Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge

The Good
Belmont's Revenge is in my opinion one of the best games you can get on the Game Boy and ranks second to Super Castlevania IV only on my list of favorite Castlevania games.

As a successor to the Castlevania adventure it improves on all fronts that were wrong with its predecessor. Gone is the unfair system that when you get hit by an enemy your whip gets down-graded. The overall difficulty has been toned down and we finally got a password system for your progress. Belmont's Revenge also re-introduced the sub-weapons like the Axe and the Holy Water, making Christopher more versatile. But the biggest addition to this game was the Stage Select option. Belmont's Revenge lets you tackle down 5 Different Castles of which you can choose the order you want to destroy them in of 4 of them, the fifth castle being Dracula's which will only rise when the 4 others have been destroyed.

The levels are all well structured and sometimes even have alternate routes. When you approach one of the bosses you will enter a short stage with no enemies that's accompanied by an eerie music that builds up the tension before you duke it out with the boss itself. There are more of these little touches that make the levels feel unique: Destroying bridges with explosions coming from the eye-balls. Being slowed down by the vines on the ground you have to walk through. The flowers that pop open when you walk by them. The room going dark when you destroy the last candle and awaking the dormant insects etc, etc. These are all great examples of nice touches that you will encounter during your journey.

As you can expect from a Castlevania games the music is excellent. This is the best soundtrack for a Game Boy game that you can find. The songs are all a mixture of renaissance/classical music combined with more up-tempo Rock and Poppy influences.

All these elements combined give you a pretty unique and highly enjoyable Castlevania experience that you won't soon forget.

The Bad
There's not much to complain about. The only thing that comes to mind is the sluggishness of Christopher. Like all other Castlevania protagonists of the pre-Symphony of the Night era his sprite moves sometimes frustratingly slow. It is also a bit short with 6 stages in total, but then again back in the days when 4 levels were normal it wasn't that bad actually.

The Bottom Line
If you are into Castlevania then you shouldn't let this one pass you by. Don't be discouraged by the limited hardware of the game Boy (no-color and chip sounds) because due to some great graphical artists and genius music composers this little Game Boy title ranks among the best of the Castlevania games out there.