Troubled game. Has some likeable things buried under a lot of unfortunate amateurism.
The combat has some nice violent crunch, via Spell Fusions. Ice + Axe's murderous crashing slab is a winner, I could land that weighty beast on charging Armour Lords and somersaulting Blade Masters all day.
Imperiously sledging death from above. Speaking of, large enemy explosions are bonerizing. Ability to forward
and backdash a nice twist too. But the air control chokes balls. Attacking at any point in the air will hijack the height+movement control, absolutely godawful feeling. I think it was some misguided attempt to bridge traditional and modern CV, bad idea. Stick to the ground and you're mostly ok.
Map, on a macro level, has a
dual-layered concept
that's not explicitly communicated until some ways in. Nothing too original, but memorably revealed. I absolutely love this, being a huge fan of Legacy Of The Wizard and other
Oh Shit I'm Lost sidescrolling affairs. It's the one SOTNesque I've played where simply figuring out how to progress can be tricky, moreso than scanning the map for telltale open white borders. When it's been a few years, I always enjoy reassembling the scant breadcrumb trail. Aesthetically, it's portrayed quite creepily, too.
On micro level, it's blatantly padded-out for "biggest map yet" cred, something the mags trumpeted at the time. Countless corridors and shafts 3x as long as they needed to be, with scant enemy resistance. Also lots of huge rooms containing useless trinkets at the very end. Where the other SOTNesques are a pleasure to clear out as a matter of course, I'll consistently have ugly blotches of unexplored space where I know it's pointless to go, here.
Graphically, yeah, a lot of it is shockingly poor. The dayglo palette and VFX have their reasons, with the GBA's dim screen; that's not what I mean. It's the pixel art itself. Juicy is alright standing still, in his
Alucard discovers A Flock Of Seagulls way. He runs like he's trying not to piss, he jumps like he's got a Moon Rod up his ass, and he
walks like he's literally shat his pants. Full-on followed through parp, touching fine cloth, clenching and robo-strutting and praying he can make it to the toilets - before screaming internally at the realisation he's wearing his best New Romantic white trousers.
Rough night at Club Akumajou!
Soundtrack is largely awful. Again, the low-fi sound isn't the problem; I really dig it, actually. Nice grainy MSX tone, reminds me of Gradius 2. Once again, it's the composition. "Luminous Cavern" is an irritating drone, "Clocktower Casualty" a shrill annoyance, "Castle Center" pure wallpaper. Exception is the remarkably good
Offense And Defense, its warring halves locked in an escalating call/response over a thumping pulse, building to a tangibly violent breakdown and reset. Entryway BGM "Successor of Fate" is a decent attempt too, with its uneasily building tension and defiant clarions. Two rare glimpses of the baroque intensity and passion abundant in the prior and later games.
Bosses are largely inert shite; no real qualifications to be made there, except that the worst are truly perplexing. PEEPING BIG and MAX SLIMER will make you suspect you're on candid camera, IGA and an NHK film crew waiting to pop out from behind your couch to explain you've been PWNed.
A small but undeniable silver lining for longtime Konami fans in Takeshi Takeda, who per the staff roll worked on enemy designs. Perhaps why the Cyclops looks as rad as anything from Vampire Killer+Hard Corps, and those large explosions pop so furiously MD-good. ty for your service Takeda-san, I always thought that was pretty baller naming the badass transforming robot after yourself, burning ambition any young man should note ;w;7
I do like HOD, as evinced by my typing a wall of text every time it's brought up. >_> So conditionally nice I bought it thrice! (NTSCU at release, JP Super GR8 Value much later, JP original run because neurotic - and I suppose the M2 collection makes four) Perhaps understandably troubled, being IGA's first directorial outing. Play AOS instead, imo. It's by far the most recommendable of the GBA trio, with a pacey map and a beefy endgame gauntlet, SOTN-good controls, and some nice aggressive enemy designs, which I wish Bloodstained had carried over to its weak roster. (like Valkyries and Cagnazzos, superb air-to-ground strikers it's always fun to outfox, and the Killer Mantle, an all-too-rare backstep punisher) I wish HOD and AOS had been one strong game, with weirdness and straightforward quality in equal measure, rather than a deeply flawed oddity and a straitlaced conventional.
I like a lot about Circle of the Moon, too, namely the super-tight collison and fiendishly tricky lategame enemies, plus the archly challenging Battle Arena. But it's not without fairly stern caveats. (very linear map progression, middling presentation, and over-reliance on doubletap running, straight outta SOTN Richter - as there, use about-face inputs instead to relieve some monotony)
---
Had a great time with Ecclesia's Normal loop, as expected; got a few things to write up for R2R. Only complaint, I was stunned at how blatant the villagers' Skinnerbox drop quests were.
Reminded me of why I made this. 
(contrary to popular image, SOTN is
effectively Skinnerbox-free; don't burn your brain farming for the Crissaegrim, the
Combat Knife is readily available and much cooler
)
OBMAR the knife-obsessed EdgyBoi says GUNS ARE FOR PUSSIES 
But then Bloodstained is exactly like this, too; lifting the village concept wholesale. Bizarrely familiar, giving I played Bloodstained far more recently. I'd saved Ecclesia's Nightmare/Hard or whatever its second mode is for just such a big-screen occasion; looking forward to trying that out this weekend.
even mean, though?!
.
Hello again Mr Boat! Sup Mr Giant Boney-kun! Imma take out your kneecap with my fuckoff massive hammer! I actually think the former's polys have aged gracefully into the PS1 aesthetic, having found them a mortifying eyesore back at release. Now OOE is SOTN-comfy too. 
Conspicuously seamless viewing.
As with Umezaki's Circle of the Moon, it's also nice just being to appreciate the SOTN-tight collison on a decently visible screen.
