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Which GBA Castlevania game is the best?

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kittens

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I'm in the mood for some Castlevania, and I've never played the GBA ones. I've heard great things about all of them, but where should I start? Which is your personal favorite? Thanks!
 
Sounds like I'm going with Aria! I just found out there's an official AoS/HoD Double Pack cartridge, so that makes the decision a lot easier.
 
Circle of the Moon for challenge
Aria of Sorrow for SotN2
Harmony of Dissonance for a little fun
 
I remember when I first played Circle of the Moon, could barely see anything. The game was too damn dark and the original GBA's display was shit. XD
 
Phire Phox said:
I remember when I first played Circle of the Moon, could barely see anything. The game was too damn dark and the original GBA's display was shit. XD
Click to expand...

Aye, need that backlit SP or else...

GA-80752.jpg
 
Aria Of Sorrow was very nice. I'm sort of bitter when I look back through because it felt like the game that slowly eased the series into it's trashy modern anime look.

Ignore that though, game is still fantastic. It's like a portable SotN.
 
Aria has the best combination of music, story, graphics, and powers.

Circle of the Moon is amazing though... if you are playing on anything that isn't the original "wide" Game Boy Advance. If you're on an SP, the Game Boy Player, a Micro, or a DS/DS Lite.. then it's all gravy. It has amazing music, and it's the hardest of the three.

Harmony of Dissonance has the "worst" music.. but it's the instruments for the music.. not the composition. The graphics on it are more simplistic in comparison to the Circle and Aria to compensate for the dark original GBA screens. This one is the "weakest" of the three, but it's still amazing.

I really suggest playing Circle, then Aria, and then Harmony. In that order.
 
Haven't played CoM, but Aria of Sorrow is definitely better than Harmony of Dissonance. I actually disliked HoD with a passion.
 
Aria of Sorrow is the best out from the three. The controls are more fluid than in previous two and the progression is well paced. I'd probably rank them AoS, CotM and HoD. The latter one suffers from very bad audio and the castle feels kind of padded.
 
Aria of Sorrow is the best.

As far as a suggestion of where to start, I don't suggest Aria first, but play all of them in order of their release. That order is Circle, followed by Harmony, then Aria.

They are all great games.
 
FDBK said:
Aria of Sorrow is the best.

As far as a suggestion of where to start, I don't suggest Aria first, but play all of them in order of their release. That order is Circle, followed by Harmony, then Aria.

They are all great games.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I was thinking of doing this. It'd be kinda cool to see the progression in game design.
 
Circle of the Moon is classicvania + metroidvania done right. Pretty unique and challenging, and the card system for powers is awesome. Best of the bunch imho.

And it has an amazing soundtrack in the vein of the classic titles, including also some nice remixes.
 
Aria is the closest to Symphony of the Night.

Circle is more oldschoold Castlevania, really good, but without big story and frills.

Harmony is somewhere in the middle, great music, whippy main character and pink-gothy look to it all.

To me it goes like this: Circle<Harmony<Aria, I'd offer op to finish them in this order, they are all great games and great Castlevania games. It's just an evolution. Do the evolution.
 
Aria of Sorrow is without a doubt the best. After that Circle of the Moon is in a bit of a different style but is fantastic. Harmony of Dissonance was alright, but not comparable to the other two.
 
Which one is the best? As everyone has said, Aria of Sorrow.

Which ones should you play? All of them, in order of release.

I have a soft spot for Circle, but it's mainly because of the challenge and the abusing DSS glitch is fun.
 
Aria is the best.

Harmony is ok, but it has flaws, like pretty average music. Neat plot, though.

Circle has atmosphere but the play control is so terrible it's the worst.
 
Aria of Sorrow is my favourite Castlevania game, so it's not a hard pick to me. Gameplay-wise, it's Symphony of the Night with more magic attacks. It's a lot of fun, and one of the best games on the system.

If you have any interest in the others, you probably don't want to start with Aria though.
 
Aria of Sorrow is hands down the best GBAvania.

Circle of the Moon seems to split the crowd (I personally don't like it that much, it was okay though the controls were clunky), and Harmony of Dissonance is mostly silly and has pretty bad music, but it's an okay Metroidvania.
 
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