4/5 ★ – RawMetal's review of Castlevania: The Arcade.

System: Arcade Started: April 13, 2023 Ended: April 13, 2023 Free Play Arcade Session - April 13, 2023: 1/12 April the 13th was the day I took a long road trip to the Arcade called Galloping Ghost where I spent one whole day playing nothing but Free Play Arcade games. This is a special review since I have played a total of 12 Arcade games in full playthroughs and I’ll attempt to review all of them per week when I got the time. Castlevania: The Arcade was my first free play session to start the day and this is a pretty rare arcade machine that you couldn’t find anywhere but only a couple places. The game has only Japanese Text, but you can hear English Voice Acting so it's easy to follow. What really makes this arcade game unique is the motion controls for its light gun mechanic as a form of a whip. You swing the controller for damage and there are two buttons, the button that switches Sub Weapons like the Knife, Ax, Holy Water, Cross, and the trigger button that fires the Sub Weapon. You do hit candles and breakable objects to replenish hearts as ammo. It plays like any other Castlevania game but it’s On-Rails. Dracula has resurrected, his Castle sprung up, evil monsters take over and you play as a Vampire Hunter to put an end to this madness. Two players can play this game in co-op and you also get to play other characters such as Lady Gunner and Little Witch. For this session, I played as the Vampire Hunter. You go through Point A to Point B by Chapters and as you whip skeletons, bats, knights and Lizard Men, you fight a sub-boss on occasion and finally the end level boss. Once the battle is over, you progress to the next Chapter. This game truly captures the essence of Castlevania from traversing through the Village, The Castle entrance, going into the Underground Caverns, To the Clocktower and finally the Throne Room. And you fight some popular bosses in the series like the Harpy and Death himself. Castlevania: The Arcade also has one of the best remixed Castlevania soundtracks that I ever heard. There are familiar tunes from the classic Castlevania games especially when you start the game as the Prologue theme from Castlevania III plays. I recommend checking out the soundtrack of this for Castlevania enthusiast. The lore for this game overall is honestly a tad weak due to not expanding on its world building. Is this Arcade game canon to the mainline series? What Year did this game take place in? None of the playable characters said their names and I always want to know who these heroes are. You don’t play as a Belmont or a Belnades. In fact, the Vampire Hunter looks like Trevor Belmont, but he is not Trevor and how does he obtain the Vampire Killer whip. I might understand that its a complete dream story or Konami just made another Castlevania Arcade game with its basic plot whatsoever since there were previous Castlevania Arcade games before. The RPG mechanic of this can be a nitpick of criticism. After clearing a level and depending on how well you perform, you get skill points to upgrade your stats for the next level such as increase damage to the whip and sub-weapons, increase health, or just earn more points. This game is an hour long and this is the type that people have to wait in line at the arcades for wanting to play this. I don’t have time to stop and upgrade stats especially if this game can be paid credits in certain arcade places. But luckily, this was free play and I was aware of people wanting to play this game, but I beat them to it when I got the chance. If you are a hardcore Castlevania fan, this is a must-play if you plan to have a trip to a local arcade that has this. From the other two Castlevania Arcade games, Haunted Castle and VS Castlevania, this easily takes the cake as the best one. Konami should port this game to Home Consoles since this game came out in 2009 and it should be ported on PC, Switch and PS5 since they are still compatible with Motion Controls. Edit: September 12, 2023 - Managed to play this game again only this time as Lady Gunner. It plays the same exactly like Vampire Hunter except Lady Gunner has a Sub-Weapon of Guns. Pistol Bullets, Shotgun, Sniper Rifle and Silver Bullet. There is a wiki online and it says there are only rounds but the way the image in the game shows they look like different types of bullets for different guns. She's fun to play as well. You will still get the same outcome as the Vampire Hunter anyways. I also found out that playing as Little Witch is hard to come by since you need some kind of card ID in order to play as her which my local arcade does not have. Unless you try to emulate the game and attempt to play as her.