Another GZDOOM fan game has been updated recently, this time we have the rather good Castlevania: Simon's Destiny.
For those not aware of it, here's how the developer describes it:
Castlevania : Simon's Destiny is a standalone non-profit GZDOOM based fan game born as a love letter to this legendary franchise.
This mod aims to reinvent the very first NES title of the franchise with a nostalgic yet brand new first person gameplay.
All the levels from the classic NES era game have been reimagined like never before, experience the tale of Simon's fight against Dracula and his army of the night!
The latest update, is mainly focused on graphical upgrades and it's looking pretty sweet. Here's the update trailer for V1.3:
Direct Link
If you want to try it out, it requires GZDOOM 3.4.1 or higher which you can get from the official site.
You can find the official post on the game on the ZDoom forum (there's a couple of music addons available there) or Mod DB.
Once you have GZDoom installed, you can add the "Castlevania.ipk3" into "/.config/gzdoom". It actually seems to work without a Doom or Freedoom wad file, so you can simply run it like so from terminal:
gzdoom -iwad Castlevania.ipk3
Projectile Vomit Jul 9, 2018
I find the idea of trying to apply Castlevania to a 2.5d game really fascinating, so I left some thoughts and criticisms below. Regardless I found the game itself fun for what it was :)
The 3d aspect does not play to Simon's favor, unfortunately. While I am glad that medusa heads don't send you flying, 3d platforming adds a new dimension to the wonky-ness. The physics of 2d Castlevania were very precise (i.e. simple); the axe knights could throw a low axe to jump over or high axe to duck (then the axe returns, but that's not in this game so w/e). Here I mostly dealt with them by popping in and out of cover and spamming my ranged weapon. The only time ducking is feasible is for the medusa heads since they move in a fixed pattern. Maybe they could've fixed this by locking the axis of enemy projectiles, but then you'd need to position them so they're not easily sniped from above or below... tricky.
The skeletons are done well, their bones fly at a predictable arc and they can only throw so far. However, when it comes to your own spec weapons I can only reccomend the boomerang-cross, dagger, and pocket-watch. The axe is really hard to use appropriately, figuring out the arc is strange in first person. It's also so short range it'll be useless in many situations, same goes for the holy water, which may have worked better with a bigger AOE.
Oh, and the whip is... alright. The range can be hard to predict in 3d, but the impact does feel satisfying on enemies you can use it on. It'll be useless against most projectile enemies (save for the skelly) and most bosses, since the whipping slows you down allowing for you to get shot in the face; but this can work in tandem with the watch.
Edit: And I should mention the aesthetics and soundtrack are nice. Breaking all the candles in the castle was appropriately nostalgic :B
Last edited by HadBabits on 9 July 2018 at 8:26 pm UTC
Luke_Nukem Jul 10, 2018
Cloversheen Jul 10, 2018
Can totally recommend! :D
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