Line #32 YMMV/CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDespair


1	* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic:
2	** It's a ''Castlevania'' game, what did you expect? The soundtrack is composed entirely of remixes from the DS games, and there are more songs then there are stages. Go into Options and you can assign new songs to the stages and bosses you fight.
3	** Chapter 10 includes the entire ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaI'' soundtrack. The fandom celebrated yet again.
4	* ComplacentGamingSyndrome:
5	** Most of the online players pick Soma due to the sheer number of souls from enemies to collect and the amount of versatility and [[GameBreaker brokenness]] of some of them. Most of the other characters just can't compete.
6	** And on the other end? Don't expect to see much Maria unless you're on the 360 or Yoko unless you're playing Chapter 9.
7	** As for Yoko users, they tend to use [=HOLY LIGHTNING=] ''a lot''.
8	** For equipment, you'll mostly be seeing luck and/or movement speed boosting boots, the raiment's and super potions.
9	* FanNickname:
10	** Hard mode is introduced to first-timers by more experienced players as "Ultra Hard Rape Mode" for good reason (and ''Normal'' Mode can get hair-pullingly difficult!)
11	** Yatsucard, Blendercard, Blendmatic, Blender, and so on for Alucard players using [[DualWielding dual]] Yasutsunas, due to this weapon's nature of slashing incredibly fast in front of the character and can be backdash canceled for even more attacks, effectively creating a tornado of cutting death.
12	** Somanway, for the Soma build that's usually two copies of Valmanway +1, Succubus Soul, Medusa Head, Berserk Mail, Astral Ring, and Skull Ring. Melts everything in seconds and Soma is functionally immortal if he spams fast enough.
13	** SSJ Charlotte, for the Charlotte build of Astral Ring, Skull Ring, Holy Veil, Robe Decolette, and shoes of choice, since Charlotte now has effectively infinite spellcasting and glows yellow (due to the Skull Ring giving her a permanent curse status).
14	** The soundtrack is usually noted for having "HD Guitar-Spam Syndrome", thanks to almost all of the [=DLC=] songs done by one of the main composers for ''{{VideoGame/Gitadora}}'', Yasushi Asada.
15	** Due to the high amount of Soma players and how game-breaking Soma can get, the name "Castlevania: Soma and Friends" has been thrown around.
16	** Another nickname for the game: ''Harmony of Flipping Pages'', in reference to how basically everything menu-related, not the least of which is the game's loading screen, is shown via flipping through the pages of a book.
17	* FirstInstallmentWins: Averted initially. Every playable character came from ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaRondoOfBlood Rondo of Blood]]'' or later. Played straight later with Simon Belmont, who appears in his original 8-bit glory.
18	* GameBreaker: It's a ''Castlevania'' game, so of course it's going to have its fair share of these.
19	** Charlotte has a heal spell. Prior to the Dec 20 update, with high spell levels and good intelligence bonuses, it could recover significantly more HP than it cost in MP, and was very quick to activate as well. The Astral Ring, when equipped, causes you to use HP instead of MP to use magicl combine with the previous for infinite spellcasting. This was eventually patched out so that the amount of healing gotten has been greatly reduced and the spell takes 50 MP now, meaning it's hard to break even with it. It also doesn't have any invincibility frames anymore when cast, meaning you can't use it to bypass stage hazards. This means if you are able to cast Heal for free, it's all you'll be doing.
20	** Yatsu/Blendercard, if the player doing that doesn't forget to dodge stuff while mashing the two attack buttons, pretty much anything coming across his way is gonna die in seconds. Yes, even Dracula in Hard mode, especially if there are other Blenders in the team. Applies to Soma and 2 Valmanways as well. It's almost the same, a little bit weaker, but faster and with more range. And Soma can use the Succubus soul to regain health every time he hits an enemy. This kind of weapon allows you to strike more than 20 times per second or so. Do the math. Winged Boots and Berserker Mail work wonders in this set.
21	** The update decreased the damage output of the Yatsutsuna a great deal, making it a much less effective method of dealing damage, although to compensate, Muramasa received a massive damage increase. Amusingly enough, Chapter 11 adds both a Yasutsuna+1, which only has +2 attack over the normal version (compare +20 most other +1 gear gets, even Valmanway+1 gets +6) but hits just as fast as the original version used to, along with a Muramasa+1 which makes it the strongest katana in the game.
22	** The DLC stages can be used to farm cash in increments of 2k, which will allow you (with a little farming) to get very expensive gear for your characters before you even beat the first stage (making said stage, and a few thereafter, pretty much cake).
23	** The Valmanway (AKA the Crissaegrim) hits four times for each push of the attack button. Soma's Succubus soul recovers 1 HP every time he scores a hit (2 HP if you have nine of them). The HP you can recover with these two items piles up very fast, moreso if you have a second Valmanway. Combined with the Astral Ring, you get infinite magic attacks, and you can hover in place indefinitely with the Medusa Head soul, which breaks Legion entirely if you hover between its core and the spot where its tentacle laser appears. See why some people refer to this game as [[FanNickname Somavania?]] If the 2 HP per hit seems hardly worth mentioning, everyone starts with 300 HP and can only increase it with equipment, with the best gear for that purpose (some of which, by the way, is usable ''only'' by Jonathan Morris and the Belmonts) being barely able to push it to upwards of about 413-ish HP, with the overall enemy damage being scaled appropriately.
24	** A level-9 Buer soul on Soma surrounds him with a ring of fireballs. It doesn't do too much damage, but with it he can plow right through swarms of weaker enemies like bats, ghosts, imps, fleamen, and medusa heads effortlessly. It also handily dispatches certain projectiles like Death's scythes and Ryotsuki's fireballs. With enough MP-restoring equipment, you can keep it on for virtually the entire level.
25	** Miser Rings increase your attack by 1 for every million gold you have, with a maximum effect of 10. Not your strength, your attack. Even the Vorpal Blade is dangerous with two of these, much less two Valmanway +1s. and if you're good with backdash canceling? You can say ''goodbye'' to the difficulty.
26	** When Chapter 9 was released, it gave an item known as the Fool's Tablet. It's essentially a variant of the Skull Ring, but instead of cursing you it poisons you instead, and it won't ever fade until you take it off. You'll be constantly taking damage, so you have to wonder why you'd ever use such a thing...and someone found a reason why. The Astral Brooch and Blood Cape both have the effect that they can regenerate your MP equal to damage taken, and since the Fool's Tablet can trigger poison damage (which does a flat 3 damage per second), you'd be getting 6 MP per second. Combine it with Charlotte and her Heal and she'd be practically back up to her glory! Alas, this was patched in the [=PS3=] version so the Fool's Tablet would take away ALL of your HP and reduce it to 1 no matter what.
27	* GoddamnedBoss: Menace. He is actually very easy to dodge, but the problem is how damn long it takes for him to open himself up, leading to a long, drawn out chase around his stage to get the switches in place, climb up if he knocks you off a ledge, and so on. However, there are ways to trigger him to wake up early (mostly by using some long ranged attacks that go through walls, the game only checks if you're on the same horizontal level as he is and allows such attacks to hit him where they shouldn't), but it still takes an eternity for him to lumber his way to the left side of the stage where he's meant to be fought. Once he does get there, it doesn't take long to kill off his weak points and consecutively the rest of him.
28	* GoodBadBugs: Oh so many:
29	** The acceleration glitch. Mainly, if a character is going fast enough, they will have to wait a few frames to land safely and get up. However, if you do this to the edge of a platform, you'll accelerate forward quickly. Depending on how you trigger the glitch and who you're using, you can possibly go through walls and floors.
30	** If a ledge is just a few pixels too high, a drop kick might get you on the ledge due to awkward hitboxes. This is most abusable with Shanoa and Julius.
31	** Pre-patch, Charlotte's Heal spell also granted invisibility frames, allowing her to bypass flame jets and use what were supposed to be multiplayer shortcuts all by herself.
32	** The elevators in Chapters 1 and 5 can be used without assistance so long as you can slide far enough.
33	** A multiplayer shortcut in Chapter 2 with the 2 gates can be easily used alone by backdashing the same time you trigger the switch.
34	** The Medusa Head soul and the retro variant will reset your aerial speed, so rapidly tapping RB/R1 will level out your fall, making some jumps easier to make.
35	** Same with Alucard's Mist Form, but it also slightly moves, allowing Alucard to better pull off the "drop kick-ledge" trick above.
36	** Chapter 10 is filled with these. When you get to the elevator, you'll most likely see a Soma player on the elevator, throwing a puppet off the wall, then teleporting into the opposite wall and flying into what is supposed to be Stage 6 of the original ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaI''. If you're lucky, however, you'll see a ''really good'' Soma player do the same thing...'''but at the start of the level'''.
37	** The green chests in Chapter 8 Normal don't have generic loot pools to draw from, allowing you to get a handful of Johnathan's subweapons and a good chunk of the Martial Arts very easily.
38	** The Feather Gear forces knockback on you when taking damage. If however you're crouching and can't stand up, the game will force you through walls until it can draw your character in the knockback animation.
39	* GrowingTheBeard: Many that hated the game or thought it was SoOkayItsAverage when it came out have been drawn to it thanks to all of the DLC and the update which fixed several issues about the game. A more arguable example since the game did receive strong reviews from day one, but the rise from being considered a decent spin-off to one of the best games in the franchise is still an impressive change.
40	* PolishedPort: The [=PS3=] version comes with offline multiplayer and a fixed drop table so rare drops actually drop more than once in a blue moon. Unfortunately, it comes with an unpatched version of Maria...
41	* PortingDisaster: The streamable version on PS Now. Aside from the streaming service causing a few frame hiccups, it can't be played online and unlike most [=PS3=] games on the service, comes with no [=DLC=].
42	* ScrappyMechanic: Normally the camera is has three variable levels of zoom, depending on whether you want to focus on yourself or the stage around you. This works perfectly fine in the singleplayer or online modes. But if you play the local co-op on the [=PS3=] version? EventObscuringCamera doesn't even begin to describe the absolute mess the game becomes on a dime from trying to make sure all the players stay on screen at the same time as it constantly zooms in and out; teleports and transferring across the stage force everyone to stand still or lose track of themselves as but specks on the screen. Combine that with anyone being able to shift the camera at any moment and a single {{Troll}} can turn everything into a nauseating mess. Since the HUD is already relatively small in terms of screen estate, a clever usage of splitscreen could've fixed ''a lot'' of the problem.
43	* ThatOneAttack:
44	** Legion is flat out pathetic in his first form... And then he pulls out his flame jets which are an absolute pain to dodge. Same with 8 Bit Dracula's Second Form fireballs, which become a BulletHell-esque spread.
45	** The PC fan port turns many enemy attacks into straight up undodgeable BulletHell patterns on the aptly named "Hell" difficulty.
46	* ThatOneBoss:
47	** One of Puppet Master's attacks is to put a puppet into an unblocked iron maiden, summoning a random character into that iron maiden and doing massive damage (which kills all but the most healthy and HP-buffed characters). On Hard mode, it takes five hits to kill a puppet ''per character''--that's anywhere from 5 (solo) to 30 (in a max-sized party) hits needed to prevent instant death, and you'll find that [[LeeroyJenkins some people eschew tactics in favor of spamming the boss with expensive and sometimes not very effective attacks]]... Ugh.
48	** Ryukotsuki and his goddamn screen-filling knives and fireballs.
49	* TheyChangedItNowItSucks:
50	** Everyone who enjoys the game was probably once complaining about the lack of experience, story, or a large castle to explore. Only to become addicted to the game's depth and ContinuityPorn.
51	** Predictably, the reaction to those who abused the previously mentioned healing trick with Charlotte once it was no longer possible. According to them, though, it enabled Charlotte to be just as effective as Soma or Alucard in the right hands, so its removal just centers the game even further around those two. Fortunately the patch boosted the damage of the rest of her spells, lowered their [=MP=] costs and the [=DLC=] spells are all rather useful.

Context YMMV / CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDespair