I'd score CotM lower than Aria of Sorrow: worse bosses, less enemy variety; but because it feels so much like a classic Castlevania with a heavy emphasis on platforming, it's always been my favorite of the epxloration titles. The different modes also introduce a lot of replay value. Warrior gives Hugh better stats, but there's a 0% drop rate for cards. Magician mode starts Hugh off with all cards and a very high amount of MP, but poor stats. I think thief mode is the second to last, and if so, thief mode has similar stats to magician mode but a much higher luck stat giving near guaranteed drops for even the rarest items. Shooter mode is last I think, which would give it the worst stats in all categories but with a has a high heart count and takes far more damage against enemies with sub weapons. Shooter mode also gets access to a sub weapon found only within this mode, not that great, but if you already have the dagger sub weapon, you'll be able to pick up a second dagger and you'll have a homing dagger.
Harmony of Dissonance is the worst exploration game in the series when it comes to gameplay, but the amount of secrets within the game, the amount of fan service to past games in the series, I still play the game often. The issue with this game is Juste Belmont is comparable to Michael Jordan which is why he moon jumps. I have a theory IGA was trying to make a basketball game when Konami asked him to make another Castlevania so IGA decided to use what he's already done on the new Castlevania, hence Juste's moon jump. The other thing I hate about this game is the inclusion of a backdash that is made in a way that you can't help but constantly press L and R. Whenever I play this game I almost never push left and right because of it and almost only use the L and R dashes. Some other issues with the game is the massively poor balance. It's actually fairly well balanced on hard mode until you meet up with Death at the portal halfway through the game and find that you're actually traveling back and forth between two different castles. Throughout the rest of the game except very specific parts, you're constantly killing either severely under leveled enemies or the same enemies going back and forth through the castle. The game does have some really cool ideas though. The sub weapon/spell book combo thing is something I actually prefer over card combos and the souls from the future games, because there's no random luck behind it. You find the book and it is all determined on your equipped sub weapon. There's also the different rings you can get to modify your sub weapons, etc. Another good thing about this game is stuff that happens in one castle changes stuff in the other. For example, the part that kainemaxwell named in one of his posts. There's a part where you step on a switch for a hammer to knock an armored knight through a wall, while in the other castle there's no way for you to get past that area before you do this(which btw you hold the whip and keep hitting right to keep knocking the knight off his balance into the gears and you'll get his full set of armor.) The castle design is pretty good. So while this game has a lot that's wrong with it, there's a lot about this game that I really like.
Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow are the two all around best exploration style CV games. Well balanced, great castle design, excellent control(from then on out there was excellent control with these games honestly.) All around these games are the best with Dawn of Sorrow the one I'd put a bit above in quality. Julius mode on Dawn of Sorrow is leaps and bounds above the original AoS Julius mode and Richter mode from SotN which solidifies it as my favorite. If there's one thing I can say I don't like about Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow, and by extension every other game created by IGA afterwards including Bloodstained, it's the damn soul system. The randomness of what's going to be dropped when killing an enemy is really irritating, not only because forces the player to get lucky to get certain skills, but also messes with the damn ocd tendencies.
Portrait of Ruin is better than Harmony of Dissonance somewhat, sure, but this game has just as many issues that keep me from really loving this game. First off, Jonathan and Charlotte, or rather pretty much all the art in this game is rather terrible, but what's really the problem is the dungeon design, the balance, everything. The main castle is unbalanced as all hell, and by that, I mean pathetically easy throughout. Whenever you reach a painting, exploration is almost non existent as you're almost always on a straight one way path all the way to the end of the painting, maybe the slightest branching off for a single room here and there, but yeah. The spell and art system is called something different, but don't let it fool you, it's the same damn system all over again, you're just picking up item drops instead of souls flying to your character. With the paintings it is probably one of the bigger games in the series, but it the flaws are still there. The controls to the game are great though just like Aria and Dawn of Sorrow, the other character being able to be summoned as an assist or ai controlled works well. Oh yeah, the biggest disgrace to Castlevania ever appears in this game with a dual spell called "The Greatest Five." The greatest five consists of Leon, Simon, Trevor, Juste, and Richter. Wait, aren't they missing someone? Christopher Belmont is not only in the crappy Castlevania Adventure, but the excellent Castlevania 2 Belmont's Revenge, and even the eshop exclusive remake of Castlevania Adventure on the Wii. How could IGA overlook this?
Then there's Order of Ecclessia, which is a game I so wanted to like and I do, but barely. So first things first, the environments in this game are just absolutely beautiful. It's the first exploration title since Castlevania 2 that takes place in the countryside of Wallachia outside of Dracula Castle. There's even specific areas in the game, especially the swamp and enemies in the swamp that pay homage to Castlevania 2. With Order of Ecclesia, once again, just like Portrait of Ruin, there's very little exploration in the game, and you're usually going from point a to b. So there's a real lack of platforming and such in most areas throughout the game. Order of Ecclesia not only does that, but limits what the player can actually do. It still uses the soul system mind you, but now souls replace your weaponry and they've even added certain weapon types that damage enemies better or worse. So you're constantly forced to switch between multiple types of weapons to do optimal damage. Okay, that's not all though. Unless you want to do no damage in comparison, the game is built around enemies being damage sponges and you have to tap Y and X in turn repeatedly which will cancel your attacks and immediately allow you to do quick attacks in a row without having to use any backdash tricks. The problem is, with all the damage sponge enemies you're just avoiding attacks then constantly mashing the attack buttons and it just turns into a button mash fest. It takes a lot away from the game and makes it a much more unenjoyable experience unfortunately. And yet that still isn't all. The bosses in Order of Ecclesia are just shit. These bosses are pretty much pulled from a shmup game where if you are not standing in the exact place on the screen due to visual queues, you're getting hit, because all boss attacks pretty much have only a single area that's safe from damage. Have I played through this game several times and can make my way through these bosses(many times without getting hit?) Yes, but it doesn't change the fact that these bosses are bullshit and less based on player skill and more based on complete memorization. I'll include a link to one of the bosses, but nearly every single one of them is very similar in structure(meaning, a shmup boss.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCKQ7-8l3Sk
On the 3DS, there's Lords of Shadow Mirror of Fate. Lords of Shadow being a reboot of the Castlevania series in order to not get cancelled, but despite all the hate that you may have heard about this game, Mirror of Fate is a great game and is atleast near the top of the list compared to the rest of these games imo. Like Circle of the Moon the game has a lot of platforming and is so much more enjoyable than a lot of the others in that regard. The combat is like playing the PS360 Lords of Shadow but in 2D, and by removing a lot of the attacks and keeping the most base skills along with other useful upgrades, it actually works extremely well. The only bad thing about this game is that the check points are a bit forgiving, but there's an easy way to fix that. Finish 100% of the game so the journals and such can no longer be acquired, and play on hardcore difficulty(or maybe just hard if you'd rather do that.) It keeps the difficulty high and reduces the amount of check points to just the entrance point in each area. As enjoyable as the game was, this makes the experience far more enjoyable. I had 80 hours playtime of this game(multiple playthroughs) on my first 3DS XL, 30-40 on my New 3DS XL. Last thing about this game is the 3D is amazing. Nintendo really should have promoted this game as what the 3DS can really do with 3D honestly. It's jaw dropping and is the very reason I bought a New 3DS XL. I bought the New 3DS specifically for the 3D and honestly because of this game. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gw5sE0eqDdU
Finally. Stay away from Harmony of Despair. Absolute piece of shit soulless game.
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