History VideoGame / CastlevaniaChroniclesOfSorrow

* MegaManning: Dmitrii Blinov has the ability to use any enemy ability he's hit by. In your fight with him, he'll mimic any Bullet and Guardian Souls you use against him, but he'll only utilize what you hit him with last, so you could... say... use the Student Witch soul and throw an easy-to-dodge cat at him, [[PowerupLetdown forcibly locking Dmitrii into a laughably easy attack pattern]] (all you'd really need to worry about then would be a simple [[KnifeNut stabbing attack]]). If you want to make him look even more ridiculous, hit him with the Cave Troll soul: any enemy ability he copies is restricted to level 1, meaning that instead of the longranged tongue attack with half screen range Soma gets at level 9, he'll be stuck with an ineffectual mildly rude gesture that has an even shorter range than his knife.

* DidNotDoTheResearch: The Excalibur weapon allows you to swing an enormous sword, and ''the stone it's still embedded in.'' However, in the original legend, Excalibur was ''not'' the sword in the stone.

* [=~Hey, It's That Voice!~=]:

* ReincarnationRomance: It's implied that Mina Hakuba is [[spoiler:the reincarnation of Elisabetha and Lisa, as in ''[=~Bram Stoker's Dracula~=]'', where Dracula's reincarnated wife was named Mina Harker]].

* [=~You Can't Fight Fate~=]: Not alone anyways. [[spoiler:And if everything goes terribly wrong there's a [[HeroAntagonist team]] ready to end [[VillainProtagonist you]]]].

The box, manual and introduction [[LateArrivalSpoiler make no effort to hide]] Soma's status as Dracula's reincarnation. The game starts with Soma living a normal life with his [[SheIsNotMyGirlfriend not-girlfriend]] Mina when he is suddenly attacked by cult leader Celia, who wishes to create a new dark lord. After the fight, Soma [[WithThisHerring charges into the cult's base with nothing but a rusty pocket knife and the clothes on his back]]. Oh, and [[BagOfSpilling he doesn't have any of the souls from ]]''[[BagOfSpilling Aria]]''[[[[BagOfSpilling , having dumped them in the Chaotic Realm to reseal Castlevania and all]]. This time, the castle is somewhere in Europe and is apparently an "exact replica" of Castlevania (how the TropeNamer for ChaosArchitecture can have an "exact replica" is never explained).

The box, manual and introduction [[LateArrivalSpoiler make no effort to hide]] Soma's status as Dracula's reincarnation. The game starts with Soma living a normal life with his [[SheIsNotMyGirlfriend not-girlfriend]] Mina when he is suddenly attacked by cult leader Celia, who wishes to create a new dark lord. After the fight, Soma [[WithThisHerring charges into the cult's base with nothing but a rusty pocket knife and the clothes on his back]]. Oh, and he doesn't have any of the souls from ''Aria'', having dumped them in the Chaotic Realm to reseal Castlevania and all. This time, the castle is somewhere in Europe and is apparently an "exact replica" of Castlevania (how the TropeNamer for ChaosArchitecture can have an "exact replica" is never explained).

** The UniqueEnemy [[spoiler: Chronomage, who can stop time]] is depicted as [[spoiler: a [[AliceInWonderland White Rabbit in Victorian dress with a pocketwatch.]] ]]

*** possibly more FridgeBrilliace, because the belmonts could learn to do so without magic, and Soma gains instant mastery meaning that he would probobly remember how to do it after enough, removing the need for the soul.

* CaptainErsatz: Zephyr in ''Dawn'' is basically a palette swap of Dio Brando from ''Manga/JojosBizarreAdventure'', with the same abilities and everything. You even fight him outside of the clock tower, much like the final battle between Dio and Jotaro.

** Being a high schooler and a [[spoiler:(reincarnation of a) vampire]], Konami couldn't resist making Soma full of [[JoJosBizarreAdventure Jotaro and Dio]] references.

* DangerouslyGenreSavvy: Dark Lord Soma has shown himself to be much smarter than he was as Dracula. He actualy relies on the souls he's absorbed, and if he has you cornered against the wall in his second form [[ArtificialBrilliance He'll repeatedly hit you with the Abaddon soul, making impossible to escape.]]

* DangeroulyGenreSavvy: Dark Lord Soma has shown himself to be much smarter than he was as Dracula. He actualy relies on the souls he's absorbed, and if he has you cornered against the wall in his second form [[ArtificialBrilliance He'll repeatedly hit you with the Abaddon soul, making impossible to escape.]]

* [=~What The Hell, Hero?~=]: In ''Dawn'', Dario calls out Soma for [[spoiler:apparently fighting Dmitrii with enough lethality to apparently kill him]], prompting Soma to apologize for his actions. This (and EvenEvilHasStandards) is then subverted, as Dario then snidely remarks that [[spoiler:''he'' wanted to be the one to kill Dmitrii ("Ah, what are you talking about? I just wanted to beat that stuck up jerk to death with my own hands!"). Oh, and Dmitrii actually isn't dead, as [[{{Foreshadowing}} alluded by]] the acquistion of his soul by Soma after their fight.]]

* YourDefeatMeansIObtainYourPowers: Soma himself does this. Every soul is from an enemy, most of the time, one you'll meet, even for basic attacking souls. Like he can get the Skeleton soul to throw bones from the Skeleton etc. In ''Aria'' you have to beat bosses to get the soul in the next room, which is often of a completely different creature, but in ''Dawn'', this is played much more straight and you get the soul of the boss you killed instantly.

* LevelGrinding: Annoyingly, ''Dawn'' has a perfect leveling curve, if you don't avoid enemies you should always be around the right level, but encourages every ''other'' form of grinding. To get any Soul beyond the most frequently dropped and frequently encountered ones to a decent level (or found in the first place) you need to grind with the Soul Eater Ring (double soul drop rates) equipped. And to afford the Soul Eater Ring, you need a ''lot'' of money. The only way to afford this (as pretty much every enemy drops the same amount of money regardless of strength) is to grind zombies and fuse their souls into weapons and sell the weapons. This takes about 14 or so trips with each trip taking 8 or so minutes with decent LuckStat. Once you spent 2 hours on the Soul Eater Ring, you spend more time repeatedly killing various enemies with low soul drop rates (many are 1% before ring and luck bonus, while others only appear in a single room). Of course, this only really applies if you're going for OneHundredPercentCompletion, but there are benefits to doing so...

** And Julius. Just like Arikado, he is never seen laughing throughout the game--let alone smiling at all. He is heard laughing at Soma and Mina at the end of the best ending of ''Dawn'' with Yoko and Hammer, though.

* TheStarscream: [[spoiler:Dmitrii Blinov.]]
* TheStoic: Arikado.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: In ''Aria'', [[HornyDevils a Succubus and a Lilith]] appear to have been taking a bath together in one room, and the Lilith is hidden underwater at first. In both games, quite a few of the humanoid or partially humanoid enemies have sprites that make it obvious that they're completely naked. The sprites are actually anatomically correct in many cases, but it's fairly subtle due to the GBA and DS's resolution. This is also true of some of the background art. Also, see PinkBishoujoGhetto.

* PinkBishoujoGhetto: The Inner Quarters in ''Aria''. Practically all of the enemies there are [[CuteMonsterGirl Cute Monster/Humanoid Girls]] of one kind or another. Fun fact: If [[http://castlevaniadungeon.net/Games/ariaweird.html the results of using a certain debug code]] are any guide, the area was originally going to be called "The Harem". Also, a single room in ''Dawn'' has a similar theme. As it so happens, it's a bedroom.

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