Castlevania Fighter is a homebrewed Castlevania game, developed by Serio using M.U.G.E.N as the game engine. While the plot — such as it is — involves characters coming together from several alternate universes and timelines (a bit like the cast of Castlevania: Judgment coming from several points in the timeline — and ironically, we are speaking of the official Castlevania Fighting Game), the game itself plays like a very long boss rush styled after the platformers of the series, with graphics borrowed from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and the DS games along with new sprites drawn in the same style.
Unfortunately, Serio announced on February 9, 2019 that they are no longer working on the project. They've left the source code
for anyone who wishes to pick up where they left off. The new development team and the latest build for the game can be found in this Discord server.
Castlevania Fighter demonstrates the following tropes:
- After-Combat Recovery: Just like in the main games, every boss leaves behind an orb when beaten. If you catch the orb so that you're in some kind of animation when the freeze-frame happens (jumping, attacking, doing a special move), your maximum HP, MP, and/or attack power will increase. Catch enough orbs like this and you'll get a Double Shot or Triple Shot, which lets you toss more subweapons at a time, or strengthens them if they're the kind you can't use more than one of in quick succession. Depending on the character you use, it may be easier or harder to time an "Excellent/Perfect" orb catch.
- Alternate Timeline: In the universe where this game takes place, Alucard got killed along with Lisa, then Sypha Belnades got killed, and to top it all off, in 1476 Trevor Belmont lost against Dracula, whose power then extended over the whole of Europe. 400 years later, said power has grown so much it starts to affect even timelines where Trevor won.
This may explain why there are some baddies, even a version of Death, among the selectable cast — they may not be good doubles from some Mirror Universe, but rather just interested in not having a Dracula from another reality influence their own. - Background Boss: Balore is featured as he was in Aria of Sorrow, looming in the background and trying to punch the player with both hands. At half health, he remains still and repeatedly sweeps the floor with a blazing laser beam.
- BFS:
- Axe Armor has its own take on this, using a humongous axe for one of its special moves.
- For a straighter example, Montano carries four for each subweapon he has equipped.
- One of Soma's command moves has him swing his weapon with greater size, speed, and damage.
- Boss Game: You go straight from one boss to the next, with nothing between them.
- The Cameo:
- Reimu Hakurei, Sakuya Izayoi, and Remilia Scarlet appear in their forms from Koumajou Densetsu, as a playable character and boss respectively.
- Ronald McDonald and Duke Nukem are playable, too.
- One stranger inclusion is Montano Cyprus from the Castlevania clone Castle Of Shadows.
- The other two Survival-exclusive bosses are taken from the Demon Hunter Legend series of mobile Castlevania clones.
- Cast from Hit Points: Jonathan loses HP while using the Vampire Killer, as only the Belmonts can wield it safely.
- Character Level: Not quite played straight. You can power yourself up, but only by catching the after-boss orbs in special ways. Soma and Alucard also grow a little bit stronger with every boss they defeat, by absorbing their souls.
- Charged Attack: Many characters, like Hugh, Charlotte, Axe Armor, and Master Skeleton, have special moves you can charge up. Whatever character it is, you can see a bar above them that fills up to full. Charlotte and Loretta have to charge up a moment to use their magic spell subweapons, but you can also keep charging to use a stronger version of them.
- Combos: In a frightening inversion, the bosses can do these, because you flinch from their attacks and not vice versa. Lots of them have at least one possible method of juggling you, and you get Mercy Invincibility only when you touch the ground. Richter Belmont is an infamous example for this.
- The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: In recent versions, Item Crashes need to be charged up before they're used. This doesn't apply to boss characters.
- Continuing is VERY Painful/Unstable Equilibrium: If you die and use a continue, you lose all the stat boosts you got from special orb catches. Ergo, the best (perhaps only?) way to beat the game is to "one-credit clear" it. Technically averted as of the latest update, as you now keep all stats, points, and items when continuing. However, continues are now limited unless you use a secret cheat, and using said cheat both cuts your score in half and reduces all points you earn by 25% from that point on, so you can forget about getting a high score.
- Double Jump: One of the common abilities that all the playable characters have, even if they didn't have one in their original games.
- Easy-Mode Mockery: Beating the game on Easy gets your character thrown off the cliff in the ending scene and afterwards a cutesy pic of Flandre Scarlet and a sarcastic comment "congratulating" you for beating Easy mode.
- Excuse Plot: Currently the game doesn't have much of an over-arching plot, but things are being planned out for a story. Unfortunately, with the creator abandoning the project, it seems like these ideas will never come into fruition.
- From Nobody to Nightmare: Compare this game's Lesser Demon and Cerberus with their Castlevania: Symphony of the Night counterparts.
- Flechette Storm: Most of the characters possessing the dagger subweapon can "item crash" with it, throwing a lot of daggers forward.
- Storm of Blades: Grant does an even flashier version, jumping up and rapidly throwing downward a hefty amount of homing daggers.
- Gatling Good: One of Hammer's and Duke's special moves involves charging up and firing a gatling gun, and while actually firing it they're invincible. Time it right and you'll be dodging attacks you probably didn't think you could avoid. Additionally, Hammer can aim it diagonally upwards to batter down flying bosses.
- Glass Cannon: Hanz Belmont, who is accessible as an alternate mode of Richter, starts off with large boosts to strength, but has the lowest starting HP to date (950) and some of the worst defenses to both physical and magical.
- Gradual Regeneration: Your MP recovers over time during the fights. If you have enough time, you can hold Up for at least 2 seconds to pose and make it recover faster.
- Guest Fighter: As of now, Reimu Hakurei, Sakuya Izayoi, Ronald McDonald, Duke Nukem, and curiously, Montano Cyprus from Castle Of Shadows.
- Guns Akimbo: Another of Hammer's specials lets him do his best impression of Dante, hanging in the air while shooting twin pistols diagonally down.
- Harder Than Hard/Nintendo Hard: Just about every boss has new attacks, several having outright Took a Level in Badass, and even on Normal mode, things can get pretty hectic. Past Normal, there's Hard mode and Nightmare mode, the latter of which isn't visible until you highlight it on the difficulty select screen.
- Heal Thyself: Yoko, Charlotte, Maxim, Maria, Sonia, and Simon are innately able to heal themselves (and nearby partners in co-op) in the middle of battle. Anyone can do it with healing potions from the item shop.
- Life Drain: Alucard, Maria, Nathan, Persephone, and Yoko have moves that can drain HP as they attack the enemy.
- On the opposing side, Brauner, Remilia, and Dracula all have attacks to grab you and drain your health.
- Homing Projectile: Carrie has an entire button devoted to throwing homing orbs around.
- Invulnerable Attack: Quite a few characters have at least one move which gives some invincibility, like Albus' Igniz Kick and Richter's Whip Rush. When playing as some characters, you're pretty much forced to exploit this invincibility if you expect to beat the boss at all.
- Joke Character:
- Since Serio doesn't like Jonathan Morris that much, he's in the roster as a joke character, with the Terror Bear from Harmony Of Despair instead of the whip, a set of silly subweapons, and special moves that can backfire or are limited-use. However, if used wisely, he can still hold his own against the bosses. The joke turns a little more mean-spirited if you play Survival Mode and end up against an AI-controlled Jonathan, since he'll use proper versions of his armaments from Portrait of Ruin, including the Vampire Killer whip and a Holy Claymore for his main weapons. As icing on the cake, the in-game files refer to Jonathan as Jonafag. Using the Konami Code in-game, however (the B and A buttons corresponding to Stonewall and backdash) turns Jonathan into his serious self, completely changing his moveset and essentially allowing one to use his boss moveset, although use of the whip drains his health.
- There's also the Frog from Rondo of Blood. He can only use his tongue as a whip-like attack and hop around. Despite this, he is a small target and isn't really weak. The September 2015 update has turned him into a fully-fledged character with a proper set of moves — he can even breathe fire or ice.
- There's even Ronald McDonald from Treasure Land Adventure among the roster. At first, his only attacks were throwing a weak sparkle, an incendiary hamburger, and Fry Kids. Later updates gave him a full moveset, including a Grimace assist that tosses a rather damaging homing milkshake at enemies if he is hit.
- Konami Code: Turns "Jonafag" into regular Jonathan. B is Stonewall and A is the backdash.
- Last Ditch Move: Dario, Lesser Demon, Dogether, Dullahan, and Flying Armor all have some method of hurting you as they die, but most of the bosses have another form of this — if you strike the killing blow while they're doing an attack, they won't die until the attack is finished.
- Dracula has one last trick under his cape after defeating his third phase. During this fourth and final phase, he'll begin to charge up a final attack, summoning two swarms of bats to protect him. If the players can't deal enough damage in time to force him to teleport away and reset his charge time, he'll unleash the Giga Demonic Megiddo, a full-screen instant kill.
- Leitmotif: Several characters get these when playing against them. Including ones that normally don't have one.
- For the ones without a motif in their games of origin: the Axe Armor, Persephone, the frog, and the Master Skeleton all have "Followers of Darkness -The First-", Hugh has "Proof of Blood", Carrie is given Cornell's theme from Judgment, Hans is given "S (Sparda Battle)", and Hammer is given "Cross a Fear". (Which is funny because Hammer did have a Leitmotif in Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow.)
- Limit Break: Every playable character (except for Yoko, Persephone, and Ronald McDonald) has at least one super powerful move that runs off of hearts instead of the usual MP. Everyone who uses the classic Castlevania subweapons (Dagger, Axe, Cross, etc.) is able to perform their corresponding Item Crushes, except for Simon, who instead uses a Rosary for a full-screen attack. Nathan and Hugh have to activate DSS Mode first. Sakuya has a unique Item Crash for the Stopwatch, but shares the Dagger Item Crash with the Belmonts. Jonathan has to be in serious mode in order to use Item Crashes. Most of the characters who don't use the classic subweapons have unique super moves instead.
- Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Alucard and Axe Armor have a shield on their secondary attack buttons, which will effectively nullify all destructible projectiles. 2 bosses: Great Armor and Medusa also have this feature, completely blocking a lot of the player's projectiles.
- Mook–Face Turn: Some former enemies of the Belmonts are turned into playable characters, ranging from Skeletons to Werewolves to Axe Armors to Persephones. Even the Rondo of Blood version of Death is a playable character (the boss-only version, on the other hand, is from Dawn of Sorrow).
- Optional Boss: Remilia Scarlet, two bosses from Demon Hunter Legend, and The Creature (the SotN version) only appear at random in Survival Mode.
- Palette Swap: A few characters actually turn into new characters altogether through specific colors.
- Richter by default uses a custom sprite based on artwork for SotN; his alternate colors change him into his Rondo appearance, "Hans Belmont" from the cancelled 32X game, or his attire from the Dracula X Chronicles. Hans isn't so much a new color, as he has a few moves to himself.
- Maria's alternate colors change her from an adult to a child, with her moves based more on Rondo than Symphony. Young Maria cannot dive kick like Adult Maria nor can she super jump or airdash, but she can throw egg bombs and use the song book instead of doing a fireball or forward kick. Their respective animal item crashes also function quite differently.
- Simon by default uses his Chronicles design. Four of his alternate colors change him to his Super Castlevania IV design, with a few new moves including an upwards whip attack. Two turn him into his original 8-bit sprite. SCV4 Simon even changes the music during the final battle to "Dracula's Theme" during the first two phases (yes, even during the fight with Ultimate Dracula) and "Simon's Theme" during the last two. Even the stage clear fanfare changes.
- Stella's alternate colors replace her with Loretta, who functions completely differently from her sister.
- Rage Quit: Dracula's fourth and final phase amounts to this — he completely gives up on fighting you conventionally and instead conjures a swarm of bats to protect him while he charges up the Giga Demonic Megiddo to absurd levels in order to utterly obliterate you.
- Real-Time Weapon Change: Every playable character has at least two or three subweapons, and you have a button to cycle through them.
- Sequential Boss: In Arcade mode only, Dracula is first fought in his human appearance from Order of Ecclesia, then turns One-Winged Angel (this particular form being taken from Circle of the Moon), and finally, when you think it's over, he has to be fought again in a powered-up version of his first form (which has two separate phases in its own right). He averts this in survival mode, fighting only in his third phase.
- Death and Shaft have two forms as well. Death turns this into Turns Red, though, as he only has one life meter, switching phases once you've worn him down to about 50% health.
- Silliness Switch: Inverted. Jonathan begins as a joke character but can be changed into his serious form through the Konami Code.
- Smart Bomb: Several characters can use Item Crashes or variants of that ability. Rosaries are an item version. Dracula also gets his own full-screen move, the Demonic Megiddo, which he sometimes uses in his third phase, but in a lesser form like in Portrait of Ruin that you can dodge. In his fourth phase, he'll charge its Giga variant, killing you if you don't beat him quickly enough.
- Special Attack: Almost every character has at least one, and the commands for them aren't particularly exotic, since this is a platformer we're dealing with. The usual motions before the button include tapping forward twice, a quarter-circle forward, Up and a quarter-circle forward (rolling Up-Back-Down-Forward works too), a half-circle forward, and a half circle Down-Forward-Up (used for Item Crushes and similar super-powerful attacks).
- Spin to Deflect Stuff: Everyone who uses a whip can spin it around, which deals very little damage but is incredibly useful for blocking projectiles and clearing away any small-fry baddies the boss summons, as well as pushing back Gergoth's poison and petrifying gas and wiping away Brauner's Blood Art strokes.
- Spring Jump: All playable characters can jump very high by pressing Up+Backdash.
- Suddenly Voiced: Hugh Baldwin gets a few lines courtesy of David Vincent, by way of voice clips of Richter.
- Summon Magic: Most of Reimu's special attacks bring in Cirno and Marisa to use some of their signature attacks. Charlotte and Jonathan's heart moves bring in their partner for the Holy Lightning Dual Crush. That is, unless you put Jonathan in serious mode. Stella and Loretta also summon each other for their heart moves.
- Time Stands Still: Soma, Charlotte, Death, and anyone with a Stopwatch can slow down time for a bit, causing the boss to move and attack in slow-motion. While it doesn't freeze anything completely, it works on just about every boss. Sakuya's Stopwatch item crash actually does freeze time entirely, however, long enough for her to throw a large number of knives straight into her enemy.
- A Taste of Their Own Medicine: Using Stopwatch against Zephyr, however, will make him reverse its effects, instead causing the player to move and attack in slow-motion.
- Time Stands Still: True to the original, Zephyr also stops time to throw daggers from above, or to slash the player if he was hit beforehand.
- Shout-Out: Less of a shout-out than a clear reference, once Zephyr's at low health, he'll charge up an attack. If not defeated quickly enough, he will unleash ZA WARUDO, throwing a large amount of knives at the player, before resuming time. This will almost all the time instantly kill the player, unless said character is in an invincible state through whatever means.
- True Final Boss: From around V0.8 onwards, defeating Dracula after achieving 3 no-damage victories warps the player into a fight against Dark Lord Soma, who has his two phases from Dawn of Sorrow with some changed attacks.
- Turns Red: Just about all the bosses do at least something new when they've lost enough health.
- Death (as the penultimate boss, not the playable version) literally Turns Red mid-fight (along with the Moon in the background), taking on his second form from Dawn of Sorrow.
- Unnecessary Combat Roll: Super Castlevania IV Simon does this instead of sliding, and he's actually invincible while rolling. Since he has no special attacks with invincible frames, it's more of a necessary roll.
- Video Game Dashing: Every character has the ability to backdash like in recent titles (with some being able to do a forward dash). In this game, it grants invincibility, except when in contact with bosses.
