YMMV / Castlevania: The Adventure

• Awesome Music: Battle of the Holy
• Condemned by History: The Adventure got great reviews at release, critics hailing it as a solid sequel that showed the Game Boy could do NES-style action games just as well. But by the mid-2000s, the game was widely derided as one of the low points of the series, complaints centering around its sluggish pace, frustrating design decisions, and dumbed-down or missing series staples. About the only aspect that doesn't attract criticism is the game's soundtrack. This change in perception was likely brought about by the advent of better and more faithful Castlevania games on handheld, including its direct sequel.
• Demonic Spiders: Almost everything, due to Christopher's slow movement speed and the fact that his whip degrades when he is hurt. Special mention goes to the eyes (albeit only in in stage 2), and the slug-like creatures that halt your progress in the third stage (unless you have a whip upgrade).
• Fandom-Enraging Misconception: The game's title is Castlevania: The Adventure, not The Castlevania Adventure, even if the latter is what the title art appears to call the game. It's admittedly an easy mistake to make, so much that even a few official sources have occasionally done so, which is why fans generally won't get too riled up if you do it, but it's one way of instantly marking yourself as being, at most, only a casual fan of the series.
• Goddamned Bats: Bats, funnily enough. Their Artificial Brilliance and small hitboxes makes them tricky to hit, so it's possible to get hit multiple times just trying to kill one. The second stage opens up with several bats descending on Christopher, and Dracula's One-Winged Angel form uses bats as his only form of attack. You may cry now.
• Scrappy Mechanic:
  • By far the most-disliked mechanic in the game is that you lose one step of your whip's power whenever you get hit — and like most Castlevania games, there are only two steps above the base whip, meaning that two hits in quick succession is all it takes to potentially find yourself stuck with the game's weakest weapon when facing a bunch of enemies with tricky attack patterns.
  • The lack of sub-weapons, which is mitigated to some extent by the fact that your whip's most powerful step now gives you a projectile attack. Unfortunately, not only is this cancelled out by the fact that you lose said attack with just one hit, but it's useless for situations where something like the Holy Water or Stopwatch would be more helpful.
  • Using ropes instead of stairs is the kind of thing you could write off as just being a stylistic difference, if not for the fact that you can't attack while climbing the ropes, leading to many situations where you're completely defenseless.
  • And of course, Christopher's movement speed. For the love of God, a turtle could outrun him! It ultimately makes the game much more frustrating than it should be and is almost universally considered the main reason why this game is so reviled. There's even an entire ROM hack called "The Quick Fix" that increases Christopher's movement speed; that's how bad it is. While this hack doesn't make the game much easier, it does make it much more enjoyable.
• That One Boss: Despite being the last boss, Dracula certainly counts.
  • His humanoid form involves him teleporting around the room and shooting small projectiles. Not too bad; just dodge them and hit him when they pass. However, if you take too long to kill him, he'll start spawning in very inconvenient places, dragging the fight on even longer.
  • After being defeated, he turns into a bat that is twice the size of Christopher. As a humongous bat, Dracula flies back and forth along the top of the screen, occasionally stopping to summon smaller bats to attack Christopher. It's very difficult to even hit Bat!Dracula without him hitting you in the process; Christopher's speed does not help.
• That One Level: The third level is a nightmare. There's a Rise to the Challenge segment in one section with an ascending spike floor. Later on you have to deal with an Advancing Wall of Doom with spikes chasing you from the right. All whilst making pixel-perfect jumps. Be thankful the game was nice enough to give the player infinite continues.
  • The fourth and final stage is arguably worse. While the third stage can be alleviated somewhat with memorization, the same cannot be said of the fourth stage. Enemies that are almost impossible to kill without getting hit yourself, and some of the toughest parkour sections in the game, make this one hell of a final stage indeed. Dracula is also That One Boss, despite being the final boss of the game.

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