Game #1108: Bloodstained - Curse of the Moon 2

  Zangetsu got fat, because of all this filler.

 Despite Ritual of the Night's mixed reception, the original Curse of the Moon, Bloodstained's spin-off, was received pretty favorably by everyone, so it's no surprise that the spin-off itself got itself its very own sequel, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2. It's got more characters, more items and more stages than the first game... as well as a ton more fat.

 The game is made up of eight stages that you'll have to go through at least 3 times if you truly want to finish it. On your first run, you'll play as Zangetsu and join forces with Ritual of the Night's Dominique on the first stage, then the gun-tooting Robert on the second stage, an Hachi, the mech-riding Corgi on the third stage. Each character has their own unique abilities, stats and sub-weapons that will let the player take different routes throughout every stage. Each stage also hides a permanent upgrade for everyone's stats, if you can find it. After you finish the game you'll unlock Episode 2, and now you'll have to play through the entire game again, except that one of the three new characters is missing and you have the other two from the get-go. Oh, and it's a bit harder now. Depending on how you finish this Episode you'll either unlock Episode EX or Episode Final. Let's say that you want to unlock everyone, so you unlock and play Episode EX. Now you have to play an even harder version of the same eight stages, but playing with Gebel, Arthur and Miriam, the other characters from the first game. Sure, now you can take different alternate routes, but some parts of every route overlap and the end-stage bosses are the same. And now you unlock Episode Final...

 Which is the entire game again, but now you must unlock all six extra characters again. As with every other episode, there are permanent upgrades to find.... except that there are now two per stage and their efficiency is halved because screw you, keep replaying the same darn stages over and over again. This means that you'll have to play some stages OVER three times, because A) You might not have the character you need yet and B) taking a route towards one power-up may not allow you to take the route to the other power up hidden in that stage. The original game was short but sweet, this one is so long its downright boring, I wound up hating the game by the time it was over.

 It doesn't help that the game is much harder than the original, and it's not even rewarding, between having to play the same stages so many times, to the fact that sometimes enemy placement is downright unfair considering how clunky, on purpose, controls and movement are. If you liked 8-bit games because you enjoy masturbating your ego over being able to deal with unfair level design and clunky gameplay, you are in luck, this is exactly down your alley. Still, I'll give the game this: It can still be fun. My first playthrough of Episode One on the veteran difficulty setting WAS fun, but every time I had to go back to the same stages I felt my excitement with the game decrease and decrease until I was dreading have to play the same stages again. Finishing the game didn't make me happy I played through it or sad that I was done with it... but just relieved. Relieved that I didn't have to play it again.

 In a word... I find Curse of the Moon 2 to be disappointing. I love the new characters, I love the fact that eventually you get every character from the original and every character from the sequel and that you can change between characters at any time, I love how even though we are up to 7 total characters they still managed to make everyone different, I love how it's more Classic-vania style gameplay.... but man, I simply can't agree with how they made this game harder just because, or how you are supposed to play the same stages over and over and over and over and over and over again.... it stopped being any fun after my second time around. Unlocking Episode Final was so bittersweet for me, I finally got access to every character.... but now I have to play some stages up to three times, meaning I played some stages over 6 times total, and every time it got harder just because. From the levels themselves to the flow of the game.... it's poorly designed, and there's no way around it. If you ask, I'm gonna stick with the first one.

5.5