VinnyVania: Bloodlines - Part 02

My cousin who works at Nintendo says you only get an extra life every 2 million points.

Don't ask me why he knows how genesis games work.

Does the emulator that you're using have a fast-forward feature?

I liked Castlevania 64.

I love how angry this game makes Vinny. I wonder if they'd feel differently about this game if they were coming off Super Castlevania IV instead of Rondo.

That said, the continue/password system in this game is some serious BS. Vinny, no one is going to think less of you if you use a password.

Huh. I wasn't aware anyone did the kiss on the cheek thing anywhere in America anymore. Interesting. For me, it's handshake, whatever you call the hand clasp that slides to a fingertip grip that then ends in a snap, or fist bump unless we've known each other a long time. Months, at minimum. Then you get a quick hug. Family and best friends get deep hugs depending on how well I know the family member.

@matoyak: If you do the handshake, go in for a half-hug and then snap the fingers, that is called a dap.

So I'm going to say it, and I know it isn't going to be popular, but I think using a code you didn't earn is cheating.

Don't get me wrong, I'm semi-ok with cheating. It's certainly fine if it's the only way to get through this and continue the series. But you can't really claim you've actually beaten the game if that's the way you go.

I don't think anyone cares.

Austin's business Frankenstein bit was amazing. So was their reactions to the gear man boss fight!

On the soft reset thing, I think what it is saying is that you need to soft reset while still alive, not from the game over screen. If you do it from 0 lives at the start of the level you restart from the beginning of the level still with 0 lives, but when you die you get 2 continues.

If they are telling the truth, of course (probably not.)

It's not just Rondo being better, it's also the fact that this is the last hurdle before SotN. Vinny wants to get to Symphony. Having this game between those two really stresses the weaknesses of this game. And the biggest weakness is one that too many Genesis games had, which was to make a difficult game with limited lives/continues to extend the "value" of the game.

Man the Leaning Tower of Pisa sucks. I went up the Washington monument once and the Medusa heads were a pain the whole way.

Also I like this might have been the game that broke Vinny.

You never wanna be the guy trying to tell people they didn't really earn something. There isn't even a benefit for suffering in the shoes of that guy. That guy isn't even providing a public good.

Stop being that guy.

This game is some hot bullshit though.

Man, what a massive drop in quality after Super Castlevania IV and Tondo. People saying that Bloodlines isn't as bad as the NES games, or that it's even a 'good' game, really need to check themselves. Nostalgia is messing with you, man. I appreciate that some may have owned nothing but a Genesis growing up and Bloodlines was it during your formative youth, but come on now. As much as the NES games have aged, Bloodlines has none of the design panache of those aged classics. Bloodlines looks like a fanmade game and, having fired it up out of curiosity, it plays like one too.

I salute Vinny for sticking with it though, if it were me I would've skipped straight to Symphony. Bloodlines is to Castlevania what the CD-I games are to thethe Zelda series.

Man, what a massive drop in quality after Super Castlevania IV and Rondo. People saying that Bloodlines isn't as bad as the NES games, or that it's even a 'good' game, really need to check themselves. Nostalgia is messing with you, man. I appreciate that some may have owned nothing but a Genesis growing up and Bloodlines was it during your formative youth, but come on now. As much as the NES games have aged, Bloodlines has none of the design panache of those aged classics. Bloodlines looks like a fanmade game and, having fired it up out of curiosity, it plays like one too.

I salute Vinny for sticking with it though, if it were me I would've skipped straight to Symphony. Bloodlines is to Castlevania what the CD-I games are to the Zelda series.

The reset button on the Geneisis was a soft reset, see that stupid X-man game.

@poppa_large: these are my thoughts exactly!

It's really ugly compared to the other games too.

@poppa_large: I don't think this looks like a particularly great game but drawing a comparison to CD-I Zelda is too far.

Just found my new favorite moment of all time for GB East. Austin's face when vinny says "do you guys eat the butt?"

I owned both a Genesis and an SNES, and I played Bloodlines after I first played SotN, and I still love Bloodlines. Bloodlines is an interesting game in that it takes elements from each of the older installments in the series and combines them to form what I consider to be a better end product.

Starting with the jumping, Bloodlines borrows more heavily from the NES games in that you can't steer your jumps in mid-air. Given the game's faster pace, you want predictable jumps, and the lack of air control gives you just that. You can, however, jump onto and off of stairs, similar to the other non-NES installments in the series, so you still have plenty of mobility when you need it.

As far as whipping goes, Bloodlines gives you the means to whip in five directions instead of eight, and it limits the diagonal whipping to when you're airborne, which makes perfect sense when you consider the fact that you generally don't need to whip diagonally up when you aren't airborne. Even if you do, there's a second character for that. You don't need to be able to whip down or diagonally down as you did in SCIV. That always felt awkward.

I like how this game handles sub-weapons, because the order in which it gives you sub-weapons is always Boomerang - Axe - Holy Water. You also nearly always get sub-weapons from candles, and you only ever get them from the single candles. You don't really need the ability to reclaim your old sub-weapon as you did in Rondo, as I believe that this is the one game in the series that disperses sub-weapons in this manner. It's very predictable.

While the use of visual effects in this game can seem odd, I at least like the fact that it never interrupts the pacing of the game. That wasn't true of SCIV, in which you had to just hang there doing nothing while a room turned, for example.

That said, I don't mind if Vinny uses a code. He'd gradually get better at the game to the point that he'd get these codes or better, anyway. Thing is, though, I do feel that he's selling the game short by not having to replay more of it. The original Castlevania on NES required that he replay earlier parts of it a lot, and I don't feel that he's giving Bloodlines the same chance. While that's definitely disappointing, I have no problem with looking past that to suggest that he use a code, because - again - he'd get better at the game with each play-through, anyway.

The greetings conversation was pretty interesting. I'm a hispanic guy from Miami, so kissing on the cheek to say hello is practically muscle memory. Even if it's the first time meeting someone. A half hug or full hug is added to the cheek kiss depending on how well I know the person.

I didn't expect Vinnyvania to break Vinny like Brad's famous Breaking Brad series and yet, here we are.

I kind of lost it during both of those.

Austin's a pleasant fellow, and he's always fun to have around. But since he arrived he's made me lose my shit more than anyone during that span.

I can't wait for Part 03. These first two videos have been pure gold.

I fell down laughing when the clockwork boss started doing this random thing on the ceiling.

At least those NES games looked like Castlevania. This whole things feels so off and utterly ridiculous with army skeletons, thunderbugs and those bosses. Combine it with some absurb stages it barely feels like a Castlevania.

Suggesting Simon's Quest had "design panache" is too far as well.

I feel like this games silliness would've been better appreciated had the limited continues not started Vinny off on so the wrong foot. Instead of learning the game as he goes I think Vinny is getting frustrated while he beats his head against it, skipping through levels to glimpse his path through the game while never really getting comfortable with any of the stages or mechanics. Without a solid foundation it just becomes this downward spiral of frustration and impatience.

I mean this aint no master class in Castlevania games for sure, but I think its rough edges are being made into vast chasms via the added frustrations.

@lv4monk: I think Vinny plays carelessly, but I always admired how he makes up for it with sheer perseverance, and this continue system makes banging your head against it a terrible strategy. Plus didn't they all say they were tired before the beginning of a three day weekend? I'd be cranky too.

Venerable beast crew, it's ok to password to the next level with full lives and continues for a run at that next level. We want to see you guys get through the game. You don't have to bang you head against a bad mechanic so hard.

A+ for effort though.

Vinny, beware the boss rush. It's the real reason passwords are alright.

...nah.

I played Bloodlines after I finished Symphony of the Night, and the former is still one of my favourite games in the franchise (although SotN is still the ultimate). I even prefer Bloodlines to Super Castlevania IV, a title which I think doesn't really hold up as well as an overall experience as everyone thinks (but it's got loads of graphical gimmicks, which is cool, and it's solid overall). And if we're comparing, there are even levels where SC IV looks shitty.

I love Bloodlines for a few reasons. It's a challenge, but by no means is it an insurmountable one. Once you learn the feel of the characters, the action can be pretty tight and fun. Granted, I prefer playing Lecarde because his skill set makes things a bit easier to traverse the levels and defend from enemies, but both characters are still viable.

I also love it from a technical viewpoint: it pushes the hardware in interesting ways that you don't normally see, or were even considered impossible (such as scaling/rotation stuff). It pulls out a bunch of tricks that are either unique to the game, or are nice twists on established stuff. A lot of the effects aren't as dazzling as Ranger X or Alien Soldier, but they still took some serious knowledge from the programmers about how the machine works.

I love that some of the levels have unique art, and you barely spend any time in them before you're off to the next new thing. That's so weird and dumb and cool to me.

It's not a perfect game, and some of the boss stuff can be straight bullshit (hell, I still think the gargoyle boss can be frustrating nonsense at times) but it's such an interesting Castlevania game with its own odd, fell-through-a-portal-from-an-alternate-dimension vibe that really does it for me. It's the Doom 64 of the Castlevania series. God, I love Doom 64. Wait... what were we talking about again?

I agree. People cite blind nostalgia as the reason for people liking Bloodlines, but Bloodlines is easily the better game from a game play perspective. SCIV is really poorly-balanced, as the enemies generally don't have a means of competing with Simon's new abilities. Not to mention the fact that you barely even need sub-weapons at all in SCIV.

SCIV had very little impact on the future installments in the series (in the form of whip-flailing and some enemies), whereas Bloodlines managed to snag a sequel in the form of a pretty significant installment in the series. People are just downright delusional about the quality of SCIV and its impact on the series.

It's tragic that DOOM 64 will probably never be re-released. Such a great game.

@kevinski: I just published my SnapMap homage to Doom 64's opening level last night! :)

Nice! I haven't purchased the new DOOM yet, but I plan on picking it up fairly soon, once I've finished playing a few other games. I'm looking forward to checking out SnapMap.

Oh boy, that cog monster. What a fucking mess of greatness.

I do really like this game. I never played it until maybe a year ago. It's super hard but I liked how dynamic it was with all the wacky moving things. Full use of Blast Processing. It was a nice 16bit rendition of classic gameplay unlike the weirdness of Super IV and the evolution in Rondo. I'm a sucker for multiple characters in any game too.

I'm curious to actually see a CV64 playthrough because I've never seen one completed. I've seen people try and give up. Then on the other end of the spectrum, I've seen a speedrun. No one seems to be able to play it through legit.

Super Castlevania IV is indeed insanely forgettable and overrated. Long Live Bloodlines!

this is great

Castlevania Bloodlines, where the extra lives are made up and the points don't matter.

Bloodlines was a later installment in my play through of the Castlevania games and it's one of my favorites. I didn't think it was that hard either (after the NES ones). It does however, demand attention and precision Vinny doesn't seem to want to afford it. I don't necessarily blame him, the continue situation is frustrating and he's been battling with it since the beginning.

Looks at these fucking Vectorman rejected ass bosses.

When you are meeting a woman you don't initiate anything; you do a 2-3 inch lean forward/nod which communicates that any hug/handshake will start with them.

We need the gif of @Vinny giving props at 20:12 please!!!

I actually really like this game, but I think a lot of that comes from my preference for using the lance guy (Eric). So many of the stages and bosses are designed with his weapon's range in mind and watching this playthrough really highlights for me just how much of this game isn't designed with a whip in mind. For example, when you are using the other character you only need to stand still and stab upward to hit the Stage 3 boss and the gargoyles in the autoscroll section can be hit long before they charge at you. There's actually a split path in the middle of Stage 3 depending on which character you use, but it's only for a short segment and I think that's the only point where that occurs.

I wouldn't be surprised if most of the people who have fond memories of this game are like me and went through it with Eric because it really does look significantly less fun with the whip.

I think some good middle ground would be if we could get some kind of confirmation that the soft reset workaround actually DOES work outside of an emulator, they should be able to put in the password that would drop them at that level with 0 lives and 2 continues...

Or just put it a password for full lives and continues and end this madness.

I get the feeling that if any of them noticed that the gargoyle-whatevers in the tower climb section of Italy always do one full circle around you, then charge in, things would have gone a little more smoothly.

This music sounds a lot like Snatcher music.... oh because EVERYONE at Konami made Snatchers music.

@vinny Remember why you started this. You want this the right way. You always pick the canon character even if it's more difficult. Don't let a moment of frustration and weakness steal this from you. We will suffer through it with you. Are we in a hurry to get through these?

I don't mind if you do whatever to continue progress. The only thing I'd suggest is that if you find yourself trying to replay from the start to have more continues, just turn the lives up to 5 per continue.

Bat Tech deployed at 34:52.