighty big shoes to fill but does so admirably. It delivers a classic, yet satisfying experience that fans have been wanting for years.
Igarashi-san has made another masterpiece. Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is an unapologetic celebration of the best parts of his previous work, bringing them all together with some fresh approaches to progression. Gorgeous and rewarding, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is phenomenal and is a worthy, near flawless successor to Symphony Of the Night, and that's high praise indeed.
A competent Metroidvania that will entertain for ten to fifteen hours.
It's been a hot minute since the Kickstarter for Koji Igarashi's new game wrapped up and Castlevania fans have a good reason to celebrate on how this turned out.
So, what we've got in Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a well-designed game that's poorly developed. A championship-caliber team that needs another few months (or perhaps another year) of training camp. 505 Games has promised to fix the glaring problems, but I can't review a game based on promises. There's still some fun to be had here, but it shouldn't have been released in its current state. Wait for the updates. If they don't come, wait for a sale…and stay away from the bookshelves.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a comfortable return for Koji Igarashi. It doesn't push any boundaries, but it's a fluid, well-crafted labor of love with tons of content and a satisfying core gameplay loop.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, Koji Igarashi's first proper effort since 2008's Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, is a Rococo masterwork.
...a modern game in the spirit of the post-Symphony of the Night Castlevania titles, you can't do much better than this.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, for lack of a better description is a modern-day Castlevania game. It's typical Koji Igarashi gameplay at its finest and fans of his works will find everything here very familiar. Lots of stuff to do, enjoyable gameplay and a game that has more than enough to offer fans of the genre. The four-year wait was worth it.
After years of development and a handful of delays, Koji Igarashi’s highly anticipated return to gaming is perfection personified, or close to it. It is one of the finest side-scrolling action-RPGs that you’ll play, with beautifully stylistic and colorful visuals that work wonderfully with the 2.5D presentation. The endgame grind may be too much of an investment, but I love every moment of it, especially considering how much I enjoy the hack-and-slash gameplay and being able to swap between my customized presets at any moment. It may feel quite familiar to his previous work but sets the bar for the series moving forward.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night doesn't reinvent the idea of what a Castlevania game should be, but it does a better job than any of its contemporaries at emulating that classic formula that Konami have long abandoned. While it's technically got a few issues they're hurdles that I am sure it will overcome. Still, in a market that's flooded with imitations, Bloodstained is the real deal. A true successor to Castlevania that fans and newcomers will easily sink their teeth into.
Bloodstained finally delivers upon the promise of a modern follow-up to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, and it does so spectacularly.
Overall, there is little wrong with Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night. Some of the sections have a trial and error feel, meaning you might lose and that will cost you progress, though the overall game achieves what it wants. As a fan of those games, I got a similar impression of this as I did with Castlevania: Harmony of Despair. If you're up for looking around every corner, work on your moves and invest in the story, it's hard not to see the value of Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is everything that was great about Igarashi's Metroidvania titles all rolled into one, and feels like it will be as timeless a game as Symphony of the Night.
A worthy successor to the legacy laid out by Symphony of the Night that stands on its own with a compelling new universe and highly customizable build system.